GoG's Guillaume Rambourg: Steam Sales are hurting the industry

>shockface.jpg

GoG has been very busy as of late, but ho boy, this one is a doozy.

The plan, then, is to stock newer games that never really got their chance to shine when they first came out. You know, the games you typically scarf buffet-table-cIassics during Steam sales. So then, why go toe-to-toe with Valve in one of its biggest, most minefield-and-barbed-wire-laden arenas? Well, GOG's gotten this far on a heart so gutsy it might actually be made of guts, and it's not quitting now. Even while sales numbers skyrocket for both Valve and the publishers who line Steam's catalog, GOG thinks they're out-and-out hurting the industry.

"Heavy discounts are bad for gamers," Rambourg explained. "If a gamer buys a game he or she doesn't want just because it's on sale, they're being trained to make bad purchases, and they're also learning that games aren't valuable. We all know gamers who spend more every month on games than they want to, just because there were too many games that were discounted too deeply. That's not good for anyone."

"We provide a lot of value in our games that goes beyond just the price. This is one of the key ways we fight against piracy, after all: providing gamers with more value than a pirate does. We actually generate more than half of our revenue from full-price sales, simply because we keep our prices reasonable in the first place. Our average sale tends to be around 40% – 50% off; that's plenty of incentive to pick up a game if you're interested or if you just think you might like to try it because you're not sure about the game, but not some crazy 75% or 85% discount that damages the long-term value of a game."Via Rock Paper Shotgun

The dude has a point.

I love GoG, while I am guilty of this and learnt some lessons from various sale periods, I dont thnk it is the problem of the sale or Steam. I think they--and the publishers--have the right to discount and do so as it is their own business. And with regards to Steam, it is a form of transparent DRM and probably needs those appealing discounts to sustain that sense of transparency.

Publishers, devs, Valve and us gamers seem happy when participating in sales and it is not like there are dirt cheap games that we havent enjoyed, or even wouldnt have given a chance had we not purchased it at a discount. #WasteNotWantNot

If this behaviour is a problem, it all just comes down to consumer responsibility and consumer awareness: to weigh out whether or not they really want the game, and steam does a pretty good job of helping us, with direct forum links, a metascore, hardware requirements, peer reccomendations and other things like what goes on here with community game reccomendations.

-

Your thoughts on GoGs views on Steam sales?

The whole writeup is here. It is a rather interesting read and even though I dont agree with his stance on Steam sales (they are a competitor to steam after all and can say whatever **** they want), they otherwise have the right ideas.

Paying less money for games is never bad.

99% of all games released arent worth the 60 bucks you usually have to spend on them.

>shockface.jpg

GoG has been very busy as of late, but ho boy, this one is a doozy.

[Quote="Via Rock Paper Shotgun"]

The plan, then, is to stock newer games that never really got their chance to shine when they first came out. You know, the games you typically scarf buffet-table-cIassics during Steam sales. So then, why go toe-to-toe with Valve in one of its biggest, most minefield-and-barbed-wire-laden arenas? Well, GOG's gotten this far on a heart so gutsy it might actually be made of guts, and it's not quitting now. Even while sales numbers skyrocket for both Valve and the publishers who line Steam's catalog, GOG thinks they're out-and-out hurting the industry.

"Heavy discounts are bad for gamers," Rambourg explained. "If a gamer buys a game he or she doesn't want just because it's on sale, they're being trained to make bad purchases, and they're also learning that games aren't valuable. We all know gamers who spend more every month on games than they want to, just because there were too many games that were discounted too deeply. That's not good for anyone."

"We provide a lot of value in our games that goes beyond just the price. This is one of the key ways we fight against piracy, after all: providing gamers with more value than a pirate does. We actually generate more than half of our revenue from full-price sales, simply because we keep our prices reasonable in the first place. Our average sale tends to be around 40% – 50% off; that's plenty of incentive to pick up a game if you're interested or if you just think you might like to try it because you're not sure about the game, but not some crazy 75% or 85% discount that damages the long-term value of a game."illmatic87

The dude has a point.

I love GoG, while I am guilty of this and learnt some lessons from various sale periods, I dont thnk it is the problem of the sale or Steam. I think they--and the publishers--have the right to discount and do so as it is their own business. And with regards to Steam, it is a form of transparent DRM and probably needs those appealing discounts to sustain that sense of transparency.

Publishers, devs, Valve and us gamers seem happy when participating in sales and it is not like there are dirt cheap games that we havent enjoyed, or even wouldnt have given a chance had we not purchased it at a discount. #WasteNotWantNot

If this behaviour is a problem, it all just comes down to consumer responsibility and consumer awareness: to weigh out whether or not they really want the game, and steam does a pretty good job of helping us, with direct forum links, a metascore, hardware requirements, peer reccomendations and other things like what goes on here with community game reccomendations.

-

Your thoughts on GoGs views on Steam sales?

The whole writeup is here. It is a rather interesting read and even though I dont agree with his stance on Steam sales (they are a competitor to steam after all and can say whatever **** they want), they otherwise have the right ideas.

I spend way more money on games then I would otherwise because of the sales If everything stayed at mrsp pricing I wouldn't buy nearly as many games and would likely stick to spending my money on more established developers and there games such as blizzard and valve games. I actually do play over 90% of the games I buy and I don't need to play each one for hours or even finish a game to get my enjoyment out of it or tell if its just not for me.

The cheap prices and sheer number of games I can buy because of also kills buyer remorse for me if I don't enjoy a game very much its not big deal the monetary loss is low and I have a ton of other games that I bought alongside it and can play instead of it as opposed to buying one game for $50 and not enjoying it and not having any new games to play that sucks big time.

I don't think big sales are bad. Only for a relatively new game that goes on sale 75% off. That's a slap in the face of people that buy new. Many of them start waiting to buy on sale instead of new. Certain new games that sold poorly maybe should have sales to get more income, but most games that sell poorly are because they were bad and not worth full price. Something like Dragon Age 2 I would expect to go on sale fast, because of its lower quality and low sales after the first month. A good game like Portal 2 should stay full price longer, maybe even for a year.

I disagree because take for instance myself, I cant always afford to buy all the games that I want at launch or at full price, so if I cant afford it I wont buy it, if it happens that a steam sale comes along and its in the pricerange that at the current moment I can get it for then I buy it. I carefully pick my games the ones that I buy at full price, these games usually are in the BF3, D3, SC2 category games. I would buy all the games at full price if I could afford them but I cant. Not everyone can throw 60$ at a game every month. But also they need to consider the games that arent actually worth those prices. But sometimes I buy discounted games even though I may not like them just because it costs 5$, well why not.

I disagree because take for instance myself, I cant always afford to buy all the games that I want at launch or at full price, so if I cant afford it I wont buy it, if it happens that a steam sale comes along and its in the pricerange that at the current moment I can get it for then I buy it. I carefully pick my games the ones that I buy at full price, these games usually are in the BF3, D3, SC2 category games. I would buy all the games at full price if I could afford them but I cant. Not everyone can throw 60$ at a game every month. But also they need to consider the games that arent actually worth those prices. But sometimes I buy discounted games even though I may not like them just because it costs 5$, well why not.

Silicel1

I agree completely with this. If it weren't for some of these sales then some developers wouldn't have had my purchase. Because DA and DA2 were on sale for $10 today, I bought them. I wouldn't have bought them if they were more. Same goes for Mass Effect 1+2, I got both for $12 today and never would have purchased them otherwise. People like me probably make up a huge sector of game sales (Valve does say that Revenue goes up by 1000% when a game is marked 90% off), so they have to lower the price to get our business because they are otherwise limiting themselves to the crowd that is willing to pay more.

Agree with everything the guy said 100%.

Seems people aren't actually reading the post. The guy said it's better to charge a more reasonable standard price and not rely on ridiculous massive sales off that price for the majority of revenue.

Find someone who says steam's regular non-sale prices are good and you'll have found a moron.

>shockface.jpg

GoG has been very busy as of late, but ho boy, this one is a doozy.

[Quote="Via Rock Paper Shotgun"]

The plan, then, is to stock newer games that never really got their chance to shine when they first came out. You know, the games you typically scarf buffet-table-cIassics during Steam sales. So then, why go toe-to-toe with Valve in one of its biggest, most minefield-and-barbed-wire-laden arenas? Well, GOG's gotten this far on a heart so gutsy it might actually be made of guts, and it's not quitting now. Even while sales numbers skyrocket for both Valve and the publishers who line Steam's catalog, GOG thinks they're out-and-out hurting the industry.

"Heavy discounts are bad for gamers," Rambourg explained. "If a gamer buys a game he or she doesn't want just because it's on sale, they're being trained to make bad purchases, and they're also learning that games aren't valuable. We all know gamers who spend more every month on games than they want to, just because there were too many games that were discounted too deeply. That's not good for anyone."

"We provide a lot of value in our games that goes beyond just the price. This is one of the key ways we fight against piracy, after all: providing gamers with more value than a pirate does. We actually generate more than half of our revenue from full-price sales, simply because we keep our prices reasonable in the first place. Our average sale tends to be around 40% – 50% off; that's plenty of incentive to pick up a game if you're interested or if you just think you might like to try it because you're not sure about the game, but not some crazy 75% or 85% discount that damages the long-term value of a game."illmatic87

The dude has a point.

I love GoG, while I am guilty of this and learnt some lessons from various sale periods, I dont thnk it is the problem of the sale or Steam. I think they--and the publishers--have the right to discount and do so as it is their own business. And with regards to Steam, it is a form of transparent DRM and probably needs those appealing discounts to sustain that sense of transparency.

Publishers, devs, Valve and us gamers seem happy when participating in sales and it is not like there are dirt cheap games that we havent enjoyed, or even wouldnt have given a chance had we not purchased it at a discount. #WasteNotWantNot

If this behaviour is a problem, it all just comes down to consumer responsibility and consumer awareness: to weigh out whether or not they really want the game, and steam does a pretty good job of helping us, with direct forum links, a metascore, hardware requirements, peer reccomendations and other things like what goes on here with community game reccomendations.

-

Your thoughts on GoGs views on Steam sales?

The whole writeup is here. It is a rather interesting read and even though I dont agree with his stance on Steam sales (they are a competitor to steam after all and can say whatever **** they want), they otherwise have the right ideas.

[QUOTE="shakmaster13"]I just feel like since I don't pay as much as I used to for games, they are not of as much value to me. I do not feel the the same urge to play games I get for cheap that I used to before steam sales. I want that feel back.CrazyKilljoy117

[QUOTE="CrazyKilljoy117"]

[QUOTE="shakmaster13"]I just feel like since I don't pay as much as I used to for games, they are not of as much value to me. I do not feel the the same urge to play games I get for cheap that I used to before steam sales. I want that feel back.jhalter1

If GoG would offer more competitive prices they would have my business much more. Edit: Competitive SALE prices. IxX3xil3d0n3XxI

Most of their games are at competitive prices of $9.99 to be honest, and sale is usually 50% off.

Agree with everything the guy said 100%.

Seems people aren't actually reading the post. The guy said it's better to charge a more reasonable standard price and not rely on ridiculous massive sales off that price for the majority of revenue.

Find someone who says steam's regular non-sale prices are good and you'll have found a moron.

topgunmv

I think you got his point.

He has a point. I don't buy games full price on Steam and probably never will because I could just wait for 50% or 75%. I can wait for it by finishing big backlog of games I bought on previous Steam sale. The cycle never ends.

He has a point. I don't buy games full price on Steam and probably never will because I could just wait for 50% or 75%. I can wait for it by finishing big backlog of games I bought on previous Steam sale. The cycle never ends.

Everiez

I find it hard to believe this theory...

If anything, it's setting the industry on the right path. It's giving consumers more options to pay what they think a game is worth. Guillaume is obviously ignoring that the developer's perspective of video game value has been inflated with the industry standard of $60, regardless of quality. Some games are undervalued too, so it's not just one way.

Paying less money for games is never bad.

99% of all games released arent worth the 60 bucks you usually have to spend on them.

Fizzman

If GoG would offer more competitive prices they would have my business much more. Edit: Competitive SALE prices. IxX3xil3d0n3XxI

Well, my Steam-backlog is huge.

I respect the guys at GoG but the fact of the matter is that I would have not bought those games if they sold for $80-$100 a pop (curse you Australian prices) so effectively Steam counters this by offering many high quality games for a heavily discounted price which then I buy and thus money gets to the developers compared to the other scenario where absolutely no money goes to the developers.

While he does have a point, those low prices convince me to buy a game that I wouldn't consider otherwise. Hell I've found plenty of games I didn't even know about because of the sale.

I am very well aware that the Steam Store's discounts are undercutting a lot of its competitors in digital distribution, even before you started this thread, ilmatic87. I have noticed that its competitors just cannot compete with Steam's discounts.

Valve, with its headstart in grabbing much of the digital distribution market, has already achieved economies of scale.

However, I would say here that only the spendthrift are at risk of being "trained" like Mr. Rambourg said.

Yet, the spendthrift can always be "trained" any which way - they are already spendthrifty after all. If I care an iota about their spending habits - and I don't because it's their money, not mine and anyone else's - I would say that it's better for them to be "trained" to buy game licenses on the cheap than any other way.

Then GoG needs to adapt.

This is what Blockbuster and Planet Hollywood said when Netflix was emerging. Look what happened to them.

In business you can't blame anybody else for your failures except yourself.

They're being 'trained' to make bad purchases? Please, these guys are full of crap.

Check out my sig for that.

>shockface.jpg

GoG has been very busy as of late, but ho boy, this one is a doozy.

[Quote="Via Rock Paper Shotgun"]

The plan, then, is to stock newer games that never really got their chance to shine when they first came out. You know, the games you typically scarf buffet-table-cIassics during Steam sales. So then, why go toe-to-toe with Valve in one of its biggest, most minefield-and-barbed-wire-laden arenas? Well, GOG's gotten this far on a heart so gutsy it might actually be made of guts, and it's not quitting now. Even while sales numbers skyrocket for both Valve and the publishers who line Steam's catalog, GOG thinks they're out-and-out hurting the industry.

"Heavy discounts are bad for gamers," Rambourg explained. "If a gamer buys a game he or she doesn't want just because it's on sale, they're being trained to make bad purchases, and they're also learning that games aren't valuable. We all know gamers who spend more every month on games than they want to, just because there were too many games that were discounted too deeply. That's not good for anyone."

"We provide a lot of value in our games that goes beyond just the price. This is one of the key ways we fight against piracy, after all: providing gamers with more value than a pirate does. We actually generate more than half of our revenue from full-price sales, simply because we keep our prices reasonable in the first place. Our average sale tends to be around 40% – 50% off; that's plenty of incentive to pick up a game if you're interested or if you just think you might like to try it because you're not sure about the game, but not some crazy 75% or 85% discount that damages the long-term value of a game."illmatic87

The dude has a point.

I love GoG, while I am guilty of this and learnt some lessons from various sale periods, I dont thnk it is the problem of the sale or Steam. I think they--and the publishers--have the right to discount and do so as it is their own business. And with regards to Steam, it is a form of transparent DRM and probably needs those appealing discounts to sustain that sense of transparency.

Publishers, devs, Valve and us gamers seem happy when participating in sales and it is not like there are dirt cheap games that we havent enjoyed, or even wouldnt have given a chance had we not purchased it at a discount. #WasteNotWantNot

If this behaviour is a problem, it all just comes down to consumer responsibility and consumer awareness: to weigh out whether or not they really want the game, and steam does a pretty good job of helping us, with direct forum links, a metascore, hardware requirements, peer reccomendations and other things like what goes on here with community game reccomendations.

-

Your thoughts on GoGs views on Steam sales?

The whole writeup is here. It is a rather interesting read and even though I dont agree with his stance on Steam sales (they are a competitor to steam after all and can say whatever **** they want), they otherwise have the right ideas.

I must admit that in a bout of weakness I bought a few games on Steam at a hugely reduced price, and then regretted it because I realised I probably wouldn't get around to playing them. I have a backlog of games that I really want to play first.

If the games had been a higher price, on reflection I probably wouldn't have picked them up. So in those terms, I sort of agree with the general idea Rambourg raises.

On the other hand, there were a couple of titles that I might never have bought because I thought I wouldn't like them, risked getting them on a sale, and discovered I did like them. If sequels were then developed for those games, I would be more likely to buy those at normal price. This problem, though, can be alleviated if there are demos available to 'try before you buy'.

Another issue, particularly with Steam games, is that if I want to play co-op (over LAN) with my son, I usually need to buy two copies, and I'm less likely to buy two copies at full price, unless I'm sure we'll get a lot of replayability out of them. So I would be looking for a big saving there.

Having said all that, if there is a game available on both Steam and GOG, I will usually opt for the GOG version even if it's slightly more expensive, because I know it is DRM-free and comes with a decent package of extra goodies.

Paying less money for games is never bad.

99% of all games released arent worth the 60 bucks you usually have to spend on them.

Fizzman

Steam sales are bad for one thing, they addicted me to buying PC games I may never play lol. Either way isn't it great for the people making the games?? How is that bad? GoG has their niche with the older games, be happy.

Steam, amazon, and gog sales are the reason I do not have a single cracked game on my computer.

I have 15 ps3 games and I got them all used, and we all know the publishers think that used games are as bad as pirated games.

Steam sales are bad for one thing, they addicted me to buying PC games I may never play lol. Either way isn't it great for the people making the games?? How is that bad? GoG has their niche with the older games, be happy.

vfibsux

So he says game prices should be reasonable from the start and that's why they sell so many games at full price. But he also b*tches about the competition heavily discounting the unreasonably priced games.

So he says game prices should be reasonable from the start and that's why they sell so many games at full price. But he also b*tches about the competition heavily discounting the unreasonably priced games.

Baranga

Agree with everything the guy said 100%.

Seems people aren't actually reading the post. The guy said it's better to charge a more reasonable standard price and not rely on ridiculous massive sales off that price for the majority of revenue.

Find someone who says steam's regular non-sale prices are good and you'll have found a moron.

topgunmv

That makes absolutely NO sense. They reason it's a high initial price and then slow price drops and sales is because the market is segmented, and they are trying to maximize profits as much as possible.

The guy from GoG.com is probably frustrated because all his sales have no DRM/cdkeys, and are massively available to be pirated at ease.

[QUOTE="topgunmv"]

Agree with everything the guy said 100%.

Seems people aren't actually reading the post. The guy said it's better to charge a more reasonable standard price and not rely on ridiculous massive sales off that price for the majority of revenue.

Find someone who says steam's regular non-sale prices are good and you'll have found a moron.

True_Sounds

That makes absolutely NO sense. They reason it's a high initial price and then slow price drops and sales is because the market is segmented, and they are trying to maximize profits as much as possible.

The guy from GoG.com is probably frustrated because all his sales have no DRM/cdkeys, and are massively available to be pirated at ease.

[QUOTE="vfibsux"]

Steam sales are bad for one thing, they addicted me to buying PC games I may never play lol. Either way isn't it great for the people making the games?? How is that bad? GoG has their niche with the older games, be happy.

SF_KiLLaMaN

I'd rather spend 70 dollars on 12 games 6 of which I play than 120 on 2 games I play.