Question about game prices and perception of quality

rogerdv

rogerdv

First time out of the vault
A month ago I was talking with a friend from USA about my plans to develop games. When I said that I could develop a game for 15-20% of the cost of production in USA/Europe, and then sell it for half the price, he told me that I should not do so. "If I see two things, one costing $40 and the other costing $20, I automatically consider that the cheaper one has lower quality. You should not sell your game for less than other similar games."
What do you think about this? Does game price influences your perception about its possible quality?
 
For the AAA public, as they are used to 60$ tags, they might relate a lower price to lower quality (and production value, which is true).

But for PC public, that's even better. Most of my favourite games were hardly reaching 40$ tags, without accounting discounts.
 
That is an awfull way of thinking. Most of the time, games that cost the most don't deserve to be bought at that price. I would even say all the time, as that price is way to high imo. I am willing to spend 20-25€ if i really want the game, but even that is pretty rare.
 
Doesn't really change my view of a games' quality. Mostly because I don't buy games blind, I watch them on YouTube first. Honestly it's the best way to know if you'll like the game or not.
 
Way I look at it is this: I'd rather spend 5-10 bucks on something that ultimately was a letdown and feel snubbed out of my money than spend 60 bucks on something that has the exact same risk.

Games are not worth more than 25 bucks to me. 30 if we're reeeeeeaaaally pushing it. Like Dark Souls 3, it was for sale at 30 bucks and I considered buying that but I ended up buying some other stuff again but I'd probably buy it if I had 30 bucks in my steam wallet because I know what the Dark Souls games are like and I can trust a certain level of quality from them.

But even with a game series I like and know it will live up to my expectations (like Dark Souls) it is still not worth more than 30 bucks. Hell, even at 30 bucks I don't feel like I want to risk it and would only spend that amount of money on it if I literally have nothing else that interests me. And at 40 bucks? Even if I have LITERALLY nothing else to buy and I have 40 bucks in my steam wallet I'd rather save it in case something else comes up.

Games are simply not worth more than 25 bucks for me most of the time.

Base price can be 5 bucks or 80 bucks. I don't care. The price is meaningless to me when it comes to how good a game will be.

So no, the price of a game does not influence my perception of its quality. If anything, the higher the price the worse of a risk it is to spend such a huge amount of cash on something I might regret buying.

[edit]

I think I've grown spoiled from steam sales to be honest.
 
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I actually stay away from expensive games since a while ago. Most expensive games are not worth the price for me, I don't have much money to spend on games to begin with, but that is not why I say that expensive games are not worth the price, I mean that AAA games these days usually suck and I have found I have more fun playing cheap indie games than expensive ones.

Now I won't deny that there are people like that friend, people that rate games for their price, but I don't think you will find many of those around here in NMA.
 
The actual level of quality versus cost is almost irrelevant but I do tend to think lower costs are going to not guarantee higher sales.

Look at it this way, you can get 200+ hours out of Fallout 4 or 12 hours of Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and they cost the same.
 
Don't know about about conversion of money but in the UK i won't spend over £40 0n brand new games /9I don't buy that many). I always avoid new release because you can grantee that the price will drop with in a month or too. The last game i brought was BF1 i would't pay £48 or above. Got it from tesco for £42 it does seems to little differeance as it cna be sold for £52 and £42. No to mention most games on the xbox store are overpriced esp for new game and you can't sell the game on.

For me the big talking point is like what Phipps has said. You can have a game the last of us that has (Really great story). But is short 15 hours or less. Compeared any game such as minecraft that has replay vaule etc. Not saying you will play minecraft longer but potentially you could.

It sort of like BF1 i brought for the muitplayer because I keep playing even though the stroy was short 15 hours less I still knew I would get muiltplayer vaule from it. I don't think I could spend £40 odd point new for a game I would play once for 15 hours and that be it. Even if those 15 hours was amazing
 
rogerdv said:
A month ago I was talking with a friend from USA about my plans to develop games. When I said that I could develop a game for 15-20% of the cost of production in USA/Europe, and then sell it for half the price, he told me that I should not do so. "If I see two things, one costing $40 and the other costing $20, I automatically consider that the cheaper one has lower quality. You should not sell your game for less than other similar games."
What do you think about this? Does game price influences your perception about its possible quality?
Click to expand...

Nope. There are good games that are low in price and shit games that are higher in price. If I like the look of a game and it isn't too badly reviewed I'll grab it, or if it's too much I'll wait for the price to drop. I've recently bought a game that's on sale for £40 or around that amount, but using some reward tokens I got from work I only paid £7.
 
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