Dom 3 price...

[vanedor]

I have long been a �moderate� fan of Dom2. Never played it in multi-player but still managed to get a lot of fun from it. I expected to purchase Dom 3 so I tried the demo... but found it was pretty much the same game with *more* of everything. Don't get me wrong, getting more is great. But 55$ for an independant game that feature basically the same engine as Dom2... well, this seems to me quite overpriced. Most AAA games can be bought for less than that at my local EB Games. Especially now that the game has been released over a year ago. Any chance that the price is lowered anytime soon?

[Zeldor]

Use search option, you will find a big recent thread about it that has all the answers.

[Endoperez]

No. This has been discussed previously, and Shrapnel Games' business model is not to lower prices. Most games sold in physical stores make net loss, and only big publishers can afford throwing various games at the market in the hopes that the few good ones make enough money to cover the losses, or something similar.

There are various holiday sales. Try around Valentines, Easter, Christmas etc. Also, the FRAGS! newsletter will inform you about any sales SG has. I never read it much, besides the occassional checking of whether Dom3 is still the best seller. I think it's been on top 3 of Shrapnel Games' best-selling games since it was published.

Besides new nations and spells, there are some interface changes. A screen where you can see income, sites, tax rate, unrest etc of your whole kingdom (and adjust taxes, increase pd etc); little icons for every item commander wears in the map view, ability to set mages to automatically cast site-searching spells, every turn, until they've gone through all your provinces, etc. If the new nations don't interest you, the interface changes won't get you to pick up the game; if you still want to play with more of the same, they probably are worth it. It's still far from perfect, though.

[NTJedi]

I would recommend buying the DOM_3 game. The quantity of *more* means it will have a longer replay value. DOM_3 is one of those games I'll have on my systems for decades of gaming so $55 is a super deal.

The only downside is DOM_3 still has reported major bugs which are listed in red within the bug thread shortlist... which have been around forever with no signs of them getting fixed. So I suggest reviewing the major bugs and then deciding.

My personal opinion is advising to buy the game.

[vanedor]

Sorry for mentioning something often discussed but I guess it means that I'm not the first one who realize that something is not quite right here.

I'm someone who bought in the recent years quite a few independant games. Eschalon, Avernum, Mount and Blades... and all of them are far cheaper than Dominion 3. Sure, the manual might be worth some money... but what about selling a version of the game *without* the manual for 40$?

[MKDELTA]

Dom 2 and 3 are different, in subtle but significant ways. For example, the more limited random magic, and lesser amount of indie mages. Nations feel different due this. Getting Ice Devils for Caelum and such is much harder. Life draining weapons aren't as awesome as before. National summons are a huge big thing for some nations, adding a whole different angle. Or did Dom 2 have them? I don't think so. Not sure. New nations might feel like "more the same", but for example Dom 3 Mictlan, Bandar Log, Lanka, Agartha and Fomoria are a kind of a thing of their own. Especialy the EA ape nation which is really %�#! shoot at start but becomes really awesome once you get enough conjuration and evocation. Watching your research levels up has never been more exciting. Oh yeah, Quickness doesn't let your mages cast two spells in row now.

And so on.

Dom 3 feels like the perfect Dominions game in my opinion. Dom 2 was kind of in-between. It didn't have the eldritch misanthropic mysticism of Dom 1 and it's intricate but mind-defying interface, neither it had the (relative) easy and barrels' o features of Dominions 3. In retrospect, Dom 2 was something of a disapointment. Even it's interface was like a spreadsheet or an operating table. Dom 3 interface is prettier. Warmer earth tones and all that. But I digress. Dom 3 3.10 is just awesome. It feels great to play. Some things remain the same as they have ever been. Undead creatures kill everyone dead, blood magic is awesome when you can use, Ulm still gets kicked around and so on. Perversely MA Caelum is now considered a weak nation...heh.

[Meglobob]

Watch out for shrapnel special offers on gamers front, as already mentioned. They had one before xmas, you could get 15% - 20% off if I remember, it takes it to $40'ish dollars. You will never get the price reduced below this however.

The money I spent on Dom3 was the biggest bargain ever, sometimes you after pay top dollar for pure quality.

[LDiCesare]

Comparing Dom 3 to Avernum, I 'd say that the price of Dom 3 is not exaggerated. Spiderweb software requires you to buy hints manuals for instance, without which you may be unable to finish the game, whereas Dom 3 ships with a manual that happens to be useful, and has more replay value than Avernum.

I thought I'd mention ageing among the new things in Dom 3 over Dom 2. Can be quite significant in terms of gameplay.

And I can't understand why an indep game ought to be cheaper than a AAA game. If you enjoy Dom 3, you're likely to spend more hours on it than most games that are cheaper.

[Saulot]

This is pretty much econ 101 or even Junior High Econ. IMHO they seem to operating at the optimal price for maximum profit. X (amount of units sold) at Y (profit per unit) for Z dollars (total profit). Do you really imagine they would more than double their sales if they cut the price in half or do something else with X and Y to create a larger Z? I very much doubt it. If you consider as well the holiday sales to lure the bargain hunters out there, they're doing the correct strategy.

I very much dislike the arguments for indie games being priced arbitrarily less than regular games (ie. because less people worked on them/less money was thrown at the game/less graphics/whatever) or more than regular games (it is niche, so you must pay more because your tastes/preferences are less important than those of the majority). I'm a big fan of they should charge what they can to max profit. If the game is good, people will buy it, and they can make more of them. If the game is bad, well, at least it points out what you shouldn't do in game development, and creates contrast for the good.

[Endoperez]

NTJedi said:The only downside is DOM_3 still has reported major bugs which are listed in red within the bug thread shortlist... which have been around forever with no signs of them getting fixed. So I suggest reviewing the major bugs and then deciding.

Eh? There aren't that many major red bugs. And some of them are fixed each patch. As an example, I counted 22 red bugs in the shortlist, and 5 of them should be fixed in the next version according to the progress page (vanishing scales/dominion spread from corrupted geotables, the 3 ritual-casting items and the 'y'-key bug).