So apparently now Borderlands 3 pre-orders have been deactivated due to the Epic Store sale.
This feels incompetent. Did they not clear this stuff with the developers beforehand? Also, why did Vampire need to remove their entire game from the store instead of just not participating in the sale?
Also, further evidence that a higher profit margin doesn't mean games will be any cheaper and Metro was the anomaly.
Epic probably didn't code the opt out from sale mechanism
It's so weird how Crosscode emulates the feeling of playing an MMO despite being a singleplayer game, even on a meta level with its content updates. Like, the arena mode update comes with new gear an cosmetics attached to a new activity that gives you the currency you need to get them. It feels like doing the new endgame of the latest expansion in microcosm.
So apparently now Borderlands 3 pre-orders have been deactivated due to the Epic Store sale.
This feels incompetent. Did they not clear this stuff with the developers beforehand? Also, why did Vampire need to remove their entire game from the store instead of just not participating in the sale?
Also, further evidence that a higher profit margin doesn't mean games will be any cheaper and Metro was the anomaly.
Epic probably didn't code the opt out from sale mechanism
Apparently the way they worked it, Epic footed the discount out of their cut so the developer cut wasn't changed. Might have just figured devs would enjoy the sales bump and not complain since it didn't cut into their per-unit revenue.
Eurogamer had one dev comment about why they'd pulled their game for the duration of the sale - their game was in pre-order, as were several other games (not to mention some brand new releases). Most of the pulled stuff was either in that category, or from the same dev/publisher as something that was and they pulled their whole catalog or a lot of it.
There's a strategy to discounts that goes past the per-unit cut. You launch full price, and when sales start to dry up you use a first-discount sale to bump them, catching people who were on the fence at first. If you do that too early, you can devalue the game, giving the fence sitters the perception that the sale price is the "right" price, so once they make the decision they're liable to wait for an even bigger sale down the road, while you cut a deal to a chunk of people who would have paid full price.
So even if they're getting the same cut at their end, their logic is that now they'll need to cut deeper to get the full effect of the first-discount bump.
This stuff is way outside my wheelhouse, I know just enough about marketing stuff to know that some of it works and some of it doesn't and when it comes down to it the economy just kind of stumbles around throwing shit at the walls, but it's still a strategy that companies believe in and are committed to, so I certainly understand some outrage in having a vendor interfere with that strategy even if it doesn't do anything to their immediate returns.
This was basically a dev abusing his reputation as a sim developer to sell manuals to flight sim or fighter enthusiasts outside the US and make money on the side.
That said, Eagle Dynamics does put a lot of effort in making their sims as authentic as they can given unclassified information. They actually have a partnership with Boeing for their F/A-18 module, to the point that Boeing send them the actual audio files used for the Hornet's Bitching Betty.
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
I guess I just assumed a higher degree of competency when they said they hired the Steam Spy guy.
Either the dark magicks of Steam yet require more blood sacrifices or Epic is doing like most which is doing the bare minimum to be profitable.
-Loki-Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining.Registered Userregular
I watched the noclip Half Life 2 documentary, and it was really good for not having anyone from valve actually contribute. Saw that there's a team actually making episode 3 from that blog the ex-dev made? That's cool. Then saw that Black Mesa is actually nearing completion with Xen looking to be done soon(ish)?
Time to reinstall Half Life. Haven't played Half Life 2 for... over ten years. Holy crap. Also someone did a nice graphics update. Might buy Black Mesa now, I held off because I never expected it to actually finish.
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Zavianuniversal peace sounds better than forever warRegistered Userregular
Speaking of Half Life 2, Digital Foundry just did a pretty interesting ray tracing mod video on it: https://youtu.be/6O9mik6LESQ
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
I guess I just assumed a higher degree of competency when they said they hired the Steam Spy guy.
Either the dark magicks of Steam yet require more blood sacrifices or Epic is doing like most which is doing the bare minimum to be profitable.
I dunno, if the selected tweets that Era keeps posting from him are any indication, he may be one of the ones driving the crazy train
I watched the noclip Half Life 2 documentary, and it was really good for not having anyone from valve actually contribute. Saw that there's a team actually making episode 3 from that blog the ex-dev made? That's cool. Then saw that Black Mesa is actually nearing completion with Xen looking to be done soon(ish)?
Time to reinstall Half Life. Haven't played Half Life 2 for... over ten years. Holy crap. Also someone did a nice graphics update. Might buy Black Mesa now, I held off because I never expected it to actually finish.
If you don't mind using mods, here's one you should consider. I tried it recently and the gunplay feels so good, I couldn't stop myself from playing.
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
...are we implying Valve are good at this? Because Valve are really not good at this. They just benefit from having been the first to achieve critical mass, but they've historically been nearly as incompetent about Steam as Epic about their storefront.
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
...are we implying Valve are good at this? Because Valve are really not good at this. They just benefit from having been the first to achieve critical mass, but they've historically been nearly as incompetent about Steam as Epic about their storefront.
There’s something to be gained by observing someone’s failures.
Epic seems to not be gaining anything. Valve didn’t have anyone to observe in the first place.
I think we went over this about 3 months ago. All Epic had to do was fix what Valve wouldn't and everyone would love them. And yet, Epic doesn't even have a Cart. Flesh out your platform (and stop with the exclusivity bullshit) and the customers will come.
Instead, they hire the Steam Spy guy, who - surprise! - doesn't know how to build a Store. He only knows how to harvest and manage data.
Mugsley on
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anoffdayTo be changed whenever Anoffday gets around to it.Registered Userregular
I watched the noclip Half Life 2 documentary, and it was really good for not having anyone from valve actually contribute. Saw that there's a team actually making episode 3 from that blog the ex-dev made? That's cool. Then saw that Black Mesa is actually nearing completion with Xen looking to be done soon(ish)?
Time to reinstall Half Life. Haven't played Half Life 2 for... over ten years. Holy crap. Also someone did a nice graphics update. Might buy Black Mesa now, I held off because I never expected it to actually finish.
That damn black mesa.
Steam: offday
+1
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FiggyFighter of the night manChampion of the sunRegistered Userregular
The problem publishers have with the Epic sale is a price integrity issue.
It's why wagjag/groupon/etc is so bad for most businesses. They convince the business that by offering a deep discount on their product/service, they can get truckloads of sales for them. And they can. So there's exposure, brand awareness, and a cash influx where there otherwise wouldn't be. Even if the deep discount completely obliterated your margin, the pitch is that you've gained all these new customers.
The underlying, fundamental problem with this strategy is that you've just told all those new customers your product/service is worth what they just paid for it. So when that customer comes back again, and your price is suddenly double, they don't see the value.
There are some exceptions, and there are a lot of consumer behaviour concepts that play into it too (you generally want a customer to see value before price) but all around, it's very short-sighted, devalues your brand, and you're left where you started with a bunch of sales that were below cost or close to it.
For Epic, they're in a growth stage and don't GAF about margins right now. They have that Fortnite money to just dump into the store to make it attractive to developers, and then they subsidize deep discounts to get traffic to their store. But again, this is bad for both customers and developers.
You're telling the customers these games are really worth x when they developers set the price at y. Next time you release a game, the chances those customers pre-order at the regular price is lower. They'll wait for a sale.
FiggyFighter of the night manChampion of the sunRegistered Userregular
Also, is noone who has bought games on Epic concerned that if it finally flops, their games are all gone?
Same risk as any digital service, but Epic is making some bad decisions, and their business model is disliked by a signficant chunk of the market. And as a developer? I would not want to part of this shit if I made my game exclusive on Epic and then suddenly down it went.. good luck earning consumer confidence again.
Posts
Epic probably didn't code the opt out from sale mechanism
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Ceiling Cat, I should know better than to mention things when people like @Pixelated Pixie are stalking about. Thanks for Talisman: Origins!
I can has cheezburger, yes?
All according to plan.
Uh....huh.
New respect for those games
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Steam ID: Good Life
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
To be fair, the ubi games were pulled before the sale
Gonna need to play a lot of life affirming Mario Oddssey to perk myself back up after this.
Apparently the way they worked it, Epic footed the discount out of their cut so the developer cut wasn't changed. Might have just figured devs would enjoy the sales bump and not complain since it didn't cut into their per-unit revenue.
Eurogamer had one dev comment about why they'd pulled their game for the duration of the sale - their game was in pre-order, as were several other games (not to mention some brand new releases). Most of the pulled stuff was either in that category, or from the same dev/publisher as something that was and they pulled their whole catalog or a lot of it.
There's a strategy to discounts that goes past the per-unit cut. You launch full price, and when sales start to dry up you use a first-discount sale to bump them, catching people who were on the fence at first. If you do that too early, you can devalue the game, giving the fence sitters the perception that the sale price is the "right" price, so once they make the decision they're liable to wait for an even bigger sale down the road, while you cut a deal to a chunk of people who would have paid full price.
So even if they're getting the same cut at their end, their logic is that now they'll need to cut deeper to get the full effect of the first-discount bump.
This stuff is way outside my wheelhouse, I know just enough about marketing stuff to know that some of it works and some of it doesn't and when it comes down to it the economy just kind of stumbles around throwing shit at the walls, but it's still a strategy that companies believe in and are committed to, so I certainly understand some outrage in having a vendor interfere with that strategy even if it doesn't do anything to their immediate returns.
This was basically a dev abusing his reputation as a sim developer to sell manuals to flight sim or fighter enthusiasts outside the US and make money on the side.
That said, Eagle Dynamics does put a lot of effort in making their sims as authentic as they can given unclassified information. They actually have a partnership with Boeing for their F/A-18 module, to the point that Boeing send them the actual audio files used for the Hornet's Bitching Betty.
This just keeps getting better and better.
I liked the concept of lisa. But yeah the way the story works was like the one single case where I just can’t bring myself to go through that.
How are they so bad at this?
Needs to be a skyrim mod.
Dragon priests are proletariat champions
About to crush the nords, one castle left.
I have asked for a city i conquered so that I may lead our expansion east, into the deserts.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Money can do a lot of things, but it can't buy class experience, especially like Steam's. Steam may not moneyhat titles, but they sure as fuck know what they're doing store-wise.
I can has cheezburger, yes?
Epic fail.
I guess I just assumed a higher degree of competency when they said they hired the Steam Spy guy.
Either the dark magicks of Steam yet require more blood sacrifices or Epic is doing like most which is doing the bare minimum to be profitable.
Time to reinstall Half Life. Haven't played Half Life 2 for... over ten years. Holy crap. Also someone did a nice graphics update. Might buy Black Mesa now, I held off because I never expected it to actually finish.
I dunno, if the selected tweets that Era keeps posting from him are any indication, he may be one of the ones driving the crazy train
If you don't mind using mods, here's one you should consider. I tried it recently and the gunplay feels so good, I couldn't stop myself from playing.
Also someone made a lighting update and it works with the mod from above. It doesn't change much, except for Ravenholm which looks glorious.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/290930/HalfLife_2_Update/
The game is pretty fun, which is good, because everything around it, from the ultra-minimal dialogue to the aesthetic is... not my cup of tea.
...are we implying Valve are good at this? Because Valve are really not good at this. They just benefit from having been the first to achieve critical mass, but they've historically been nearly as incompetent about Steam as Epic about their storefront.
There’s something to be gained by observing someone’s failures.
Epic seems to not be gaining anything. Valve didn’t have anyone to observe in the first place.
Instead, they hire the Steam Spy guy, who - surprise! - doesn't know how to build a Store. He only knows how to harvest and manage data.
That damn black mesa.
It's why wagjag/groupon/etc is so bad for most businesses. They convince the business that by offering a deep discount on their product/service, they can get truckloads of sales for them. And they can. So there's exposure, brand awareness, and a cash influx where there otherwise wouldn't be. Even if the deep discount completely obliterated your margin, the pitch is that you've gained all these new customers.
The underlying, fundamental problem with this strategy is that you've just told all those new customers your product/service is worth what they just paid for it. So when that customer comes back again, and your price is suddenly double, they don't see the value.
There are some exceptions, and there are a lot of consumer behaviour concepts that play into it too (you generally want a customer to see value before price) but all around, it's very short-sighted, devalues your brand, and you're left where you started with a bunch of sales that were below cost or close to it.
For Epic, they're in a growth stage and don't GAF about margins right now. They have that Fortnite money to just dump into the store to make it attractive to developers, and then they subsidize deep discounts to get traffic to their store. But again, this is bad for both customers and developers.
You're telling the customers these games are really worth x when they developers set the price at y. Next time you release a game, the chances those customers pre-order at the regular price is lower. They'll wait for a sale.
Same risk as any digital service, but Epic is making some bad decisions, and their business model is disliked by a signficant chunk of the market. And as a developer? I would not want to part of this shit if I made my game exclusive on Epic and then suddenly down it went.. good luck earning consumer confidence again.
My Backloggery
Edit* seems to have fixed itself ... silly drunk steam
Steam | XBL
It's always Tuesday in steam chat