>$60 digital game
>$60 physical game
Why is this allowed?
>>335790573
because reasons
So you will praise Steam during sales
>$48 dollar physical game thanks to best buy gamers club
>>335790573
There'd be little price difference per unit, as at such a large scale, distribution and manufacturing are practically free.
Digital downloads are only there for convience of the consumer.
Because cucks like you allow it.
>>335790573
because steamfags will defend this regardless. gabe is their god and savior, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
>>335791006
>distribution and manufacturing are practically free
The level of rationalization these morons do is astounding.
>>335790573
>physical disc only has steam installer on it
>60$ digital game
>60€ digital game
Why? We are suppouse to be 'europoors' right? Thats like 72$
>>335790573
Keeping servers running 24/7 isn't cheap. In fact, it can be more expensive and wasteful than physical copies.
>>335790952
>proudly display my vidya collection
>virtcucks have to open a virtual library to do it
I don't give a fuck about power levels it feels good
>>335790573
Because people will pay that much. How is this even a question? Are you a fucking commie?
>>335790573
Not sure why this is even a question.
You may not have had any proper work experience.
If games publishers supply their digital products at a cheaper offering than those at retailer, then retailers sanction the publisher in retaliation, they either refuse to sell the same product, not participate in marketing programs like advertising or reduce the number of products being sold in store.
Worse they actively promote competitors products who do not alter their prices.
Its all about the business relationship yo
>>335792564
>>335791282
So what's even the reason to go digital?
paying to have the game instantly vs. paying to have it in a day or more in a cheap box printed onto cheap dvds.
>>335790573
>steam version 59,99€
>amazon steelbook with soundtrack, installation dvds, soundtrack, miniguide and other shit, shipping included:59,99€
>>335792564
>All this wrong
Gamestop doesn't make a profit on digital aside selling cash cards for LIVE, PSN, Steam and that's on the assumption that mom and dad don't just pony up the credit card to begin with. This also applies to other retailers so unless you're still relying on owning a physical copy to play a game, it's a moot point. Everything is going digital.
>yfw Microsoft was right all along
>>335792903
Minimal infrastructure and distribution support required, as a result margins are significantly higher than standard retail sales.
Digital distribution also supports supplemental transactions like micro transactions and subscription fees. Its also a product feature used to compete with other product offerings.
It also encourages consumption of other digital services, once the consumer has made a digital software purchase it is easier to entice future digital purchases.
tldr
its just another distribution channel to sell products direct to your consumer base. Different channels have different benefits, disadvantages etc.
>>335793295
I never said gamestop or other retailers make a profit on digital sales.
So long as pricing parity remains the same at both retail and digital, publishers will enjoy continued support from retailers in selling their products (including hardware)
Think of it this way, if you were boss man of gamestop and microsoft marketing team comes up to you and says
"frank we are going sell all our games digitally at 50% of retail value"
as retail boss man you would know that your sales would drop immensely, so you retaliate and refuse to sell their products and hardware and focus on the competitors
I'll do you one better OP.
>Digital
>No production and shipping costs of discs/carts
>No retailer cut
>Can effectively sell infinite copies forever
>Same cost as physical
Literal jews.
>>335793818
>have virtual game library
>20 years later
>servers are gone and games no longer supported
>can't get in to game because verification server is gone
This generation of gamers is in for a rude awakening. It's one thing for an MMO to shut its doors, but single player games are going to rotate of of existence as well if developers have their way.
>>335790952
>$30 Digital Game on launch thanks to cheeki breeki
>$5 Digital Game thanks to Steam
>$1 Digital Game thanks to Humble
November last year:
>look at fallout 4 price on Steam: €60
>look at retail price at local store: €49
>retail copy is a steam code where only 15% of the game is on the dvd
>>335790573
I live in weedland so it comes to over 100 weedbucks :(
>>335793648
>as retail boss man you would know that your sales would drop immensely, so you retaliate and refuse to sell their products and hardware and focus on the competitors
You're assuming the competition isn't going to call you an hour later and say "Hey, digital is a big thing so we're pulling out of the deal and putting all our stuff on direct-download for a 50% cut in price and selling physical copies out of the factory for full retail" and at which point you're now shit out of luck because your market has just cut you out of the deal.
>>335794724
On disc games will last maybe 10 years longer until disc rot sets in.
>>335791130
What asshat publisher did this? I am genuinely interested.
Because they want to make you think it's the software that costs $60 and nothing else.
>>335795360
Why wouldn't a company just sell it same as retail and thus have a larger margin, instead of fucking themselves by cutting digital prices in half
>>335795917
>Being this out of touch
Been a thing for quite a while, senpai. Gamestop and other retailers don't take any post-2008 PC games because they don't have the game on-disc. It's just an installer and code nowadays.
>>335795679
I still have ps1 games that work what are you on
>>335790573
Just a some info
> Physical games get a price drop quicker than digital
> physical copy run out
> todays pc games on a disc are unplayable without a patch literally random files on the disc
> after a few months sales doesn't matter
>>335796175
They're not gonna last forever man.
>>335795981
Blizzard already does it
>>335795917
Skyrim on pc was only a cd key and steam.exe
>>335791130
>Buy PSP games
>get home and excited to play Patapon 2
>its just a code
>no internet
>mfw I just spent $40 on an empty case
>>335795679
based os O.S.T.A.
>dvd lifespan: 30-100 years
>blue ray 100-150 years
>>335797534
> buy senran Kagura estival versus vita physical
> patch
> 1.9go
> 550min download
> had to delete senran Kagura shinovi versus to make space
> the game use 1.9go and still ask for the physical version to be in the vita to be played
>>335795917
mgsV was just a steam installer
fallout 4 came with only 1 dvd
>>335791130
Christ, it's a shame how fucked PC gaming is due to Steam. Fucking DRM.
>>335797902
This kind of shit is the worst
Especially if you have a data cap
why the fuck can't these companies at least compress their shit.
Witcher 3 was a 30 fucking GB download
I have a 100GB cap
Why the fuck couldn't Steam just compress that shit and extract it when its done downloading
>>335790573
Because they can, capitalism.
If you want to enact change, buy from physical retailers and enourage tohers too.
Eventually the publishers will have had enough and will lower the price of digital games such as they get a higher profit than the would have from retail but you paid.
Digital will ALWAYS be 'overpriced' compared to retail, don't ever expect publisher to drop prices that low, but a middle ground is obtainable.
Honestly, if you think about it, digital versions should cost more than physical.
>Added comfort
>No need to grab anything, it's all in your computer
>>335795917
Civilization 5?
>tfw used to be pissed off that games were still $60 when they started using cheap ass 2 cent CDs instead of cartridges
>now they charge full price for a game that doesn't even technically exist
>the physical versions with the cheap ass discs don't even come with manuals anymore
What the fuck happened
>>335798067
>why the fuck can't these companies at least compress their shit.
They do.
Do you really think you're getting uncompressed textures, uncompressed sounds, music, animation, FMVs, etc...
Try compressing an MP3 with whatever file compression program you use, you'll never make it small enough to be any more viable than the real mp3 file, because it's already compressed to hell and back.
As for you ISP, why do you sucscribe to such a cuck service?
Even in Australia, a place known for shit internet, I get 18mbps (upto 24mbps) for $39.99 per month.
Unlimited data.
I just simply don't understand how anyone outside of maybe someone on a really remote island with a satellite connection (who I have no pity for) has such a crappy connection unless they didn't research anything at all and cucked themselves (also no pity)
>>335798624
Company making video games have to pay salary to women occupying chair doing nothing
>>335798624
Game got longer than 2-3 hours for unique level games and otherwise have more unique levels rather than rehashed bullshit.
Also 3D is much harder to make than 2D.
>>335798850
>Also 3D is much harder to make than 2D.
What the fuck does that have to do with CDs costing literally nothing to produce and games not having manuals anymore.
>>335798624
Vidya companies found out just how willing their customers are to get fucked.
>>335790573
> some people are ready to pay full price months before the actual release of a game
>>335799147
>some people are ready to pay more than full price before the actual DEVELOPMENT of a game
How did we get to this point?
>>335798947
The cost offset was made up for with the increase in development costs
>>335795917
literally all of them, m8.
>>335799265
> How did we get to this point?
The average gamer has no idea how a company works
>>335798734
>I just simply don't understand how anyone outside of maybe someone on a really remote island with a satellite connection
Rural Canada, so pretty much the same thing.
Its the only option that isn't literal dial up, or satellite internet that runs at 6 Kb/s
The satellite internet is unlimited, but here is a screenshot of what I was dealing with before I bit the bullet and switched to the data cap
>>335799343
>The cost offset was made up for with the increase in development costs
>development costs
I think you meant "marketing budgets"
>>335799502
>25.0 KB/S PEAK
Holy shit.
>>335799579
It makes paying $170/month for 100GB cap that runs on cell signals not sting so muchit still stings though
>>335799532
Marketing consulting company must be really happy
>>335799502
How close if you nearest neighbour?
If you're in the sticks, well that's just the cost of being that far away from town.
If you're in or within 5km of a town (not town centre, within 5km of the suburbs outskirts if they exist for whatever town) then start talking to people in your local area - there are two ways around it if you're in a town
- Municipal broadband
In this case, your local town is going to have to band together and build their own network, this means you're going to have raise cash from the city AND the local populace.
The end result can either be a city owned network with a city owned ISP, or a city owned wholesale network that allows any ISP to provide services over the wholesale last mile network
- State/Federal level wholesale network (ala NBN)
In this situation you need to convince a shitload of leader to spend billions of dollars building a new wholesale, publicly owned network, that any ISP could provide services over.
>>335790573
>$60 physical game
>$54 digital game
Thanks Sony.
>>335800130
I live in a literal village.
The nearest minimart is a KM away, but the closest town doesn't have internet that is much better.
>>335797534
>>335797902
>>335798067
>>335798734
>>335799502
>tfw you live in europe with fast and cheap unlimited internet
>>335798734
>live in germany
>quiet, rural town
>rapefugees more important than infrastructure
>1,5 mbps max
>>335800165
> selling games on the psn is more profitable than making them
> sony will become valve 2
>$40 physical game
>$50 digital game
>>335791226
>Why?
VAT
>>335800403
>only give each store 10 physical copies each
>don't restock for months
>>335800405
99% of companies lower the price so that with VAT included the price will still be the same.
>>335797902
Wow what was the patch? Especially on a vita memory card where space is precious. It better add some nice stuff.
>>335800270
> europe
Enjoy your Rapefugee
>>335800405
what does vat mean
>>335801005
It adds a game mod and of course support of the paying dlc in game
>>335801193
It means you must be 18 to post here
>>335801296
Ugh y'know what I was just thinking the way DOAX3 is doing their dlc, I hope the file size for the updates doesn't balloon up to unmanageable sizes since each dlc is being released as patch updates. I'm never gonna buy the dlc anyway so I'd hate to suffer 200mb updates everytime they release a new swimsuit.
>>335801048
Enjoy your coalburners :^)
>>335795981
>Why wouldn't a company just sell it same as retail and thus have a larger margin, instead of fucking themselves by cutting digital prices in half
Because digital sale would spike like a motherfucker if people knew they could get the same game at half the price and without needing to have a physical copy to boot. It's a smart business strategy to cut the price when you're literally making more long-term.
>>335795917
I remember buying mw3 at best buy in 2011, didn't even know what the fuck steam was, made me install it anyway.
>>335798734
If you lived on Svalbard
you'd have the best connection in the world, and it's pretty fucking remote
>not getting as much scrilla from grease-nerds as possible
Video games are a tax on man children for being man children
>>335798067
>Having data caps
What shithole do you hail from?
I'm third world and not even here do we have data caps.
I think there's only one company with an upload data cap but it's upload only, the rest of them don't do this kind of shit.
Sure, speeds are fucking useless without optical fibre here but data caps are unthinkable.
>>335800259
Fibre isn't actually expensive, the big costs are
1. The last 'hundred metres' - from the driveway to the inside of your house
2. Trenches
3. 'last mile' swtiching equipment
4. routing equipment/core network
Try it man, find some people knowledgeable in your local area and/or talk to your local universities IT dept.
It's surprisingly not hard to get things organized once everyone is on board, getting you local area on board isn't hard once you explain how much more shit they'll be able to do for pittance on the current prices...
>>335802846
>Try it man, find some people knowledgeable in your local area and/or talk to your local universities IT dept.
>"I live in a literal village"
>local university
You don't seem to understand what a village is
>>335790573
>>$60 digital game
>>$60 physical game
>Why is this allowed?
because gamer solidarity is tantamount to shia / sunni moslem solidarity
>>335802996
I'm from Australia, 'local' doesn't mean the same as in USA.
I'm sure there is a university in a 300KM radius around you.
>>335803169
That city already has Fiber-optic, but its owned by Bell Canada, which pretty much has a monopoly on that shit and won't install it anywhere if they don't feel like it
>$60 game in US
>same game for 60€ in EU
>60£ in UK
Why is this allowed?
>>335803468
>60£ in UK
When have you ever seen a £60 game?
Ours are usually somewhere between £40-£55 if you're looking at GAME or similar places, and £30-£38 if you're looking for the best price online.
>>335803707
>When have you ever seen a £60 game?
Steam, several online stores
it's pretty rare, only happens when the publisher is extremely lazy and instead of setting prices per region, sets one for all of EU and calls it a day.
>>335803346
Not entirely relevant,
you want to ask that universities ICT faculty (not the IT dept)(also very, very nicely) whether they could (or rather whether students could!) price out a municipal wholesale fibre network for your local town.
Uni's will do this shit occasionally as if they think it could go somewhere, they get their name plastered on it for publicity, which is great.
Plus they made students to (potentially)profitable work whilst paying for privilege!
If they are able to price it out, present it your city during a council/town/whatever civic meeting.
Do you think that public utilities just appear from no where?
We have to fight for them, we have to do the hard yards and prove that it's something possible before a government will act and spend public funds to commission such a utility, from a road to a park to a communications network, all the same thing.
>>335790573
Because gamers are fucking stupid
