[Economics of Game Prices]

I'll admit, what constitutes "shovelware" is a subjective line, although I think we can agree that the Wii has got it the worst this gen. I'm just waiting for the "quality over quantity" view to start reigning again... but that's mainly because I know that "quantity over quality" is what caused (in large part) the original game crash. Like I said earlier, over 1200 games released in a single year? That's just excessive; so many of those games were just destined to fail. We may have a a good selection of quality titles, but the ratio of good to bad games is just abysmal. I think that's the most confusing thing to me. We're always hearing publishers complain about how they "don't make back their investments", and they blame it so much on piracy, but never seem to take responsibility for just how much bad crap they put out.

It's like... well, no wonder you're losing money; you're flooding the market with Imagine: Pony Dress Up #13. There's only so much crap people can buy at once, and at least we are saving up for the Mass Effects and the Red Deads. I just wish more of that shovelware money would be thrown at indie devs... THEY are the ones that deserve it more than anyone.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Well, I have to say I'm pleasantly surprised; I expected you to actually have me do your homework for you. So, are you still going to continue whining? Or do you have it out of your system now?

As to the actual topic: Well, Zircon, I think you're talking more about the process of getting permission to publish games at all, not to publish each game. As it stands (if I understand the process correctly) you have to apply to get your SDK (you can't just buy it; they have to agree to LET you buy it), and that's the hard part of the process. But, once Nintendo lets you buy the SDK, you're a licensed publisher / developer, and from that point on, any games you release are implicitly allowed by Nintendo, unlike the old process, where every individual game had to be reviewed.

These days, once your in, your in, and you can release as much crap as you want. Of course, this is what I've picked up from reading GamaSutra and game design articles online since the Wii came out, so if there's someone with more recent or more direct experience who can spell the process out in more detail, by all means.

[Economics of Game Prices]

You say that an argument and the person that gives it are not the same. But you are posting them. This is a terrible fallacy. You are saying these things, because you believe them. If your beliefs in a subject were somehow not connected to you, then you wouldn't be making them. The fact that you seem to strongly invested in them only affirms that. If this was simple debate, and you were chosen to represent your side, then you would do so in a manner that reflected that: rational, collected.

(Emphasis added)

You're kidding, right? Ok, so if Saddam Hussein came up to you and said that the Earth is spherical, you wouldn't believe him because he is (was) an asshole? The truth value of a statement, group of statements, or argument as a whole is totally independent of the people who believe in a particular truth value. That's why the Clergy saying the Earth was flat didn't actually make it flat. Who CARES if I believe what I'm saying? Do you know how many times I've played Devil's Advocate in an argument? I built a competitive items ruleset in Brawl that has been played in multiple countries on a bet, playing Devil's Advocate, arguing a point of view I didn't even believe in.

Because, whether I agreed with it or not didn't actually affect its truth value. A statement is true or false regardless of who says the statement. How do you NOT understand that?

You may not have noticed this, but none of us are 14 years old, and this is not SmashBoards. Your behavior may be appropriate for there, but it is not acceptable for here.

Yeah, you're not 14, which makes it even worse that you don't understand basic logical concepts that I could explain to a high schooler. Again, I don't care what you think of me; my premises are independent of me.

You may claim whatever imaginary moral victory you wish over anyone of us, but the hard truth is, you have not done anything to even remotely sway a single person here to your line of thinking.

Well, that's a lofty claim, since in order to prove it, you'd have to innately know the opinions of every single person who has read this thread.

All you have done is shown you are not an expert in the matters discussed...

I never asserted I was the end-all-be-all expert. Just that I was knowledgeable. And, even if I wasn't, that doesn't affect the inherent truth values of my statements; I could just be parroting someone else's thoughts, and that doesn't automatically make those thoughts false, just because I don't understand or know them myself.

...you have a personal belief in the evils of capitalism...

I do think that capitalism is based off of a viewpoint that doesn't just espouse, but depends on, taking advantage of others, yes. So?

...and you react by treating your fellow members with contempt for merely standing up to your utter drivel.

No, I treat those with contempt who aren't constructive, like you. I assure you, I do not hold Zircon or Gario with contempt, even though I disagree with them. You're the only one in here I think is a dick. And even then, that wasn't until YOU started throwing around insults because I criticized your precious Pokemon, a game I also hold near and dear to my heart (which was the whole reason I cared so much to criticize it in the first place: you criticize the things you care about because you want them to get better).

When you are done having intellectual fisticuffs with 14 year-olds on that another site, you are welcome to come back here and have a proper discussion like an adult.

Well, aren't YOU just the arbiter of an entire forum all of the sudden.

EDIT@DS:

The Nintendo Seal of Quality (currently Official Nintendo Seal in NTSC regions) is a gold seal first used by Nintendo of America' date=' and later Nintendo of Europe, displayed on any game, system, or accessory licensed for use on one of its video game consoles, denoting the game has been properly licensed by Nintendo ([b']and, in theory, checked for quality).

(Emphasis added)

Didn't say it was a perfect system; sure, bad games still happened. But, at least Ninty was checking something; they still had to OK the game at ALL. Nowadays, all you have to do is buy the SDK and get someone to print / distribute your discs, and you can make and sell Wii games. NO quality control AT ALL. This has actually been a significant criticism of Nintendo's 3rd party relations towards later consoles.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Alright, why not?

Even though numbering the arguments and splitting them into two separate arguments yourself implies that they are mutually exclusive, I'll include them altogether.

I don't really see how numbering them makes them exclusive to each other; I would have thought that made them sequential. See? Misunderstanding. It happens.

Wait, this has very little to NOTHING to do with piracy. Perhaps it's a decent idea to save money (or sell more games, overall), but if there were fewer games in the market then that just makes a pirate's job easier. This is a non-sequitur argument that does not lead into the second point. Why did you want me to include it, again?

I'll admit that I could have been a LOT clearer as to why shovelware matters to piracy. I'll give you the short version: even pirated copies of shovelware count towards piracy statistics, and shovelware is at an increased risk of piracy because the kind of people who use torrents are already predisposed to NOT want to pay money for it; tech-savvy people are NOT the market that shovelware designers are aiming at... they are aiming at dumb parents who think Carnival Games sounds like a good time for the family.

I'll readily admit that I've pirated shovelware because I wanted a time-waster, but wasn't willing to pay full price for something that obviously wasn't WORTH full price, and I doubt I'm the only one. That, unfortunately but understandably, counts towards piracy statistics. Less shovelware means less games to actually pirate, and I'm ok with there being less games on the market if the ones that get taken down are the "Custer's Revenge" of the gaming world.

Not to mention that most of what you said is highly subjective - there are more than enough people that like shovelware out there for it's existence to be justified. I don't like it and neither do you, but why would a company make it if no one liked it? For someone that likes attacking people based on them making assumptions and opinions, you sure do use them a lot yourself.

First point - completely irrelevant. Next point.

Well, I was one of those people who LIKED Nintendo's Seal of Approval system; I liked it when companies controlled the QUALITY of their libraries, instead of just hyping the QUANTITY of games in it. Sure, there are people who don't do their research and will buy shovelware without knowing it's a buggy, poorly designed piece of shit... but just because there are stupid people out there doesn't mean we have to provide them with crappy stuff to buy. If that argument was sound, we wouldn't have consumer protection laws in the first place because, hey, it's YOUR job to know if the toy has lead-based paint in it; if people are buying lead-based toys, there is obviously a market for them.

There you have it - your entire argument, in it's original form. Even in it's entirety it still reduces to that last sentence.

Well, I guess that's another misunderstanding; I didn't say "you won't have piracy at all", I said "you won't have RAMPANT piracy". Again, having to do with the rates, not the existence. I had intended for "rampant" to have been the operative word in that statement, not "piracy". I'm sorry for the confusion; I should have bolded or italicized or something.

Hey, I can actually agree with that. Too bad that wasn't your first argument (shown in full above - no denying that now). We can leave it at that peacefully, if you'd like.

Well, in all honesty, if I had known that one of my posts was going to be the OP for an entire thread, I might have elaborated more or written a bit more exhaustively on the subject. Unfortunately, that was originally one off-hand post in a greater thread, not a planned OP. So... I'm sorry one of my singular posts got hacked out of a thread and turned into an OP by a moderator without my planning or knowledge?

I'm glad we could at least agree on that one statement, though. See? Progress! It happens, even on the internet. ^_-

[Economics of Game Prices]

What... what? You know, there are some times when I really wish I knew Korean, and some times when I'm REALLY glad I don't... and I'm not sure which time this is. At least it's not as confusing as that Korean Intel song.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Again, personal slights for no reason.

yeah, I'm really hurt that you had to resort to insults to make your points. Trust me, my feelings are far from hurt.

Then, why do you post nothing constructive anymore? You haven't actually quoted an argument I've made in... 7 pages. All you quote anymore is axillary stuff that has nothing to do with the topic at hand. I suppose I'm partially to blame; I really should ignore you're off-topic ranting, raving, and rambling about how I'm just such a mean poster.

First, it was a jpg. Jpg is not a gif. You should know this.

I'm sorry I didn't check your image properties when you posted. I assumed you were posting a .gif when you posted an animated popcorn image you said was a .gif. My bad.

You are a computer something student. I can't recall right now, it it had something to do with programming, because you specifically mentioned it multiple times to back up your arguments.

I've studied game design (design and production) and C/C++ programming, yes. My major is philosophy. I've studied broadly in my time in school.

Second, again, your behavior betrays your position. Again, this does not help anything you have said or done.

What? Mocking you? Hardly. I could be the most patient, respectful poster in the history of the internet, and my points would be no different (though my execution might). What you need to learn is what a bunch of 14 year-olds on SmashBoards already know: a person is separate from his argument, and trying to discredit a person doesn't actually discredit an argument; that can only be done by proving premises or conclusion false. So, say whatever you want about me or my posting style; if you can't prove the premises wrong, or prove their connection to my conclusion wrong, it doesn't matter what you say about me, as a person, because I am not my argument.

Even I don't say your arguments are false because you're stupid... although I DO think you're stupid, though that's just my opinion. Feel free to disregard it.

Thrid, when you stop doing the very thing you accuse me, and others here, of doing, and stop ignoring our arguments, pretending they aren't relevant, and getting righteous while proving nothing with any kind of support aside from "BECAUSE I KNOW IT'S RIGHT", then I 'll get back to you.

I have never "ignored" any argument in this thread; any time someone quotes me, I directly multi-quote them back with a point-by-point rebuttal of their premises, and I have NEVER once in this whole debate tried to prove an argument right by saying that "it's right because I know its right". Everything I've provided so far can be found with a simple Google search. I've never even ignored YOUR arguments; I gave you the same point-by-point treatment, even when it was obvious that the only reason you disagreed was because you misinterpreted my post (the Pkmn DLC thing, where you somehow thought I meant a GBA game had DLC or something).

Besides, Schwaltzvald said I could have a free trial of his posting style. He's not Blizzard, and therefore not charging me anything to use it. How do you respond to that?

...irrelevant? Great for you? I really don't care.

I love how he feels the need to include one extra line of a quote, which doesn't even need to be used or answered, so he can make one more comment that contributes nothing to either side of the discussion. It's like he has to get the last word in, even in his own posts.

To show him I have no personal feelings against him, I will let him have the last word in my post.

I would like to let you know, by the way, that I respond to EVERY section of a post, no matter how banal it is, because I don't even want to RISK quoting someone out of context, much like Gario did earlier to me. If I'm going to quote someone, I'm going to quote them ENTIRELY. That's why I multi-quote everything: because even when I don't respect YOU, I still respect your posts enough to quote them in their entirety.

EDIT: Sorry for the double-post. I figured someone would have posted by now. My bad.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Well then, let's remind you what your argument was.

HOLY CRAP lowering the price was your solution to piracy. What are you even talking about, when you say people are ignoring your argument? That was your original argument. Word for word.

No, it wasn't "word for word". You forgot this part:

1 ) Developers need to make more compelling software... and no, just because 2010 had ME2, a CoD, a Halo, and RDR, that does NOT mean that we're putting out quality titles. The ENTIRE VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY, across all consoles + PCs (without iDevices) released 1224 games in 2010. Note: that includes multi-console releases (ME2 coming out on 360 and PC counts as 2 releases)... but even taking that into consideration, over 1200 games were released in 2010, and how many of them mattered? How many of them sold? How many of them were even GOOD?

Hint: If you didn't know that many games were even released, then the answer is "very few".

Instead of studios sinking money into all of this shovelware (I cringe to think about how many of those games were Wii trash titles), how about NOT MAKING ALL OF THAT CRAP. Make less games, and make them ALL BETTER. How about only releasing 500, or 300 games total between all consoles, and using all that saved money to make those 300-500 games all AAA titles? If all of those games were must-have games, you'd be selling more. Which brings me to...

The point was twofold, which means that they go together; you can't quote half of it, and claim you're giving full context. People pirate games they don't feel are actually worth a purchase, and people pirate games they feel cost too much. Fix both of those, or even ONE of those, and you'll go a long way towards fixing the problem... but like I've said since then (because there is not infinite room to post), you'll never stop it outright.

There's no way around it - you are arguing that lowering prices will reduce piracy to a non-factor, and everyone else says no it won't (not to mention that they're saying that lowering prices hurt business more than piracy does, but that's another issue entirely).

(Emphasis added)

NO I'M NOT. How many times do I have to say that? If you THINK that's my argument, then it's due to me not being clear or choosing the right words, due to you misinterpreting my posts, or some combination of the two. Piracy will never be a non-factor until companies choose to ignore its effects, which is, by the way, a totally valid response to piracy: again, the HIB people ignored piracy outright, and it made them a ton of money. Hell, Blizzard gives away WoW, knowing that private servers exist. Even THEY ignore piracy, to some extent.

Don't expect a consistent answer when you can't come up with a consistent question. By the way, in logic what you're doing is called 'moving the goalpost'. That reference to the first post is proof of that.

Not when you quote half of it out of context, it's not.

[Economics of Game Prices]

OK, enough is enough. This isn't an economic debate. JackKieser isn't even talking economics, but rather the morality of capitalism itself, which is a different topic and belongs in PPR if anything. I'm hesitant to move it yet again but honestly all of you are just banging your head against a wall because you're failing to see the fundamental disagreement that is making intelligent debate impossible.

But on the topics of games and piracy, since that was basically the origin of this to begin with: people heavily pirated the first and second Humble Indie Bundle, both of which could be purchased for literally 1 penny, the lowest possible price imaginable (and at that price, the developers involved were taking a loss simply due to cost of transaction/bandwidth alone.) We're talking a minimum of 25% piracy rate, and these are games that the gaming community at large widely-praised, being sold at the lowest possible price point.

So? It was pirated; piracy will happen. That's a given. But, the guys who put out the HIB understood that, and even though a lot of people didn't pay for their games, a metric shit ton DID. They made money. Dare I say, they made enough money to comfortably live off their product for at least as long as it took them to make the games in the first place, which is really all you can (and should) ask for. They'd have made more if they didn't, quite nobly, give so much of it to charity.

Hell, I don't know HOW many times I've personally paid for things I liked over the internet not because I HAD to, but because I WANTED to.

This invalidates your argument that developers can realistically combat piracy by lowering prices.

Well, that's because it wasn't my argument. There's NOTHING developers can do to realistically (by that, I assume you mean totally) combat piracy. Piracy already won. It will NEVER lose. You cannot beat digital pirates... the tech is on THEIR side, and always will be, unless you fundamentally change the way the computer is designed, on a physical level.

Keeping in mind that no developer can realistically charge 1 penny, or even $1 and expect to recoup the costs of even the transaction, much less the production of the game, substantial piracy will inevitably exist simply because some people are lazy, immoral assholes.

Sure, it will. But, the fact that companies let an inevitable war that they cannot win affect how much they will charge for a game or how they handle content distribution shows not only how out of touch they are, but WHY they are losing SO badly.

It's just like Sephfire said: they have to provide a better product more efficiently and effectively than pirates. The one flaw with digital data is that it's easy to lose forever: one power surge, and my drive is fried. A physical disc doesn't have that problem. But, they are SO stuck on charging out the ass for physical discs that they are blind to the better alternative. After all, why not sell both? Sell me a digital version of ME2 for 10$, or a disc version for 40$? If they're so worried about how much GS is marking them up, stop selling games to GameStop. Last time I checked, they have the right to refuse service to anyone... at least, that's what MY EULAs tell me.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Why respond at all? He's just like millions of other trolls jacking off to the fact he can command everyone's attention doing nothing more than being the crowned king asshole. Nobody works this hard or spends this much time to prove a point to someone they don't know on the internet unless they get a really sick satisfaction out of doing it.

Wait, which point are you saying is wrong? The game prices one, or the "religions don't have scientific evidence" one? Because one I can respond to, and one I should really stop responding to (in this thread, at least; I'd be happy to take it to PM or another thread).

[Economics of Game Prices]

So explain that one to me. If my argument is invalid, then so is yours, based on the same logic. It'd be hard pressed to prove that high prices do affect piracy rates, just as it's hard to prove that they don't. Hey look, we have a case of negative proof from you, thus technically making your original argument invalid.

By polling, chief. Again, people have been asked this before, and the usual answer is "it's expensive". Even Sephfire said this in his video: people cite the cost of games as a reason they pirate... which kind of means that prices affect piracy rates. Remember: unless we have PROOF to think they're lying, they must be telling the truth. All it takes is ONE instance of someone truly pirating because of cost for the piracy rate to be affected, mind you.

However, I'll pretend that your argument has some weight and counter it anyway (technically, your argument is dead in the water, but I want to have some fun with it) My position shows that there are alternative explanations that are proven to exist (lookie here) that undermine your original assumption (e.g. people claim high prices cause piracy). My position exists not to show that I'm right, but to show that your creating a slippery slope that doesn't look at the alternatives.

AGAIN, you keep saying that I'm asserting that high prices CAUSE piracy. THEY. DON'T. Stop saying that like it's MY argument, because it's not. They AFFECT piracy rates. That's it.

The reason piracy exists is because intellectual property is an oxymoron, and because digital media is, by definition, an infinite resource. Jesus Christ, you guys don't read.

Enough meta-logic, though - what makes you say that my theory isn't possible, and your theory is the ONLY possible explanation for the phenomena? You'll need to provide reasoning that your explanation is the only correct one if you want your argument that 'Lower prices = less piracy' is true. Otherwise, you're setting yourself up for cum hoc ergo propter hoc.

As a philosophy major I'm sure you know what that means, eh?

No, but correlation does furtively glance in that direction, mouthing "look over there", if you'll allow me to paraphrase Randall Munroe. Again, you keep making assumptions. My argument (that prices affect piracy rates) is already proven as soon as people state that the high price of a digital good is the reason it was pirated. That's it. Bam, proven. Even so, I never said that my argument was the only valid one, just that it's MORE valid that yours... which is what, actually? I never asked that. What do YOU think affects piracy rates? Because to the extent of my knowledge, multiple things can affect piracy rates, so if you have some other premise, it probably isn't even mutually exclusive with mine.

The only reason I have beef with your counterpoints so far is because you're not even reading my conclusions properly. Well, that and because your premise requires more assumption than mine, and I tend to favor Occam's Razor.

That line of argument is only valid for necessities, not for vanities.

Why is that? People want things, so they get them. They can't afford digital media, so they steal it. I didn't say it was right, just that it was a reason. Theft is still wrong, but that doesn't mean you can't have a REASON for stealing, and that includes stealing vanity items.

Um, no, that's not what you're doing when you pirate copies. If you didn't have the product and yet showed interest in it then the company has incentive to fix the problem. If you don't buy the product and yet have it somehow then what's the point in fixing the problem? The product is out, so why would the company cater to pirate's demands (which is the WHOLE POINT of not buying a product)?

I think you misunderstood me. You said, if you don't have the money for something don't buy it. What I meant by responding was to say that people AREN'T buying what they don't think they can afford... they are stealing what they feel they can't afford. But, due to how digital media is an infinite resource, people are figuring out, slowly but surely, that the selling of an intangible is kind of stupid; it's like selling air. Unless you think people should have to go to air utility companies in the same way they go to a power or water company, at it's most base, selling digital data is really dumb, for all of the supply / demand reasons I gave before.

He stopped responding to you when you decided to throw his arguments away without cause.

I had plenty of cause. I always broke his "arguments" down, even his ones about Pokemon DLC. I addressed him, point by point, just like anyone else... and he responded with lots of bashing because I called him stupid for buying into Madden and mishandling his buying power. Ok, so he has plenty of right to be mad at me for calling him a name over the internet, but that doesn't mean my points were wrong (that Madden is a mishandled property and that Pokemon should be redesigned with a DLC system in place).

Instead of him countering my perfectly valid and sound points, he just went "baawwwwwww" in the corner and posted .gifs. Fine; obviously there are better people for me to discuss this with.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Jack, your basic premise has repeatedly been 'Making a large profit is bad'. This makes no sense and is undermining your entire argument.

Making a large profit is, in and of itself, not bad, and was never my premise (my premise was that making profit at the expense of others is bad). What makes it bad right now is how its done (at the expense of others: to make a profit, you have to force someone to pay more than cost) and how it's a priority.

You know when Blizzard can make $745 million in a quarter? When world hunger is eradicated, when AIDS is cured, when homelessness is no longer an issue, when cancer is defeated, when we have clean, efficient energy sources, when the economy isn't in shambles, and when the environment isn't fucked.

THEN, make your profit. By all means. But until then, you're literally saying, "my company and the fact that I want to have 2 or 3 houses with 5 cars at each is more important than stopping blood wars over resources in Africa, scientific research, exploring the universe, and a hundred other things that benefit not just me, but all of humanity." And, that's people being dicks. Straight up. There is very little true evil in the world... but there are a lot of assholes who would rather drive 3 of the same car than solve humanity's real issues.

And, I take issue with that, as a human.

Just because a corporation makes a large profit does not make it evil, overbearing, or unfit to exist. All these subscribers you speak of don't have to pay. It's their choice; they believe that fee is worth being paid for the content they receive. You can not decide that for them.

No, I can't. But, if more people REALLY knew what was going on, they'd be pissed and want it to change, too. The people playing WoW find those subscription fees totally reasonable. The problem is, they aren't reasonable by a long shot, and if people really knew the obscenity of how much Blizzard was making, I'm sure they'd come to the (perfectly valid) conclusion that they are getting fucked, and maybe they wouldn't pay. Maybe they would. Who can say?

Doesn't mean it's the most efficient way to run the world, though.

[Economics of Game Prices]

what about voodoo and all that stuff.

What ABOUT voodoo? Last time I checked, it didn't have any science backing it up, either. Until it does, it's just as BS as anything else.

[Economics of Game Prices]

I wonder how Jacko here feels about Blizzard and World of Warcraft. They aren't publishers (derpaderp) but they do charge for the core game, the expansion packs, as well as a monthly fee for playing. Same goes for SquareEnix and their Final Fantasy online games. Or for that matter, every pay-for-play MMO game.

Personally, I don't play MMOs because of the pay structure; I'll decide to play Old Republic solely on the basis of whether it has a subscription or not.

I'll directly reference Blizzard here, because WoW is simply the end-all-be-all of MMOs; yes, there are others, but come on... it's WoW. PCWorld reported back in November that Blizzard (not Activizion, but Blizzard) made over $745 million in third quarter revenue in 2010. This was, in part, due to the release of SCII (which brought up early estimates fomr only $600 million to a paltry $700 million), but as usual, the main reason for the profits was due to WoW sales from membership fees (probably up because of the impending release of Cataclysm). Blizzard is doing fine: they don't need to charge what they do for subscriptions. Even if they lower the price per month to 3$, that's 3$ times 12 mil. subscribers times 12 months: $432 million a year. That's. Too. Much. Money.

Simply, Blizzard's draconian pay structure makes them FAR more in profit that it takes to maintain the game world and servers. They are, without a doubt, the most profitable dev firms on the planet. EVERY SINGLE SUBSCRIBER to WoW is being bent over a table and fucked repeatedly with WoW's subscription fees.

...and that game forms the basis for almost every paid MMO out there. Hell yeah, I disagree with it.

And what about X-Box Live and PSN? Same kind of deal there: pay for service or don't get all this stuff, like multiplayer and updates, DLC, etc.

First of all, PSN is free. PSN+ is not. So, I'm fine with PSN. As far as Microsoft is concerned, simply copypasta my above statements about Blizzard and WoW: Microsoft has more money than god, and they have the balls to say that they HAVE to raise the Live subscription fee because, oh no, now we have ESPN access, shit's getting REAL. Bull. M$ is making so much money off of console sales, Kinect (now), and subscriptions, aside from game sales, that they really don't need to charge what they do: hell, even by fourth quarter 2010, they had somehow tripled profits, despite a decrease in revenue. How the hell does that work?

What's your feelings on that?

Read above, plox.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Lol, Nekofrog. That's such a weak argument. Well, technically not even that... If you tried giving an argument like that in a debate, you'd be laughed out of the forum. A conclusion, with. No premise. Try again, my friend, and I'll respond.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Well, Gario, it's possible, but remember: assumptions are dangerous. If people SAY that's the reason, we have no choice but to assume they are telling the truth until we have FACT to back it up. For instance, if you ask someone why he pirated a movie and his answer was "because movie tickets are too expensive"... but he has a theater in his town, and the tickets are 5$ for a night showing, we have probably cause to think he's lying (unless he's also, like, making barely enough to live, but that's an extreme case). Unless we have that probable cause, though, we have no choice but to take people at face value when formulating our premises; remember, "innocent until proven guilty", and we can't charge someone with lying before we have the evidence.

I'm sure there are people who do what you say; I'm not doubting their existance. But, times ARE tough, the economy IS wrecked, and worker wages ARE at a low point, only gaining a .5% increase in full time 4th quarter wages since 2009; it's not really hard to think that people ARE struggling to pay for things. Sure, you can argue that if they can't afford it, don't buy it... but then, that's exactly what they're doing, and the technology of digital media allows for people who can't afford to still have at no cost to anyone (no, "lost sales" is a bullshit term).

Anyway, I just finished cleaning the house (woohoo!), so I'm off to play a little DA:O. Feel free to counter-argue; I'll respond when I get back.

Oh, and the Damned... neener, neener, neener... See, I can do it, too. If I recall, I'm still waiting for some responses from you. You know, outside of witty .gifs.

[Economics of Game Prices]

as a very impressionable theist i always thought atheists were supposed to be extremely intelligent and logically sound, hence why they always put themselves far above the silly god-worshipping crowd

what happened jack

Well then there's the atheists who are just atheists to STICK IT TO THE MAN, parroting humanist rhetoric just as blindly as any fundamentalist.

I'm an atheist, simply, because atheism is the default position in the universe. You don't DISPROVE something, you PROVE it, and theists of any kind haven't presented sufficient empirical evidence to prove the existence of a god of any kind. Just wanted to point that out, since apparently all it takes is someone saying, "You're not logically sound" for it to be true on the internet, as opposed to illustrating WHY with valid deductions.

Tangential, I know, but I wanted to clarify that.

@Neko: Piracy doesn't exist because of high prices, and if you'd have READ my posts in their entirity, you'd know that. Why? Because piracy exists due to the nature of digital media. It is only EXACERBATED by high prices. High prices take the problem of piracy and AMPLIFY it by giving otherwise decent people a reason to want to pirate. Otherwise average people don't want to steal; they know its wrong and goes against their moral compass... but its hard to care when you see publishers posting record profits.

If game prices weren't so high, the problem wouldn't be as bad. It'd still exist, but you'd be hard pressed to prove that high prices don't affect piracy rates. After all, how many people claim to pirate movies because theater tickets are 12-15$ a show?

[Economics of Game Prices]

Let's ask zircon. His recently released game, 'Return All Robots!', has received very little attention. Even as an indie developer, Space Whale Studios didn't receive any attention from known indie sites. Even releasing the game through XBox Live didn't have the desired results, if I'm not mistaken.

The question I have is this: if they had been able to release through a publisher, would that have improved their chances for exposure to a much wider audience? Would the people making the game receive a greater profit from going through a publisher than they would releasing it by themselves?

Those are two separate questions. To the first question: sure, they would have reached a greater audience, or rather, the marketing would have. There are no guarantees that it would have sold better.

To the second: Zircon's people might have gotten a greater profit. Or, they might have gotten the SAME profit, and the PUBLISHER would have gotten a greater profit. Because, what you're not realizing is that, as part of the contract publisher's MAKE dev teams sign before getting capital, the dev team agrees to a pre-set amount of payment BEFORE the game ships. And, many times, they get paid on a milestone schedule, which means that greater sales can NEVER equal greater profit for the dev team. Which, I guarantee you, would have happened to Zircon's guys.

Occasionally, games have enough of their own merit to garner attention from standard media outlets. However, many times, even the best new developers end up buried under a massive pile of other mediocre games. Why? Lack of proper marketing can be a huge contributor, as was the case with the well-rated, yet relatively unknown Spirit Engine 2, which made far less money than the writer had hoped for and deserved.

Let me ask you a question: is it possible that you have this backwards? Could it be that good games get overlooked not because they don't have ENOUGH marketing, but because poorly made games backed by publishers get TOO MUCH marketing? It's akin to the hyperbolic rhetoric in politics: everyone is made out to be evil, so when REAL evil happens, it gets overlooked. Well, EVERYTHING is hyped as the best game ever, so when a TRULY GOOD game comes out, it gets overlooked.

Maybe... maybe we just need LESS game marketing in general.

Publishers aren't just responsible for printing and shipping games; they have to work with presentation of the game (packaging and related materials), marketing (advertisements on a wide variety of platforms), networking (contacting media sources to plug the game and offer info), and funding (providing resources that the development team wouldn't otherwise have). In return, they receive payment.

In the capitalist world, this is called a service, and it makes sense. The publisher is making an investment in the developer's game, and hopes to gain returns from it.

HOPES to. Not is guaranteed to. Which is how it is now. Publishers get first cut of sales, remember? They make back their investment first, not the dev team. There's nothing wrong with getting paid for a service, but there IS something wrong with a system designed to take advantage of the perceived "necessity" of having a publisher.

Similarly, the developers hope that the publisher will provide the end benefits of greater sales than they could accomplish alone. It's a symbiotic relationship, not a destructive one.

Tell that to the closing game studios. Publishers rarely fail, even when making bad decision after bad decision. ONE bad game can close a dev studio.

Now, I will give you that the publishers likely try to take advantage of their vital position by overcharging, or collecting more than their due from the sales. But the idea is a sound one, when used honorably. It's also the case that many developers can release without a publisher; however, this often relies on reputation, which often can not be built without having released previous material.

Well, sales SHOULD come with reputation, but it shouldn't be impossible to make sales from your first game, IF THAT GAME IS AWESOME. You said in the beginning of your post that Zircon's game didn't sell well. Well, Braid DID. Minecraft DID. This is going to piss people off (especially those who like Zircon's game), but is it just possible that his game isn't good? Or that it's good, but not GREAT? I haven't played it, but if I did, would I consider it revolutionary? Game changing (if you'll pardon the pun)? Is Return All Robots so new, fresh, inventive, and well-designed that there is no other game like it? Because there ISN'T another game like Braid, and there ISN'T another game like Minecraft.

Maybe... Zircon's game didn't sell well because it's just not that amazing. It would have sold better if a publisher was TELLING us that it was a good game, though. I think that might be an argument AGAINST publishers, not FOR them.

[The Extra Credits thread!! EC is amazing!]

Well, I think Seph touched on something: Even if the tools used against piracy don't work right now, it does not mean that piracy can't be beaten...

No, piracy can't be beaten; digital media, by definition, RELIES on free copying to work, so piracy will always, in some form, exist. Example: in order to access OCRemix, my computer has to make a COPY of the site onto my hard drive / memory. Assume for the sake of argument that OCRemix begins charging a fee at the door to access music; don't pay the fee, the site won't load. All a pirate has to do is either:

* pay once and make copies of all the songs while he has access, or

* crack the encryption and get in the backdoor

...meanwhile, if OCRemix adds DRM to all of the songs, all the pirate has to do is make a copy of the song in memory, and RAM dump only the audio of the song, re-encode it if necessary, and BAM. Free music. Why would a pirate do this? Well, the most logical reason is because HE wants the music legitimately, but doesn't want music he paid for to have DRM, so he removes it... and afterwards, why NOT make a torrent? It's not like it costs you anything but bandwidth, and more people get to hear the music. Win / win for the pirate.

...or that it should be tolerated.

THERE you go. Piracy will NEVER be beaten, but it still shouldn't be tolerated.

Companies need to change their attitudes, and as consumers we should tell the companies quite clearly that they are going too far with DRM.

I don't know... companies have a right to their DRM, and if we tell them that they don't, that might come off as socialist. Seriously, though, DRM shouldn't be legal. If you pay for a product, you should own it, not own a license to use it. Buy something or don't buy something.

But if we complain about DRM, then we cannot, and very well should not, turn a blind eye to piracy and we should try to remain as honest as we can.

True.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Ok, the tangential stuff first:

1 ) Never said anyone was "evil". Just that publishers extort... which is a prime tenant of capitalism, so it's not surprising.

2 ) The religion comment was an anecdote to compare how fanatically the people in this thread cling to capitalism and its economic principles, even in the face of counterargument: you guys protect selling an mp3 for 100$ or a publisher screwing over a dev team the same way religious devotees get pissed at Ricky Gervais for making a comment about God. And the comparison to Catholics was an anecdotal argument to how bad capitalism (and thus, the current business practices in game publishing) must be if a group of people that defends something that is provably wrong (raping kids) says that capitalism is bad... capitalism must be REALLY bad. Like I said, it was an anecdotal inductive argument; if you'd like, I can restructure it in a way that will make it easier for those without formal logic training to read.

Also, the definition that you gave for "religion" is "accurate", but meaningless, since that definition can include, literally, anything; that makes it a bad definition. Mine is not only the one taught in Major World Religion classes (ones I've also taken), but it is more useful because it describes how religions operate, instead of what they are (everything, ultimately).

3 ) I haven't ignored any "argument" passed to me once so far; meanwhile, I can't count the number of times I've heard "(economic principle A) is true because economists say it is / that's how economics works"; I've given concrete examples as to why digital media breaks supply / demand models, and no one has given me a legitimate counterpoint yet. So, who is "ignoring" whom?

4 ) If you'd like me to prove I was at Video Games Live, I can show you a pic of my Tallarico/O'Donnell/Salvatore-signed DSi, for the "pics or it didn't happen" crowd.

Now, onto the substance.

This thread is huge and messy and has tons of terrible facts, and maybe someone pointed this out already, but I'd just like to point out that in digital distribution, Apple (iTunes) basically plays the role of the publisher. They take 30% of the profits if you release an application on the Apple Mac Store, just like EA would take whatever cut of publishing the game for you, and like how Gamestop takes 20% of the retail sale.

Yet, songs are still .99$, and THAT'S what's important. You know why? Because even though Apple takes a cut (still) of song sales, the fact that they don't have to print a physical disc reduces cost DRAMATICALLY, which is all I'm arguing. Furthermore, artists like Girl Talk make an obscene amount of money, even without iTunes. Digital distribution IS the future of digital content distribution; anyone who thinks otherwise is delusional / stuck in the past.

Blizzard runs its own online game store, and they love it, because they get to keep their 20% cut.

First of all, Blizzard is a dev studio, not a publisher; if they're running their own digital content store, they should be getting MORE than a 20% cut for THEIR OWN WORK. If Activision is really taking an 80% cut from BLIZZARD'S store, there's a problem.

I will also take a moment here to describe a number of factors that you have not taken into account, either.

First, many development studios don't have a lot of money because they're making their first few games. If they want to release a AAA title, then they need to bring in money, and this is where the publisher comes in. They say, "We'll give you $3 million dollars, which is currently $2.8 million more than you have, to make this game, as long as we get a 20% cut of your revenues."

The publisher, in addition to providing the studio a way to sell, market, and promote the game (without the studio having to hire that talent themselves), also has the supply connections to efficiently distribute the game to every Best Buy, Gamestop, Wal-Mart, and Target in the United States and Canada. They also have the expertise to sell that same game in Europe and Latin America. This is the publisher's end of the deal. This makes it such that the studio doesn't have to deal with things like localization, sales, and all of that stuff that they don't like to do. They can just concentrate on building the game.

That is all technically correct, but, again, without the dev team, there is no game to sell at all. Meanwhile, without the publisher, the dev team COULD still produce a quality, well designed title, complete with high-end production values and a WELL-DESIGNED system of gameplay, AND they'd be able to sell it... it'd just take longer, probably wouldn't have high-end, PS3-straining graphics, and wouldn't sell as well.

...but it could still be done.

That means, by default, that the dev team is a necessary resource, while the publisher is simply a resource of convenience (a TON of convenience, but convenience none the less). As such, it logically follows that, the NECESSARY resource gets a higher cut than the resource of CONVENIENCE; if the game sells well, the publisher will make back investment AFTER the dev team gets paid their cut.

How does that NOT make sense?

Second, it takes a lot of money to build an online store, and the existing ones take your money in big ways. I mentioned iTunes already. 30% goes to Apple from the App store. Sure, you could try to build your own, it'll cost a few hundred dollars just for the signed certificate to ensure that transactions are secure, not to mention potential liability if credit cards are leaked, or what-not. You also don't have the business analysis tools to examine the records in a knowledgable fashion. Why not just get that all from the publisher? They're going to provide that to you if you sign away whatever percent of your revenues.

Again, tell that to the guys who made the Humble Indie Bundle. Over a million dollars in sales. In less than a month. They didn't have Steam. What you're missing is that, while you are TECHNICALLY accurate, again, what you're saying isn't NECESSARY to do to make sales in the 21st century, by evidence of other people doing just that. I wonder what the publisher's cut of Minecraft is, for instance?

Publishers have traditionally served a purpose and they are virtually necessary for large-scale distribution.

They WERE virtually necessary. Not anymore. They are still so, but that's because, like Sephfire said earlier, the infrastructure still needs to grow over time. We will continue to have publishers for the next few years, but if the industry grows PROPERLY, in 5-10 years, we won't have publishers anymore. Investors will invest DIRECTLY in dev studios (like Bioware), and dev teams will sell their own product online at no additional cost, AND take their cut first. The ONLY people who don't benefit from this are the publishers, who lose their job.

But, that's ok! We won't need them anymore, so why have them? Ok, we'll have a few big ones for the few remaining brick-and-mortar stores, catering to those unfortunate few who live in rural Kansas and don't have a constant broadband connection, but for the rest of us living in the future? We won't need publishers, so the cost of our games will go down. I'm surprised at how many people seemingly argue against the lowering of prices...

While you might not believe it, brick-and-mortar distribution is still a large part of game sales.

For now. What I'm arguing is that this is a concept that is changing, and furthermore, as consumers, it is in our best interest to facilitate that change through our purchasing decisions. We only get benefits from this.

[Economics of Game Prices]

Just got back from Video Games Live, so I'm about to crash and will put off posting a proper response until tomorrow. Until then, I'll say this:

1 ) being "salty" essentially means being bitter; it's a term I picked up from posting on Smashboards. Sorry if you didn't know what that meant.

2 ) Religion is not an off-topic... topic. Religion can be criticized, and is, BY DEFINITION, belief in something despite, or sometimes in spite of, the evidence. That's why it's a "belief" and not a "fact" or a "thought". Me criticizing religion does not make me a bad person... it makes me someone who is treating people equally; I'm not going to put those who believe on a pedestal, higher than those who don't. Religion is not immune from criticism.

3 ) Glad you're getting lulz. I've grown accustomed to having people take "discourse" and make it "personal vendetta", so it doesn't affect me anymore. Posting legitimate counterargument =/= "I hate OCRemixers". So, think what you want; I don't care what you think. I'm going to continue to post what I think to be the most accurate statements about the real world, backed up by legitimate fact and observation, as long as I feel the topic at hand has discussion value.

See you guys tomorrow.

[Economics of Game Prices]

So what? No one else cares? That doesn't mean that the business practice is right. That's the thing about argumentum ad popululm: it doesn't matter how many people agree on a conclusion, the conclusion can still be wrong. Example: religion.

I don't care if 1 million people buy Pkmn B&W. I don't care if 2 million people do. I don't care if 15 million do. If Nintendo is engaging in exploitative business practices (and I have argued that they are), if EA is (like they are with the Madden franchise), if publishers do (by not embracing digital distribution and by hiking prices and shorting developers), then they are wrong and should change.

([tangent]The great thing about me is that I'm not trying to convince the Damned of anything. He's just (and I'm going to be blunt here) a tool to be used, a guy to argue against. My GF asks me all the time, "why do you argue with these people? They won't change." Well, because I'm not trying to convince HIM. I'm trying to convince at least one of the people lurking or reading the tread, who potentially will change his mind and give that idea to someone HE knows, who will spread that idea to a few friends... and so on. I am more interested in gradual social change through education than changing one stubborn dude's mind over the internet.

So, post away. But, I've been arguing about this topic for far longer than I'm sure you think I have. Copyright law, pricing structures, exploitative business practices... these have been philosophical passions for at least a decade now. So, give me counter arguments. I want them. I want to see other viewpoints because it just gives me more data I can use to make better arguments.

...besides, excluding random outbursts, I don't get trolled easily (the EC thread was, I admit, a low point, and I do apologize for that post). The Damned, though, gets salty pretty easily, and it makes his arguments weaker. I don't want that. I want strong counterpoints, something I can work with.[/tangent])

[Economics of Game Prices]

Good luck with that. The hundred million other people around that world that buy the games won't participate with you, but hey, they will be busy playing what is being touted as the best of the series to date. Hell, it was the first Pokémon game that got a 40.40 from Famitsu. Yes, yes, "Famitsu scores don't mean anything anymore" and all that. That doesn't change the fact taht it has, on average, scored very high, and some reviews rank it higher than any of the other generations.

So, basically, "You'll never change anything, so don't try." Yeah, no.

Not every company screws their people. Bioware is actually a nice place to work at. They have nice offices, great break rooms, and are flexible with family issues and timetables for projects.

Bioware is a dev firm, not a publisher. I'm not asserting that dev companies are dicks (although I'm sure some are quite draconian), I'm asserting that PUBLISHERS are. You're missing the point.

Before you ask, yes, I do know some of them, and I have been to their offices before, on several occasions. My cousin Tracy is married to one of the writers, I went to school with a few of the current staff, and I have a friend that went to school with others of the staff. I've met both Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk personally, I even interviewed them for a pre-entry requirement at another school.

Awesome. Also, totally irrelevant.

Trust, me, Bioware aren't like EA is supposed to be.

Like I said, not a publisher. So, it's not a valid comparison. You might have a point if you compared Activision to EA, but both companies use business practices that are corrupted at their core. So... yeah.

Nintendo, MS and Blizzard, all big names, offer all kinds of support for their workers. They don't shit on them, they don't treat them like shit,and they aren't like EA.

Nintendo treats most of their teams well, but I'm sure has their faults, and as a publisher, they act just like EA or Activision (see: the problem with Pokemon). MS is MS; they treat indy devs badly, and lock their system out just like everyone else. Blizzard also ISN'T A PUBLISHER (Activision publishes their games), so moot comparison.

In fact, I'd say that there more "nice" companies than there are shitty ones.

I'm sure there are. Are they the big ones that shape the industry, though? If not, it still doesn't help all that much. Valve is a great place to work; ALL companies need to be like Valve, and if they aren't, they should strive to be and WE, as consumers, should strive to make them be like Valve.

As for screwing the customer... how are they doing that?

By purposefully ignoring tech like DLC in favor of selling a full price retail product just because it will make them more money. Again, it's their "right"(?), but that just means we need better market regulations.

You want to make these broad claims, start backing them up with some examples. Otherwise you're just painting everything as being bad "just because".

I have. You ignore all my examples (like the Pokemon-as-DLC argument) because you don't like them, yet can't actually provide counter-points beyond "well, there's no point to changing it because we aren't powerful enough to".

[Economics of Game Prices]

Wait, what? Why? Why can't I just buy a server, make a website, and distribute downloads myself? Why do I need Steam? I agree, for console games, you're screwed into using XBL or PSN for now, but on PC? You don't even need a publisher at ALL.

[The Extra Credits thread!! EC is amazing!]

Ignoring the Damned's ranting, I really do think that piracy is going to be an unwinnable fight because of the nature of digital media. Digital media, by definition, breaks all existing supply / demand models. The only reason supply / demand works as an economic principle is because for any given PHYSICAL resource, there is a finite supply...

...except with digital media. A game CAN be copied infinitely, at NO additional cost. It costs NOTHING to copy a game. At all. It costs money to print a disc, but to digitally distribute? Nada. That's why pirates are so successful; they, by definition, have an infinite supply to distribute.

People are figuring that out now. Sephfire does make a point that, just because you aren't stealing a physical copy doesn't mean you aren't stealing at all... but you still aren't actually stealing a thing. You're stealing data, which is intangible and by definition can't be controlled. It's the fundamental flaw with intellectual property law, too: "intellectual property" is an oxymoron, because you can't own an idea, physically. Once someone else knows your idea, it propagates automatically and freely. The only way to control an idea (and thus a movie, song, game, or digital data) is to never make it concrete in the first place (i.e.: never write the song, never film the movie, never make the game, never write down or verbalize the idea).

Games can never be fully controlled because digital data can never be fully controlled. So, piracy wins simply by definition.

[Economics of Game Prices]

And, it's "good business sense" that blatantly takes advantage of consumers, so we shouldn't support it with our money. Again, that's why I don't buy Pkmn games anymore: because I want to force the Pokemon Company to make and sell their games differently. Wasn't that a point in Sephfire's video? If you don't like it, don't pirate... just try to change the system?

I fundamentally disagree with Nintendo's business practices on Pokemon, and with the major publishers for almost ANY game. They screw the dev teams, they screw the consumer, they screw indy game devs. It's good business... that should be changed.

What's wrong with that?