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greenmedic88 on 21 March 2010
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makingmusic476 said:
richardhutnik said:
Lastgengamer said:

Would DLC really be sufficient enough to make up for lost sales in the after market? I doubt it.

I don't think failing to produce games that people keep (and not trade in) is sufficient enough to justify the whining by the videogame market for a place like Gamestop using trade ins to reduce the cost of news games.  Why does the videogame industry expect people to shell out $60 for 10-20 hours of gameplay TOPS?

Studios have no trouble selling 2-3 hour movies for $15-20. 

The current issue is that there is no other industry in which the used market is so well organized and deeply entrenched.  GameStop has created a very effective method to push used sales over new, and it's something that simply doesn't impact other industries as seriously.  Hell, GameStop even entered into the used movie business only to fail miserably, eventually selling off what used stock it had in "buy one get two free" sales.  GameStop had issues moving used product for <$5, meanwhile they can sell used games for $55 with relative ease.

Definitely agree that comparing DVDs or even BDs to games in terms of used sales really is a bad analogy.

For one thing, with the average price of a DVD being closer to $10 than $20 and new releases rarely going for over $20, there just isn't much resale value left to make used movies a worthwhile endeavor.

The same thing more or less happened to used CD sales, shortly before iTunes and MP3s became the primary means by which the average consumer bought music.

But, when you still have media retailing for $50-60, there's still quite a bit of room for offering more than just a few dollars on a trade in that will in turn be flipped for maybe a 100% mark up or more.

 

As for the whole number of hours to cost argument, the movie analogy does put things a bit into perspective on the assumption that people don't buy movies just so they can watch them one time, which is a waste of money. But if the same movie were to be watched multiple times, it makes more sense than renting.

Same applies to games. If you only plan to play through it once, and in many cases, players won't even put 10-20 hours into a game before they move onto another, maybe renting is the "value" prospect.

For those who like to revisit games or play at their leisure and tend to play many games simultaneously, few have issues with paying $60 for a game, even if it doesn't give them whatever random number of hours a given person considers to be "good value."

Is there a magic formula? $60 game should equal what; 6 hours of play at $10 an hour compared to say a $20 DVD which is about 2 hours long being $10/hour? Or are games supposed to offer cheaper entertainment at $5 an hour meaning a $60 game should be what, 12 hours long? Still too expensive? A game should be $2.50 an hour meaning any game that can be completed, never to be played again under 24 hours is a terrible value to the point of ripping off the consumer? Ridiculous.

People that measure games in this fashion should probably stick to rentals and get over the "but then I don't get any residual trade in value!" fixation.

Yes, there is a point where a game is simply too short to warrant a $60 price, which is why there are PSN and XBL DL games as well as discount titles that are priced well under that $60 upon release.