Ripped off by online E-Retailers

[randall]

Those numbers seem to be pretty consistent with the industry, as far as I know. Peter actually has all our numbers/stats.

I do know that Germany is among our top foreign customers, if not THE top. That could be for a number of reasons though... I can't think of anything off the top of my head.

I completely understand Dans reasoning for "testing the market". I was actually talking about game developers, where that kind of testing isn't normally done in the public eye. At least not for big releases.

[TechMage]

[Dan East]

[T¹]

[randall]

True, cheesy clones and ripoffs don't sell well. But they also don't instill confidence in the industry or the other products that are available. Imagine if the first games you saw running on a PocketPC were Snails and Chopper Alley. That sets a whole new precedence than seeing Bubblets2000 or Arkanerd (I made these names up, hopefully they don't reference an existing game).

I'm not saying Snails is state of the art- it isn't. Apparently it doesn't have to be, in order to be embraced by the consumer.

Coding is only a small part of the game/app, the part that people can't see or hear. Do people care how smart your AI is, if its wrapped in CRAP? This is a complete package- if the graphics and sound are shoddy then it is assumed the coding is shoddy. I didn't make up the rules and this certainly isn't true for every title. But there are always standards that are set by the current games/apps.

What was the top 5 original titles of last year? Compare those to this years offerings and the picture is quite a bit different.

My point is, that the cheesy clones served their purpose. I saw these titles and knew I could do better so I joined the fray. Naturally, only the strong survive. Eventually I'll be wiped off the face of the earth unless I progress.

Do I WANT to kill off the independents? Hell no. Those are the up-and-comers. It spawned developers like Peter Balogh, Jacco Bikker, and Dan East. And just like Peter, Dan and Jacco, they'll need to adapt to survive.

Online sales is a good place to start, test and fine-tune your product. Right now I think developers will find there is an extremely low ceiling. As more devices are introduced and better games/apps enter the marketplace, the consumer will gain confidence and double that over the next year or so. With that kind of clearance, newer games could potentially come in and anhialate the current top 3 games easily. More buyers = Higher Ceiling.

Brick and mortar stores can expand the oportunity. Most software is still sold the old fashioned way. Unfortunately, only the biggest devs can afford this route (unless they have alot of help) so big-name devs will always have the upper hand over the independents.

Independents have a choice- get published or get buried. I don't care for those choices too much. Either way, you are no longer independent. So we'll have to find our own way.

[Dan East]

Bump.

Dan East

[T¹]

I was thinking it would be an appropriate time to make a re-entry...

[esw]

[randall]

Everyone is forging their own path at this time. Which is why some larger companies can run into difficulties- their old tactics don't work. I don't have a problem sharing info with Dan East since it would boost his product, and in my view, he is one of the people that could help boost credibilty of the industry. I don't have any inside details or specifics, though. I wouldn't do it without Peters permission either.

How could Snails possibly lose if Dan gets more people to buy?

Strategic Assault (by our own xen games) is a competitor even though Snails is completely different genre. Only because the market is so small. I want to see that game sell as many copies as possible, because as long as people are buying, they might look at my title too.

A few people have tried to gather a network, but if you ask me, it seems to include all the wrong people sponging info from the dedicated devs. Ive never joined one, but I don't have alot of friends in the industry anyway- because I don't shut up.

I won't help Bubblets2000 (fake name) become prominent in the market. Start-up developers see this, and say "hey, there must be a market, and I can do better than that". Then we have a flood of crap.

Get Nutcracker out there, and show there is a market for real games. CNets TOP10 was pretty good, and people will always disagree on some level. But that list is at least a target for what Devs should be aiming for.

I'll give one hint to Developers of Crap (DOC) (there you have a new name). Lower your prices within the threshold of the industry and you MIGHT sell one copy. I saw DOC games selling for super-high prices at one time. Can you compete with Chopper Alley? Then why is your price even IN that area?

[Courtney White]

[suchiaruzu]

[Courtney White]

[TechMage]

DOC don't just exist in the PPC industry. A few months ago, I was at Target, and I saw the PC game; Pool of Radience Ruins of Myth Dranor, for $50 USD. For those of you who don't know what that is, its a new D&D RPG. I'm a big fan of D&D games, and their Forgetten Realms games in particular, so I thought this looked like a cool game. But alas, I was out of cash, so I didn't buy it.

Man, I am glad I didn't. Yesterday I went to Costco, and saw the game for $17 USD! I had heard that the game had flopped, but from 50 bucks to 17! So I thought, well maybe I will buy it. So I did. I soon installed it on my PC, and began playing. In 3 hours, my computer had froze up 5 times, and the game had serious graphical glitches. I thought, Damn it, I hate it when companies half-ass do a game, but for 17 bucks what could I expect, right?

I downloaded the latest patch, a few hours later, and installed it. It still, was freezing up my comp ever time I died, and when I moved the mouse the screen glitched and sometimes, inanimate objects would move when my characters moved. So I restarted my machine, and tried again this morning. Aparently, you had to restart your machine, for the patch to work, this would have been no big deal, but the instalation instructions for the patch said nothing of this!

Also the version 1.4 patch I found out, does not contain the fixes in version 1.1 and you have to install each patch, although the website says nothing about this! And apparently the game will not properly uninstall without the 1.1 patch! If I wasn't such a big D&D fan, I would have chucked this game in the garbage. What is really sad is the people who paid 50 USD, for the game, and have no internet acess to download the patches. Because not only can they not play thee game without their PC freezing, they also can not uninstall the piece of shit!

[randall]

No, we don't expect developers to drop their prices to $12. $20 for titles like Chopper Alley and Nutcracker are reasonable and justified. A developer should know if they are in the same league as the big titles. If not, then they need to find another job.

I don't see how any PPC game sold online should exceed $20. Sim City 2K has been around for eons, but slapping a $29 price tag on it seems a little greedy. Sure there are licensing fees, but that isn't the consumers fault. The last 15 computers I bought, SC2K came WITH it.

So this game came with a built-in reputation, marketing, and a huge user-base following from the PC industry. Where else is this excessive price justified?

Now $29 for an off the shelf copy is justified, especially if there is a manual, extra stuff on the CD, posters...

Our $12 price wasn't instilled because we thought the game was crap. The first beta we released showed us that there was a huge amount of interest. We just couldn't find a reason to justify an over-priced product since we had virtually ZERO overhead.

Return to Castle Wolfenstein debuted at over $50. A much anticipated title (not just hype), the work is incredible and it is definately a premium title worthy of a high-end price tag.

How "Pool Of Radience" thinks it is a premium title, I don't know. If the price dropped that quickly, they greatly underestimated the consumer. I've never even heard of it.

The DOC can't last forever. Developers of quality titles remain to be few, but that won't last forever- look at how games have changed in the last year.

[Courtney White]

I've seen a large number of people dropping console gaming for PC gaming.

With a PC title, you can Patch. With a console... im not sure, but i don't think so.

Most PC titles are very well engineered, but even if they make a mistake, they can fix it.

Snails, for sure, was made for the gamers. You could have charged a lot, but you didn't. some people are in it for the people, others for the money... I think the best of the PPC games have been very cheap, or free.