Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yeah, but I bought that game for 30 bucks....and if I could go back, i wouldn't pay 5 bucks for it....I just hated that game....

To me, Dominions offers EVERYTHING that I have wanted in a strategy game, AND, it is fantasy based....but not typical fantasy....original fantasy....

To me, that is worth the ticket....then there is the replayability of it all....

Shadow Magic was just...I don't know, human words simply cannot describe it....it would be more like a painful howl....

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

For a game that requires specific types of computers, such as high-end windows machines, then the price doesnt really matter since I wont need alot of it. For a game that can run on anything, it does matter, at least for me.

I understand that probably there arent alot of people who have many machines hooked up with many people who want to play with each other. For me to replace all my Dom1 copies would take one months retirement check. Im waiting to see what method has been used to balance some races, and what options are in the map editor, before I decide on a full shift to Dom2 games.

But as I said, Im probably not in a group large enough for consideration on whether pricing works or not. Other options that I would have been happy to see would be built-in allowance for home lan as some games have allowing you legally to play an MP game at home with one disc, or bulk discounts, or a cheaper Online method for buying just a CD key which is possible because it involves no production and shipping.

[ November 03, 2003, 13:28: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

I would definitely "deny" myself this game for 10 or 15 bucks. Basically I don't have a lot of money to spend on video games. When a company is charging more than almost any other game out there for it's product I want to know why.

All I can see for why is

1. People will pay for it. They have a core group of rabid fans who will pay any price for their products.

2. They have some distrobution issues they are unable to resolve.

Neither of these reasons warrants such a high price in my opinion. The cost/benefits comes off a bit in the negative by about 5 to 10 bucks.

Somebody asked if the price was a deterrant and so don't flame me for answering that question because for me, YES the price is a deterrant.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Im not disagreeing with your other points but I wanted to point out....
The price of this game was much lower for Dom 1 which was only sold off of the programmers web page. The price for Dom 2 is not really "higher" but is very much like the prices of the other games being offered on Shrapnel game site. Shrapnel is the production company marketing this new Version of the game and is offering experienced advice in this area.

[ November 03, 2003, 17:02: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Bahahhaa, I am very young, so my father will buy the game. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif 30 or 50 I don't care! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

There may be other factors explaining why Dominions II seems expensive for you: Sharpnel is basically selling less games than, say, EA. Less sales result in a higher sell price, even if the costs to make a game are less expensive.

Along the sames lines, either Doug Church or Warren Spector (If you don't know who they are, perhaps you know some of the games they have been involved in: Ultima Underworld, System Shock, the Thief series, Deus Ex, Ultima 7 if memory serves right, to name but a few) said that, while the cost to make Thief were *ten* times higher than for Ultima Underworld, the sales for the game were about the same. You can see there will be a problem somewhere at this rate.

And Tim said that the costs needed just to make the CD and the manual are raising as well with each pasing year. And I would believe other expenses were increased as well. If you haven't read their Posts, I would advise you to do so if you want to know why their games tend to be more expensive. (At least for the inhabitants of the USA. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif )

If that can help you make feel better, Dominions II is a very cheap game by the standards here in France. The average game costs in fact more than Dominions, even if you don't take into account the current exchange rates. (If you say a dollar is equal to an euro, your average costs about 50 to 55 dollars here in France. At the moment it would be somewhere between 60 and 65 dollars.) So as far as I am concerned, Dominions is a cheap game, less expensive than most. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

[ November 03, 2003, 17:54: Message edited by: Alneyan ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Both of these requests seem reasonable.

We've been told that the manual itself costs a lot to print, so it would make sense to offer a "pure CD key" option for a significantly lower price.

And then, all I'd have to do would be convince my girlfriend to play. I'll start with the easy lobbying option, and convince Shrapnel to offer us a BIG discount http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

They use CDkeys too?! Oh my god... I don't patronize bioware or blizzard because of their attack on home lan environments. Guess I'm adding shrapnel to my list of unfriendly money grubbing company's.

Look. I'm not a company making huge profits. I'm not a university paying for everything with grants or a government organization paying with taxes. I'm a guy who works for a living. You people just don't have the right to expect home Users to pay for multiple licenses of software. You just don't, period. Sooner or later that tactic is going to run you guys out of business and I'll be happy to see it happen.

Great game or not, your business practices stink.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">In this case Im not sure there is a choice. The only real protection that Dom1 had was that the host would insult and badly treat players that showed up with the same CD-key. That wasnt a really all-encompasing protection. I dont see an easy way to ignore it for lan and still have it work for internet. (take into account proxies, ram drives, the different ways that lans can be created, etc)

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If ever shrapnelgames forces you to buy and pay 45 USD for a game, I'll be right there besides you, brandishing a sign, sporting a bandana, shouting slogans, climbing barricades and establishing a revolutionary court. Until then I fail to see what your grievance is. If you for various reasons find the game unreasonably priced, don't buy it.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This reasoning is a bit strange to me. How do you arrive at how much a game is worth to you? Do you take the projected hours of entertainment and divide by the cost? Or do you simply decide that no game over $35 is worth the money? Are there other issues involved?

Don't take that as a flame, its not, I'm just curious about the mind set of people who don't think Dom2 is worth $45. Again, we're not talking about how much profit Shrap and Illwinter will make, we're not talking about how much of a margin is 'fair' for them to tack on. We're talking about how much Dom2 is worth to *you*.

Many people have said its worth more than $50, and I assume they base that at least in part on what other games go for in retal ($50+ for new releases), I'm sure that even if everyone did an accurate analysis of what their time/price point is for Dom2 and it came out to $1 and hour they would be loathe to spend $100 on the game while assuming they were going to get 100+ hours out of it.

I dunno, alot of opinions in this thread seem so completely arbitrary to me that they have essentially no value at all.

And what is this bit about companies not having the right to market and sell their games on their terms? Of course they have the right to sell the product however they damn well want to, just as you have the right to not buy the product. You may dislike how CD-Keys affect your Lan parties, but the game maker probably dislikes how they lose customers because not everyone needs to buy the product in the first place to enjoy it. I'm not saying which side I agree with, just that to invoke the 'R' word is seriously misguided.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

licker,

I couldn’t agree with you more.

The problem seems to me that if you own a business you are automatically labeled a money grubbing capitalist pig. It does not matter if you are Microsoft or run a small business out of your home.

-blackwulf

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Hmm. It is too bad not to allow friends to play in the same game from one copy, as long as they aren't taking it home. Especially for getting girlfriends, wives, children, parents, etc. involved. It seems like there might be a reasonable work-around to allow this. At least, to allow them to play multiple nations hot-seat in the same game. That is, allow the same registration number as long as the same network address is used. I guess it would still be a problem for people calling in on dialup accounts with dynamic IP addresses, but maybe other means could establish it was the same computer.

Mmm, another idea - give everyone several "sub" registration codes, but only allow them to be used if their "master" registration code is also in the game. Or, do like many games do, and allow people to play multi-player only, and only if at least one player has a registered copy.

PvK

[ November 03, 2003, 23:47: Message edited by: PvK ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Wow that statment says it all.

Blizzard just recently released a mammoth patch/enhancement for a game that is over two years old. Bioware have developed some of the best games in RPG over the Last decade. Both are dedicated to their customer base and produce award winning titles. However you don't patronize them because you feel that they don't deserve to be paid for each person that enjoys countless hours playing their games.


<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Actually they do have that right. Just like you have the right to spend your money where you want to.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I've not tried hotseat, but you can play on teh same comp no problem I'm assuming.

Sure its nicer to have the Lan, but hey, many people playing on one CD is supported...

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

I fail to understand what is so difficult to grasp about my position. My complaint is simple. I want this game, but I feel like the company's business practice's are unethical. This forces me to pass the product by even though I'd really like to play it. I won't because I refuse to patronize a company that uses cdkeys and charges so much for a 2nd rate product.

Let me explain. I want to play this game. But not as much as I want to play, say, age of wonders shadow magic. From there the math and logic are simple.

Shadow magic works just fine on my lan without any cdkey nonsense so I can play it with my girlfriend. It cost less than 35 dollars.

More use, more fun, less cost. Shadow magic wins. So even though Dom is cool, they lost me with their business ethics.

I do not feel like they should make a profit based on individual solely. Over the internet, sure. But in one's own home with one's family?

Do you really think that is just? To treat a family like it's some corporation with multiple licenses of say, office for word processing?

See, company's make money, so do universities and governments. These are profit based organizations, (please, don't make me argue that point I've seen plenty of examples of both of the later institutions ledgers) they make money.

They make money using another company's software. Since they are profiting from another's company's software there is justice in the idea that the company should pay for multiple licenses.

My household makes no profit. Simply put, although I enjoy games they are a leisure activity. I don't make any money from them. Therefore, to suggest that using multiple instances to get the maximum enjoyment from my game is worth purchasing multiple licenses, NO!

BTW, hot seat sucks. Most company's have mothballed this feature. Waste of time.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Then provide a mechanism whereby it is possible to prevent others (anyone not in your family) from using your copy of Dom2, while at the same time allowing others (anyone in your family) to play the game. Also note that most games that do not force you to play on only one comptuer still have clauses in their licenses that only allow you to play on one computer at a time.

I'm not really seeing why people are complaining about the price anyways, considering that it's right in the middle of normal prices for just-released games. In fact, it's cheaper than the average new release, at $58 CDN, while most sit at $69 CDN or more.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I feel that your position is unrealistic. Additionally the focus of your position has changed. Originally before you discovered that you need to purchase additional copies to play lan games you were simply appalled at the price. Now the major focal point of your reply is that they dare to require that each player own a copy of the game.

It seems that you want them to knock $10-$15 off the game and allow you and all your friends/family to play multiplayer lan games for free. There is nothing wrong with feeling this way. However to wish that someone goes out of business because they don’t agree with your demands is a bit much don’t you think?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">.

Why would you want to purchase a 2nd rate product at any price?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">.

So because you have seen the ledgers of a few companies that have made profits you can infer from this that all businesses are making money?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">.

While I do agree that hot seat is not my favorite . I feel that some people might actually be happy with the option. Simply because it is of no use to you does not make it a waste of time to include.

-blackwulf

[ November 04, 2003, 07:34: Message edited by: blackwulf ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I understand. If you like Doms II less than AOW, play AOW. Different players like different games. I believe Shrapnel when they say they need to sell it at $45 based on their costs and business model.

More importantly, my tastes are the reverse of yours in this case. To me, AOW2 is a marginal product, which I wouldn't pay more than about $10 for, while to me, Doms I and II are the best (and really, the only) games of their type. To me, they're worth $45, or even $30 for the one and $45 for the second (plus shipping, etc). I'll be playing the heck out of them, so they'll be great deals for me, which no other game can substitute for.

Anyway, I understand where you're coming from. Stick with what you like. Hopefully though, you can appreciate that some of us think the Doms games are unique, excellent, and well worth the price Shrapnel needs to charge for them.

PvK

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Watchdog:

You may not like our business practices in respect to software piracy and pricing, but you've got to respect us for letting you come into our 'home', use our bandwidth - which, by the way, is paid for partially by the money we make off of Dominions II - and express your wishes that you hope we go out of business, that our games are second rate, and that our business practices stink. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Also, if we didn't offer copy protection, our license would still only allow you to use the software on one computer at a time. I don't know of one game publisher that doesn't have a license stating this. So your objection is quite hollow, as to play mulit-player, even in your home, would require multiple copies.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I agree with you in general, and think the pricing is fine; why should the best game in it's genre come at a discount?! Moreover those saying the price should be lower have only opinion to back up their claims, which seems rather pale to me in comparison to practical experience.

Still, it's worth pointing out that there is a rather prominent exception to your blanket statement -- Warcraft 2. This let 3 players play in a multiplayer game per CD, but you needed a cd for solo play. IMHO this was a wise move, and probably contributed to Warcraft's popularity and Blizzard's ascension.

Admitedly Warcraft is the sort of game this tactic is perfect for, and Dominions probably isn't...

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

I'll just make one more point and then I'll leave off the topic. In my defense I originally posted with such energy because it looked like the price might actually be re-assigned once shrap saw that many people were posting about not buying the game because it's price to high. I was wrong.

My Last point is this. Software eula's have yet to be tested in court. They look very impressive but many of them contain several fictions that won't stand up if a judge gets involved. That being the case I tend to take their edict with a grain of salt. I don't pirate because I think it's stealing. But installing multiple instances or making backups(this is also prohibited by some licenses I've seen) are things that I will do regardless of whatever licensing stipulations I click on to install the game without actually agreeing to.

Anyway, Last bit from me. Have fun with your game.


PS.. "offer" copy protection......... lol that's a funny way to put it.

[ November 05, 2003, 13:16: Message edited by: Watchdog ]