Support NeoGAF

[Fbh]

With the WiiU we already got a taste of Nintendo embracing DLC's for some of their big franchise with the introduction of a Season pass for Mario Kart 8 as well as DLC for Smash and some other games.
To be fair I definitely see the benefit, like being able to get more fighters for Smash without having to wait for a whole new game, or Pokemon finally moving away from the enhanced re-releases to focus on what looks like a more substantial amount of new content for a lower price.
Also, to their credit most of their DLC seems to be fairly good, the original Mario Kart 8 DLC had a ton of value, the Breath of the wild DLC was fun (if slightly underwhelming) and people seem to enjoy the Smash fighters, who also come with a new stage and a ton of music.

With that said, once you combine season passes in the $25-30 range with Nintendo's usual lack of price drops and bad (as well as rare) sales, we have now reached the point where the "complete package" for a lot of these games ends up in the $80+ territory and basically stays there.

DLC's and season passes are nothing new for the rest of the industry but as long as you wait a bit for sales or Goty editions you can still generally grab the complete version of most games for a good price.
If you go to, say, amazon right now you can pick up Monster Hunter + Iceborne for $37, FFXIV Complete edition for $44 and that's just looking at games that had major DLC's last year.

Meanwhile Splatoon 2 (released in 2017) + DLC (released in 2018) is still $80
Breath of the wild + DLC (both released in 2017) is still $80
And I'm sure both Pokemon and Fire emblem (+ DLC) will continue to be $90 and $85 respectively for years to come.


This is sort of killing my enthusiasm for their stuff. The one reason I can still play a lot of their games is that due to their pricing policy at least used copies tend to retain their value, so it's easy to buy games and then resell them without a big loss. But now with digital DLC that's no longer the case.

 

[Wolfgang Jr]

And they still sell shitloads.

 

[Fbh]

And they still sell shitloads.

Oh absolutely, I'm not saying this will affect them negatively. If anything it's probably the other way around. They are in a position that almost every other dev/publisher would kill for

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

This is why I bought a Wii back in 2017, 10 years after its release.

 

[PocoJoe]

Yeah it sucks, and nintendo fanboys defending their greediest busines model sucks even more.

First they sell slow, shitty specs old and low quality system for premium price and then ask full price for old games.

Kind of like apple, fanboys defending even when they ask 5x the price for their parts and so on.

Good thing that switch is so easily hackable, I guess it balances the greedyscale

 

[VertigoOA]

Complaining about SFV’s price model when smash will never drop in price and continue with 25$ character packs... LOL

Never forget...90$ pro controller and... literally selling cardboard as a game.

 

[Danjin44]

I do want to see Nintendo release bundle with discount price with games with lots of DLCs. You could also say I'm part of that problem because I usually buy the games I want day one, rarely wait for price drop, so this doesn't really has effect on me.

 

[Rockondevil]

And this is why I am yet to go digital. The prices are trash for old games when you compare physical. I've purchased 90% of my switch games used for pennies compared to buying it digitally.
Sure I lose the convenience of being able to switch games in 2 seconds, but I'll get over it.

 

[Virex]

This is why I bought a Wii back in 2017, 10 years after its release.

You better also have picked up a copy Pandora's Tower and The Last Story. Our friendship depends on it

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

You better also have picked up a copy Pandora's Tower and The Last Story. Our friendship depends on it

Impossible for me to get The Last Story

 

[iconmaster]

They just literally had a major eShop sale.

If you mean physical game prices then yeah, you’re right.

 

[Virex]

Impossible for me to get The Last Story

 

[Rawker]

I bought killer instinct for SNES on launch day for $115, relax.

 

[-Arcadia-]

This no sales meme is a little weird. Or maybe it needs a bit more nuance.

We literally just got done, or it’s still going on, I don’t know, with a New Year’s sale that cut across a wide swath of first party software, and offered some really good discounts. There‘ve been other big sales of that nature, too.

The nuance needed here is that Nintendo almost never drops their permanent prices, except for when a Greatest Hits collection comes along.

As far as that goes, maybe Nintendo games are good enough to not price collapse a few months after release? To sustain interest at full-price, long after a hype cycle is over. That doesn’t seem like a criticism to me.

 

[DonF]

They just literally had a major eShop sale.

If you mean physical game prices then yeah, you’re right.

 

[Spukc]

the thing that annoys me the most is sometimes piss poor support for indie titles.
that get updated way sooner on other consoles.

 

[VertigoOA]

the thing that annoys me the most is sometimes piss poor support for indie titles.
that get updated way sooner on other consoles.

it takes time for console patches as well. there’s different certifications in place for approval. Of course pc updates can happen whenever a dev feels like

 

[Spukc]

just check forager on switch

zero updates,, what a joke

 

[Jubenhimer]

I do wish Nintendo would start doing "complete additions" for their games with DLC. I'm okay with their conservative approach to sales and price drops, but come on, BotW is nearly 3 years old, and is done getting DLC. The least you could do is re-release the game with the DLC packed in. I wouldn't even mind paying full price for it.

 

[hangdang69]

It's annoying, but as long as people keep buying, they won't change.

 

[LOLCats]

Its true and i buy less games because of it.

that was still garbage, $42 for a 2 year old game is NOT a deal.

 

[Fbh]

They just literally had a major eShop sale.

If you mean physical game prices then yeah, you’re right.

This no sales meme is a little weird. Or maybe it needs a bit more nuance.

We literally just got done, or it’s still going on, I don’t know, with a New Year’s sale that cut across a wide swath of first party software, and offered some really good discounts. There‘ve been other big sales of that nature, too.

Their massive biggest ever super mega sale they do like once or twice a year...... with 2 years old games (half of which are ports of even older stuff) down to $41, wow.
So best case scenario you could pick up Pokemon Sword or Fire Emblem 3 houses + DLC for like $70.... in 2 years.

As I said in the OP, it's not that they don't do deals, but they are rare and bad, you find better deals on the weekly sales we get on basically every other major platform.

 

[mcjmetroid]

Its a double edges sword. I agree with you it's ridiculous sometimes. Games like.Bayonetta 1 and 2 could really have used a price drop by now. My point of contention is the price of ports. I started getting pissed around the time of Donkey Kong country TP with it's limited new content but now it's become worse.

I'm to understand that Tokyo Mirage barely has any new content and still runs at 720p. I'm sorry but no.

Other the other hand you're trained to buy Nintendo games new BECAUSE they never drop in price hardly.

 

[Gargus]

And they still sell shitloads.

Nintendo has the life to be sure. They rarely allow sales, their msrp stays at the max for quite a long time on everything for a premium and so on.

And the best thing is Nintendo very very rarely has to actually do anything new. They just gradually evolve all of their hardware, they have just been shitting out the same franchises for decades now with hardly ever actually making a new game, they re release games over and over again and they merchandise the shit out of themselves.

Honestly nintendo is more of a bad company than microsoft is since microsoft is simply just short sighted and not very bright in how they handle their gaming, but nintendo is just lazy as fuck and wont get off the couch because they can just sit and gouge on prices for the same old shit.

Nintendo is only in business because of the nostalgia factor they carry, they are overly safe and simple, and they are represented by soft spoken, smiling and friendly faces.

I mean I own a switch and all but I constantly and thinking "god damn can I have a new game for this thing besides ring fit adventure, and arms, or another game that is just like the 37th sequel?" And the whole just releasing old wiiu games over again is old news. And 85% of its catalog is just games that have been on other systems for years that perform better and cost 1/3 of the amount.

 

[HerpDerpstreit]

Impossible for me to get The Last Story

Why can't you get a copy of it? Twas released in all regions.

 

[Danjin44]

Why can't you get a copy of it? Twas released in all regions.

Well currently in Canada its impossible to find the copy in stores and in online they can be little pricy.

god damn can I have a new game for this thing besides ring fit adventure, and arms, or another game that is just like the 37th sequel?

Sure if you ignore new games like Astral Chain and Daemon X Machina, if you don't finding games to like on Switch thats mostly on you not Nintendo. If you don't enjoy most Nintendo games then why buy their system in the first place?

 

[cryptoadam]

Blame the Japanese.

Have you seen the sales charts? It fluctuates between 80-100% Nintendo. I think the last 3 weeks the top 10 was all Switch games. Smash and MK 8 are still selling in the top 5.

Odyssey and Splatoon just dropped out of the top 10 recently.

Tell me a business that will cut prices when their product is selling like hot cakes.

 

[HerpDerpstreit]

Well currently in Canada its impossible to find the copy in stores and in online they can be little pricy.

Is Canada still region 1?

 

[Zog]

And they still sell shitloads.

...and this is what should matter to consumers?

 

[DonF]

that was still garbage, $42 for a 2 year old game is NOT a deal.

I agree with you, thats why I posted that picture.

30%, biggest sale of the year...Oof! The least they could do is a permanent drop to old games.

 

[Fbh]

Other the other hand you're trained to buy Nintendo games new BECAUSE they never drop in price hardly.

Yep. I'm speaking more from a personal point of view, for them as a business it's amazing.
I'm sure every single developer/publisher would kill to be able to release a game with the production values of a Ps2 release for $60 ($90 if you include DLC) and still sell 10+ million units.

 

[-Arcadia-]

Other the other hand you're trained to buy Nintendo games new BECAUSE they never drop in price hardly.

Ding.

If you have games that can maintain mass interest for years at full price + occasional sales, why would you cut the price? Or even set that expectation?

Smart business, and it’s clearly paying off for them. When your top 4 alone, look like this...

...and sold for full price, why change anything?

Customers that don’t like this will have to accept that they’re a tiny minority, and either choose not to do business with Nintendo, or deal with the apparent horror of $40 - $60 prices for great - excellent games that deliver a compete, polished experience out of the box.

 

[Zog]

Ding.

If you have games that can maintain mass interest for years at full price + occasional sales, why would you cut the price? Or even set that expectation? Smart business, and it’s clearly paying off for them. When your top 4 alone, look like this... ...and sold for full price, why change anything?

Customers that don’t like this will have to accept that they’re a tiny minority, and either choose not to do business with Nintendo, or deal with the apparent horror of $40 - $60 prices for great - excellent games that deliver a compete, polished experience out of the box.

Maybe the sales numbers would be doubled or even tripled if the price went down over time? Game consumers who think like consumers do seem to be in the minority, most seem to care more about corporations making as much money as possible than consumers getting a good deal.

Do you work in marketing?

 

[Heart_Attack]

I agree. I remember the talking points by Nintendodrones and insiders like Emily Rodgers that killing their handheld systems in favor of a hybrid console would unify their development studios and thus increase game production. And three years in, its the same slow shit as ever. Low budget gimmicky games got a price bump and now they're getting pricey DLC. I'm over Nintendo honestly.

 

[jts]

Yeah it sucks, and nintendo fanboys defending their greediest busines model sucks even more.

First they sell slow, shitty specs old and low quality system for premium price and then ask full price for old games.

Kind of like apple, fanboys defending even when they ask 5x the price for their parts and so on.

Good thing that switch is so easily hackable, I guess it balances the greedyscale

No Switch model currently on the shelves is hackable at all, let alone easily. lol pwned

 

[-Arcadia-]

Maybe the sales number would be doubled or even tripled if the price went down over time? Game consumers who think like consumers do seem to be in the minority, most seem to care more about corporations making as much money as possible than consumers getting a good deal.

Do you work in marketing?

You can think in your interest all you want, but as long as the bottom line for these companies remains intensely profitable, nothing is going to change.

The goal is to explain that to Gaf, which seems to have trouble with the concept.

As for sales numbers tripling, which at $20 or so, would be the exact same revenue now, the history of Nintendo games doesn’t seem to show a significant boost from big price drops. Stuff like the Player’s Choice collections have existed, dropping prices down to $20 or $30, and the needle hasn’t really moved.

 

[V4skunk]

But Nintendo games hold most of their value after purchase.

 

[Fbh]

Ding.

If you have games that can maintain mass interest for years at full price + occasional sales, why would you cut the price? Or even set that expectation?

Smart business, and it’s clearly paying off for them. When your top 4 alone, look like this...

...and sold for full price, why change anything?

Customers that don’t like this will have to accept that they’re a tiny minority, and either choose not to do business with Nintendo, or deal with the apparent horror of $40 - $60 prices for great - excellent games that deliver a compete, polished experience out of the box.

I pay between $0 and $10 for most of them since I buy used and then resell for the same (or nearly the same) price.
So it hasn't really affected me that much. But with their new focus on DLC I am a bit annoyed that I'll be missing out on them.
I wish they would at lease release goty editions or something with everything on the cartridge

 

[Hotspurr]

Nintendo first party stuff rarely goes on sale, but often you can pick up physical games at $45 instead of $60.
The third party stuff and the eShop sales have bee pretty great, on par with steam.
As for season passes/DLC, that stuff is often not discounted anyway, meh. I think with the Switch generation everything feels a lot more fair and affordable.
The controllers and accessories are still robbery...but meh, you don't need too many of those

 

[Zog]

You can think in your interest all you want, but as long as the bottom line for these companies remains intensely profitable, nothing is going to change.

I would say that as long as game consumers care more about corporate profits than consumer interests then nothing will change.

 

[theclaw135]

Show me credible allegations that Nintendo is inflating prices of second hand copies, and I'll gladly complain.

As it stands, many of these games remain costly because they DO continue to sell for years after release.

 

[Strider Highwind]

I wouldve disagreed, but.then when you see Xenoblade Chronicles 2 at full price-still?yeah f*ck em

 

[Zog]

Show me credible allegations that Nintendo is inflating prices of second hand copies, and I'll gladly complain.

Used prices are usually affected by new prices.

 

[JohnnyFootball]

Yeah it sucks, and nintendo fanboys defending their greediest busines model sucks even more.

First they sell slow, shitty specs old and low quality system for premium price and then ask full price for old games.

Kind of like apple, fanboys defending even when they ask 5x the price for their parts and so on.

Good thing that switch is so easily hackable, I guess it balances the greedyscale

Cemu is the way to play Wii U games. I have accepted that Nintendo will never release a system that appeals to my liking.

Breath of the Wild in 4K/60fps is amazing.

 

[JohnnyFootball]

Show me credible allegations that Nintendo is inflating prices of second hand copies, and I'll gladly complain.

As it stands, many of these games remain costly because they DO continue to sell for years after release.

What it means is that price of new stays high keeps the price of the used high.

 

[oagboghi2]

Nintendo has the life to be sure. They rarely allow sales, their msrp stays at the max for quite a long time on everything for a premium and so on.

And the best thing is Nintendo very very rarely has to actually do anything new. They just gradually evolve all of their hardware, they have just been shitting out the same franchises for decades now with hardly ever actually making a new game, they re release games over and over again and they merchandise the shit out of themselves.

Honestly nintendo is more of a bad company than microsoft is since microsoft is simply just short sighted and not very bright in how they handle their gaming, but nintendo is just lazy as fuck and wont get off the couch because they can just sit and gouge on prices for the same old shit.

Nintendo is only in business because of the nostalgia factor they carry, they are overly safe and simple, and they are represented by soft spoken, smiling and friendly faces.

I mean I own a switch and all but I constantly and thinking "god damn can I have a new game for this thing besides ring fit adventure, and arms, or another game that is just like the 37th sequel?" And the whole just releasing old wiiu games over again is old news. And 85% of its catalog is just games that have been on other systems for years that perform better and cost 1/3 of the amount.

Why did you buy it if you are going to ignore the games they release?

What it means is that price of new stays high keeps the price of the used high.

The prices stay high becuase people are willing to pay the price.

I'm not sure why Nintendo has to throw money away.

 

[CrisPy2019]

From a logical perspective not dropping in price is a very good thing.

If you are not dumb you know how to get discounts. So buying a $50€ game for 30 is not hard.

Being able to sell it years later for the same price is awesome. Not that I ever sold a game anyway . (E.g. Just got my 100th 3DS game this week)

I don't have to worry whether to buy a game or wait because it doesn't drop anyway. I regretted buying games just to see them get a price cut a week after so many times...... That's why I completely stopped buying games day1.

Unless it's (well was) Nintendo.

Them embracing dlc changed that tho.
Since they introduced DLC I also don't buy their games day1 anymore. If I have to pay extra to get the whole game experience anyway I will not pay full price for the game. I mean I got Smash Ultimate for $30€. A single character for 5? Never lol.

And the only DLC I bought on switch was for Zelda and I immediately regretted it.
"We have to check if you are allowed to use this software" is fucking annoying.

I wish Nintendo would simply replace the base game with GOTY ones on store shelves once dlc is out so I don't have to deal with digital crap. I can't take my dlc to other consoles, to friends, to replacement systems etc. Without it being a pain in the ass.

Companies have to change DLC. They have to make it physical too. And they have to make it bring in more people. So basically new people buying the game keep the Cashflow coming in that in turn finances DLC. Kinda like GTA5 works.

If everyone would get all DLC for free. The games lifespan wound be much longer. More and more people would have an incentive to buy a game because their experience will be better than before without paying more money.

Every DLC splits the userbase even more. 100 people buy the game, 90 the dlc, 70 dlc2, 50 dlc3 etc... And then the game dies a slow death because half of the people feel left out. The other half have half as many people to connect with.

 

[BouncyFrag]

This is helpful:

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

 

[Zog]

The prices stay high becuase people are willing to pay the price.

I'm not sure why Nintendo has to throw money away.

Do you think that they would sell more copies if they lowered prices as time went on?

 

[zcaa0g]

Nintendo is actually more arrogant than Sony and that takes some doing. 60 dollar games with zero production values to warrant their cost.

I don't expect anything less from a company that doesn't even know what an analog trigger is and charges more for their controllers than the vastly superior Microsoft and Sony controllers.