Has a demo ever affected your choice?

[manythings]

I've seen it a lot more recently that people are complaining about a lack of demos for things and I was wondering does it actually affect your end decision?

I can only think of a couple of demos I've played in that past 3-4 years (I don't think I played any demos between about 1995-2006 when I made my steam account) that actually got me to buy a game I wasn't going to get before. Jolly Rover, a fairly decent point and click, and Lara Croft and the Guardian of light. Every other demo I got for a game didn't change my mind at all; if I was going to get it, I got it, if I wasn't going to get it, I didn't.

So how about you guys? Does a demo make that much of a difference or is it just a thing a lot of people demand but doesn't actually change minds?

 

[Jezzascmezza]

Not really that often.
I usually only download demos if I'm already considering buying.

 

[MisterShine]

Absolutely.

I read someone on this forum talk about how much they enjoyed the recently released "Risen" and what a great and undersold rpg it was, so I decided to download the demo before shelling the 40 bucks. After what was pretty high on my list of the worst 10 minutes of my life I was glad I didn't accept the opinion of one Escapist.

On the flipside, I thought Castle Crashers looked like the normal Newgrounds idiotic bullshit, then a minute and a half into the demo I fell in love with it. Great game..

I understand why a lot of companies (especially pc developers) don't do them, but for me at least they really do make a difference.

 

[barash]

Of course. The latest demo to convince me to purchase was Magicka.

 

[Calcium]

Demos caused me to buy Super Meat Boy and to avoid Hydrophobia.

Hydrophobia sounded so promising too, but the demo was so... poor. There was little action and the water effecting gameplay was only shown once.

So yeah, I still find demos useful.

 

[thenumberthirteen]

I bought The Darkness based solely on the demo. It's now one of my favourite games.

I find a good demo really useful.

 

[Frybird]

Happened a bunch of times, especially with all those smaller downloadable titles nowadays.

Latest purchase was the full season of Back to the Future: The Game after i played the first episode for free with the 121GIGAWATTS code. Guess you could count that also as a demo...

 

[ProGrasTiNation]

The last guy demo on the PSN,,bought it the next day..a good demo will sell a game,,a buggy one would make you rent first.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Always, a bad demo kills the game for me(exception is Minecraft), no demo means I'll get it second hand(mostly), and a good demo is a definite buy.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I played the demo of Blade Kitten before I got the full version.

But, before that, the last games I got cause I liked the demos were ages ago, Exile 3 and Space Empires 3 or thereabouts.

 

[Ldude893]

If a demo I play is great, there's a significant chance that I'll buy the full game. I would have never touched Batman: Arkham Asylum if I hadn't played the demo, and I never regretted buying it.

[sub][sub]Except for the time when I bought my first copy of the game while on a summer trip to the United States. I learned as a gamer outside of the U.S. not to buy from Gamestop anymore.[/sub][/sub]

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

I find demos invaluable, and always preview demos if possible on my gaming purchases. Over the years demos have saved me from buying some real shockers as well as hooking me up with some amazing games I otherwise wouldn't have considered.

When games don't release demos people end up accidentally forking over 40 quid for AvP. For example. /bitterness

 

[Super Toast]

Yes. Without a demo, I would've probably given Heavy Rain and The Darkness a miss.

 

[Soxafloppin]

I bought Castlevania: Lords of Shadow it was delayed being delivered, so decided to play the demo just to see what it was like and was disappointed, but then I got the game and it turned out to be one of my favourite games on PS3!

 

[Strife17O7]

Offhand, two. And yes, it has been some time, but I've also had a lot less time to spare for games in general in recent years..

Long story-short, Marathon trilogy & Saints Row.

For the longer story anyway, (for those who might care)the more recent of those two, the original Saints' Row, was recommended to me by a particularly trustworthy fellow on my XBL friends list at the time. It was especially interesting because we were both playing at the same time in roughly the same boxed-in demo area, so it was almost like we were causing havoc co-op style(a positive factor that Volition thankfully took into consideration for SR2). Might also add that both have featured some of the best character customization overall that I've seen in a game to-date. Just a personal <3 bit there.

The second, and probably more influential overall was Marathon. First encountered Marathon IIurandal on a shareware/freeware disc that came in the mail, back in the day when people used to still do that..For a long time I wasn't sure how to actually get the game since when I first tried it, I was about 7 or 8 and it always seemed hard to find mac-exclusives in stores...but it was plenty impressive enough to continue to scratch around the curiosity in the back of my mind until sometime about '98-'99ish when I finally got all of Bungie's major mac releases to-date via the "Mac Action Sack" disc...which unfortunately was about the last they put out before being shackled to Microsoft. And...thinking about it, that kindof leads to a sort-of '3', since I took that whole merger thing rather personally, resented Microsoft & Xbox, and aligned myself exclusively with Nintendo for most of Halo's first year or so until I tried it at a friend's Xbox and that was all she wrote. It let me know that in spite of their 'enslavement', Bungie was still alive & kicking up some considerable badassery. I'd remorsefully given them up for dead for a time when it seemed like they nearly disappeared.
Anyway...I know the Halo instance wasn't technically a 'demo', but it caused the same effect.

Sry if this has all been tl:dr btw.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

Most recently?

The demo UNsold me on Bulletstorm.

And today we will see what happens with Dragon Age 2...

 

[BENZOOKA]

I haven't tried demos in ten years really.

But I bet they would, if I did try them.