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Off Topic / Indie game pricing - interesting blog article
« on: December 23, 2010, 11:47:52 AM »
Low prices, low expectations? Ars looks at indie game pricing
There's a thought-provoking piece this week in Arstechnica on the pros and cons for indie game developers of deep-discount pricing and the effect this has on sales, exposure and gamer expectations. Arguments both ways here. I was wondering what Arcen think on this from your own experiences with Steam etc?
From my own experience as a gamer making buying choices, there's a mixed economy. There's a handful of small developers (e.g. Arcen, Introversion...) whose games and creative ethos I really believe in and want to actively support by buying their stuff from them direct and at full price (when I can afford to do that). For the rest, I have limited money and am much more heavily swayed by pricing; there are many games that I'd be unlikely to ever go for at £15 or more but would happily bite on a declining scale of £7.49 or £5 or whatever depending on how much it interested me.
And I say I put Arcen in that first small category - however this is a result of having picked up all your games at heavy discount prices (mostly from Steam) and then spent more time with them and really liked them and found out what you are about. Both Tidalis and AI War were things I'd mentally pigeon-holed as game genres that I thought were probably not my bag. So I didn't really pay attention to them until I saw them in a weekly promotion on Steam, saw the good reviews, downloaded the demo and liked it, so bought the games.
Long term though, there's got be a danger that this continuous stream of deep discount sales of 75% and 90%-off is eroding the market of people who might ever be prepared to pay a full price of say $15 or $20 for an indie game? Is it ultimately just driving down list prices across the market?
There's a thought-provoking piece this week in Arstechnica on the pros and cons for indie game developers of deep-discount pricing and the effect this has on sales, exposure and gamer expectations. Arguments both ways here. I was wondering what Arcen think on this from your own experiences with Steam etc?
From my own experience as a gamer making buying choices, there's a mixed economy. There's a handful of small developers (e.g. Arcen, Introversion...) whose games and creative ethos I really believe in and want to actively support by buying their stuff from them direct and at full price (when I can afford to do that). For the rest, I have limited money and am much more heavily swayed by pricing; there are many games that I'd be unlikely to ever go for at £15 or more but would happily bite on a declining scale of £7.49 or £5 or whatever depending on how much it interested me.
And I say I put Arcen in that first small category - however this is a result of having picked up all your games at heavy discount prices (mostly from Steam) and then spent more time with them and really liked them and found out what you are about. Both Tidalis and AI War were things I'd mentally pigeon-holed as game genres that I thought were probably not my bag. So I didn't really pay attention to them until I saw them in a weekly promotion on Steam, saw the good reviews, downloaded the demo and liked it, so bought the games.
Long term though, there's got be a danger that this continuous stream of deep discount sales of 75% and 90%-off is eroding the market of people who might ever be prepared to pay a full price of say $15 or $20 for an indie game? Is it ultimately just driving down list prices across the market?
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Off Topic / Humble Bundle 2 out now
« on: December 14, 2010, 01:50:12 PM »
You'll no doubt read about this on your gaming news feed of choice this week but worth plugging it here too as it supports the Childs Play charity...
http://www.humblebundle.com/
Available for one week only. Games are Braid, Cortex Command (currently in Beta), Machinarium, Osmos, Revenge of the Titans (also beta). Pay as much or as little as you want for the bundle and decide what proportion goes to the developers and the two charities. DRM-free and no limit on activations. The last bundle had license keys that activated on Steam but this came a while later.
Have to say this is well worth it for Braid and Revenge of the Titans alone, both of which were on my want list already. Played the Braid demo and it is beautiful and innovative, I generally have a very brief attention span with ultra-tough platformers but will give this another go. Revenge of the Titans is an intriguing arcade-style take on tower defence with Puppy Games' lovely retro-graphics style. I was waiting to see how some of the gameplay concepts panned out in the Beta before buying - will definitely get it now though!
http://www.humblebundle.com/
Available for one week only. Games are Braid, Cortex Command (currently in Beta), Machinarium, Osmos, Revenge of the Titans (also beta). Pay as much or as little as you want for the bundle and decide what proportion goes to the developers and the two charities. DRM-free and no limit on activations. The last bundle had license keys that activated on Steam but this came a while later.
Have to say this is well worth it for Braid and Revenge of the Titans alone, both of which were on my want list already. Played the Braid demo and it is beautiful and innovative, I generally have a very brief attention span with ultra-tough platformers but will give this another go. Revenge of the Titans is an intriguing arcade-style take on tower defence with Puppy Games' lovely retro-graphics style. I was waiting to see how some of the gameplay concepts panned out in the Beta before buying - will definitely get it now though!
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Tidalis Technical Support / Graphics glitch in 1.008/9
« on: December 12, 2010, 07:21:40 AM »
Hi, since I installed the new patches I've got a graphics glitch that wasn't there before.
PC version, 1680x1050 and only when in full screen mode:
There is a a bright line a couple of pixels deep across the top of the game window that looks like it's wrapped from the bottom of the frame - see screenshot.
The more distracting glitch is in all menu and game screens where I have a line of similar thickness to the screenshot across the whole far left side of the screen. And another across the bottom of the screen, this one is just the width of the game frame. I've tried taking screenshots but these two lines don't seem to show up in the capture. Also tried tweaking my monitor screen centering (I shouldn't have to it is properly set up....) but it doesn't remove the lines.
On the Adventure Mode map screen, when scrolling the map a similar line appears on the far left side, same width as the map, looks like the last couple of pixels are wrapping back to the black screen border.
I've put a bug entry in your Mantis tool,
Brilliant game by the way, I haven't been obsessed by a puzzle game this much in years....
PC version, 1680x1050 and only when in full screen mode:
There is a a bright line a couple of pixels deep across the top of the game window that looks like it's wrapped from the bottom of the frame - see screenshot.
The more distracting glitch is in all menu and game screens where I have a line of similar thickness to the screenshot across the whole far left side of the screen. And another across the bottom of the screen, this one is just the width of the game frame. I've tried taking screenshots but these two lines don't seem to show up in the capture. Also tried tweaking my monitor screen centering (I shouldn't have to it is properly set up....) but it doesn't remove the lines.
On the Adventure Mode map screen, when scrolling the map a similar line appears on the far left side, same width as the map, looks like the last couple of pixels are wrapping back to the black screen border.
I've put a bug entry in your Mantis tool,
Brilliant game by the way, I haven't been obsessed by a puzzle game this much in years....
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