Sheikah

That's a whole lot of films. I take it horror is your favourite film genre?

I wouldn't say it's contradictory. Sony could have put in microtransactions and released DLC if profit was their only concern. They left money on the table in this regard which suggests money was not the only focus. That's not to say profit isn't a concern at all. Of course it is. Which might explain why they reduced its price accordingly, to ultimately increase end profit in the manner I suggested. I strongly believe that keeping the game price at £60 the whole generation would have resulted in far fewer people picking it up. Not everyone has that money. I can absolutely vouch that there are loads of Nintendo games I never pick up because of their more or less fixed prices. GoW is a system seller for sure but another term might be a "system justifier". By releasing quality exclusives throughout the last generation they have no doubt convinced people to stay with PlayStation into the next generation.

This point keeps getting raised but nobody has any proof that holding your game's price at £60 for years is the absolute correct thing to do. I realise we can't really prove it, but let's consider the alternative. For all we know, reducing the price after 4/6/8 months helps bring in new customers, keep your game in the public eye, sell extra copies you otherwise wouldn't have, and ultimately make more profit than you otherwise would've if you didn't lower the price. I also mentioned before that games like God of War aren't made to make maximum possible profit (which is why they don't have microtransactions); they are system sellers. So reducing the price to sell more copies (and therefore consoles) might be their aim. So saying "they shouldn't be lowering the price" isn't necessarily true for those sorts of exclusives. I am of the opinion that a lot of people wouldn't buy nearly as many games if they were all priced at RRP, it's not a simple solution that publishers should just hold their prices.

Ah man, the dying trophy. Believe it or not I died before encountering the statue in the village. Let's just say it's not pleasant to die before the loop is established. [emoji14]

What do you mean "since they became multiplatform"? Insomniac have always had the choice to release their games on whatever platform they want, until they got bought out. They were not restricted by any technical limitations or archeticture hinderances like Bethesda were with their games. If you look at the system requirements of many of Bethesda's games, you were not going to get them running on SNES or PS1! Instead of arbitrarily gating the list like that (and giving equal weight to app games), if you look at all the games Insomniac have released, most of their big titles have been PlayStation exclusives. They've even practically made mascots for PlayStation with the likes of Spyro and Ratchet. That counts for a lot more than you'd think. In fact there's only very few games they even put out on Xbox, not like with Bethesda who have released all their big games on both main consoles since 2007, starting with Oblivion. These different situations make direct comparisons tenuous - if you were to show someone Insomniac's game development history you would forgive them for thinking they were a PlayStation brand already. I am certain that many people gaming today would not have thought Bethesda was in Microsoft's pocket prior to the takeover. The biggest reason this comparison doesn't sit right is because ultimately, it's all about what the players with each console lose when each company goes exclusive. Insomniac were not putting out much on Xbox to begin with - in fact, Sunset Overdrive is the only game they have put on an Xbox console that I've even heard of. Bethesda on the other hand...Christ. There's so many games there that Sony gamers have been used to getting, that they now won't. It's actually a bit depressing to think about how much is getting taken away, how much they had access to but now won't. I get that you want to make the situations seem comparable but will you at least agree the impact to gamers on each console is very, very different?

Ah man, one of the most fun trophies in this game involves landing on something that's very challenging. A hell of a lot of fun. I won't spoil it, you might even have figured out out already.

None of the other consoles of that time would have run Morrowind. It run on Xbox...just barely. It definitely wouldn't have run on PS2. Remember, it wasn't even until that era of consoles that hard drives were a thing! You're also mentioning other companies with less intensive games that feasibly could be ported over without too much work. I think you need to remember that only a slim fraction of games got ported from PC back then, it's not like it is now. PCs and consoles are very homogenised now. Back to my point though, the past is the past, Bethesda since moved on and became almost entirely multiplatform. The Insomniac comparison doesn't work because almost everything they have ever done has been PlayStation. Insomniac certainly didn't release a bevy of massive games on Xbox over several generations prior to their takeover!

Because it wasn't until the original Xbox that it could actually run games like Morrowind - and even then only just. At the time Morrowind was a technical powerhouse, you're mentioning PC to console games like Sim City but they were a joke to run compared to Morrowind. There was also a lot of work involved in porting games of that magnitude to console back then, it wasn't generally something that was automatically done like it is for every big multiplatform game now which almost always go to all platforms. Saying it was a PC exclusive is hardly indicative of a special relationship with Microsoft, back then if you were a PC game developer you didn't really have a choice to go anywhere else!

Honestly, I would not say this is a convincing comparison. Bethesda have some "exclusive" history *years* back with Microsoft (when, let's be honest, PC had no competition and consoles couldn't really run Elder Scrolls games). For many years now they have been putting their biggest games onto as many platforms as they can. Skyrim is on almost everything! Meanwhile Insomniac have been making almost all PlayStation games for their entire existence. They made Sunset Overdrive for Xbox, but that's the only exclusive they made for Xbox. There is really no credible comparison to be made here, I don't think. For many years now Bethesda have released game after game across all platforms. A relationship a long time ago doesn't make them an exclusive developer "in all but name" *now*.

And what about games like FIFA? They should stay at £60 for a few years, even when the next one comes out every year? As I said...Nintendo's strategy does not make sense for everyone. And there's no proof it's the best strategy, you might sell more copies by reducing the price and make more profit overall.

Come on, Bethesda have been for a good while a massive multiplatfotm developer with some of the biggest multiplatform games out there, literally some of the absolute biggest games like Skyrim and Fallout. People on Sony consoles have enjoyed their games for a good few generations now, almost as long as Xbox consoles have had them. You're comparing this to the takeover of Insomniac, c'maan. Look at Insomniac's games, they were practically PlayStation developers most of their history. You can't compare this to Bethesda, the situation is so very different!

Exactly. This is also why Xbox timed exclusivity of Tomb Raider stung particularly, given the close association of Tomb Raider with PlayStation. Buying Bethesda was purely to stop gamers from playing their games on another platform. Bethesda were a multiplatform developer, their games would have released on Xbox anyway!

Sorry [mention=883]Dcubed[/mention], but that's a load of spin and not true at all. Also we were talking about Bethesda. When it comes to Bethesda they bought them so Xbox has the next Elder Scrolls, Fallout, etc, while their competition doesn't. They could have easily not bought Bethesda and those games would have come to Xbox anyway, as multiplatform games. Buying Bethesda was clearly a hostile move to bring people over to their platform. All those reasons you have sound exactly like the nonsense that was peddled when the second Tomb Raider game on Xbox One was announced as an exclusive ("allow them to focus on the platform, etc"). Initially it wasn't clear it was just a timed exclusive, then they brought it to PS4 anyway after a year!

Buying a developer completely stops people on one console playing their games, whereas stopping it going to game pass means Xbox players can still play the game, just not on Game Pass. The former is therefore a lot worse for gamers.

Thanks for clarifying that. No surprise to see who was quick to jump on the rumours.

This comparison doesn't actually prove anything, not really sure what you're trying to say. You don't know how many copies God of War would have sold had it never got a price reduction. It could have made far less profit overall by not having a price cut, for all you know it might have only sold 7 million copies. How does Luigi's Mansion selling 10 million copies have anything to do with God of War?

AC Odyssey sold many millions in less than 1 year, before receiving substantial price cuts. Doom Eternal sold 3 million copies in a week, 3 times that of Doom 2016. How, though, didn't people remember their training?! Very doubtful. As I showed further up, GoW sold gangbusters early on, before reductions came in. It's not like nobody picked it up until it got discounted. This idea that Sony are losing profit because they reduce their games after a time is based on what exactly? Why are you equating cost with number of hours of gameplay? That's a really strange and unhelpful way to assess games. I'm far more likely to decide whether I want to buy at launch based on whether the game is very good, and whether there's bugs. Really, really strange logic! Also the director was asking people to pay full price, which is (officially) 60 quid. Let's not change the narrative here.

God of War sold 5 million copies in 1 month at full price. It sold 10 million copies by May 2019. The lesson is that if it's a great game, people value it highly and will pay the asking price. In actual fact, once it started being heavily discounted, loads of people had already paid full price for it. So in terms of what you're saying, that people mostly just wait for the price drop, I'd argue that people are more likely to wait for less critically revered games that they aren't so sure about, or are buggy. And that feels perfectly acceptable to me. Also you say "if slashing prices = more profit in the long term (for Nintendo), they would have done it". But couldn't you argue the reverse for Sony - if maintaining the price at 60 pounds forever would have meant more profit for them, they would have done it? Could it be that both strategies have merit and suit different companies who ultimately have different brands, expectations, and amibitons?

"You don't know that" - so you're saying that if, say, 80% of the sales were made when it was reduced, those people would have in fact paid full price if they never dropped the price? I think we can be very sure that the game wouldn't have sold as many copies if it never got reduced, so this guy is wishful thinking. Or by saying "you don't know that" do you mean that he might not be saying he expects everyone who plays it to pay full price? Because that's what he is saying. This isn't the kind of game that people were crying out for, it's the sort of game people took a chance on when it got cheap. If they never reduced the price many people would simply have never have bought it, as they don't value it as a £60 game. That's just the reality of it. Your seem to be suggesting that the main reason it didn't do well at launch was because nearly everyone just plays the waiting game for a discount. But time and time again we see games like Ghost of Tsushima do well at launch. You can't just dismiss all the examples as 'outliers'. People will pay for the game at launch if they value what is on offer. You are also suggesting all AAA games are treated equally - people will pay top dollar for games like BOTW at launch, the same can't be said for this.

Exactly, GoT was critically very well received, which is why it's only just seeing modest price cuts now. This root of this guy's bitterness is that the game they made just wasn't as well received or polished, that's the reason behind why people waited for a price drop. And another example - Sekiro. That game kept its price remarkably well; this isn't unusual for quality games.

That's because he wants all the sales they made at the lower price to have been full price sales instead. Which is not realistic, given the asking price and state of the game at launch. If the price never got slashed I doubt they would have sold many copies or made much profit. What he really wanted was for the game to be more popular and better received by critics, like how Ghost of Tsushima was (which did very well at launch). But...this situation is down to the developer and publisher. He can't blame the players, is he basically expecting people to buy a buggy game at launch for £60? Is it the players fault for not bankrolling their work-in-progress game?

Yeah, this was my first thought. The jurors were kept anonymous but various newspapers have revealed a lot of information on them - it wouldn't be difficult for colleagues and such to piece together who they were based on who has been absent from work. In this case as a juror, you'd definitely be fearful of consequences if you came to a light verdict. I bet that was playing on their minds for sure.

A more accurate example would be selling at full price for a few months (which they do) followed by a price cut, versus never having a price cut. It would be more like selling a 100 copies at full price and another 100 at half price, versus just 120 copies at full price.

But the reason they halve the price is because people aren't really buying it anymore at full price. So they actually get more profit overall by lowering the price.

But they're not waiting because they're 'trained' to want the best possible price, at detriment to the game makers. They're waiting because £70 is perceived by many as too much for this type of game. If this game launched at £29.99 (about right for a procedurally generated roguelike) and reviewed well you wouldn't see as many people wanting to wait. As I've been saying, it all comes down to that initial price and what people perceive as good and fair value for what's on offer. £70 is the new normal for Sony games but I don't know anyone that feels that's a fair price. Just as many don't want to pay £60 for Days Gone at launch when it's buggy and a bit by the books. People will pay a premium for a game they perceive as high quality, though. Ubisoft games are not generally held in that regard, though.