Why Not Digitial Distribution?

[Tim Brooks]

Hi all. I've been following this thread and thought you should hear the official Shrapnel position with regards to Dominions 3. I will attempt to do this while answering some of what has been said in this thread. I also have a few questions.

A good concept served by the bare minimum acceptable services.

Interesting comment. kasnavada, what would make our services more than the minimum acceptable?

Even forgetting digital distribution (which space empire does), the distribution services doesn't even offer to use "fast" delivery services like UPS or DHL.

Do you really want to get into Space Empires, a game that less than 9 months after release was selling for $10? There's a model we don't care to emulate.

We used to use UPS and Fedex. 1 in every 7 international orders had to be reshipped. That is why we don't use them anymore. Now, on average, we have to reship about 6 packages a year.

However, an option for a faster delivery service than 7 days (or more...) is really needed...

Most packages are delivered within 3-7 days. Any longer is a function of the shipment being held in customs. The same thing happened with both UPS and Fedex.

The cost per copy is higher, but it sells more copies.

This goes to the whole digital distribution model. We have researched this and we use it with a number of our games so we know what is what. The assumption is false when it comes to niche games. A game like Dominions will not sell noticeably more copies. It will just shift a percentage of sales from physical product to digital. And for publishers in niche markets looking to minimize costs this is unacceptable since you will print less physical product and therefore increase costs. Also, distributing a manual in electronic format for a game where the manual is almost a necessity just plays into the pirates hands. Want to know the most searched on term that leads people to Shrapnel Games? 'Dominions 3 Manual'. This accounts for almost one third of all searches that come to our site. We are sort of happy that the pirates have a hard time with the game. Actually that's not true, we are very, very happy that the pirates have a hard time with the game.

Based on the above the only answer would be to go to a totally electronic distribution model. I would love to do this. No inventory hassles, no printers to deal with, fewer employees... the list goes on and on. And one day we may do this, but right now we just don't see it as an option for a game as popular and as niche as Dominions 3. To limit piracy, we would have to go to a system like Steam uses and I personally refuse to do this. I don't think that the person buying the game should be the one penalized for spending their hard earned money in support of our developers.

A thought: Wonder why Steam doesn't sell physical products? I mean, your arguments are we would sell more if we had digital distribution. Wouldn't Steam sell more if they had physical products too? Funny how the digital distribution argument is never turned around.

Want some other interesting facts? We get about 1 support request for every 100 (approximate number) physical games sold. For every download product, we get about 17 support requests for every 100 games sold. Talk about costs. Know what the most expensive single component to a game is? Support. That is why so many of our competitors have such lousy support. So lets do something that increases that cost. In this thread people have talked about getting Dominions cheaper if we had digital distribution. Actually the opposite is true. Digital distributed products cost us more than physically distributed games.

I really want to write more, but have to leave for a meeting now, so I will leave this here and try to get back to it later.

[Agrajag]

First, read the informative post by Tim Brooks

Jazzepi said:
If I could buy this game through digital distro with the same DRM currently in place, I would have, and it would have added value to the product while cutting the amount of money it cost you to sell the game, thus increasing your profits.

As Tim said, it doesn't really decrease costs, but rather increases them.
Furthermore, if we rule out a PDF manual (it's pretty clear that a PDF manual isn't going to happen.), even if we exclude all of Tim's previous arguments, the product becomes more expensive for Shrapnel - the production costs stay the same, while bandwidth and support costs are added. (support for the actual digital distribution service.)
So, you're wrong.
Actually, ignore the support costs, since Tim mentioned them. But still, bandwidth costs

Responses to the following quote are in bold inside the quote.
Also, thanks for all the sarcasm kasnavada, it really makes your post enjoyable

kasnavada said:

Everything but the conclusion is correct. The cost per copy is higher, but it sells more copies.
Yes, but how many of those more expensive sells are actually people that would have bought a physical copy?
We don't have any figures on how many extra sales Dominions would get, and Tim seems to indicate that he has figures to show that a digital distribution will not generate enough extra sales to generate a profit.
And like the tongue-in-cheek example from before, adding cheese and wine with each copy would also increase sales (anyone who would buy the game would still buy it, and more purchases will be generated from people that decide that the extra cheese and wine make the deal desirable enough), but it won't generate extra profit because it will be much more expensive to produce each copy, and the cheese and wine would probably not contribute enough new sells.

Elitist thinking like this does give the game a far worse name that more newbies will. Furthermore, the manual isn't up to date, and many things are not in the manual, which means that if I follow what you say, people already have a bad understanding of the game. And are already giving it a bad name. Finally : you are assuming that people need the manual ? Have it sent by mail even if you buy it online ! Why should disappear all of a sudden ?
read more carefuly, point 1 assumes a manual will be shipped, point 2 does not.
And of course the effect I mentioned isn't that significant but it's there, thanks to the wonderful magic of statistics

... that was the most ridiculous argument ever. It's not pirates you spot, it's idiots. The ones that want to pirate the game and have half a brain working won't speak about the manual at all. And won't be caught by such a simple thing.
You should really spend more time at the forums then

Furthermore, does it also mean that anyone playing the demo, since it doesn't come with the manual, is giving the game a bad name ?
There's a reason it's called a demo.

And, in order to end this argument, ever considered the slight possibility that it might actually be true in some cases ? There is a number of reason why it could be : theft, fire, accidental destruction, lost when moving to another place...
Sure I have, those are common excuses for pirates, so I'm aware of them
But... Your manual being burned is the same as your car being stolen - tough luck as they say.

That is already done by other company and there is no problem with it. Why should it be a problem for shrapnel ? Are they dumber than others or something ? Besides cdkey scams already exist since the game can be resold. It's not a problem associated with digital distribution at all !
They deal with the problem, and dealing with the problem costs them money.

Why ? I mean, That is already done by other company and there is no problem with it. It's just a different writing of argument four. Saying it twice doesn't make it true.
The problem is in switching from one model to the next. It's quite obvious that there are already existing models for Digital Distribution, and there are models for physical only distribution, but they are not the same, so switching from one model to the other will cost money. (And might actually be quite expensive)

Putting the same argument twice doesn't make it more true. More costs ? Yes, obviously. More sales ? yes obviously. I'm among those that believe that the new sales (given what the game is) will lead to more profits that the new costs.
[b]That is your belief. And according to Tim you are probably wrong
And the costs for adding the product to the digital distribution service are not the same as the costs for distributing it over the digital distribution service, which is what I talked about in a previous point, so these are not identical points.

That said, I don't really expect things to change to online distribution. However, I won't stand idle when people say that it is inherently bad, because it isn't. It's different, but not better or worse.
It's better or worse for a specific product.

Well, I'm in the process of waiting for the game to arrive. Which may take up to a month.
It may take up to ten million years

[kasnavada]

Woah, I certainly got more answers than I expected.

Not that I have much more to add anyway, but I'll answer what people ask.

To Tim Brooks :
I said in my post, the bare minimum is (at least for me) what dominions 3 lacks compared to other games in the same category... graphics, UI, AI, shipping possibilities... well AI is a special matter since in most games people think that the AI is weak anyway. And given all possibilities that this particular game proposes it's no wonder that it's easy to outhink it .

I didn't say anything about the music, for example, because it's great. That makes me think that you can do it for the other things that dominions 3 offers.

Well, that means I'll have to comment on your opinion of dominions 3. You say, a niche game. I say : why should it be one ? But comments on this thread (including your answers) makes me believe that dominions 3 wants to remain a niche game, played by a few, known by a few.

I can't help but think : if that or that was better, it might attract more players to try and play the game. It might also be easier to introduce that games to my friends to play with them. It might attract more people, therefore more competition, making the game harder.

That said, I'm nothing but a player. One among many. Some people like the fact that it is a niche game and enjoy playing less known games, because of many personal reasons. And it's not my place to say what the game should be. However, what I can say is what I think could make the game better. And that's what I did.

Do you really want to get into Space Empires, a game that less than 9 months after release was selling for $10? There's a model we don't care to immolate.

That's not what I said, nor want. Actually, I've no complaints about the price. I actually think that some would pay more to get the game faster. What I wanted to say is that I as a customer and probably many others would like the possibility of having to choose how fast the content you sale is shipped.

For example : either ship it with "default" mail service and it comes at reduced price but longer waiting time, or use another one and get it delivered faster (of course the price is higher).

Well, it will make your job less easy and is a selfish demand from some in the playerbase. As justly said above by others, you don't have to obey because I pay for it. I merely suggest it, and I do think it's needed. If you don't, however... well. You certainly have good reasons for it. Reasons that, as a player, I can't know. However, no one's harmed by asking.

(online distribution...)

As for your experience on online distribution, you're saying that it will not sale better, I've got no choice but to believe it.

For your comments on Steam, actually, I'm pretty sure people have been asking for print-outs of the game manuals and live cds and other stuff like this. However, they can answer "we don't do this because so and so company does". For example : for space empire, why should they (steam) sell a hardcopy of the game when you can go to your local game store and buy it ? Or when gamersfront offers the game ? The situation is not the same as Dominions 3 because there are other ways to buy the same product.

Finally, to Agrajag :
About the content of the quotes :
Well, Tim Brooks' post summed it nicely.

About the manual and anti-pirate policy.
I did spend time on the forum and did find the 'I lost my manual' thread. Actually, I'm rather happy I did, because it showed me 2 things : the manual actually is useful (unlike most other games out here), and made me laugh a bit when 1 or 2 pages back the same question was answered because it had no 'I lost my manual' excuse in it.

[Agrajag]

Finally, to Agrajag :
About the content of the quotes :
Well, Tim Brooks' post summed it nicely.

I agree
But I had to respond in spite of Tim's post because I am a follower of the great god Argumemnon and according to our holy Argumentative Codex we are not allowed to "drop" an argument

[Caduceus]

Unfortunately, Argumemnon is a niche god without digital distribution

[llamabeast]

Tim;

Thanks for that answer, that was very satisfactory and thoughtful answer. It's good to see that you've considered the issues carefully and it looks now as if you've taken very sensible decisions.

Also, I just went to dominions3.com to remind myself of how awful it is - and it's been revamped! Hurrah! I don't know how long ago it changed, but when I last looked at it (probably a long time ago to be fair) it was just a "coming soon" page. Now it looks really nice and very professional. The screenshots are well chosen too.

If I may suggest adding another couple of links to the website: a link called "reviews" pointing at the "What they're saying" page on Shrapnel would be an excellent idea (since those reviews are so glowing). Also I'd suggest giving detailed guides and lots of pictures for a couple of races (the guides are pretty much ready in the community and I'm sure people would be happy to let you use them) with little thumbnails for all the other races, showing the amazing range of fascinating things available in the game. The people who like games like Dominions absolutely love reading about such details online, and it would really encourage sales I think. Certainly it would work on me.

Finally a link to a couple of AARs would be good. At the moment there are few high quality AARs around. However, if you said here that you wanted a couple, I'm sure we'd all start beavering away and you could choose the best two and put them up. Seriously, AARs are amazing sales tools, it's very hard to read one for a good game without salivating.

[Don_Seba]

A few comments about Dominions III "weaknesses"...

User Interface - I got used to it. I cannot quite remember if anything ever bothered me... Maybe the left vs right click to move.

AI - Better AI would be great. Not going to happen. What I, as a programmer, would love happening is for Dominions to provide a way for us to build our own AIs and have them fight. It will be way too processor intensive for anything but AI duels, but I would still love it.

Graphics - I have no problem with them. Two sprites, clean and simple. Better camera control, zoom and replay mechanisms would be nice.

Balance - Good considering the variety. With a few glaring problems - wimpy MA Ulm, currently crippled LA Vanheim...

Service - What's wrong with the service?

Shipping - I got both my copies (2 & 3) within a week. I had the demo to keep me busy. I loved it when I could finally check Pythium, which had been impressing me in the demo.

[llamabeast]

Don_Seba: What do you mean about camera control? Do you know PgUp, PgDn and the 4 cursor keys allow you to move it in all 6 directions (plus f for fast forward and n for 'next round')?

The graphics for the sprites are actually largely really very good indeed, once you get used to them being 2D sprites.

I didn't know there was anything wrong with LA Vanheim either.

[sector24]

Tim Brooks: We live like 10 miles from one another, can I buy you a beer sometime?

On a marginally related note, if someone were to compile User Interface improvements would there be any chance of seeing them get considered? Three examples off the top of my head:

1) Commanders should be able to dump all their gems into a lab without using hotkeys or clicking 30 times.
2) Item Transfer Screen: Laboratory should be at the top of the list instead of the bottom. (Requested several times I think)
3) Nation Overview (F1): Cannot sort anything on this screen. Ideal improvement would be for the top row with the column titles to be "locked" and persist when you scroll up and down, and clicking on the title of a column would sort by that column, first, ascending then descending.

Someone also suggested player scores persisting on the score graphs. Very good suggestion. I'm sure every player has 1 or 2 "nitpicks" about the interface that when put together would really serve to improve the game on a significant level. But it's kind of a wasted effort if the current interface is set in stone.

[Jazzepi]

Tim, thank you for responding to the points presented in a meaningful, accurate way. I have two points.

1. I think you overstate the manual as a form of DRM. People get help on the forums all the time. There's a path boosting guide there as well. In game there is a description for every spell that is mostly accurate, every unit's stats can be gotten simply by looking at them. That is to say that not having the manual makes the game more difficult to play, but for someone pirating the game there are plenty of other resources that supplement, replace, and otherwise correct the manual that are readily available on these forums and the dom3 wiki, that you really don't even need the manual.

Actually, your best form of DRM is banning cd-keys from playing online by releasing updates. DOM3 single player leaves a lot to be desired from the AI.

2. You said that the cost of producing the manuals would go up if you starting making PDFs because the size of your manual runs would go down since people would switch over to digital distributions and this would negate any savings from not having to press + print + mail the physical media. Maybe I'm being simple here, but it seems like to me all you would have to do is keep the print run at the same size, the trade off being that you'd have a higher inventory for a longer period of time.

Jazzepi