Well I think its definitely you who don't know how things works :

When companies release a new product, especially one with a rather fast obsolescence like video games, they expect to get a good chunk of their money back and maybe even start making profit out of it in a short time frame. Sometime its not a "wish" but a question of life or death and disappointing sales during the first weeks/months could literally kill a studio or even a company.

The problem is not whenever or not goods lose value, of course they are, the problem is that if "everybody" decides to wait X months or X years before buying a game they might kill the company/studio as surely as if they were pirating it.

Very few publishers will care if a game starts making money years after release (unless it's a MMO and they were planing it would), if a game doesn't make enough money in the first weeks/months after release then it's considered as a failure.

Me neither.

Which never happened and never will.

It's the opposite. Games are loosing value faster and faster but they still make more money in first two weeks than a year before / previous game installment.

After achieving some goals, every penny made is a profit, this is why companies decide to lower their price.

Saying "if you're not buying for the full price you're greedy, and very similar to a pirate" is so fucking stupid I just can't imagine how anybody could make up such argument. Sorry.

"Oh, you're gonna sell this bread for 0.99? Oh, please, don't make me look greedy, please take this 99.99!"


eot for me

The same could be said about piracy; and that's the reason why I put "everybody" between quotes : It will never happen that "everybody" wait for a sale like it will never happen that "everybody" pirate the game, but for both the question remain very similar : how much of those all very important initial sales are lost because of peoples pirating/waiting for a sale ?

Of course companies makes some money during sales so they are technically better for them than piracy, but if the studio/devs/franchise is long gone because of poor initial sales then in the end it doesn't make that much difference, at least for them...

Like for piracy the issue is not with peoples who weren't interested in the game to begin with and would never have bought it full price no matter what; but with peoples who were interested in the game but decided to wait for a sale instead of buying it full price.

lol, I guess you don't watch the news then : Very often you hear complaints about : "if peoples were buying their bread from a real baker instead of buying a cheap industrial one at a big super market then small artisans wouldn't be disappearing", or "if peoples were buying locally made clothes (you can replace "clothes" by car, electronics, furniture, etc...) instead of buying cheap Chinese clothes then the local clothes industry wouldn't be dying and peoples wouldn't be losing their jobs", etc... In this "economical crisis" period that's actually something we hear very very very often.

Everybody is "greedy" from time to time, mostly because few have unlimited money to waste, there is nothing "wrong" with it, but it's not a reason to forget (or pretends) it's not without it's consequences.

That's a fair point, and certainly a chunk of PC gamers are getting a bit greedy wanting everything cheap. But equally the rest are being sensible consumers.

From my point of view that demonstrates fair interaction between consumers and publishers/retailers. If people are unhappy with a price for a game for whatever reason, or believe it represents bad value for money, they don't buy it. If the publisher want's to make a sale, they have to meet that persons valuation of the product, hence inevitable price drops etc. I look at it as haggling at a market, only there is no verbal communication. If the publisher fails to offer the product at a price that the consumer deems acceptable, they simply wont make a sale to that individual.

It's quite different than pirating the product as a means of making demands.

Not to mention, a sale can convince someone who isn't part of a publishers target market to buy a game that they would otherwise have no interest in. I don't typically like puzzle games, so I don't buy them, but if I came across an interesting looking game in a sale, I might consider risking a small sum of money in the hope that I will enjoy it. Sales convince consumers to buy things they wouldn't normally purchase. That's nothing new.

And in any case, day one sales are only one part of the profit a company hopes to make. Much like films.

Absolutely, especially since pirates often seem to literally hate these aspects of the industry. I mean, often pirates quote the fact that a huge amount of money goes not to the developers but institutions that supposedly "exploit" them as an excuse why buying games does not support the developers anyway. They have no idea how important these companies are and how grateful the developers are for the funds and other services that they get from publishers or the range they get thanks to distributors. Generally speaking it's a kind of symbiosis - sometimes it works great, sometimes it doesn't, but in general it just works. It's sad that all the bad stories get broad media attention but barely anyone is talking about the usually good aspects of this cooperation. Stalker only got finished after THQ sent its own guy to GSC Gameworld who reorganized the project, Akira Yamaoka recently said that EA provided great support during the development of Shadows of the Damned, Piranha Bytes almost ceased to exist while working on Gothic but were saved by mother company Phenomedia (and its success with Moorhuhn Jagd). Pirates are often in complete denial when it comes to this stuff.

No, you are wrong. You clearly don't know how the market works. Every good goes down in price as time passes. This goes for everything: cars, PC hardware, TVs, clothes, and the list goes on. This is a basic rule within any market.

Am i being greedy if i don't buy X video card on release day? Am i being greedy if i choose to wait for an inevitable price drop? Am i being greedy if i wait for a discount on car X? No, i'm not, i'm just a consumer trying to save money. Saving money =/= being greedy.

Same goes for games. I do buy many games on release day. This year so far i have bought Diablo 3, Max Payne 3, Spec Ops The Line, CS:GO, Uncharted Golden Abyss, Resident Evil Revelations and a few others on release day. I did it because i couldn't wait for these games. I wanted to play them when they were released. If i were a bit more patient, i could have been rewarded with a discount (MP3 was on sale at 50% a few months ago), but i don't care, i made a concious choice when i bought these games on release day. These games attracted me so much that i felt i had to buy on release day. But no, i'm not buying every game on release day because a) i'm not rich, b) i'm not retarded and c) i don't even have time to play my games, my backlog is fucking huge.

So yeah, for games that i'm mildly interested i will wait for a sale. Just to give you an example, i'm interested in trying Resident Evil Operation Raccon City out, but there's absolutely no way i will pay full price for it. Capcom has 2 options: make a sale and get my money, even though it'll be a fraction of the actual price, or never get my money at all. What do you think is the best option? It's not rocket science, is it? It's just some fucking good old common sense. Sales make the potential audience wider. With a lower price, people who were not interested to buy the game at first will take a look at it. That's how the market works. Those who are REALLY interested in a game will always buy it at full price. Those who are not will wait for a sale. It's that easy.

It's just a matter of being a sensible consumer. If i can wait for a sale, i will, if i can't, i won't. If publishers want to sell me their game for U$2,50 i will take it. I'm not forcing that price down their throats. They made the decision themselves. It's MUCH different than pirating. Fuck, this is a matter of common sense.

"Oh wait, that shiny game for U$5? Ohhhh no, i'm being too greedy, i'd rather wait for it to go back to full price". You gotta be fucking kidding me.

Now did you understand or do you want me to draw a picture for you?
Me neither.

So what would you consider self-evident rights?

Read my answer to keeveek.

They are interested by the money of those who buy the game during the initial weeks after release, that's the best option for them, that's this option that will decide whenever a game was a success or a failure and in some case that will decide if the studio/devs got laid down or will continue to exists. They don't really care about making the "audience wider" they only care about ROI and most of the time (unless it's a MMO/F2P) ROI during the same fiscal period.

Well, there's a whole lot of method, that's for sure. I'm having a hard time seeing a clear argument inside all the lofty philosophical and legal terminology, though. Then again, I've never claimed to be an academic :P

Oh yeah, so according to your logic, EVERYONE who does not buy a game on release day is greedy and guilty if the game doesn't sell well. Oh yeah, let's blame 1 billion of poor indians too. Yeah, they can't even afford food, but they're also responsible for a game not selling well on the first week. Those greedy bastards.

If someone does not buy game X on release day, it's because the game is not interesing enough for that person to decide to pour U$60 on it.

COD sells hundreds of millions of dollars within 24 hours after the game is released. Give me a fucking break.

You know you should really try to read the whole post your are answering too. (and even better try to understand what you read)

I did. It's just as stupid as your nonsense logic.


Are you serious? Buddy, even 1 dollar is betten than 0. I'm really fucking sure that publishers know more about business than we do. If they make sales, they know what they are doing.

Anyway, this thread is over for me. I'm done discussing basic things. You lack basic common sense.

No, just because a company do something doesn't necessarily means that they do it because they "want" it and that they wouldn't do it otherwise if had a real choice.

To take your example, If a publisher lower it's price because of piracy it doesn't mean that they "want" to lower their price, it simply mean that to try to fight piracy they "have" to lower it; but if piracy wasn't there they wouldn't have.

Sales are a good thing for them when it means getting some extra money out of older properties that no longer sell well at "normal" price but they can become a bad thing if/when a big enough portion of the initial sales are lost because of them.

Clearly, YOU are the one who should read other posts more carefully. Your logic is flawed and i have proven it. PERIOD. End of thread for me.

If you can't understand the difference between piracy and BUYING games on sale, then i really have nothing to discuss with you anymore.