DVD games, and the price we pay (small rant)

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DragonNOA1

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Aug 15, 2004
Messages
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A few things that I have been thinking about.[rant]

Why do companies continue to sell games on cd's when according to Valve's poll it says most people have DVD drives?
drivetype8cf.jpg

I know maybe it doesn't include everyone in this poll but I'm sure a lot of non-hardcore gamers picked up Half Life 2 and are counted in this poll. According to this, and I'm sure from the outcry of gamers that we all have heard before, companies should already know that regular cd-rom's are on the decline and should stop selling games on them. The only reason to continue with cd-rom's/cd's would be, of course, if the game only needed 1 (one) cd for all it's game data. Two or more cd's equal DVD time.

and secondly,

How come after all this preaching from game companies/developers/distributors about game prices going down have game prices not gone down at all? Some have even gone up! They talked about smaller boxes to lower prices. Nope! They talk about getting rid of thick manuals to save us money. Nope! Even getting rid of the box and selling online, eliminating the distributor and physical costs from everything, but you know what, prices haven't gone down. Check out Steam and look what price HL2 continues to stay at. 50 bucks, that's right. Why would they charge us less if we are already willing to pay 50 dollars? We pay 50 so they just keep giving us less and less. They save all this money but continue to charge us the same or even more.

I think it all is a load of crap.
[/rant]
 
As far as them not selling DVD only games, it's that the pussies don't want to lose a potential %10 of their sales.

The pathetic thing is that if a gamer wants a game bad enough to pay $60 for it, I'm betting he would buy a $20 DVD drive to support it. If the entire industry would change he'd have to.

Sadly, DVD only games won't take off in full until after you will need 2 or more DVD's to install a game. By then HDDVD or bluegay will be out and we'll have the same battle again.
 
I buy CDROM versions for two reasons:

1) The CDROM version is usually cheaper (which is odd)
2) CDROMs are more durable around kids

That being said, if the DVD version were the same price or less I would buy it. Or if there weren't a CDROM version, I would do it.

CDROM versions are a self-fulfilling prophecy as long as they are consistently priced below DVD versions.
 
I remember buying HL2, when I pulled out the 5 or 6 CDs I thought why the hell didn't they just throw it on one DVD?! I'm all for games on DVD, I'm not sure why the industry hasn't at least offered them as an option along with the CD versions. I liked how EA had BF2 offered in both CD and DVD versions...and the DVD one was only $5 more...at least in my case.
 
DragonNOA1 said:
How come after all this preaching from game companies/developers/distributors about game prices going down have game prices not gone down at all? Some have even gone up! They talked about smaller boxes to lower prices. Nope! They talk about getting rid of thick manuals to save us money. Nope! Even getting rid of the box and selling online, eliminating the distributor and physical costs from everything, but you know what, prices haven't gone down. Check out Steam and look what price HL2 continues to stay at. 50 bucks, that's right. Why would they charge us less if we are already willing to pay 50 dollars? We pay 50 so they just keep giving us less and less. They save all this money but continue to charge us the same or even more.

I think it all is a load of crap.
[/rant]
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Yeah, I have the anger for this as well. But are you suprised? It's not just games. It's EVERYTHING! Look at a new neighborhood. The houses all suck, they look the same, they're poor quality, there's no privacy, no backyard, and they cost twice as much. Things are getting shittier and costing more. That's the way things are going. I'm going to start an actual Slowbiz... where I make everything myself. Video games made of wood... food made of wood... wood everything. Yes.
 
It's similar to car companies continuing to sell tape decks as standard in cars up until recently, even though you haven't been able to buy tapes in stores for years.

They figure they've got an installed base of drivers with tapes. Same goes for companies selling you games on CD, and since DVD-ROM drives are backward compatible, they get the best of both worlds.

Besides, if they have to put it on 4 CDs they'll just cut out your nice jewel case and throw your discs in some crappy paper sleeve that scratches the hell out of your discs whenever you use them. Then they'll put your instructions in PDF format and fill the remaining space in the box with ads from 20 different companies.

See there? It's easy to make up the cost.

Oh yeah, and the worst part is that those 10% that only have CD drives would scream at the top of their lungs "How dare you leave me out by only making a DVD version!" And the company would have to listen to the whiny, vocal minority bitch and bitch and bitch about it. It's probably just not worth it.
 
Yeah it's crazy, most of the big name companies offer both though. Coincidentaly I went into wal-mart to see if they had Psychonauts since no other place locally had it (would never go in there otherwise) and they were sold out of a few DVD versions of current games but still had CD versions for sale. You don't think of the typical Wal-Mart customer as being on the bleeding edge of technology (especially in this area...) so that says something about DVD vs CD if DVD versions of PC games are more popular at a wal-mart in a little "podunk" town like this one.
 
There is one advantage to multi-cd games:
If you forget to bring your CD to a LAN, you can just borrow someone elses.
That saved my life once when I forgot my bf1942 cd at home.
 
PCJ said:
There is one advantage to multi-cd games:
If you forget to bring your CD to a LAN, you can just borrow someone elses.
That saved my life once when I forgot my bf1942 cd at home.
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That doesn't work on most games anymore. BF2 has 3 CDs, but only one works as a play disc, same with UT2004. The list of games this is an advantage with is growing shorter and shorter.
 
I would like to say that the smaller boxes were not to reduce costs to the publishers. The smaller boxes were to reduce the amount of shelf space and waste that was going into computer games. Back with the large boxes most of the space was not being used, games were taking up a lot of shelf space in stores, and a lot of cardboard was being wasted, not too environmentally friendly. That is why they made the shift, not to reduce game costs.

And why do you think games were supposed to go down? Production costs for games keep getting higher and higher, you would think that would lead to higher game prices not smaller ones.
 
I wouldn't think DVD versions should cost anymore. Look at when the last Myst was released. They only sold it on DVD, it was actually 2 DVDs for the game. They also gave a bonus third dvd with previous Myst on it. Then packaging was the normal small box, but with a normal dvd case that slided out (like how some dvd movies have cardboard around them)

So it was nice packaging with 2 dvds and bonus dvd with another game, actual case and not paper inserts, all for $30 on the day of release with no sale. If this was EA charging like they did for BF2 you'd expect it to be $65.
 
peacetilence said:
Yeah it's crazy, most of the big name companies offer both though. Coincidentaly I went into wal-mart to see if they had Psychonauts since no other place locally had it (would never go in there otherwise) and they were sold out of a few DVD versions of current games but still had CD versions for sale. You don't think of the typical Wal-Mart customer as being on the bleeding edge of technology (especially in this area...) so that says something about DVD vs CD if DVD versions of PC games are more popular at a wal-mart in a little "podunk" town like this one.
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They probably thought it was a disney movie.
 
They cut the size of the boxes, eliminated the manuals, and switched to DVD media to save themselves money, not us. While their cost for reproduction continues to go down ours will continue to go up as they try to squeeze us for every penny. HL2 is a prime example of the crap we have to put up with from game developers today. It has no manual, steam is a crock, and you have to purchase one of the online Platinum or Gold versions to even get to download the extra mods like Day of Defeat. Pretty soon you'll just see the games sold on store shelves in nothing but a paper sleeve. Gaming today has cotinued to turn more towards greed and less towards the gamer. They then stop and wonder why software piracy is so high with ignorant plans like Steam. Maybe if they just charged fair prices on software instead of $50 a title then they could get alot further.
 
Erasmus354 said:
And why do you think games were supposed to go down?
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You probably haven't paid attention to the announcements over the past few years and don't remember hearing anything about it. I remember when these "improvements" were announced and have paid close attention to it. I haven't seen any change in anything, tho.

As of late I have heard about the production costs going up for games. So I see what your saying there. But before all that people have talked about what I mentioned before would make the price go down, and the hasn't changed the price at all. So as I said b4 it is all a pile of poo.

I agree with the above poster also. It's right in line with what I was saying.
 
Do a search for Author: "Torgo" Keywords: "DVD prices"

I've written about this far too many times in the past. It's all explained there. It's to the point where the subject drains me of all energy.
 
^Gotchya... but my thread is about putting more games onto DVD's and the non-decreasing price of games... not necessarily dvd prices but I hear what ya sayin'.
 
Torgo said:
Do a search for Author: "Torgo" Keywords: "DVD prices"

I've written about this far too many times in the past. It's all explained there. It's to the point where the subject drains me of all energy.
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I did that search and the only thread that came up was this one :p
 
While it would be nice to have all my games come on DVD I can understand why publishers still release on CD. They can hit 100% of the market by putting out on CD since DVD players still read cds but not vice versa. So it makes sense at this time to still keep it on cd. When they quit making cd drives maybe then we will see most games come out on dvd.
Whether or not the game comes out ond CD or DVD or a download, in the end the software is still worth the same price. I dont really see a reason why a publisher would pass on any savings to us if the market will bear a certain price. $50 for a title like HL2, GTA:SA, BF2 etc is worth in imo regardless of distribution media. I doubt the difference in price between burning a game to Cd or dvd matters much in the pricing model when the cost of producing the game in the first place is sky high.
 
One word - Capitalism

Welcome to America: land of outsourcing, supply and demand and reaganomics.
 
I still fail to see where some of you got the idea that smaller packaging would mean cheaper game prices. I did find this quote from a site that took a snippet of a USA Today article on the smaller packaging

"It's very expensive to make good games," says Beth Featherstone, head of marketing for Microsoft's PC group. "The cheaper and more automated the packaging, the more dollars you can put into making games better."
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linky

I am curious to see however if someone of you have a quote of a game publisher head making a comment that smaller packaging would lead to cheaper games. Personally, I am happy that game prices have not risen dramatically, although it looks like they are going to rise soon. Games cost a lot to make, and I would rather pay 50$ for a well made game that wont crash my system, than 25$ for a game that was slapped together, that didn't take the time and money to go through extensive testing, and happens to crash my computer everytime I shoot evil imp 3 in the head.
 
I did the search myself... can't believe I'm quoting myself from a year ago:

I used to work with CD manufactoring so I know what the prices pretty much are. Mastering something on DVD and then producing the discs wouldn't cost that much. It's a bit more, but most publishers just go ahead and eat the cost if they're determined to go that route. Like I mentioned earlier, the cost of making the game evens out since 4 CDs = cost 1 DVD. It may be even be closer to 3 CDs = 1 DVD.

The cost will quickly go down. The reason why the price is different is because not every CD production facility has the DVD equipment. That machinery is expensive and they expense through their pricing runs. As all the plants are finding the money to upgrade, the costs are coming down. It didn't help that early on, all the DVD manufacturing facilities were being used by the movie companies, limited the number of DVD makers availible to make games and also keeping the price artificially high. Essentially the materials required to make a DVD are the same as a CD so it will eventually be as cheap to make a DVD as it is to make a CD
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Stiler
1. Demo's, these should come out BEFORE the game, not "after"...

2. Price issue. Remember the argument people were using about switchin from "big" boxes to smaller dvd style boxing? that the companies would pass on the savings to the customers?

3. CD copy protection.
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1. Agreed. It would cut down (somewhat) on people downloading the full version to try it out. Not that much though. It would remove an excuse.

2. You fell for that line? Do you know the real story behind that? It's not the publishers who pushed for it. It was the retailers who wanted it done so they could put more games on the shelf, but still charge publishers the same for shelf space. It happens all the time in the grocery store. Savings are never passed on to the customer. Packaging costs literally pennies between the old way and the new way. I know since I contracted with a CD plant that made games.

3. The copy protection is only there to prevent casual copying. Giving it to your friend or your neighbor. It's never intended to stop pirates. Developers should concentrate on software that spawns copies or phoning home to verify a key. Like it or not, some sort of copy protection is here to stay. It'll just be in a different form than CD checks. (Hey, I hate 'em too.)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by douglas25
Pirating software illegal? Sure, I agree. Is it 100% wrong? No, not by far.

Lowest Possible Prices - Why are games released at $55 bucks then 1 month later are $29? Better Support - reduce the bugs in games. No more release now and patch later. /cough Ubisoft
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So if it's 75% wrong then it's okay? 50%? 33%?

As for prices, here's the way it pretty much works. All games are released at full price, even if the publisher knows that it won't sell well. Why? There are those few people who are going to buy a title no matter how expensive it is. When initial sales comes back, the publisher then will drop the price to reach that sweet spot where price meets demand. The top selling games (Diablo, Warcraft, Age of Empires, Sims) remain at a higher price longer than titles that fail to sell decently.

Hey, I totally agree with the quality point. I contributed to two books on the subject and working on a third. Yet, publishers often look to the QA department first for budget cuts and don't train the people on how to perform their job. Most importantly, the gamers can blame themselves for not making it a bigger issue. Publishers have trained the gaming public to accept patches for problems. The publishers then don't make initial quality a big issue and rely on the patch later. A larger problem comes into play if the title doesn't sell well, the budget for patches gets killed and further patches don't come out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Syphon Filter
That is true...but more people would be inclined to buy them if they wre cheaper rather than dload them.
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That's true to a point. As the music industry has found, selling songs a la carte has slowed piracy but hasn't stopped it. The problem is that for all the people bitching about the cost of games, the cost can't go down much more. With titles costing $4 to $10 million a pop, you can't undercut yourself too much. Especially the independent developer. Most developers live title to title. If one doesn't succeed, then you're in big trouble. If you don't sell enough copies, you may not have enough money to fund your next game.

Movies are different. You spend $100 million to make it and recover your costs at the theater. There's also the international release. If you don't recover your costs by then, there's always DVD sales. In most cases, DVD sales are just gravy. Considering it costs less than 1% to master and manufacture a DVD compared to the cost of the initial movie (and I'm being generous here) DVDs are where the money is at.

Games have their CD/DVD release as the initial product. They either make or break it here. Developers have to recover costs of their big project as quickly as possible and they have only one shot. If the game heads to the bargin bin, it's too late. By then, another company has bought out the remaining stock at a huuuuuge discount and work to sell that remainder. If you see a game in the bargin bin, the developer gets none of that money back.

If you're Microsoft or EA, you have a large enough development stable to release a game like ESPN 2K5 at $18.00 to gain market share and take a hit. (MS isn't making a profit off of ESPN) MS will just sell a few million copies of Halo 2 at full price and be just fine.

It's simple economics at work.
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BTW, I found these posts of mine using the above search terms. Just don't use the actual quotes, that'll screw up the search.

Anyway, I don't have time to look up the actual post, but factoring in inflation, games are cheaper today than in 1983. The cost of Pac-Man for the 2600 then in today's dollars is just over $80 bucks. Even at $60 a game today has more production value and (hopefully) a longer playing time. Video game prices have stayed remarkably stable over the years.
 
To be honest... I don't really care. Sure, DVD's are handier, but face it, unless you're a Windows reinstall freak, you're not installing these games on a daily basis. I've installed my multi CD games that I've had for over a year maybe two times. It's not that hard, I'm usually browsing [H] or something anyway, so it's not like I'm wasting my life changing CD's.

And once it's installed, it's installed. It's still a single play disk to play it (though I usually patch it, simply because I hate having to put the CD in every time I want to play a game).

Not that I'm not saying I wouldn't like to see more DVD games, I would. It's time to switch over. But I'm not going to cry about it, it's only marginally more convenient. (to me, anyway :) )
 
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