Bethesda Pirates

(Bridger) #21

Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood debuted on steam for $50 AUS, and that’s a huge title. There doesn’t seem to be a real reason other than “everyone else is doing it so we can get away with it too!”

(Herandar) #22

Ragoo’s link explains exactly why the prices are the way they are.

(SockDog) #23

I think people are over thinking this with development costs and international support, they simply do it because they can. Big companies rarely have the imagination, balls or willingness to challenge established practices.

Others sell at $90 then we sell at $90
Prices go down, never up
etc etc

What I’d like to see more of and I posted one project in the Off Topic forumis pre-purchasing games to fund the developers directly. May not work for massive projects (yet) but it certainly seems worth the small risk to free developers from the publisher’s money bags and influence. Minecraft being the obvious (exceptional?) example.

(Ragoo) #24

Perfect example of people answering without reading the thread :stuck_out_tongue:

edit: And by that I don’t mean you but other people speculating about stuff.

(Senethro) #25

I’m pretty sure they just crap on Australia because they can. Disadvantage of being a small secondary market and all.

(DouglasDanger) #26

Australia is a consumer economy that is literally on the other side of the world. What do you expect?

(Bridger) #27

I didn’t understand his argument. What do local developers/publishers have to do with anything? It sounds like he’s implying that the publishers think “hey, no local competition means we can jack up the prices.” But in the US, they compete with every other AAA title, and in austrailia the same games compete int he same market. There’s no difference in the competition. So what does it matter if Au doesn’t have an EA or an Ubisoft? I’m sure Germany doesn’t have any large publishing house, but their prices are not 80% over average are they?

(FFSturm) #28

$60-70 should be the game price, basically 42.3 €- 49.3 €

(LyndonL) #29

Yes there are ways and means. I buy many of my Steam games through the UK and US sites. Steam has IP filtering which disallows you to buy off another country’s Steam page if your IP isn’t from there. If you let them know you travel internationally for work they can remove the IP lock…

If it went to the devs it would still suck that we’re getting singled out, but I could tolerate it a little… but it doesn’t. The publishers keep the profit.

Unfortunately no it doesn’t. Ragoo’s link explains why physical media is dearer. Steam is digital and therefore the same model doesn’t apply.

(Shadowcat) #30

It turns out that a very real culprit may just be regulation costs.

“Things like how the game is rated can affect the price,” claims Mark. “If a game in Australia must be rated MA15+, whereas overseas it can be sold with a PG rating, then the price is likely to be higher in Australia because the potential market is smaller – a lower rating makes the game available to more potential buyers.”

the article points out several other possible/likely culprits, and chances are that at least a few of them are working together to cause the prices you see. But when it comes to downloaded software, the quote above seems to be the only one that applies. Other than, of course, “because they can”.

Edit: Its also possible that they were forced to increase the steam price for political reasons. I have to imagine that the hard copy retailers were not too thrilled to find one of their competitors was able to sell the game for $30-$40 less than them.

I remember hearing a story about retailers in the UK boycotting games that were sold by steam, because it takes so much of their business, and that was for games that steam sells for the same price.

(Seyu) #31

A drive to bring a change in the herd mentality of publishers/distributors.

(crazyfoolish) #32

wait. So steam changes it’s prices according to location? I have always been charged in USD and i live in NZ.

(DoHo) #33

Foreword: I already got my copy for $50USD.

  1. Steam is digital distribution (no extra cost of transporting goods, excuses for a smalelr market are moot)
  2. Retailers already had the price much higher for the above reason
  3. It WAS on Steam for several months (since September last year) for only $50USD.
  4. The Australian dollar right now is worth $ 1.01225USD. If anything we should be paying slightly LESS, not $90 ****ing US dollars.

There’s not ONE reason to justify doubling the price of the game on Steam except “because we can.”

It’s bull ****.

(Apples) #34

Maybe its time to stop buying overpriced games? If more people voted with their wallets there would be some changes I think (oh yes I’m an optimist), but unfortunately it wont happen (or I’m a pesimist… dont know really! please help!)

That sucks big time indeed, but if they charge that much, just dont buy the game, plain and simple.

Peace

(BioSnark) #35

put this thread in the bethesda forums and see what happens.

(Jess Alon) #36

They would nicely ask you to leave and never return in their sickly sweet fashion.

I commend the splash damage developers for letting us discuss this openly.

(Apples) #37

here you go

(LyndonL) #38

[QUOTE=Apples;271486]http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/topic/1175355-australian-pricing/

here you go[/QUOTE]

Wow impressive that it wasn’t shut down. BUT the people in that thread also didn’t mention that it was Bethesda to blame. The publisher is who sets the price of the game on Steam and Valve just complies. Retail parity isn’t a valid reason since many other games release new for $45 to $50 on AU Steam.

[QUOTE=Shadowcat;271412]http://www.kotaku.com.au/2010/11/why-do-videogames-cost-so-much/

It turns out that a very real culprit may just be regulation costs.

“Things like how the game is rated can affect the price,” claims Mark. “If a game in Australia must be rated MA15+, whereas overseas it can be sold with a PG rating, then the price is likely to be higher in Australia because the potential market is smaller – a lower rating makes the game available to more potential buyers.”

[/QUOTE]

Not a good explanation at all. It’s actually quite the opposite. Since our rating system is so broken, a very large percentage of our games are under rated. Comparitively a lot of our M (15+) games are actually rated 18+ in comparitive overseas countries because we don’t have another option. They just get shoe-horned in. I can’t think of any examples of games in Aus that are rated higher than their overseas counterparts - not any large selling titles anyway. Nice try to the men in the suits trying to justify our false economy though :rolleyes:

(Cankor) #39

Only thing which makes sense is so that the price is the same the retailers have to charge.

Still, it seems like retailers would have a really hard time in Australia because who the heck would buy at a Brick and Mortar store when you can get a 45% discount buying on line at Amazon or some place like that.

(Bridger) #40

[QUOTE=Cankor;271514]Only thing which makes sense is so that the price is the same the retailers have to charge.

Still, it seems like retailers would have a really hard time in Australia because who the heck would buy at a Brick and Mortar store when you can get a 45% discount buying on line at Amazon or some place like that.[/QUOTE]

It really does suck for the brick and mortar stores, but they are obsolete. We don’t need them anymore. We should not have to pay for the overhead of a retail establishment when it is cheaper and more convenient to buy online. If anything games should cost at least $10 less online.