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sharonbn: Looking at "Now on Sale" I see all the 5.99 games from early 90s like Battle Chess, Prehistorik 1+2, Dragon Wars etc. They all have regular price 9.99 and are currently on sale.

So has GOG decided to eliminate the 5.99 price point?

A game from 1990 is really worth 10 US$??

Does anyone remember their slogan from the beginning about having only two price points?
Did you miss the 90% off for Interplay completionists offer ? Each game was $0.99 .
its great when games go on sale
regardless, it is very strange and unusual when old games get a price increase.
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sharonbn: People are not willing to pay premium for 25 years old technology....
As an aside, that's kind of a quirk of the marketplace of this hobby. Regardless of the tech, many games are just as fun today as they were when released decades ago. Some other forms of entertainment don't really go through the same pricing change like games do. For instance, books and music.

I understand why they drop, but at the same time it seems strange for a top-quality AAA game of a decade ago to be just 5 or 10 bucks today. Same fun as it always was...

Anyway, that's a whole other discussion.
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idbeholdME: The publishers set the price specifics.
Didn't GOG assure us at one point those 5.99 price points weren't going anywhere though?

Edit: Hmm, I think that was something that was discussed when they started introducing price points over 5.99/9.99 at the time. Not that anything prevented publishers from going 9.99 back then either
Post edited October 09, 2018 by Pheace
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i_hope_you_rot: Did you miss the 90% off for Interplay completionists offer ? Each game was $0.99 .
"90%" off ... after increasing the price by 66% first. :-)

I guess Interplay just saw that nobody bought their games at regular price. All those who would do that, already have the games. So they only get sales during sales. Therefore they increased the base price to a level which they know no one will pay - but it allows them to have their games 'on sale' almost permanently. It's just a trick for catching those customers who only buy products that are 'on sale'.
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sharonbn: Looking at "Now on Sale" I see all the 5.99 games from early 90s like Battle Chess, Prehistorik 1+2, Dragon Wars etc. They all have regular price 9.99 and are currently on sale.

So has GOG decided to eliminate the 5.99 price point?

A game from 1990 is really worth 10 US$??

Does anyone remember their slogan from the beginning about having only two price points?
It was a dick move from Interplay back in 2012. Read the second paragraph: https://www.gog.com/forum/general_archive/special_promo_whole_interplay_catalog
Post edited October 09, 2018 by joppo
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sharonbn: Looking at "Now on Sale" I see all the 5.99 games from early 90s like Battle Chess, Prehistorik 1+2, Dragon Wars etc. They all have regular price 9.99 and are currently on sale.

So has GOG decided to eliminate the 5.99 price point?
No.

http://www.gog.com/game/sam_max_hit_the_road
http://www.gog.com/game/indiana_jones_and_the_last_crusade
http://www.gog.com/game/indiana_jones_and_the_infernal_machine
http://www.gog.com/game/leisure_suit_larry_love_for_sail
http://www.gog.com/game/gabriel_knight_sins_of_the_fathers
http://www.gog.com/game/myst_masterpiece_edition
http://www.gog.com/game/the_7th_guest

...and so on.
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sharonbn: A game from 1990 is really worth 10 US$??
That's up to you to decide. That's how free market works. You pay as much as you think the thing is worth, or then spend your money on something else.

The question is: is a game from the past much less enjoyable now than it was in the past? If yes, then price reduction may be necessary. If no, if it's still as good as it was, then why should the price be low?

Riding an old roller coaster isn't (usually) any cheaper than riding a brand new. Somehow with games there's this weird attitude that anything older than 3-5 years is worthless. Much of this attitude can sadly be traced to publishers themselves, who really haven't historically taken much care of their old catalog. Licences expire, source codes get trashed, games are not available for purchase.
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sharonbn: Does anyone remember their slogan from the beginning about having only two price points?
I remember it like it was yesterday.
It was plain and simple, and the prices were same for the whole world.

It should be noted that back then GOG also said that they don't want to devalue games, and discounts bigger than 30% were rare, sometimes there were 50% discounts, but nothing more than that.

Things have changed much since then.
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i_hope_you_rot: Did you miss the 90% off for Interplay completionists offer ? Each game was $0.99 .
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Lifthrasil: "90%" off ... after increasing the price by 66% first. :-)
I'd say $0,99 is a damned good price...doesn't really matter that $0,60 would have been even better.

There is such a thing as price awareness - and then there's just plain old greed.
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sharonbn: People are not willing to pay premium for 25 years old technology....
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HereForTheBeer: As an aside, that's kind of a quirk of the marketplace of this hobby. Regardless of the tech, many games are just as fun today as they were when released decades ago. Some other forms of entertainment don't really go through the same pricing change like games do. For instance, books and music.

I understand why they drop, but at the same time it seems strange for a top-quality AAA game of a decade ago to be just 5 or 10 bucks today. Same fun as it always was...

Anyway, that's a whole other discussion.
That greatly depends on the buyer perspective.
See, many gamers remember the time they played an old game back when it was new. When they buy and play an old game, they basically want to relive the excitement of that first time experience.
A young(er) gamer, who buys an old game first time, judges the game vs modern technology and playstyle standards, and in this case, I can see why sometimes old games will not compare favorably to new ones.
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PixelBoy: It should be noted that back then GOG also said that they don't want to devalue games, and discounts bigger than 30% were rare, sometimes there were 50% discounts, but nothing more than that.

Things have changed much since then.
When was this? I remember when I first opened my GOG account, I got excited when I saw games for 50% off, it wasn't long after I joined that 75% off discounts were more common.
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PixelBoy: It should be noted that back then GOG also said that they don't want to devalue games, and discounts bigger than 30% were rare, sometimes there were 50% discounts, but nothing more than that.

Things have changed much since then.
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IwubCheeze: When was this? I remember when I first opened my GOG account, I got excited when I saw games for 50% off, it wasn't long after I joined that 75% off discounts were more common.
At least in 2012 they were still publicly against big discounts:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-04-12-gog-com-steam-sales-send-wrong-message-to-gamers
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IwubCheeze: When was this? I remember when I first opened my GOG account, I got excited when I saw games for 50% off, it wasn't long after I joined that 75% off discounts were more common.
Before 2012, when the only pricepoints were 5.99 and 9.99
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idbeholdME: The publishers set the price specifics.
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Pheace: Didn't GOG assure us at one point those 5.99 price points weren't going anywhere though?

Edit: Hmm, I think that was something that was discussed when they started introducing price points over 5.99/9.99 at the time. Not that anything prevented publishers from going 9.99 back then either
As we don't see inside the GOG-publisher deals, we will never know they system they use. But I think it can be 100% said that it is the publisher and not GOG who is in the position of power regarding this. Interplay has just seen it fit to increase the prices and GOG couldn't do anything about it.
Post edited October 09, 2018 by idbeholdME
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sharonbn: Looking at "Now on Sale" I see all the 5.99 games from early 90s like Battle Chess, Prehistorik 1+2, Dragon Wars etc. They all have regular price 9.99 and are currently on sale.

So has GOG decided to eliminate the 5.99 price point?
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PixelBoy: No.

http://www.gog.com/game/sam_max_hit_the_road
http://www.gog.com/game/indiana_jones_and_the_last_crusade
http://www.gog.com/game/indiana_jones_and_the_infernal_machine
http://www.gog.com/game/leisure_suit_larry_love_for_sail
http://www.gog.com/game/gabriel_knight_sins_of_the_fathers
http://www.gog.com/game/myst_masterpiece_edition
http://www.gog.com/game/the_7th_guest

...and so on.
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sharonbn: A game from 1990 is really worth 10 US$??
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PixelBoy: That's up to you to decide. That's how free market works. You pay as much as you think the thing is worth, or then spend your money on something else.

The question is: is a game from the past much less enjoyable now than it was in the past? If yes, then price reduction may be necessary. If no, if it's still as good as it was, then why should the price be low?

Riding an old roller coaster isn't (usually) any cheaper than riding a brand new. Somehow with games there's this weird attitude that anything older than 3-5 years is worthless. Much of this attitude can sadly be traced to publishers themselves, who really haven't historically taken much care of their old catalog. Licences expire, source codes get trashed, games are not available for purchase.
avatar
sharonbn: Does anyone remember their slogan from the beginning about having only two price points?
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PixelBoy: I remember it like it was yesterday.
It was plain and simple, and the prices were same for the whole world.

It should be noted that back then GOG also said that they don't want to devalue games, and discounts bigger than 30% were rare, sometimes there were 50% discounts, but nothing more than that.

Things have changed much since then.
Yes, I was already answered that only interplay games had their price increased.
I would have noticed it myself if the "on sale" section of the new storefront design would include the name of the sale promotion...

of course it is up to me to decide whether or not to buy a product at a certain price. That is a given and can be said for regional prices as well - still doesn't make the practice any more tolerable.

regarding if a game is less enjoyable now than it was in the past - already answered - it might feel this way for someone who does not have fond memories from the times the game was new. Also, I encountered several times when a game was too old to be enjoyable on modern system with high resolution.
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Pheace: Didn't GOG assure us at one point those 5.99 price points weren't going anywhere though?

Edit: Hmm, I think that was something that was discussed when they started introducing price points over 5.99/9.99 at the time. Not that anything prevented publishers from going 9.99 back then either
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idbeholdME: As we don't see inside the GOG-publisher deals, we will never know they system they use. But I think it can be 100% said that it is the publisher and not GOG who is in the position of power regarding this. Interplay has just seen it fit to increase the prices and GOG couldn't do anything about it.
I find this odd.
GOG should have (and did have in the past) a policy regarding prices and their changes. After all, they have a reputation they need to protect. each time a publisher decides on price changes, this may cause a discontent and backlash from users and in this case GOG will bear the brunt of users complaints. The retailer-publisher deals should protect the interests of both parties.
Post edited October 09, 2018 by sharonbn
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sharonbn: Also, I encountered several times when a game was too old to be enjoyable on modern system with high resolution.
That's only a problem if you try to run it in fullscreen mode.

Run the game windowed, apply suitable scaler, and it will look just as good as it did back then - unless you specifically want to have CRT experience, in which case the problem isn't in the game, but hardware. There are some programs to simulate that too.

For instance most of the games I linked before look perfectly good when you run ScummVM windowed with 3X scaling, with aspect ratio correction turned on.
(There's also a filter to smoothen pixel borders, but that makes beautiful pixel graphics look crappy, not recommended.)