Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That is your interpretation of the question. Obviously, it's not the same for everyone here.

If Shrapnel's only intent was to make as much money as they could (not saying it is, but that's sometimes one of the goal of commercial companies), they should set the price at the level that will maximize that. Assuming the manufacturing costs are fixed (and yes, they could make it cheaper by offering a "download only" option, though I can understand if they are wary of the possible piracy consequences), the "best" price level is the one that maximizes "profit per unit" times "number of units sold"; increasing the price tag will mean less copies sold, and increasing it too high will undoubtedly mean less profit.

If the answer to "what should the price be" and "how much would you pay for the game" were supposed to be the same, then the question about "is the price right" would be meaningless - the question about how much you'd pay would be enough. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It is my interpretation of the question, as I said elsewhere. However, no where in the questions is there any mention of Shrapnel. And I've said (4 times now) that the only question of importance is the 3rd one, the 1st is misleading at best.

I don't know how to come up with a 'fair' price other than to wind up at a fixed one, there is no 'range' possible for an idividual, either the game is worth x or it isn't. There is no well today is tuesday so the game is worth more to me...

In reality there is because people are fickle, but that's not the *honest* answer, the game has a fixed value at any given point, so either the game is too cheap, or it is too expensive, unless it is just right. You still can't have it both ways!

If they were selling the game for $15 would you say it is too cheap? What about $5? You have a cut off where you will feel that the game is underprices (though you will be happy it is cheap). So if you answer that the game is worth more to you than what it is being sold for (everyone who answered that they'd pay $50+) then the game is underpriced! There is no other way to look at this, that's why I didn't like the wording of the 1st question.

Again, there is no element of how much Shrapnel should charge in this, that is an entirely different question (in my mind). The questions in this poll are about how much you as an idividual are willing to pay for the game, not about how much Shrapnel should charge, becuase none of us have any idea what that number should be.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

I would buy this game immediately if it was a $30.00 download.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">(snipping most of your post)

Once again, you're changing from "this is my interpretation" to "there is no other way".

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">(snipping most of your post)

Once again, you're changing from "this is my interpretation" to "there is no other way". </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes, because the more I thought about it, there is no other way. It is still my interpretation however, namely that there is no other way http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

BTW, software piracy is no more an issue with a CD copy of the program, than it is for a downloaded Version. Are you suggesting that software pirates can't wait for the mail?

MS Office, NT 4.0 and countless others are pirated everyday. And all of them are distributed by CD.

Making Dominions 2 available for dowload will only increase the chance that we'll buy it, while at the same time reducing your costs.

I'm not a hacker or a software pirate, but I am an impulse buyer.

[ October 31, 2003, 17:43: Message edited by: mpace ]

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

The problem with downloads is the bandwith you have to provide and to handle all the cases of corrupted and aborted downloads. It's mainly a technical problem for Shrapnel.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I find this hard to believe, since the demo is being download as we speak. You'll have to come up with a better excuse than that. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Nice Poll, I liked the 3 tiered questions. Also interesting to see how everyone else voted as well.

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Shrapnel does offer download sales of some other games.

There was a post from Shapnel saying they weren't including a digital manual with the demo to make it harder for pirates...

... it was also mentioned that buying Doms II gets you a manual, and someone mentioned full-color item catalog...

... so since we're just wildly conjecturing here, lemme suggest that part of the reason for the $45 price and lack of download is the physical manual. Just an idea.

On the other hand, SE4 Gold is still priced at $39.95. It comes with a pretty good manual, but I expect not as good as the Doms II manual. Dungeon Odyssey is available for $29.95 download... or $29.95 via CD (printable manual only).

I dunno. Personally, I think Doms II is a great deal at $45 if you like the game. It offer huge amounts of fun play time. If you like the game, but don't buy it because the price is $15 higher than you'd like to pay, it seems to me you're just talking yourself out of a lot of fun. There isn't really any similar game available... except Doms I - you can get that for $30, and it's quite good.

PvK

Re: Is the price of Dominions II a deterrent?
 

Actually, Tim Brooks just made a nice post on this topic HERE.

(No color manual, as I conjectured in the Last post. However from other Posts by Psi it sounds like it will be a treasure trove of game mechanics and stats info, which is much better.)

PvK