When it's 90% off.

It's worth mentioning that a lot of older games on GOG have demos, which can be found with a quick google search, although they are not always compatible with modern systems. I find them useful when they are available!

Oooh esoteric game buying calculus - my kind of topic LOL.

I can be pretty cheap, so sometimes I'll wait for a steep price drop - especially for games I'm "on the fence about." Or an older game that I think I might like, or that I could get bored with quickly because it's just too old school (excessive difficulty, just plain old clunky).

I'll do the same for a newer game if I'm afraid I might burn out on it quickly or think it might be light on gameplay / high on repetition. Or maybe something that looks really good to me, but is in a genre I'm generally not a fan of (I've bought a few adventure games that fall in this category).

I'll buy a game right away / full price if it's something I really want to support and show is viable. If someone's pet project checks all my boxes, I'll buy it. If a big publisher releases something new(er) I've been interested in, DRM free, I'll buy it.

My backlog also plays a role in when I'll buy. I don't like it to get out of hand, and *most* games I want to get to in a timely manner. Don't get me wrong, some stuff falls by the wayside. But for the most part if I'm buried, I won't buy a game, even if it's on sale and / or I want it. I know it'll go up again and when it does I might have fewer games to play. I always try to keep a few games "on hand" for when the mood strikes me. Sometimes I might want a turnbased RPG, sometimes maybe a shooter, sometimes something new and shiny, sometimes something more quirky or rogue-like.

Finally, once in a while I just want a game RIGHT NAHW (Fairfox will have to spell that properly for me). Just recently I grabbed Expeditions Viking because that's exactly what I felt like playing. During a sale Battle Brother came up and I couldn't help but think how much fun it would be to drop what I was playing, suit up a bunch of little Weebles in progressively better gear and get them killed in horrible ways.

So yeah, enjoy that wall of text ;)

Usually one year after a true PC game comes out. Speaking of which, it's a good time to buy Expeditions: Viking, as the last patch of it came out, and after playing through, I gotta say if you loved anything from Bioware (e.g. strong story), it's your kinda shit. Even though their original title, Expecitons: Conquistador is even better.

Gotta admit that I just buy them when there's a sale.

For this site, I scan my personal wishlist as well as the current sales pages to see if anything pops out.

That is of course if there's money in my wallet.

I agree - it went much more in the traditional "Western RPG / Bioware" direction (but turnbased) rather than doing what Conquistador did. As a HUGE fan of Conquistador, I was hoping for more of the same and then some. I actually found the party based exploration of maps a bit jaring at first (in Viking). And I sort of miss the "text based quests" (in Viking they're sort of replaced by more traditional dialogue options).

But it's certainly still a good game and the setting is interesting. Plus I had a lot of fun building my party and switching out my little guys.

Thanks for the heads up on the patch by the way - I'm not sure if I have it or not - I'll go take a look now. Though so far the game has been incredibly stable / bug free / no glaring quest glitches I've seen.

I agree, in Conquistador you had the feeling of being a traveler with your own wheelhouse where in Viking you had your base from the start, so it kinda ruined the feeling of being totally free and exposed to the whims of nature.

Sure. You can buy an original 16th-century painting for $500,000, or a print of the same for $5 :-P

Kidding, of course.

If it's a game I'm fucking stoked for, I'll buy it as soon as it's released, unless it gets a release sale, in which case I wait until said sale ends in order to be the sole data point showing that some people may be prepared to purchase games off-sale.

Usually, I get games when they have a price I'm prepared to pay for them - not a certain percentage off, or "as cheaply as possible", and not even "this price or less" - but sometimes I get games in a deep sale just because they happen to support Linux, or I get a "maybe I'll try that some day" vibe off it, despite not having researched them before.

I guess the short answer about the title, is I did not want to make it sound like the topic is just about me.

But I also do buy a game sometimes, despite no changes, when perhaps I am in a more receptive mood or after longer reflection.

Or perhaps some element of the game has nagged at me, so i do eventually go and check out youtube etc.

@ALL
Some have suggested I should just go to youtube etc. But really, why should I have to? I am usually checking out a bunch of games, possibly on limited time or usually there are a lot.

Everything we need to make a determination, should be provided at GOG on the game page. End of story really.

It takes real motivation (from where?) to go outside of GOG to check up on a game ... at least for me.

I am the same.
For me, it is about the end price, not a percentage of discount, and about what you get for that price, and how interested I am in a game.

I am a great believer in paying a fair price for things.
That fair price varies of course, for me, depending on the game.

If I am not that interested in the game, and it is a freebie, then for me, that's a fair price to maybe give it a go.

If I am half interested or unsure, then a few dollars is a good price.

Generally I have a few cutoff prices in mind, depending on what I perceive is the return or content.

The most I think I have ever paid at GOG for a game, was around $32 for Witcher 3 ... but then it included all the DLC etc, and I got around $6 back in my wallet.

I paid higher than I am normally want to, for Mafia 2 and 3, for similar reasons. And there have been a few others.
The average price I pay, is usually less than $5 AUD, though I regularly pay up to about $10 AUD for games I am really keen on ... sometimes a bit more.

Age of the game is a consideration for price, as is Byte for Buck.

For many games, there really is a lot to consider ... some are easy.

Often it is just a matter of being patient, taking your time ... giving things time to sink in.

---------------------------- Maybe we should meet and get married ... just don't tell my wife. :)

Thanks! Same for you.

I'm not really after advice, and I already gave my reasoning regarding reviews and clips. I am not going to suddenly change the way I do things ... I do them the way I do for very well determined reasons.

This topic is really about having a discussion and possibly garnering support to encourage those who can, to improve their screenshots ... and of course making them aware in the first place of how important GOOD screenshots are.


@ALL
Occasionally, not very often, I will pay more for a game, maybe even purchase a game, to encourage or support developers.

Sometimes the opposite happens, for a bunch of reasons, and not likely to be related to a small developer ... only a greedy big one ... or the Publisher they are using.

Totally agree.
I have most of the demos available here at GOG, even have the full games of two of them.

I guess I am old school in that regard, and probably have thousands of Game Demos ... something developers used to always do back in the day.

I am unlikely though, to download a demo during a sale, so I can check it out quickly, to take advantage of a sale price. It takes a certain amount of interest in the first place, to even bother with a demo.

That said, I would grab a demo of Aquanox and check it out at my leisure, and then maybe grab the game next time it is on sale after that. I am not going to go looking for a demo though. Devs must do their part and provide here at GOG. If the do that, then I will do my part, and download the demo and eventually check it out ... perhaps. Even if they provide a link to a demo on another website, on the GOG game page, that's at least something.

Yep, a very real consideration.

There is usually only so much money I will spend on games, and hours and times I can play them in.

One has to be realistic ... at least to a point. I am also a collector, so I go a bit above and beyond ... makes me feel like a king, having all those choices, even if I know I will never do them all.

Variety is the spice of life.

Sometimes I will buy a game, just to fill in category/genre gaps ... if it is appealing enough ... maybe given lots of good reviews. Many of those I will probably never play. But who knows .... never say never.

I doubt I will buy as many in my subsequent years with GOG as I bought in the first year, though I am still on track to replicate the first year, thanks to their damn sales and great games at great prices.

Gotta be a slow down some time surely.

Much of what I got was backlog stuff I already had on disc or missed out in the last ten years.

Getting DRM-Free games has certainly grabbed me big time ... especially with newer OS support.

Sure, something like that. Or just the ability to go online and look at a picture of that painting.
I mean, libraries are a thing, too.

But here's the thing, though:
This works for some games.

Looking at my favourite ten games in my library, there's one that won me over on screenshots. Related to an earlier point, in contrast three of them were "fuck it, they're so cheap right now, might as well give them a try" and another three I didn't want in the first place and got in a bundle (and re-bought later on gog). And frankly, if I were to judge by screenshots, some of them look a bit like ass, and that's not down to the quality of the screenshots, that's just how the game looks (and, of course, customer bias and genre preference, which doesn't necessarilly correlate with enjoyment of the final product, which is probably its own can of worms).

I mean, what are you going to do, if your game just isn't that photogenic?