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Pre-order game bonuses = out of hand lately!?
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by
on 2011-09-29 00:36:53 (edited 2011-09-29 03:10:51)
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Okay, so basically our society today is in a recession although sometimes it doesn't seem that bad. Sike~ (Psyche) It's nothing like that first recession during/after the war or whatever... [insert history dialog here] Now, lately, gaming companies (EA, Activision, etc.) are coming out with what's become so common it seems when pre-ordering games, pre-order "bonuses". Now if you don't know what they are they're basically content "which is already available in the game", but you have to pay more money to obtain them all. Ridiculous, right?! Not only that, you'd think "oh wait I have to buy "x" game from Gamestop, Amazon, and BestBuy" just to get this?" You'd then be paying 60$x3 when honestly there's no need for that. Now I highly doubt people are that impatient when it comes to those pre-order content, let alone idiotic and financially unstable, people are definitely impatient when they know the pre-order content will come as DLC (something that is also common these days). Games are already insanely expensive enough. 60$ for a "new" game? Wtf is this? I'm not sure when the price from what, 50$ it seems just a few years ago for a new game, rose. Also, it has to be "every" new game, including dumb movie games (which in fact are horrible majority of the time). For a great example, the new ICO/SOTC HD Remake Collection is only 40$, since release, no pre-order bonsuses, remade classics from PS2 to HD to PS3, and not only that they're 2 games which easily could've been 120$ together!! This is what I think is a true release, regardless of it being a remake from PS2. The simplest explanation of why we have all these countless pre-order bonuses, is because these companies want to make money! Simple! It is a pretty genius idea, but it also irritates the people that want to buy what you're releasing!! WE, THE CONSUMERS!! It's dumb having to go to three different sites to get pre-order content, whether or not that's a big deal for you or not, but to lately pay money for a "code" to unlock content which is already on the game? Is that not dumb to you guys? And not only that the then turned "DLC" doesn't even come out for a few months depending on some games, making you wait longer... Why do we not get 100% of what we're paying 100% of money for? I don't understand this. I've dealt with pre-order bonuses before but they're usually not that bad. Say with shooting games they're just early access to guns and whatnot which are unlocked later in the game, stuff like that is fine. With others it's like you only get "A" here, "B" there, and "C" later as DLC. Certain DLC now are just extra content for gamers to have a new experience to games (e.g. map packs). Those things are at least "new" and originally was not going to be included in the original game. But pre-order bonuses turned DLC are just dumb cause you're nearly paying half as much as the original game inself, for content which you had to wait for months to obtain when it was already on the disc! Also it's not uncommon that when people buy these DLC packs (codes/passwords) that the code is incorrect, than there's another issue... Overall what I'm saying is that it's ridiculous, right? Anyone else have any opinions on this?? 
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Re: Pre-order game bonuses = out of hand lately!?
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by angel_of_stone
on 2011-10-24 08:25:44 (edited 2011-10-24 08:25:58)
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The simplest explanation of why we have all these countless pre-order bonuses, is because these companies want to make money! Well... they are businesses and businesses need to make money... Naw, I totally get what you are saying. If you are the type that will buy games as soon as they are released then there is no reason not to pre-order. But if you are like me and buy games after they drop a few bucks, the pre-order bonus is rarely incentive to buy them earlier. For example, the bonus for Two Worlds 2 was a few codes to get high powered weapons and armour, but you still couldn't use them until you were a high level. Whereas I believe the bonus for BF3 (on steam, at least) is that you get the first expansion free. That seems like a much better bonus since BF3 won't drop in price for months and the expansions are usually $10 - $15. In general, though, the bonuses are lame things like a short comic book, or a poster, or something that is already available in the game. The problem game companies have is that they don't get any money from pre-played game sales, or game rentals. So they have to get as much money out of the launch as possible. Or, if you look at PSP, they don't even make money on games anymore. They make $40 off of the first guy that buys a PSP game, then everyone else gets a pirated copy from that guy. That is actually the reason that Valkyria Chronicles 3 didn't get a North American or European release, too much piracy to make any profit. I'm getting side tracked here... Anyway, I agree with you that companies are being money-grubbers, but if they don't do that then game quality and/or quantity would quickly drop off.
"But as Deepak Chopra taught us, quantum physics means that anything can happen at anytime and for no reason." -Prof. Hubert J. Farnsworth
"I don't have any opinions anymore. All I know is that no one is better than anyone else, and everyone is the best at everything." -Seymour Skinner "...if I got trapped by an evil wizard then I did enough cool s**t in my life to be content with it ending. " -Wolf |
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Re: Pre-order game bonuses = out of hand lately!?
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Pre-order is just a advertisement thing, meaning they want to get a good figure of how much they will earn before its sold. Extra stuff is just an appealment for those who really want to buy it so they also get a gist of how big their fanbase for the product is. The fanbase is happy because they got a little extra, and the company is happy because it got some useful information. And generally after its launch date, sales aren't going up by much. Its not dumb, its smart. The only thing I have a problem with is their customer support. Check out reddit and /v/ about their origin complaints. Some guy ended up paying twice for battlefield 3 and it still doesn't work. Guy has receits and money transfers on screen, customer support says "We'll look into it. Have a nice day". The only game where customer support is awsome that I know is LoL. Price went up because demand is up. People are willing to pay $60 for it, and apparently they are making more money. Just keep it at $60. Well, poorfags like me just pirate it. Oh, and you can thank FED for being stupid and printing more money, making the buying power less. DLC is bad. I really don't like how I paid $60 for the game and now have to pay another $15 PER new map. Its great from a business point of view, but I think its far too expensive. $2-3 is reasonable. tl;dr, screw big companies like EA, they don't care about you. Support small companies that actually give a damn.
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Re: Pre-order game bonuses = out of hand lately!?
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by
on 2011-11-13 03:59:47 |
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they're definitely getting outta hand. what happened to getting extra/awesome items upon completion of hard, long quests? you have money, you got more good stuffs. if you don't...well, go jelly. orz. hate. sure there are free ones sometimes, but that's...not really satisfying. i guess this is like, making rich guys richer. both gamers and companies, bleh. sure some of them seem useless, like costumes, but hey, it's fanservice, and...i got attracted, and want--/bricked. i suppose costumes do have some sorta value though, like a collector's thing, but the prices sometimes are ridiculous. *sighs* then again this IS a kind of special edition thing because not everyone can get it, yes again, money issues, darn it. i myself pre-order games and get some DLCs for japanese games (at least they're worth it, so far satisfying), but too much DLCs will kill me, soon. orz. it's just lucky that i don't really bother with racing games' DLC, or else i already died early. well, some games do have cough pirated cough copies and dlcs online, so meh. they'll get more than paid gamers, and the losers here, are definitely those who paid for stuffs while in online can leech just like that. orz i prefer doing hard quests than burning my money, if i can choose...  |