17 réponses à ce sujet

[ShadowLordXII]

Dear Bioware,

If this game must have a Day One DLC deal, make sure that it only features aestetics that we don't need like weapons and armor.

Do Not.

DO NOT.

Please, do not take a companion and related missions out of the core product to put them into a seperate DLC pack that's released right alongside the main game.  Make up whatever excuse that you want, if the resources are completed at the same time as the game, it should be included in the game.

The problem with Day One DLC deals in games like DA2 and ME3 was that we were being forced to pay an additional fee to essentially fill in a hole in your roster.  The ME3 deal is especially worst because of it's limited roster and the fact that you believed that a prothean squadmate wouldn't be something a ME fan would want.

With DA: O and ME2, it was alright because the character dlc's were free with new copies. Some will debate the overtone of punishing customers for buying used copies, but for what we got, it was decent. Especially since the code still worked even after the game's price dropped.

I know that the market is tough right now and you want DA: I to make a profit. You may have a passion for game development, but it's a business at the end of the day and a business needs to make money.

However, repeating the mistake of DA2 and ME3 regarding Day One DLC may cause a loss in profits. A lot of fans are already ticked off about those two games and having to shelve out more money to fill up a hole in their party after already paying full price for what could was marketed as a free game.  So please! If you must have a Day One DLC pack, make sure that it only features aesthitics that no one would honestly care about. Basically cool armor or cool weapons, somewhat in the same vein as pre-order stuff.

But an actual fully developed companion?

If you have to do that, just go the Shale route and provide a passcode for people who buy a new copy. But there is no need to charge money for something that should already be part of the core game. I'm not just saying this as a gamer who doesn't want to pay more money than I feel that I should, but also as an objective observer who sees how a marketing technique is causing more damage then good.  You're better off abandoning it altogether, but if you have to keep, find a way to lessen the damage so that you don't ignite remnant bad feelings.

Just offering helpful advice. If you've already heard this then feel free to ignore it.

Signed, An Excited yet Observant Fan

PS:  Can we have a Warden Background for the Inquisitor?

[Allan Schumacher]

after all, these play-and-burn players you talk about, while not rare, are hardly indicative of the average gamer's time frame, let alone the majority

What is the average gamer's time frame? (And if it's different than the majority's, what is the majority's too)

[Allan Schumacher]

The average gamer doesn't finish the game, so I can't imagine it takes them more than a week to move on to something else.

That's typically been my assumption, but in most cases I'm just making an assumption myself.

I'd consider a game like Skyrim to be a very successful game, but Steam's achievement rates still surprised me. And these numbers haven't really changed since I last looked at them over a year ago now, so I couldn't even conclude that it's just people buying the game on Steam sales (the game has never been a very cheap game though, since I have it on my Wishlist and will likely pick it up once it goes below $20).

10.3% of the Steam gamers (I am making the assumption that the numbers don't differ much compared to consoles. I could make cases for why they could be higher OR lower).

16.5% never reach level 5.
23.2% never reach level 10.

Now, I don't know how long it takes to get to level 25, but I am getting the impression it's a bit of a decent time investment, and it's here where I start to go "Okay, people may have played this game for some time" as it's up at 59.2%. But less than half get a skill up to 100 (Max I assume - granted maybe most spread their points around so it's less reliable of a metric). A mere 33.7% complete 10 sidequests. (!!) That number was very surprising for me, as if it's like Oblivion or Morrowind, finding and doing side quests is pretty common.

The numbers start to get pretty low, though I have zero clue how much time it takes to get these types of achievements. I'm assuming level 50 is max, which is 22.4% and I would wager is a pretty good time investment.

[Allan Schumacher]

It's off topic, so following up via PM.

[Allan Schumacher]

As I've said in this thread multiple times, perception is reality.

As a scientist, I have seen perception get smashed repeatedly, over and over again by empiricism. Reality is reality, and what people may think they see is routinely shown otherwise. Whether or not they choose to believe it is another thing. And what people say and how they behave is often not in alignment.

People may feel cheated, but if that's the case you send contrary messaging if you proclaim to dislike something but then pay full price for it. If your declaration of "perception is reality," what these actions could make me perceive is that, while you may be outspoken about it, fundamentally you're okay with it because you were still willing to pay for it... it's just a standard circumstance of a consumer saying "Hey, I'd like this to be cheaper." Is this perception invalid? If so, then is perception still reality, because that's the perception a lot of people have. It then leads to the perception of entitlement by those that feel the complaining is unjustified. I know the idea of people saying you're entitled makes you upset, but if perception is reality... then isn't that the cross you have to bear then, and any protestations you make to that claim not really relevant? Because what I am seeing is that our perceptions are not in alignment. One of them must not be true. You can say that the larger aggregate has more weight, but I would still be skeptical that, if people don't adjust their purchasing decisions that the results they hope for would effectively be achieved. Once the reality of "we're not purchasing this stuff any more" is achieved, then the impetus of changes is put on you.

Though the cynic in me does point out that early you point out that gamers are irrational and that businesses need to work around that irrationality, to which I could say that paid day-one DLC may do just that. People protest, yet still purchase... it's irrational.

Well, I'd first off like to say it would be extremely difficult to find and calculate an average, since it would require tracking when a new game was purchased and when it was sold by the same individual, which would be problematic even if they bought and sold it through the same retailer. I am imagine GameStops reward program could offer insight, but it would only be a snapshot.

Sorry I misunderstood, in that I was looking more at just the "time spent in game" rather than "time until resale." Still, from everything I have heard shows that there is a very strong inverse correlation to time after launch, and DLC attach rate. I believe that From Ashes is our best selling DLC to date.


In conclusion, I will summarize by pointing out that logic is also something that gets smashed by empiricism repeatedly. Making a logical assertion, many of which I would say are even plausible, does not mean that it's actually the way reality is. We have a bias to overstate our own analysis because, frankly, we have ego and if we actually felt the world behaved in a different way, we'd present that logical construct instead of another. Simply because something makes logical sense, and is in alignment with the way we wish to perceive the world, doesn't mean that that is the way the world actually is. And I know of an MMO where the rate of MTX purchasing is very strongly correlated to the amount of complaining said user does about MTX. (The ones who complain the most, buy the most MTX... probably because they're more likely to actually be interested in said MTX, otherwise they wouldn't care and wouldn't complain).

[Allan Schumacher]

New Game sales, of which one copy sold generates as much revenue as six D1DLC downloads)?

Don't forget the differences in profit margin between the two products however.


Having said that (since I'm evidently splitting my post somewhat), you are correct that it may not be worth gamer goodwill. I don't know this (I don't think anyone really does). It could very well be short term gain at long term cost, which ultimately isn't worth it, and I know it's not something we're oblivious to.

A lot of the DLC stuff is frankly, trials. If we don't try it, we won't really know how it reacts. If the world went "This seems perfectly fair and reasonable" then we'd have been silly to never try it. But you run into that muddy issue of "some people don't like it. And some people may actually stop buying our stuff. But in the long run, if we make up that loss with the increased DLC sales, should we do it?" Crystal balls come in handy here, but alas I dropped mine.

You are correct that DLC is in large ways risk mitigation. It's risk mitigation for the entire project even. But it's easy to simply say "If you released it two weeks later, it'd be better." Maybe we just need to actually try it (please people don't take this post as some sort of hint to our DLC policy for DAI). Although there's uncertainty. If it DOESN'T work, how much will that cost us? If it's close or just a little bit, well then that's probably okay. If we do see significant decline, well then that is teh suck. Assuming we can control for variables such as quality.... so the thing continues to be messy.


My personal preference? Free for new purchases. I am pretty sure Stone Prisoner was actually still a good seller in and of itself (I think we were even able to confirm that some pirates bought it!), and has much, MUCH better optics. I don't know the numbers, but I would hope that (assuming it isn't superior) it's not too far off the paid DLC, and I can only hope that in the long run it pays off with better customer loyalty (since this is more likely a long term benefit, rather than a short term one).

[Allan Schumacher]

I'm also not at all clear how keeping people out of the game store for another day is an advantage. What's the mechanism there?

I think by keeping a "reseller" out of the store for a day, means that for one more day the supply of used games is lower, and as such may lead to increased new game sales over used sales.

[Allan Schumacher]

If you guys start worrying about the "optics," don't you end up with some pretty ludicrous incentives? Such as sending the DLC team on vacation before the release date so you don't accidentally have the first DLC go gold too early?

I'll admit I'm not entirely sure where this is going. My initial reaction was "he's making a silly post" but I didn't want to make a flippant remark in return because I'm not confident I read this correctly...

[Allan Schumacher]

As I said in an earlier post, many people perceive Paid D1DLC to be a greedy cash grab. The reality of that is not important. Because that person will believe it. They will complain about it - to the company, but also to their friends and peers (which is infinitely more damaging). And it will require the parent company to address those concerns as if they are actually greedy and needing to defend themselves, while also losing sales/revenue because of it.

Many people perceive it as okay, and some have even said 'Keep doing it.'

There's also the perception from our end. "People say they don't like it, yet they keep buying it.... How much confidence is there that this behaviour may change?"

As a PC Gamer, there was a LOT of resistance to PC games (especially AAA ones) moving to $60, and I remember a lot of outrage at a comment Bobby Kotick made about how he'd like to sell all PC games at $60. And here we are at a state where PC games typically retail for $60, and there's not nearly as much of a peep about it now. Reference

So on some level, is the level of outrage for Day One DLC something that is typical of most price increases, and that overtime the consumer base may be more accepting?



Off topic but, do you have a reference for this claim:

This brings to mind an off-topic thought about the Soviet Space program in the 60's and 70's. the program itself was plagued by cost, engineering and logistical problems, but the Soviet government kept the entire program itself under incredibly tight informational wraps, that nothing was leaked until the event was at full fruition. Soviet citizens would suddenly, out of nowhere, hear that Sputnik was launched or they had put a man into orbit, giving the appearance of the innovations simply popping up out of the ground due to the Soviet government's brilliant initiative, when, in reality, the program suffered from many delays, setbacks and failures that its people (and the world) were simply completely not aware of.

This seemingly infallible Soviet space program, however, spurned the U.S. to take very aggressive action with its own Space Program, seeing them being left in the dust by the supernatural success and speed of the Soviets. Again... the reality was not important for the vast majority of people, as everyone except a select few were operating under the same assumption. When that happens, logic and empiricism often take a backseat to perception.

I'm not able to find any information about costs of the Soviet Space Program, but was able to find that both the US and Soviet Union announced (with 4 days of each other) that they planned to put satellites in space, and that the US simply lost and didn't like that the Soviet Union (after initial hesitation) was using it as propaganda. I was also able to find information that the American's announcing their intent allowed Korolyov to convince Khrushchev that they should attempt to beat the Americans into space.

I'm unaware of how tightly "under wraps" either space program was both to each other as well as to their own nations, as well as any interpretations that the Americans felt the Soviet space program was "infallible" or simply that they lost (since they had announced their intentions first).

[Allan Schumacher]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

My only point out here would be that other developers have released DLC in Week 2/3 and have seen negligible amount of flak for if, at least in comparison to the Day One content (an example could be Borderlands 2). Obviously, anyone familiar with the industry conversation would say "well, they clearly were working on the DLC during production and could have easily ramped up to have it released on Day One... that won't fool anyone." But, apparently, it does.

Speculation.  You don't know this.  It may just as well only be seen as palatable because the alternative is more ostensible "milking."  Consumers (video games or otherwise) never have a shortage of hypotheticals that they can throw out, and it's entirely possible that Borderlands 2 is seen as acceptable because people can say "At least it's not the Day One stuff like EA does."  Would it have still been as much of a non-issue if there wasn't a worse example to compare with?

Are fans going to be understanding if they still find assets embedded into the base disc, even with week 2/3 DLC?  Or is the issue that we should really just spend more effort

But again, for the 400,000-500,000 who bought the From Ashes DLC on Day One, revenue in the amount of $4-5 million was gained. While nothing to sneeze at, that is a drop in the bucket of the full sales revenue (barely over 1% for ME3's book of business). Is 1% worth a PR disaster? Even with 100% margins, I can't imagine it being so.

How much was sold on Day 2?  On Day 3?  How much do we make per unit sale of the retail box?  How many preorders were made because it could get you the DLC?  All for an unquantifiable cost of what the "PR disaster" actually costs.  The economics are not as simple as you paint it out to be.

I understand that you don't know until you try, as well, but I would think that market research might be done beforehand to see how things like the perception of on-disc content that ties directly into the Day One DLC might cause consumer negativity, but I don't want to assume anything about internal policy making or research on the behalf of Bioware/EA (not sure if that would be more of a corporate function or they prefer/allow individual developers to collect and analyze their own data).

Just keep in mind that market research told us we should use the dialogue wheel for DA2.  How much should we rely on market research, in your opinion?

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 01 août 2013 - 07:45 .

[Allan Schumacher]

AlanC9 wrote...

My point was that if The Stone Prisoner has good optics and From Ashes does not, and the better optics make up for the lost immediate sales....... then don't you have an incentive to hold the first DLC for a couple of weeks even if it's ready?

Could be, yes.  It might even be superior to do it that way.  I'm simply sharing what I, as a gamer, prefer.  In large part because for most games it's not uncommon for me to be onto something else by week 2/3.

Well, that's the thing. Some folks wanted BG3. They didn't get BG3.
Telling them that NWN wasn't ever supposed to be BG3 didn't help.

This is an interesting point, because at some point I think we have to acknowledge that some people just have expectations that don't align, and there's probably not much we can do about that.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 01 août 2013 - 07:45 .

[Allan Schumacher]

Pre-orders could not "get you the DLC" (unless you got the collector's edition; what a mistake that turned out to be). From Ashes was not first-sale DLC.

To be honest, I'm a bit surprised Sebastian doesn't get brought up more often (I think it's a credit to just how poorly DA2 was received; nobody even cares?). I think he exists entirely on the disc (his download is something like 30MB total, or maybe even less).

I apologize. Collectors Editions.

You're not seriously trying to defend NWN, are you?

No. I'm saying that the people that were upset because it wasn't BG3 may have just been expecting something that NWN was never intended to be. Heck, had BioWare actually made BG3, I wouldn't be surprised if some would have still had unreasonable expectations for it.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 01 août 2013 - 07:55 .

[Allan Schumacher]

What I would like to see is the game being sold for $70 straight up, with Javik's content, and to have seen the reaction there.

[Allan Schumacher]

Yes but for some (completely baffling to me) reason, you all get the shaft

[Allan Schumacher]

devSin wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

What I would like to see is the game being sold for $70 straight up, with Javik's content, and to have seen the reaction there.

To what end? I'm not sure how raising the price of the game is really relevant to this argument.

Either Javik's part of the game or he's not. Unless you're suggesting that he alone is worth some 15% the overall cost.

Because I'm curious if people react differently if it's $60 +$10 compared to just straight up selling the game "complete" but for $70.

[Allan Schumacher]

Peter Moore said that 40% attachment rate I quoted was for all of Week 1. We can assume a large amount of those were true Day One, but even if the full amount was lost during that first with a Week 2 DLC launch, that would only be 40% of the 1 million+ units of ME3 moved during the first week, equalling roughly 400,000 to 500,000 units, since we don't know the details of that "+" as well as Peter Moore.

How about increase in collectors edition sales.

"But again, for the 400,000-500,000 who bought the From Ashes DLC on Day One, revenue in the amount of $4-5 million was gained. While nothing to sneeze at, that is a drop in the bucket of the full sales revenue (barely over 1% for ME3's book of business). Is 1% worth a PR disaster? Even with 100% margins, I can't imagine it being so."

I think this is the problem.

You can't imagine it being so, therefore it can't be. And with that it becomes a hell of a conversation non-starter, because if you can't imagine it being so, you'll continue to drag up hypotheticals like how much Martin and Sheen and Seth Green won't want to be a part of us going forward (sorry, I discount this one as being wholly implausible).

Suggested reading, however: The Science of Why We Don't Believe in Science.

You're clearly a smart guy Jimmy, but it's interesting that the smarter people tend to be better capable of rationalizing reasons to prevent cognitive dissonance. And it's interesting because your innate response upon reading this article will be that I am doing the same (which I may very well be - I'll openly admit I have literally done this in other interactions in my entire time online, or even with friends, and not just because of playing Devil's Advocate but because I was obstinate and didn't want to concede I could be wrong).

I can, however, acknowledge that Day One DLCs may not be the best thing for BioWare/EA going forward, as I don't have perfect information. Is it possible that they may be, however?


Lets look at some problems with your earlier statements.

You compared the gross of the whole project to the gross of the DLC, while failing to account for the difference in markup. You know better than this, but we also both know that the greater you can separate the values, the more convincing the argument appears. You've since even compared it against *the entire trilogy* worth of sales, which just starts to come across as rather silly.

A breakdown:
A million units in first week, at $60.

At 10% profit, the DLC represents 67% of the profit of the base game at that time.
At 20% profit, the DLC represents 33% of the profit of the base game at that time.
At 30% profit, the DLC represents 22%...
At 40% profit, the DLC represents 17%.
At 50% profit, the DLC represents 13%.
And so on.

Now, can you imagine that a 13% - 67% increase in the numbers that affect the bottom line may be perceived as a good thing? Or is that still just not possible?


Factors overlooked:
Collectors edition purchases. How many people bought collectors editions that would not have? Rather than asking "Do you think it is significant" (because I know the answer to that), I'll ask "Do you think it could be significant."

Getting the same amount of money sooner is always better than getting the same amount of money later. It is *trivial* to see this across gaming (and the market in general), as stuff like Day One DLC for *free* with a preorder is very, very, VERY common. I actually preorder more now (although still infrequently) than I did when preordering was necessary to ensure a copy, because I literally get more value for my money by doing so. If I expect to buy a game at release (i.e. EU4, Rome 2, and possibly Saints Row 4), and it has a preorder incentive, I usually preorder it. This gives them less overall on the bottom line, but gives them the money sooner. There are a lot of advantages for providing a preorder incentive, even if it means "giving stuff away." It's one thing to say that From Ashes is bad long term, which is a position I can certainly see. But in the short term, it's pretty clear that many businesses would rather take less money that is guaranteed sooner, rather than wait and possibly make more money.

Press: How true is the old adage "there's no such thing as bad press?" (I actually don't know, but I know some believe it). This may apply more to the ending itself than the DLC, but there are large articles about the DLC. Yes, maybe Erik Kain's article whipped people into a furor and maybe even contributed to less sales. How many people did it go "I wonder what the big deal is" or for some ended up being "Oh man there's some extra content already available?" because they didn't actually know about it. Is it possible that despite the outrage, it may have been mitigated enough by the exposure?


The problems with "arguing to win:" You refuse to point out potential benefits, nor concede that your hypotheticals may not only be incorrect - but could even be opposite.. You either come across as not knowing about those potential benefits, or give the impression of intentionally withholding them. Neither of these strengthen the perception of your argument, especially when you use such strong statements as how you can imagine how it's better.

Saying you can't imagine it gives the perception that you're being myopic in your focus and possibly just being unreasonable.
Saying you think it's not the best thing for the company going forward, however, would actually put you in alignment with my own feelings.


Which perception of you would you like me to have as reality? How does my perception of you and your arguments change based on prior interactions with you, and how will those perceptions alter how much I read into your future posts? You'll have to weight the advantages of whether or not it's worth it.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 01 août 2013 - 09:00 .

[Allan Schumacher]

I don't think it's particularly useful to conflate promotional or first-sale offers (which incentivize retail purchases, as opposed to rentals or used purchases), and Day One DLC, which is what is being discussed here.

When discussing whether or not it's "worth it" to get the money sooner, which is the point Jimmy was putting forth, I disagree.  Jimmy is arguing that the money from the DLC in the first week isn't worth it, because it just isn't significant, and ultimately hurts our bottom line.  As he now advocates for Week 2/3 DLC, he obviously feels that the money made specifically in the first week's window doesn't make up the difference.

And if promotional and first-sale offers were exclusively to incentivize retail purchases, they wouldn't be so common on PC only games which neither have a rental nor used market. Two games I listed, EU4 and Rome 2, are PC only games with Steam integration. These promotions are offered because it gets them money sooner, and the belief that guaranteeing that revenue is worth more than what they would get if they didn't offer that.


As such, it could be seen as there being a greater guarantee of getting the revenue if the Day One DLC is released earlier (a position I'd support, since attach rates are inversely correlated with time after release), the only way Week 2/3 DLC would be superior is if it lead to ostensibly increased sales later, to make up for the fact that the money was received later.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 01 août 2013 - 09:08 .

[Allan Schumacher]

My thought is that the system exists as basically a form of kickback—provide an "exclusive" for a retailer, which causes the retailer to more heavily advertise your product (since they can directly advertise the exclusive as well). It's there to drive revenue, you're correct, but only because you essentially get the services of expanded marketing for free (it's a largely costless way to get other people to push your goods).

That works for retailers, yes. And you're right, getting preorders through retailers helps obtain boxed copies purchased and the like. Although if you're thinking of things like the Gamestop exclusive preorder bonuses, those are actually situations where Gamestop effectively pays us to create some unique content to encourage people to preorder through Gamestop as opposed to somewhere else (although I think the market is shifting away from this, but I have a bias as a PC gamer so I see less of the console retail effect)

A game like EU4, however, does not even have a boxed version, and PC gaming in general as really started to shift to digital platforms. Yet these preorders still exist, and they exist in a way that actually encourages me to preorder, since in the past I rarely felt a need to preorder (which was a method to ensure I got a copy on release), whereas now I actually get more stuff. As long as I care about said stuff, I'll preorder. If I don't, I won't.

Getting the money "sooner" is eminently important, though. Doesn't your industry basically function these days on preorder and first week revenue?

Most sales do happen early in the product cycle, yes.

Although it still applies to pretty much everything. I pay a higher interest rate on my mortgage because I went 5 years instead of 1 year for the term. If I pay $50/week on my credit card instead of $100 every two weeks, I pay it off faster and with less overall interest. Even though I'm "paying the same amount."