How much would you pay for a "complete" game?

[djzombie]

yeah day1/week1/month1 dlc is really frustrating and always feels like the developer intentionally did not include something in the original game that has already been completed just to sell it afterwards for a profit.

[Don Katsu]

People don't want to pay $.99 for a game on a smartphone which they play for hours but blow $60 on a game that last them 7 hours or less.

This needs to change. I don't buy games often at all.

[Ksandra]

0dwjj
[edit] my baby was smashing keyboard...idk how this happened...ignore this post lol

[hey]

I'm of the opinion that there shouldn't be a standard video game price. Games should be priced what they're worth.

This. I couldn't imagine paying more than $10-20 for most of the games i play. At least half of the games i've played in the last few years would have to be under $5 for me to consider buying them instead of pirating them. Plenty of better games would be more than reasonable at $30-60 if they are longer and/or really good games. And then every so often there are games which i could pay $100 or more for, and still feel like i got a great deal. If games were priced based on some function of length and fun per unit time, instead of just $30-40 for hand held games, and $50-60 for console games, i'd probably buy a lot more of them, and i'd definitely pay more for the really great games.

I don't really mind dlc, as long as it's priced reasonably (fuck $5 costumes!). I've bought some before, and have never really been particularly disappointed in it. Of course most dlc isn't really worth buying, but i don't mind them offering it at all.

[kuronosan]

I have come to accept DLC as the future. My problem is when they charge you for things that should have been in the game from the beginning but were clearly removed for the purposes of selling limited extreme or ultimate editions.

[DeathbySnoosnoo]

well i would pay more for a game that i know i would play for a long time but i would also like to pay less for one that i wouldn't and sadly that will never happen among the big companies because they want their money(obviously since dlc is money piles for big companies these days.) so while i would agree no average price point should be how its done, it will never work because people are greedy.
Also i hate you dlc.

[niwaar]

I have purchased a very select few games lately. Even then I have been disappointed with a number of the games I did purchase. Gone are the days of the 20+ hour single player campaign. The last game I purchased was Tomb Raider and while I completely enjoyed the game, the game is relatively short. I do not think it should have been a 60$ game. It should have been a 40$ game with how pathetic the multiplayer is.

I want a complete experience for my money. Yes I may have "wasted" money on SimCity, but in the end getting Dead Space 3 for free, made that game a decent value in the end. But it is also a game I will inevitably drop 100+ hours into when they get their shit together.

Other than P4G, Tomb Raider and SimCity, you have to go back to ME3 to find the last game I chose to pay full price for. Yes I have games like Dishonored, Walking Dead, Person 4 Arena and others, but I chose to wait weeks and in some cases months to get them cheaper than the starting $59.99.

Games are simply not worth the money if its not going to consume my time. Games are also not worth it if I am going to have to pay another 50$ worth of DLC to enjoy them to the fullest. ie Mass Effect 3 was a great game, but seeing 3 separate DLCs for the game with 10-15$ price tags is just not worth my time. I dont mind the dlc, but please do not charge 15$ for another 3 hours of game play. I can get more out of that money by picking up something like Journey.

[Krandor]

I have come to accept DLC as the future. My problem is when they charge you for things that should have been in the game from the beginning but were clearly removed for the purposes of selling limited extreme or ultimate editions.

The game industry is moving in this direction, and it's going to be the standard no matter how much people complain.

Personally I have no issue with the pricing of games nowadays, as was mentioned in some other thread recently, given inflation 60 bucks for a game is honestly pretty cheap, considering there were games selling for that price in the SNES era. There was a drop in price again with the PS1, but I wouldn't be surprised seeing games in the 70-80 range for the next console generation, which would likely turn me away from games I was on the fence about, but in the long term dropping a fraction of my paycheck for 2 or 3 games a month is pretty minimal. Games are still a very cheap form on entertainment all things considered, since a game that could keep you occupied for a few days is gonna be sitting around the same price as a night out at the bar, or the price of around 4 movie tickets (let's say 8 hours worth of entertainment for the same 60 bucks).

[kuronosan]

Angry Birds costs $2 and provides infinitely more playability than most games do at $60.

[Kaisha]

I guess I'd be described as a cheap-ass, since majority of my game grabs are either from Steam sales, or bargain bin PS3 titles.

I "value" a game more that is meaty or 'complete' in content, but I wouldn't really pay more for it with my current shopping habits. It just means I'd pick it up eventually, rather than ignoring it completely.

Not a big fan of day-1/week-1 DLC, but I've yet to play a game where lacking said DLC hasn't ruined the experience much for me. I could think of cases where it would be a problem, but that'd only if you bought a game used, and I don't do that.

Most DLC content is a complete wash anyhow. If all add-ons were more like mini-expansions as was the original idea with DLC, such as Bethesda's track record w/ Fallout 3 and onwards, or Minerva's Den in Bioshock 2, I'd be all the more happy to pay for it. Is just stupid if you pay $60 for a game, and then another $40 in DLC, where the DLC doesn't even amount to half the length or quality of the core game.

Only full-price purchases I can remember in the last three years were Uncharted 2, Demon's Souls, Dark Souls, and Heavy Rain. None of them disappointed me in the least, even if two of them I blasted through in a couple days.


On an unrelated note, I wish Sony/Microsoft were more aggressive with sales on DLC content. It's amost non-existant on both their online marketplaces. You get infinite shelf-space on a digital storefront, but shouldn't it be subjected to the usual price-drops with age like everything retail does?

[Krandor]

Angry Birds costs $2 and provides infinitely more playability than most games do at $60.

I've played the ever loving hell out of Cut the Rope and the like, but the experience isn't remotely as satisfying as the experiences you'll find in core games.

Time waster at work or while using public transit, for sure. But personally it's not something I'm going to use to entertain myself when I'm at home and have access to my PC or consoles.

[seppuku-gb]

I guess it all depends on what you consider a 'complete' game to be. The current model I hate is having a ton of repetitive/tedious tasks to accomplish to get some in-game reward. That's definitely what killed FFXI for me. I do agree that time to complete a game isn't the only factor that affects it's value. Shadow of the Colossus and Plants vs. Zombies are both short games that I play pretty often.

[kuronosan]

I've played the ever loving hell out of Cut the Rope and the like, but the experience isn't remotely as satisfying as the experiences you'll find in core games.

Time waster at work or while using public transit, for sure. But personally it's not something I'm going to use to entertain myself when I'm at home and have access to my PC or consoles.

I think perhaps the best way to approach the idea of intrinsic game value would be to approach what we feel makes a game "incomplete".

[hey]

Personally I have no issue with the pricing of games nowadays, as was mentioned in some other thread recently, given inflation 60 bucks for a game is honestly pretty cheap, considering there were games selling for that price in the SNES era.

I don't really like this argument. Movies generally cost much more than games to make, and are sold for a fraction of the price. This works because they sell much more. Video games have become more popular over time, so prices are able to drop without them making less money.

[Xantavia]

I guess it all depends on what you consider a 'complete' game to be.

I find it easier to describe what isn't a complete game. And this is content, already present on disc, that can't be accessed without spending additional money.

For me, $60 dollar is a good price. Its what I currently pay, get satisfaction out of the game and I don't spend any money on extra DLC. Not sure what it used to cost, but I remember saving up birthday and X-mas cash to buy games for the 2600 in the early 80's. Maybe because of this I always think "do I really want this game" before I buy something.

[Dngnhack]

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f1...ps90eb27a6.jpg

Guess it all depends on how long you'll have it vs how much you make. If i enjoy a game for enough hours to justify the time it spent to earn the money i use to purchase the game it doesn't bother me. Plus with the fact there are so many ways to sell the game afterwards (only reason console > pc master gaming race ) cost isn't really 60$. Sure i wouldn't complain if games were cheaper but 60$ hasn't stopped me from buying 3 copies of a multiplayer game so that cousin, brother and i can play.

Cost is subjective.

[Vandole]

Reselling is why console games are so expensive. Devs dont get that money.

PC > console.

Spoiler: show

obv has nothing to do with pc pirating kappa

[Kuishen]

I don't really like this argument. Movies generally cost much more than games to make, and are sold for a fraction of the price. This works because they sell much more. Video games have become more popular over time, so prices are able to drop without them making less money.

Not to mention we're in a recession, if they want to move more product they have to realize that people have less money to spend on entertainment these days. With the advent of digital distribution and how much they're pushing it, they are going to have to cut the price on games eventually. Zero reasons to be paying $60 for a game when the publisher doesn't have to pay for production costs, shipping costs and the retailer's cut. I guarantee they would make more money if games were cheaper just because they would sell a lot more copies of new games. This has been proven by mobile and indie games repeatedly.

I don't have a problem with DLC that is like Bethesda's model pre-skyrim (I don't think any of Skyrim's DLC has been worth the price tbh and they definitely didn't add as much to the game as the previous iterations and their DLC/expansions did), or Borderlands 1/2, as they seem to have the right idea. Of course the other types of DLC wouldn't even be a problem if they followed Steam's model. Steam has constant sales on games and their dlc. A game like Dungeon Defenders will straight up give out some of the DLC for free over a weekend if you already own the game. If give-aways and sales like that applied to all games I don't think the industry would be catching as much flak as they do for DLC.

That being said don't hold back on putting shit in a game that was clearly intended for it just so you can nickel and dime it out of the consumers, that shit is downright anti-consumer.

EDIT: Another thing, developers seem to be inflating their development budget (looking at you TOR) without really adding anything of worth to the content of the game. It's like, yeah your game is pretty and cost you a whole lot of money to get it that way, but it's a shitty game so... what were you trying to accomplish? Jacking yourself off with how good your graphics engine is?

[Quicklet]

I find myself factoring in how much I desire to support the publisher/developer into how much I'm willing to pay for a game.

Torchlight 2 for $20 for a studio I like? No brainer. $60 (plus an additional $20+ for planned DLC) for ME3 when I can buy it new for $14 a year later? No thanks.

Spending $5, $10, or even $20 on a game mitigates the risk of having felt like I wasted my money if I end up disliking the game. Also, since pretty much all games other than Wii games drop in price quickly these days, it's almost guaranteed that if I wait a few months I can pick up a game for much less than its release price.

I also am willing to spend more on Kickstarter projects I like that don't get publisher support anymore (old-style Sierra adventure games, for example).

[Viq]

I'll pay upwards for 500 Won (about $0.46) to play a completed game. If a game doesn't have an arcade release these days, it's almost a foregone conclusion that I'm not going to like it. Games designed to be instantly and consistently fun + a social environment = really hard to beat.