I Buy Games for The Developers

[shrekfan246]

One thing to note is that unless a developer isn't working under a publisher, purchasing the game to directly support them is a bit of a double-edged blade, because developers that don't self-publish generally seem to get a very small percentage of royalties from game sales after release.

Problem with that perspective though is that the publishers have bankrolled the studio already and the sales are to recuperate their costs for funding the studio.

By buying the game it shows the publisher that hey this studio is worth it for supporting for their future games, which could lead to future hits. Examples: Valve and Sierra.

By not doing so, the studio dies from their first release, because no one bought into it. Like Clover and Okami.

And it's probably far more important for said support if the studio is independent and not owned by a publisher - Obsidian or DoubleFine over Naughty Dog.

Oh, I know that. I've brought the same things up before around these forums. My point was more that "supporting the developer" is far more indirect than a lot of people think when said developer is being funded by a publisher. In OP's specific case, for example, I'm sure a good chunk of the money from the sales of Dragon Commander go straight to Larian (as I don't know what percentage Steam shaves off, if any at all).

Purchasing a game new, even if you're not going to play it, is a good way to make a publisher look at that title/studio and say "Hey, they're worth keeping around!" but it's not really guaranteed that they'll be kept around, especially if the publisher has greater problems in other areas of their business.

Granted, I don't imagine most people are going to do something like that for the publishers that would be most likely to close competent studios anyway, so I'm not sure it makes much difference in the end.

 

[secretkeeper12]

Why on earth would you spend money solely to increase some developers paycheck? Seems very myopic, given there's literally THOUSANDS of better causes out there. Plan Canada, for example [http://plancanada.ca/]. For the price of a new AAA game, you could instead sponsor a child for a month and a half of their life. That'll go a much longer way than putting a few bucks in some devs pocket (most of which, as pointed out, goes towards the publishers anyways).

 

[verdant monkai]

Its kinda the 'I read Penthouse for the articles' argument but its true - I buy games more to support the developer than to play. Dont have time to game much anymore but I want to give good devs support

Example; I just bought 'Dragon Commander' on Steam. I probably wont play it (if I do, it'll be for 10 minutes) but I liked the feel and aesthetic of the Divinity 2 games, and want the company to do well.

Anyone else do this?

No.

Whats the point in supporting them if you wont use their stuff? Cash is scarce these days and I cant afford to spend £15 and not use what I bought. I buy most of Atlus' stuff but thats just because if people dont, they will simply not port games over to the west.

Whereas with dragon commander it doesnt matter. Because they havent really got any other choice of where they can sell it Other than on the internet, if I dont buy Atlus games they wont come to the uk.

 

[BarkBarker]

How can you know who the 'good' developers are if you haven't played their games? You literally bought a game just because of the most superficial quality, the art direction; so a game like FTL is fucked when it comes to you because they are more into gameplay than artwork that they can plaster around the internet?

You have to do both in order to be making informed decisions to the benefit of yourself and the market. Don't support awful developers and don't buy games just because you think a dev is good and then don't play the product.

imagine the greatest game of all time being made by Lucifer himself, I DON'T WANT A SINGLE PROCEED TO GO TO FUCKING LUCIFER!

Why not? He is only doing what !!God intended him to do, you know since God is omnipotent and all!!. Satan is about a evil as the CIA is anti-American. In fact some religions record the story of Lucifer as his fall being because he, unlike God, was anti-torture and instead wanted everyone to get into heaven.

Omnipotent and all that doesn't mean everything happens because he wants to, a guy with infinite cosmic powers makes mistakes, just look at the platypus. I AM familiar with the story as Lucifer being a victim and frankly I prefer that to the impression that he is a tremendously vicious person down to the core for having ambitions that god didn't approve of, but what you were in the past and your tragic fall doesn't excuse your actions, victims don't get off scot free because they had a rough time to put in the lightest of terms, and I don't want a single penny of mine going to a man who fucks with humanity because he has a beef with god.

 

[Erttheking]

Sorta. I ended up buying two copies of the Witcher because I couldn't even get the first one to work and even then I ended up rage quitting ten hours in, but I'm not too upset about it because it didn't cost me too much and the money went to Projket Red, and those guys are awesome.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

One thing to note is that unless a developer isn't working under a publisher, purchasing the game to directly support them is a bit of a double-edged blade, because developers that don't self-publish generally seem to get a very small percentage of royalties from game sales after release.

I don't generally buy games I don't expect to play at some point, but there are certainly certain developers I wish I could throw my money at; Chief among them being CD Projekt RED and Stardock. Larian is pretty high up there as well--I quite enjoyed Divinity 2 after all of the expansions and patches and I'm excited to see how Dragon Commander and Original Sin turn out--but I don't think they have quite the same level of support for their community that the other two studios try to provide.

Correction: if they're signed to a publisher, the devs don't get /any/ royalties, although some contracts allow a bonus if the software sells well enough... which the publishers keep trying to get out of, as happened with Obsidian after Fallout New Vegas, and Infinity Ward after Modern Warfare 2. Game developers are paid the way software developers in other industries are paid, which is to say they're just normal salaried employees, not partial owners of their product who are entitled to royalty checks. That's what the budget figures that keep getting quoted and people keep saying are too high are: it's the combined salary of everyone who worked on the game.

So long story short, if you want to actually send some money to the developers, you're better off mailing them a check.

 

[Yopaz]

Well, it depends on the game. If I like the developer then I am more inclined to buy a game before looking into it or before a price drop.

I do however buy my games new as long as it's possible which I guess is because I want to support the publisher and by extension the developer.

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

Omnipotent... ...doesn't mean everything happens because he wants to

Actually, that's exactly what it means.

 

[TrevHead]

I won't buy a game I have no intention of playing but I will buy a game near full RRP even if I have a large backlog of the same game type just to support the devs. The game will then just sit on my game shelf with the knowledge that I won't get around to play it for possibly 6-12 months.

Although these tend to be super niche premium price games that rapidly bomb to the bargain bin. Those games like CAVE shmups on the 360 really do rely on their tiny fanbase to buy at launch though, without that the games just would not get made which would leave me with no new games when my backlog is finished.

 

[GundamSentinel]

Never done that. I buy games because I want to play them. The devs are in it to make money, and that works two ways: I have to pay for their products, but they have to make products that justify me paying for them. I'm not going to throw money at something just for the devs.

 

[Gitty101]

No. I buy my games to play them. Good developers will get my money anyway with quality products I want to play.

 

[PeterMerkin69]

So this thread is about wallet voter fraud?

I don't care about the health of the industry beyond its usefulness to me so I don't go out of my way to support anyone I don't immediately benefit from, no. If my personal purchases can even be said to support anyone then I'm unintentionally contributing when I buy release-day games like Dark Souls, Fallout, some indies, etc., but even then I'm only doing it because I want to play them too badly to wait until they're available for less money.

The industry is an unwieldy behemoth that's beyond the control of any one person, let alone one single consumer; in other words, like real voting, whatever's going to happen is going to happen despite my wallet votes, so I don't feel an obligation to take personal responsibility for it. Okay, well, I might be responsible for 1/150,000,000th of an outcome, but I'm hardly going to lose any sleep over that.

 

[thebakedpotato]

These days I buy games in a similar fashion to buying jerky at the gas station. Impulsively.

 

[spartandude]

If I was going to give away money I'd give it to charity, not to gainfully employed middle class people.

.

this really sums up my opinion on the matter, i may boycott a game/dev/publisher if they do something i really hate but i dont buy something just so they can have my money

 

[Signa]

I don't think I've ever bought a game purely to blow the cash on something I didn't want or have a use for, just to support the people behind it. However, I will use that argument as justification to buy something I'm not really that interested in, or if it costs more than my interest holds. Supporting things you like is important, even if it's just the people behind something that you're not thrilled with. It's what separates those with talent from those without.

 

[TehCookie]

I'll buy it at a higher price, like I buy most Platinum, Atlus and NIS games full price instead of waiting for it to go down like most games. However I find those games to be worth it, and in niche audiences I think my purchase means more. Or if a group is asking a game to be localized and they bring it over, I'm going to be part of it and buy it to show there are still people interested in that. Like bringing Xenoblade Chronicles to the US, but like I said I also enjoy the game.

I'm not rich enough to support games I don't care about or can't play.

 

[themind]

I can't say that I do. I generally only buy new games if I know beyond a shadow of all doubt that I will enjoy the game and get my $60.00 worth. The last batch of games I got was online, 12 games for about $120.00. A few stinkers among the lot, but GTA IV, Arkham Asylum, Call of Juarez, and Dragon Age Origins were the best of the bunch.

I may buy a game new when it drops in price to $20 or under, but by that time the Dev' isn't getting a whole lot of money out of me. The really shitter practices like those who released Colonial Marines has made me very wary of new games, and while I like to support the Dev's that are consistently good, I don't explore new game options often for fear of getting ripped off and inadvertly giving money to a crap studio that has no business making games in the first place.

 

[ThriKreen]

Correction: if they're signed to a publisher, the devs don't get /any/ royalties, although some contracts allow a bonus if the software sells well enough...

It depends on the contract signed, every relationship is different. And studios owned by publishers still get bonuses based on how the company as a whole is doing, so it's still a way of supporting them.

And the advantage there is that with the financial burden hopefully lessened by having a publisher bank roll the studio, as well as potentially being better paid instead of scrounging for every penny of the budget as an independant, you'd hopefully have better morale for the devs which could lead to a better developed game.

 

[Ender910_v1legacy]

I do this quite often actually, usually with the intent to play the game later whenever I get the chance. I think it's important to support good, creative, and often-times smaller/independent developers whenever possible, especially now with how mainstream the industry's been getting.

And I absolutely refuse to buy games from larger developers/publishers who just pump out the same mundane slop with just about every release (yeah, I'm talking about you Blizzard/Activision, Ubisoft, and Sega). I'd rather spend money towards brilliant artists who actually need and deserve funding.