Honestly, if the idea of no trials don’t bother you, there are plenty more reminders why YOU shouldn’t preorder.
Developer here - currently indie but was in the machine at one point. Cold hard fact is that demos hurt sales for AAA games, and pre-orders get cash in the door today to keep the lights on. With millions and years invested, they must hedge and limit risk as hard and as quickly as possible.
If demos hurt sales, that means that game devs depend on gamers buying games they don’t actually end up liking right? I understand making games has become pricier and pricier, but if the whole business model is dependent on “We want to trick people into getting stuff they don’t want”, then we have a problem.
The reality is probably closer to the flightily nature of us as gamers - We mostly just want to try the game because some part of it seems fun, if that can be tried for free with a demo, why buy it now that we got our fix? Why would a big AAA take that risk?
If people get enough from a free demo maybe it’s time to make shorter cheaper games, and start churning out 2 hour playtrough 15usd games, but with high quality graphics/acting/voices/etc. Or just abolish capitalism and make fun games no matter if they sell or not 😂
If a demo is enough of a fix for a customer, then that’s got to mean that something wrong with the product overall.
Good games keep you engaged, bad games you leave alone.
I personally agree with that sentiment. Rather than demos, I lean into cheap early access indie games that seem cool on steam, and use subscriptions to check out bigger games (humble choice and xbox gamepass). Tons of games to try, while still less than one “full” game in cost each month.
Companies 100% have a right to skip demos and sell pre-orders. And people have a right to boycott those.
Absolutely! The numbers show they gain roughly double the sales with trailers/footage and no demo, they won’t budge until boycotts reverses that. Same with microtransactions we all hate; they basically just print money.
I don’t really understand how this is measured? I attempted to look up some research on it, but it seems most articles that say this are referencing one conference by Jesse Schnell who basically just correlated games with demos, sales, and expected sales. What measure is used to figure out if a demo causes someone to not buy the game? I suppose if they measured presales that were cancelled after a demo, but most anticipated games don’t have demos anyway so the data is already skewed in the favor of “no demos.” Does it take into account outliers like FFXVI? Highly anticipated game with a demo that sold very well…
I would venture to guess that the data is skewed because lots of AAA games don’t have demos and lots of indie games that might not have been purchased anyways trying to get a little markershare, but there seems to be such little research on it.
If you have an actual study on the topic, I would be very interested in seeing their method of results.
The study was they tracked sales across multiple games for years, here’s the first example I came across in the wild from ten years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us6OPbYtKBM&t=640s
I think it’s an age thing a lot of times. It’s like telling my kids to brush their teeth because of my experiences with dental, or you can plug any example like that.
I can tell kids not to preorder all I want. They just haven’t had the opportunity to be burned as many times as we have yet.
I think a lot of gamers just don’t care enough too. I know so many people that buy a game on release, play it for a few hours, and then drop it. Even AAA titles that are actually good.
Steam achievements kinda confirm that as well, there is a fair bit of drop-off on even the most popular games.
This isn’t a kids thing, we’ve been pre-ordering games since before today’s kids were born
yeah, when we were kids ourselves. But after getting burned we stopped.
deleted by creator
I did a quick search and couldn’t find anything that breaks down by age sadly. I really hope someone has the stats cause it would be fascinating to see.
I don’t have the figures either but when I think which age group could have the money to actually preorder a game on a whim without knowing if it will be good, then it really isn’t kids but working adults.
It made some sense when they came in physical format and there was a real risk of a highly sought game selling out. Nowadays they have put worthless digital incentives on preorders and they can’t possibly run out.
It didn’t make sense to me that people are pre-ordering digital copies at first too, then I remember mtx and streamers which didn’t exist back then.
It’s the boiling frog syndrome. Gradual implementation of predatory monetization practices like mtx and gachas have made us grown numb to being treated like cash cows for unfinished products.
The latest generation of gamers probably see this as a norm. It’s up to us oldies to remind them about the good ol’ days when you only pay once for finished products.
I mean, I usually buy physical and sometimes they do run out. Metroid prime remastered for instance was a pain to get. Granted it’s probably not the norm but it happens.
I think it’s an age thing a lot of times.
I don’t have numbers but I bet that a lot of people who preorder aren’t kids but adults with a proper income. Kids as a group don’t have the income to uphold the current presale figures, that’s done by working adults who can afford to preorder a game and take the not so small risk that it’s utterly shit.
If I want I could preoder a lot of games that come out this year without having to worry about the waste of money to much. I doubt that any regular kid can do that.
It’s funny when you get older how much you realize experience is what drives behavior. You can tell a child 100 times about something, but until they experience it themselves, your warnings more often than not will fall on deaf ears.
Hey it’s Lemmy, so I will happily use this opportunity to blame rich people as well. I know people doing very well for themselves, who constantly, say, “yeah it sucks, but I’ve got the money and it doesn’t hurt me so who cares?”
Because they’re so completely unable to to think of ANYONE else in a different situation, or even remember their younger selves, that they will continue to incentivize predatory behavior because “fuck you, I got mine”, and they’re such huge pieces of self involved shit that they won’t delay their gratification for a split second to help out an entire industry’s consumers.
If that sound harsh, it’s been a shit day full of people just like that; decide on your own if it applies here.
Financially, preorders without a “preorder bonus” are a zero interest loan to the developer. Preorders with the “preorder bonus” are a loan with the bonus as interest. Even if the game were guaranteed to be good, you could most likely be doing something better with the money until it comes out. Since the game is not guaranteed to be good, it is a risky loan as well. Without any of the protections you get when you make an actual loan.
Without any of the protections you get when you make an actual loan.
I’d say a 100% refund when requested with less than two hours of use within the first two weeks is a pretty good protection, and it’s pretty much the standard policy on PC.
That’s certainly true. I’d still say that for the online stores, for which that policy applies, there isn’t a lot of upside to preordering. Because the purchase is digital, you will always be able to get a copy on release day (unless the publisher artificially limits how many games it will sell, but I’ve never heard of a publisher doing this).
I would also guess the people doing preorders comparatively aren’t the ones who are the harshest critics of the game and are more likely to enjoy the experience.
The caveat being that this would not be true if the game is a buggy mess that isn’t uncommon on launch these days.
I used to keep my Galactic Edition copy of Spore on my shelf as a reminder to not preorder games.
Didn’t you like spore? I thought it was awesome! Maybe because I was I kid when I played it though
So, full disclosure, I do look back on it nostalgically now. I was in high school when it came out. I was incredibly invested in the hype. I would watch the tech demos of it multiple times a week I think. It wasn’t so much that it was bad, more that it heavily under delivered on what was shown in demos.
I never saw a trailer/a developer interview (I didn’t have access to easy internet at the time) and I only learned about it though a review on a printed game magazine (I miss those, even if they were expensive) that rated it quite highly. So I didn’t have any expectations and I had a blast playing it! I wonder how a sequel would have been, from time to time.
My Copy of Alien: Colonial Marines would like to have a word with your copy of Spore.
Fallout76 is my reminder, it was an expensive lesson, but one that needed teaching.
I agree with this; we used to pre-order back when physical copies were the only way to get a game, in order to reserve a copy. Now they use it to squeeze extra money out of you for “exclusive content.” As somebody who is as militantly against exclusive content (because it screws over late adopters) as always-online content, I can’t agree enough that digital pre-ordering needs to die.
I don’t pre-order games nor do I really buy any games new.
I mean why should I when I can buy complete version of the game for like 10-20 bucks 1-3 years later. Honestly I’ve simply discarded the idea of being consumer and shifted to thinking myself as customer instead. Its not my job to support the developers and keep their studios afloat its their job by making good games that are actually worth their price tag.
I already have backlog of games that would take years clear thanks to steam sales, playstation plus and all sorts of bundle offers. I am in no hurry to buy new games and I can easily wait for the developers to actually finish the game and buy the GOTY/Ultimate/Definite edition that includes most if not all the expansions and dlc for a discounted price.
As for free 2 play and live service games I simply don’t have the time and interest to play those. If I ever make an exception to this then I’ll be using only default skins/cosmetics, no gatcha and ignoring the battle pass completely.
Its not my job to support the developers and keep their studios afloat its their job by making good games that are actually worth their price tag.
That’s fine and all, but it goes both ways. If you’re gonna wait years to maybe buy their game, then they’re not going to cater to what you want.
There’s a middle ground imo. If I love a certain type of game, I’m gonna buy it relatively new to show my support. If you don’t do that, then you’re essentially a bottom of the barrel afterthought that the market simply won’t cater to.
I don’t view myself as some sort of unique snowflake that has somehow developer some sort of unique and refined taste in video games. I also belong to the most catered majority in video game industry which is white heterosexual men in their 30’s. Honestly it would probably be better if the industry would cater less to my interests as I feel beyond spoiled with choice already.
If you want to support some independent gaming studio with handful of passionate developers making niche games of great quality without relying on dark patterns then please do so. But don’t lie to yourself about these bigger corporations as all they really care about generating profits for their shareholders.
All that literally every business that has ever existed cares about is profits. Businesses aren’t charities. People don’t work for free.
All that literally every business that has ever existed cares about is profits. Businesses aren’t charities. People don’t work for free.
Well one thing related to profits that businesses care about above all else is cost effiency. In market economy if a produt or service can be made more cheaply and more efficiently without employing any people then there’s no incentive to keep people employed.
There’s also quite a difference in some small business with handful of employees that is content with just making some money to keep roof over their heads, food on the table and cover the cost of other necessities compared to some huge multinational corporation where most money goes pretty much everywhere but the developers like to fund the already lavish lifestyles of the filthy rich, tax havens and developing the next get set of dark patterns to leech even more money from customers.
There is no small business on this planet that would not accept higher profits with no costs to them or disruption in their customer base.
Sure and almost all large corporations where small businesses at first until the grew to their current size. The problems usually arise when they hit a wall with their growth and have to start looking for more ways to grow. Often this happens by buying off the competition and eventually enshittification or something like it.
This is not always the chase and there are quite a few independent developers that just spend those profits to make new better games or just keep improving their one successful title.
when I can buy complete version of the game for like 10-20 bucks 1-3 years later
…or, for like 1-3 bucks 10-20 years later.
Life is short, but not that short.
I don’t bother pre-ordering anymore. Can’t afford to. Most AAA games are £60-£70 on release (up to £90 if you want the Upgraded Super Deluxe Gold version). I wait until a game goes on sale before I buy it. By then all the bugs have been patched and most of the DLC has been released so you get a better experience.
I wanna talk about DLC. I bought a physical copy of Fire Emblem Engage. I also bought the DLC. I had to go out to take someone somewhere and wait, so I brought my Switch. The game was running before I left home. Had to connect to the internet to resume the game while I was waiting for the person.
Your primary Switch shouldn’t need to do that, and it also would have done it if you didn’t get the DLC. It is dumb that it basically requires internet access for all your additional Switches to operate, and it actually promotes you marking your travel switch as the primary device while the actual primary device sits at home where you always have internet access.
It is my primary. I haven’t played the game on any other console.
Edit: it might not be. My old console might still be considered primary. Shame you can’t see it on the website, but I need to charge it to check.
I pretty much don’t even buy a game after it’s been launched now and I wait a couple of months to see what happens. They haven’t bought out a game since Halo that I’ve cared enough about to even buy on day 1 and it’s not like I don’t have a fat library of other games I already enjoy.
I stopped preordering awhile ago but honestly I just stopped buying games in general. I already have enough games to last me a lifetime and there is just so much trash getting released that I skip it all together.
I miss the age of videogame demos, it feels like nothing but a distant memory now. And the only reason companies let people play their broken betas now is to gauge excitement for their games and fix any serious game breaking bugs.
Eh.
On the flip side, back in the day, a lot of people bought a lot of crappy games based on nothing more than what the cover art on the box showed. The only source of info was video game magazines, and that applied only to new releases and only certain games.
Now upon release you can look up dozens of detailed reviews, even video reviews. You can watch full play through a on YouTube. You can ask for opinions in social media.
The amount of information you have to figure out if this game is for you is insane compared to before.
Depends really. Nowadays publishers push out fake CGI marketing trailers and paid reviews to premptively muddy those information sources long before release. Same goes for social media (not that they were ever reliably accurate or objective anyway). There are even promises of DLC roadmaps that never materialise such as the OW2 story mode.
By the time actual independent reviewers have their embargoes lifted, the preorder sales window has closed and it wouldn’t make much difference to those who already sunk money into the game. Those waiting in vain for DLC and patches are merely sacrificing their refund window.
That’s true. I understand.
I’m also not a fan of the DLC and change to video game design based on such payouts.
But even then, even with fake reviews, young gamers are completely spoiled with information compared to the black hole that existed in the 80s and 90s. I’m not sure how people argue otherwise.
The fact that I can go on my phone, jump on YouTube, and watch a play through is incredible. When I was young, I had to make decisions based on what the box art looked like ffs.
I miss the age of videogame demos
Fuck the corps. That’s what piracy is for.
Pirating big games is probably morally fine. Pirating indie games is shitty, like stealing from a local business.
He is not talking about actual piracy though. Piracy for try-before-you-buy’s sake is even more morally fine.
We may just have very different tastes in gaming, but there’s really no shortage of solid game demos out there, they’re just usually for the indie stuff.
Yeah, I mentioned that to another person, Steam Next Fest was great this year, I got to try out a bunch of awesome games. But like if we’re talking triple A, or even just games on consoles demos are just a resource sink for a lot of these companies and don’t exist. When there’s a demo there’s usually a lot of marketing push behind it.
Honestly it’s been more incentive for me to move away from the AAA stuff and lean way more indie. They have demos, deep sales, and they make an effort to engage with the community. It is a bummer the lack of demos available on consoles though.
for some reason indie games still seem to have demos semi-often, especially if you check their itch.io pages.
I miss the age of videogame demos, it feels like nothing but a distant memory now.
No it isn’t! With Steam you can try most (if not every) game for 2h and return it if you didn’t like it.
That’s not a demo, that’s a return policy. Plus, in most cases you don’t get a good feel of a game in the first 2 hours of the game. A demo is a snippet of the game made specifically to let people get accustomed to most of the mechanics in a game, something that isn’t usually present in the first two hours.
You could’ve easily said Steam Next Fest and I would’ve agreed with you. Indie devs are the only ones who seem to care about their players these days.
Can someone unbiasly tell me whats the point of preordering a digital copy?
People mostly pre-order for the add ons they put in. It’s not uncommon for pre-orders to get beta access, or early access. Sometimes they get even greedier and tie that into the next tier up so you’ll pay $80-100 for the game. People don’t like to wait/get hit with fomo when they see everyone playing the game already.
I’m sure it varies from person to person, but as far as I can tell it’s some combination of FOMO, peer pressure, and virtual dick measuring
It’s installed when I want to play it. Usually the counter I hear is that internet is fast enough where that isn’t a problem. This is an argument, that gamers use to contend when the idea of online only was considered by Microsoft. The fact that I can preinstall 100GB of data beforehand at my leisure is worth it.
Especially now considering that steam offers free refunds up to 2 hours of gametime or 15 days after release? Realistically on PC there is very little reason to argue against it at this point in my opinion (obviously this is referring to PC, no need to do that for Consoles that don’t provide these opportunities.
This isn’t really a pro preorder, I just lost my frustrations with it when the risk was mitigated
I miss the days of game demos
Steam’s Next fest has brought back some demos on PC. You might not get a demo for a big IP, but you can try lots of smaller dev games without having to buy first.
Yeah idk why anyone is still pre-ordering games.
The fact that you can “pre-buy” a digital game is insane to me!
Like what’s the point! You still can’t play it until it comes out!
If it allows you to pre-download it so you can play as soon as it’s available it makes some sense.
That’s what I thought. But after pre-ordering a game recently, when I went to launch, the process of unpacking/unencrypting took at least as long as downloading the thing from scratch.
So if you’ve a good internet connection and a mid cpu like me, pre-downloading is not an advantage.
And games these days are digital copies. It’s not like the supply is limited.
Last time I pre-ordered a game was Diablo 3. I could choose a hard copy for RSP or a digital copy for an extra “convenience fee”. As if that wasn’t ridiculous enogh, I ordered the hard copy and on release day, they told me that I was on a queue since so many people pre-ordered and they ran out of copies.
I tried to cancel my pre-order and these actual scumbags told me, I couldn’t cancel until I received my copy. Pristine customer support, I really felt they did everything to accomodate my needs. So, I contacted Actiblizz to let them know about the practices of their “official reseller” and the next day, my pre-order was canceled and my money was being wired back.
Also the game was trash, but that’s besides the point.
Diablo 3 was also the last game I pre-ordered. I took the day off work on release day, had the game downloaded, and spent the next 14 hours on an error screen because their servers were overloaded for an always online SINGLE PLAYER GAME!
Fucking bullshit.
I may be mistaken but isn’t Diablo 4 also force online?
It is tragically.
Worst is, “buying” digital games off a store/launcher doesn’t mean you own it.
Technically you didn’t own the games you bought on physical media, either.
But you own the physical media it’s on, meaning the “license” to own it can be traded, sold, etc.
I said “technically”. What more do you want from me?
You can move your games to a different folder, the storefront won’t be able to remove them. But that requires you to download all your games and keep them stored somewhere.
I have a few games I do that with.
