160 réponses à ce sujet

[CENIC]

I only buy 1-2 games a year, and they're generally games I have been following in development so I'm confident I will get my money's worth.

I've poured so many hours into the Dragon Age games and Dragon's Dogma that other gamers think I'm insane
I can quite happily play one expansive RPG for years without getting sick of it.

[Olessan-]

Actually, I think RPGs being priced the same as other, shorter genres gives them a huge advantage. Even with all new games in the $80-$110 area here, the game has to be very worth it to justify a purchase while it's new.

I dropped $140 (which is great value considering what you got) on AC4's Buccaneer Edition. My playtime on that game was only at ~40hrs by the time I was done. On the contrary, I spent $200 on Skyrim and have clocked over 600 hours, and to go back a generation, on Oblivion I have over 900 hours and I spent just $90 on it. I feel like I got generously more than my money's worth.

 

On the other hand, I spent $30 on Dragon's Dogma (Dark Arisen adding another $20), and so far I have just about 200 hours on it now. Great value. Again, money's worth.

 

The way I see it, RPGs having much more content for the same price seems to give them a great advantage over other titles if only for the fact that they offer better percieved value, and that's no bad thing. Someone given a choice of two games,

- One a 20 hour, but high quality shooter,

- The second a massive RPG,

And both priced at the same point of, say, $90, a lot of people are going to go for the RPG if they have to pick one. There will of course be those who only get one or the other depending on taste, and then the people who wait for the prices to drop, but the RPG has a significant advantage over the other if you're judging by amount of content. In my eyes, anyway.

[Gamemako]

Secondly, the games haven't actually raised that much. Wasteland raised under 3 million. Torment raised 4.1 million. PE raised 4.5 million. At modern AAA pricing of $60 a pop, that's 75,000 sales for PE. If we assume the older $40 for a PC game (without factoring in inflation), that would be 112,500 units.

After everyone takes a cut, an independent developer gets more like $14 per sale according to Max Schaefer, former CEO of Runic Games. That's part of why digital distribution is such a big deal.

[In Exile]

After everyone takes a cut, an independent developer gets more like $14 per sale according to Max Schaefer, former CEO of Runic Games. That's part of why digital distribution is such a big deal.

 

Even if we say that an indie dev has a 3:1 return compared to an AAA dev because of the added cost of distribution, Kickstarter games move very few units, and their raw returns are still pretty small comparatively, even if we ignore the risk of a no-name studio. 

[Schreckstoff]

You're thinking about it backwards - by greatly reducing their costs, they can risk far less to get reasonable returns.

It's the unrealistic expectations of always "betting the house" to win big that is the reason the industry has become risky. The fact that Kickstarters have games where people are throwing money at developers to make certain games should be seen as an indicator that some gamers feel completely and totally neglected by the current care of RPGs and the inability to tell most them apart from action games.

The size of this market and the number of players willing to pay for these Kickstarter games has yet to be totally proven, but the releases that have come out to date have given strong evidence to the idea that there are a good amount of players showing up for these niche markets and that the games being produced with today's technology and yesterday's design principles are, all in all, not as devastating unpopular as developers and publishers would have many believe.

I don't know what this comment has to do with mine but RPGs already are expensive to develop yet have a comparably small customer base to other genres. Increasing the development cycle which would also drive up development costs and simultaneously raising the price thereby further reducing the customer base would make any game that tries this a total flop.

[Bayonet Hipshot]

You're thinking about it backwards - by greatly reducing their costs, they can risk far less to get reasonable returns.

It's the unrealistic expectations of always "betting the house" to win big that is the reason the industry has become risky. The fact that Kickstarters have games where people are throwing money at developers to make certain games should be seen as an indicator that some gamers feel completely and totally neglected by the current care of RPGs and the inability to tell most them apart from action games.

The size of this market and the number of players willing to pay for these Kickstarter games has yet to be totally proven, but the releases that have come out to date have given strong evidence to the idea that there are a good amount of players showing up for these niche markets and that the games being produced with today's technology and yesterday's design principles are, all in all, not as devastating unpopular as developers and publishers would have many believe.

 

QFT ! 

 

The reception towards games like Pillars of Eternity as well as huge mods like SkyWind show that within a niche gaming section like RPG, there are smaller sub-niches that cater to different types of RPG gamers.

 

I mean when you take a look at mods like SkyWind and SkyOblivion, where they are recreating old games on a new engine, and the amount of people they have gotten to voluntarily join and support them as well as support for Pillars of Eternity, it shows that RPGs are not being held back because of pricing, RPGs are being held back because RPG developers, for the most part, are just making RPGs that cater to one type of audience. 

 

There are exceptions to this of course and the easiest big budget one I can think of it CDPR with The Witcher. Many people like that game not just because it is good but some liked it because it was not trying to be Bioware-ish or Fable-ish in terms of game design. 

 

It would be nice if we can do a research of sorts on the niches within the RPG genre itself in order to see the demographics in it. 

 

I wager that we would find very distinct demographics of RPG gamers.

 

Some want realism and immersion. Some want flashiness, emotional connection and representation. Some want challenging combat, lore, interesting gaming mechanics. Some want old game design with new age graphics. Some want action with a smatter of RPG elements. 

 

RPG gaming is not being held back by price. If anything is holding RPG games back, it is the inability of various types of RPG gamers to get the RPG games they want. Hence they turn to Kickstarter or mod projects. 

[Maria Caliban]

I don't believe RPGs are being held back.

I do believe that the doubling of manhours for each console generation in unsustainable, and we need about another 30 years before the games reach a healthy equilibrium when it comes to development costs vs market demand.

[Gamemako]

Even if we say that an indie dev has a 3:1 return compared to an AAA dev because of the added cost of distribution, Kickstarter games move very few units, and their raw returns are still pretty small comparatively, even if we ignore the risk of a no-name studio.

Oh, I'm not disagreeing with that. Kickstarter is useful for getting the initial funding to get a project off the ground. You usually still need sales after-the-fact.

[hexaligned]

The genre is healthier now than it has been in years, but I primarily play Indie games.  Bioware is really the only AAA dev I buy games from, and even then, I didn't buy their two latest ones at release.  If your question is "Does watering RPG's down to the point they have mass market appeal hurt the genre?"  I still think the answer is no, as there are plenty of other options to consumers/gamers these days. 

[In Exile]

Oh, I'm not disagreeing with that. Kickstarter is useful for getting the initial funding to get a project off the ground. You usually still need sales after-the-fact.

I agree, with the caveat that the funding is really only available to already established developers: see the difference between the old Black Isle vs. randoms on Kickstarter. 

[hexaligned]

Qft. There was a recent example of this with square- enix, where bravely default a turn- based old- school jrpg outsold the much newer, and more expensive to make lightning returns. I think that examples like this show, that there is still shitloads of money to be made in classic style RPGs.

Another example would be Divinity, which topped Steam sales for (at least) a good week after release.  It may still be, I haven't checked it lately.  A pretty good showing for a small studios low budget complexish turn based RPG.

[Gamemako]

Another example would be Divinity, which topped Steam sales for (at least) a good week after release.  It may still be, I haven't checked it lately.  A pretty good showing for a small studios low budget complexish turn based RPG.

Larian isn't new to the field, though. The Divinity series started in 2002 with Divine Divinity. Original Sin is Larian going back to that style after the third-person action-RPG Divinity 2. They severed ties with publishers after Divinity 2 because they felt the game was rushed and didn't have the polish it needed to be released, and because nobody wanted to publish Original Sin. Dragon Commander and Original Sin have both been self-published.

Original Sin currently has a hell of a userscore over at Metacritic along with an average 85 critic score. Also, it cost about 4 million euros to make, so it's hard to envision them losing money on the endeavor. More than anything, it shows how starved players have been for other styles of games. Kinda like how Square-Enix got a slap in the face with the success of Bravely Default, I suppose.

[Burricho]

£50-60 for the standard edition? Uhhh no, the game costs £45 for standard and £60 for deluxe. (On ps4) On a PC, it's more like £35.

[TheLastSuperSaiyan87]

I always get my money's worth with RPGS

[SofaJockey]

Price and value are of course not always matched.

Expectation plays a huge part.

 

There are few games that I will pre-order though that does include pretty much anything BioWare puts out,

because even when BioWare falls short of expectation,they are not producing bad games, just look at the rest of the market.

 

I was quietly looking forward to Aliens: Colonial Marines - that purchase did not happen.

I was planning to play Elder Scrolls Online, but the beta killed that idea for me.

 

Release price is often similar, but it's what the studio does with their budget that counts.

[dutch_gamer]

Games cost enough as is. If the standard price for RPGs was set higher than other games I would be done with gaming. The only reason I am even willing to pay the standard price right now is because of the amount of hours you can play RPGs in comparison to other single player experiences. So no, OP maybe you have money to burn and that is why you have the option to pay more by buying CEs for RPGs. I think a different price point like you propose will only hurt sales.

[BloodyTalon]

Does the vat tax really effect the costs of games that much?

OR am I missing something, though I do miss the days where games where 50 bucks for basic edition.

[Schreckstoff]

Does the vat tax really effect the costs of games that much?

OR am I missing something, though I do miss the days where games where 50 bucks for basic edition.

Well it's 20 frickin %

[NUM13ER]

No. In my opinion RPG's, especially one with huge worlds, are one of the the few games worth the money out there. And one of the few types of games I actually buy these days rather than rent. Why then increase what isn't exactly cheap?

If anything making RPG's more expensive than other genres means reducing the amount of people who will buy it. It would only hurt the games we enjoy long term.

I would never pay full retail for a game with barely any single player and I'm done with in 6 hours because I don't believe it's worth it. If anything I'd be asking why other games charge so much for far less content or rather why customers would pay the same for less.

[Fast Jimmy]

People greatly overrate the success of Kickstarter games. Most games raised a pittance. The only studio that raised anything worthwhile has been Obsidian and other Black Isle legacy staff, largely on the reputation of their AAA development (and particular their AAA Isometric development). Unknown indie developers haven't been able to gather very much of anything, because trust is a huge currency in the Kickstarter market that just doesn't exist w/o established names.
 
Secondly, the games haven't actually raised that much. Wasteland raised under 3 million. Torment raised 4.1 million. PE raised 4.5 million. At modern AAA pricing of $60 a pop, that's 75,000 sales for PE. If we assume the older $40 for a PC game (without factoring in inflation), that would be 112,500 units. 
 
And we don't know if the market is capped out. Even AAA flops more than quadruple what these legendary Kickstarter games pulled in. Until these games are released and we see what else they bring in market-wise, it's hard to say there's any substantial market for them at all. \
 
For all we know, anyone who's really ever going to get a copy of PE already got a copy of it.

I'd point to Divinity Original Sin, which raised a much more modest amount in Kickstarter funds, was not released by a AAA studio and has been released to very good reviews and which has already outsold the number of its original backers.

It has made them money and has been embraced by those other than who backed it... now, whether that is enough to bring home the bacon or keep the studio in business is still uncertain. But the game has only been out about a week and a half, so the jury is still very much out.

[Kage]

I dont think RPG games should increase in cost, even if I would gladly pay more for them.

 

You see, for DAI I would GLADLY pay twice the cost for twice the content (or even for 50% more content). Because I know I am going to get my money's worth.

However, I do not know for other RPGs, even when I am a RPG gamer (I only play RPGs).

 

I would have paid 100€ for the original Dragon Age without a doubt.

I would have paid 100€ for the original (nonDLC) Skyrim without a doubt.

 

I bought Dragon's Dogma, and didnt finish it. The lack of story and non-character progression nor interaction just killed me, combat is not the only thing that keeps me playing. Did I regret paying for the game? No, I got my money's worth, because I played a lot and it was cheap.

If I had payed 100€ for the game I would re-think the purchase next time.

 

So I think they cannot raise the cost of the games, because we would think too much about purchasing that game. I buy a lot of games because economically I can, but if they were more expensive, even if I still could, I would feel guilty spending so much in them.

 

The solution and best approach are the DLC. Yes, I am a strong defender of DLC if done right.

It is a way of purchasing a longer game, more content, after you have seen the original game where you spent just the initial cost. I will not buy Dragon's Dogma DLCs, but I bought all of Skyrim's DLC.

 

DLC must be the way for you to get a longer game for an extra price, without risking the developer's original game.

[Xerxes52]

No, honestly RPGs are one of the few games that are actually worth the $60 price tag imo.

[DisturbedJim83]

Something i am a little curious about is if people are willing to pay £50-60 standard edition for these (albeit some are good) games that have a 20-30 hour competition time or multiplayer based games released every year, maybe a new pricing for a truly epically scoped RPG looking at the the ones we put 100's of hours into game could set us back £100 standard edition if it was allowed proper development (like 5 years including concepts obviously)

 

I can easily say i play bioware games (bar DAII which i only had about 60hrs) well over double or triple the amount that i play multiplayer games such as fifa,bf etc that are quick releases so it would justify the cost, which to EA might justify the added funding, as at the end of the day making a great game that sells millions and an epic game that sells millions that bring in roughly the same profit but one has 1-2 years development the other 3+ years, as a business which would you choose?

 

Forgot to add.... Inquisition is looking like a BioWare game of old in terms of quality, this post was about trying to maintain that kind of quality!

The problem is UK customer's like us get royally screwed on the price in the USA DAI and most new AAA are $60 which in the UK is £35 however we have to pay £60($102) so each and every time we are effectively being charged almost double anyway because of Dev companies refusal to base regional prices on currency values

 

*Note prices are current exchange rate values 

[Fast Jimmy]

I don't know what this comment has to do with mine but RPGs already are expensive to develop yet have a comparably small customer base to other genres. Increasing the development cycle which would also drive up development costs and simultaneously raising the price thereby further reducing the customer base would make any game that tries this a total flop.

RPGs are only expensive to create because developers have placed a bigger importance on graphics and voice acting than options and content. That's what I was saying - it's only a risky, boom-or-bust genre/industry because developers choose for it to be.