G-Doc: ...A game with $5.99 price tag - for example - will cost 4.49 Euro, 3.69 Pounds Sterling, 6.49 Australian Dollars, and 219 Roubles respectively...
undeadcow: Interestingly ALL titles just got more expensive for users with the exception of European (cheaper) and American (same) currencies.
Price increases/decreases according to the $5.99 currency equivilants posted by G-Doc:
-0.05 Euros (or 7 US cents) cheaper ($5.99 = 4.54 euros, current GOG euro price is 4.49);
+0.08 Pounds Sterling (or 12 US cents) more expensive ($5.99 = 3.61 pounds, current GOG pound price is 3.69)
+0.07 Austrailan Dollars (or 7 US center) more expensive ($5.99 = 6.42 australian dollars, current a.d. GOG standard is 6.49)
+ 2.47 roubles (or 8 US cents) more expensive ($5.99 = 216.53 roubles, current rouble GOG standard is 219)
Assuming developers/publishers wouldn't object to making MORE money on games; does that imply the "dealbreaker" is a slighty 0.05 euro reduction for titles in that currency? Also, higher priced titles would likely have a greater difference in price tiers.
This is NOT fair regional pricing because now ALL titles are different values in different regions (even if it is consistent and differences are considered minor). I don't understand why GOG can't keep prices strictly equivilant as units of currency allow (it seems the currency match could go down to 0.01 even if the price tier is an awkward 3.61 pounds).
Currency conversion rates per Google.
You cannot compare prices using conversion rates per Google and complain about a difference in order of several cents. First, this would be insane to expect an
online retailer to keep up recalculating prices - it is financial companies' service. Second, it would totally complicate already complex contracts with publishers. And more importantly, this train of thoughts is also wrong from users' perspective, as these are not the prices that
the user would buy dollars at, so even if it looks like dollars would come up cheaper by "Google's" inter-bank/market rate, somebody that owns a bank account in different currency would need to take the hit for currency conversion (some extra for either the bank, a credit card company, paypal or somebody else). And probably end up paying some extra cents. You know, like when you go to a currency exchange office, and you get two prices, for buying and selling, one always higher that "Google's", and the other lower... it is the same with online transactions across currencies - some intermediary makes a profit.
And that's a reason why the local prices
can be advantageous for us customers. And as I understand, for non-"local" priced "exceptions", you can checkout in usd anyway. There's also a potential advantage of extra availability, but with so many payment options, I don't think it would hold valid ;)
The problem that Gog takes a stand against is much huger. Publishers try (and usually do) convert prices
1-to-1, e.g. your 50USD for a new release is 50euro for me; or at least totally unfairly (e.g. 150% of an us price in uk) - which is a lot more than your "unfair" market-price-error-order difference.
Now, as some games will remain "locally" priced (which usually means - among other things - more expensive in the eurozone), Gog already had to weight the benefit of making some games available against publishers' wishes. They decided that in some cases they are willing to refund users in a form of a store credit, rather than take games out. That is for their benefit (more games = more users), and for users, which get, well, the best treatment they currently can among digital game distribution platforms - a price as fair as possible, with only a slightly painful "hook" of a store-specific credit.
For some reason, they were unable to settle with Nordic - perhaps they opposed Fair Price Package, perhaps their price differences were too high, perhaps their share demands grew unacceptable, or they wanted some content restrictions - something, that Gog found either unprofitable or against their principles. Again - if it was about price, it wouldn't be about be about 5 cents cheaper on gog in euro, it would be about (say) 30% cheaper in euro on gog that the publisher wanted.
Perhaps gog could avoid introducing local prices while avoiding local currencies at all? Honestly I don't know - other than the user experience, availability and a potential error-like pricing advantage as outlined above, there are various concerns related to international law, accounting, taxes and publisher contracts. ;) And probably more. I don't think it came up like a manager shouting "I've got an idea, let's allow users to pay in euros". It must be painful to make it happen.
And either way, they try to do this in a different, more consumer-friendly way that anyone else, and so far it turns out good. If anything, I'd wonder, why they allowed FPP at all... They still get my support and respect for everything.
