Fairplay Campaign for lower-priced videogames

[MankeyMan]

If you want to see games reduced in price, now’s your chance to actually do something about it. You might never get another one. A variety of banners are available from the “Action” page – stick one on your site. Talk about the campaign. Tell your local press. Tell the national press. Write letters to papers and magazines. Post messages in relevant forums you read. Send us useful information (reliable sales stats for ANY leisure-culture items, ie movies, CDs, books are especially welcome, but anything you think might be helpful, up to and including secretly-obtained photographs of the President of Sony shagging a chicken). If you know any developers, or if you are one, give us a quote we can add to the site. Organise a leafletting campaign outside your local game stores before or during the boycott (leaflets ready for printing out are also available on the “Action” page). Do other things that we haven’t thought of.

Most importantly, join the boycott. We’re not asking you to give up on the game you’ve been looking forward to for months. All we’re asking is that you buy it before 1st December or after 8th December.

If enough people join the campaign, it WILL succeed. Now that’s a big “if”, of course. But you can either sit around on the sidelines whingeing quietly, achieving nothing, and paying £40($60) for games until the end of time; or you can make this incredibly small effort now and stand a chance of changing the world of videogames forever. It’s your choice.

http://www.fairplay-campaign.co.uk

[Captain Wrong]

Although I agree wholeheartedly with your sentiments, I gotta play devil's advocate for a moment.

*climbs on soapbox*

Most people are more than content to sit around and bitch about the price of things (be it games, or cds or whatever) while continuing to support the system. If the public at large really and truly believed that games were overpriced, there would be a lot less people who still bought games at full price or new. The sad fact is, the price of videogames isn't really a big enough concern to most people to change their buying habits. People will complain about things, but when it comes to putting their money where their mouths are and potentially doing without, a majority of people shut up and open their wallets.

If more people honestly felt games were overpriced, they would not buy games at full retail. Pre-ordering games would stop. People would wait for the price drop that almost always comes after a few months. Used game sales would go up. Etc., etc.

This is an industry based on hype. You gotta have the newest and greatest and you gotta have it first. There's a reason they hype continues and that is because it works.

A one week boycott would be difficult to organize and really wouldn't send out a message other than "we'll wait until next week to buy your games again." What kind of message does that send? Who wins there?

And what next? Another boycott in the future? Going one week without buying high priced games seems half hearted and short sighted to me. Besides, I think most people (not on this board mind you, but the public at large) are hooked in to the hype so much, they wouldn't participate in something like this anyway, assuming they even knew it was happening in the first place. (It's easy to get lost on the web.)

Yes, I think new games are overpriced, so I don't buy them. Simple as that. If I want a new game, I wait until I find it used or until the price drops. Usually by the time that happens, I've forgotten about it anyway as it's been replaced by the next newest and best which I won't pay full retail for either.

My point is this, games are not in fact overpriced because the market continues to support them at the price they are selling for. However, to me they are overpriced and I choose not to participate in that system, instead waiting until they come down to a price I am willing to pay. So long as games continue to sell in the numbers they do at the price they do, it's not going to change.

I don't think a boycott is going to change that, unless everyone who has GTA Vice City on pre-order suddenly canceled and refused to buy it until the price dropped. But I really don't see that happening.

Until more consumers are unhappy enough with the current prices to PERMANTENTLY change their purchasing habits, with no exceptions, the system will continue to function as it does and prices will stand as they are. People can complain all they want (not saying you are, but people in general) but until they are ready to stop shelling out top dollar once and for all even if it means not getting the game right when it comes out or potnetially not getting it ever, things are not going to change.

*steps down*

Thank you.

(PS you can change every instance of game for CD and that's pretty much how I feel about the music industry as well.)

[omnedon]

*golf clap*

[congobongo]

Let's not forget how the use of mod-chips to play bootlegs contributes to the price of games indirectly as well.

Do I think retailers would drop the price if everyone sudden stopped using mod chips? No.

Am I completely innocent in this regard? No.

But the less money that trickles down to the developers, the more they have to compensate for. Most of the time I don't mind waiting a month to get a game at a reasonable price. As far as duped games and CDs go, I don't mind paying for it as long as it's something I really like. Also, I used to download all kinds of music and burn CDs and now I'm just way too lazy. My time is more valuable than the money I save wasting time on that.

[ianoid]

Sorry, Video Games are already cheap. The resale market is massive, and if you can wait a year, you can pay half of what you might for new stuff. And sadly, none of that money goes to the developer. No matter! They have to support the 50 person squads that make the games nowadays.

I have no problem with paying $50 for 40 hours of entertainment. And if you buy crappy games and get less than that, try reading some reviews.

The fact is I only rarely buy new games. I plan to buy 3 games when they come out, and I may not even do that: Vice City, Tony Hawk 4, and maybe MOH: Frontline for Xbox. The first two I can't wait for. MOH:Frontline for Xbox I probably will wait for, since I know it's silly to have 3 games that I will put at least 35 hours into apiece.

Now if you want to campaign for lowering the prices of anything, I would go with CDs (promises, promises- what a FAT and GREEDY industry- the music biz), Movies (it is expensive to operate a movie theatre, but $9 for a movie? I can't even get a ticket on a weekend night.)

ian, unsympathetic

[geelw]

that and the fact that:

small retailers make shit on systems and only clear a small profit on games:

e.g. ps2 systems cost us $196
new titles like gta vice city or the thing cost about $40-$43 (retail $49.99)

ps2 greatest hits cost about $16-$17 (retail $19.99)

ouch... :mad:

[Nature Boy]

I'm guessing MankeyMan is a bit suprised by the posts so far.

But I have to agree with everybody. Games are a luxury item. You don't have to buy them brand new if you don't want to. You'd think, by listening to the guys at EB, that the world will end if you don't preorder GTA: VC because you won't get it. Guess what. It won't.

I've actually noticed that the price of games has gone down lately anyway. New games used to be $75-$80 (Canadian). I'm noticing new stuff like Sly Cooper selling for $60 from day one.

And I chalk that up to the Xbox/Gamecube/PS2 competition. The best thing we can hope for is three healthy competitors until the next generation (and in the next generation).

[bargora]

Yes, I think new games are overpriced, so I don't buy them. Simple as that. If I want a new game, I wait until I find it used or until the price drops. Usually by the time that happens, I've forgotten about it anyway as it's been replaced by the next newest and best which I won't pay full retail for either.

Well said. I was *literally* LOLing. Just not too loud, or the guy in the next office would wonder what I was doing.

And hell yeah. I'm so cheap that I am *refusing* to pay more than $12 for a complete used copy of Twisted Metal: Black. And I'll get it, too, just not right now. Of course, since I have a huge stack of used games (spanning the last 25 years) just waiting for me to play them (for the first time), there's no big hurry!

And another thing. Every once in a while I see somebody preaching against the used game market because no portion of the second sale goes to the developer. The thing is, these morons never consider that people who sell their games usually don't just stop playing games altogether. No, they sell their games because they are impatient to play the new Mario the Hedgicoot Kart Shooter (EX Alpha) and need the dough. When I buy a used game I fully appreciate that I am indirectly contributing to the primary market via some impatient gamer by *financing* his purchase of a new high-priced game. And if he had the poor sense to do a Funco trade-in rather than auctioning it to me directly on ebay, then I also get a chance to support Barnes & Noble's fine videogame franchise monopoly, where you can reserve Madden 2049er.

[MankeyMan]

Hmm, I need to be more detailed.
I never buy new games, because there is always something else that I want, or I don't want to risk the chance that I might not like it. And I'm a 'hardcore' gamer, as it were. But there are many people, who buy a couple of games a year. Most people would by more if the games were cheaper. I know I buy a hell of a lot more new CD's than games because I know that I won't have wasted a load of money if I don't like it, which is the exact opposite of a game.
If games were lowered in price, then people would be more likely to go out on a whim and buy more games. It would also introduce more people who previously didn't buy games because of their price the chance to try them out, which wouldn't be at all bad for the industry.
It just seems that developers and manufacturers are too afraid to lower prices because they can't see the good side to it, and because they are happy to let all their crap games flop like a fish as long as their big-names make the money they need.

[Mr. NEStalgia]

I have to say that I think new games are overpriced. I just dont see how 4 cd's can cost as much as a system. It just doesn't make any sense to me.

On that note, I am just leaving to go buy Sly Cooper for PS2 for $40 :P lol

-=Mr. NEStalgia=-