Anger With Game Content Lock Spurs Reaction From Studio Head Curt Shilling 908
MojoKid writes "Studios and publishers are fighting back hard against the used game market, with the upcoming title Kingdoms of Amular the latest to declare it will use a content lock. In this case, KoA ups the ante by locking out part of the game that's normally available in single-player mode. Gamers exploded, with many angry that game content that had shipped on the physical disc was locked away and missing, as well as being angry at the fact that content was withheld from used game players. One forum thread asking if the studio fought back against allowing EA to lock the content went on for 49 pages before Curt Shilling, the head of 38 Studios, took to the forums himself. His commentary on the situation is blunt and to the point. 'This is not 38 trying to take more of your money, or EA in this case, this is us rewarding people for helping us! If you disagree due to methodology, ok, but that is our intent... companies are still trying to figure out how to receive dollars spent on games they make, when they are bought. Is that wrong? if so please tell me how.'"
Why yes it is. (Score:5, Insightful)
Is that wrong? if so please tell me how
There's nothing wrong with wanting to make a profit. There's everything wrong about withholding product and lying about it.
Yes, it's wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
They are preventing someone from having anything of value to sell after they are done with it. Perhaps if the game didn't cost so much in the first place it would have less value used and more would buy it new - what a concept. I don't buy too many games these days but I play many older ones and some online games. It's stunts like this that would prevent me from buying this game new OR used. $50 and $60 dollars per game is crazy and has greatly curtailed my desire to buy. Between crappy DRM that makes my life hell and is now starting to limit even hardware changes to publishers pulling crap like this to ensure I cannot resell any game I buy I simply have no stomach to purchase their crap. Let them go bankrupt and someone who values their customers more take their place so far as I'm concerned....
OK then. (Score:5, Insightful)
companies are still trying to figure out how to receive dollars spent on games they make, when they are bought. Is that wrong? if so please tell me how.
In my case they need to figure out a better way to receive my dollars. There's absolutely nothing wrong with what they are doing. It simply means that I will refuse to support their business by purchasing their products. If enough people feel the same way, then they will either find a way to stop treating people like shit and make money or go out of business.
...if so please tell me how... (Score:5, Insightful)
I still got my original copies of Chrono Cross & Star Ocean 2 from launch day. Just sayin'...
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't give a shit what an executive figurehead says out of the corner of his mouth. The outcome is all the matters and game developers are trying to charge the same price for a single use, non-transferable license as they used to charge for transferable media.
Yes that is wrong, because I as a customer have no desire to pay the same or higher price for a reduced value. I will download pirated copies or go without before I willfully entrap myself in this DRM/license pay-per-use dystopia being advanced by IP Rights Holders.
There's nothing wrong with making a profit, but don't complain to congress if you find that your scheme isn't viable in a free market. You'll lose money in your attempt to re-write the social contract.
Rewarding people for helping us (Score:4, Insightful)
... this is us rewarding people for helping us!
Where did this jackass study economics? This ain't the way it works: I give you money, you give me something of equal value in return, period. His former dean and professors should fail him retroactively.
What a spin doctor.
It's simple (Score:2, Insightful)
Game with resale value > Game without resale value. If you make a game that's as good as another game, and I can sell that other game for more, I am more likely to buy that if I have any interest in possibly selling or even giving away that other game.
By blocking content to secondary users, you have lowered the value of your game. If you don't lower the price in a corresponding fashion, you will have fewer sales.
Doublespeak (Score:4, Insightful)
"We're not trying to take more of your money, we're rewarding you! By generously allowing you to access content that you've already bought from us and that already belongs to you. But we don't allow you to resell that content that you bought, even though you're legally entitled to. We don't want to reward you as much as that."
DLC (Score:4, Insightful)
[rant]Game companies are already forking us over on DLC. When you buy a game, figure on 2x the list price in order to get a *complete* game.[/rant]
I never buy new games anymore. I wait until you can buy the game, all the expansions, and all the DLC on Steam for $20 before I buy it.
The Fight Against Ownership (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:OK then. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well said. The problem here is, like Garth Brooks, some companies believe that used games are somehow the bane of their existence. I've seen games sell upwards of a million or more copies in a week, and how again is used killing them? Oh, it's out of their control. Something I don't care about.
I know people use it all the time, but damnit, the First Sale doctrine is alive and well. If they want to "license" us a copy of the game, then we should be able to exchange media when ours is scratched by our kids playing frisbee. We should also be able to get a replacement if we break the disc. Currently, you're mostly shit outta luck with respect to the latter (and the former, but it varies by publisher.) But if they want this sort of licensing model (effectively killing used game sales), then they should be prepared for the consequences of their new model.
Trouble is, they want (like the music and movie industry) to have it both ways. No need for them to uphold any sort of content licensing agreement, but if they want to squeeze you, the customer, about something like used games or DLC, then they want that power. Funny how companies are like that. :)
And no, I am not interested in their game. They (and EA) have decided to make it difficult for me, so I will make it difficult for them to continue with this business model by NOT buying their games. Quite simply, if it's not "evil pirates" it's those goddamned "evil used buyers." I'm tired of fucking hearing it. Clamping down on your paying customers is NOT going to solve the infringement problem... nor is it going to garner you any goodwill, which once you lose, takes YEARS to get back.
Re:OK then. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's absolutely nothing wrong with what they are doing
There is absolutely everything wrong with they are doing.
I understand that digital delivery and games that can be played online has confused the issue, along with the persistent confusion over what copyright is.
However, it is really this fucking simple:
Customer purchased product from store.
Customer owns product from store.
Customer after some period of time sells product used to somebody else.
Store already got paid, so they have no legal interest, much less moral or ethical interest, in the second sale.
First Sale Doctrine covers this. Everywhere else in the physical world you cannot pull this fucking shit for two seconds without being called crazy greedy retarded sons of bitches.
I have said before, and some of disagreed with me (they are wrong), but when you pay for copyrighted content you are granted rights in return for the consideration you paid. Part of that, is quite obviously, the ability to sell your copy. Traditionally in the past this was very easy to wrap your mind around with when it came to art and books, since they were physical items you could touch and pick up. Every single time a piece of artwork or book is sold the legal entitlements that came from copyright are transferred. It is completely legal, moral, and ethical to be able to do so. You own it, the physical medium and those rights.
They can try all the EULA crap that they want. That does not make it right, or legally defensible in a court of law. Shilling is a greedy fucking dumbass who cannot understand why he cannot get a part of each and every resale in perpetuity. Quite simply, he is not satisfied with being legally compensated one time, but has major entitlement issues to believe (erroneously) that he has every right to be compensated when his customer sells the game to another gamer used.
The fundamental problem being that Shilling does not want to understand copyright as it currently is, or what it was designed to be. Shilling, and other shitheads like him, only want to be part of a world where they have absolute control over every copy everywhere and that it always remains their direct property under their direct control at all times.
Well fuck him, and fuck Microsoft with their 720. When I purchase physical mediums, or directly download copies of copyrighted content I will absolutely protect, by force if required, my right to transfer those rights to anyone I please for any amount of consideration I please.
There is everything wrong with they are doing from every perspective you can think of.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
So, you get the content for free, if you're the original owner, but you need to buy it, if you're a second-hand owner? That's frustrating, but it's not as bad as it could be.
Anyway, my suggestion to them would be to have a market on their own website, where you can auction/sell activation codes to the games that you own. That way, they can track the second hand market, make it easier for people, and also perhaps make a tiny profit off of each sale (say, 5% or 10%). Also, this would make it very easy to trade/sell DLC. In fact, I should probably set up a third party website like this.
Dear Curt Shilling (Score:5, Insightful)
I can see that you might struggle to understand why you shouldn't get a cut every time something you once produced is re-sold. After all, when you buy a used book you send some money to the original publisher right?. And every time you sell your used car, you are happy to make sure a percentage makes its way to the original manufacturer don't you?.
Just think, that beautiful antique Ming vase you brought, the original effort and creativity that went into the painting. It's unique, some Chinese artisan spent months, or even years, of their life making it. They would never do that if they didn't know that hundreds of years later when you bought it at an auction in New York, they were not going to get a cut of that.
Yes, I see your problem. Your problem is that an item's value consists of it's useful value (the value of actually using it), plus the residual value. The residual value is the amount the owner can get by selling the item once they have no further use for it. You are attempting to reduce the residual value artificially. Your problem is that reduces the actual value of the game over all. So guess what? people won't pay you as much for it.
Your other problem is that you really don't understand the above.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Yes, it's wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop used sales, and your product becomes worth less... one might get more of each sale, but the total number of sales tends to go down resulting in a net decrease of income. Sadly, new industries keep forgetting that there is more to a market then the immediate first order effects.. learning how things interconnect is important. grrr.
Re:Why yes it is. (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think they are lying about anything. They are being very clear in what they are doing and why they are doing. People are not happy with what they are doing, but I don't think deception is involved.
Re:"Is that wrong? if so please tell me how" (Score:5, Insightful)
If Ford started selling the key to your car as a "free" app for your smartphone, but anyone buying that same car second hand had to shell out $1500 for a new "key," how long do you think it would take for before either a) congress enacts a law outlawing the practice, or b) FoMoCo's HQ is burnt to the ground?
Or c), GM, Chrysler, VAG, Toyota, Honda, Subaru, BMW, Mercedes, etc all start doing it too and everyone just accepts it as the new norm. Because, sadly, "c" is where the video game world is headed.
Not about bargin bin (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't about games being picked out of bargain bin for $5 two or three years after release.
It's about the practice of game stores selling new $60 games, then a couple weeks later buying them back for $8 (or more typically store credit) and re-selling them for $55. It's a practice that sees almost as much money leave consumer pockets but half as much reach the people who actually made the games and is very wide spread. The stores deliberately under-stock new games in order to push people towards the used copies. It's typical to go in a week after release and be told they don't have any new copies, but there are a half dozen used for a couple dollars off.
It's a practice that's bad for the developers, the publishers and fairly bad for the consumers as a whole. Basically bad for everyone but the pawn shops in the middle. It siphons enormous amounts of money out of the industry and is one of the reasons that basically every studio smaller than EA or Ubisoft is forced to sell out or close, regardless of how well liked their games are.
Yes, measures taken to combat this have some nasty collateral damage. No such thing as perfect system in real life.
Re:...if so please tell me how... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not every game wants to be that epic. In this day and age you're competing as much for time as for money. If people can't pick up your game and be done with it in a week (when they buy the next big game) you might not sell very many - because if you aren't Skyrim you're better to be Portal than Divinity 2: Ego Draconis or the First templar . "Long" is not a selling point anymore and nor is "50 hour experience" or "70 hour experience".
Want to know why? Because the people who have money to game all have their original copies of chrono cross and star ocean too, and guess what, those people all have (or are trying to get) jobs, and families and stuff now, and spending 70 or 80 hours on one game doesn't have the appeal it did when they were younger. People *might* want a few games a year that are big epics, but most of the time they want portal, uncharted 3, call of duty or any collection of other 'short' games interspersed amongst their skyrims and WoW/SWTOR time.
Re:Why yes it is. (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually yes. It involved deception. When you buy a game, there is a reasonable expectation that you will be able to play everything that is in the disc. More over, there is an expectation that you will get a "complete experince".
It's kinda like if you bought out The Dark Knight only to find that the last 15 minutes are locked by a subscription system. Or like going to see a movie and then just before the last part the managers ask you for an extra fee to see the end.
This is the kind of thing that you would expect to be informed beforehand. So while it isn't a crime, it deserves all the backslash it can get, I hope you are not suggesting that the gamers should shush about this.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
There's something called the first sale doctrine , which applies to books and which logically should extent to all media.
These are attempts to cheat it, just like DVD regions are a cheat attempt at price fixing.
Call things by their true names, will ya?
Re:Don't buy (Score:5, Insightful)
Because it diminishes the value of the product to the original buyer. I don't buy many secondhand games and never sell them back, so I'll use an example for something I would buy: a decent mac laptop. They're not exactly cheap compared to the Wintel ones, but they have great resale value. I may not want to spend $1k on a laptop, but if I can buy it use it for a year and sell it for $800+, I'm no longer asking myself "Do you want to spend $1k?" It's become "Do you want to spend $200 to have this for a year?" The fact that I can sell the thing easily makes me a willing primary buyer.
ObCarAnalogy: It's as if when you buy the car, you can never sell it. You can blow it up, you can park it in your garage, you can cut the top off and plant plants in it, but you can never sell it. Suddenly cars have become very, very expensive for people who only keep them for a year or two. Those people will start buying fewer cars.
Re:Yes, it's wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of people will buy a game, mess with it, and if they get enough, or if they don't like it all that much , they'll pawn it.
Take that away and they will become far more wary of what to pay for.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Um... you do know what the F2p model is right? it's a giant DLC farm (if you want anything good you pay for it), and if you're only there for free you exists as a product to keep some other sucker paying 100 dollars a month for the game. That's what F2P is. Free to play is in no way free. They're going to try and hook you into 'well I spend 10 dollars, what's 10 more?" or "well I could spend 15 dollars a month on WoW, why not 15 dollars for that new Tank or gold to buy tanks or whatever. If there isn't one person paying 150 dollars for every 9 people who pay nothing they're going out of business as would Blizzard if they had no subscription revenue. If you aren't the sucker paying 150 dollars a month then their goal is to make you into that sucker, or you to die for that sucker to feel good about his 150 dollars a month.
Which works remarkably well at generating revenue, and is a perfectly valid business model. But one should be under no illusion what they're doing.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
"And what happens when there is nothing else?"
Games are toys. There will always be toys. Crave something different.
Re:Not about bargin bin (Score:5, Insightful)
I understand the pressure that publishers are under, and I can understand that they see profit made by GameStop and want a piece - the simple truth is that they just haven't earned a dime of it.
IT'S YOUR BUSINESS MODEL, STUPID! GameStop can only abuse the industry on such a massive scale because of the prices YOU set. And if you offered an online service for users to trade used licenses, not only could you make a bit off the second hand market but you would put GameStop out of business overnight.
Exploiting your customer base and breaking games is NOT acceptable collateral damage.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:3, Insightful)
Does he know the mayor of Boston?
I'm not sure, but I'll bet the mayor of Boston knows him. I mean, hell, Martha Coakley mistaking him for a Yankee was enough to get a Republican into Ted Kennedy's senate seat.
That said, I listened to Curt Schilling talk at a panel at PAX East last year, and I will say this - the guy is legitimately passionate about video games. He clearly enjoys playing them, and it's clear that he hopes to make the best game he can. So he's not just some random executive, he's a gamer at heart.
While I'm impressed with his passion towards making games, I'm not at all convinced it translates to the ability to make a good game. Nor does it mean that he's able to run a game company.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Even better example would be TF2 where the things that are exclusively for purchase don't affect game balance at all.
The point is though - yes, this is a business model, and yes , it's aimed at generating revenue, but it is remarkably customer-friendly. The business model mentioned in the article above is just heavy duty assholery attempting to bypass existing laws and screw customers over.
Re:Piracy is great (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
"There has grown in the minds of certain groups in this country the idea that just because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with guaranteeing such a profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is supported by neither statute or common law. Neither corporations or individuals have the right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back."
Robert Heinlein, Life Line, 1939
Sheer poetry from the Dean of Science Fiction, early in his career and long before he was famous.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that you miss the point. Nobody is trying to stop them from making a profit. This isn't about us trying to make them poor, it's about people being fed up with companies acting more like parasites trying to squeeze more revenue from their product their predecessors did and is worth paying. They treat the consumers like they need their products. They forget that people aren't always able or willing to pay higher and higher prices for their merchandise.
Sure, F2P games are often there to provide a profit. We don't have a problem with that like we didn't have a problem buying and trading games back in the 80's and 90's. When I was growing up, part of the fun of buying a game was that after you got bored with it, you could trade it off with one of your friends. You'd still buy the latest games that came out when you had the cash, but your old games still held value. Even in this new age, I still enjoy breaking out the old Nintendo games sometimes.
As a side note, there are many truly free games out there. It's called OSS. I know that some people will complain about the low quality compared to the more polished proprietary games, but at least we have some free options. As for me, I haven't found any game, for pay or for free, that I enjoy as much as nethack. So, let them make a profit, but when that profit is made to spite the consumer, I say it's time to look for an alternative.
This is my concern as well (Score:5, Insightful)
So, this type of DRM is a great reason not to buy the game since I won't be able to play it later. It has a limited life span.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
The only perceived entitlement is that of the publisher and maker believing that they have a right to a percentage of all sales: used, new or otherwise.
I also like how being a business makes you inherently not evil. Just replace “business” with “assassin” and you've described the “free market”. Just because I kill people for money doesn't make me evil. I'm just trying make a profit. Now, if I could just get rid of all those government regulations about not killing people. It's really killing my business model. Stupid people and their perceived entitlement to life.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:1, Insightful)
Actually its their game and their contract and they can have it both ways and another four ways too if they want. If you don't like what they are offering in exchange for your money (call it license, or product or whatever you wish) then don't buy it. It really is like that in the real world and it's a good thing because that is what freedom is like. If I offer to buy your coffee table and you set the price to $100 million plus a kidney then I have the right to refuse it but I don't have the right to steal it from you just because I don't like your terms. If you don't like it then get angry and scream a lot, cause then the companies will do things your way just like your mom did when you were a baby.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
How is it wrong to raise the price? This game is not that previous game you bought for the same price. In the same way Harry Potter is not star wars. They may come on DVD's but they are in no way the same movie.
And in short: you're going to go without. Good or bad the games industry is fed up with used games, and piracy. That means the entire experience is going to require you be authenticated with their service, constantly, and some of the core content will only exist on that service. In other words it's going to look at lot more like Steam, and a lot less like the 1980's.
I think the automobile industry should do this also. Make it so software is required to drive the car, and that software gets downloaded everytime you start the car up.
That way the car manufactures can make money thru the used market without having to actually buy and sell used cars.
Re:"Is that wrong? if so please tell me how" (Score:5, Insightful)
Because some industry hack told you his wishful thinking and you lapped it up? I'll sell you a controlling interest in the Brooklyn Bridge at a discount rate...
Re:Not on the disc (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes that is wrong, because I as a customer have no desire to pay the same or higher price for a reduced value.
There is no reduction in the value. Software does not wear out over time, it's 100% identical to a brand new license. If you're referring to the physical media, packaging, inserts, cover art, etc. yes it does wear over time but all that stuff also can be re-sold under "first sale" and isn't the topic at hand.
game developers are trying to charge the same price for a single use, non-transferable license as they used to charge for transferable media.
Wait, are you talking about the media, or the license? You seem confused.
The license DOES transfer. You didn't bother to read at all, which is obviously lost on the people who gave you a +5 Insightful rating. What you want is the license AND the bonus content license to transfer, and you're pissed that the additional content license isn't transferring. Which is fine, you have a right to your opinion, but stop pretending like the entire thing is non-transferable when that is not true at all.
I will download pirated copies or go without before I willfully entrap myself in this DRM/license pay-per-use dystopia
Again, you seem confused. Are you angry about the DRM? That's one issue. Are you angry about pay-per "use" licensing? That's another, related issue, but not the same issue.
If you have a problem with it, don't play the game. Just like if u have a problem with a company's corporate ideology or manufacturing practices, don't use their products.
There's nothing wrong with making a profit, but don't complain to congress if you find that your scheme isn't viable in a free market. You'll lose money in your attempt to re-write the social contract.
Well it IS viable, and has been for quite some time. I haven't noticed any gaming companies going bankrupt because people boycotted their games due to DRM or non-transferable licensing. And I have no idea why you even bring up Congress in all of this, other than to add some fuel to the fires you're trying to light.
And they are not rewriting any so-called "social contract". There are plenty of things in life which are non-transferable contracts, and since there is no actual property changing hands or physical goods to be owned, it's a moot argument to start with.
We've been through all of this before, with audio cassette tapes (among other things). The license transfers with the media because the license was bound to the specific copy which resided on that specific cassette. If you destroy the cassette, you don't still have license because the copy you were licensed to use is destroyed. (or to be completely accurate, you still have the license but since the copy is gone, it's useless.)
In the case of software, in particular with DRM, the license is a contract specifically between you and the rights holder allowing you to use a copy. There isn't any binding of the license to media, it's bound to you the person.
The price you pay is for the game without the DLC, the DLC is provided for Free to anybody who buys the game "first-hand" from the publisher. Does this have the effect of cutting out the used games sellers? Why, yes it does.
Look, it comes down to a matter of numbers. If we allow used sellers to sell transfers of licenses, then the game publishers will just keep raising the prices to compensate, and if you want a new game you'll end up paying $100 for a copy. These used game companies could approach the content companies and work together to come up with a royalty scheme which would allow for reselling games and still keeping the price point low, while giving some money back to the developer. But they refuse to do that, they've given the developers the middle finger and told them to go get fucked. So the devs are taking the route of simply cutting brick and mortar out of the equation as much as possible.
I
Re:Not on the disc (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm going to summarize this issue:
When you buy a hammer to assemble a bed you just bought, you're perfectly free to sell that hammer once you're finished using it. The hammer manufacturer can not demand that the person you sold it to pays them something too.
And it should be the same with games. If you decide you're done playing with a game and you want to sell it, then you should be free to sell your right to play the game. When you sell a used game, you lose the option to play it again in the future.
Now I know game companies are going to say that a game is designed to be played only once and so if people could just resell their games, they (the companies) would go out of business. My answer: so what?
First of all, my father had only one hammer since he moved out of his parent's home when he was 20. He's 60 today and still has that hammer. When I moved out, I bought a hammer (as well as some other tools) and I plan to keep those tools my whole life. There's one hammer per household, and yet hammer manufacturers don't seem to be going out of business.
People don't buy just one video game in their entire life. They buy quite a few. Even when they can freely resell those games, they still buy several games. Also, video games can be more expensive than a hammer. If hammer manufactures can do it, then why can't game studios? I think it's clear that game studios are just trying to use the fact that their product is digital instead of physical to make more money.
Second, if people don't want to keep your game their whole life, then that's your own fault. Major game studios these days release games that last just a few hours (I think the average is 8 hours). Compare this to the 90's when a game could last 50+ hours. 8 hour games also cost quite a lot, usually $50 - $60. Let me rephrase that: you're expected to pay $60 for just 8 hours of entertainment. And then you're expected to pay that again on a regular basis (hence why we have dozens of sequels to most major games - Call of Duty franchise anyone?)
It's normal that when your product is so expensive but is useful only for a few hours, your customers will try to resell it after they're done with it. See, my girlfriend bought a hammer last month because she had to nail a painting to her wall; she never uses a hammer but she decided to keep it instead of selling it to a friend or neighbor, because she might need a hammer again in a few years.
So instead of complaining that customers don't want to keep your game very long and quickly resell it, why don't you make games that people want to play for a while? Some suggestions to achieve that:
- Longer storyline that lasts 50+ hours (like most games in the 90s)
- Stop holding our hand and penalize getting killed within the game! I played Modern Warfare and when I died, I came back to life right where I had fallen. No wonder I finished the game in a single afternoon! And by the end I hated the game, because while too hard is frustrating, too easy is boring.
- Add a reason to replay the game. For instance, I recently played a game where after finishing the campaign, I could restart a new campaign with all my earned skills, weapons and upgrades. This also enabled me to access secret areas and do stuff you can't do the first time you play. Just don't over do it - replaying the entire game 10 times just to pick up some development art sucks.
- Make expansions to the game. Lots of them. For 5+ years. I hate sequels because sequels add content but also remove some of it. Good expansions (i.e. not cheap DLC that add a costume or a new gun but expansions that are almost as big as a full game) are what I look for. In sandbox games, it's also fun to have one huge map in the same game rather than 3 smaller maps spread through 3 games (think of Grand Theft Auto series and what it would have been like if you could play in Liberty City, Vice City and San Andreas all at once, from the same game).
Just by using expansions, you can make your game last years. You can even price expansions the
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
This "take it or leave it" attitude is part of the problem. Aside from there being a lot of sly deception (does it clearly state on the box that you are buying a license rather than a game, and that it is worth less second hand, and that if you buy second hand you get a cut down version?) companies need to form relationships with their customers, and part of any relationship is a two way dialogue.
Customers have every right to complain, and in fact in this case it is absolutely vital because if they don't and the game fails to sell it will be blamed on piracy. We need to make it clear that the nasty DRM is what made it fail in the marketplace.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Good or bad the games industry is fed up with used games, and piracy.
Yeah, and I want a pony.
Re:"Is that wrong? if so please tell me how" (Score:2, Insightful)
First sale doctrine. QED.
I find it humorous that people talk about "an idea is not property", "information wants to be free", and "you can't own an idea", but then cite "First Sale". I'm sure they're not the same people but it still seems a bit silly.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
No it isn't. It isn't a compromise at all.
How much do games cost in the store? How much did they cost 10 years ago? 20? 30? Games have gotten cheaper when inflation is taken into account. Here: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/10/an-inconvenient-truth-game-prices-have-come-down-with-time.ars [arstechnica.com]
we have decided to offer the base game without any of the optional expansions for a reduced price
It's believed that consumers take the price of good as a reflection of quality. If you see a game that is $40 on a shelf that's filled with $60 games most people will assume that there is something wrong with that $40. I'm not saying that the American games retail market can't change but I doubt it.
Selling a dlc expecting game for the price of a full title, selling the dlc for premium prices on top of that, and offering some dlcs as special exclusives is *not* a compromise.
...
Don't shut out second-hand buyers. Offer them the missing content for a reasonable fee. This way you stand to monetize the 2nd and 3rd hand sales.
I don't know what game you're complaining about but it isn't Amular. If you buy Amular new then you also receive a code to buy the dlc for free. If you buy Amular used and if it doesn't come with an unused code then you can purchase the dlc like normal. You seem to be arguing that the companies should be doing exactly what they are doing.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree they are being jerks.
But if you invest $10,000,000 to make the first coffee table, then you are going to want to make at least $10,000,000 back.
And if you invested $30,000,000 in three other failures, then you are going to price this game to make $40,000,000 or go bankrupt.
That investment is people's salaries, rent on the buildings, power bills, computer and desks.
Once you get past that base cost, sure, the extra copies are "free".
I think the publishers are cheating, swindling, weasels who want us to pay 5 times for the exact same content. And we have a right to scream and shout about it and try to convince people not to buy the products.
But try to be realistic about the real costs to make these games.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
but definitely don't steal it.
What about downloading it?
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words, i'm not saying we won't be seeing such attempts, but that they are flat out wrong, and I don't feel like letting myself be ripped off.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah.. so when you resell the car, the trunk should lock, the A/C should stop working, and the gas mileage should drop from 27mpg to 21mpg.
We want to keep the "premium" car experience to first purchasers.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:2, Insightful)
I just love how people like you defend this crap. I'm not 'signing a fucking contract' when I buy a game, I'm buying a product and I really fail to see how the two are even remotely similar.
Unless you're being paid by a company who is doing this, I don't see how in the hell you can defend such actions. This isn't capitalism at all. This is greedy company trying to milk your wallet by making up bullshit rules about how to use their products after the transfer of ownership.
We'll yell and scream all we want. Maybe this company won't change their practices, but maybe a company or two out there will hear it and it will stop them from changing theirs. And maybe some gamers out there will hear it and choose not to buy products that do this sort of thing.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I suppose that depends on how you go about increasing the prices.
I mean, if all Shilling wanted was to raise the price he could have simply, you know, charged more money for the product and then we'd not be having this silly conversation.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
When was the last time you had to agree to 'terms' when purchasing your game? You don't get to learn about them until you get home and open the box, or even until you finish installing it.
Why should those terms be enforced? Why should their violation be considered copyright infringement? You bought a copy, now you should be able to do with it whatever you want. Including reselling it.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
"And what happens when there is nothing else?"
Games are toys. There will always be toys. Crave something different.
Today it is games and toys. Tomorrow, it will be tools and necessities. We fight this battle over baubles in the hopes that we will not have to fight over the things that really matter.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
A couple of things you're missing here:
1/ Their 'contracts', EULAs, whatever are not sacrosanct, they are subject to various laws and quite likely violate consumer laws in many countries; they rely on having more lawyer money than you to counteract this. This *should not* be a viable business model - to break the law and get away with it because of how much money you have. If they don't want to do business under certain countries' consumer laws they should just not sell their products in those countries, but they want it both ways.
2/ They treat the transaction as a simple sale when it suits them and a license when it doesn't. If they are effectively tying you to a onerous and difficult to understand contract which limits your rights such as return, resale, reinstallation etc. in various ways, this should be made clear at the point of sale - there should be a license/contract document for you to sign saying you understand these provisions and agree to them (subject to consumer and contract law). Why don't they do this? Because they want to falsely make out that it *is* a simple sale. This is fraudulent and should be stopped - and hopefully will be stopped when someone makes an appropriate legal challenge in a country with sane consumer laws.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
So he's not just some random executive, he's a gamer at heart.
A gamer who wants to badly fuck other gamers over to make an easy buck. It's utterly absurd that he thinks he has a right to perpetual profits after the original point of sale for a particular copy of a game.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
That means the entire experience is going to require you be authenticated with their service, constantly, and some of the core content will only exist on that service. In other words it's going to look at lot more like Steam, and a lot less like the 1980's.
And that means that there will be a lot more piracy or people who just stop buying from the major game studios until they quit being greedy little shits who think they can violate the doctrine of first sale to make perpetual profits off of one copy of a game.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Just wait until the copyright expires.
That's great, so roughly 45 years after my unborn grandchildren die of old age, the copyright will finally expire.
but definitely don't steal it.
First off, you cannot steal something if they still have the item. Secondly, by their own words, buying used = pirating, so why not? The greedy fucks view it the same, so why pay any money to Gamestop for it then?
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
i think your inventing a point about something that has nothing to do with piracy .
if i'm a developer and want to sell a game for $42.00 - $48.00 to a game store and they want to buy it and we can come to an agreement then that should be okay. what happens to the game after is none of my business. the store now owns this copy of the game.
If the store wants to sell it to customer a for $59.00 and customer a agrees with this then that should be okay to. what happens from here on out is no-one's business other than customer a. customer a owns the copy now.
if customer a now wants to sell it back to the store for $5 and the store wants to buy it for that price. then no one is doing anything wrong and no one other than customer a and the store are involved in the transaction.
if then the store wishes to sell it to customer b for $54.95 and customer b accepts then go for it. the copy of the game is now customer b's.
if you can give me a single valid reason why any of these transactions are immoral or advise where the developer should get more money then i shall concede that something should be done to hinder the used game market.
resale of goods occurs in every other market, and no one has a problem with it. i don't understand why developers believe they should have some extra right to stop resale of their goods. nor do i understand why they get away with planned obsolescence in their products(which many of the schemes to combat the used game market are). planned obsolescence is a breach of consumer rights in at least the UK.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd just say it's about them double-dipping and trying to work around the first-sale doctrine.
Once a game is bought new, the creator shouldn't be able to say shit about how it's used. Licenses and CD-keys should be 100% transferable.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes. Until one of the contract clauses specifies something that is illegal, in which case that contractual clause is null and void - it doesn't exists, and you can ignore it.
Every content industry, gaming included, hates the first sale doctrine. Actually, every industry hates the first sale doctrine. If the car industry could prevent the sale of used cars, and force you to buy exclusively new cars, they would probably pop the cork, and the cheers would be heard all around the world. But they haven't found a way to go around the first sale doctrine.
(no internet discussion is complete without a car analogy)
A company could try to do so. They'll sell you the car, but only lease you the right to turn on the engine. So you can sell the car, but then, the new buyer would have to get a new engine (or rather the license for an engine). Of course, you wouldn't pay the same amount for this car. And it's clearly a way to get around the first sale doctrine.
The analogy goes even better: if you don't like that car idea, you can go and buy a different car under better terms (it's a different car, since the car manufacturer has a monopoly on its brand).
So why don't the car industry do that? Because if they did, the blatant attempt at weaseling out of the first sale doctrine would be obvious enough, and they'd get crucified. So it's telling that the content industries think they can get away with it, and indeed, they succeed in doing that.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:3, Insightful)
General Motors doesn't get a dime of the sale when I buy a used car either. Why should software companies feel they are more entitled to resale $ than any other company in the world?
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
i think your inventing a point about something that has nothing to do with piracy .
He's not inventing it. He's just echoing sound-bites from a half-dozen different press releases whining about the evils of the used game market. We don't see them a lot on slashdot, but on sites like, for example, The Escapist, every few months there's a new press-release from some butt-hurt developer telling people that customers who buy used games are no better than pirates.
And said sites are full of people like the OP, who seem to be about even money between being "reputation management"-level shills, or just empty-headed industry cheerleaders supporting these scumbags to the detriment of their own interests.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
That investment is people's salaries, rent on the buildings, power bills, computer and desks.
Oh boo freaking hoo. Most of us would be out on the street from one significant financial slip-up, but we're supposed to pity the boneheaded fuckers in the game industry who can't tell good business from their own assholes?
All they have to do is sell the games cheap and DRM-free to turn pirates into customers. It's not fucking rocket science. People will be able to pirate your games just as easily either way. In the current situation, the incentive to pirate is driven by horrific DRM and a $60+ cost, and the disincentive is a little bit of up-front effort. Sell the game for under $20 without DRM and probably half of the pirates become customers, while you retain all your old customers, and you get new customers who couldn't afford your games before or were offended by the DRM! The downside? Fucking nothing! You can lay off your DRM developers who can crawl back into the dark pit they came out of and shut down your DRM servers. Your initial costs are CUT, your running costs are CUT, and it BRINGS IN MORE REVENUE. Figure it out morons!
As for used games, if you sell your games cheap and DRM-free with online backup and official support, why would anyone buy used? Seriously it's astounding that these are the idiots who get rich.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
Economically, there is no difference between not buying and pirating.
That's untrue. Resale allows the original purchaser to recoup some of the cost of buying the product. This either makes the product more valuable (i.e. the seller can charge a higher price for the new product), or means the buyer has more money to spend on the next product they want (so they can buy more games or higher priced games as a result). At the end of the day, this means that the publishers should be making more money from each purchaser since a proportion of the money flows up from the resale activities.
Of course, the publishers are restricting resale, under the premise that if people can't buy a used game at a knock-down price, they will instead buy a brand new one at full price. If this were true, then preventing resale would make sense. However, IMHO this isn't going to happen - people only have a certain amount of money to spend on games, and if they can't get old ones for the knock-down price they will either buy less games or turn to the black market.
All this is, of course, disregarding the loss of sales from the primary purchasers who boycott as a result of feelng that they are being abused by the vendor.
Shrinking market (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is greater than they imagine and you will start to see it every where.
Just google the word plutonomy for the big picture.
The dilemma has always been to provide a customer with a product for a price that works for all. The problem is the price no longer works for the producer so they want to jack it. The blow-back is that customers, who do not think themselves thieves, but savvy consumers are being told they are no longer viable and not wanted.
As the majority of Americans continue to make less while a small part of them continue to make more you will see more and more "big companies" have this same fight. They don't see that the problem isn't that fact that as time goes on only fewer folks will have the ability to afford their goods, they will instead see that they need to lash out against the "unworthy" customers who just don't want to shell out the cash they know in their hearts their product is worth.
One should remember that Price is one of the 4 P's of marketing. We tend to think that it means that charging 5 to 10 times the true value of Chanel No. 5 is all that it is about but it also works on the lower spectrum. If your target market is spending 0.025% of their monthly income to purchase your product you need to remember that has to scale. I don't buy my DVDs at best buy. I buy them low cost from the WalMart bin or secondhand in pawn shops. It's not that I don't want to buy DVDs but that source meets my budget.
By continuing to start a war of words and technologies against folks who perceive they are your customer to you are basically telling me I am not your customer. I am not worthy of your product. Fair enough. If they keep this up their customers will find new products to fill that same niche in their income bracket, as they should.
I don't dream of Lamborghini's or Chanel No. 5. My heart no longer goes pitter pat to see the latest Spielberg flick on the big screen at today's movie prices. Although game design studio's may think their products are gold, and they may very well be, they will find by shrinking their own market, rather than finding ways to price appropriately that they also will have no market.
Looks like they want to get to their destination fast rather than slow. Screw 'em. I like board and card games better. If I need story I will pick a good pick up a god book or short story they may or may not have paid the rights to themselves (actually I will lend it from the library cuzz I can't afford to buy it.)
This lesson was learned by me again just the other day. The local coffee roaster that I have loved for years and seen them grow decided that a free cup of coffee could no longer be given if you bought a half pound of whole bean coffee instead of a full pound. The owner actually got the employees together to "discuss this" and then expounded on his personal view that it was too expensive. They never thought to offer a cup of coffee for 50-75 cents with the purchase of the half pound, instead the owner basically made the moral judgement that folks who can only afford half a pound of coffee (6 bucks by the way) are no longer their customer. So I am no longer their customer.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
They are fed up with the Doctrine of First Sale, yet whine when everyone else gets even more fed up with the rest of the copyright law.
I guess we're headed for another great video game crash; the combination of incompetence, rising development costs and feelings of entitlement reaching the level of absurd hubris in the industry are a deadly combination. Now if only they'll take the movie and music industries with them, we can start cleaning the corruption they have inflicted on us, such as ACTA.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:5, Insightful)
A gamer who wants to badly fuck other gamers over to make an easy buck.
The most hilarious thing is that he doesn't understand how markets work at all.
People discount the price they're willing to pay by the amount they'll get back later if they sell used. When I go out and sell a used game for $20 that I originally paid $50 for, that's $20 I put toward the purchase of the next new game I buy. If I don't have that $20 in my pocket, I'm not paying more than $30 for the next game because I literally don't have the money anymore. Meanwhile, the guy who would have bought the game used from me has still only got $20 to buy a game, and if the game doesn't cost $20 then he can't afford it either.
There are three actual ways to make more money selling video games: Either you set the price more appropriately (because it's either higher or lower than the sweet spot, which means that volume times price is not maximized), or you make better games so that more people buy them, or you make games that are just as good more efficiently so that you have lower costs against the same revenues. There is no option that says "fuck over your paying customers" because that doesn't work.
Re:Not on the disc (Score:4, Insightful)
Valve has proven that while gamers will bitch about it they will put up with anti-resale measures. Heck if you make the service you are locking them into treat them well (unlimeted redownloads, massive discounts in sales etc) then they might even grow to like it (I'd say I see far more positive posts on steam round here nowadays than negative ones).
I guess the only questions left for devs are
1: which is more controversial and/or more profitable. Preventing resale altogether as valve and blizzard do or trying to cream some money off resale through content that is free to the first owner but chargable to subsequent owners.
2: how to balance strength of the protection measures verses inconviniance caused to user.