$60 for a digital download? Really?

[GIGN]

The epic fail in this thread is bewildering.

 

"Durrr you're paying for the same product as in the shops!"

 

No, really? Yeah, except the final cost of the physical product is supposed to reflect a ton of extras such as producing the physical copies and, just as importantly, shipping. Digital delivery has its own costs (Valve takes a portion of the profits), but it's much lower than the traditional method and comes with its own unique benefits. Anyone capable of basic reasoning should be able to deduce that the final price should be lower if the costs to take it to market are lower as well.

 

But instead of making digital delivery a cheaper option for gamers, publishers have decided to use it as a way of making extra profits over hard copies. Obviously -- if you didn't see this coming, then you have no idea how ruthless business is. Companies only care about customers if there's a way to make more money out of them. While people keep buying at this price, they'll continue pushing.

 

There's your answer without all the fanboy sugarcoating and excuses.

Edited February 9, 2012 by GIGN

[PsxMeUP]

Kinda like hard disk prices. The flooding problems in Asia that caused stock shortages, which caused higher HDD prices, are resolved and prices can do down, but they are keeping them high cause people are still buying despite the higher prices.

[TheFourthHorse]

Yea real classy man :rolleyes:

[babis8142]

I bought Skyrim 20 euro cheaper than steam. 17 actually Edited February 9, 2012 by babis8142

[thesapien]

Kinda like hard disk prices. The flooding problems in Asia that caused stock shortages, which caused higher HDD prices, are resolved and prices can do down, but they are keeping them high cause people are still buying despite the higher prices.

 

Whatever you're thinking, that's not how price discovery is supposed to work. Instead, it's more along the lines of supply and demand curves. Price is not determined by just taking the costs and adding an arbitrary percentage for profit. In order to maximize profit, prices ought to be where supply and demand curves meet.

 

What really happened was that the shortage revealed a higher demand than expected, thus the correct supply side response to raise prices. Notice they didn't raise them super high like say 10x because that would actually lessen profits because so many fewer people would buy. Similarly, lowering prices again would mean less profit and would also lead to another shortage.

 

Edit/PS: My key point was the last one, that is; a return to the lower prices would cause another shortage and just doesn't make sense in a market/economy.

Edited February 9, 2012 by thesapien

[TheFourthHorse]

Kinda like hard disk prices. The flooding problems in Asia that caused stock shortages, which caused higher HDD prices, are resolved and prices can do down, but they are keeping them high cause people are still buying despite the higher prices.

 

Whatever you're thinking, that's not how price discovery is supposed to work. Instead, it's more along the lines of supply and demand curves. Price is not determined by just taking the costs and adding an arbitrary percentage for profit. In order to maximize profit, prices ought to be where supply and demand curves meet.

 

What really happened was that the shortage revealed a higher demand than expected, thus the correct supply side response to raise prices. Notice they didn't raise them super high like say 10x because that would actually lessen profits because so many fewer people would buy. Similarly, lowering prices again would mean less profit and would also lead to another shortage.

 

Edit/PS: My key point was the last one, that is; a return to the lower prices would cause another shortage and just doesn't make sense in a market/economy.

 

Interesting point, I hadn’t thought of that.

 

I always saw it as a self correcting system to be honest. Some products may climb the ladder in relative cost faster than others and of course there’s the ever present inflation factor but supply and demand is a pretty simple system when it comes to luxury or semi-luxury items.

 

If it’s too high they won’t sell and they will have to bring the price down or down size and (as you pointed out) if it’s too low product will move too quickly to meet demand. Even when it comes down to digital downloads (while there isn’t any physical value) the product represents an investment in production. If the industry invests and designs games with 60 dollars as the norm… then that’s what they need to sell it at.

 

I can understand maybe lowering the price with the (low) cost of dvds and packaging in mind but what the OP expects is pretty crazy imo. If he thinks $40 is a bad price for a new game… I don’t know man :unsure:

Edited February 9, 2012 by TheFourthHorse

[Thepal]

As everyone else has said, you're paying for the game. The actual box and disk that a physical Skyrim copy comes with would cost the company less than $5. This is a huge game, that cost a *lot* of money. It's the development costs that we're paying for, not the cost of getting it to us (plus the extra to make creating a game worthwhile for Bethesda)

[x2ruff4u]

60 + tax in store is 63.6 here in FL + gas to get there = 10 + your time. You pay about 73.60$ :ohdear: vs 60$

[Thasic]

If you can't afford the price tag don't buy the game. geez, what's the big deal? If you want to save a little money, wait for a sale. I did. I got the game for $30. If you want to save a lot of money, wait until all the DLCs are out and the GOTY edition comes along and get the whole thing for 20 bucks. Fallout 3 GOTY is selling for $20 right now on Steam, not on sale. Considering that includes all the DLCs you're saving like $140. Well worth the price tag.

[Axisdeath]

Skyrim has been in the works, even fi not announced then, since 2007. That's 5 years of work into one freaking amazing game that's worth every cent. Dude, id be s***ing cash for this game, good thing i got it for my birthday, right? Haha.