tomwaits

With so many of last year's 'B' titles going on $5-$10 clearance at major chains, doesn't it seem like there might be a return of the early 80's videogame crash on the way?

Too many games being released, and retailers are getting stuck with excess inventory. So much extra that they're willing to sell six month old inventory at a major loss just to get rid of it.

These stores probably won't be stocking nearly as many 'B' titles and much lower quantities of all titles this year. These clearance sales may be a warning sign that the games industry will see a major decline in 2004.

xVladx

It's not like the declining sales are an industry wide thing. The Gran Turismos, Metal Gears, Grand Theft Autos, etc, are all selling quite well. Yes, the lesser known titles tend to fall under the radar, regardless of quality (I'm still annoyed that a sequel to Frequency/Amplitude is looking less than likely), and that is a bit of a problem, but the industry is hardly in a decline.

mrglass

I think game companies need to rethink their pricing strategy. How many of us will turn our noses up at a game priced at $49.99, but will give it a second look if it's priced $29.99 and lower?

fujishig

The excessive markdown on some of these games does have me worried. I'm used to seeing clearance at around 15-20 bucks, but not 5-10. I wonder why Bestbuy especially didn't just markdown some games to 20? I'm sure they would've moved them. And the problem with CC is that, in my experience, they don't update the shelftags...

What REALLY worries me is that the buying public doesn't seem to recognize some really great (IMHO) games. Beyond Good and Evil, down to 10-15 bucks. Prince of Persia, they had to bundle in Splinter Cell for free, and I still see some of them on the shelves. The ESPN franchise struggling to gain a foothold against almighty EA Sports. Meanwhile, sequels and licensed games are flying off the shelves. What incentive is there for developers to spend the time and effort to make a truly original, great game, when you can just spend some money on a license (see: matrix) or pump out a sequel to an established series and pretty much guarantee a hit?

I don't think we'll ever have a crash like we did earlier, though. Too many people playing games, and having grown up playing games, and too big of an investment by big companies for it to just go away. And it's still not as bad as the computer gaming industry, where if you're not a hit in the first couple of weeks, you're dead in the water.

DVD Josh

I didn't even consider buying 13 or Robotech until it hit $10.

asianxcore

Beyond Good and Evil comes to mind. It was probably my favorite game of 2003, and currently one of my favorite games now. It sucked to see it drop so low (9.99 at one point) for people to give it a look. Defiantely underated overall.

and I'm not too worried bout those clearances. especially in the case of CC and KB. Just because that huge CC clearance that went down during Xmas of last year was a ton of games that werent so good, but some that were. KB, well kids go there mainly to get toys, there are a ton of other video game stores that parents probably go to, to get their kids games (or even places like Target/Walmart).

Josh H

I agree. I wait for all but my "must have" games like Zelda or Metroid.

Espeically on PS2 games, as the good ones tend to hit $20 after a year or so.

xVladx

I've noticed that a LOT lately. A lot of times I'll hear about some price reductions on a message board and go to check it out, only to have the game still marked at $49.99. Heck, I've heard that F-Zero GX has dropped in price, but I was in a Circuit City earlier today that still has them marked at fifty bucks...

cheapskate

CC never update their price tags. When I bought Wipeout Fusion for $4.95, the tag still bodly claimed it was $49.95. You have to have them price scan it for you.

mrglass has a good point...

Isn't the video game industry now bigger than the movie industry? Don't video games still cost less to produce than Hollywood movies? Why are DVD movies $15-20, and video games still $40-50? The end product is the same, right? A disc in a DVD case with artwork.

Is it because movies have the "first run" to make money at the box office, and just make extra from the home movie sales? I could buy that... somewhat... since video games are only ever released once to the consumer, not twice.

No doubt someone more knowledgable than myself will clear this up in no time...

Josh H

I think it's just supply and demand. Games have been $40-50 or more for a long time and the industry has continued to grow, thus they have no reaon to cut the price.

I guess you could look at it in terms of hours of entertainment. Say the average movie is 2 hours, so at $20 that's $10/hour. Say the average game is played for $20 hours (many are played much longer, especially multiplaer games) for $50 that's $2.50/hour.

But that's just a way to rationalize the expense to yourself, not to explain the price difference per se.

msdmoney

That has me worried too. When I went into Best Buy looking for clearance games yesterday, I noticed the amount of games on the shelves had decreased dramatically. This is more noticeable in the gamecube section, but even without the clearances they had little variety in games besides the big name games/series. It didn't look like they were sold out of games, just stocking very little. It worries me to see such a limited selection in store.

Yeah that worries me too, I don't think we will see another Beyond Good & Evil. Don't get me wrong I love the deals, but I'm nervous about the direction of the market. Maybe I am overexaggerating the current gaming situation, but I don't want lesser known games to lose major retail support.

milo bloom

I thought I read long ago that one of the reasons the industy switched to disc based media was that it was easier to do smaller runs, or a repressing in case demand was higher than expected, whereas cartridges had to be made in one big shot and it was harder to do repressings.

If so, I don't understand why I see so many disc based games in bargain bins in every kind of store imaginable. I think the companies could stand to print fewer copies of each, and lower the initial price. I of course love picking up clearance bargains, but it can't be healthy for the industry.

btlives

The only thing that REALLY worries me is not getting
all these games are at bargain prices right now.

BG&E does worry me a little. As it was one
of the better/unique games of last year.
But then I see that Prince of Perisia 2 is coming out
around the winter holiday season.
So I guess time will tell.

xVladx

I'm wondering if the actual numbers for the lesser known games are lower than they were in say, the SNES era. Once videogaming became more mainstream with the Playstation, it was pretty much a given that the more mainstream games would sell more. Look at the movie industry, the summer action movies tend to make more than the more carefully written and directed ones. Look at the music industry, the majority of lesser known but good bands tend to stay less popular, because people in general tend to buy the stuff they're comfortable with.

The same goes for the video game industry. The mainstream game player tends to view a new game decision in relation to what they've played before. Instead of looking a game on its own merits, it's compared to Halo, GTA, Madden, etc. If it's something different, it tends to get ignored by most people.

Also, it's a LOT easier to buy games used nowadays. In the 16 bit days and before, used games were pretty much found at garage sales and flea markets. Now, the big video game sellers have huge used game sections (at ridiculous prices, but that's beside the point), and then there's Ebay. I know that I tend to go there first before any brick and mortar store, because I can often find an awesome deal on a used game in excellent condition.

fujishig

What we've seen this past year is reports that videogame revenue is higher than movie industry revenue. While this is huge in and of itself, I think that the comparison was done just with box-office numbers, not home video releases, and that if the price of games dropped to 20 bucks, which is less than half of the current standard price, total revenue would drop. So it's not a factor of: they made so much money, why don't they drop the price, more that they made so much money because the average price is higher. Put simply, more people went to movies than bought videogames, but the price of videogames is higher, so total revenue was higher.

I don't think we can really complain about prices, because the price has pretty much remained the same for a few generations, without any inflation, and in some cases, software prices actually decreased ( I remember not being able to buy Phantasy Star IV because it was close to 100 bucks). The media is cheaper to produce than the old cartridges, but the cost of making a game has increased dramatically. And now, if you come out at the wrong time or you don't put enough into marketing, you're game might tank.

I thought that it was pretty cool when the whole videogame revenue thing was announced. But if you look at the industry today, it's a bunch of giants swallowing up the small companies, and the job market for game developers has kinda petered out.

For a good look at how tough it is to be in the game industry, you should see that year-old documentary following Microsoft development teams. It details how the Crimson Skies team was pretty much replaced well into the development cycle, and it also featured the next Oddworld game, which I heard was finally canned by MS...

cheapskate

That was a great documentary...

I've seen it replayed a few times on the Discovery Times channel if anyone is interested. They seem to run it fairly frequently.

Puzznic

The whole thing seems like a vicious cycle. The games drop in price really fast, which in turn makes me less likely to buy games at $50 when they first come out. So when i don't get a game at full price, because i expect it to drop in price, it is just making it that much more likely that it will drop in price. It's pretty much a self fulfilling prophecy.

Michael Corvin

Not really. in the opening weeked of a movie, even a bad movie, I would bet 1 million people go to see it. At $10 a ticket that is $10 million in 3 days.

It takes a long time for a game to sell a million copies. I doubt it would happen any faster if games were cheaper.

I for one am all for a price drop though. NES games were $50 for crying out loud. I think $30-$35 is perfect for new releases.

wildcatlh

I'm not arguing with you that I wish games were cheaper... but you do realize that at the same price, $50 games today are far, far cheaper than $50 games when the NES was at its peak, right?

And I paid $70 for SNES games at times. So $50 isn't too bad. But I do save paying $50 for the big titles (and, admittedly, the sports titles)

gp98

Going back to the original post, stores don't make a lot of money on each game sold. The mark up on a videogame is about the same as a dvd (a new game usually costs the store around $43 whereas dvds usually cost as little as half the price for the store). Granted they take up the same amount of space as movies but they cost more if they are stolen. Where the stores clean up is on accessories and strategy guides where they usually make about 70% profit.

So these prices are definitely fixed by the publishers and distributors, not the stores but remember that there are a number of pockets being filled for each game sold (which is how Sony, etc can get away with selling systems at a loss) compared to a movie.