Topic: "Buy early, play early" is going to be a thing now.

[idolminds]

There are a couple games now that let you pay more money to play the game a few days early, namely Gears of War 4 and Battlefield 1. This isn't just a preorder since you are actually paying more money than standard retail for the privilege. And it's only like 3-4 days early so who is going to spend $20 more on a game just for that?

248,000 people are playing BF1 today. At $20 extra for each copy that's just short of $5 million. For the publisher to literally do nothing but hold back the regular retail release a couple days. With money that easy I can see this happening a lot more in the future.

[Quemaqua]

The natural evolution of the wondrous consumer mentality that made DLC something we'll have to live with forever.

[Cobra951]

Microsoft did the same thing with Forza Horizon 3.  Only the $100 "Ultimate" edition could be played 4 days early.  If this is the only new money-grubbing thing for a while, I can live with it.  Waiting a few more days is no big deal.  Having chunks of a game cut out, then sold later as DLC, that's a big deal.  Paying to win in a retail game is much worse than that, and I'm seeing this happening already.

[K-man]

Smart business move, but it's pretty sad the things game companies are able to monetize. 

[W7RE]

You actually do get stuff other than just early access. With Gears 4, the ultimate edition costs exactly the same as if you bought the game and the season pass separately. You get both, plus some bonus card packs (skins and XP bonus items). With Battlefield 1 you pay $20 extra and get extra vehicle and weapon unlocks (no idea if these are cosmetic only), as well as early access. This kind of thing has been happening for years in free to play MMOs. (As far as I recall, paid MMOs have only given early access for pre-ordering, not for paying more.) Typically you buy a "founder's pack" and get a bunch of cash shop items or currency at a discount of what it would cost you normally, and you also get early access.

Unless the early play time gets stretched out really far, like weeks or months ahead of the normal release, this doesn't really bother me much. I bought the $100 version of Gear 4 the day before release, so I didn't really even get to play early, I just wanted the season pass. You know what does bother me a LOT though? Microtransactions with a randomized element to them, in full priced games. Yeah, Overwatch with it's damn loot boxes where you could spend $100 or more and still not get what you want because there's no way to target the items you actually want. Destiny and Gears 4 do this as well. All 3 also make it take a long ass time to gather the currency to buy shit without spending real money.

[Cobra951]

Yeah, I just posted elsewhere about that yesterday.  It's a lousy thing to do.  You pay money, and don't even know what you're paying for.  It's gambling, and works by preying on people's weakness and obsessions.  Many of those people are just kids.  The hot water Valve fell into because of the gambling element in CS: Go serves them right, even if they didn't do anything illegal (because it should be illegal, and it's definitely wrong).

Having said that, the gaming community as a whole is doing this to itself.  It wouldn't be happening if it weren't so profitable that normally straight-arrow companies end up throwing all ethics out the window in pursuit of that pie.

[gpw11]

To be honest, I'm fine with this sort of thing and the fact that so many games have a "Day 1 Digital" premium edition, etc. Giant Bomb had a good point, although a bit of a throwaway, in that the two tiers of pricing is a way to avoid blatantly increasing the price of games across the board.   

[Cobra951]

Increasing the price of games $20-40 across the board would mean a lot less games would be sold.  That can't be used as an excuse.  Prices are where the market will bear.  The big companies have staff to figure how far they can push.

Edit:  Actually, that only scratches the surface.  It's not about covering costs of development plus some modest profit margin.  It's about making a killing, about increasing profitability way high, and driving publisher stock prices higher.  To remove these MTs while keeping the same overall revenue would require tripling the retail price, or more, while expecting the games to sell in the same quantities as before.  It's simply not going to happen.  MTs are here to stay as their own big-money extractor.  Game prices have no bearing on it.

[gpw11]

It's not an excuse, it's a reality of price strategy .   The excuse would be that the price of games hasn't kept up with market inflation over the last 20 years (although I would argue the increase of digital sales has countered that somewhat since the hard costs have been marginally reduced).

There's no one sitting in the back room of any of these companies sweating over demand curves trying to find out where price equilibrium sits, the only way you find that out is by past experience or trial and error.  What the staff at those companies have figured out is what people in other industries have figured out as well - there will be consumer blowback against a $10 price increase across the board.  Nevertheless, you have targets and you need to hit or exceed them or you're gone. 

The problem is that you don't KNOW what the market will bear until you try it out.  Maybe you get all the other publishers on board, charge $10 extra and people grumble but still buy just as many games -nice and easy - it worked with PC games 5 or so years ago when they brought all new releases back up to console pricing.  But MAYBE you charge $10 extra and lose 30% of your sales.  That'll sink you, you don't need that.

Well, maybe it's somewhere in between and that could work if.....or maybe you just increase $5? Maybe.....hey, how about you don't even bother. How about you leave the base price as it is so the casual consumers and the one who are budget-bound don't jump ship over the increase but then you release a second edition with a $25-30 higher price point, give them a simplified $5 per unit our costs worth of extra content, convince them some free services are "premium".  We retain the budget bound buyers as nothing changed for them and we get more than we would have from the inelastic consumers in order to cover some of what we could have made off the middle consumers. And hey, minimal waves compared to the alternative.

I have no problem with this at all.  If someone wants to play an extra $20 or so to stress test some servers for me and get some skins, great for them.  I find it a lot more palatable and harmless than most other avenues for increasing revenue that these companies tend to use.

[Cobra951]

My point is that it doesn't matter how much you incrementally raise retail prices (up to the point where everyone knows it won't fly with the mass market).  That is not going to make up for the insane, unearned-but-still-obtained profits from longterm microtransactions.  It may be that games go up to $70-80, but that won't remove a single pay-to-win or gamble-real-dough-for-virtual-goods MT from the picture.

[MysterD]

If people want to buy early to play early and spent more $, let them. Game dev's + publishers need/want the $, so let them.

We who wait for the price-cuts do the best here normally, as we get (likely) better patched-up games at MUCH cheaper prices. As someone who buys LOTS of games, I have to normally buy most of my games ONLY when they're on sale for a major discount in many cases - i.e. wait for 75% off discount or better from the lowest MSRP price; or buy it in a Humble Bundle, BundleStars, or from some other bundle site.

75% off seems to be happening less quickly and/or less frequently - so, sometimes I drop it down 50% off or 60% off; depends on the title.

And for the super-patient, those can wait for the re-release bundle w/ base-game + All extra content (DLC's/Season Pass/Expansions) - if they actually put one out, of course.

[gpw11]

My point is that it doesn't matter how much you incrementally raise retail prices (up to the point where everyone knows it won't fly with the mass market).  That is not going to make up for the insane, unearned-but-still-obtained profits from longterm microtransactions.  It may be that games go up to $70-80, but that won't remove a single pay-to-win or gamble-real-dough-for-virtual-goods MT from the picture.

Oh, I agree completely.  I have a feeling we were talking about two completely different things.   Microtransactions are unfortunately the target revenue stream of the future.  I don't think there's really an upside to it and I think we, as consumers, just have to be vigilant in both shunning games with blatantly unfair models (at least the worst offenders) as well as supporting games that are more traditionally funded as well.

Overwatch, for example.   I don't mind the loot boxes there at all.  It's all cosmetic and actually kind of fun.  I don't doubt that the inclusion of lootboxes also means that they'll be willing to put more resources into the game in the form of new maps, characters, and modes - in hopes that whale's spend more and more money on boxes.   I do get that it's gambling, but I don't see it as being any more or less unethical than the model trading card sellers use(d) - I spent a lot of time as a kid opening packs of baseball cards in hopes of getting a sweet foil or the right card to complete the Jays.  You spend the money and don't know what you're getting, but I think as long as you know that going in, you're fine.

When I think back to Mass Effect 3's MP (which is the first time I came across loot boxes or crates, and the last until OW actually) that seems a little more shady (Although I actually thought it was kind of fun earning them).  It was how you unlocked classes, weapons, etc.   I can see that being frustrating if you're looking for something in particular.

[Cobra951]

Oh, I agree completely.  I have a feeling we were talking about two completely different things.   Microtransactions are unfortunately the target revenue stream of the future.  I don't think there's really an upside to it and I think we, as consumers, just have to be vigilant in both shunning games with blatantly unfair models (at least the worst offenders) as well as supporting games that are more traditionally funded as well.

Exactly.  Very well put.

[ren]

Considering right now I wait a few months to pay $20 less, I don't have an issue with this move. Game companies can play around with their price elasticity models all they want if that's what they need to do. The cost of development has gone up so much lately and the price of games has not.

Companies will definitely take this too far as they experiment but they'll eventually hit a sweet spot.

Exactly.  Very well put.

I think a subscription model will eventually beat out microtransactions. Not by game but by publisher. The vast majority of revenue from microtransactions comes from very few users and a subscription model will let them cast a wider net. I'm surprised that EA Sports hasn't tried something like this already.