Price Increase a Month Before Launch?
gamer1000k
Join Date: 2017-04-29 Member: 230121Members
Join Date: 2017-04-29 Member: 230121Members
Just noticed this Trello card:
https://trello.com/c/a6MGmKOW/286-increase-price-a-month-before-so-we-have-option-to-launch-v10-with-a-discount
With all the drama around ARK increasing to full price while still in EA, I'm a little concerned with the title of this card and the reference to EU price manipulation laws. I'm sure the devs are well aware of what's been going on with ARK and aren't intending to pull anything like what Wildcard did, but would a dev be able to weigh in and clarify what this ticket actually means?
https://trello.com/c/a6MGmKOW/286-increase-price-a-month-before-so-we-have-option-to-launch-v10-with-a-discount
With all the drama around ARK increasing to full price while still in EA, I'm a little concerned with the title of this card and the reference to EU price manipulation laws. I'm sure the devs are well aware of what's been going on with ARK and aren't intending to pull anything like what Wildcard did, but would a dev be able to weigh in and clarify what this ticket actually means?
Comments
Agreed!
Because if you simply the gaming industry it's just a bunch of people making money.
The reason ARK's was a scandal is that it arbitrarily changed from one day to the next with no warning and the price doubled - which flies in the face of what happens when companies normally raise the price - it's a similar reason as to why Bethesda got a lot of flak for arbitrarily raising the price of the season pass for Fallout 4. Early access games being cheap than getting more expensive at launch was a standard set by Minecraft that dozens of early access games have followed.
I believe that that particular thought, is prevalent throughout the Entire World as a basic tenet of what is called a
Profitable Business Venture.
And, if memory serves, it is pretty much standard practice for the price to increase on release, at least on Steam.
You guys deserve a little more money
So like all industrys?
Thanks for the clarification. I know that all games coming out of EA have a price increase at launch, the part I was a little confused about was the month before release thing (which still hasn't really been answered). Hopefully we'll get some more details about that soon.
I would love to see many DLC expansions to it..
My wallet is open.take my money!!
Just give me more Subnautica!!
Oh God no. Development studios are being shut down left and right and being sold to EA or Ubisoft, who are shutting down studios left and right. It's a tough industry.
New talent was brought in for Subnautica and it costs more. From what I gather, the game was never intended to even be at this scope, but a successful early access allowed for more development resources. We did that by supporting the game and development. At the end of the day, it's expected to cost more after being developed. Early adopters that provided resources to support development are rewarded through early access prices and getting to follow the development progress.
The game on release is not the same product as early access. I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like it should be expected to go up in price for a finished product.
Edit: Beyond that, there's a lot of risk with early adopters. You won't get your money back if the game moves in a direction to where you wouldn't have bought the full release due to changes.
already bought it as a game preview on xbox basically me owning the license to that copy even if they hike up the prices. with the current state even on xbox with the abysmal behind on 3 updates still worth buying at this point only differences its that much closer to being up to speed...
Careful, there. You make the flawed assumption that a higher price per copy will result in more money overall for UWE. Any price increase comes with the very real possibility that the company will actually earn less money because the sales will drop too much from it.
I'm not really for or against a small increase to this game. I don't think I would have bought it for more than $20, though. Despite how fun and unique the gameplay is, it has quite a few drawbacks. The map is almost depressingly small for an ocean exploration game, for instance.
Agreed, Subnautica is a fun survival game, but it definitely has its issues, especially with limited replayability (no multiplayer, tiny map, no world randomization outside of a few loot/fragment locations). Not to mention most games in this genre are competing with Minecraft (especially this one with the E10 target rating) which sets a price expectation around $20 by itself. I'm all for the devs getting their fair compensation for their work on this game, but there's a good chance they'll sell a lot more copies and make more money overall at around $20 than they would at a higher price point (unless they put the game on sale all the time so the effective price ends up being $20 anyways).
Every game has its flaws.
I think the community of Subnautica players would still pay a couple of dollars more for the game. Yes, if it was too much more than players would complain it's overpriced but the current/future pricing is justified in my opinion.
Me: I'm going to buy this, because it seems like a fun, open world, survival sandbox.
UWE: We're going to remove all the sandbox features, do nothing to expand the open world, cut all the most interesting biomes and creatures planned, make survival trivial with super powerful plants that give you food and water forever, but wait, you won't be having fun with that freedom from survival needs because the map is covered in enemies that relentlessly pursue you and you are given few or no ways to kill them, the cyclops is now a tin can, oh, and remember those OP fruits? Well they spoil in five seconds so we basically just massively discouraged you from leaving your base. Hey though, we added the most unoriginal storyline ever, filled with lame tropes! So have fun with that.
/saltyAF
While I agree with all of those points (hopefully at least some of them will be addressed prior to launch once they actually get around to doing a proper balance pass), I'm just glad we're ultimately going to get a decent game out of this (unless the devs manage to totally break everything in the next few months). Still, it does feel like an overpromise/underdeliver situation with the current version of the game relative to the early concepts and design plans before they had to start cutting a bunch of things just to be able to finish the game.
I'm sure this happens more often than not in game development, we just see a lot more of the process in early access, and especially with Subnautica since they make so much development info public. With AAA games, they don't even announce the game until they're close to being done and are (usually) already past the cutting stage so we don't see what awesome features were in the original game concept that didn't make it into the game.
That's a smart move for them cuz by doing it they can launch 1.0 with a discount so even after the launch 1.0 you won't pay the full price I always knew subnautica devs are nice
From a business perspective that might be smart, but IMHO it's still a bit dishonest to price a product high and then put it perpetually on sale to make it look like a better deal. A lot of game publishers do it though. They'll charge $20 for a $10 game and then have it on a 50% sale most of the time to make people think they're getting a steal on the game.
From everything I've seen about Subnautica I don't see the devs doing anything like this (I would assume this is a limited time sale to generate more sales at launch given the popularity of this game), but this is a common marketing practice to be aware of.
You cant really judge a game from its early stages. Most if not all games change from the first playable version to the final product.
Most of the issuses in your post will be covered before release (the plants rotting in 5 minutes) so we can all sleep in peace for now
Your post disturbs me somewhat.
Those "lame tropes" were what drove me away, months ago. The whole Precursor "plot" and the addition of a ridiculous big gun was simply too cringeworthy for me to handle.
However, I'm still looking forward to playing 1.0 and seeing what's changed since I played, it can't be all bad. What's this about sandbox features being removed and biomes cut?
Relentless enemies pleases me though, as one of my main complaints was the fauna being way too easy to deal with. But it has to be implemented correctly. Perhaps someone would be kind enough to give me a brief run down of major recent developments?
Just tell me the Seamoth hasn't been messed with, and I'll be 75% pleased.
Yeah, Seamoth still gets air, still goes down to 900m fully upgraded. EDF still works, as to torps, you should be golden for at least 75% pleasure to pain ratio.
Now, kids, the lesson we all need to take home today is this:
You can't please everyone.
And the second is like unto it:
Especially gamers.
**Steam Summer sale :Subnautica at 74.97$**
OMG GOTTA BUY IT !
#WHATADEAL
Hey i paid my copy 10$ on a 50% steam sale about 2 years ago, about 1100 hours later im pretty sure i got my money's worth out of it and its still in Early Access stage