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Forums - Sales Discussion - Amazon U.S. July bestsellers and general Amazon-based discussion

 

ThisGuyFooks said:
Pyro as Bill said:
If you want cheaper games pay the 2nd hand price. Personally I prefer it if publishers didn't destroy the resale/trade-in value of my game collection.

Everything devalues over time.

I find absurd the idea of defending a corporation so they can mantain the full price of something for years and years.

Who are we rooting for?! LOL

Whats next? Burning stores for having Black Fridays or something?

Most things devalue over time but it's the difference between 3 years or 3 weeks.

The people who get hurt by a drop in price isn't the publisher or new customers, it's the people who already bought it that lose out. I'm not defending corporations, I'm defending my purchasing power.

Temporary sales are fine, they're expected on any item.



Nov 2016 - NES outsells PS1 (JP)

Don't Play Stationary 4 ever. Switch!

Around the Network
Pyro as Bill said:

 

ThisGuyFooks said:

Everything devalues over time.

I find absurd the idea of defending a corporation so they can mantain the full price of something for years and years.

Who are we rooting for?! LOL

Whats next? Burning stores for having Black Fridays or something?

Most things devalue over time but it's the difference between 3 years or 3 weeks.

The people who get hurt by a drop in price isn't the publisher or new customers, it's the people who already bought it that lose out. I'm not defending corporations, I'm defending my purchasing power.

Temporary sales are fine, they're expected on any item.

 

Nobody is taking away your purchase power.

If you decide to buy Day One at Full Price, that is your choice.

If you pretend that because you paid Full Price, the game has to remain that price forever and ever is just silly.

If your stance is for games to remain at full price for longer, well...you are being Pro Corporation and Anti Consumer.

I paid 1000$ for my PS4 (bought it in South America Day Uno), should i be mad because i can find the thing for 200 bucks now?

I just cant believe im having this conversation..........................



Double Post



Pyro as Bill said:
If you want cheaper games pay the 2nd hand price. Personally I prefer it if publishers didn't destroy the resale/trade-in value of my game collection.

Then it's time to start looking at video games as recreation as opposed to some financial investment.



ThisGuyFooks said:
Pyro as Bill said:

 

Most things devalue over time but it's the difference between 3 years or 3 weeks.

The people who get hurt by a drop in price isn't the publisher or new customers, it's the people who already bought it that lose out. I'm not defending corporations, I'm defending my purchasing power.

Temporary sales are fine, they're expected on any item.

 

Nobody is taking away your purchase power.

If you decide to buy Day One at Full Price, that is your choice.

If you pretend that because you paid Full Price, the game has to remain that price forever and ever is just silly.

If your stance is for games to remain at full price for longer, well...you are being Pro Corporation and Anti Consumer.

I paid 1000$ for my PS4 (bought it in South America Day Uno), should i be mad because i can find the thing for 200 bucks now?

I just cant believe im having this conversation..........................

I want everything I own to increase in value because it makes me richer.



Nov 2016 - NES outsells PS1 (JP)

Don't Play Stationary 4 ever. Switch!

Around the Network
RJ_Sizzle said:
Pyro as Bill said:
If you want cheaper games pay the 2nd hand price. Personally I prefer it if publishers didn't destroy the resale/trade-in value of my game collection.

Then it's time to start looking at video games as recreation as opposed to some financial investment.



7 hours since the last update

HARDWARE:
#13 NS Neon  (up 2) 
#19 PS4 UC4 (down 3)
#23 NS Grey (up 7) 
#37 N3DS Galaxy Style (up 1)
#59 PS4 Pro (up 1) 
#75 XB1 Halo 5 + Ghost Recon Wildlands Gold Edition (up 25)
#87 NS Gra(down 16)

SOFTWARE (Pre-orders Only)**
#20 NS Super Mario Odyssey (re-entry into the top 20)*
#56 3DS Miitopia (up 8)
#68 3DS Hey! PIKMIN (up 11)

Does not affect this month: *
Software outside of the month only gets added if it's in the top 20: **

PS4: 2 in the top 100 / 1 in the top 50 / 1 in the top 20 / 0 in the top 10 / 0 in the top 5
XB1: 1 in the top 100 / 0 in the top 50 / 0 in the top 20 / 0 in the top 10 / 0 in the top 5
NIS: 3 in the top 100 / 2 in the top 50 / 1 in the top 20 / 0 in the top 10 / 0 in the top 5
3DS: in the top 100 / 1 in the top 50 / 0 in the top 20 / 0 in the top 10 / 0 in the top 5



RJ_Sizzle said:
Nuvendil said:

Personally, for me, it's not Stockholm Syndrome  (thanks for that bit of presumptuous ondescension though), it's just that I have a broader perspective on the issue.  Cutting prices this fast in my mind devalues games as a whole, especially when it is a high quality game doing it, and ultimately perpetuates the hype-machine driven front-loaded-sales state that the industry is in.  It conditions consumers to *expect* rapid drops in prices, meaning if your game isn't spectacular or more to the point hyped up by a massive advertising push, you're screwed.  Because your game won't sell enough in launch window and you can't keep your price up and bank on legs because no one will pay that full price.  Rapidly falling prices on all games in my mind is unhealthy for the games industry.  It encourages companies to double down on the already toxic preorder culture, devalues games in general in the minds of consumers, discourages taking risks on new ideas that will be dependent on long term sales rather than massive launch window sales, and encourages the already egregious advertising spending.  Nintendo can be extreme in peotecting the value of games, but look at, say, Splatoon.  In a market where games have been devalued by the aforementioned practices and consumers conditioned to expect price cuts constantly, Splatoon would have had little chance of becoming the successful new IP it was because it's very odd premise made it dependent on legs much more so than launch day sales.  Could it have been a sales success still? Probably but nowhere near as profitable and who knows where that would put us at now.  Who knows if Nintendo would have even bothered. 

Personally, in my mind, unless a game is failing in sales, I would like it's MSRP to stay $60 for 12 months.  Then drop it in tiers over an extended period.  Cutting a quality game's price in half 5 months after launch is just not healthy for the industry and while it's lovely short term for consumers, it's not worth the exchange.

That's the gaming market in general, things depreciate in time. It's generally out of a publisher's hands when a game doesn't move despite their efforts. Video games aren't currency though. Trying to artificially fix prices way beyond the point of interest doesn't help the publisher at all, especially when they should ultimately look out for their consumers.  You have to get the product out there the best you can to keep interest in your brand's output so they can figure out why it's worth buying in the first place. It seems like publishers like Nintendo have been creating this economic subculture among their fandom of scalpers and forgers due to both keeping their prices relatively high compared to other publishers, and having product in constantly limited stock.

To be fair, I do understand what you mean by devaluing the market. Case in point, the Xbox One, which is at the polar opposite of the spectrum. Microsoft had gotten so desperate to put systems in homes, they were giving away so much of their merchandise (along with third party games) at the time. It was less a move to benefit themselves, than it was just to spoil the industry for the competition. Giving away SEVERAL current gen games with the purchase of their consoles on top of the discounted price of the system, only stemmed the market to wait to buy their products in fire sales. Not just at the end of the year in holiday sales, but year round. Leading to their position at the moment.

There's got to be a balance between not being flexible with prices and giving away the house, since the interest and demand for games has a small window from release. Video games are a rapidly evolving industry, constantly looking for new angles to sell games. Sometimes, products fail, but playing keep-away with prices and hoping and wishing products get discovered at some natural impulse doesn't happen. The industry has to move forward, looking for the next product that can hopefully be successful.

At least you acknowledge the basics of what I am pointing out, but you highlighted the wrong extreme with Xbox.  Yeah, that's a devalued brand but the ultimate end of a devaluation trend, of a race to endlessly undersell is the mobile market, a market bereft of creativity, of risk, of ambition.  A market rife with the worst consumer-hostile practices.  And a large part of it is because the consumer base there has been conditioned to see games as having absolutely no intrinsic value of any kind.  You have the psychologically batter people through game design to get a penny out of most.  Only a tiny number of brands can have any success selling for even $10.  Shoot even $5.  For goodness sake MARIO has struggled selling at a premium.  And this KILLS creativity.  Because profits are so low or because you are chasing microtransaction revenue, you are either a breakout big success or you're out of business.  And so the market is dominated by me-too games and shallow experiences more concerned with concocting "gotcha!" schemes than actually advancing game design. 

And that's what rampant devaluation breeds: it renders mid-tier projects and creatively risky or new ventures financially unviable.  I mean, here's a news flash for people:  cost to put a game on a shelf is WAY lower than the $60  price.  These companies could price the game way lower and still turn profit in theory.  Call of Duty could launch for $30 and have profit well in reach.  Problem is, if you have a market where consumers expect games launch or to rapidly fall to $30, only the juggernauts would survive.  Because if you reduce revenue by that significant an amount, you have to increase volume of sales to recoup development cost.  So all your mid tier stuff?  Gone.  Dead.  Bye bye.  Because the increase in volume wouldn't be enough to offset the lost revenue.  Especially when, after passage of time the price would go from being viewed as a huge deal to just normal.  I mean keep in mind $50 to $60 was once upon a time a drop in price to from the $70 to $80 and no one talks about that being a good deal, even as inflation has made $60 easier to accumulate for your average joe. 

And look, I'm fine with prices falling over time, that's just business.  But there's a difference between timely price cuts and devaluation by racing to undersell, between looking out for consumers and cultivating a mindset where games have no intrinsic value.  One consequence no one points out in this is the indie pricing problem.  Indies, except for a VERY select few, cannot get away with pricing over $20.  Shoot, most are expected to price at $15.  Why?  Because they "don't spend as much on it."  The reason I take umbridge with that argument is simply that it implies the ONLY value a game has is what was spent on it, NOT the quality of the game.  And it doesn't seem to matter whatsoever what kind of game it is.  I've seen people balk at FAST RMX having a $20 price tag.  People balk at the $30 for Rime.  It shows the mindset that has been cultivated in the current market:  people don't view the games as having value unto themselves.  You don't pay $60 for the game, you pay $60 for the money spent to make the game and that is what I find disconcerting.  It should be the other way round.  Screw the budget, a game is worth $60 when its quality warrants the price of $60 and that's all there is to it. 

And to those who think I am paranoid, look around you.  The signs are there.  The obsession with preorders, the integration of micro-transactions in full price games, the absolute focus on launch week sales, the MASSIVE hype machines pushing all of this, all these are actions companies are taking as the window for making full price sale revenue shrinks more and more.  And we also see companies like Ubisoft, where the devaluation is probably the most advanced with a software publisher's brand, pulling all of these stunts as well as starting to stagnate in creativity and ambition, using the same basic design document for almost every game out of fear of missing those all-important launch window sales.  Companies are feeling the squeeze from this ever shrinking window of opportunity and they still continue to shrink it. 

And like I said, Nintendo is an extremist in this and yes, I feel a middle ground is best, but they do have the right of it:  big sellers hailed as high quality games should *hold* their value longer.  Low quality games or games not gaining traction should fall in price faster.  That cultivatese the right mindset, that good games are worth something because tehy are of good quality.  That's why I say big sellers that are hailed as great by consumer and critic should hold their price for 8 to 12 months then drop to $40 for say 6 months and then drop to something like $30 and then go down or stay stable depending on sales.  Games with weaker sales would obviously not hold as long as these but my point is that rapidly lowering the price of high quality sales successes is an unhealthy practice.  And obviously, periodic sales are different. 

And if people wonder why I care about "Nintendo's wallet" well for one, it's not Nintendo's wallet I care about the whole industry's health.  And I care because the health of the industry corelates directly with the quality and quantity of games we get.  A lot of people have a "screw them, got mine" attitude and that's all well and good for your immediate gratification but what about the future?  That's my concern.  Instilling a concept of intrinsic value in the games themselves is a good thing. 

 

Oh and just to address a personal pet peeve: Nintendo does not artificially supply constrain everything.  In fact, they have done this so very few times.  The Switch is not artificially supply constrained.  This is factually, demonstrably incorrect.  The NAND component shortage is a documented fact.  Denying it as an explanation for the shortages is as silly as denying gravity as an explanation for why stuff falls.  The Wii was conservative in initial shipment but NIntendo rapidly increased production as much as possible, hence why it broke sales records.  The only possible examples are the NES Mini and Amiibo which are collectibles/limited time products BY THEIR NATURE.  It's like railing against Sony for artificially restriciting supply of the gold PS4.

And as for the price hold of their products factoring into the desire for people to resell their products...well yeah.  But frankly, if no one is even passingly interested in reselling your product for profit, you might want to give your business a solid look cause that means your product has no value.  Again, not defending the length of time Nintendo holds their game prices, but the idea that your product having intrinsic value in the minds of consumers is "bad" is just silly.  And just as a side not, Nintendo virtually NEVER undersupplies a game.  Shoot, I can find tons of copies of every Nintendo published Switch game out and about right now.  So their game price holding does really nothing to effect the scalper nonsense.

 

But yeah, TL;DR:  I want a healthy and stable industry.  That's good for everyone long term.  Sacrificing that for a brief window of good deals is just not worth the damage. 



3DS is doing pretty good  considering that the Switch is a thing now.



Nuvendil said:
RJ_Sizzle said:

That's the gaming market in general, things depreciate in time. It's generally out of a publisher's hands when a game doesn't move despite their efforts. Video games aren't currency though. Trying to artificially fix prices way beyond the point of interest doesn't help the publisher at all, especially when they should ultimately look out for their consumers.  You have to get the product out there the best you can to keep interest in your brand's output so they can figure out why it's worth buying in the first place. It seems like publishers like Nintendo have been creating this economic subculture among their fandom of scalpers and forgers due to both keeping their prices relatively high compared to other publishers, and having product in constantly limited stock.

To be fair, I do understand what you mean by devaluing the market. Case in point, the Xbox One, which is at the polar opposite of the spectrum. Microsoft had gotten so desperate to put systems in homes, they were giving away so much of their merchandise (along with third party games) at the time. It was less a move to benefit themselves, than it was just to spoil the industry for the competition. Giving away SEVERAL current gen games with the purchase of their consoles on top of the discounted price of the system, only stemmed the market to wait to buy their products in fire sales. Not just at the end of the year in holiday sales, but year round. Leading to their position at the moment.

There's got to be a balance between not being flexible with prices and giving away the house, since the interest and demand for games has a small window from release. Video games are a rapidly evolving industry, constantly looking for new angles to sell games. Sometimes, products fail, but playing keep-away with prices and hoping and wishing products get discovered at some natural impulse doesn't happen. The industry has to move forward, looking for the next product that can hopefully be successful.

At least you acknowledge the basics of what I am pointing out, but you highlighted the wrong extreme with Xbox.  Yeah, that's a devalued brand but the ultimate end of a devaluation trend, of a race to endlessly undersell is the mobile market, a market bereft of creativity, of risk, of ambition.  A market rife with the worst consumer-hostile practices.  And a large part of it is because the consumer base there has been conditioned to see games as having absolutely no intrinsic value of any kind.  You have the psychologically batter people through game design to get a penny out of most.  Only a tiny number of brands can have any success selling for even $10.  Shoot even $5.  For goodness sake MARIO has struggled selling at a premium.  And this KILLS creativity.  Because profits are so low or because you are chasing microtransaction revenue, you are either a breakout big success or you're out of business.  And so the market is dominated by me-too games and shallow experiences more concerned with concocting "gotcha!" schemes than actually advancing game design. 

And that's what rampant devaluation breeds: it renders mid-tier projects and creatively risky or new ventures financially unviable.  I mean, here's a news flash for people:  cost to put a game on a shelf is WAY lower than the $60  price.  These companies could price the game way lower and still turn profit in theory.  Call of Duty could launch for $30 and have profit well in reach.  Problem is, if you have a market where consumers expect games launch or to rapidly fall to $30, only the juggernauts would survive.  Because if you reduce revenue by that significant an amount, you have to increase volume of sales to recoup development cost.  So all your mid tier stuff?  Gone.  Dead.  Bye bye.  Because the increase in volume wouldn't be enough to offset the lost revenue.  Especially when, after passage of time the price would go from being viewed as a huge deal to just normal.  I mean keep in mind $50 to $60 was once upon a time a drop in price to from the $70 to $80 and no one talks about that being a good deal, even as inflation has made $60 easier to accumulate for your average joe. 

And look, I'm fine with prices falling over time, that's just business.  But there's a difference between timely price cuts and devaluation by racing to undersell, between looking out for consumers and cultivating a mindset where games have no intrinsic value.  One consequence no one points out in this is the indie pricing problem.  Indies, except for a VERY select few, cannot get away with pricing over $20.  Shoot, most are expected to price at $15.  Why?  Because they "don't spend as much on it."  The reason I take umbridge with that argument is simply that it implies the ONLY value a game has is what was spent on it, NOT the quality of the game.  And it doesn't seem to matter whatsoever what kind of game it is.  I've seen people balk at FAST RMX having a $20 price tag.  People balk at the $30 for Rime.  It shows the mindset that has been cultivated in the current market:  people don't view the games as having value unto themselves.  You don't pay $60 for the game, you pay $60 for the money spent to make the game and that is what I find disconcerting.  It should be the other way round.  Screw the budget, a game is worth $60 when its quality warrants the price of $60 and that's all there is to it. 

And to those who think I am paranoid, look around you.  The signs are there.  The obsession with preorders, the integration of micro-transactions in full price games, the absolute focus on launch week sales, the MASSIVE hype machines pushing all of this, all these are actions companies are taking as the window for making full price sale revenue shrinks more and more.  And we also see companies like Ubisoft, where the devaluation is probably the most advanced with a software publisher's brand, pulling all of these stunts as well as starting to stagnate in creativity and ambition, using the same basic design document for almost every game out of fear of missing those all-important launch window sales.  Companies are feeling the squeeze from this ever shrinking window of opportunity and they still continue to shrink it. 

And like I said, Nintendo is an extremist in this and yes, I feel a middle ground is best, but they do have the right of it:  big sellers hailed as high quality games should *hold* their value longer.  Low quality games or games not gaining traction should fall in price faster.  That cultivatese the right mindset, that good games are worth something because tehy are of good quality.  That's why I say big sellers that are hailed as great by consumer and critic should hold their price for 8 to 12 months then drop to $40 for say 6 months and then drop to something like $30 and then go down or stay stable depending on sales.  Games with weaker sales would obviously not hold as long as these but my point is that rapidly lowering the price of high quality sales successes is an unhealthy practice.  And obviously, periodic sales are different. 

And if people wonder why I care about "Nintendo's wallet" well for one, it's not Nintendo's wallet I care about the whole industry's health.  And I care because the health of the industry corelates directly with the quality and quantity of games we get.  A lot of people have a "screw them, got mine" attitude and that's all well and good for your immediate gratification but what about the future?  That's my concern.  Instilling a concept of intrinsic value in the games themselves is a good thing. 

 

Oh and just to address a personal pet peeve: Nintendo does not artificially supply constrain everything.  In fact, they have done this so very few times.  The Switch is not artificially supply constrained.  This is factually, demonstrably incorrect.  The NAND component shortage is a documented fact.  Denying it as an explanation for the shortages is as silly as denying gravity as an explanation for why stuff falls.  The Wii was conservative in initial shipment but NIntendo rapidly increased production as much as possible, hence why it broke sales records.  The only possible examples are the NES Mini and Amiibo which are collectibles/limited time products BY THEIR NATURE.  It's like railing against Sony for artificially restriciting supply of the gold PS4.

And as for the price hold of their products factoring into the desire for people to resell their products...well yeah.  But frankly, if no one is even passingly interested in reselling your product for profit, you might want to give your business a solid look cause that means your product has no value.  Again, not defending the length of time Nintendo holds their game prices, but the idea that your product having intrinsic value in the minds of consumers is "bad" is just silly.  And just as a side not, Nintendo virtually NEVER undersupplies a game.  Shoot, I can find tons of copies of every Nintendo published Switch game out and about right now.  So their game price holding does really nothing to effect the scalper nonsense.

 

But yeah, TL;DR:  I want a healthy and stable industry.  That's good for everyone long term.  Sacrificing that for a brief window of good deals is just not worth the damage. 

The pricing of games isn't the scapegoat for killing creativity in gaming. There's a number of factors that make games poor. Games with massive budgets having poor management, rushing a deadline... or, just plain not having a good idea etc. There's no magic number or price that's set to make a game better. At least there are people with not much money at all coming up making games in the indie scene. The mobile comparison is kind of different to the console market in that people still expect to get enough of a product at face value with their purchase, while mobile seems to be strictly leaning on GaaS for revenue. Microtransaction revenue is still revenue. Note the reason why NPD has shifted to a revenue focus now instead of just physical.

You have to be vigilant and feel out the playing field. They just have to feel out the market. Naturally, if people are balking at paying the price for a certain type of game, it's on the publisher/dev to decide if they want to get their product out there. Sometimes, that means a compromise. That's the market telling you what they expect. Being stubborn isn't going to do them favors. 

Sometimes games are great, but still won't appeal to the masses in general. A game having a $60 dollar price tag longer whether good or bad doesn't automatically give it any more value than what's in the eye of the beholder. There's a difference in undercutting just to hurt the next guy, and giving out deals to entice more people to give your product a chance. And that's okay. One of the best games I played this year, Titanfall 2 I got at a discounted price, and I'm glad I was able to, since staying at a higher price point would have had me second guessing a purchase. 

The market is constantly changing, and publishers have to adapt. It's not up to the consumer to nurture them through thick and thin. Being a game creator is a high-risk industry, even if you go the safe route, nothing is guaranteed. However, if a game is great, I think it deserves the chance to be in more hands via a price drop. I don't want an industry that's going to stagnate because they create a product, and expect to sell through some synergy that's not coming because it's just occupying shelf space. Games should remain fun for the customers, if they create a good product, then that should be the basis alone for their making profit, not creating a bubble economy for consumers that want to turn gaming into something like the wine industry. 

Pre-order trends happen since there's a lot of gamers that can't hold their horses. And that's too bad. I wish gamers would have stronger impulses than to give in to pre-order culture and wait until some decent word of mouth to hop head first into a game.

Games will always have a future. Sony pricing Horizon temporarily at 35 bucks isn't going to be the end of the world. I don't see everything collapsing yet. These companies should know the threshold before creating games becomes unsustainable. I don't see AAA games going to a dollar anytime soon. But there's nothing wrong with giving the consumer the occasional break to open the door for them to have access to a game. 

Though I don't really agree about Nintendo holding back stock. The well-documented fact is really just a PR statement from Nintendo. We see Nintendo has increased their stock for the Switch with the release of Splatoon 2, and I doubt these consoles are fresh out the oven. There's a strategy to holding back stock. Though I'm sure Nintendo wants to get systems out there the best they can, it's probably a little better in their eyes to make the public hungry than to pull an MS and oversaturate the market with them just yet. Also, there's no good reason they couldn't have made enough NES minis for people who want them. Now there are knockoffs floating around the market, and that didn't have to happen.

If there's anything they could be doing, Nintendo could have been preventing their IP from being infringed upon just by making things readily available for their consumers. But, I guess I don't really much else to say on this topic. Competitive pricing is good, price dumping to flush out competition is bad. For gaming outside of the non-Nintendo sphere, I can't knock getting a deal.