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On May 02 2011 20:15 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 20:02 teamsolid wrote:
People who call companies "money grubbing" if they try to monetize their game beyond the purchase price are hypocritical, because they are the same. Think about how much development costs have increased for (non-web based browser) games nowadays. It costs at least 10x or more of what it cost 10 years ago, yet we still pay the same price.
What reason do you have for not supporting your favorite game company financially for a product you enjoy for hundreds if not thousands of hours besides saving a few measly bucks yourself? We actually pay less, if you adjust for inflation. That's more of an argument for the fact that video games used to be way too expensive than that they are too cheap now. As more and more people buy video games, they can be sold more cheaply, since the production costs of the physical products, i.e. discs, boxes, shipping, labor etc, are minimal or near zero if digitally distributed. Point is: they're making money, and charging more money for the same products is the definition of greed, regardless of their responsibilities to their shareholders.
The market for relatively "niche" games like SC2 have certainly not grown 10x what it was 10 years ago, esp. seeing as how BW is still outselling it.
Charging more for products that cost more to make is basic business sense and following the laws of economics, not greed. If you want to label that greed, that sense of entitlement and unwillingness to pay a few extra bucks (or even tolerating the existence of DLC's, etc) for a game you play for hours on end is just as greedy if not worse.
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On May 02 2011 20:23 teamsolid wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 20:15 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 20:02 teamsolid wrote:
People who call companies "money grubbing" if they try to monetize their game beyond the purchase price are hypocritical, because they are the same. Think about how much development costs have increased for (non-web based browser) games nowadays. It costs at least 10x or more of what it cost 10 years ago, yet we still pay the same price.
What reason do you have for not supporting your favorite game company financially for a product you enjoy for hundreds if not thousands of hours besides saving a few measly bucks yourself? We actually pay less, if you adjust for inflation. That's more of an argument for the fact that video games used to be way too expensive than that they are too cheap now. As more and more people buy video games, they can be sold more cheaply, since the production costs of the physical products, i.e. discs, boxes, shipping, labor etc, are minimal or near zero if digitally distributed. Point is: they're making money, and charging more money for the same products is the definition of greed, regardless of their responsibilities to their shareholders. Charging more for products that cost more to make is basic business sense and following the laws of economics, not greed. If you want to label that greed, not willing to pay a few extra bucks (or even tolerating the existence of DLC's, etc) is just as greedy if not worse.
No, a consumer not wanting to pay more is not greed. If that were the case, then anyone who has used a coupon has committed a cardinal sin. However, as people were discussing in the thread, adding a monthly fee to SC2 and not adding any new services to compensate would, in fact, be greedy.
Disclaimer: I have an active WoW subscription. For that, I get fairly responsive customer service, weekly server maintenence, and semi regular content updates. I'm not averse to the idea of fees or DLC, but a lot of what companies like Activision or EA put out is horse shit, or in the case of Bethesda, 2 dollar horse armor.
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On May 02 2011 16:27 Irrelevant wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 16:20 Goldfish wrote:I remember in an interview that Vivendi (Company that owns Blizzard) was the one that purchased Activision (Vivendi also decided to remove Blizzard North and scrap that early version of Diablo 3 too I think). In this case, would Activison be able to affect Blizzard at all or is it Vivendi that calls the shots? Blizz was bought by Activision, vivendi had massive debts even with wow's income
NO! Activision and Blizzard merged, becoming one company owned by Vivendi.
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On May 02 2011 19:44 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 19:27 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:19 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 19:06 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:02 GizmoPT wrote:On May 02 2011 19:00 Fission wrote:On May 02 2011 18:56 Inori wrote:On May 02 2011 18:50 Fission wrote:
i'd pay a monthly fee to play sc2. Because of people like you there are now stupid money milking strategies like DLC, monthly fees and etc. Feel free to blame me in particular, but there are a legion of people who feel similarly to me. Explain to me why you feel that you are entitled to persistent monthly service for something you pay a small nominal fee for? What other industry works in a similar manner? if you feel so bad for not paying it monthly why dont you just send money to blizzard to help them pay their bills Look at it this way. Buy a movie, you get what you buy and nothing changes. Buy a book, same deal. Buy a game, expect updates/patches/maps/improvements for free for a unlimited time. Sounds weird to me. I think what he's saying is that no other provider of that kind of service do it for free, so if supporting game devs like Blizzard with a small monthly fee means a stable development and no money hungry CEO's ruining the franchise i'm all for it. Movies cost more to produce than video games, yet cost less. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to expect continued support when you shell out 60 bucks for a video game versus 15 bucks for a DVD. Movie also sell on theaters, on DVD's, on Blu-ray and to all the movie-channels on TV. Die Hart 4 had a budget of 110 million dollars, Killzon 2 had about 20 million dollars. So sure movies have a higher budget, they are also a bigger medium and appeal to a much bigger audience. Yeah 60 bucks for a game where the campaign alone is at least 10 hours with potentially endless gametime online compared to a 15 buck 1.5-2 hour movie. Not a great comparison. You pay 60 dollars because of all those countless hours spent online. It's not some added perk of buying the game, that's what you're buying. It costs a production company 0 dollars when I rewatch a movie. It costs blizzard an extremely tiny amount for me to use battle.net. That extremely tiny amount is bundled into the cost of the game. It is not free. Like when you buy a bottle of shampoo, and it says "30% free," that stuff isn't free. You just paid for it when you bought the shampoo. It's a marketing trick.
If a Directors Cut is released or a remaster you have to rebuy the same movie with slight changes. You get these changes for free with a game.
Yes you pay $60 for a videogame, a interactive medium with at least 10+ hours of singleplayer. You pay $15 for a movie with 1.5 hours of entertainment. The game also has unlimited online potential for at least 50-100 more hours. The game also has updates, improvements, new maps and is constantly being improved upon.
A 10-15 hour long singleplayer game for 60 bucks is comparable to a 1.5 hour 15 buck movie. A game with constant updates, improvements AND huge online is a better deal AND could potentially be worth a small monthly fee. IF, and only if, it means that devs get the chance to do it their way and not sell out due to pressure to gain more profits.
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On May 02 2011 20:31 Gheed wrote:
Disclaimer: I have an active WoW subscription. For that, I get fairly responsive customer service, weekly server maintenence, and semi regular content updates. I'm not averse to the idea of fees or DLC, but a lot of what companies like Activision or EA put out is horse shit, or in the case of Bethesda, 2 dollar horse armor.
What if you could get that in SC2? Better customer service, regular maintenace, better feedback and info from the devs, a bigger more indepth integration with different tournaments directly in battle.net, more content in the form of custom games and such.
Some of these things are in the works, but they would have come sooner if they had the added revenue AND pressure that comes with a monthy fee. ($5 or something, not as much as WoW)
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On May 02 2011 16:30 BLinD-RawR wrote:
lol blizzard please break up with activision.
yeah clearly this relationship has been going on too long.
Someone had to tell you, Blizzard! She's not the right corporation for you!
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On May 02 2011 20:40 karpo wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 19:44 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 19:27 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:19 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 19:06 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:02 GizmoPT wrote:On May 02 2011 19:00 Fission wrote:On May 02 2011 18:56 Inori wrote:On May 02 2011 18:50 Fission wrote:
i'd pay a monthly fee to play sc2. Because of people like you there are now stupid money milking strategies like DLC, monthly fees and etc. Feel free to blame me in particular, but there are a legion of people who feel similarly to me. Explain to me why you feel that you are entitled to persistent monthly service for something you pay a small nominal fee for? What other industry works in a similar manner? if you feel so bad for not paying it monthly why dont you just send money to blizzard to help them pay their bills Look at it this way. Buy a movie, you get what you buy and nothing changes. Buy a book, same deal. Buy a game, expect updates/patches/maps/improvements for free for a unlimited time. Sounds weird to me. I think what he's saying is that no other provider of that kind of service do it for free, so if supporting game devs like Blizzard with a small monthly fee means a stable development and no money hungry CEO's ruining the franchise i'm all for it. Movies cost more to produce than video games, yet cost less. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to expect continued support when you shell out 60 bucks for a video game versus 15 bucks for a DVD. Movie also sell on theaters, on DVD's, on Blu-ray and to all the movie-channels on TV. Die Hart 4 had a budget of 110 million dollars, Killzon 2 had about 20 million dollars. So sure movies have a higher budget, they are also a bigger medium and appeal to a much bigger audience. Yeah 60 bucks for a game where the campaign alone is at least 10 hours with potentially endless gametime online compared to a 15 buck 1.5-2 hour movie. Not a great comparison. You pay 60 dollars because of all those countless hours spent online. It's not some added perk of buying the game, that's what you're buying. It costs a production company 0 dollars when I rewatch a movie. It costs blizzard an extremely tiny amount for me to use battle.net. That extremely tiny amount is bundled into the cost of the game. It is not free. Like when you buy a bottle of shampoo, and it says "30% free," that stuff isn't free. You just paid for it when you bought the shampoo. It's a marketing trick. If a Directors Cut is released or a remaster you have to rebuy the same movie with slight changes. You get these changes for free with a game. Yes you pay $60 for a videogame, a interactive medium with at least 10+ hours of singleplayer. You pay $15 for a movie with 1.5 hours of entertainment. The game also has unlimited online potential for at least 50-100 more hours. The game also has updates, improvements, new maps and is constantly being improved upon. A 10-15 hour long singleplayer game for 60 bucks is comparable to a 1.5 hour 15 buck movie. A game with constant updates, improvements AND huge online is a better deal AND could potentially be worth a small monthly fee. IF, and only if, it means that devs get the chance to do it their way and not sell out due to pressure to gain more profits.
The amount of "entertainment time" you get from a purchase was immaterial to my argument. I am not arguing whether or not video games give you more entertainment hours per dollar spent over movies. Undoubtedly they have the potential to. I am arguing that because video games cost more than movies, it is not unreasonable to expect extended support, in the form of an online service, e.g. battle.net, and is, in fact, expected.
I'm sure there's a disclaimer in the EULA that battle.net service is not guaranteed, but the expectation at the time of purchase is that battle.net will be available to the purchaser. That's what you're buying when you're buying SC2. It's not a free service. It's not bleeding Blizzard dry. I can log on to my BW account right now, years after purchase. To say that a monthly fee is needed is wrong, the reason why some higher ups at Activision are bemoaning the Blizzard model for non WoW games is that it is not as profitable as it could be, not because they could sell us more stuff, but because they could charge more for the same stuff.
And that's bullshit.
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We just gotta wait some years until these old capatilistic men, who practically understands nothing of today's youth and what's going on in the different communities and where the interests are, fade away and the new generation of entrepreneurs and businessmen, who actually understands something, enters the topspots. Maybe by then, the tides have turned once again, who knows.
I guess what im trying to say is, these CEOs shouldnt just look for stuff that can squeeze out the most money, they should look for what people want, where the interest are, and how well people respond to different stuff and act accordingly. That'd be a company that people like, and that will stay strong for the future.
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Market interests trumps players and spectators interests, that's capitalism for you.
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Personally if this game had a monthly fee I wouldn't have bought it (unless it was half the price) but just pirated it for singleplayer and moved on while cursing Blizzards name to anyone I know.
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I wonder what would happen if Blizzard splits off from Activision and decides to merge with Valve...
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Doesn't Blizzard plan on making some sort of marketing system with user maps? I seem to remember them saying map makers can make money somewhere, not sure where exactly. That combined with a name change could turn Starcraft into more of a cash cow (not saying it's a good thing)
Part of me actually wishes map makers could charge money for a duplicate map name change. For instance if I ran a tournament I could pay X$ to the map makers and get RQTV prefixed to the map name. Why? Just to make it easier for players; all they have to do is search for RQTV. Yeah, this sort of thing could also be accomplished via public bookmarking but I would have no problems giving the map makers money for all their hard work.
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On May 02 2011 20:31 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 20:23 teamsolid wrote:On May 02 2011 20:15 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 20:02 teamsolid wrote:
People who call companies "money grubbing" if they try to monetize their game beyond the purchase price are hypocritical, because they are the same. Think about how much development costs have increased for (non-web based browser) games nowadays. It costs at least 10x or more of what it cost 10 years ago, yet we still pay the same price.
What reason do you have for not supporting your favorite game company financially for a product you enjoy for hundreds if not thousands of hours besides saving a few measly bucks yourself? We actually pay less, if you adjust for inflation. That's more of an argument for the fact that video games used to be way too expensive than that they are too cheap now. As more and more people buy video games, they can be sold more cheaply, since the production costs of the physical products, i.e. discs, boxes, shipping, labor etc, are minimal or near zero if digitally distributed. Point is: they're making money, and charging more money for the same products is the definition of greed, regardless of their responsibilities to their shareholders. Charging more for products that cost more to make is basic business sense and following the laws of economics, not greed. If you want to label that greed, not willing to pay a few extra bucks (or even tolerating the existence of DLC's, etc) is just as greedy if not worse. No, a consumer not wanting to pay more is not greed. If that were the case, then anyone who has used a coupon has committed a cardinal sin. However, as people were discussing in the thread, adding a monthly fee to SC2 and not adding any new services to compensate would, in fact, be greedy
Both examples you gave are irrelevant, the first because it's unrelated to the situation at hand and the second because that would never happen. Of course they would have to provide additional services and/or release content if they were to charge a fee. Furthermore, rather than a monthly fee, DLCs/custom maps/portraits/unit skins would make far more sense and likely be more profitable for the SC2 model.
Let's say a food product (e.g. some kind of fish) becomes rarer and rarer over several years so that the commodity price increases. If you are outraged at your local store and/or restaurant for charging more for the exact same product that you had years ago, that's just dumb and probably greedy.
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On May 02 2011 20:51 Dystisis wrote:
Market interests trumps players and spectators interests, that's capitalism for you.
I dont understand. Doesnt the market consist of the players and spectators?
Obviously Activision wants to make money. But if the players dont want to pay a monthly fee then Activision wont introduce one because then they wont make any money.
Starcraft 2 will be just fine, i dont get why everyone is getting so upset over this. Activision hasnt even mentioned a monthly fee, have they?
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On May 02 2011 20:48 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 20:40 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:44 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 19:27 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:19 Gheed wrote:On May 02 2011 19:06 karpo wrote:On May 02 2011 19:02 GizmoPT wrote:On May 02 2011 19:00 Fission wrote:On May 02 2011 18:56 Inori wrote:On May 02 2011 18:50 Fission wrote:
i'd pay a monthly fee to play sc2. Because of people like you there are now stupid money milking strategies like DLC, monthly fees and etc. Feel free to blame me in particular, but there are a legion of people who feel similarly to me. Explain to me why you feel that you are entitled to persistent monthly service for something you pay a small nominal fee for? What other industry works in a similar manner? if you feel so bad for not paying it monthly why dont you just send money to blizzard to help them pay their bills Look at it this way. Buy a movie, you get what you buy and nothing changes. Buy a book, same deal. Buy a game, expect updates/patches/maps/improvements for free for a unlimited time. Sounds weird to me. I think what he's saying is that no other provider of that kind of service do it for free, so if supporting game devs like Blizzard with a small monthly fee means a stable development and no money hungry CEO's ruining the franchise i'm all for it. Movies cost more to produce than video games, yet cost less. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to expect continued support when you shell out 60 bucks for a video game versus 15 bucks for a DVD. Movie also sell on theaters, on DVD's, on Blu-ray and to all the movie-channels on TV. Die Hart 4 had a budget of 110 million dollars, Killzon 2 had about 20 million dollars. So sure movies have a higher budget, they are also a bigger medium and appeal to a much bigger audience. Yeah 60 bucks for a game where the campaign alone is at least 10 hours with potentially endless gametime online compared to a 15 buck 1.5-2 hour movie. Not a great comparison. You pay 60 dollars because of all those countless hours spent online. It's not some added perk of buying the game, that's what you're buying. It costs a production company 0 dollars when I rewatch a movie. It costs blizzard an extremely tiny amount for me to use battle.net. That extremely tiny amount is bundled into the cost of the game. It is not free. Like when you buy a bottle of shampoo, and it says "30% free," that stuff isn't free. You just paid for it when you bought the shampoo. It's a marketing trick. If a Directors Cut is released or a remaster you have to rebuy the same movie with slight changes. You get these changes for free with a game. Yes you pay $60 for a videogame, a interactive medium with at least 10+ hours of singleplayer. You pay $15 for a movie with 1.5 hours of entertainment. The game also has unlimited online potential for at least 50-100 more hours. The game also has updates, improvements, new maps and is constantly being improved upon. A 10-15 hour long singleplayer game for 60 bucks is comparable to a 1.5 hour 15 buck movie. A game with constant updates, improvements AND huge online is a better deal AND could potentially be worth a small monthly fee. IF, and only if, it means that devs get the chance to do it their way and not sell out due to pressure to gain more profits. The amount of "entertainment time" you get from a purchase was immaterial to my argument. I am not arguing whether or not video games give you more entertainment hours per dollar spent over movies. Undoubtedly they have the potential to. I am arguing that because video games cost more than movies, it is not unreasonable to expect extended support, in the form of an online service, e.g. battle.net, and is, in fact, expected. I'm sure there's a disclaimer in the EULA that battle.net service is not guaranteed, but the expectation at the time of purchase is that battle.net will be available to the purchaser. That's what you're buying when you're buying SC2. It's not a free service. It's not bleeding Blizzard dry. I can log on to my BW account right now, years after purchase. To say that a monthly fee is needed is wrong, the reason why some higher ups at Activision are bemoaning the Blizzard model for non WoW games is that it is not as profitable as it could be, not because they could sell us more stuff, but because they could charge more for the same stuff. And that's bullshit.
So a game that has more entertainment per dollar should also provide alot of other services. Sounds like to me like unwarranted entitlement.
Most console games have no proper online and they still cost $60. I really don't understand why a bigger clump sum, compared to a movie, warrants even more free stuff like updates and new content. You don't expect free content from books, movies or music but you do from games even though they provide more bang for buck anyway.
If you honestly believe that map updates, custom game development, multiplayer balancing and other services don't cost blizzard money you're naive.
I'm not saying that i want a montly fee for the same stuff we get today. I want a monthly fee IF it will keep Activision of our backs and give the devs time and room to listen to the community and make SC2 the best game it can possibly be. If SC2 is a bit more profitable AND we get better support/updates/content it would be a win-win.
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Blizzard + Valve = Nuclear Gaming Launch Detected lol
2 Best developers out there, unfortunately Activision is keeping Blizzard on a tight leashe
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On May 02 2011 20:44 karpo wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2011 20:31 Gheed wrote:
Disclaimer: I have an active WoW subscription. For that, I get fairly responsive customer service, weekly server maintenence, and semi regular content updates. I'm not averse to the idea of fees or DLC, but a lot of what companies like Activision or EA put out is horse shit, or in the case of Bethesda, 2 dollar horse armor. What if you could get that in SC2? Better customer service, regular maintenace, better feedback and info from the devs, a bigger more indepth integration with different tournaments directly in battle.net, more content in the form of custom games and such. Some of these things are in the works, but they would have come sooner if they had the added revenue AND pressure that comes with a monthy fee. ($5 or something, not as much as WoW)
I think you're overestimating how giving them more money would speed up their development times. Blizzard is a pretty small company, speaking relatively, and paying designers and programmers more money is not going to make them work faster, and hiring more would not necessarily improve the quality.
As to whether I'd ever accept a fee for SC2, no. Any sort of fee for a game like SC2 would be wholly unpalatable. It's like on-disc DLC. I refuse to buy it out of principal; they would be making me pay for something they've proven they have the capability of giving me for free, on top of making me pay for the game itself.
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does this mean they won't meddle with sc2 and let it flourish?
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Meh.. let Starcraft alone 
Blizzard give them enough money via WoW anyway (it's Activision who came with all the microtransaction in WoW). Don't ruin Blizzard because you want more.
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If you honestly believe that map updates, custom game development, multiplayer balancing and other services don't cost blizzard money you're naive.
??? You are the naive one. Blizzard pays its employes on a monthly basis, meaning the only relationship between profits and losses is time and quality.
I think Blizzard has taken the quality over quantity approach that has lasted them 20 years with huge success and are not a crap company like Activision that had 3 years success with Rock band or shit and then it burned out all consumers, now a shitty rock band can't even sell half a million copies on 3 platforms, while SC2 sells 5 million copies on 1 platform the PC, which arguably is the lowest one.
And again the only thing that really costs blizzard money is the online server they are paying, but hey its their choice, they can always return to the P2P model like WC3.
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EPT
