So are we talking about the visuals/art style then? Because I don’t think choosing to make a game look pixel art vs. going with a more “modern” 3D texture look should change what you command for the game, either. Do you feel like Ni no Kuni 2 is fairly priced at $60 because it’s super pretty?
I don’t know why anyone thinks Octopath Traveler would be anything less than $60 on any platform except 3DS/Vita at this point, considering it’s very clear that it’s a longform RPG, sold at retail, with eight fully-formed player characters, each with unique gameplay mechanics and a different manner of interacting with the world. The art style is irrelevant, especially for a company like Square Enix.
I mean, i’m not saying it’s perfect, or my thinking is justified, I’m just saying it’s definitely pretty unprecedented and there are a lot of things gamers indulged that got carried away, like loot boxes, and the abysmal state of “F2P” mobile gaming. It seems there’s definitely some people who are unsure and people who are onboard, does this mean a new era of big studio pixel games with large price tags? Also, personally I feel like pixel art is a huge amount of the bread and butter of the indie scene so i’m definitely opposed to the market being look at long term by bigger studios :P
It’s also not really literally the art style I was getting at, it was more so with how digital tech is treated as a whole, new iphone comes out, old iphone takes a price drop, photoshop 7 comes out, 6 gets a pricedrop, so I guess I view it in that light, which connects back into the dawn of the Playstation era where super nintendo game’s used price at my local game store definitely changed and they were trying to price them out and push the 32bit stuff, the in this analogy pixel art is the “old” tech. So for me it’s kind of like saying here’s this old gen iPhone we have BUT, we gave it a unique processor that does some flashy stuff the old one didn’t,it’s 100% better, and can compete with the iphone 7 (but doesn’t use the same technology or as expensive of parts but for lovers of the old iphone it’s negligible) Obviously is very likely that to actually MAKE the game they are using current tech but try to look at the bigger idea rather than the literal side by side.
I don’t know if I’m making any sense, or if the argument i’m making is being looked at from a neutral stand point but it makes sense to me. And again, this is only my argument, I didn’t make any claims as to whether or not it deserved the price tag or not, it’s simply to my knowledge unheard of for a reputable company to put a AAA price on a pixel game in this era, so when something like this happens it’s natural for me to speculate and consider the different components.
But it’s not though. I get where you are coming from, but it’s a completely legitimate artistic style (and “pixel art” spans a lot of different things, I know we’re talking about 16-bit era JRPGs in particular here). Indeed, two different games emulating the SNES style can still look very different, referring specifically to the quality of pixels/engine (as it were). A game can look like an RPG maker game, or it can look much better (IMO).
This isn’t some indie with gamer maker XVI or whatever number they are on. It’s much better looking, albeit with a very deliberately retro look. I’m a bit surprised at the price, but I am still going to pay for it.
Speaking of the game, I haven’t found an answer to this yet. But is ther eno way to change the random encounter frequency? Honestly, this was the best part of the Bravely series. Every JRPG should include this.
I mean, there is still the point that SE did a remake of Secret of Mana in 3D a classic and only slapped a $40 tag on it, so I guess again I’m just wrapping my head around it. Personally, because game dev soaks up all my funds I’m pretty much never in a position to drop 60 bucks on a game unless it is something I can’t bare not to have, but I also imagine if I things were different I’d be less critical of price tags.
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Isn’t that actual 3d though?
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The Secret of Mana remake looks like a whale’s cancerous butthole.
Obviously some of this is to taste but the Octopath engine is a very different beast than the Mana remake. And I don’t think there exists on this planet a serious argument that the latter looks better than the former in any objective sense. That remake was slapdash and disappointing (ugly, buggy).
Because one game is like that doesn’t mean another is like that.
I don’t really see the cost inputs for a work of entertainment as being important to the price I pay for it.
tacopizzacats is not wrong. What a game is worth is extremely subjective and everyone has their own perspective. While I disagree with it I can definitely see how the art style (while intentional) comes across as old school and/or indie and thus not worth a full AAA game price. I know plenty of people that held the same for Shovel Knight and many others in that same vein.
And at the end of the day it doesn’t matter how much it cost to make a game, nor how much content is in the game (a lot of games put filler content to pad the length). What matters is what someone thinks the game is worth and what they are willing to buy it at.
Well I mean come on, of course this is a major factor.
It’s not the customer’s concern how much money was spent on the game, it’s only the customer’s concern if the game is worth MSRP for them. I don’t care if you spent $20m to make a game or $2m, if the gameplay for a game makes it seem like it’s a $20 game to me then I’m going to wait till it’s $20 regardless of what they spent to make it.
If enough people think like me that it hurts the developer then sorry, there’s just not a market for that style of game at that price point and the developer should have been more cost conscious in their production. If enough people still buy it at the MSRP to make it successful then the developer isn’t hurt and I’m still going to wait till it’s $20 because that’s what the game is worth to me.
If I build a company to build a product, and I can’t sell that product at a high enough price point to make my money back that’s on me, not on consumers for not valuing my product enough. Not sure why games should be any different.
Creating great detailed pixel art and animation is very time consuming and this looks like a rather large adventure with a lot of character variety that had to be created from whole cloth. Why that should be budget priced is beyond me?
I loved that mechanic, and if this game also includes it I’d be much more inclined to splash out!
I’m pretty sure I’m buying this, but I tried some of the scholar’s story, The dialogue was meh and the voice acting in English sure didn’t help. Much weaker than the Dancer’s beginning.
Unless the other voice acting gets above community theatre level, I’m just going to read it and switch the voices to Japanese. Then maybe I can imagine it’s good.
Overall, it’s intriguing to me. It feels like they’re trying a different rpg angle.
I see what you are saying, and you are obviously entitled to your opinion re: any given game’s value for you personally (and let’s be clear, I’d rather pay $36 for the game than $48), but I still haven’t seen a compelling argument that the cost to develop a game isn’t a major factor in what the publisher sets the MSRP at.
Is the cost to develop a game the concern of the customer? No, of course not. Does it influence what publishers set the price at? Yes, absolutely. And we’ve seen time and time again entire projects get cancelled because “they aren’t living up to our expectations” which is code for “we can’t possibly sell this for what we would need to make any money on it” most of the time. And those game’s almost never get reduced in scope and come out at a cheaper price. They just… never come out.
Everyone shut up and answer the random encounter frequency mechanic (or lack thereof) question OR ELSE.
No one knows yet. If it’s in, it’s one of the “unannounced” features that was included based on feedback from the first demo. Looking around with a quick Google search, it’s an incredibly sought after option, so it would be super strange for the developers to not include it in the full version.
Hm, I guess I am buying a Switch.
I’m never a fan of judging how much you should charge for a game based on how it looks. A “pixel art” game can easily be worth charging $60 just as a fully-3D FPS could be worth charging $15 for. It’s all about reaching a balance between what you think the customer is looking for with how high the quality is of the thing you’re selling.
All that said, Octopath Traveler is a helluva lot more than a pixel art game once you see how it all looks in motion. It’s really beautiful all-up.
What ultimately matters is whether the price you’re charging works. And in Octopath Traveler’s case, it seems like they picked the right price to start at and it’ll be really successful:
When my people return to conquer this world the names of you and your family will be added to the rolls of those to be protected. . .
. . . assuming the feature makes it in.
Excellent!
Fair enough! :)