Are we paying more for less?

[alexti]

Leif_- said:
There are two reasons why normal games are sold at a refund after a while. The first is that their perceived value in the market has gone down, because newer and, in theory, improved games have entered the market at their old games.

Part of this reason is that the only strong suit of many games is high-end graphics. Which after a year becomes not so high-end and a bit later it becomes just outdated. Without anything else to offer the value of those games falls to pretty much zero.

Dominions don't suffer from it, because they start with outdated graphics and the gameplay content doesn't deprecate with time. At least until they get some competition, which so far was non-existent.

[Archonsod]

Practical business says that you charge what the market will bear for your product

Practical business says you charge what the market will pay for it. It's better to sell three copies for $50 each than 6 copies at $20.

You know you have a good thing here with Dominions but you also have to look realistically at the production values of your game over others, along with the standard pricing policies of the industry

Two things:

1. Price drops in shops are usually the retailer's perogative, the loss is kicked back to the publisher. Given the choice, most publisher's wouldn't lower the price at all - look at other online only stores/distribution services, most keep the price steady since they can afford to set the initial price lower than other sources. The fact is that it's the retailer's stranglehold that allowed the practice to start in the first place (since you either agreed with them, or you didn't see your title on the shelves)

2. Shrapnel are a small publisher. Larger publishers can afford to spread their costs. To a company like EA, it doesn't matter if they lose a few thousand on one or two titles when they can rake in a few million with another title. They know they'll make huge profits on a couple of franchises which will more than cover the losses they make on the majority of their other games. For a smaller company with a smaller audience you just don't have that flexibility.

Charging so much for this series is really just a lose/lose situation. You don't get my money, and I don't get a good game.

Only if they were counting on your money. Since the game has already broken the pre-order record (given the work they've had to put in to ship the pre-orders, I suspect it nearly broke their capacity too!) they're still getting their money, it's you who loses out on a great game

Is Dominions anymore of a niche game than say Europa Universalis, or Supreme Ruler 2010?

Probably not (though EU did quite well commercially). The thing is, I wouldn't consider either game to be worth the same price. I didn't buy EU until it was in a sale. I'm more than happy to pay full whack for Dominions though, which to be honest is probably the first time I've said that for a while. It's somewhat silly to base how much your willing to pay on the production values rather than the quality (i.e. the value to you) of the product. Many premium products don't cost significantly more than their counterparts to produce, however they sell for a lot more because people are willing to pay much more due to it's percieved value or quality. It's simple economics again, if a great game costs $10 to make, people are going to be willing to pay more than they would for a poor or mediocre game, even if it cost substantially more to produce.

Actually, CD Rom provides a good example for those old enough to remember when they first appeared. It's way cheaper to produce a game (or audio for that matter) on a CD than it was to produce it on diskette or audio cassette. You wouldn't have thought it from the price they sold at though, since CD was always more expensive than it's counterpart.

[JaydedOne]

I'm still trying to figure out what "less" is actually supposed to mean here. I'm not paying "more" to begin with. $54.95 is about standard median price between my XBox 360, computer and PS2 purchases. So I'm paying about average.

As for less, most computer games offer me considerably less in the way of strategic options and replay value(I paid full price for Master of Orion 3 and Civ IV, neither of which hold a candle here). As much as you seem to dismiss the manual as a value-add, the fact is that most of us DO see it as one because, as has been noted earlier, it's the equivalent of what most companies put out as strategy guides at $20 a pop. We get "less" in the way of graphics, certainly, but I won't launch into my rant about how I'd trade polygon count for a game that breaks molds and forces me to think. I've had enough beautiful FPS and RTS games all cut from the same cloth to last me a lifetime... or at least until Halo 3 and Bioshock come out. *ahem*

And, of course, there's the small publisher angle. I grit my teeth at buying an EA or Rockstar product at full price. I actually find that, despite their huge budgets, their QA tends to be atrocious by comparison to smaller companies and I hate their corporate politics. I love the fact that Illwinter is essentially two guys (and a few helpers) who love what they do and do it as best they can in their spare time. I love that Shrapnel is a small company that continues to pump out complex games in a market that's increasingly shy about them because of their lack of mass appeal. And I'm willing to pay $55 (although I paid only $48 due to their pre-order special) to go ahead and show them the love they deserve.

If you don't feel the same, that's fine. But one play of Dominions 3 has already convinced me that I'm never going back to Dominions 2 except for the occasional nostalgia play. Already, I'm convinced it's THAT much better. I wish you the best either way.

[Boron]

JaydedOne said:
If you don't feel the same, that's fine. But one play of Dominions 3 has already convinced me that I'm never going back to Dominions 2 except for the occasional nostalgia play. Already, I'm convinced it's THAT much better. I wish you the best either way.

Exactly .

When i still played Dom2 blitzes i always thought if my companions already had Dom3 this would be even more fun.
Fortunately this is now over almost and in a week i hope everybody has their copy of Dom3

[Endoperez]

JaydedOne said:
I'm still trying to figure out what "less" is actually supposed to mean here. I'm not paying "more" to begin with. $54.95 is about standard median price between my XBox 360, computer and PS2 purchases. So I'm paying about average.

I think he refers to the other games in general, not to Dominions II. "More for less", or "more money for something that won't be as polished and bug-free and won't get its bugs squashed as quickly as a bigger company could make it happen".

"More" isn't about the starting price, but the price you can eventually buy the game at. I don't have any consoles, but I've understood that it's standard market practise for everything to considerably drop in price as time goes by, from consoles to games to accessories.
"Less" isn't about the improvements from DomII in this case, as far as I've understood Talleyrand's intent.

However, as other posters have noted:
1) Shrapnel Games does very good work in customer service, even though (or because?) they are a small company.
2) Dominions II was enjoyable for a long time, and Dominions 3 will probably be the same. The series beats many competitors in this amount, but as I haven't actually played many strategy games besides Dominions, I can't comment on that.

The manual is a hefty issue. I actually predicted this earlier in this thread. The manual lists summons, items and spells, and I understand it does this much better than Dominions II manual did. I understand it also offers simple strategies and playing hints and goes into more detaile when explaining the mechanics; could anyone who actually has the paper manual comment on this?
The game can be hard to get into. The manual makes it easier to get into the game, making more people who buy the game able to enjoy it. Perhaps it's better this way than if the game was sold without the manual, and people were left confused?



BigJMoney is right. The only troll in here is in Leif's avatar. I enjoy this discussion, even though there are too few people arguing against Shrapnel's policy to make this really enjoyable debate.

[JPSeraph]

I still remember dishing out $80 for Dungeon Master on SNES and loving that game to death. So $55 doesn't seem like too much for a game - the first game in years - that really evokes that same sense of discovery and recaptures the joy of those early gaming experiences.

Most everything since the early days has been streamlined interfaces, pretty graphics, crap gameplay, and no actual improvement on the great ideas that were floating around not so long ago and seem all but lost in today's Hollywoodesque gaming market.

And then I stumbled upon Dominions a couple of months ago. $55 is nothing, and as so many have said, it's probably Shrapnel's optimal selling price.

I wouldn't pay $5 for Disciples 2 on Amazon, but I gladly paid $35 for Dominions 2 even knowing that Dominions 3 was just around the corner. That's value.

[DominionsFan]

JPSeraph said:

I wouldn't pay $5 for Disciples 2 on Amazon, but I gladly paid $35 for Dominions 2 even knowing that Dominions 3 was just around the corner. That's value.

Yep. Since Doms 3. is an unique game on the strategy market, I don't see any problems with the high price of the game.
Not to mention that I can tell you the same like JPSeraph.
I wouldn't pay 5 euros for NHL 07 for example, but I would glady pay 100$ for Dominions 3.

[Taqwus]

You're also paying to support developers and a publisher who don't simply release a couple of perfunctory patches before releasing a somewhat-debugged and slightly-expanded version as a $$$ sequel or expansion just months later... followed by a $$$ 'Gold Edition'... and who actually take into account user feedback.

If you look at EU, for instance, what was the length of the gap between EU and EU II? And did the publisher and developer show any inclination whatsoever to deal with major issues such as the AI's tendency to fixate on particular provinces, its blatant cheating with respect to (complete immunity to) fleet attrition, or so forth?

If you take developer responsiveness into account, you'll often find better value with, say, Illwinter, Malfador Machinations, Battlefront, HPS Simulations...

[TheBigBlueBox]

I think the previous posters in this thread explained it pretty well, but I'll sum up why it's okay for dominions 3 to be $55.

First of all, it's the niche market that dominions caters to. D3 will only sell a few thousand copies to a select few hardcore TBS and fantasy/myth fans... there's no way illwinter/shrapnel can make any kind of profit (and therefore continue to make games) if they sell it at less then $55.

Secondly, the 300 page spiral bound printed manual costs ALOT to produce. The manual alone adds at least $10 to the price and is well worth it.

Thirdly, let's look at what the game features shall we:

Over 1500 different units...all with unique abilities and strategies for using them, 600+ spells.. and not just a bunch of spells that are just the same spell with varying power, but unique spells with unique effects and unique descriptions.... FIFTY unique nations to play as with wildly differing strategies... add to that all the choices you have in a single turn, multiplayer support, modability, improved AI (which is a feat for this level of detail), and oh yeah, a 300 page manual...

Now tell me this game isn't worth $55 to a fan of this type of game...

[BigJMoney]

A couple things:

1) I agreee with Morkilus the wise, sitcky this!

2) The OPer is not trolling. Let's not start a witch-hunt here. The person has every right to not only speak his mind politely, but also pose a difficult question.

3) "More for less" has been adequately explained. He means more as in the price compared to Dom 2, and less meaning lower production values than larger development schemes.

@Talley
Everything you have brought up has already been addressed eloquently by people with very piquant points. You are priced out, and that's all there is to it. You will overcome your perceived dillema with the game's price or you won't.

**Tries to use hypnosis -- "You will get over your dillema..."**

Shrapnel's current goal is to run a business. Maybe the business owner(s) possess the utlimate goal of helping good games reach people, or maybe not. Trying to find their proper place in the market is probably a good way to achieve a goal like that though, even if many are priced out. Don't be convinced by convention that they are making a bad decision here, when it could very well be the best one to reach their goals. Then again, maybe not. Maybe they are shooting themselves in the foot. We'll probably know for sure in five years.

=$=