Grargar: Their current perception on GOG, yes, but what about their future perception? What if the new owner takes a leaf from Bethesda's book and starts doing lower discounts? While old customers might be wary of buying them at lower discounts, that might not be the case with newer ones, who might not even know (or care) about the ludicrous discounts of the past and just want to play Freespace 2.
I understand the logic of what you're saying but I think that if another company buys their games they would have to do it at a low enough price that if they sold Interplay's games at the same price Interplay did they would turn a worthwhile enough profit to even bother, and if they sell them at even higher prices then Interplay would have to take a bigger kick in the balls to sell at an even lower price so the new IP owner can sell at a higher price to make it worthwhile. But at the same time, if the games have come on sale for 90% off bargain bin cup of coffee discounts, that sets up the market to accept that, so future prices that are higher will be rejected by many knowing the games sold several times for far less. For it to be profitable there would have to still be high enough interest out there when everything was taken into consideration.
In short, there are a lot of variables but it could go either way.
Grargar: Are we talking about base price or discounted price? Because if we're talking about base price, then Interplay's cheapest game is also no lower than $6. If we're talking about discounted price (as it seems that you're doing), then yes, Bethesda/EA/Ubisoft have actually sold their old games for less than $2.
I was referring to the discounted prices because largely as time goes on they are the real prices. I suggest that to be true based on the idea that a brand new release sells at a high price because of anticipation of the game and people willing to buy it immediately to get it right away who are willing to pay a higher price. But as time goes on, those people have already bought it and are shaken out of the buyer's list. The price has to go down to motivate others into anticipation again. In the mean time all sales promotional discounts have the same although very temporary effect. As a game ages and the price continues to drop I believe this effect shifts around to the opposite side of things where there are only a very small trickle of people willing to pay the non-discounted retail price and the primary mover that sells the games is the discounted price. I think that for the oldest of games the volume moves only when they're on sale.
I have no experience on that side of things, it's just educated hypothesis of sorts but I think it's a reasonable conjecture. :)
To clarify on the final note you mentioned, I was thinking of Bethesda games mostly in the year 2000-2010 range rather than older stuff like say... Betrayal at Krondor or the 90s in my examples. There are many 2000s games out there that were highly popular in their day and are well loved to day made by many developers, but a tonne of them now go for anywhere from $1-3 each either standalone or bundled together into packs either continuously or periodically either by the publisher or by the retailler. I picked up a number of retailler created collections from Amazon for example where I paid $2ish on average for top notch AAA games that are 10 or less years old and highly popular. But... try to find a deal like that on Elder Scrolls games or anything made by id Software and good fricken luck. :) Same thing with many Ubisoft titles or EA. The cheapest they seem willing to go on just about anything is like $2.49'ish. It seems most of them have a price point where they're like "We'd rather throw it in the garbage than accept a penny less than this."
Not saying it's right or wrong, but that it just happens and only because the company and question is in a position where they
can do it even if 0 copies of something sell. They still sleep well at night. I'm sure not at Interplay though. :)
I should say another thing here too... I did say I wasn't dissing Interplay and I'm not, just expressing where I see things are at for them now. For the record while this conversation was going on I went and grabbed a game I wanted to play and installed it - Star Trek 25th Anniversary. I had no idea it was even made by Interplay. I own at least 15 Interplay games on GOG (maybe more but they don't all show up in a search of the store because some are no longer sold here) which makes them in my top 10 list of companies I own the most games from in my catalogue I think, and I probably own a number on Steam too perhaps. I just wanted to say that because a big Interplay fan may see my comments and think I'm being overly harsh or have a beef with them or something perhaps and I want to assure that I don't and I love and own many classic Interplay games also. In fact more than I even know or realize likely. :)
Grargar: As I said above, that might be their current perception, but not necessarily their future one. To give an example, under Interplay's ownership, Freespace 2 might not be worthy of more than, say, $1. Under the future owner's ownership, it might actually be considered worthy of $5. Or maybe, the new owner might give Freespace 2 a typical 75% discount without trying to bait customers to buy other games for a higher discount (as is Interplay's 60%/90% discount MO)
I understand what you're saying. I think my response to your first paragraph above covers my thoughts on that. Could go either way.
skeletonbow: If Bethesda started to struggle to the danger point, you bet we'd likely see DOOM3, Rage, and many many other games that are both old and $8-20 all of a sudden be $1-3 too. :)
Grargar: Doom 3 is currently available for $2.5 on Humble Store. Abandon the Bethesda ship! :P
Ok, the cheapest I've seen it to date was about $3 before or maybe $3.50, but you're most likely talking USD and I'm talking CAD so that price sounds about the same as the cheapest I've ever seen it. ITAD always knows best and haven't checked. There's DOOM, the expansion, and BFG edition, and possibly combinations of them. I never see them for the price that makes me hot to trot though. For $3 CAD if they threw in the expansion I might spring for the original release, or for the BFG edition perhaps. The thing is though, soon as I do that, 10 minutes later Bethesda will drop them here on GOG and I'll let out a big fat sigh.
If I wait, it'll be another year though and then show up for like $20 regular, $7.99 on GOG sale or something like that... and I'll sigh some more. :)
Grargar: Every company is currently in a better position that Interplay. Well OK, maybe Atari isn't.
LOL! Can't argue much with that, except to whisper out loud... "Hello Games"... :)
Ok, they're probably doing good with cashflow right now... but just wait 12-24 months... :)
All I can say is... well... Goodbye Games... :)
