Poll: Are console games overpriced?

[TheComedown]

$60-$70 AUD is what I payed for the last few games I bought at release and i think its a fair price that the game has a fair amount of content. For instance, the 3.7 hours it took me to finish homefront(really i beat the devs on my first play through? Someone was taking the piss) was not worth the the price of admission. (But the bonus metro 2033 was a nice touch, and the MP is surprisingly good and fun.

 

[Razmataz]

Why do console games cost (on average) a good £10-£15 more than the PC counterparts anyway?

Because consoles are subsidised to lock customers into exclusive, proprietary hardware setups and software is where that money is made back.

 

[harvz]

i would be happy paying the american equivalent on launch day, even with the conversion rate at the time (AUD), so unless australias economy goes down the hole (to the point of 1USD=2AUD) we would be paying less

though i did find a nice little online store where games are roughly $60AUD for day of launch and older games get to be $10, beats EB Games

 

[Atmos Duality]

Full Price ($60 USD/AUD) - If I had a guarantee of all the fucking content being there.
Limited Install DLC sucks enough ass already; having to pay $10-$15 more on top of a $60 dollar game is usually enough to push me away from it (assuming it's even worth playing on its own merits, and to my taste).

 

[2xDouble]

I agree that $100-$120 for a new game is bullshit. And $90 for used games is still bullshit.

I don't suppose building (or building more) local manufacturers of video games in Australia is an option? Not having to import should cut costs down to our "evil American" levels, about $60 for a new release. I wouldn't pay more than that unless there was a Collector's Edition that contained some particularly interesting swag.

Concerning used games... I don't buy new releases used; It's better just to buy new. Pricing is pretty much bullshit here too, about $5 off full price (proportional when you think about it, but come on...), and if there is a used copy of a new release that usually means the game is shit or stolen. F that either way. However, older (but still good) games tend to sell around the $15-$20 mark, and I think that's a fine price for them.

 

[DTWolfwood]

30-50. they can suck it if they want 60 for every cookie cutter sequel they stamp out on a yearly basis.

 

[New Troll]

I use to pay full price for most every game that came out, but with prices continuing to rise, I only pay full price for maybe one game a year anymore.

Game industry is really losing money on me. Before I'd spend $40-$50 a month on at least 4 games. So roughly 50 games a year at $50. $2,500! Oh my.

Now I spend $60 on one game a year and usually end up waiting for everything else to drop below $30. When a game does drop to $40, usually enough time has passed that I either have lost interest or I decide I had already waited this long so what's a little while longer for it to drop more. And then I end up just talking myself out of the game altogether cause the next thing has already come along. So... estimating roughly 1x$60 + 2x$40 + 6x$30 + 12x$20 = $560!

Yup, less than a quarter what they use to get from me when they had lower release prices. How's that for commerce.

 

[DanielBrown]

50-60$ was my pick. The new games here in Sweden are around 100-120$, so I always wait around a year and buy them from England instead, where they're a hell of a lot cheaper.
If they were around 50-60$ however I'd just buy them here.

 

[Gizmo007666]

I think games are fairly priced compared to days gone by, I remember buying FFIX for £40 and games for the N64 for about the same, so 2 generations on to be paying the same price is good going.

However, in terms of how much I'm willing to pay, the "issue" comes with just how quickly the price drops away after release. There seems to be little point in buying games on release for £40 when you can wait around three months and get them half price (online). Also can't see the point in buying second hand as, as far as the pricing goes in my local area, they go on the shelf for £30-£35 which remains several months after release, meaning those that actually buy games in stores second hand pay more than I do buying new online.

 

[Prof. Monkeypox]

I don't think that new releases are (much) overpriced. But I still don't want to pay the price they list.

While I don't mind companies charging $60 when the game first comes out, I do mind that it takes forever for the price to reduce, so either you pay tons of money- or you buy it used. Then they complain about used game sales.

I think games should release for around $50-$60, but reduce steadily in price in the same way DVDs do. A year later, they'd cost about $20-$30 at the most. Either that, or figure out some way to reward the customer for big purchases (like, a rebate or something). No, a pre-order bonus doesn't cut it, because some of those aren't very interesting, and it doesn't change the fact that games are still prohibitively expensive.

Only tangentially related: Why does Starcraft 2 still cost $60 in store, Blizzard? That game is nearly a year old at this point, and I still won't buy it because I am on a very tight budget. Some money is better than no money, right? Well knock the price down a few bucks before I completely lose interest.

 

[Mushroom 118i]

I don't spend more than £40 on a game if I can help it. Usually even launch games end up at around that or £45, so its not too bad.

CAPTCHA: everything turshet

 

[L8NEYET]

40-50, mostly cuz i'm damn poor. i don't think $60 is really unreasonable though, games are expensive to make.

Good, well thought out games are expensive to make, crappy games are not. I like the $50 price tag and if developers would stop using Blu-rays and relied on a more affordable media, even down loading it should be cheaper. If I download a game, why should I pay the same price as someone who bought it at a retail chain, where there was shipping cost, and adverts and employees involved. Fans who cut out the middle man and are loyal should catch a break. Just my opinion.

 

[Marowit]

I'd pay more if the games provided more; I'll, and do, pay less if the game offers less (eg used games/borrowing them from friends).

If a game is fantastic, epic, loaded with content I'd would gladly pay $100 for it. For example if Red Dead Redemption had another 10-20 hours of single player content that was as good as the rest of the game I would gladly shell out $100.00. If it has had content carved out for DLC, and linear I wouldn't bother buying it let alone spend $60 on it.

It seems like kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy right now with publishers right now. They carve out content for DLC, and make their initial release not as full as it could be. Then certain gamers wait for sales/used/GoTY-bundles since they know the game isn't 'complete' when it's released. This then reduces revenue and puts the impetuous on publishers to monetize their product even more...and more content turned into DLC and things like Plot/mechanics are skimped on (look at any shooter today and this is a glaring problem).

Obviously this is personal opinion, and I certainly wouldn't fork out $100.00 for current-generation games as they are. There's just not enough single-player content for me.

 

[The Hot Sauce Thief]

I live in england, and when i buy a brand new game on release day, its usually £40. The only game ive ever seen for over £40 on release day was a timesplitter game which was about £50

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I have never paid more than $40 for a game, and I never will as long as I can get away with it. $40 is in itself more than I'm willing to pay outside of a few special cases involving limited releases and small developers, but $60 is a ripoff. I know Australian gamers laugh at Americans for complaining about $60 games, but just because you're getting ripped off worse than we are doesn't mean we aren't getting ripped off; as an analogy, if someone steals $10 from me, but $20 from you, do I lose my right to complain that I've been stolen from just because you lost more money? Especially when you make more money than I do, so that the higher amount means less to you than it would to me? [sub]Seriously, check out American wages. They are ridiculously low, and have been dropping pretty much across the board since the 70's. Stagflation is a *****.[/sub]

Getting back on topic, the $60 price tag is not some move to keep up with inflation, nor is it a necessary move to keep up with increasing development costs. Sure, some AAA games cost as much to make as a blockbuster movie, but if you look at the statistics, those games are extremely rare, and none of them cost more than an average blockbuster film, let alone a really big one like Avatar. The price hike this gen is pure greed, as was the $40 price point from last gen, for that matter -- the only reason it was that high was because people were used to paying a lot of money from the days when cartridges justified it. Since the advent of the CD-ROM, games have been comparable to audio CDs and movie DVDs in every way except the price to the consumer. Any arguments to the contrary -- ie, the idea that games lack venues like concerts and movie theaters -- are marketing BS of the sort that the gaming community loves to swallow. Games would be profitable at a lower price point, especially with the mass market appeal they have reached this gen. The publishers don't lower it because they don't have to; there's plenty of people with more disposable income than sense waiting to overpay, so why take a gamble on an actually reasonable price?

PS: The price point that I almost never go over is $20 -- you know, comparable to a DVD. $40 is reserved for special cases, when I absolutely have to have a game at the time of release -- usually because I won't be able to get it if I don't buy it then. I can guarantee that if more games launched at $20, the industry would be getting a lot more money out of me, instead of Gamestop and the local record shops, who currently get the majority of my non-steam-sale videogame money.

 

[Roxor]

The only time in the last five years that I've spent more than $30 on a single game was last month when I pre-ordered Portal 2, and that's only because I can be pretty-much certain that I'll like it.