The Cost of Gaming

I was reading "The Video Game Industry Can't Go On Like This" at Kotaku, and had some thoughts. No solutions, unfortunately, but definitely thoughts as to where I fit in all of this.

The article starts off with the cost of making a AAA game these days and eventually dives into the ecological cost of going digital, unfair labor practices, and more. While the later issues are still noteworthy, I'm going to focus on the price point of a game, the literal cost of gaming, because believe it or not, the $60 price point for a brand new console game is still cheaper than some brand new Genesis games were back in the 16-bit era, and that's not even counting for inflation. I think some of the difference is the willingness to pay that much.

When I was a younger gamer, games were shorter and I routinely played and replayed many of them. There was a time when between my brother and I we owned every RPG that had ever been released on the Genesis, so if we finished one and enjoyed it, it was only natural to play it again. I think Phantasy Star II cost us $70 split in half, but I beat it five times. (And as the first RPG on Genesis, it's not like it had a lot of competition.)

Phantasy Star IV was an even more ridiculous $100, but again, two kids splitting their allowance money in half and saving up specifically for that game could manage. And really, Phantasy Star IV was the pinnacle of Genesis RPGs. I never regretted the purchase, and I played it the first day we got it.

But something happened in college and the years following.

Games weren't that uncommon a hobby anymore. Final Fantasy became a marquee name. There were tons of games coming out, and I suddenly had income because I was now a working adult.

My backlog really began during my first year post-college, though I naively thought at the time that I would still go through games just as fast as I had when I was kid. I've since gotten over the impulse to buy every single RPG in a series I "should" have played, but it took a little time to adjust to what became my current reality.

And the reality is that there are too many games.

Everyone wants to get noticed, so developers work their butts off to make the most compelling games they can, and then they load up the DLC to stretch the success of those games as long as possible before they have to start over and make yet another game, which may or may not be a hit.

Meanwhile, I'm still sitting here with my backlog of awesome or potentially awesome games that I haven't gotten around to, so I can't justify paying full price for the latest and greatest if it's just going to be in the bargain bin by the time I get around to playing it. There's so much competition for my gaming time now. It's not just what's currently on the market that a game has to compete against, but my backlog too.

(Interestingly, because I came late to Steam, I have a zero purchased game backlog on it. I am quite adamant that I am not allowed to buy a new game on Steam until I've finished the last one, and that's kept everything remarkably under control.)

The only thing that gets me to pay full price now is a game I know I'm going to play Day 1 (which is extremely rare, maybe once every year or two) or is a title that for one reason or another I want to support (maybe it's a niche game, or part of my favorite franchise). For example, I pre-ordered Code:Realize ~Wintertide Miracles~ for both of those reasons. It's my favorite otome series, I cracked it open the day it arrived, and it's in a niche genre. The Liar Princess and the Blind Princess that I covered last week was another full price game, which I didn't quite get to Day 1, but because it's a very indie-ish game I wanted to support it.

All other games wait for a substantial price drop, which I know does the developer no favors, but there are just too many games, and I really hate getting burned when an even better deal comes along after I've had a game in my backlog. Nothing makes it worse than when a publisher releases a deluxe edition with new content and all the DLC for cheaper than what I paid for the original.

When a game wants my money, that's pretty much what it's up against; my enthusiasm for a product I know I'll love, my sense of patronage for a niche that needs the support, and my skepticism on whether I'm getting a good deal. There are very few games that fall into the first category (maybe 1-2 a year), by its nature the majority of games cannot be in the second category, which means that most games, even though I enjoy them quite a bit, fall into the third category where I simply wait for a good price break and take my chances.

The Kotaku article mentions that the major publishers no longer publish nearly as many games in a year as they used to, and I think that's become a necessity as costs rise. If they want an AAA game, the bar is so high that it's no longer practical to develop several at once. It's better to get a good solid hit and then ride that gravy train through as much DLC as possible.

And fewer releases is probably a good thing. I'd like to think that studios will take additional time to make sure a game is "right" before releasing it (better not to make a bad situation worse by releasing a steaming pile of crap that could have been salvageable with a few more months of development).

For someone like me, fewer releases also means there's a higher chance I'll be able to pay attention when a new game comes out. I might never be convinced to buy a Call of Duty game, but I'd be more open to say a God of War if I had room in my backlog.

Right now the game industry is drowning in so much content that I can't keep up. I love gaming, that's why I blog about it when I have no writing-related announcements, and it sucks having to prioritize which games I'm going to get to. It was so much simpler when I was a kid and there weren't many choices, but most of those choices were solid regardless.

I'd like to think that the nature of the AAA beast will make it more likely that mass market games will be of good quality (or quickly patched up to that), and for those who are looking for more niche games, smaller publishers and indies exist. Granted, it's very hard for an indie publisher to get visibility, but if they work in a niche and show up where gamers of that niche are likely to be found, they still have a chance to be discovered.

That's how I ended up playing Valentines Otome last year, and that's not the only indie visual novel I've played or am currently following. For instance, I'm currently in the middle of When the Night Comes, which is an episodic romance visual novel with new installments coming out every few months. (Not sure how I'll ever do a VN Talk for it unless it's got an end point somewhere.)

I suppose indies could still flood the market leaving me with once again too much content to devour, but I think the nature of the beast tends to make indies shorter playthroughs, and since they're almost exclusively digital I don't feel the urge to buy them on a sale cycle. They'll be there when I'm finally free (or interested enough) to play them, or not.

Anyway, I want to thank everyone who participated in my poll for my next RPG/VN Talk. That survey is now closed, and the winner is Final Fantasy XV. I've already started playing and you can follow along on Twitter where I'm @writerrat.

Over the next six weeks I'll be running through my VN Talk series for Bad Apple Wars, and I figure that should give me enough time to finish going through Final Fantasy XV. If you'd like a heads up for when the next RPG/VN Talk Readers Pick is going to be, follow me on Ko-fi. You can do that without putting a tip in the figurative jar, though if you want to, please do!