[PATV] Monday, August 1, 2011 - Extra Credits Season 1, Ep. 10: Project Ten Dollar

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[PATV] Monday, August 1, 2011 - Extra Credits Season 1, Ep. 10: Project Ten Dollar

This week, we look at EA's "Project Ten Dollar" and suggest some alternatives.

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brunoais

I wanted to hear the rest.
Nice joke for the end, though . Great job!

garyscary

Seems like a pretty good idea though I have one question. Haven't games mostly been in this dollar range brand new or is it just due to raising costs of making games?

betrayerkol

"the problem is..." no. That's not a problem. If I buy a used shirt at goodwill, it's not a problem that GAP doesn't get a cut. No other business wants a cut of used good sales, it's absurd that people treat it as a reasonable request for game companies to do so.

Fnoros

Or maybe they should make games worth keeping... they have already made their profits from the used games. they don't deserve any more.

MisterGunpowder

Betrayerkol, the issue with your scenario there is that the shirt from GAP didn't cost 30 million dollars to design, and that shirts aren't at all expensive to produce. Movies are the only other medium that have that kind of budget, and the studios behind them aren't demanding the same thing video game publishers are about buying used DVDs. Why? Because most of the revenue a movie makes comes from theaters. Video games don't have the luxury of a theater-like experience, and the revenue generated from them comes from direct purchase of copies of the game. That is the reason why the games industry is taking issue with used game sale; video games are the only medium where generating sufficient revenue to return the cost of making them almost completely relies on direct purchases. The standpoint of the publishers is completely reasonable, and, even if everything I just typed fails to affect you, let me put it this way: If that one-million mark is not reached several times (read: games) in a row, (which is entirely possible,) then the video game publishing company involved may have to shut down the particular developer studio for those games. As an example, imagine if that happened with a developer like Irrational Games. The make several games, all of which fail to hit the 1,000,000 copies sold mark. 2K, which has lost a substantial sum of money due to this, must then close down Irrational Games in order to save money. This means that the developers behind BioShock and System Shock 2 would lose their jobs, and probably split apart. I don't think anyone wants that.

Mogg

As games are now, they've become more one use only thus we will see less used games on the shelves. Some released games are actually now less than $60 which is great, I am not fond of having to fork over a weeks worth of food money for a single game I play once. It also means I feel so bad if I end up with a really bad game if I paid under $20 for it (which rarely happens now because I do a lot of research into games before buying it -money is not a luxury to squander, in this household).

AnonTheMouse

Personally, I don't have any problems with companies offering an incentive to buy new. It's good business. In fact, it's exactly the sort of thing that they should be doing. In fact, given that in general companies pay for the servers, I wouldn't even be upset if multiplayer was something you had to unlock for used copies...after all, why let people use their servers who haven't payed for them? You wouldn't expect to be let into a health club because you bought one of their used spa robes, would you? No, my problem comes when companies start charging the people who bough the game new for that disk locked content. That's really all there is to say about that.

mr.tanen

i'm with AnonTheMouse here...expecting to be able to play multiplayer when you didn't even buy the game from the developers doesn't sound very reasonable, making it a dlc or sth does
expecting to be able to charge for something you've already been charged for already, doesn't!
developers should really understand that this short-termed practice will hurt them in the long-run, big time, because that way they draw a line between developers and consumers and make our interests opposed to theirs, and that is not a win-win situation

littlefaith

If a retailer makes money doing used game sales, why should they be demonized for it? They are providing an important service to the gaming community. I don't mind developers putting in something extra for people who buy their stuff new. I don't mind developers charging for server use. I don't even mind developers charging for future upgrades, because it takes them time and resources.