Nintendo Selling 3DS & Wii U Retail Games Digitally

[Chris_D]

Originally Posted by Kelegacy

Nothing should be region locked. An online store being region locked is just plain stupid.

Amen brother. One day...

[Vandabo]

Originally Posted by Urizen

I suppose what we need is a way for buyers to be able to transfer digital content. I mean, I downloaded a game I paid for. But what if I could deactivate that download myself and generate a new download code in the process and email that to a friend who paid me $20.

Wouldn't something like that work in the developer and publisher's favor in the long run?

This would be pretty sweet, but I can't imagine the publishers would want to do anything that enabled this, as they are already fighting used game sales every way they can. Plus, with a digital copy, there is no difference between the original and the 'used' copy, unless they somehow tag them so that they can't access certain content or something.

[OldJadedGamer]

Originally Posted by TheFlyingOrc

Eh, the cost of the disc and shipping is such a small part of the overhead of making video games that it doesn't really bother me.

Those costs are small... but not the only ones. Valve maybe made around $25-$30 bucks from the boxed copy of Portal 2. That is how much gamers should have paid. Why are we paying for the retailer make up when not purchased through retail?!

[bean]

Originally Posted by OldJadedGamer

Those costs are small... but not the only ones. Valve maybe made around $25-$30 bucks from the boxed copy of Portal 2.

That's about right, though Portal 2 was priced at about $55, there were many sales online for it at $45. So here's how it breaks down:

~$4-5 = Boxing, art, disc, shitty manual
~$10-15 = Retailer's cut and possible restocking fees from returns (usually just $10 as most stores won't let you return games; however, some of the companies still allow you to return them directly).

For console games that are $60, there is also $10 that goes to the platform holder for each game sold.

I've heard that Steam is less expensive with the cut going up based on the marketing level you want for your game, so even on PC it can be $10, but this is the same as a retailer fee. . . not a platform fee. This is why you often see AAA games on PC launching at $40-50 instead of $60 on consoles.

So for a $60 game on console, a publisher gets $30-35, and for a $50 game sold on Steam, the publisher gets ~$35-40. What should piss you off are the $60 games sold on Steam.

That is how much gamers should have paid. Why are we paying for the retailer make up when not purchased through retail?!

Well, Steam still provides a service that costs money. They have people working in customer support and operations to keep it running as well as people working to create new features for Steam. Thus, even with their own games, they have a "retailer" fee.

Also, it's not like they don't eventually sell their first-party titles for next to nothing or bundle them with other goodies. Valve is one of the most generous game developers around and Steam is by far the most pro-consumer marketplace in gaming.

[OldJadedGamer]

Bean, your numbers are way too high and the margins way too low. There was a break up once of the money distribution and it came out to around $25 dollars that the publisher got before all the costs associated with selling at retail.

Just an instance of what you left out is that EA distributed all retail Valve games (console and PC) and of course they get a cut too. There are many more costs as well and I'll try to find the link.

[bean]

@Old - The only difference is that the numbers you are talking about take marketing out of the peice that the publishers get, which is bad math. The publishers have to pay the developers X and the marketers Y to ship the game, but they are still getting this higher amount per unit. I don't like including marketing as $10 for each game like all games have the same marketing budgets.

[JayVe]

Living on the other side of the world, picking up new games is a bit of a pain in the ass. I welcome this move wholeheartedly so I can get in on the gaming.

[Widgetcraft]

One of the most exciting features of the Vita, for me, was that all games would be available day-one on PSN. Also, most are discounted a bit, like $5.00 below the physical copies. I'm not sure if I would trust Nintendo with this, though. With PSN, I have a unified login across Sony's platforms. With Nintendo... I don't even know what I have. So far as I can tell things are tied directly to the system itself.

[KamaItachi]

Originally Posted by Widgetcraft

One of the most exciting features of the Vita, for me, was that all games would be available day-one on PSN. Also, most are discounted a bit, like $5.00 below the physical copies. I'm not sure if I would trust Nintendo with this, though. With PSN, I have a unified login across Sony's platforms. With Nintendo... I don't even know what I have. So far as I can tell things are tied directly to the system itself.

With the 3DS you can link your system to your Club Nintendo Account. I don't think it's as fully fleshed out as the PSN, but I'm imagining that they'll be closer to a unified system to prepare for the WiiU release.