There is a lot of good reasoning in your big post Zeussy, and I'd like to add a point or two to this discussion:
First of all I'm glad that you see that our poll cannot be representative in any way as we (or most of us)
would easily be willing to pay a much higher price for Automation than the average internet-dwelling Joe...
although I think that the centroid of the normal distribution would be shifted by much more than 20%.
I think your average-price calculation has major flaws though (of course my reasoning could be equally
flawed, but I have had quite a good look at the German games market the past few years).
Most of the games you mention are built around an entirely different philosophy than Automation:
You produce a game with the publisher's licensed super-shitty and outdated engine within half a year;
needless to say that there is no polish, no real quality control. You put it in a shiny box with nice pictures
on the back of it and put it in the big shopping centers like Media Markt and Saturn (these are the major
German chains selling boxed computer games). Yes, that is right... German, because the market you imply
with these games is a German phenomenon almost entirely. But back to my train of thought:
There it stands: the shitty game that no one would ever buy if he or she knew just how bad it was.
If you are not convinced, the excellent independent site
http://www.4players.de regularly tests the latest
"Simulators", and it is very very rare to see them get more than 50% ratings - I usually read the tests for
comedic value alone.
How would you price a game that will not grow in sales through word of mouth?
How would you price a game that is so bad that it's marketing entirely relies on its misinformed buyers?
Yes, exactly, you need to put a higher price on it for it to be worth, as the sales figures will be as
dynamic as an exponential decay...
There is a huge "simulator flood" in Germany right now... and the worst part of it: people are buying them.
There are very very few games in there which actually are decent / good and provide the advertised user
experience. The major part of them is just riding the wave.
What I am getting at: you are comparing the pricing of your game, which you put all your blood and time into,
with (to large extent) F- rip-off productions that follow an entirely different (marketing) approach and thus
need a higher price tag to pay off.
I know that you know that it is not strictly "higher price = more profit"... but some people seem to have that
misconception. What we want is a balance between price, value, and perceived value that yields you, the
developers, the highest possible profit. Why this can mean a low price tag I have described in a previous
post of mine.
On a different note... the pre-ordering: This is indeed an excellent way of financing the last few steps before
release, but just the last steps. Users generally only accept products that are fleshed out already, beta or not.
And I see Daffy has the "correct" view on things
Thu Apr 21, 2011 1:29 am 
