Way back in the Seventies when I owned a software house, I went to a few computer stores that were selling microcomputer business systems. we had pretty goo accounting software, plus tools for customizing input and output layout to match customers' current paper systems. I suggested to the computer store owners that, rather than buying individual copies of each program, they license them from us for an annual fee and then bundle the software into the price of the computer, plus a hefty upcharge for customization--which would take any competent, or semi-competent, programmer and afternoon to a full day. They did everything but pat me on the head and go "There, there, little girl, go play and let the big boys handle the business." They were convinced that bundling software into a system and then selling the system already loaded was a losing idea. Within two years, Osborne offered their first-ever portable personal computer, with software already bundled into it--DOS, WordStar, a couple other programs. Your remark about the likely reaction to telling game developers of yesteryear to give away the games and sell the 'upgrades' to make more money than selling the program reminded me of it.
Your opinion sure has changed. I remember back when you explained how niche games needed to charge more, because of their niche small group of fans. Talking about needing to get paid for your time, you can make 100 million dollars charging $3 for a game, without dlc or cosmetics. Getting paid for your time has nothing to do with what you price your game at, you price your game at what will maximize your profits. If you are trying to come up with pricing ideas by extrapolating how many hours you want every user to have to work morally pay for your game, then you are simply doing it wrong.
$20-25 is not too much for a video games because these digital intrinsically worthless games are worth anything and nothing simultaneously, but it is enough to price many people out of buying, some of these people might pirate I guess, but throwing around the accusation when they are probably more likely to just go pickup one of the amazing $1-5 dollar games is uncalled for.
Also, we are at a interesting transitional period in game sales. We have hit a progress ceiling, games from 10 years ago look and play like games from today. And a lot of 10 year old games are being sold for cents on the dollar. Why would I pay new game prices when I could go pickup the best game of 2015 that is probably on sale for $5, has 200 hours of game play, and 5 years of modding and community support behind it? Your niche fanbase very well may have played every single similar game, but everyone else has a huge library of games they never got around to playing or are in their own niche and are uninterested.
wisnojkij, I hate pummeling again and again at your post because it feels unfair, especially since you may never see any of this. But I want to make one more point that if you ever see this you might find interesting.
"you price your game at what will maximize your profits"
The game industry itself has little interest in this approach. The way I know this is that standard prices exist. A few years ago, every new AAA PS4 title was $60. Now it is $70.
This approach is WEIRD, isn't it? I mean, this means we can't be pricing our games to maximize profit for an individual title, because if we were isn't is incredibly unlikely that EVERY game would land at $70?
In the end, I have to loop back to what I wrote at the very tippy top of the post: "Do we understand anything about pricing video games?"
That is a fair point, but I still think you may be looking at it from the wrong angle. If you believe you have a specific sized market, then I am 100% behind the idea of increasing your price or shrinking your product (but I am guessing that you probably have a artistic or moral objection to DLC). But that is what is so great about these mini products like skins, you can experiment with the prices without risking a lot.
And game pricing is complicated, that is probably why sales work so well for so much of the industry. Some games are bought because they are art, some games are bought as a form of charity to developers, some because the purchaser has some spare spending money and is looking for something to spend it on, and some because someone needs x hours of entertainment. And they can all be the same game and the same purchaser at different times. So wildly fluctuating prices can hit more of these markets than static ones, but sales can also have hugely negative effects on a business and the perceived value of its products.
But I cannot agree with this last argument. They are all priced the same for 2 reasons most likely. All AAA games have the same market, everyone. And also they do enough research to know what price people will pay for a AAA game. But you do bring up a really interesting point. Is their a world where poorly reviewed games or movies have a reduced ticket price? Do reviews just not matter, or maybe their research is so lacking that they are just randomly throwing out prices? I know some AAA games and some AAA movies sell better than others, but how if any does this effect their pricing? I don't buy either so I am not really sure.
I am coming out of this discussion feeling like I know far less than when I went in. :-)
When I was wee, Atari 2600 games has 3 price points, $20, $30, $40. More premium games (Asteroids!) got higher prices. I'm really curious why that went away. It was way easier to implement than multiple prices for movies would be.
As an additional data point, I would like to note that this "standard AAA price" only exists in American and some European markets. In my local Steam store, I can see wildly different prices for various AAA titles - from "full American price" to "something that will not drive the locals to piracy". I guess it depends a lot on how much the series/studio is known around here, and how much the publisher cares about this market.
Also, cosmetic skins and other F2P IAPs do not prove that people are ready to pay more for games - they prove SOME people are ready, which is a big difference. Whale-fishing is a completely different approach to monetizing your game, but the fact that some Arabian sheikh is willing to shell out several million dollars on IAPs in a shitty browser brawler has no bearing on a pricing for a "premium" single-player game (unless he hired you to make a game specifically for him - now THAT would be an interesting idea!).
"you price your game at what will maximize your profits" No. Because life is not an economics class. You will NEVER know what price might have maximized your profits. You guess before, and you guess after.
What you actually do is price your game at a level where, if it manages to sell an amount reasonable for the produce/niche and the market, you are able to buy food and your business doesn't explode.
People pay full price for new games rather than pennies or less for old games because you are shopping for works of art, not bricks or apples. That people with libraries of old games EVER buy new ones instead of playing the old games shows that your approach to pricing is questionable.
I have to point out that what I wrote above about picking your price applies more to smaller developers (which is the viewpoint I always write from). Big companies can afford to do more research about what price to choose. Little guys like me have to guess and we have LONG arguments about the best approach to pricing and sales. A topic which will sadly only grow more contentious in the current global economic situation.
As a game developer (programmer) I have an intrinsic reaction against exploiting this kind of cosmetics, but really it's not because it doesn't work or even that it's a bad idea, it's just that it feels cheap because of how I view myself and my work.
I spend months making games, and I'd like to think I know what I'm doing, and do it well.
That game might make money, or might not. I'd like to think that what I'm doing has some bearing on that, because it's a lot of work and I've spent a lifetime on those skills.
When someone sells a gun skin that took an artist (maybe, at a push) a few hours for $70, and makes a mint, that's depressing because very little effort made loads of money whereas a lot of effort can (quite frequently) make no money. The ultimate end of that of course is NFTs, where you can sell the shiny guns without even needing to bother making a game at all.
But it's only depressing because it highlights the lack of a connection between time/effort put in, and money got out the other end, and that was always there. Much as I understand intellectually that the customer doesn't give a toss how much effort went into making something, they only care about the end result, it still viscerally feels wrong. But that's totally a me problem, because I make games, put effort in, and want there to be a link between the two.
I think you, like me, are reflexively underestimating the importance of style, fashion, and personal expression. I've been listening to people get EXCITED about these skins. Before you judge too much, I think you should think about how much people are capable of valuing a sense of style and self-expression.
I wouldn't buy new skins either. But I totally get why people do. For many, it's not a scam. It's a key part of the experience.
(This is also why I thing blaming the phenomenon of compulsively-addicted whales is the wrong way to go. There are a few compulsive collectors, sure, but for most it only takes a couple purchases to get enough distinctiveness.)
Oh, intellectually I know the customers are right, but emotionally it's still hard to get away from I am the author, they are the audience. I outrank them.
FWIW, I've been playing your games since Exile, back when I was a broke college student and all I could afford was the huge free demos. I remember the thrill of finally being to afford to buy my first game and actually finish one. That was Avernum 3 and I've bought everything since (direct from you, as I assume you get more of the revenue that way than you do through Steam or where ever). I would totally pay $25 for Queen's Wish 2. Or $35. Not $70 though; I'd wait for a Steam sale on that one. $40 or $45 ... dunno, maybe. $50, we're definitely back in Steam sale territory.
There's your non-representative n=1 research study of the day.
I found that very interesting. I really truly have no idea how many people would pay what for my stuff.
Even if I took polls and surveys, it wouldn't help much. Most of my games sell to a big, silent mass of people out there I will never talk to or hear from, and who knows how their feelings would differ from the vocal ones?
To be honest, if it was $50 on Steam I'd blanch too, but I paid more than that to get a scroll on Kickstarter that I wasn't overly excited about, because I had the money and felt like it was an opportunity to tangibly show my support. Probably would do similar things if it was "pay what you want, $20 or more." I'm sure there's interesting psychology there.
That's got me thinking about what sort of KS add-ons I actually *would* be excited about. Maybe if you designed a fun retro game box with printed manual/hintbook? Maybe some sort of commentary videos of you going through the game and recounting interesting decisions/design choices?
What I'd really want is probably pure downside for you - you're a thoughtful grownup who studies power and its uses and has the capacity to take in other perspectives, so you're one of the vanishingly small percentage of people with whom it would be constructive to talk politics. Hard to imagine even a private message board being worth the risk of being screenshotted and blasted all over Twitter though (and this is *regardless* of what you believe, about which I'm thoroughly ignorant).
Yes, a documentary would be great. I enjoyed watching the Double Fine documentary more than the game they made. Bottom Feeder could hold a Kickstarter to see if it would be profitable 😀
In the Indy scene people are willing to pay a lot to make a change to the game for everyone which is is there own personal thing. For example several players (including myself) paid over a thousand dollars to add new customer designed taverns to the game with their own quests in the game Sryth. This something only indies can offer as the additional costs of making something noticeable are small enough that enough people can found that will pay.
I feel like there's another lesson about tiered pricing options to be gleaned somewhere here -- not just about raising prices in general, but a way to profit from letting the customer set their own price. Dunno, maybe that only works if you have a Valorant-level megahit on your hands.
You already do Deluxe Edition options (Hint book plus cheat options, I think) -- you could also put the Scrolls of Absolution from your Kickstarter tiers on Steam and the other storefronts, maybe?
Note: I'm not saying that you're wrong about raising your base prices to $25. I'm just not sure that's the lesson to learn from observing Valorant spending, which notably starts at free-to-play.
Having the base Steam price be above the $20 we Kickstarter backers paid will deliver instant smug satisfaction! (Even if we know there will inevitably be much lower sale prices)
I dunno if how deep I want to sink into the pudding of "inflation." On one hand, I hear it used as a justification for upping AAA prices, even though AAA profitability is the kind of insane that makes explaining mod economics to og id look perfectly sensible. Buuuuut… small scale, indie profits (with a few astronomical exceptions) aren't.
These adventurous souls are more like… artisanal craftsmen, not digital mega moguls. Cost of existence applies to them – they haven't and likely never will unlock life's coveted infinite money mode. And, as time goes by and the industry becomes more corporate, not just in terms of scale but slime, it does make an argument for supporting those who have some decency to speak of.
Moralizing aside, the model of "pay money, get thing" is one I'm inclined to support. Ownership has become increasingly fleeting overtime. "Pay money, get limited access license to non-guaranteed thing as determined by the property rights holder and their wherewithal to bother keeping servers humming" is far more objectionable than, "hey, sorry, but I'm gonna need a few more bucks this time."
What I think you are really looking at is the drive to games-as-a-service. What these games are really selling is the ability to get something cool and show it off to the other people you play with. If we were talking about offline doom weapon skins there is no way anyone would pay these prices.
Also, we can thank mobile for normalizing spending hundreds of dollars on free games.
My interest is in how much money people are willing to spend on games. I know I'm making an lot of apples v oranges comparisons here, yet knowing the size of the pool of available cash is very relevant.
In the world of deep discounts and bundles and giveaways, it is important to remember that people are still willing to actually spend money on stuff, if motivated.
If Valorant charges $70 for a skin that's purchased by 0.1% of their userbase then they get 7c/user, far less than your $20/user... I think your post is talking about whales and long-tail distributions. I paid $200 for "The Conqueror" so I'm one of your whales. What percentage of your users are whales, vs what percentage of Valorant's?
There are so many metrics that it's hard to know which ones to analyze. I wonder if maybe Valorant and Spiderweb Software have roughly comparable per-active-user revenue? Beyond that it'd be hard to meaningfully compare.
In terms of userbase size, I bet the industry is itself a long tail distribution of some anomalous successes like Valorant, and lots of failures like Crucible. If we measure userbase/headcount (where Riot Games has a headcount of 2500 and Spiderweb Software has a headcount of 2), then I wonder if Spiderweb Software simply sits somewhere in the comfortable middle of that long tail?
I strongly considered bringing the "whale" factor into the piece, but I couldn't.
You assume that the expensive sets of skins have the "whale" dynamic, but that is just a guess, and Riot guards that information carefully. The "whale" dynamic definitely applies to gacha games or games where you get a constant flow of improvements from continuously spending money, but does this apply to cosmetics, that work very differently?
It might. But without proof, I can't really say much about it.
Have to add: I would LOVE to know what percentage of players of something like Rocket League pay for cosmetics. My gut tells me the market dynamics are different for cosmetics and purchases that have a substantive in-game effect. If someone has a link to writing relevant to this topic, I'd love to see it.
I have no research numbers, but I have some recent anecdotal experience:
I started playing Fortnite a few months ago when they introduced zero build mode. It was more fun than I expected, and I fully enjoyed playing for free. I thought I would for forever!
Then I roped my siblings in. There are four of us, all 30-40yo, spread out a bit around the country. My brother bought the monthly “crew” where you get skins, the battle pass, and game currency for $12/mo. Then he gifted one to my sister. So I bought one. And then we roped in my other sister. Now we’re all playing with skins etc from the pass, and have “vbucks” to throw around in the store.
So he bought a dance emote. And it was absolutely hilarious when we’re sitting there in game waiting for a vault door to open and he’s dancing to some pop music. So then we all started buying dances ($3-5).
Then he paid for an expensive dinner on our dad’s birthday. So when I got home I bought extra vbucks and got him a $15 skin package I knew he’d like as a thank you.
Oh, and for the May the Fourth celebration they had lots of Star Wars skins, so he got a Storm Trooper skin.
And then I got tired of my dances and got a few more. Etc, etc, etc.
We’ve probably spent $250 or more from the four of us in the last two months.
Observations:
1. Fortnite is way more fun than I thought when building is disabled.
2. The social element creates lots of incentives for wanting to spend.
3. They make it so easy to gift cosmetics to others, and gifting feels rewarding.
4. It’s so fun altogether and as a social evening that despite the price tag I just wrote _for cosmetics_ I don’t even feel bad about it.
5. It’s not just zoomers, and it’s definitely not just whales.
I believe all of this. For four adults with real jobs, $250 is not a huge amount for a bunch of fun socializing together. People in Seattle routinely pay more than that for one night out to dinner.
I wonder how much of your customer base you would lose charging $50 or $40, and running the same routine discounts down to your normal discounted price of $15.
I remember way, way back last millennium mailing a check to Spiderweb Software for a... I think it was a $25 game, and it was very exciting. Clearly, those days are over.
I think it is very hard to be a pioneer, especially because the risk is very real.
I don't think it's as simple as "if people couldn't pirate the game they would pay more for it, and not complain about the price being too high". I do agree with you that the dollar for value in the video game industry is extremely good, but your aren't just competing with movies and music, you're also competing with Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and EVERY OTHER VIDEO GAME out there, including the MASSIVE free games. So of course some people are going to play Portal 1 and say "The cost is just too much for the amount of game you get, I mean I never paid a dime for Valorant and I have 1000s of hours in it, Portal only gave me 4!" or "Yeah, your 40 hour indy game is $20, but I can buy The Witcher 3 Complete Collection for $10 on a sale and get 200+ hours on the first playthrough".
Not saying you don't have a problem with piracy, I obviously have no idea of your company finances and such. Anyway, I enjoy your games, so thank or making them.
I don't agree with this because, as I said in a different response, you're shopping for works of art, not bricks or apples. I'm not competing with Instagram or TikTok, any more than I am competing with the bakery up the street. My works are purely the product of my own brain and, like them or hate them, only Jeff Vogel can make Jeff Vogel games.
If someone is complaining that a $20 unique product by a small developer is too expensive, even though it is actually quite cheap, it is fair to wonder what else is going on.
To corroborate how cheap $20 is now, I have to pay that much to go out to lunch at local burger joints.
$20 for a 40-50ish hour RPG game is just crazy value by comparison.
And although I'm an older richer techie guy and could pay $60/70, I don't know that I ever would for an indie game unless I really knew the creator and I can't give you a good reason for it.
I back Jeff's games at a high price now when I see the Kickstarters because I've been playing his games since I was literally a child, but I wouldn't roll the proverbial die on an unknown indie for $70 even though that amount of money isn't a lot for me.
You're exactly right. For most people, $20 isn't a barrier to buying something they really want. But there is a strong mental barrier to paying that amount, especially if you think it'll be free on Epic a month later.
Way back in the Seventies when I owned a software house, I went to a few computer stores that were selling microcomputer business systems. we had pretty goo accounting software, plus tools for customizing input and output layout to match customers' current paper systems. I suggested to the computer store owners that, rather than buying individual copies of each program, they license them from us for an annual fee and then bundle the software into the price of the computer, plus a hefty upcharge for customization--which would take any competent, or semi-competent, programmer and afternoon to a full day. They did everything but pat me on the head and go "There, there, little girl, go play and let the big boys handle the business." They were convinced that bundling software into a system and then selling the system already loaded was a losing idea. Within two years, Osborne offered their first-ever portable personal computer, with software already bundled into it--DOS, WordStar, a couple other programs. Your remark about the likely reaction to telling game developers of yesteryear to give away the games and sell the 'upgrades' to make more money than selling the program reminded me of it.
If it can comfort your decision, I will pay way more than 25$ to play your next game.
Your opinion sure has changed. I remember back when you explained how niche games needed to charge more, because of their niche small group of fans. Talking about needing to get paid for your time, you can make 100 million dollars charging $3 for a game, without dlc or cosmetics. Getting paid for your time has nothing to do with what you price your game at, you price your game at what will maximize your profits. If you are trying to come up with pricing ideas by extrapolating how many hours you want every user to have to work morally pay for your game, then you are simply doing it wrong.
$20-25 is not too much for a video games because these digital intrinsically worthless games are worth anything and nothing simultaneously, but it is enough to price many people out of buying, some of these people might pirate I guess, but throwing around the accusation when they are probably more likely to just go pickup one of the amazing $1-5 dollar games is uncalled for.
Also, we are at a interesting transitional period in game sales. We have hit a progress ceiling, games from 10 years ago look and play like games from today. And a lot of 10 year old games are being sold for cents on the dollar. Why would I pay new game prices when I could go pickup the best game of 2015 that is probably on sale for $5, has 200 hours of game play, and 5 years of modding and community support behind it? Your niche fanbase very well may have played every single similar game, but everyone else has a huge library of games they never got around to playing or are in their own niche and are uninterested.
wisnojkij, I hate pummeling again and again at your post because it feels unfair, especially since you may never see any of this. But I want to make one more point that if you ever see this you might find interesting.
"you price your game at what will maximize your profits"
The game industry itself has little interest in this approach. The way I know this is that standard prices exist. A few years ago, every new AAA PS4 title was $60. Now it is $70.
This approach is WEIRD, isn't it? I mean, this means we can't be pricing our games to maximize profit for an individual title, because if we were isn't is incredibly unlikely that EVERY game would land at $70?
In the end, I have to loop back to what I wrote at the very tippy top of the post: "Do we understand anything about pricing video games?"
Na, I was just making diner.
That is a fair point, but I still think you may be looking at it from the wrong angle. If you believe you have a specific sized market, then I am 100% behind the idea of increasing your price or shrinking your product (but I am guessing that you probably have a artistic or moral objection to DLC). But that is what is so great about these mini products like skins, you can experiment with the prices without risking a lot.
And game pricing is complicated, that is probably why sales work so well for so much of the industry. Some games are bought because they are art, some games are bought as a form of charity to developers, some because the purchaser has some spare spending money and is looking for something to spend it on, and some because someone needs x hours of entertainment. And they can all be the same game and the same purchaser at different times. So wildly fluctuating prices can hit more of these markets than static ones, but sales can also have hugely negative effects on a business and the perceived value of its products.
But I cannot agree with this last argument. They are all priced the same for 2 reasons most likely. All AAA games have the same market, everyone. And also they do enough research to know what price people will pay for a AAA game. But you do bring up a really interesting point. Is their a world where poorly reviewed games or movies have a reduced ticket price? Do reviews just not matter, or maybe their research is so lacking that they are just randomly throwing out prices? I know some AAA games and some AAA movies sell better than others, but how if any does this effect their pricing? I don't buy either so I am not really sure.
I am coming out of this discussion feeling like I know far less than when I went in. :-)
When I was wee, Atari 2600 games has 3 price points, $20, $30, $40. More premium games (Asteroids!) got higher prices. I'm really curious why that went away. It was way easier to implement than multiple prices for movies would be.
As an additional data point, I would like to note that this "standard AAA price" only exists in American and some European markets. In my local Steam store, I can see wildly different prices for various AAA titles - from "full American price" to "something that will not drive the locals to piracy". I guess it depends a lot on how much the series/studio is known around here, and how much the publisher cares about this market.
Also, cosmetic skins and other F2P IAPs do not prove that people are ready to pay more for games - they prove SOME people are ready, which is a big difference. Whale-fishing is a completely different approach to monetizing your game, but the fact that some Arabian sheikh is willing to shell out several million dollars on IAPs in a shitty browser brawler has no bearing on a pricing for a "premium" single-player game (unless he hired you to make a game specifically for him - now THAT would be an interesting idea!).
"you price your game at what will maximize your profits" No. Because life is not an economics class. You will NEVER know what price might have maximized your profits. You guess before, and you guess after.
What you actually do is price your game at a level where, if it manages to sell an amount reasonable for the produce/niche and the market, you are able to buy food and your business doesn't explode.
People pay full price for new games rather than pennies or less for old games because you are shopping for works of art, not bricks or apples. That people with libraries of old games EVER buy new ones instead of playing the old games shows that your approach to pricing is questionable.
I have to point out that what I wrote above about picking your price applies more to smaller developers (which is the viewpoint I always write from). Big companies can afford to do more research about what price to choose. Little guys like me have to guess and we have LONG arguments about the best approach to pricing and sales. A topic which will sadly only grow more contentious in the current global economic situation.
As a game developer (programmer) I have an intrinsic reaction against exploiting this kind of cosmetics, but really it's not because it doesn't work or even that it's a bad idea, it's just that it feels cheap because of how I view myself and my work.
I spend months making games, and I'd like to think I know what I'm doing, and do it well.
That game might make money, or might not. I'd like to think that what I'm doing has some bearing on that, because it's a lot of work and I've spent a lifetime on those skills.
When someone sells a gun skin that took an artist (maybe, at a push) a few hours for $70, and makes a mint, that's depressing because very little effort made loads of money whereas a lot of effort can (quite frequently) make no money. The ultimate end of that of course is NFTs, where you can sell the shiny guns without even needing to bother making a game at all.
But it's only depressing because it highlights the lack of a connection between time/effort put in, and money got out the other end, and that was always there. Much as I understand intellectually that the customer doesn't give a toss how much effort went into making something, they only care about the end result, it still viscerally feels wrong. But that's totally a me problem, because I make games, put effort in, and want there to be a link between the two.
I think you, like me, are reflexively underestimating the importance of style, fashion, and personal expression. I've been listening to people get EXCITED about these skins. Before you judge too much, I think you should think about how much people are capable of valuing a sense of style and self-expression.
I wouldn't buy new skins either. But I totally get why people do. For many, it's not a scam. It's a key part of the experience.
(This is also why I thing blaming the phenomenon of compulsively-addicted whales is the wrong way to go. There are a few compulsive collectors, sure, but for most it only takes a couple purchases to get enough distinctiveness.)
Oh, intellectually I know the customers are right, but emotionally it's still hard to get away from I am the author, they are the audience. I outrank them.
FWIW, I've been playing your games since Exile, back when I was a broke college student and all I could afford was the huge free demos. I remember the thrill of finally being to afford to buy my first game and actually finish one. That was Avernum 3 and I've bought everything since (direct from you, as I assume you get more of the revenue that way than you do through Steam or where ever). I would totally pay $25 for Queen's Wish 2. Or $35. Not $70 though; I'd wait for a Steam sale on that one. $40 or $45 ... dunno, maybe. $50, we're definitely back in Steam sale territory.
There's your non-representative n=1 research study of the day.
I found that very interesting. I really truly have no idea how many people would pay what for my stuff.
Even if I took polls and surveys, it wouldn't help much. Most of my games sell to a big, silent mass of people out there I will never talk to or hear from, and who knows how their feelings would differ from the vocal ones?
To be honest, if it was $50 on Steam I'd blanch too, but I paid more than that to get a scroll on Kickstarter that I wasn't overly excited about, because I had the money and felt like it was an opportunity to tangibly show my support. Probably would do similar things if it was "pay what you want, $20 or more." I'm sure there's interesting psychology there.
That's got me thinking about what sort of KS add-ons I actually *would* be excited about. Maybe if you designed a fun retro game box with printed manual/hintbook? Maybe some sort of commentary videos of you going through the game and recounting interesting decisions/design choices?
What I'd really want is probably pure downside for you - you're a thoughtful grownup who studies power and its uses and has the capacity to take in other perspectives, so you're one of the vanishingly small percentage of people with whom it would be constructive to talk politics. Hard to imagine even a private message board being worth the risk of being screenshotted and blasted all over Twitter though (and this is *regardless* of what you believe, about which I'm thoroughly ignorant).
Yes, a documentary would be great. I enjoyed watching the Double Fine documentary more than the game they made. Bottom Feeder could hold a Kickstarter to see if it would be profitable 😀
In the Indy scene people are willing to pay a lot to make a change to the game for everyone which is is there own personal thing. For example several players (including myself) paid over a thousand dollars to add new customer designed taverns to the game with their own quests in the game Sryth. This something only indies can offer as the additional costs of making something noticeable are small enough that enough people can found that will pay.
I feel like there's another lesson about tiered pricing options to be gleaned somewhere here -- not just about raising prices in general, but a way to profit from letting the customer set their own price. Dunno, maybe that only works if you have a Valorant-level megahit on your hands.
You already do Deluxe Edition options (Hint book plus cheat options, I think) -- you could also put the Scrolls of Absolution from your Kickstarter tiers on Steam and the other storefronts, maybe?
DLC?
Season passes?
Note: I'm not saying that you're wrong about raising your base prices to $25. I'm just not sure that's the lesson to learn from observing Valorant spending, which notably starts at free-to-play.
Having the base Steam price be above the $20 we Kickstarter backers paid will deliver instant smug satisfaction! (Even if we know there will inevitably be much lower sale prices)
I dunno if how deep I want to sink into the pudding of "inflation." On one hand, I hear it used as a justification for upping AAA prices, even though AAA profitability is the kind of insane that makes explaining mod economics to og id look perfectly sensible. Buuuuut… small scale, indie profits (with a few astronomical exceptions) aren't.
These adventurous souls are more like… artisanal craftsmen, not digital mega moguls. Cost of existence applies to them – they haven't and likely never will unlock life's coveted infinite money mode. And, as time goes by and the industry becomes more corporate, not just in terms of scale but slime, it does make an argument for supporting those who have some decency to speak of.
Moralizing aside, the model of "pay money, get thing" is one I'm inclined to support. Ownership has become increasingly fleeting overtime. "Pay money, get limited access license to non-guaranteed thing as determined by the property rights holder and their wherewithal to bother keeping servers humming" is far more objectionable than, "hey, sorry, but I'm gonna need a few more bucks this time."
What I think you are really looking at is the drive to games-as-a-service. What these games are really selling is the ability to get something cool and show it off to the other people you play with. If we were talking about offline doom weapon skins there is no way anyone would pay these prices.
Also, we can thank mobile for normalizing spending hundreds of dollars on free games.
My interest is in how much money people are willing to spend on games. I know I'm making an lot of apples v oranges comparisons here, yet knowing the size of the pool of available cash is very relevant.
In the world of deep discounts and bundles and giveaways, it is important to remember that people are still willing to actually spend money on stuff, if motivated.
If Valorant charges $70 for a skin that's purchased by 0.1% of their userbase then they get 7c/user, far less than your $20/user... I think your post is talking about whales and long-tail distributions. I paid $200 for "The Conqueror" so I'm one of your whales. What percentage of your users are whales, vs what percentage of Valorant's?
There are so many metrics that it's hard to know which ones to analyze. I wonder if maybe Valorant and Spiderweb Software have roughly comparable per-active-user revenue? Beyond that it'd be hard to meaningfully compare.
In terms of userbase size, I bet the industry is itself a long tail distribution of some anomalous successes like Valorant, and lots of failures like Crucible. If we measure userbase/headcount (where Riot Games has a headcount of 2500 and Spiderweb Software has a headcount of 2), then I wonder if Spiderweb Software simply sits somewhere in the comfortable middle of that long tail?
I strongly considered bringing the "whale" factor into the piece, but I couldn't.
You assume that the expensive sets of skins have the "whale" dynamic, but that is just a guess, and Riot guards that information carefully. The "whale" dynamic definitely applies to gacha games or games where you get a constant flow of improvements from continuously spending money, but does this apply to cosmetics, that work very differently?
It might. But without proof, I can't really say much about it.
Have to add: I would LOVE to know what percentage of players of something like Rocket League pay for cosmetics. My gut tells me the market dynamics are different for cosmetics and purchases that have a substantive in-game effect. If someone has a link to writing relevant to this topic, I'd love to see it.
I have no research numbers, but I have some recent anecdotal experience:
I started playing Fortnite a few months ago when they introduced zero build mode. It was more fun than I expected, and I fully enjoyed playing for free. I thought I would for forever!
Then I roped my siblings in. There are four of us, all 30-40yo, spread out a bit around the country. My brother bought the monthly “crew” where you get skins, the battle pass, and game currency for $12/mo. Then he gifted one to my sister. So I bought one. And then we roped in my other sister. Now we’re all playing with skins etc from the pass, and have “vbucks” to throw around in the store.
So he bought a dance emote. And it was absolutely hilarious when we’re sitting there in game waiting for a vault door to open and he’s dancing to some pop music. So then we all started buying dances ($3-5).
Then he paid for an expensive dinner on our dad’s birthday. So when I got home I bought extra vbucks and got him a $15 skin package I knew he’d like as a thank you.
Oh, and for the May the Fourth celebration they had lots of Star Wars skins, so he got a Storm Trooper skin.
And then I got tired of my dances and got a few more. Etc, etc, etc.
We’ve probably spent $250 or more from the four of us in the last two months.
Observations:
1. Fortnite is way more fun than I thought when building is disabled.
2. The social element creates lots of incentives for wanting to spend.
3. They make it so easy to gift cosmetics to others, and gifting feels rewarding.
4. It’s so fun altogether and as a social evening that despite the price tag I just wrote _for cosmetics_ I don’t even feel bad about it.
5. It’s not just zoomers, and it’s definitely not just whales.
I believe all of this. For four adults with real jobs, $250 is not a huge amount for a bunch of fun socializing together. People in Seattle routinely pay more than that for one night out to dinner.
I wonder how much of your customer base you would lose charging $50 or $40, and running the same routine discounts down to your normal discounted price of $15.
I remember way, way back last millennium mailing a check to Spiderweb Software for a... I think it was a $25 game, and it was very exciting. Clearly, those days are over.
I think it is very hard to be a pioneer, especially because the risk is very real.
I don't think it's as simple as "if people couldn't pirate the game they would pay more for it, and not complain about the price being too high". I do agree with you that the dollar for value in the video game industry is extremely good, but your aren't just competing with movies and music, you're also competing with Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and EVERY OTHER VIDEO GAME out there, including the MASSIVE free games. So of course some people are going to play Portal 1 and say "The cost is just too much for the amount of game you get, I mean I never paid a dime for Valorant and I have 1000s of hours in it, Portal only gave me 4!" or "Yeah, your 40 hour indy game is $20, but I can buy The Witcher 3 Complete Collection for $10 on a sale and get 200+ hours on the first playthrough".
Not saying you don't have a problem with piracy, I obviously have no idea of your company finances and such. Anyway, I enjoy your games, so thank or making them.
I don't agree with this because, as I said in a different response, you're shopping for works of art, not bricks or apples. I'm not competing with Instagram or TikTok, any more than I am competing with the bakery up the street. My works are purely the product of my own brain and, like them or hate them, only Jeff Vogel can make Jeff Vogel games.
If someone is complaining that a $20 unique product by a small developer is too expensive, even though it is actually quite cheap, it is fair to wonder what else is going on.
To corroborate how cheap $20 is now, I have to pay that much to go out to lunch at local burger joints.
$20 for a 40-50ish hour RPG game is just crazy value by comparison.
And although I'm an older richer techie guy and could pay $60/70, I don't know that I ever would for an indie game unless I really knew the creator and I can't give you a good reason for it.
I back Jeff's games at a high price now when I see the Kickstarters because I've been playing his games since I was literally a child, but I wouldn't roll the proverbial die on an unknown indie for $70 even though that amount of money isn't a lot for me.
You're exactly right. For most people, $20 isn't a barrier to buying something they really want. But there is a strong mental barrier to paying that amount, especially if you think it'll be free on Epic a month later.