Yeah dude it makes a world of difference to me :P

Like enslaved was totally not on my radar and now it is :P

well, mostly I rely on gut feeling and reviews , so VC, Uncharted, Super Star Dust, LBP and so on always were games I'd buy and the demos didn't help or prevent that..

the games that I bought just because I really enjoyed the demo are few, namely: Minna no Golf 5, Civilization Revolution and Bladestorm

demos that turned me away from buying a game are even fewer.. right now that's only Resident Evil 5

but still, I really like demos and hope we will get demos for most games :)

Looking at my collection, I don't think a demo has convinced me of getting a game I never intended to get, perhaps L4D ..

It has however turned me off a lot of games I intended to buy, Mass Effect 2 (don't shoot!) Dante's Inferno, Burnout Paradise, Vanquish, Crackdown 1 & 2, Banjo N&B all I most likely would have bought had it not been for the demo.

Bioshock demo made me buy it, I didn't get Uncharted one or 2 because of the demo. The controls seemed wonky and it was boring for me. Now MAG, the beta for that made me avoid it like the plague.

It's rare, but sometimes a demo can put a game that was completely off my radar onto the buy list.

Enslaved was the most recent. Knew little about it other than being developed by Ninja Theory who I associate with Heavenly Sword (another game that I enjoyed and was sold on after playing the demo). Hopefully the entire game keeps the same pace as that demo had a big grin on my face for being just plain fun.

Heavy Rain made me want to play the full game. Infamous really sold me on the game. But I think it's the more obscure games that stand more to gain by making a demo if they don't have much of a budget for marketing and advertising.

But with all the good games available and or soon to be released, I typically use demos to rule out games that I won't buy rather than find more games that I want to buy/play. I have way too many unfinished games that are fully worth finishing as is.

And a lot of times, a demo that was bad or just let me know that the game wasn't what I thought/hoped it would be saves me the cost of a disappointing purchase.

There are quite a few games in my collection that I wouldn't have bought had I played a demo first.

Yes Demos have made a difference for me.

DEMOES THAT MADE ME BUY:

The Uncharted Drake's Fortune Demo was boring and made me not buy it until about a year later when word of mouth got around saying Drake's Fortune was a solid game. Guess the word of mouth was correct.

The MGS4 Demo was just orgasmic :D! Around that time I was so hyped for it and getting to play the demo back then was like a dream come true. It was fantastic and I could not wait for MGS4.

Killzone 2 demo was a turn on. It got me used to the weighty feel and controls for the real game and it was good fun.

LittleBigPlanet demo persuaded me to buy the game. It was a must buy after playing through the demo. The demo itself was very well put together and who knows, if I never played that demo, I would've never had picked up LBP and definitely not be interested in LBP 2.

Battlefield Bad Company 2 Multiplayer Demo was a blast. It got me hooked up with the Battlefield franchise again and I eventually got it this month because in March I had God of War III, Final Fantasy XIII and Heavy Rain to play.

DEMOES THAT WERE GOOD BUT NEVE GOT TO BUY:

The inFamous demo demonstrated very well as to what players can expect in the final game. I was hooked into the demo but around the release of inFamous, I didn't have time to buy it and as we moved into 2010, it just got worse and didn't have the time.

Split Second Demo I found was cool. I found the gameplay was good and all but same reason as inFamous, just don't have the time this year to pick it up.

DEMOES THAT MADE ME NOT BUY:

The Quantum Theory Demo absolutely killed the chances of me buying the game. It's so horribly sluggish and no fun.

Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 Demo also turned me off. Just didn't like it. I hoped that it could convert me into a NG fan but guess it didn't.

Heavenly Sword Demo was so short that I kinda got pissed off and didn't make me wanna buy the game. Not only that but I didn't feel as if the gameplay was that good.

These's are only a handful of demo's I've mentioned and just wanted to show how demo's do affect my decision on their purchases.

Back in the nineties, I was what today people call a hardcore gamer, no doubt about it. I spent lots of hours of my week with videogames, I had lots of time to spare and I could easily skip some sleep to happily game my way through the night without a witchy wife telling me to go to sleep. I finished tons of games with just a weekend rental and maybe an average of 6 or 7 games a month, to say something. Things have changed a lot now. But back in the day, I could risk playing games I was not really convinced on. That's a luxury I don't have today.

I bought 4 or 5 gaming magazines which helped me to be "updated" about what was going on and what was new. No matter this, I made some blind purchases as Final Fantasy Tactics (that was genious luck!), Driver and Bust a Groove.

I quit gaming in year 2000 only to come back at it in 2008 and gosh, lots of things have changed. Making a choice now is so much easier, specially thanks to the internet. But then you also have the Demos, which I personaly love. They may have helped me avoid some titles more than encourage to purchase them and that could be read as a fail, but that's not how I see it.

I think it is an excellent service, very considerate towards us as costumers, which help us select what is appealing to us with ease. I must conceed that most developers don't put enough thinking and effort into their demos and that's a problem. Who would want to underestimate such a powerful marketing tool?

I do a lot of research before I buy a game, specially cause its very expensive for me.

But demos have changed my mind a few times such as Mafia II. Thought about getting it, but the demo showed me a very very weak game.

Im like 98% sure I will get Two Worlds 2, and a demo would surely seal the deal.

Strangely enough, Darksiders was a game that I didnt enjoy the demo, but really enjoyed the game. So somebody screwed up in that department.

the only demo that ever made me buy a game was megalomania on atari ST (bought the game on the megadrive though).

There is one demo that I played the crap out of, but then I was already 100% gonna buy the game... that was Diablo.

A demo that made me not buy a game was Too human...

I usually use demos just to play 10 mins a game i'll never buy or games that i'm just considering, I usually end up not byuing though... there are too many must buys for maybes to be more than a 10 min play anyways.

I agree with hat though that reviews are more important than demos.... I tend to buy my games much more based on universal acclaim than on a short demo that barely shows the game.

Actually, one of the strongest demoes for me was actually the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 demo. I haven't really been interested in multiplayer games this generation, as I have found very few games with multiplayer I like. But Akvod convinced me to try the demo, and damn it if that isn't some of the most awesome multiplayer I have ever tried, I absolutely adore it! I played that demo for more than 20 hours, and whenever I jump back into the game, it's still absolutely awesome!