$59.99. Who determines a video game's standard price?

[Veknoid_Outcast]

Teeqoz said:

Veknoid_Outcast said:

 

Kap stole my thunder ;)

But yes. Digital sales are on the rise, and publishers take a larger cut of those sales (plus they spend less on overhead).

There's even evidence to suggest that game prices should be lowered from $60 -- that $60 is a high enough threshold to deter a consumer altogether, resulting in a missed sale. A lower price tag would make the product more desirable, and instead of 50 people paying $60 for a game, you might have 150 people pay $40.

The point is this: there are other solutions to this budget problem, apart from "pass the expense on to the end-user in the form of loot boxes and micro-transactions." If a game's budget is so high that it needs to sell five million copies at $60 (plus a few hundred thousand $30 season passes) then maybe the budget has gotten out of control. 

If I'm a publisher looking at the equation Revenue - Expenses = Profit, why do I need to attack the Revenue side of things? Why not tackle the Expenses part? Many of those now defunct 7th gen publishers failed because they spent beyond their means and tried to wedge their talent and intellectual property into a "AAA" model. Look at something like Hellblade, which recouped costs in three months. The studio kept costs down by maintaining a small development team, applying for loans (now paid back), finding tax breaks in the UK, and using savings (which existed because of financial foresight).

I'm of the opinion that micro-transactions (mtx) and loot boxes are unnecessary to keep games like Call of Duty and Battlefront afloat -- that it's less about securing commercial viability and more about filling coffers as quickly and effortlessly as possible. But even if we assume a dire situation where EA and Activision would close shop without mtx revenue, why do we need to accept it? Especially when, in 2017, it's been proven that mtx economies are having deleterious effects on game systems -- to the point where the temporary removal of loot boxes in Battlefront II necessitated a dramatic rebalancing of the game's economy and progression system. 

I am all for keeping the video game industry healthy and profitable. But I just can't defend invasive and predatory mtx practices as a way to maintain that profitability, especially when other, less exploitative solutions exist.

I never said we need to accept microtransactions, which is where your point falls flat. I'm just saying that I think a big part of reason why nearly every major publisher that remains today is looking more and more into alternate revenue sources (CD Project Red - has the microtransaction powered Gwent, Nintendo - Amiibo's and mobile games, Sony - has several games with microtransactions, same with Microsoft, Take Two - same thing, EA and Activision I don't even need to explain, and hell, even DLC overall is an attempt at the same thing) is because game budgets have risen without a corresponding rise in game prices. Like you say, there are other, less exploitative solutions, that's exactly why I propose raising game prices. Games are still a ridiculously cheap form of entertainment compared to other media. To diversify the portfolio of games you offer is also part of the solution, but for every Hellblade and No Man's Sky (both very financially successful, smaller budget games, even though NMS struggled in other areas), there are also plenty of games that end up as commercial failures. The successes have to not only pay for themselves, but bank-roll the riskier titles that sometimes underperform.

I believe the initial point that proved controversial was that mtx are necessary for AAA games to maintain profitability. Neither of us can prove or disprove that point. For every inflation argument there's a digital distribution argument. For every Activision public relations campaign insisting on the necessity of mtx there's an EA note to investors stating the opposite. For every AA studio that flew too close to the sun and fell, there's a Ninja Theory which proved the viability of the space between indie and AAA. There's just no definitive proof either way. Without crunching the numbers, we can't say that rising game budgets and static game prices have put an undue burden on publishers.

So neither of us can claim victory on that point.

A more fruitful discussion comes from "should they" instead of "must they." Must they? I seriously doubt it. Should they. Hell no :P