Cost of video games becoming absurd

[Surfd]

it doesn't work like that

Indeed. Pirating PC games probably leads to more actual sales of PC games then loss of sales.

If I pirate a game, there is a 90% chance that I was never planning on buyin it in the first place. If I actually like it, there is a moderate chance that I might actually buy a copy at some point (maybe on a steam sale, or something), just so I dont have to deal with stupid warez / cracks shit to get it to work every time I want to play it, or because I feel like supporting the dev who made it. If I didnt like it, they havent lost a sale, because I was never planning on buying it to begin with.

For most people, Pirating is essentially a "free trial" of the game, without all the crippleware that usually comes attached with an official free trial.

[Evolixe]

I saw the new standard version of CoD is gonna be going for 80 bucks

I find that hilarious. Even more so when they find out how big of a mistake that actually was.

[Charge me Doctor]

You think that's absurd? Take a look at Overwatch. Costs 60$, has no singleplayer campaign, no story, no group PVE, no vehicles, no complex maps like Planetside 2. Meanwhile Planetside 2, Warframe and even fucking MMOs are f2p. Ahahahahahahahahahaha.

Overwatch should have been f2p or 10$ at most. An no, I don't work at McDonald's, I'm fucking rich, but it feels like I'm being taken for ride.

Game devs don't give a shit about the correct price for video games, just look like at EA's overpriced shit. Nowadays they just put whatever the hell number they want as a price.

F2p Overwatch would lead to extremely toxic community, so, no, thanks. If people want to consistently troll others and waste their time - it will cost them at least 60$

[Acidbaron]

Console games have always been more expensive.
Games are still relatively a cheap form of entertainment.
Game prices haven't really increased over a long period of time, a direct increase is seen as a turn off for buyers.
There are people with a lot of disposable income especially the gamer crowd 20-40, probably often single or not having kids, combine that with other economic factors and you can see why companies are doing what they are.

As long it sells, it will continue to happen nothing you can do about it. P2W games are still here and games on smart phones have shown that there is quite a lot of money in that and P2W is highly controversial.

[PenguinChan]

Base game + DLC / Season pass has been $100 for awhile now. News flash, games are REALLY expensive to make and actually take quite a lot of money to do so. Inflation is real and games haven't increased in price that much at all for the base game. Let alone sales also spoiling perception of how much people normally would pay for things.

[Deletedaccount1]

Opinions on a fan site for the same company.


Its like they still have a grip on you.

I don't come here to talk about WoW, the only time I've talked about WoW on here in the last 3 years was when Blizzard shut down Nost. I like this site because it is the best active place that I've found to have discussions with people who are usually moderately educated and informed while still in a pseudo-anonymous casual setting.

- - - Updated - - -

My thesis on blaming consumers over Blizzard for a reduction in game quality I think is somewhat proven by Overwatch. The game is fairly priced for what it is. $40 for a game that doesn't rely on macro transactions in any form is a very reasonable thing in 2016. I still think Blizzard is fair with Diablo 3 but I think they could do more. Starcraft 2 is on its dying breath.

Of course none of this is the case with HoTS, WoW or Hearthstone. These games want to milk money of people and the only reason Blizzard does this is that they know they can get away with it. This is the biggest problem with consumerism in general, it relies on people being responsible and smart which is unfortunately rare.

[apples]

the weaker the american middle class, the more expensive games will be

[May90]

It seems to me that many people claiming that games used to be cheaper simply say so because back in 90-s parents bought games for them, so they didn't have to bother with costs, while nowadays they buy games with their own funds. Objectively, it is just not true. Look:

Doom (1993) - $40 ($65 accounting for inflation)
Doom (2016) - $60

Starcraft 1 plus expansion (1998) - $50, $30 ($73, $44 accounting for inflation)
Starcraft 2 (2010) plus two expansions (2013, 2016) - $60, $40, $40

Yes, there are also DLCs, boost packs, etc. you can buy for many games nowadays - but, since you don't have to, it is kind of irrelevant.
Systems able to run latest games also cost way less than before. A very good gaming PC back in mid-90s would go for like $3,000, which equals 1.5 times that today; nowadays, a $1000 system will run everything ever released at comfortable FPS, if you are willing to play around with graphical settings a bit.

If you ask me, games cost very little nowadays. I've spent a total of, I think, $130 on Starcraft 2 + 2 expansions, and I've invested like 4,000 hours in it; that's more than 30 hours per dollar. What else could possibly give you so much off one dollar? I don't know, maybe a book, if you read through it over a dozen times...

[Airlick]

"You only pay for a console once, and you have to upgrade your PC every year."

As for high prices on new AAA games (AAA as in: cost a shitton to develop, which does not necessarily correspond with game's quality) - well, you have a few options if you can't afford them - wait for sales (a year from now that 160$ game will cost 40$), buy older or indie games, play F2P games or pirate them.

Are the prices too high? Yeah, they are for me, hence I'm careful with my buys. The last game I bought was OW, and before that some older games on Steam that I haven't played until now. It's really not like you have to play every AAA game that comes out, most of them aren't even worth touching the box in the shop.

[Vurdah]

Step one build a PC.
Step two wait till the Steam sale this fall and pick it up with all it's dlc for like $60.
Step 3 (optional) follow step one and then just pirate it.

[Laerrus]

I remember an NES cartridge for Super Mario Bros. 2 in 1988 was $65.

Factor in inflation and that same game would be $130 today.

Count your blessings that Blizzard hasn't raised the cost of a WoW sub over the past 12 years. If they had, we would be paying close to $19 per month instead of $15 (or $98 instead of $78 every 6 months)

[brimdog]

iirc I bought moon patrol for the Atari at Kmart in the early 80's for >$30
and games for the NES were >$40

[Deleted]

I get it when someone says Bethesda or EA charge too much for their garbage. But 60$ for a game that (for now) comes without any mandatory DLCs is not too much. And there are several sites that offer Overwatch for ~40$ (even Origins edition).

[Deletedaccount1]

Count your blessings that Blizzard hasn't raised the cost of a WoW sub over the past 12 years. If they had, we would be paying close to $19 per month instead of $15 (or $98 instead of $78 every 6 months)

Maybe if they had raised it and started getting some people with actual talent to work on it, it wouldn't be shitty like it is today.

[Deleted]

That's why the vast majority of games I buy are at least 2 years old and I only buy them during Steam sales, the only games I bought from 2015 were The Witcher 3 and GTA V but still waited for a nice discount, you don't need to buy games on release day.

[Deleted]

Don't be cheap and pull that wallet!

[Surfd]

"You only pay for a console once, and you have to upgrade your PC every year."

Unless you are a bleeding edge nutjob who has to play every single new release at the absolute maximum resolution+FPS+Shader bullshit settings, this is pretty much complete bullshit.

Unless you are buying absolute shit PCs, the average lifespan of a decent gaming PC is probably about 3 to 4 years (and that is lowballing it a bit, depending on how flexible you are willing to be with dialing down graphics settings on bleeding edge games). Which is actually probably LONGER then the lifespan of some console generations.....

[Airlick]

Unless you are a bleeding edge nutjob who has to play every single new release at the absolute maximum resolution+FPS+Shader bullshit settings, this is pretty much complete bullshit.

Unless you are buying absolute shit PCs, the average lifespan of a decent gaming PC is probably about 3 to 4 years (and that is lowballing it a bit, depending on how flexible you are willing to be with dialing down graphics settings on bleeding edge games). Which is actually probably LONGER then the lifespan of some console generations.....

I know, hence the quotation marks. It's just a popular saying in my country, used by console gamers because they feel the need to affirm their decision of buying a console instead of a proper gaming PC - the division between console and PC gamers is quite significant, not that many people own both a gaming PC and a console. Consoles are good for weekend gamers and absolute newbies at computers, since they are much easier to set up and maintain. Aside of that, the only thing that warrants their existence are exclusives, and well, exclusives exist because they are the only thing that warrants developing new consoles.

[Zandalarian Paladin]

Indeed. Pirating PC games probably leads to more actual sales of PC games then loss of sales.

If I pirate a game, there is a 90% chance that I was never planning on buyin it in the first place. If I actually like it, there is a moderate chance that I might actually buy a copy at some point (maybe on a steam sale, or something), just so I dont have to deal with stupid warez / cracks shit to get it to work every time I want to play it, or because I feel like supporting the dev who made it. If I didnt like it, they havent lost a sale, because I was never planning on buying it to begin with.

For most people, Pirating is essentially a "free trial" of the game, without all the crippleware that usually comes attached with an official free trial.

This is only true to the extent of AAA games. Sadly, this does not apply to Indie games :/

Indies are most of the time too niche - even great concepts can sometime get lost easily in the flood of games on steam. So when your only "sales" are actually pirated copies, it can, most of the time, indicate the death of your enterprise.

[Attackrabbit]

Gotta second this for posterity. average game was 69.99 for SNES. only a couple got over 90 bucks.

Gonna third this as well My Mate had an adaptor to play USA imported games on his SNES and each (imported) game was around £80 to £100 then which comes out at a staggering £150 to £180 today for some pretty terrible games :s