Are we paying more for less?

[Warhammer]

Theonlystd said:
And heck alot of poeple just on principle dont pay this much for games no matter what they offer.

That's their loss then. Some people refuse to buy games, or refuse to buy undiscounted games, etc. That is their own decision and you can't reduce the price of your good to appease a small fragment of your customer base.

[Endoperez]

Warhammer said:That's their loss then. Some people refuse to buy games, or refuse to buy undiscounted games, etc. That is their own decision and you can't reduce the price of your good to appease a small fragment of your customer base.

He is arguing that it is more than just a small fragment of the customer base. There probably are many people who weren't sure about whether they should buy Dominions II or not. The fact that Dominions 3 has a hefty and pricy manual might actually make them even more wary, especially as DomII manual wasn't that great. I hope I never have to decide about marketing. It seems to be very complicated business.

[Warhammer]

Endoperez said:

He is arguing that it is more than just a small fragment of the customer base. There probably are many people who weren't sure about whether they should buy Dominions II or not. The fact that Dominions 3 has a hefty and pricy manual might actually make them even more wary, especially as DomII manual wasn't that great. I hope I never have to decide about marketing. It seems to be very complicated business.

Unfortunately, the actual customer base for Dom3 is much smaller than the typical game market. Most of the top selling games are sports sims, not strategy games. On top of that, this is a turn based strategy game, so you have lost the RTS players, etc. Not only that, but you only have sales through online sources, which reduces your customer base even more due to customers not knowing about the product, etc.

Now, once you figure out who your core customer base is, you have to figure out how much you can charge, and given what our likes and dislikes are, $55 is a fair price. Even if you lower the cost to $40, you are not going to sell enough copies to make up the loss in sales that the $15 drop in price will result in.

I'm in marketing so I understand all this stuff!

[Endoperez]

Endoperez said:
He is arguing that it is more than just a small fragment of the customer base. There probably are many people who weren't sure about whether they should buy Dominions II or not. The fact that Dominions 3 has a hefty and pricy manual might actually make them even more wary, especially as DomII manual wasn't that great. I hope I never have to decide about marketing. It seems to be very complicated business.

Warhammer said:That's their loss then. Some people refuse to buy games, or refuse to buy undiscounted games, etc. That is their own decision and you can't reduce the price of your good to appease a small fragment of your customer base.

Warhammer said:Unfortunately, the actual customer base for Dom3 is much smaller than the typical game market. Most of the top selling games are sports sims, not strategy games. On top of that, this is a turn based strategy game, so you have lost the RTS players, etc. Not only that, but you only have sales through online sources, which reduces your customer base even more due to customers not knowing about the product, etc.

Now, once you figure out who your core customer base is, you have to figure out how much you can charge, and given what our likes and dislikes are, $55 is a fair price. Even if you lower the cost to $40, you are not going to sell enough copies to make up the loss in sales that the $15 drop in price will result in.

I'm in marketing so I understand all this stuff!

Now THAT's a good, informative post, and just to the point! I hope you don't mind me reorganizing your posts like this.

[Agrajag]

With the ~65$ the game will cost me (atleast, once I finally order it) I could buy:
28 Decent meals. OR
6 Meals at a fancy restaurant. OR
An ~80GB HD. OR
Almost 6 copies Heroes 3 Complete. OR
Almost 6 copies of the whole Baldur's Gate series. OR
Almost 6 copies of the whole IceWind Dale series. OR
A Pair of Jeans and a shirt. OR
559 Bubblegums.

Anyway, the cost of manufacturing Dominions3 is probably more than twice what manufacturing any other computer game costs. Atleast considering that making a disc costs barely 50 cents...

[DominionsFan]

Agrajag said:

Anyway, the cost of manufacturing Dominions3 is probably more than twice what manufacturing any other computer game costs. Atleast considering that making a disc costs barely 50 cents...

Don't forget about the excellent Dominions 3. manual.

[DominionsFan]

Anyways, I dont understand the title of the topic at all.

"Are we paying more for less?"
Dominions 3. will have lot of new features.
Seriously I don't understand this topic title.

[Meglobob]

DominionsFan said:

Don't forget about the excellent Dominions 3. manual.

I have never, repeat never had a 300 page manual with any game ever and I have probably had tens of thousands of computer games in my time.

Don't u just hate them cheap dvd cases computer games come in nowadays? Urgh...

[Morkilus]

As weird as this may sound, this thread or any of the dozen threads exactly like it should be stickied. It seems like every week there is someone that complains about the price and never posts again. If there was a single thread containing all the reasons why the fans bought the game and why Shrapnel does business the way they do, that should be enough, and we won't feel obligated to write about it every time.

[Gandalf Parker]

Agrajag said:
Anyway, the cost of manufacturing Dominions3 is probably more than twice what manufacturing any other computer game costs. Atleast considering that making a disc costs barely 50 cents...

That is why in some cases independent developers find it better to do it themselves, or to go to a PoD site where they can upload a CD image and sell the CD online thru a shop for very little.

Of course, there are drawbacks to that and benefits to using a publisher like Shrapnel to do more than just make the CD.