Survey Says: Sixty Buck Game Pricing Turns Some Buyers Off
Survey Says: Sixty Buck Game Pricing Turns Some Buyers Off
September 10, 2008
Letʼs have a show of hands. How many of you find the $60 price tag of most Xbox 360 and PS3 games irksome?
If so, youʼre not alone. According to data gathered by Frank N. Magid Associates, many consumers are hesitant about paying above the long-time standard video game price point of $50. Of 452 gamers (male and female, ages 12-64) surveyed on their attitude toward $59.99 games:
- 43% said theyʼd wait for next-gen game prices to drop
- 30% would buy more used games
- 23% would buy fewer games at $60 a pop
- 17% would rent more games rather than purchase them
- 17% said that for the right game, price would not matter
Via: GameDaily
-Reporting from San Diego, where sixtybuck games are just one of the reasons that GamePolitics correspondent Andrew Eisen owns a Wii...
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Posted 03/21/10 at 03:56pm
hayabusa75: Actually, 1 in 3 by 45 sounds right to me. You basically have 30 years to screw up. Seems plausible.
hayabusa75: Actually, 1 in 3 by 45 sounds right to me. You basically have 30 years to screw up. Seems plausible.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:50pm
Andrew Eisen: Huh. Both Women's Med Center and Planned Parenthood sport a "1 in 3 by age 45" statistic. I wouldn't have pegged it at even 10%.
Andrew Eisen: Huh. Both Women's Med Center and Planned Parenthood sport a "1 in 3 by age 45" statistic. I wouldn't have pegged it at even 10%.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:45pm
Valdearg: Not entirely sure. Honestly, the EO is disappointing, but not incredibly offensive, so I didn't actually read the author's final opinion. What is important is that I believe Stupak has now announced his intention to vote yes.
Valdearg: Not entirely sure. Honestly, the EO is disappointing, but not incredibly offensive, so I didn't actually read the author's final opinion. What is important is that I believe Stupak has now announced his intention to vote yes.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:43pm
Andrew Eisen: "As many as 1 in 3 women will have to have an abortion in her lifetime..." That statistic came from where?
Andrew Eisen: "As many as 1 in 3 women will have to have an abortion in her lifetime..." That statistic came from where?
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:36pm
DarkSaber: Aye, what fool bastards are these, that sail blackest pirate seas?
DarkSaber: Aye, what fool bastards are these, that sail blackest pirate seas?
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:34pm
Valdearg: Hopefully this will be enough to convince the "stupaK block" to jump off the fence and vote for the bill.
Valdearg: Hopefully this will be enough to convince the "stupaK block" to jump off the fence and vote for the bill.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:33pm
Valdearg: Making sure that Abortions don't recieve federal funding.
Valdearg: Making sure that Abortions don't recieve federal funding.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:33pm
Valdearg: If you want to read the deal, here it is. Basically it's an executive order that will enforce the Hyde amendment.
Valdearg: If you want to read the deal, here it is. Basically it's an executive order that will enforce the Hyde amendment.
Posted 03/21/10 at 03:29pm
Valdearg: Hrm.. Sounds to me like Dem leaders cut a deal with Bart Stupak, a big blue dog, for his vote on healthcare.
Valdearg: Hrm.. Sounds to me like Dem leaders cut a deal with Bart Stupak, a big blue dog, for his vote on healthcare.
Posted 03/21/10 at 02:13pm
hayabusa75: Who's Keefer?
hayabusa75: Who's Keefer?
Posted 03/21/10 at 01:58pm
ZippyDSMlee: Wow JD is on a tear he's almost filled the shout box up :P
ZippyDSMlee: Wow JD is on a tear he's almost filled the shout box up :P
Posted 03/21/10 at 12:12pm
JDKJ: DarkSaber: Keefer says he's sorry he put that merciless ass-whupping on you and hopes you'll return to assume your responsibilities as Resident GamePolitics Troll.
JDKJ: DarkSaber: Keefer says he's sorry he put that merciless ass-whupping on you and hopes you'll return to assume your responsibilities as Resident GamePolitics Troll.
Posted 03/21/10 at 09:10am
JDKJ: BREAKING: Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo, to meet with House Democrat Caucus in effort to win over undecided votes for health care reform bill.
JDKJ: BREAKING: Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo, to meet with House Democrat Caucus in effort to win over undecided votes for health care reform bill.
Posted 03/21/10 at 09:02am
JDKJ: BREAKING: Angry mobs of duckbill platypus march on Sydney in opposition to appointment of Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo.
JDKJ: BREAKING: Angry mobs of duckbill platypus march on Sydney in opposition to appointment of Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo.
Posted 03/21/10 at 08:56am
JDKJ: Of 437 koala bears surveyed, 420 preferred women with big tits.
JDKJ: Of 437 koala bears surveyed, 420 preferred women with big tits.
Posted 03/20/10 at 10:32pm
Aliasalpha: Ding dong the witch is dead eh? Maybe we'll finally be treated as adults here and women can have small tits again!
Aliasalpha: Ding dong the witch is dead eh? Maybe we'll finally be treated as adults here and women can have small tits again!
Posted 03/20/10 at 10:28pm
JDKJ: Survey says no opinion either way. But approval is high among wombats.
JDKJ: Survey says no opinion either way. But approval is high among wombats.
Posted 03/20/10 at 10:25pm
BearDogg-X: JDKJ: What does the wallabies and crocodiles think of Skippy?
BearDogg-X: JDKJ: What does the wallabies and crocodiles think of Skippy?
Copyright © 2007 ECA. All rights reserved.
Game Politics and Game Politics logo are trademarks of the ECA.
Game Politics and Game Politics logo are trademarks of the ECA.
Comments
/me raises hand.
I found very few games worth the $49.99 of the last generation, and even fewer worth $59.99
Count me in the "buy more used games" bin.
/Hand raised
Used games if EA or Activision, other than that with games like GTA4, StarCraft 2, and a few others, I am willing to cough up the money, but only 2-3 a year, when it used to be 4-6 a year... So yeah... I game online more playing flash games, and my personal life has gotten more demanding.
eBay for the win. Also, these aren't some of the worst prices we've seen. In the N64 days you might find Killer Instinct or Star Fox 64 for $75 new.
That doesn't count. Cartridges were always more expensive; in order to put more data on them, they literally had to build them larger. More chips = more expensive.
Yes it does because while cartridges were more expensive to make, they were hardly $20 more expensive (that the concurrently priced ps1 games) to produce. Just like today, it is hardly the case that current video game technology costs that much to produce. It's because people WILL pay the price tag. They would charge $80 for a game if they could get away with it, but they know they can't.
Now that I think about it, it was mostly Rare's N64 games that were priced this high. I wouldn't be too surprised since pricing is publisher-specific.
$50 dollars is too much for me. But still I'd rather pay that than $60.
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Try living in australia, our games are $90-$120 each, and considering that $60 usd is only $75aud, but we are paying ~$110 for your $60 games we are getting quite screwed.
you think $50 is lots, try $100
Given how much some of you earn for wages, that could be considered quite reasonable. An Aussie friend of mine made it quite clear that your wages are, on average, higher than North American wages.
Perhaps I'm easily amused but I thought 50 was a fair price last gen (mostly) and I don't really like the $60 price this gen.
Put me in the 'buy fewer games' category. As it stands now there are only 3 upcoming games I can think of that I would gladly pay $60.00 for.
I have demos for two games that I really enjoy (John Woo's Stranglehold and Stuntman) but I'm hesitant to pay $60 for them partly because I'm ruunning low on spare cash.
Stranglehold is only $20 (US / USD). It's dropped since release. Ditto Stuntman (if you mean Ignition).
There's another next gen stuntman other than ignition?
To be honest, I don't know. I don't really follow the series and I don't know. Ignition was the first one I found on the price search, I just assumed there might be another, like there are two burnouts already.
There was a stuntman last gen (which I haven't played) so that might explain it.
"Reporting from San Diego, where sixtybuck games are just one of the reasons that GamePolitics correspondent Andrew Eisen owns a Wii..."
The other being that you don't really like variety in your titles and you like steering with your ass ? Come on now, we could do this all day. That's a lame line.
Hey, if you think that's a lame line, check out this gem from one of my past articles:
-Reporting from San Diego, GP Correspondent Andrew Eisen wants World of Warcraft on Nintendo’s console. WoW Wii!
Andrew Eisen
I always, always, *always* buy used if I can. I inspect the disk before I leave the store and I've only had one case where the disk didn't work.
Depends on the game. For some I'll shell out sixty, for others, forty or thirty is the right price. I would prefer fifty dollar games, but I don't know if that's feasible now.
Considering that most new Xbox360 & PS3 games cost €63 over here (that's about $90) and PC games average about €50 ($71) then the $60 you pay for a new game is quite decent, although I can see how a slightly lower price (say $50) would probably increase overal revenue as people would object less to the lower price than the current one.
@_@ Jesus that's extortion.
Out of curiosity I did a quick european amazon search, and I found every video game of this generation is pretty much falling in line with american pricing after conversion. Of course, this was for the United Kingdom, so it may be off for other countries.
from Amazon.co.uk: SW:TFU for XBox360 is 39,98 (pounds) that's about $70, which appears to be the norm for new releases. Exact same pricing for the PS3.
PC games have a lot of variance in the price, but 25 pounds appears to be normal. (35 pounds without the discount, which seems almost ubiquitous.) That comes down to $40-60 for a game.
The prices I quoted in my original post were from www.bol.com which is a dutch site similar to Amazon. Their prices are about average for the dutch market.
Most of this pricing apparently consists of taking the US prices and changing the $ to a €.
*Raises hand* I'm not to fond of games costing 60 bucks either :/.
I own a PC (and a Wii) and love the cheep priced old games (that for some reason are better then the new ones...)
Here in the UK console games are £40 and PC games £25. I definitely feel I didn't get my money's worth for MGS4, when I'm used to picking up things like Mass Effect on PC for the £25.
However, I spent £145 on importing Rock Band and don't entirely regret it..
I've inadvertantly discovered the best way to avoid overspending on video games:
Step 1: Get really excited about a cool, new game.
Step 2: Reel when you realize how much it is going to cost.
Step 3: Promise yourself that you will wait to buy it used or until the price drops.
Step 4: Wait so long that you forget why you were so excited in the first place.
Step 5: Repeat.
Try getting games in Canada...some new games are 69.99....
When I buy, I go to eBay and buy used games. I got GTA:IV for $30 three months after it came out.
However, I question the results of the survey when Halo 3 sold how many million copies in its first week of release?
We've got rising unemployment, a slumping dollar, and a sickly economy. I've got more important things to spend my money on than video games. Interesting how prices never fall during an economic downturn...
Bah. Final Fantasy III and Chrono Trigger retailed for as high as $90 each back in the day, and that's in 1995 dollars. Adjust that for inflation, and it's easily over $100.
Kids these days... :p
I'd (reluctantly) pay $60 for a game like GTA IV or Assassin's Creed, but not so for some others like Turok or Burnout
The price does keep me down, but on the bright side, prevents me from buying games that I'll just stop playing in a week
I think the price tag is manageable if, like me you have a weekly gaming budget, I always set aside about £30 for my videogame fund, at the end of the month I can easily be 3 or 4 games better off, and these are proper new released 360 games, I once scored 7 used 360 games in one month, that isn't too shabby for a job at the YHA!
Your soul is a tasty refreshing treat to ones such as I
Put me in the "price drop" category.
Then again, some of the prices I pay for imported games from Japan are just as bad, if not worse because of shipping...
At least the new Banjo and Kazooie will only be $39.99. And if you preorder you get Banjo and Kazooie for free over XBL. How's that for value from Rare?
I don't bother buying more than maybe 2-3 games a year because of the price. Most games don't have enough replayability to want to spend 60 clams on.
High price (above 40) plus bad product, plus you buy it you broken it mentality its a wonder people are not more jaded.....
I is fuzzy brained mew =^^=
http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/
(in need of a bad overhaul)
::Raises an appendage (will let you guess which one
) ::
Seems to be the NextGen mentality. NextGen game = NextGen price. They did that for pretty much each new console as it came out and eventually people adjusted (or stopped buying but never enough to stop the system or change the price). Does not make it right of course, just a matter of perspective.
I do not like it much either but one cannot fight the tide. Odd that PC titles tend to run an average of $10.00 less then the PS3 or 360 and have better graphics, FPS etc.
As someone who owns both and Xbox 360 and a PC, my buying philosophy is this: if the game is being released multiplatform, I'll opt of the PC version as I'm a native PC player (I own the PC versions of Mass Effect, BioShock and Overlord and plan on getting the PC versions of Fallout 3, Rise of the Argonauts, Ghostbusters and GTA IV). PC versions, IMHO, tend to play just as well, if not better than, the console versions. Plus their price point is often $10 to $20 lower.
If it's Xbox 360-only, though, then it had better be a damn good game or one that I really want in order to justify the $60 price tag. So I'm prepared to bite the bullet on Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe and Brutal Legend because I know they're going to be good or at least be games I would be very interested in playing.
Lego: Batman, though, I'm undecided as to whcih version I should get as it will be out for both the PC and 360. On one hand, the PC version seems more reasonably-priced ($30.00), but it's console-centric control scheme may not be well-suited for a PC. The 360 version would be more appropriate, but it's more expensive ($50.00) and I honestly can't justify spending that much money on what is essentially a kids' game. :\
Play the demo for TFU first.
It was one of the ones I was planning to shell the $60 out on. After playing the demo, it can wait.
PC games go down in price quickly which is what I like the best. Good thing I waited off on buying The Orange Box because now I can easily buy Team Fortress 2 for PC and Orange Box on the 360 both for under $50. I decided to get the non-TF2 games for the 360 since they're mostly about the single player and story-telling experience.
The last game I bought for $60 was Soul Calibur IV. I just had to get that one straight from a store. It's almost worth it but when I get a second controller to play with brother then it will really be worth the value. Maybe Mirror's Edge will be the next game I buy full-price.
It definitely irks me, especially when so many games turn into such huge disappointments. Unless a decent demo is offered, you don't get to pre-play the game to see if it's any good. So you shell out the $60 and hope for the best. And some of them just aren't worth the price.
For example, I'd pay the 60, or more, for a game like Mass Effect, which was fantastic, and I was able to sink a LOT of hours into it. In contrast, Heavenly Sword was decent (but not fantastic), and lasted...what...10-15 hours? Great gameplay + great story > pretty graphics
Aside from that, if you wait 6-12 months later, the price is often cut in half. So why buy it at full price the day it comes out if you can get it for half that later? If it's not a "must have now" game for me, I wait for the price to drop. Or I enjoy a far cheaper great DS game instead.
Anyone else remember the days when a new copy of Super Mario RPG retailed for about $70?
Down here in Aus new XBox 360 games are going for $100+, as are alot of used ones.
Pretty much the only way I buy games these days are used or as part of some form of sale at EB.
I'd buy online but, frankly.. its becoming a huge thing here to import games from other countries due to price and delays in official aussie releases, and think its a bad habit not to support local retailers.
\handup
What disturbs me is the implication that the next gen will raise by another $10. $70 games anyone?
Between Rock Band and City of Heroes, I've spent at least $400 and look forward to throwing money at NCsoft and Harmonix whenever they give me the chance.
I'm not very much bothered by games costing $60 instead of $50, but outside of a few specific cases, if a game isn't worth to me $60 I wouldn't pay $25 for it either.
You don't know how lucky you are, yanks.
Games here in NZ can go for $130 on release. THAT is extortion. Current gen console games go for about $110 average in retail outlets. Pc games vary.
I own all the current gen consoles and a gaming rig, and buying games is pretty much a 'wait until the sales' activity for me, with the obvious exception of games like GTA4.
But it had always been that way ever since the mid 90's when $1 Australian Dollar used to cost $0.50 US.
Now the US Dollar has gone down but the difference in price has still not changed. New Zealand from the cooment before mine is in that similar situration. With the internet and EBay and Amazon being my shopping alternative, I see many people ditching the retailers for the online world that is allot more cheeper even with postage and handeling.
heh i buy used or with discounts now, i can't stand the higher pricing for lower quality products of late.
either i need to trade in a lot of old stuff (yeah i do it) or i wait and buy a used copy for 54 bux with a 10% off.
i buy enough games its worth it :p now Wii games... no issues there, i'll buy'em fresh off the line. but Nintendo didn't jack their prices over a minor tweak in design like M$ and Sony
My god! A whole 60 bucks! how devistating for you all to have to fork out so little for a console game? Pity those who live in other countries like Australia where the average game is 100-120 AUD! (80USD).
My heart bleeds for you all...
seriously though, it doesn't.
</sarcasm>
At current exchange rates in Australia you would generally pay between $80-$96 ($100-$120 AUD) dollars for a new Xbox or PS3 game in a retail shop. It works out cheaper to internationally express ship a game from Amazon than to buy it off the shelf (also gets you around the OFLC for some titles).
Just as your games typically have a standard price tag so do ours, the problem is our dollar went from roughly 0.50 USD to 0.97 USD at one stage, and is somewhere in the .8x region at the moment. Between retailers and the OFLC us Aussies are really getting bent over for video games.
Another Australian gamer here. USD$60 works out to be AUD$74. We tend to fork out more than AUD$100 for our games (US$80). We can wait six months for the price to go down, but when you've already waited six months (at least) after everyone else to get a hold of the game, you start to wonder whether you can handle having your wallet gutted.
That's one of the reasons so many people here love modchips (that are nice and legal, too). It's cheaper and faster for us to import the USD$60 than to wait and buy in our own territory. -_-
I find it funny that everyone is whining about $60 games. Here down under, games go for about $100 for new games. I'm not sure why that is though
I find that 60 dollars, while an annoying sum, doesn't slow down my 4 to 6 games a month rate of gameplay.
For a grand total of 130%!
Ummm...
o_O
-- mostly harmless
Might be looking at some people who made more than one choice on the options (check all that apply) perhaps....
I think it's utterly ridiculous to complain about a $60 price tag.
Not just because I live in Australia and have to pay upwards of $100 if I want a game on day one, but because it's fucking WORTH the money you spend.
A decent DVD will set you back about $20 and will give you 1 and a half to 2 hours worth of entertainment
Decent games cost you 3 times as much in price, $60, because they give you at least 3 times as much entertainment value; 6+ hours at least.
It really grinds my gears when people say video games are not worth the amount they sell for, because they ARE.
Shut up you winging fucks. We pay the equivalent of $US100 for the same product. Of course people would rather pay less. what a stupid fucking servey. 60 dollars? quit your bitching, I hope those that complained starve in the sub prime crisis, you are all wollowing in at the moment.
And I hope you elect Mcain and have to deal with 8 more years of idiot, racist white morons driving your country into the ground.
60 bucks? What a joke.
Right, because we're the ones with the nanny-state government that got pissed off over morphine being in a video game.
Wait, no, that was Australia.
Ooooo..
Low blow
*waah*waaah* Australia *waah* Seriously, let American's bitch about a price point they don't want to pay and you can bitch about a price point you don't want to pay. Don't like it? Blame game publishers and YOUR own government. Until then we'll bitch about it and you can too.
Call me crazy but...
I don't think the government has anything to do with game prices...
Also, most Americans don't really give a kangaroo for australia, dude, (myself included) sooo...
i buy everything used, i got the edge card from gamestop that gives me an extra discount on used games, so i get em for like 40-ish
How's this for a strategy to get past Australian pricing? I (a university student) date a girl a couple of years older (a graduate with a real job) with the same taste in games as me and then wait for *her* to buy them and then invite myself over... not that that's the *primary* reason I'm with her... heh heh
Otherwise we buy online, for slightly higher than American pricing and count ourselves lucky.
Seriously though, does anyone know about how we ended up with such a large price disparity? What market/legal forces are at work there? I can take stabs in the dark, but I'd be very interested to know the answer.
For a single anecdote, I haven't bought a single new game for my 360 because of the price. Only used via eBay. I have bought $50 new Wii games, though.
The Australian and New Zealand price disparity is for three reasons, as I understand it:
1) Legacy pricing from when your dollar was shit. Hey, we Canadians get this same shaft in a smaller dose. Our games are $10 more expensive than US prices, even when our dollar is BETTER than the US dollar by ten or fifteen cents. We don't even have a different region code. We get the exact same copy, but it's magically more expensive.
2) Region Coding: Because the game has to be rereleased, it gets marginally more expensive to produce. This is full justification, in the minds of publishers, to nudge the price upwards.
3) Cost of Living: As I understand it, the minimum wage on that side of the world is a fair bit higher. So is the cost of living. Or is it just videogames that are 40% more expensive than their North American counterparts?