Jesse Schell Releasing a demo harms your game sales
103 replies, posted
[QUOTE=Legolas;39550243]I think demo versions should never go away. Got some personal experience with this!
I kept hearing horrible things about RE6, was avoiding it. Last month I finally decided to try the demo, invited a friend (who was never interested in Resident Evil) and oh look, we're gonna be playing the full game today or tomorrow! :v:
Demo versions are a good thing. They should stay.[/QUOTE]
But how many times can you count where you didn't buy a game because of a demo? I think there's a lot of selective bias towards demos, with people only remembering the good ones.
Either give us demos or stop bitching about piracy. I want a "try before buy" option. If games are freaking $60 these days, I want to know if the product is good before shelling out my hard earned money.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550224]Would you do something where 77% of the outcomes result in harm to yourself?[/QUOTE]
If letting your game speak for itself results in you harming yourself you need to take a second look at your game.
I absolutely hate games with ton of dlcs, 1-3 cheap dlcs are nice but when you have the balls to make 1000 dlcs on a train simulator that's asking to get bankrupted.Yes I am looking at you railworks.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550266]But how many times can you count where you didn't buy a game because of a demo? I think there's a lot of selective bias towards demos, with people only remembering the good ones.[/QUOTE]
Many times, which resulted in me not wasting my money. Am I supposed to feel bad because I didn't buy the poor dev's crummy game?
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550224]Would you do something where 77% of the outcomes result in harm to yourself?[/QUOTE]
I wonder if 77% of those times it was because the game was bad, and the demo showed that.
[QUOTE=Fish_poke;39550228]Rental stores exist for a reason.
Expecting a demo is not something people should do. They require extra effort and money that most devs don't have in the modern day regardless of the fact that 7 times out of 9 they actually don't help sales. The only demo in recent times that has convinced me to buy a game is Metal Gear Rising. If I was to go based off the demo of games that I own, I would have never bought Dragon's Dogma.[/QUOTE]
I don't expect a demo, but I think that actively trying to increase sales based on leaving your customers in ignorance is some dirty shit.
Doing good business shouldn't have to be about deceiving your customers.
And no, I don't blame publishers for doing it, because clearly they can get away with it so they have no reason not to. But that doesn't mean I have to be satisfied.
[QUOTE=Funny Hats;39550300]If letting your game speak for itself results in you harming yourself you need to take a second look at your game.[/QUOTE]
Because making a good game is a easy as Obama pressing a button to fix the economy.
There's a lot that goes into the game design process, and once you start it's very costly to stop or change. What may seem like fun on paper might actually not be in execution, but you can't change it without losing a lot of money.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550376]Because making a good game is a easy as Obama pressing a button to fix the economy.
There's a lot that goes into the game design process, and once you start it's very costly to stop or change. What may seem like fun on paper might actually not be in execution, but you can't change it without losing a lot of money.[/QUOTE]
Bad games shouldn't top the sales chart, it ruins the industry and dilutes quality standards. If making a bad game didn't have negative consequences then why would you even bother to try to make a good one?
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550376]Because making a good game is a easy as Obama pressing a button to fix the economy.
There's a lot that goes into the game design process, and once you start it's very costly to stop or change. What may seem like fun on paper might actually not be in execution, but you can't change it without losing a lot of money.[/QUOTE]
I'm not demanding every dev to make a good game, I'm just saying that not releasing a demo shows a lack of trust that your game is good and essentially giving all your customers the ol' bait-and-switch by forcing them to hand over $60 without seeing if it's worth it.
I still Remember the demo of Unreal Tournament 2004. I enjoyed it so much that I bought that game as soon as I had a possibility to do so.
[QUOTE=Im Crimson;39550427]Bad games shouldn't top the sales chart, it ruins the industry and dilutes quality standards. If making a bad game didn't have negative consequences then why would you even bother to try to make a good one?[/QUOTE]
To stand out above the others. I hate pulling this card, but look at Valve games. You might not remember COD 5, but you sure do remember Half-Life.
And it's not like people say one day, "Today I feel like making a bad game." To developers, they feel that their game is good but not everyone feels that way.
[editline]11th February 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=Funny Hats;39550458]I'm not demanding every dev to make a good game, I'm just saying that not releasing a demo shows a lack of trust that your game is good and essentially giving all your customers the ol' bait-and-switch by forcing them to hand over $60 without seeing if it's worth it.[/QUOTE]
But from a business standpoint, why would you risk something with a [i]chance[/i] of very little gain?
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550490]To stand out above the others. I hate pulling this card, but look at Valve games. You might not remember COD 5, but you sure do remember Half-Life.
And it's not like people say one day, "Today I feel like making a bad game." To developers, they feel that their game is good but not everyone feels that way.[/QUOTE]
If they feel like their game is good they should be confident enough to release a demo that convinces people to buy it. Yes I've turned down many a game because of demos, but I've also been convinced by many demos to buy games, like Minecraft and its unintentional free weekend or Skate or MGR.
Many game demos I played did eventually drive me to purchase the full thing.
Except for one. DNF. pre-ordered, got access to the demo, never even finished the damn demo. Cancelled my pre-order the next week.
[QUOTE=Funny Hats;39550524]If they feel like their game is good they should be confident enough to release a demo that convinces people to buy it. Yes I've turned down many a game because of demos, but I've also been convinced by many demos to buy games, like Minecraft and its unintentional free weekend or Skate or MGR.[/QUOTE]
But just because they feel confident about their game, doesn't mean other people will feel the same way. So again, why risk it?
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550490]But from a business standpoint, why would you risk something with a [i]chance[/i] of very little gain?[/QUOTE]
Of course I wouldn't if I didn't think the game was good. If knew I was releasing a bad or mediocre game I would do everything in my power to trick people into buying it.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550490]To stand out above the others. I hate pulling this card, but look at Valve games. You might not remember COD 5, but you sure do remember Half-Life.
And it's not like people say one day, "Today I feel like making a bad game." To developers, they feel that their game is good but not everyone feels that way.
[/QUOTE]
Why should sub-par products be well-received in a competitive market? It's not as if they're necessary. Lesser games do have a right to exist but it's only logical for them to not be as popular, and it's bad for the entire industry to perpetuate bad design and decisions by using marketing tricks to sell sub-par products.
[quote]But from a business standpoint, why would you risk something with a [i]chance[/i] of very little gain?[/quote]
It's about having faith in your product. If you don't consider your product to be competitive even yourself, you shouldn't put it out there in the first place. Naive, but it's how it should be in the best of worlds. It's unethical to market a product that not even the author consider to be good.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550583]But just because they feel confident about their game, doesn't mean other people will feel the same way. So again, why risk it?[/QUOTE]
Because if it's actually, genuinely good, it will help sales more than it hurts them. It's high risk, high reward, but mostly it's an ethical thing.
[QUOTE=Funny Hats;39550603]Because if it's actually, genuinely good, it will help sales more than it hurts them. It's high risk, high reward, but mostly it's an ethical thing.[/QUOTE]
But what if you have a good game, but make a bad demo? It'll only turn people off.
Additionally, the title is confusing.
It sounds like its saying that if Jesse Schell releases a demo for something, it hurts [I]My[/I] game sales.
Or demos that are fun enough where you're content with just playing the demo over and over instead of buying the full game. I can name several times where that happened to me.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550644]But what if you have a good game, but make a bad demo? It'll only turn people off.[/QUOTE]
That's a genuine concern, but having a good game to begin with certainly mitigates the issue...
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550681]Or demos that are fun enough where you're content with just playing the demo over and over instead of buying the full game. I can name several times where that happened to me.[/QUOTE]
... unless you make the mistake of including too much content with the demo, but aside from that this is another case where players likely would have wound up not getting their money's worth. In other words, you either saturated the players with free content or your game isn't good enough to engage for more than a few hours, I.E the amount of good game time the demo could provide.
[QUOTE=Im Crimson;39550829]That's a genuine concern, but having a good game to begin with certainly mitigates the issue...
... unless you make the mistake of including too much content with the demo, but aside from that this is another case where players likely would have wound up not getting their money's worth. In other words, you either saturated the players with free content or your game isn't good enough to engage for more than a few hours, I.E the amount of good game time the demo could provide.[/QUOTE]
It doesn't have to be too much content. I remember playing the demo of Sonic Unleashed over and over because it was a lot of fun, which only had the first level and it didn't have the gimmicky werehog part.
Also, what if you make a bad game, but a good demo?
I've bought games because the demos were good.
Half Life 2
Arma 2
Company of Heroes
Mount and Blade: Warband
Just Cause 2
Dark Messiah
X3: Terran Conflict
Red Orchestra - Free Weekend back in 2007
Chivalry - Free Weekend
Men of War
Crysis 2
Call of Duty: United Offensive
All of those games I've enjoyed immensely. They top my steam hours because I had the oppertunity to try them and see if they were playable. Most games I buy now without a demo I hardly play at all because I didn't have the oppertunity to decide if I liked the game.
To be honest I can only think of 3 games where the demo made me buy it (Crysis, Just Cause 2 and Minecraft Classic) while I can think of many games I didn't buy because of the demo or wouldn't have bought if I had played the demo first.
I like demos, but I understand why there aren't many of them.
[quote]It doesn't have to be too much content. I remember playing the demo of Sonic Unleashed over and over because it was a lot of fun, which only had the first level and it didn't have the gimmicky werehog part.[/quote]
That means you made a too insubstantial game, as I said. You could, for instance, attempted to make a $60 game off a gameplay mechanic that would only hold up a $10 game.
[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;39550984]
Also, what if you make a bad game, but a good demo?[/QUOTE]
If you failed to make a good game I don't see how on earth you'd be able to scrape together a good demo based on that game, seems contradictory. However, even if you do manage to make a good demo based on a mediocre game, you've still provided a better game preview than, say, any TV ads or arranged gameplay videos so (some) power to you for that.
However, one could also say you've committed false advertising again by creating a demo that doesn't reflect the real experience (which is essentially equivalent of not providing any demo at all).
Well to an extent he's right. Making a demo that proves how much of a failure your game is because you can't be bothered to put effort and care into it is actually going to decrease your sales.
i have recently gotten demos for the new Sonic Racing game, metal gear solid 3DS, and Fire emblem awakening, and i must say that out of the three I would only be inclined to buy fire emblem. I didn't like the gameplay of sonic, and the controls of MGS3DS were ridiculous. I thank these demos for existing because otherwise i would have just been really mad that i bought the titles in the first place!
Got a new avatar thanks to this dude
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.