Simbabbad said:

You literally finish this the day you start it (unless you spread your gaming sessions).

Sounds like almost every big budget, 6-8 hour long action/adventure game that releases nowadays. Except they release at $60.

I dunno, at least it's probably as long as God of War 3. I don't think they should have released it at $60, but then, I bought it for $30, which seems about right. Whether you feel the production values add (or detract) from the game or not, no way you would see a game with these production values for much cheaper than $30.

Really?! I'd probably say MadWorld. Anyway I'm definitely not saying it should have been full retail, but it's a bit above typical downloadable. This is something I've been thinking about a bit lately, how one day that line will disappear and we will see more games at $20-$30 from the start.

THQ has said that they would actually like to be able to sell their games, even their big games, at $40 from day one because they saw a huge increase in sales once their games hit that price point. $60 for games is too expensive, and I think it's just the publishers trying to get more profit, and I've always thought that $50 is just right for games, which is why I like how Nintendo is pricing Wii games like that, but if THQ wants to sell their console games at $40 I'm certainly not going to complain, esp. if other publishers follow suit.

In fact I don't think a lot of publishers realize that they very well could sell more copies of something and make more profit by selling something a little cheaper, because they are so focused on selling high and getting tons of money. Take the CoD DLC for example; CoD4 and WaW's map packs were only $10, but then because MW2 was so successful Activision gauged the price up to $15, and I'm willing to bet that they'd sell more map packs if they had released them at only $10, and definitely more for only $5, but I guess that's just wishful thinking. In fact I'd like to see the sales numbers for CoD4's map pack, and MW2's first map pack to compare.

Not sure if the $40 strategy worked that well for Trauma Team, Enslaved or Maijin and the Forbidden Kingdom. It seems to me that, no matter how low the launch price is, gamers are always willing to wait for lower.

As for THQ, I think they said that specifically about some ATV game they were making, and they very openly said that it wouldn't have as much content as a $60 release, but they'd make back the difference through DLC. Hardly preferable, IMO.

edit - Yeah...

$60 is too much for games. I rarely buy a PS3 game on release date.

I'm also feeling like $40 is too much for a handheld game, and I'll probably start doing a lot of waiting for 3DS games as well.

@Pandareus

Those aren't exactly what I'd call big, huge blockbuster games though. I'm talking about every single new, non-budget title, so Call of Duty launches at $40, God of War launches at $40, Mario launches at $40, etc.

OK so I started playing it; pretty good so far, I hate missing stuff though which is why I still wish it had been a proper 3rd person game, and allowed you to freely roam about.

These "fork in the road" places, what's the deal with them? Can I come back to them later sometimes, do they lead to alternate paths I'll never see unless I play again and go the opposite way, do they make different endings, etc.?

Any tips on which should be my four weapons?

@Brick

That's the thing: that THQ guy never said they'd put out big, huge blockbuster games at $40, though. He said they'd release games with deliberately less content at $40 to "catch" as many people as possible, and then distribute more content/make more profit through DLC.

The big blockbusters do need their $60 price tag to be profitable. And of course there are millions of people who buy these big blockbusters on release day (or else they wouldn't be blockbusters), so exactly what do companies have to gain from slashing their prices by $20?

@Brick

They just lead to alternate paths, which you can go back too if you replay the chapter.

They do not give alternate endings as far as I know. Just different experiences or extras to collect. (at least I think!)

Use the four weapons that you are comfortable with or are upgraded the most. Personally I liked the flamethrower, lightning cutter (I think it is called that!), and the "shotgun" type weapon. (don't know its name)

@Pandareus

Well OK, but I think we can all agree that $60 is too much for games, and at this point, I think it is just the publishers hiking the price up to make more money, and I would love to see games go back down to just $50. $50 seems like that sweet spot for me; not too low, but not too high either.

The problem is $60 isn't too much for games based on current development costs. You pretty much need to sell well over a million copies just to break even nowadays.

What we need to see is more publishers willing to make awesome games without insane development costs. And more gamers willing to buy them.

@Zero

I'm so long out of the loop...

What's a decent salary for a game developer these days?

How big of a player is middleware these days?

Are there any figures for how well Steam/Valve does?

@Zero

You don't need to sell over a million to turn a profit though, people just have that stuck in their minds for some reason (maybe because 1 000 000 is that number we associate with being rich or something, I don't know). Many games don't sell one million copies, but are still successful, and think about it the other way around, imagine a big blockbuster game like Call of Duty, and imagine if it only sold one million copies across the board; it would be a huge failure because of all the development costs, and advertising that goes into every iteration.

I still think that more copies would be sold if the price was lowered by $10, and I'm not entirely buying that development costs are still so high; the excuse was being made at the beginning of the generation that games are being increased by $10 because of the leap in graphical fidelity, but now with even downloadable-only games coming out that look almost as good as full retail games, that excuse doesn't really hold any water anymore.

I sure hope that whenever Nintendo rolls out the Wii's successor, they stay with the $50 price point for its games.

Finally played a couple levels, and I have to say... *snore*

@Brick Well, many developers have said that you do need to sell over a million. These are developers trying to make "big budget" HD games, but for the most part... that is the only kind of HD game that puts up numbers at all. I'm not sure if the PS3/360 could do $50 and still have the same type of games.

@Simbabbad

I know that. I'm just hoping that by next gen, development costs will have gone down, even with the new hardware (it's going to be years from now, and the next jump probably won't be so huge anyways), and that games, at least on Nintendo's console, will be $50. Unlikely? Maybe, but a man can dream can't he...

@Simbabbad
Well aren't the 3DS games gonna be more expensive? Either way. We want great tech, we gotta pay for great tech. It should surprise noone. Now that's not to say a $70 HD game is better (or worth more from a gameplay standpoint) than something like Secret Of Mana or FF6 but games were pretty expensive around that time too, if not...more so?

I mean, I remember N64 games regularly going for around 70-80 dollars, and sometimes 90. I for one and pleased with game prices of today. Even IF games were $100 a pop I'd still be happy. I love my gaming and I'll happily pay any price for someone I love so dearly.

I think the N64 was the most expensive. I remember those games costing a serious arm and a leg. Again, the most expensive game I ever bought was Shadows Of The Empire for $114 (including tax). Price tag was around $88 or something from Toys R Us.

Yep. I'm fine with 50-60 dollar games. Especially when they're as jam packed with great content and replayability like Oblivion, Dead Space, etc.

I'm kind of ok with $60 games, only because it's a completely unsustainable model longterm and you can find the games for so much cheaper than that very early on, if not launch day.