Rock Band man defends Euro price Comments by Ellie Gibson

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SALES TAX EXCUSE = BULLSHIT
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Simple math. $170 (exc US tax) = £85 (exc UK tax)

£85 x 1.175 (vat) = £99.88

So, the tax excuse is bullshit.

smelly, say all you like about the deep intricacies of global markets. Name a single piece of electronic that is higher in £ amount than $. I'll bet you won't be able to find one. Even the professional Nikon/Canon DSLRs don't take the piss like that.

Dear Rob Kay,

we're not put off by the price. We're put off by the fact that we're tired of being constantly overcharged in Europe.

Don't you think we're going to get mad about a fucking 124% increase after the change?. Have you looked at the value of the US Dollar relative to the Euro lately?. Doesn't that price define this as a total ripoff?.

Fuck you, EA.

Thanks.

F*ck Harmonix and F*ck Rock Band.
Are they pricing this to fund the war effort, the thieving anti-european c*cksuckers.
Incase you aren't aware Harmonix, hardware prices go down exponentially over time - not up, or we would all be playing on £300,000 386DX's you lying, robbing, hatefull, backstabbing puppyfiddlers.

I'm going to buy a f*cking guitar instead. Tw*ts.

@smelly - If you think everyone in Europe gets paid more than the US then you're in dreamworld. Don't confuse the UK with the rest of Europe - there is a lot of poor out there!

EDIT: Corrected poster - sorry aspic

EA: I recently bought an SLR camera. It was $700. I checked UK prices when I got home, and you know how much it was? £350. Funny, that. (And yeah, it included both the lens AND the body. I didn't have to buy those separately :P) So this tax crap is just that: crap. And besides, even adding the US tax to RB doesn't double the damn price, unless the tax rate went up to 100% in the three days I've been back in the UK.

And it IN NO WAY excuses that fact that the controllers and the game are sold separately. Who the hell is going to be buying the three instrument pack but not the game that you need to use them? I'm sorry, but I'm not buying this. It's a shame, since I was looking forward to this game.

I mean, come on guys. This thing's a fairly hard sell when the pricing is reasonable. I can't imagine how hard it's going to be for me to sell this to people (I work at a Gamestation).

***SD99

Aspic was quoting a previous post by Smelly

Who has such a naive view on international economics, he must actually be Alistair Darling.

"We're not trying to rip anybody off; we're trying to rip everybody off"

Was the decision to region lock the HALF-PRICE US version anything to do with how badly they intended to fuck the UK market in the arse?

Sorry, you've lost a sale. This is absolutely shameful.

£180?

You can buy a f*cking wii for that

Smelly's went all quiet.....

What I'd like to know is, why's he sticking up for them?

Not even the CFO of EA himself could come up with a plausible excuse for this pricing cock-up.

As a PS3 owner who was extremely excited about Rock Band I am completely pissed off.

This generation really sucks in some ways...

Well I'm still in. The unbundling also suits me, as I didn't want another wired guitar to go with the four I already have. I just can't do without this game and everything it has to offer.

EA are pretty much THE reason region locking went into one of the last gen consoles (after people were initially told by the manufacturer of said console that it would be region free).

EA have long enjoyed inserting their skanky nefarious knob of influence into the soft moist velvet of our European purses

Someone had to pay for that nice shiny office in Chertsey - although now it's closed down, I spose they just want to rape our
mouths for pleasure.

How about asking why the price when:
The xbox 360 gives a pretty good fucking experience, and it's cheaper than your pressed disk and plastic instruments, I can pick up a 360 and hd-dvd addon new with an hd dvd or 2 from down the road for about £180, and I think there's the potential for one hell of an experience and I wouldn't feel like I was bending over for Harmonix to roger me.

I guess the only plus I have with this whole situation is my interest in Rock Band was only passing so I don't feel too upset that I'm not going to buy it, but when a game costs more than the console it runs on you have to say "hmm is this a good price".

I mean, come on guys. This thing's a fairly hard sell when the pricing is reasonable. I can't imagine how hard it's going to be for me to sell this to people (I work at a Gamestation).

But you'd get a whole £18 off your purchase being a gamestation employee.

Also if people are adamant in buying it you should convince them into letting you give them your employee discount, everyone knows you need atleast 7 copies of the instruments and game for various consoles you own 8-)

£130 from Play, but I still refuse to get it on principle

http://www.hotukdeals.com/item/168189/ro...

"they'll have an amazing experience they couldn't get anywhere else"

Well, yes, they could. If they were in the US, they could get it for HALF AS MUCH MONEY. And six months earlier, come to that.

@Shuya

Unfortunately we have a discount limit. Besides, I ain't doing that paperwork for anyone but me and close friends.

I'm half tempted to tell people not to buy it until the price drops. I'm certainly not buying it. Hell, if they would just put the game in with the instruments for £130 I'd buy it - I'd still be getting ripped off, but not as bad.

This game costs more than a console. Fuck that.

I honestly don't care what EA has to say. I was more than willing to pay say, 30% more than the US price, to take in the various EU taxes, but this is just too much.

I seriously hopes this causes Rock Band to totally bomb in Europe, and yes even stop launches in more European nations.

This is a rip-off plain and simple; 8 tracks hardly justifies paying for the US product 2.6 times over, and let's not forget the wait. EA, £100 off that price, NOW!

What angers me more than the pricing is the simple fact that your average person is pretty thick, and half the population is still more dense, so it'll sell and they'll make millions anyway! It just pisses me off that they'll make the same or less they would've had it been priced, say £110, and on top of this less people will get to enjoy it!

Some right old fuck-tards in EA marketing me thinks.

if you have a ps3 - its still region free import it at £85. We did in our office a couple of months ago, though after an initial couple of days flourish, its now sat in the corner gathering dust.


It was a tough sell at £120, no way is it worth the euro asking price. Start a band instead, its cheaper and the experience is more fullfilling.

Our lead coder spent 3 days on it, then quoted he felt the same kind of self loathing he would expect from spending the same amount of time having a wank.

He actually learned to play the guitar in a weekend, and that had some purpose.

@aspic - sorry, wrong poster - have corrected post

They can say whatever they want, but that price's just crazy. I'll either buy it from the US (PS3 version) or not buy it at all (most likely). They have to be nuts if they think many people will pay more than the price of an Xbox 360 for a game. Damn, it's cheaper to buy real instruments and start a band! (yeah, this has been checked).

Houses, cars, petrols and cigarettes are also too expensive in this country. I blame EA for this, and for the fact that it's snowing in April.

Anyone who forks out for this instead of a Wii, a real electric guitar or a drumkit has more money/credit than sense.

@kangarootoo: It's not just taxes.

And i agree it IS highly priced. BUT a PART of the price may not be in their control

Hmm.. how to explain this without writing a huge long essay... hmm.

Right we have the obvious things first.

1. Taxes
2. Import duties

Right.

Now onto the lesser obvious things

3. Dollar/pound fluctuations. They have to base the price based on historic data of the dollar against the pound. If they based it on todays price (like you're all doing) and the exchange rate changes dramatically they could be screwed (and with the current climate on the verge of a global recession that's fairly likely).

4. EVERYTHING costs more in the uk. That may sound like it matters jack shit.. but think about it.

The guy who drives the lorry to the warehouse gets paid more, the lorry company charges more for the lorry driver not just because his wages are higher - but also because petrol costs double in the uk.

The warehouse charges more (bear in mind it's a big product) to store it. As their staff earn more than in the us, and electric costs more, etc.

The lorry company charges more to take the game to the shops..

The shop keeper takes a bigger percentage of the price of the game because he's paying more rent on his store, more for the electricity, more for his staff, etc etc.

And there are obviously loads of steps i've missed out to get a game to the store..


ADD up ALL of those things and THATS the reason things cost more in the uk. Same goes for why games/consoles cost more too.

That's the way global ecconomics work. Some countries things cost more than others. Look at JUST petrol. England pays more than DOUBLE that the US pays.. How do YOU think businesses pay for that when selling goods?

I agree all that still probably doesnt account for why this game costs so much.. But i cant see EA being stupid enough to purposefully price the game out of the range people can afford in mass quantities without there being a good reason for it.

They've done their math.. they'd WANT to get the game out as cheap as humanly possible.

Scrumhalf said
"When asked why the game will be so much more expensive in the UK than it is in the US, Kay cited VAT and the higher price of consumer electronics generally."

I have two examples for him of VAT and higher price of consumer electronics:
iPod Touch $299 - £199
Macbook Air $1799 - £1199

Now explain Rock Band $170 - £180, please

EG

please pass this guys comment on to EA, i really want to hear them explain this away...

They've done their math.. they'd WANT to get the game out as cheap as humanly possible.
Utter rubbish. They're a corporation, not a charity. They'll want to put it on the shelves for the optimal price i.e. the peak point of the demand curve. Fundamentally, at the point where they make the most profit per unit and the price puts an acceptably small number of people off.
However, anyone who isn't a dribbling idiot can see they've managed to get this horribly wrong. It's roughly 40-50 quid (i.e. say 25%) more expensive than it really should be.

Lets make a comparison: Apple have a very popular produc, the iPod, which they sell in both the UK and the US. Every reason you state for rock band being more expensive in the UK also applies to the iPod. They're both delivered by lorries, they're both sold from high street stores, both companies have plush UK offices.. Yet an iPod is about 60% more expensive in relative terms in the UK than the US including all necessary taxes. So just what justifies Rock Band being 40% more overpriced than an iPod?
EA have this wrong. There are no legitimate justifications, there are no reasons which stand up to any sort of analysis. EA have this wrong.

"If you think everyone in Europe gets paid more than the US then you're in dreamworld. Don't confuse the UK with the rest of Europe - there is a lot of poor out there! "


Yeah.. but uk is part of europe. They wouldnt be very well able to sell it in uk for the high price, then germany at another price, then poland at another price, etc etc would they?

Besides..

Who's going to buy the complete set anyhow?

Why not just get (say) the drums, and allow yer friends to get the other bits.. then put them together?

What's the point in getting the full set (unless you have 3 tight friends coming around regularly to blag stuff off you for free, which you're desperate to impress)

Only an utter twat would pay £180 for Rock Band. Just think of the ammount of sales those pricks will lose out on. As for this clown trying to defend the price, he's just a fucking puppet who has been rolled out to tow the company line.

When a game costs more than the actual console, it's time to send a clear message to these money-grabbing idiots that it is totally unacceptable.

You've lost one customer here EA, how many more are you willing to lose.

Get a fucking reality check...

This is fucking absurd. You can buy a new console or up to six new games for the RRP of this complete game. Thus: fuck off EA/MTV.

I'm quite surprised by the pricing. I'm not going to attack the Harmonix guy, I'm pretty confident this is by no means their doing or choice.

Personally, I kinda expected the Euro version to be between £100 and £120. After all Guitar Hero (game and Guitar) is about £60, but with Rock Band they also have a Guitar, Drums and a Mic peripheral to include, so I figured an extra £50-ish would cover them for the peripherals (game included).

Worse case scenario I figured £120 for the lot - and even there it would have been a day one purchase if you got the instruments and a game.

Of course, you want mass market, a £99 price point for the lot would seem reasonable to me. It's not like you get a real drum kit and guitar after all. We're talking about fancy gamepads - not precision tuned instruments. Thats not to mention that the mic is the same as the Boogie one, and they managed to put that out on Wii for £50 and still make a profit...

At this price, I just couldn't justify it. Nor could I even get it past Mrs Sol with loads of pleading. Rock Band is an absolutely amazing game, don't get me wrong, we've got the US version in the office and it's had nothing but constant use. But £180 is too much. When you look that you could buy a 360 or a Wii for the same money, it's just too silly a price.

Hopefully EA will see all the negative response the price point they've suggested has raised and have a rethink.

---
S0L
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rock band costs less than the Wii in the U.S
ROCK BAND COSTS LESS THAN THE 360 IN THE U.S

so why does it cost more than these consoles in europe?

the same vat and import duties apply to the consoles too right?

no matter how much b.s. they give us, the fact that it costs more than the consoles just plainly isnt right, especially given that the consoles are more expensive here in the first place...

Dear EA,

Please fuck right off,

Many thanks,

Johnson.

P.S. Harmonix, I know this isn't technically your screw up but you chose to hook up with EA so you can fuck right off too. May the hairs on your arse turn to drumsticks and beat the bollocks off you.

Since the publisher, producer and developers are all, guess what, outside the uk, that means that, guess what, the fact that everything costs more is a non existent argument. In fact the strength of the pound to the dollar makes imports cheaper.

The reason they are taking the piss is because they can, this is because every other god dam country does as well. If play can charge 130 for the bundle and still make a profit that shows that the price isnt taking into account retailer profit margins either which are affected by generally higher wages in the uk. (Yes online is cheaper but never by that margin)

It's always annoyed me how Europe with 600 million people always get crapped on when the USA with only 200 million inhabitants gets the red carpet treatment.

re: "Besides..

Who's going to buy the complete set anyhow?

Why not just get (say) the drums, and allow yer friends to get the other bits.. then put them together?

What's the point in getting the full set (unless you have 3 tight friends coming around regularly to blag stuff off you for free, which you're desperate to impress) "

That's fucking scraping the barrel, quite frankly.That's fucking shameful.

A lot of the rest of the stuff you said had a shred of credibility when arguing for the pricing. I know my economics, and a lot of what you said had at least a minimal degree of merit. THAT had none. THAT was fucking horrible, and partisan, and utterly exploitative.

Asking your mates to cough up for the bits you can't afford? Insulting them, if they don't? Fucking horrible!

Yeah - I'll just get my mate to spend £70 on drums he can't use unless he's round my place.

"Allow" your friend to get the rest.

Allow?

Fuck off. That's marketing speak for demand, you hateful fucker. Please FUCK OFF you disgusting, morally repugnant twat!

'It's always annoyed me how Europe with 600 million people always get crapped on when the USA with only 200 million inhabitants gets the red carpet treatment.'

they have more guns than we do ;)

1. Since Rob Kay admits not actually knowing that much about explicit pricing, he should have refrained from speaking about it.

2. An example of reasonably more expensive US-to-EU pricing is the solus version of this game, priced at $59.99 / 69.99€. It still shows a mark-up of 10€ if you do the, now popular, $1=1€ conversion, mind you, but I think we can live with that...

3. EA may spin this any way they like, but fact is that Activision faces similar "contributing reasons", yet they priced GHIII at $99.99/99.99€. There's no way EA can justify $169.99-239.98€ difference. Like I said before, I was hoping for 169.99€, could even stretch (not pleasantly) to 199.99€, but any more than that shows no respect for their customers, in my opinion.

4. A quick look at amazon.com shows that the game and its peripherals are already offered at discounted prices. This may not be the case across retail, however it may indicate a decline in sales.

From the above I can only come to this: either EA originally priced the US Rock Band bundle at a loss (hoping that sales plus DLC will make up for it) and are not willing to repeat that in Europe (in fact they may even try to recoup some of that loss from EU sales) or hope that the extra revenue from EU sales will fund failed instrument repairs/replacements scheme. Either way, that's a silly price they are asking...

@smelly: IMHO, global economics have nothing to do with this. If Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo can price their hardware at EU prices equivalent to the US ones, I'm pretty sure EA could too. They may not be willing to, but such price difference can alienate their customers and rightfully so...

Grayvern makes a good point

since the Euro and £ stg is much stronger, shouldnt that mean that even at the same price as the U.S. , VAT and al, EA/Harmonix would still make higher profits out of europe than the US?

nintendo recently sais something similar, that they were focusing on selling Wii's in europe rather than the US for the moment, because when dollar profits are converted back to yen (nintendo is based in japan of course) it was far less profitable to sell Wii's in the US than in europe with our strong Euro & £ sterling

theres no excuse here

EA really needs to back down on this one, backlash has just been so fierce

hell i think we are owed an apology, with free DLC to make up for this, even after they readjust the price (they will, take my word on that...)

@Stoatboy

"That's fucking scraping the barrel, quite frankly.That's fucking shameful.

A lot of the rest of the stuff you said had a shred of credibility when arguing for the pricing. I know my economics, and a lot of what you said had at least a minimal degree of merit. THAT had none. THAT was fucking horrible, and partisan, and utterly exploitative.

Asking your mates to cough up for the bits you can't afford? Insulting them, if they don't? Fucking horrible! "



GEES CALM DOWN!!!

The economics thing was a explanation of how things work (as it was asked for).. The idea of sharing the prices around is a completely seperate thing..

It was just an idea.. Surely the WHOLE POINT of rock band is to play as a band.. Youd need your mates to play with you, and subsequently they'd need to practice on their own single player version?

So surely (as an idea.. i've not actually played it to know if this is viable) it makes sense for you to buy (for example) the microphone version, practice with that, then go round to your mates and sing while he plays the guitar version he's practiced with?

Surely that makes the most sense?

Personally i have very little interest in this game (no mates) but i dont see what i'd gain as a single player by having all the instruments?

@JonFE:

"If Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo can price their hardware at EU prices equivalent to the US ones,"


Erm.. Um.. Erm.. You WERE around when the ps3 launched werent you? And the 360.. and the psp?

All sold for considerably more than their US counterparts at launch

Saying that costs are higher in the EU than the US is bullshit, americans on average are still the highest paid workforce.

if i can find a good place to import from, i will seeing as i have a PS3, i'd rather fork out £85 plus shipping and get it a few months earlier with a full set of instruments than pay double that just to walk into a store and get it with a fucking muse song as a form of compensation, they could have atleast added better english songs to it.

EA will be surprised at the reaction from most of the player base, might even turn more people to Guitar Hero 4 which would be a definite fist up the arse to them.

I think I figured it out:

SHELF SPACE

Game stores (like a lot of retail outlets) will quite often charge publishers to put their games on their shelves. It must be that Euro retailers charge a lot more per shelf-metre, coupled with the fact that the Rock Band box is ridiculously big and inconvenient.

p.s. add me to the outrage pile, etc etc.

I am not an economist, but I think the price has been artificially inflated.

The reason: to recover in Europe from the losses caused by a weak dollar. Same rationale as behind the lack of Wii consoles in North America in detriment of Europe.

Panic not, Rock band is already being heavily discounted. Go to play.com and pre order , Instruments are £99.99 , game £39.99 so thats a total of £139.98 for both !! Much more acceptable

no.fucking.way.

gh3 is what £60?

so a plastic drum kit and mike is £120?

and they are making an absolute mint on DLC.

sheer fucking greed, and no mistake. global economics experts can fuck right off, I know when someone is taking the piss.

Mr. Kay should refrain from talking before saying something like this. It is an even bigger insult than the original price announcement. Although being totally ignorant about the amount of VAT taxes in the world (hint: they don't cause prices to double!!!), he also claims that he can invoke some law of "we generally rip you off" as a cause.

As far as I have been buying consumer electronics, I always found the prices to be nicely according to a realistic exchange rate. If your rip-off retailer is not sticking to it, then google somebody who will give you a fair price. As far as I am concerned, Harmonix can stick their Rip-Off Band crap and all further game experiences up their collective [insert favorite body part for outlined action].