@Grimstar
Sorry man, I apparently suck dick at forums. I’m probably a lot less of a douche in person.
Also, you might be interested in the 4th title here http://www.indieroyale.com/
To me, games cost too much. In my mind it’s because the consumer is so unsophisticated as to be obsessed with production quality over all else. You can identify this with games like Uncharted whose actual game-play is pretty pathetic. But, hey… they spent like a million dollars on animations, cinematography, and models. I guess some people get off on that. I figured that was why we had popcorn at movies that cost as much as 2 years worth of FG updates. shrug
To avoid being part of the problem some people are going to dodge SFxT --specifically-- to avoid paying the increased price in order to receive the increased production values. I think though, that in the world of fighting games. You’re going to have like 2 titles over the past 5 years (and none over the next 5) that one can ethically buy while holding onto this philosophy. And I have the feeling that most FG players who have a problem actually own (and will continue to buy) more than that.
I’m personally thankful for new revenue models since it allows you to distribute a lot of the costs of a game in a way that is best suited to your demographic. It just so happens that fighting game players are best serviced by making small to medium sized payments over time. I’d rather do that than deal with ads or pay $100 up front for a game that I may not even like.
They basically realized that people can get into the game up front for a modest fee then, when gamers get really into the game (the ones that do indeed actually like it) they can offer some asset work in exchange for providing their profit margin.
Naturally, increasing the size of the FGC will enable the profit margins to be higher. But, there’ll always be an escalation (not to mention inflation). People want more from newer games and more costs more so they have to charge more. This isn’t going to change even if fighting games go into recession again.
In some situations you’ll be annoyed that they have to charge more. Probably though, in many situations you’ll be able to justify it because you’re in some way personally invested for whatever reason.
There are a lot of old-thoughts about how profit should work. But there are also distinct advantages to approaching new revenue models in some situations and distinct disadvantages to using what was previously the standard model. These are advantages to the consumer and makes it more worthwhile for them to buy into a franchise to get their rocks off. If it wasn’t more of an advantage to the consumer then it wouldn’t be so wildly successful. Currently, fighting game players who enjoy the production quality of modern games and everything that comes from it need to understand that their game purchases, dlc purchases, and merchandise purchases are what make it happen.
Again, I agree that the game industry is too focused around these values. I’m ALL FOR indie values. Seriously, I think that great things can be made with under $100,000 budget. But, whether or not a fighting game could be made for a reasonable sum and still see any success in the current market I am doubtful at best.
If I made a serious fighting game it’d probably cost me somewhere around $100,000 and the production quality would be far below what the current industry titans have to offer. But, around there would be my sweet spot for what I’d be willing to put in and what I needed to get out. Unfortunately, for that budget I could only afford PC / Mac release. Nobody would play it and nobody would know about it. If somehow they did hear about it due to a grass-roots movement the graphics and ‘retro’ feel (euphemism for not expensive as hell to make) would make people immediately ignore it.
The only real fix for the situation is to not buy any more “expensive” games. Oh, and to make everyone else do the same thing. A good start would be to do what a lot of people are doing and just buy old games and continue to play the games that you have.
Not trying to attack you and say that you shouldn’t boycott what you find to be problematic. I just think that you may end up boycotting modern popular FGs as a whole.
For me, the only games that I tend to spend much of any money on are fighting games. The indie games that I buy are almost always very cheap (thanks to alternate distribution and revenue schemes). So, it doesn’t hurt me to put $60 (which is actually 60 euros, which is like 80 us dollars) to play a game for a year or more. I see the problem regarding production-values and overall cost. But, I’d rather play FG’s than not. So, consider me part of a problem that isn’t going to go away.
I hope that nobody is angry that I made another long post. This is obviously a topic that I’m interested in.
http://uk.gamespy.com/articles/107/1078084p1.html
Also, I really want to play that Chinese KoF98 ripoff.
BY THE WAY: I completely agree that DLC for most games is obviously horrible shit. To me not all revenue models are appropriate for all games. There’s not one right answer.