Pay more to unlock your entire game?

Games
1

Hmm… Not sure I like this trend at all. Received in email today:

Dear Denny Atkin

Thank you for your recent Codemasters registration.

We are pleased to announce the launch our new online
Bonus Code Pages. For only £2.99, (approximately $4.80),
you can now purchase unlocks and cheats for your
favourite games.

Unlock all cars and tracks in Pro Race Driver and
Colin McRae Rally 3. These are just some of the many
codes available to you.

With secure online purchasing, its easy and convenient
to purchase bonus codes for your favourite Codemasters
games.
https://secure.codemasters.com/bonuscodes

Kind regards,
Joy Armitage
Code M Team
[email protected]

First they charge for cheat/unlock codes. What’s next? Some genius realizes they could ship with 25 levels, but only make 20 accessible, and sell a code for the other 5… Kind of like my copy of Quicken, which actually contains all the programming code for the $99 version, and can be upgraded instantly with an unlock code.

2

If the game were being sold for a reduced price like $29.99 then I wound’nt mind it much. It could be considered like a form of shareware. If the game was a full $50 and did this? Well then they can go blow themselves.

3

er, is there no other way ingame to unlock the cars? I assume they mean these are regular unlockables and it’s just a cheat code to get them all in one pop.

Seems innocent to me, pubs have had cheat/tip 900 numbers for ages and ages.

Although it['d be nasty if they tried to dmca a free cheat code site or something.

4

I am 100% behind this idea. I think it’s a great idea who’s time has come.

Unfortunately, there will probably be an intermediate period of time when a few companies do the following:

  1. Announce a game. Say it has 30 levels. Expected price $40.
  2. Revise announcement, say initial game has 25 levels with the ability to unlock 5 more levels for $10.
  3. Game ships with all 30 levels on the disk. Initial price: still $40.

[EDIT: Removed paragraph.]

When you purchase a game, you are purchasing EXACTLY what the box says. No more, no less. (Of course there should be penalties for false or misleading advertising etc, but I’m not talking about that.)

If the game box says you get twenty levels, you make your purchase based on what you get for the original purchase price. Then, if it turns out you can unlock more content, you decided whether it’s worth more based on that content. It doesn’t matter what the company said 5 months ago. Read the box. NOBODY OWES YOU ANYTHING.

[I think if this system gets a chance] we will eventually be rewarded with a pricing system that fits the marketplace.

Think of the possibilities:

Scenario #1:

Game ships with 20 levels at $19.99. Most gamers never even finish all of them. Those gamers got what they paid for at a dollar per level. Some persistent gamers get through all 20 levels and are hungry for more. For $10.00 more, they unlock 20 more levels. They’re paying more, but they’re getting each level for $50 cents now. Finally, some kids with way too much time on their hands work through all 40 of the first set of levels. The third set of 20 levels is only $5.00. Now you’re really getting a good deal per level. Total price to that guy is $35 dollars. Total price to the first guy is $20. Both people are happy. They got what they paid for.

Scenario #2:

RPG ships with 60 hours of gameplay for $40. The disc comes with a level editor, but it’s locked. 95 percent of the gamers have no interest. For the rest, they get a 5 day trial of the editor, after that, they have to pay $10. Both sets of gamers get what they paid for.

Scenario #3:

New FPS game from unknown developer in the Ivory Coast sells their disc for $5. It has 10 levels. It’s so addictive that most people are dying to play more. For $15 more dollars, you can unlock 20 more levels. If you didn’t like the game, you’re only out the initial $5.

This concept opens up a hell of a lot of possibilities. Yeah…in the beginning some companies will get bad press for “abusing” the concept, but if it’s a good idea, and if the publishers give people a good deal then it will be widely adopted. And there is a good chance that this system will save gamers money in the long run because you only pay for what you play.

[EDIT: Minor changes.]
[EDIT: Decided not to call people who disagree with my opion “princesses.” Removed some of the more mocking stuff. I’ve decided that since President Bush is so awesome, I’m going to emulate him by being a more compassionate conservative. :D ]

5

If it’s something substantial, like entirely new levels, then this might not be a terrible thing, since it does resemble the shareware model, as a previous poster suggests. Basically, if you pay for a game that has 20 levels, but the company develops a good-sized chunk of extra content that isn’t enough to flesh out a full $20 retail expansion pack (like, say 5 more levels) and they don’t want to give it away for free, there are only a few options otherwise:

-Publisher pushes the extra content to retail in a box and sells it for $5-10. Much too expensive on the publisher’s end to manufacture, copy, and distribute the thing at retail.

-Publisher charges your credit card and you sit there downloading a 400MB file to your computer. Pain in the ass for you, especially if you, like most people, have a dialup connection.

6

Gee…sounds just like shareware there Spoofy…except you pay for the chance to try it out. Fun.

PC games makers are so abusive with the patches as it stands today, adding more opportunity to be abusive is just like throwing oil on the fire.

–Dave

7

I don’t know Dave, I think the downside of shareware is that a lot of it essentially becomes freeware because it seems very difficult to strike a balance between giving a player too little and too much. The developers seem to err on the side of giving too much, and a lot of “shareware” titles never get registered. I’d rather see a system that better rewarded small developers.

See?! Helping out the little guy! Compassionate conservative strikes again! Now if we can only get the indie developers their dividend taxes cut we’ll be in great shape! :twisted:

8

I don’t know Dave, I think the downside of shareware is that a lot of it essentially becomes freeware because it seems very difficult to strike a balance between giving a player too little and too much. The developers seem to err on the side of giving too much, and a lot of “shareware” titles never get registered. I’d rather see a system that better rewarded small developers.

See?! Helping out the little guy! Compassionate conservative strikes again! Now if we can only get the indie developers their dividend taxes cut we’ll be in great shape! :twisted:[/quote]

We could bomb Iraq back to the Stone Age without UN support. Would that be close enough?

9

What does bombing Iraq have to do with anything?

Anyway…this doesn’t bother me at all. The are willing to sell you cheat codes and unlocked material right? You could earn the unlocked stuff yourself, and already people on ebay sell that kind of stuff. You can usually wait and get the cheats for free online as well. The price was pretty low, and as long as it isn’t really extra gameplay/features, etc. that you can’t get in any other way, I don’t see a problem with it. I also don’t see it foreshadowing any of the other scenarios given above.

10

I think it’s a bad idea personally. I think a lot of people who buy their games all the time would be prone pirate the extra levels, since only a crack would be needed.

Also, using Jedi Knight 2 as an example, If I just finished fighting Tavion and set off to the Imperial outpost when the game ended with an advert to unlock further levels I would feel ripped off regardless of what the box said.

The alternative is to have the levels be in the middle of the game which would also mess up the story. I believe there was a discussion here of Splinter Cell doing that exact thing.

If games really HAD to do this, I would like them to be labeled as a “Light” version, and also have the full version at the regular price.

11

I admire your faith in humanity, Robert. :)

I see this as being the thin edge of the wedge and would rather the idea not take hold. I don’t think it will, so there’s probably nothing to worry about. The bottom line for me is unless the packaging explicitly states there is locked content, it’s a deceptive way to squeeze a few more bucks out of gamers.

12

If the company marketed it one way and now it says something different in anything but obvious, large text, the publishers and developers can all get bone cancer and die in agony, as far as I am concerned. Customers should not have to scour the fine print to find out if prior marketing is no longer valid.

If its in 12 pt type and obvious, then I can just barely tolerate it, but it will still piss me off.

I’m basically on the edge about game licensing and anti-piracy measures as is – it isn’t going to take much before I just lose interest.

(I have nothing against offering extra levels that were not part of the marketed product for extra money, so long as they don’t consume some unreasonable amount of disk space. It would have to be several gigs before I’d notice.)