what about the future?

[Soyweiser]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

FWIW: http://www.next-gen.biz/features/val...-too-expensive

"Discounting games does not only increase unit sales--it increases actual revenues. During the 16-day sale window over the holidays, third-parties were given a choice as to how severely they would discount their games. Those that discounted their games by 10 percent saw a 35% uptick in sales--that's dollars, not units. A 25 percent discount meant a 245 percent increase in sales. Dropping the price by 50 percent meant a sales increase of 320 percent. And a 75 percent decrease in the price point generated a 1,470 percent increase in sales."

Of course, it helps if people actually know you exist, (ie, Steam has a much higher profile than Shrapnel) - that's where advertising comes in.

One of the biggest developers does this and gets LOADS of press, for games that already are hugely popular before. Valve and L4D are huge, both in PR and amount of gamers who like it. (And zombies always sell of course ).

Question is, does the lower price help? Or the fact that it was expensive before and is now on sale?

What works for Valve doesn't have to work for a small developer. You can only do this if your potential consumer base is already large enough. Advertisement is pretty hard you know.

Ps, incoming Jeff Vogel fanboyism
http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2009/...-big-sale.html
"So the only real moral of the story is that people like sales. Not a shock."

http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2009/...more-pt-2.html
""If You Charged Less, You Would Sell More Copies"

This is true. The problem is that I won't sell enough more to justify the lower prices.

Microeconomics tells us that as we charge less, we sell more, but we make less per sale. At some point, there is a best price, a point where (number of sales) * (profit per sale) is at its maximum. The question is, where is it? Based on my experiences shifting prices up and down, I think I'm actually at the sweet spot."

http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2009/...more-pt-1.html
"Now don't get me wrong. Some games (casual quickies, simple puzzle games) should be inexpensive. But everyone (retailers, reviewers, customers) is enabling a mindset where all games, even the niche products and larger, deeper, less casual titles, are expected to be desperately cheap. This is not going to help developers stay in business. This is not how a healthy industry is maintained."