Valve: Raise price and digi games still sell

By Games Industry.biz Published 18 November, 2009

Dev discusses price variation on Steam.

Publishers and developer are free to drop and raise the price of digitally released games without any penalty to future sales or consumer loyalty, according to Valve's head of Steam, Jason Holtman, as reported on GamesIndustry.biz.

Speaking at the Montreal International Game Summit this week, Holtman said the digital market flips traditional retail thinking on its head, and that a game discounted for a short time can still go back to full price and increase sales after the promotion.

"In a connected world with a connected game it's very different and it bucks some of the traditional trends on the way people think about pricing," said Holtman.

"Fundamentally people thought that with pricing if you ever decreased the price of a product it hurt your future sales and it hurt your product as a whole. 'Don't ever take a top-end product and go to $5-10 because everybody's going to remember and they'll never buy it at the high price again, they'll think it's in the bargain bin.'

"But in a connected market prices can be moved up and down without penalty. You can have sales that are dramatically low and bring the price back up and people don't care. They don't care at all. You can do them instantaneously and you can experiment with them," he said.

For Halloween Valve dropped the price of Team Fortress 2 via Steam for six hours from $19.99 to $2.50, without marketing or advertising. "Our revenue from that weekend jumped up dramatically," said Holtman.

"When we took the game up back to its full price after we gave away all that free content and gave away lots of copies - tens of thousands of copies - we actually increased the user base and more people came back the following weekend and bought it at full price than we were selling the week before," detailed Holtman.

The sales promotion was concocted by both business and game design departments, said Holtman. "There was a meta game of people buying and selling it," he said of consumers. "They thought they were exploiting us by buying a bunch of gifts - we love it when people buy a bunch of gifts. They were stockpiling the game."

He also pointed to a Left 4 Dead promotion, where the price of the game was dropped by 50 per cent over a weekend, without it hurting sales at retail.

"We moved more units of Left 4 Dead on that weekend than we did at launch. There was no [retail] store promotion, because that's hard to set up. And retail was unaffected by that," said Holtman. "It didn't hurt our other channel at all. You can actually have lots of marginal sales on top of things and it doesn't mean you are sacrificing one for another. You can do this experimentation and it's not a zero-sum game - you don't have to hurt somebody to win."

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Comments (68) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Toothball #1 2 years ago

    I bought a second copy when they halved the price of Left 4 Dead. I had it on Xbox but it meant I could play with my PC-owning friends too.

  • Xerx3s #2 2 years ago

    Really? 2 of my mates used to buy from steam alone and they more or less dropped that completely after being fucked over on price several times.

  • bad09 #3 2 years ago

    I love Steam deals and Steam is pretty much the only way they get my cash now so the more deals the better for me!

    More serious than deals though more publishers need to address their pricing for me to buy more, The price over physical product is silly and sometimes they stay silly. Take Acti (surprise surprise) for an example, 30 notes for COD:MW - a two year old game. They even had the cheek to put it on a deal before MW2 only for it to go back up....

  • FortysixterUK #4 2 years ago

    Steam prices are a joke (overpriced) most of the time, and of course, those that miss out on the few and rare good deals just feel screwed over all the more ( I include myself in this ).
    If they had emailed me to say L4D was on special offer , or that TF2 was selling for $2.50 I would have bought them both, however, as most of the time STEAM prices are invariably the same as shop retail, there is no incentive for me to check it daily.
    STEAM is a reasonably good idea, very poorly implemented.
    They have all the opportunity in the world to sell you games that are much cheaper than retail ( after all, no box, manual or disc...in fact, no physical media at all), but they don't.***moan moan moan***

  • kangarootoo #5 2 years ago

    @Xerx3s

    Sounds like your 2 friends are the exception to an observed rule.


    "STEAM is a reasonably good idea, very poorly implemented"

    Steam obviously makes money. The only real flaw I am seeing described here is that some people would like to pay less for its products. That isn't poor implemenation - the opposite perhaps. If the products are selling, the price is right, that is how it works.

  • skillian #6 2 years ago

    Steam's prices are truly terrible at the top end and often unbeatable at the low end. There are regular unmissable deals,. particularly if you're someone who doesn't always buy big releases on day one.

    Check Steam news in an RSS feed if you don't want to check prices every day, particularly at the weekend. PC gaming being what it is, big sites like EG don't always cover the price drops and time-limited deals.

    edit: @ kangarootoo "If the products are selling, the price is right, that is how it works."

    I don't really think that's true. I'm pretty sure Valve believe that if lots of publishers changed their prices, they could sell a lot more.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 09:44

  • Schiraman #7 2 years ago

    Steam is clearly successful, but it is generally overpriced - it's fairly ridiculous that I can buy Valve games cheaper by going to an online retailer than I can by going direct to Valve through Steam.

    I can only imagine that if Steam's prices were generally competitive then it would do even better than it is - although at the cost of traditional retail. And presumably Valve are still wary of burning that bridge, although I'm sure they'll get there eventually.

  • bad09 #8 2 years ago

    "I can only imagine that if Steam's prices were generally competitive then it would do even better than it is - although at the cost of traditional retail."

    Agreed if they dropped the pricing and they would clean up!

    Sod traditional retail on PC games, I can't buy many in my area anyway! Almost no one stocks PC and if they do it's a very small selection.

  • kangarootoo #9 2 years ago

    @skillian

    Well ok, "if products are selling at their peak level the porice is right".


    What I am really saying is that there are several meanings of "overpriced". Gamers say something is overpriced if it is more expensive than they would like, but how can that ever be a guide? People would like stuff to be free, and work up from there.

    The only real guide as to whether something is overpriced is whether customers buy it. If a gamer says something is too expensive, but then buys it anyway... it clearly wasn't too expensive.

    Every business wants to find the perfect balance between profit per unit and units sold. This is why the oh so yawnful "if they halved the price they would clean up" comment that surfaces so often on forums is so frequently nonsensical. Getting the price right is as basic a lesson in retail as you can find, and Valve for one have plenty of experience in doing so.

    All I am saying is that whatever the price of things on Steam, if they are selling well and creating maximum profits for Valve, the price is right. Gamers may not always think so, but they are rarely a reliable guide for these things (those that complain but purchase anyway even less so).

    No doubt other publishers should price their own content differently, but the same rules and goals apply.


    Edit:
    "Agreed if they dropped the pricing and they would clean up!"

    Oh christ. What are the odds? :)
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 09:56

  • skillian #10 2 years ago

    @kangarootoo

    When it comes to digital downloads, I don't think anyone knows what that optimum price is yet.

    Valve are probably the closest to knowing, as they've done quite a bit of experimentation with their pricing, but even they are I suspect still making decisions with bricks and mortar stores in mind.

    Lots of other publishers (particularly the big ones) don't really have a clue what would be the optimum price for their games, which is partly why we often have Steam coming out and suggesting prices and promotions to those guys.

    Digital distribution is also very different to traditional retail, and I don't even think there is a single optimum price. Valve have dropped full price games to £5 and brought in more revenue than when the game cost 5 times as much, but I don't think even they would suggest that should be the standard price.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 10:09

  • bad09 #11 2 years ago

    @ kangarootoo

    I can't agree with you. Sure people pay up at the moment as there is little competition for DD. People pay because if you want a DD copy you have NO CHOICE but to pay the asking price.

    Saying the price is right because people pay up is silly. Sure it's business, we all understand that business cares more for the £ than the customer, but it doesn't make it right.

    Gamers rushed out for MW2 after a hike and gave it record sales. They paid up but it sure as hell wasn't right! :)

  • kangarootoo #12 2 years ago

    @skillian

    I agree. Maybe no-one will ever know the optimum price. And it almost certainly varies on a daily basis AND varies from title to title. I'm not saying perfection is achievable, I'm just saying Valve are as close as anyone (save perhaps Apple) to knowing as any vendor can be right now. Which makes it rather trite for any of us to dismiss their pricing out of hand, like we really have even the faintest idea.

  • skillian #13 2 years ago

    To be fair though, Valve's pricing on games is usually pretty good and doesn't attract that much criticism (relatively of course - this is the internet after all).

    It's usually the 3rd party games on Steam that get accused of price-gouging, and I think it's reasonably well-accepted now that Valve/Steam don't have much to do with setting prices there.

  • kangarootoo #14 2 years ago

    @bad09

    "Saying the price is right because people pay up is silly. Sure it's business, we all understand that business cares more for the £ than the customer, but it doesn't make it right."

    Well some might suggest that to even consider that "being right" is even part of the picture is rather more silly.

    To be honest mate, I'm not sure we even disagree because we aren't really talking about the same thing. I am talking about good and bad pricing from the point of view of retail and business (which in my defense is also what the article is about). You are talking about pricing from some moral basis.

    If we are talking about pricing from a moral basis I might agree with you (unlikely, I admit). As it is, we are at cross purposes.

  • mikew1985 #15 2 years ago

    For PC now, I'd actually rather buy from Steam but at €49.99 for a copy of L4D2 or any new release they can fuck right off, it's really priced badly on the euros side. I don't mind waiting and can get my new PC games for close to half that price online or in traditional retail outlets.

    Hell I can buy new 360 games for less than that from HMV. They really need to lower their prices for me to start to bite. I might at €40 but at a more reasonable €35 (i.e. in line with UK pricing) or so I wouldn't bother going retail even if it was a bit cheaper.

    I suspect I'm not alone in my feelings here, they aren't so much close to finding the "sweet spot" on pricing here (in Ireland anyway) as they are miles and miles off, so much so that it's actually insulting.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 10:27

  • kangarootoo #16 2 years ago

    "I suspect I'm not alone in my feelings here, they aren't so much close to finding the "sweet spot" on pricing here (in Ireland anyway) as they are miles and miles off, so much so that it's actually insulting."

    You might not be alone, but you surely aren't in the majority. I find it odd that people feel personal anecdotal experience is more reliable than the stat gathering efforts of the poeple running the system, WHO ALSO have a profit based motive for findign the right balance point.

    Truly, if the price was badly off Valve would not only KNOW about it far better than any of us, but would have have REASON to change it far more than any of us.


    P.s. and none of it should be insulting. You really shouldn't take anyone's pricing model personally.

  • skillian #17 2 years ago

    There was a time when Valve would have decided that even if their Euro pricing was the most profitable, the extra money wasn't worth losing the respect of many thousands of their customers.

    Do they stilll have some of that spirit? Recent decisions make me question it.

  • UncleLou #18 2 years ago

    Saying the price is right because people pay up is silly

    Er, it's not silly at all, it's the absolute, undebatable core principle of supply and demand. The price might be too high for you, subjectively, but if it sells at that point (in high enough numbers, of course), the price is right.

  • bad09 #19 2 years ago

    @ kangarootoo

    Well true from the business side you are right of course "if it's selling the price is right", but then that's the problem there is no connection between gamers and business sense. That's why we all get ripped and the industry sinks deeper into the exploitation we are seeing this gen - but that's another debate!.

    You are right though, we are sinking deeper into a pricing debate which isn't really the point of the article. I just think, as Valve say, the deals work. That says a lot of people do not like the unit price in the first place, which is part of the bigger issue. Of course people buy at full price after a deal, but as I said in the earlier post that's because there is little choice.

  • bigbadbeasty #20 2 years ago

    Even though I personally think that the price of L4D2 is too high, I still bought it, and through Steam regardless.

    I think there will always be the argument about digital vs physical, and while people feel that they should save money by buying digitally it is best not to forget the cost of bandwidth. For the size of the files and the massive speeds required, the cost would become a factor. Remember that most retail boxes will cost a little over a pound or two to make (varies drastically).

    I do think that it really comes down to the perception of value. Some feel that having the box feels tangible and valuable; while others can't find room for all there game boxes they own.

  • UncleLou #21 2 years ago

    I do think that it really comes down to the perception of value. Some feel that having the box feels tangible and valuable; while others can't find room for all there game boxes they own.

    Exactly. I am ready to spend (at least a little) more on DD, because for me, it has added value for being boxless, discless, buy and install anywhere,anytime. The piece of plastic and 4-page b/w-manual you usually get these days is an annoyance, not somethign I feel has any value.

  • mkreku #22 2 years ago

    Yeah, it's not the constant price shifting that's killing Steam for me, it's the $1 = 1€ conversion that does it. I just can't get over that.

  • skillian #23 2 years ago

    I really think people are under-estimating the value of goodwill. Valve would be the first to admit that their success has been in a large part due to the unique relationship they've built with gamers, and that would not exist if their whole business was about maximising prices.

    TF2's free updates would obviously have provided more profit if they sold them, but Valve realise that keeping customers happy brings loyalty, along with an army of gamers who sing their praises and give them incredible word of mouth recommendations that would be worth millions in marketing money.

  • bad09 #24 2 years ago

    bigbadbeasty makes a good point there about the costing of DD compared to retail. I wonder if EG could maybe do an article on the difference in costs for physical and DD it would be interesting to find out, hell if might even convince a few to pay the higher price if DD did cost more!

  • mikew1985 #25 2 years ago

    The thing is I actually like Digital downloads,they're handy and theres no faffing about with DVD's whenever you want to change games and I understand the purpose of this artcile and what the Valve guys are saying.

    I'm not even in the camp that says DD should cost less than retail, I'd be happy with parity, but that isn't the case. I don't think there is anything wrong with my argument and I would suggest that a lot less people in the Euro market (certainly in Ireland) buy games on steam than they do in the UK. Ireland, for it's size, is actually a pretty big market but also one that mostly reflects the prices in the UK. Steam's model is a long way from that.

    Even if they let me pay in Sterling I'd be happy.

  • kangarootoo #26 2 years ago

    "There was a time when Valve would have decided that even if their Euro pricing was the most profitable, the extra money wasn't worth losing the respect of many thousands of their customers"

    I'm not sure if that is really true. That just feels like a bit of rose tinted hero worship to me :)

  • UncleLou #27 2 years ago

    unclelou, thats retarded. DD has added value? by taking stuff away??

    *sigh*

    I buy and play games since the early 1980s. I already own hundreds of boxed games, and I've moved house a lot in the time since. What's retarded for me personally is having yet another tacky piece of plastic wasting valuable space when it can all be so much easier.

    to install it means downloading a 7GB file or so. hardly instant. and you cant do it anywhere. internet connection and steam required.

    Yeah, and to install from a disc, you need a PC with a disc drive. Pretty please.

    a disc you can install anywhere and instantly.

    No, I can't. For starters, it means I need to carry the disc around. I use two different PCs for gaming a lot of the time, which are hundreds of kilometers apart. Steam is an absolute Godsend.

    by taking stuff away??

    Taking away what exactly? A cheap plastic box?
    Edited by 3 at 18/11/09 @ 11:13

  • jellyhead #28 2 years ago

    I pretty much only buy stuff on Steam when they have a sale as their normal prices are a bit steep for my liking but their sale prices are usually bonkers! The Witcher for £12! Thanks, Valve :)
    As for DD over Retail, if the retail packs were like the golden age and had proper manuals and a bit of passion then i'd buy retail each time, now i'll buy the cheapest one of the two at the time i want to buy the game.

  • Sunyavadin #29 2 years ago

    And his is what I said would happen, and why I have avoided Steam from the start (Not to mention the fact that I can get every game I want for the "discounted" steam price permanently on Amazon)

  • actionfitz #30 2 years ago

    Steam still has some very stupid pricing - usually the non-valve games (surprise surprise activision is one of the worst culprits here).
    often you can order a boxed copy from online retailers for significantly less than a digital copy of the same game from steam.
    Now its likely individual developers/publishers are setting this prices, not valve...
    but still... its beyond stupid.
    Boxed copys have to be manufactured, boxes and manuals etc printed, stored in a wharehouse, shipped overseas... and yet you want me to pay sometimes £10 more for a copy I downloaded from your servers, with none of the costs mentioned above?
    no thanks.
    I only ever buy from steam on their sale weekends.
    Picked up the entire Unreal back catalogue for around £20 :)

  • bigbadbeasty #31 2 years ago

    @ actionfitz
    I think very highly of Valve and have used Steam since its launch, but I just want to be clear: Valve are a business, and I do know they take a higher cut than your standard retailer (Game for example), so don't just believe the prices are set 100% by the publisher in question.

    Valve are not saints, and they have the leading digital distribution service in the world. I am just happy it is not EA/Activision in there position :p

  • skillian #32 2 years ago

    I'm not sure if that is really true. That just feels like a bit of rose tinted hero worship to me :)

    It is true. And it's really sad that such an idea is so unthinkable in the horrible corporate monolith that gaming has become that people can barely believe it is true.

  • Eraysor #33 2 years ago

    I love Steam sales. I actually look forward to them because they're something delicious on offer pretty often.

  • actionfitz #34 2 years ago

    @ bigbadbeasty
    yeah, I know they aren't saints.
    Thing is though, the day Valve sell L4D2 or whatever for £25 on steam and £30 in a retail store... thats the day Game etc will refuse to stock PC copys of the game. Im pretty sure that deals are made with retail to keep pricing fixed at a consistent level - bar the odd 'crazy sale weekend' or two. I just wish the highstreet would quit their whingeing and just join them.
    'Game' in the UK do this to an extent - they are partnered with 'Metaboli' for games on demand i think?

  • StooMonster #35 2 years ago

    kangarootoo: "If the products are selling, the price is right, that is how it works."

    skillian: "I don't really think that's true. I'm pretty sure Valve believe that if lots of publishers changed their prices, they could sell a lot more."

    But's it's not about volume is it? It's about margin. What's worth more 100 things at £1 or 10 things at £11?

    I am sure that Valve and publishers are well versed in theory of price elasticity and price determination; if I were them I'd have a whole bunch of quantitative analysis to back up use of Steam platform to publishers.

    http://en .wikipedia.org/wiki/Elasticity_...

  • kangarootoo #36 2 years ago

    @skillian

    I'm not saying its ok :)

    Also, losing the respect of customers is unavoidable as many customers give and take their respect on a whim. Just look at the comments we see regularly on these pages. Given that Valve sell millions of copies of their top end products, "thousands of customers" represent a tiny minority... a minority that are perhaps never pleased no matter what Valve do.

    Remember the L4D2 outrage and boycott nonsense, followed by record pre-order numbers? That a few people get upset is no real guide to anything, and I would question whether Valves euro pricing IS losing the respect of any significant number of people.

  • kangarootoo #37 2 years ago

    @StooMonster

    Exactly. Valve probably know what the right price is, we probably don't. And that is why the "is they halved the price they would clean up" comment is ridiculous, as they might well clean up on sales volume but would see reduced profits.

  • kangarootoo #38 2 years ago

    Good link btw (if somewhat baffling, though I shall persist).

  • skillian #39 2 years ago

    Edited my post because I just find this argument depressing.

    The view that pissing off large numbers of your biggest fans is irrelevant because you have big pre-order numbers just reaffirms my belief that "big gaming" is just not for me anymore.

    I think you know I like your posts kangarootoo, but I remember you saying once that there is no such thing as selling out, and I think there's a fundamental difference between us that will never be resoved by debating.

    Short-term profit over everything else is one of the things that is wrong with the world today IMO. It's just about bearable when we are talking about crisps or petrol prices, but when it infects the arts and entertainment too we get left with the X-Factor and Bobby Kotick being the shining examples of their industries.
    Edited by 3 at 18/11/09 @ 12:08

  • mikew1985 #40 2 years ago

    I myself am well aware of the ecomonic theory of price elasticity, I still can't see where the Euro prices come from, and perhaps us being chucked in with the Euro market masks the effect the price has on sales. But certainly i would say they aren't getting nearly as many as they could in Ireland especially with the shift in exchange rates over the past 18 months.

    I think they really need to adjust their price in light of that and I firmly believe it would increase both sales and profits for them.

    And hey I'm not even saying Valve are the only culprits, pretty much all of the Euro DD stores are at it.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 12:19

  • gorf #41 2 years ago

    I think I would be slightly hacked off if it wernt for vavle being so goddamm good at making games. When your churning out triple A after triple A you can charge what you like
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 12:35

  • UncleLou #42 2 years ago

    you sit in your house like the rest of us. toss the box away and keep discs in a folder if theyre eating up precious space. rarely do you need to disc again anyway for a pc game. youre just creating drama.


    Irony alert. I am not the one whinging about DD. Just explaining why using it isn't "retarded". People can buy their games in boxes till the cows come home for all I care, I am not the one making a fuss about the buying habits of others.

    And yeah, I'll make a folder, I'll even neatly cut out all the CD keys I need. That's so much more practical...
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 12:51

  • Skurmedel #43 2 years ago

    I don't know what prices the UK is getting, but here in Sweden a game can be about 20% more expensive on Steam than buying it retail. I've now switched to buying them retail, even if it means a cumbersome box. I just can't support the inflated price.

    I do however partake in the many rebates on Steam, I've already bought a handful games through them, but they are an exception. Games that are cheap and not available in retail is fine with me as well, Torchlight for example.

    So "yay" for rebates, "nay" for the standard pricing.
    Edited by 2 at 18/11/09 @ 12:51

  • Bremenacht #44 2 years ago

    The fun part of this argument is that if Steam cut prices to keep some buyers happy, we'd have at least double the current comments complaining that Steam is killing retail and trying to dominate the DD market. Like UncleLou, I prefer DD for not having to have a disc in the drive to prove ownership, but it's not as fully developed (in terms of choice) as the normal retail market, so I'd rather not see disc retail go anytime soon.

    Don't like Steam prices? Buy elsewhere.

  • StooMonster #45 2 years ago

    mikew1985: "perhaps us being chucked in with the Euro market masks the effect the price has on sales. But certainly i would say they aren't getting nearly as many as they could in Ireland"

    Yep, Eurozone has to be sold at one price therefore purchase power parity in the Eurozone could be the problem; we don't know if they make squillions in large countries like Germany and that offsets small countries like Ireland.

  • Zoink #46 2 years ago

    @skillian
    To be fair though, Valve's pricing on games is usually pretty good and doesn't attract that much criticism (relatively of course - this is the internet after all).

    It's usually the 3rd party games on Steam that get accused of price-gouging, and I think it's reasonably well-accepted now that Valve/Steam don't have much to do with setting prices there.

    The amount of times I've heard that, it's practically a meme at this point. It's also complete bollockary - L4D2 Steam £29.99, Amazon £24.99. The only downside I can see to buying from retail is not being able to play from the second it's unlocked. Once you add the key to Steam you effectively have the DD version - you can bin the disc if you really want. I don't understand why Valve don't just go DD only - surely that would be even more money for them?

  • UncleLou #47 2 years ago

    I don't think DD services will ever match retail prices - seeing how there are literally thousands of brick and mortar and online shops, with each and any of them selling different games at different prices. While I agree that Steam should not insist oin the RRP like it does at the moment, we'll hardly see it pricematch the whole retail competition for each and every game.

    I also realise that Steam is less competitive in the UK than it is in other countries. Most of the time, I'll save 5 EUR at best if I order a boxed copy somewhere, while there'sa bigger gap between retail prices and Steam prices in the UK, as far as I know. With new PC games often being sold for 18 quid from what I see, Steam can't compete.

  • gjgjg #48 2 years ago

    well I care. I stopped buying full price steam when I noticed they are usually 10%+ more expensive than in my local Gamestop (Ireland). Just a question of availability in GS or getting steam discount sales for me.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 13:24

  • skillian #49 2 years ago

    @zoink: Yeah, when I say good I'm talking about relative to other games on the service - at least Valve games are close at retail unlike many other publishers, but they're still pretty bad.

    I bought L4D1 at shop, then just just took the CD and typed it into Steam and threw away the box, disc and manual. It occurred to me what a criminal waste of resources it was, as well as a waste of my time, and illustrates well the hypocracy of DD pricing.

    Before Left 4 Dead it was always cheaper to get Valve games on Steam, but I think that was mainly due to the dollar pricing.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 13:16

  • Whizzo #50 2 years ago

    A four pack of L4D2 was £80.99 as a pre-order, that made the Steam price too good to turn down for me and my colleagues.

    When Valve does pricing like that more often I'll certainly cough up the readies but a lot of the time it really doesn't make too much sense to buy via Steam unless there's a sale on.

  • kangarootoo #51 2 years ago

    @skillian

    I agree that in many situations short term profit over anything else is a bad thing. And as a gamer I want quality to be held above anything else.

    Or maybe I'm just a cynic, driven to play devil's advocate by the complaints of gamers that actually just want the moon on a stick, twice, with cashback (not you, but some). I shall explain.

    A lot of the complaints here aren't about "the games", they are about "the gamers". People demanding less for the publisher and more for the gamer, cheaper prices for no other reason than because we would all like to pay less. Its simply not realistic, and the only way to really work out a compromise is to let market forces do their thing. Customers will in the end pay the price that is truly acceptable to them. To want anything more than that is to expect charity, and games publishers aren't charitable (nor are people who can afford video games in need or derserving of it).

    If it looks like I am saying that games are all about the bottom line, then I'm misrepresenting my true opinions on the matter (which I should add, are often not what I write here when I have my devil's advocate hat on). What I DO think is true though, is that all too frequently people think that gaming should be all about giving the gamer what they want on their own terms. If robots were making games I might agree, but of course the games are being made by people too.

    It is easy to create a group witchunt mentality in these discussions, assuming the publishers (them) are all about the dollar and the gamers (us) are all about the art and creativity, but that is frankly bollocks. Valve got where they are by working hard, and they have every right to make money from their consistent efforts. What right have we to demand anything of anyone, just so we can have our toys? Does Valve's success now make them evil corps that should "give something back"? What did we gamers do to earn that from anyone (we certainly don't buy and play games as a charitable act - we do so for our ends, ie.e 'cos its fun).

    The only fair ground on which everyone is represented equally is one in which the seller decides the price, and the buyer decides whether to purchase (with some "elastic" bouncing to and fro whilst each side susses out the other's bottom line). What alternative is there? Forcing publishers to lose money until they go out of business (after which, keeping the fickle "respect" of a minority of angsty gamers will seem like a bitter fruit)? Forcing gamers to buy games that are beyond their budget? None of the alternatives make sense.
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 13:52

  • skillian #52 2 years ago

    @kangarootoo

    I agree with a lot of what you say, and I realise it's fruitless to stand here and try and hold back the tide of companies trying to increase profits. That wouldn't even be beneficial, not to game-maker or game-player.

    One of my big problems however is that it's often not simply market forces or supply and demand at work. there are all sorts of tricks being used, particularly by the big publishers, retailers and other with lots to lose that are distorting that.

    Modern Warfare 2, for example refused to let Steam play on an equal footing. They purposefully increased the price on that service to make it look less attractive, and then delayed the Steam release by a few days compared to retail just to make sure that even those for whom price is not a big consideration have a reason to avoid it.

    When Steam first came about we all saw a massive potential for cheaper games for customers and higher profits for developers, but unfortunately publishers and retailers saw it too and started manipulating the game so that Steam won't win. Or at least it'll only win on their terms.

    Does Valve's success now make them evil corps that should "give something back"?

    This bit is the wrong way round from my perspective. It often seems that lots of developers give something back when they start out, and it's only when they achieve mega-success that that old philosophy goes out of the window.

    And without veering towards hero-worship, in my eyes Valve were always one of the few who didn't fall into that trap. Even when they became the best and most successfull PC games developer out there, they still focused on service, customer satisfaction and connection with their fans. They don't always get it spot on, and some gnashing of teeth is expected when talking about games and the internet, but they do a much better job than most others. It is the reason most long-standing gamers talk about Valve in a different tone than when talking about other publishers, and believe me when I say Valve are aware of that and desperate to keep it.

    I know this sounds like just a Valve-fanboy post, but they are special and I don't want to lose them to the homogenous mainstream gaming public traded companies like so many others before them. Valve staying as a private company gives me hope that they still want to be different too, and it's clear when reading interviews with Gabe Newell or reading about them flying over to meet fans in Australia after a flippant email exchange that they genuinely are different. It's more than just the great games they make.

    This is why they get a much rougher ride than other developers would in situations like the L4D2 controversy. Yes it's unfair, but it's only because they are held in such huge regard and given the choice, I don't think Gabe Newell would change that.

    edit: God, epic post. Sorry for anyone actually trying to read these comments that isn't interested in my POV :)
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 14:15

  • Skurmedel #53 2 years ago

    Warning: Wall of text above :) Somebody write me an abstract!

    You both get a plus for thorough punctuation.
    Edited by 2 at 18/11/09 @ 14:23

  • kangarootoo #54 2 years ago

    @skillian

    I'm not sure Valve need anyone watching their back, or equally for that matter need us telling them how to price their products :)

    Anyway, we seem to have gone full circle somehow, with you saying Valve are cool and honourable and me somehow being on the opposite side. Except I started out saying Valve are doing fine, exploring pricing and ways of making money without annoying customers (which is what the article is about really), which is essentially the same thing as you.

    I'm not saying Valve should dismiss the feelins of their customers, but they should ignore the feelings of the minority who will never be pleased. And what they certainly should not do is threaten their business in an effort to keep everyone happy.

    You simply can't please everyone all the time. Valve know that I think.

  • kangarootoo #55 2 years ago

    @Skurmedel

    We all think Valve are nice, but we seemingly differ on how highly we think Valve should value the happiness of every customer.

    Skillian laments a time when game development was all about the quality of the game and the relationship with the gamer, I think that pricing is best left to market forces as that relies on gamers making up their own minds (character building imo). These two points of view are not necessarily in opposition.

    I think that sums it up.

  • skillian #56 2 years ago

    Anyway, we seem to have gone full circle somehow

    Yeah, that can happen :p

    I start by bitching about Valve's prices or something, but if I try and put a logical post together with some arguments that might stand up to scrutiny, I realise that actually they do a pretty damn good job in most areas and it would be disingenuous to criticise them too harshly.

    In fact, this post made me think a little clearer and I sent off an email to Gabe Newell to say good job :) Never done that before but this thread made me realise that I still value them very highly.

    Now that's some real fanboy shit .

  • skillian #57 2 years ago

    I like how when someone from Valve talks about raising prices

    The headline is abit unfair really. They're talking about how it's possible to do temporary cuts in prices and then bring the product back up to full price, whereas in traditional retail, once you've cut the price you can never go back again.

  • kangarootoo #58 2 years ago

    @skillian

    "Now that's some real fanboy shit"

    I think pleading guity as you have done is the best option for a lighter sentence :)


    @beemoh

    Very true.

  • kangarootoo #59 2 years ago

    Just came across this comedy clip, and it rather well represents what bugs me about when the vocal minority gets all upset about stuff.

    [link url=http://www .youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk
    ]http://www .youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk
    [/link]

    Off topic somewhat, but never mind eh.

  • skillian #60 2 years ago

    Here's something else that can happen when a vocal minority get upset about stuff: [link url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation
    ]http://en .wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipatio...[/link]

    :p

  • rprince #61 2 years ago

    Yes, you can drop and raise the price at will and people will still buy it in a closed, unfair, monopolistic market.

    Digital downloads squash competition and allow publishers to keep prices artificially high.

  • sneetch #62 2 years ago

    @gjgjg

    I'm with you on that, Steam prices are currently about 10-20% more expensive than retail here in Ireland (especially HMV these days) and that's enough for me to shop locally. For me there is a... a balancing act between the convenience of Steam and the savings I get locally (I don't order games online so much, because of the delay). I used to buy a lot more on Steam, this year I've only bought Torchlight and L4D2, both at 10% discounts for preorders. The L4D2 deal where you got early access to the demo and the baseball bat was enough to seal the deal. Firing it up at 9AM - ahem, just to check it worked, of course - wasn't bad either. ;)

    (As an extreme example MW2 was €40 in HMV, €45 in GAME and Gamestop and €60 on Steam, the original cost $70 on Steam for Europeans IIRC about €60 at the time, IIRC, I bought that in GAME for about €40 I think).

    That said, his point about how you can sell a game for half nothing one weekend and that creates a "buzz" that increases sales the next one is well taken; get people to snap up a bargain and play a new game on-line and they get their mates to come too.

    Edit: "I used to but a lot more on Steam". Curse these damn fingers, for typing they are rubbish!
    Edited by 1 at 18/11/09 @ 16:38

  • kangarootoo #63 2 years ago

    @skillian

    Oh man, thats a low blow. That is one step away from "yeah, I bet Hitler liked high DLC prices too".

    :)

  • Grayvern #64 2 years ago

    If the [rice is the same as retail I always go boxed because with larger game sizes its usually exactly the same duration to go and get it from the shops.

    I also prefer boxed copies, and I always feel like im getting less for the dame with digital distribution.

    Prices tend not to drop in realation to time as well which is what annoys me steam tends to have price drops way afte the retailer is charging £20 new.

  • YourMessageHere #65 2 years ago

    The reason I like steam is the convenience of the service, combined with the weekend deals - I always check the Steam shop on a friday to see what's going cheap that weekend. What I don't like is the prices at launch, which is why I never buy new releases from Steam unless they have meaningful preorder discounts; either I get them from a handily cheap internet if I absolutely must have them at once (a rare thing) or I get them later on when they are cheaper or on a deal. However I can't really say they are doing it wrong if it is successful, and it's not like I'm short of games to play, so waiting for the right price generally produces results for me.

    All I can fairly say is that I do feel a bit let down by the promises of lower prices than retail, facilitated by cutting out middlemen and packaging, that Valve made when Steam was new which never really came true, and I'd like the new releases to be a bit cheaper, especially the multiplayer-focused ones, and/or drop in price a bit faster. However I do love the convenience of Steam and I am nothing if not patient so I can accept things as they are. I do think there is a certain sense of entitlement that creeps into people's thinking about game prices, along with old fashioned ways of thinking about stuff. If you are playing a game when another you want is newly released on steam, (and really, who isn't?) there's no reason to buy it right then; digital distribution will never sell out of copies. It will be there when you actually want it, and if you leave it a while it will get significantly cheaper.

    @ kangarootoo

    don't you think that it's a bit deceptive to couch what gamers want as unreasonable and unwarranted demands, and what retailers want as a wholly reasonable offer? To me, customers asking retailers for lower prices is just as reasonable as retailers asking customers to buy things for more than they think is acceptable; neither is an unacceptable demand, simply an opposed position.

    Also, publishers clearly ARE all about the money, as they create nothing and simply connect producers with consumers. That's not to say developers are. The problem is that we have large companies such as EA and Valve who use the same identity to do both jobs, both for the things their developers create and for others.

  • Iain815 #66 2 years ago

    Fuck this shit, where's Episode 3?

  • kangarootoo #67 2 years ago

    @YourMessageHere

    I think somewhere in the mix I've not really been making myself clear. Its not at all unreasonable for any gamer to want the best bargain. Your comment "neither is an unacceptable demand, simply an opposed position" sums up my position perfectly.

    What I do consider to be unreasonable (annoying, whiny) is when gamers suggest that publishers are somehow morally obliged to give their products away for free.

    The thing that gets my goat (well ok, there are lots of things, but in this case) is when people act like games should be priced based on people's ability to pay. We are talking about toys here, luxuries. If the price is too high, sales will fall, and the price will fall in turn (or the publisher will go out of business).

    To demand the choice to purchase or not purchase (as we all have) is entirely reasonable, and exists right now for every one of us. To demand charity is not.

  • TeeJay #68 2 years ago

    @kangarootoo

    If I buy two copies of a game at the same price via play.com and Steam, what is the break-down of profits for the developer for each purchase? I have seen various developers say they get a bigger percentage via Steam, because Valve offer good deals and presumably because of the higher costs involved with producing and distributing a physical copy.

    Alongside wanting more of my money to go to game developers rather than middle-men I might well want to save the environment by reducing the packaging and energy used to get the product to me.

    You have claimed that whatever price a game is selling for is the 'optimal price', however there are a whole list of reasons why this theoretical descripion of a 'perfect market' might not apply (see: http://en .wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_com... ).

    You also assume that valve have perfect knowledge of their products demand curve (how demand varies with price) and that they automatically choose the perfect price (the point which maximises profit). You haven't however actually proved this to be true, you are just assuming it. In fact Steam prices just look like the publishers listing their RRP. I can't prove how many more people would switch to buying certain games from steam if their prices were competitive, but anecdotal evidence from gamers suggests that a large number of PC gamers look carefully at pricing - also witness the massive success of play.com over the last few years.

    It isn't being suggested that Valve reduce prices to levels where they don't make profits - online retailers such as play.com, gameplay.co.uk and shopto.net make decent profits. What is being suggested is that if Steam prices were similar to these sites many people would switch over to Steam in a massive way.

    It might be that Steam are selling as much as they can get away with, without massively upsetting publishers and retailers, and that their pricing far more to do with politics and backroom deals than with customer demand-curves or profit-maximisation.

    There are a lot of vested interests involved - large publishers not wanting to screw up relationships with the large retailers who provide shelf space and publicity for a lot of (mainly console) products which are not widely downloaded. The risk is that lower prices on Steam will only generate a certain extra number of sales for PC games, but that retailers will retaliate against publishers re. their boxed console products and in-store publicity etc.

    If this is the case then it is anti-competitive and harmful to the interests of consumers. I am very interested in hearing the real reasoning behind Valve (and/or the developers) consistently pricing almost all their games far higher than anyone else (except for weekend sales). It doesn't make sense from a narrow economic or business point of view and the most obvious explanation is that it is a restriction of trade and an abuse of power by the big vested interests, to buy time while they desperately try to set up their own download services and work out how to dig their wider retail operations (including music, movie & book high-street retail) out of a large hole.