Ubisoft Explains All The Terrible Reasons Why Digital Games Are So Expensive.

[Rohith_Kumar_Sp]

“Digital is more reactive than what we put in stores, but at the same time, it doesn’t react as fast on consoles than it does on PC, What we can say is that when games are older than one year, digital is a lot more dynamic on console because there are less units in stores. It’s a new business, a new trend, and we think all this will get more in line with time, but for sure, at the moment you see all sorts of prices depending on who is doing a promotion for that specific week. If you look at the PC [post-release discount] trend, I think you will see that on consoles, but you will have to wait a little bit of time for that to happen with the same speed” - Guillemot  Ceo

Ubisoft CFO Alain Martinez added, 

"On digital we will not sell [a game] for a lower price compared to physical. After a few weeks or few months things can change, and as Yves has been saying, sometime you might have a promotion on Amazon [that is] not on GameStop, but we can also react on the digital side. We are actually more aggressive on the PC side where digital is very, very strong. We tend to be more conservative on the digital side for more console and more flexible on PC."

 

 

Guillemot also pointed to one other factor that needs to be taken into account, which is how many copies of a particular game are left on store shelves:

"Also, one thing to consider is related to stocks; if we have stock in stores, we tend to make sure we decrease the quantity of units in stores before going digital with lower prices."

Thoughts -  

Ubisoft is hardly the only company with games this is true of, we know Nintendo deliberately sells digital games for the same price as physical ones in order to avoid lowering the value consumers place on its games. Even so, We've seen GameStop has voiced concerns about digital games getting too cheap, although consumers at least in the US have been shown to still prefer physical games to digital ones.

If anything, the constant argument is that games should actually be more expensive, as despite inflation, prices have remained relatively constant for a decade. But start talking about $70 USD games and the firestorm will make all other gaming controversies look trivial in comparison.

 

Sources : http://www.kitguru.net/desktop-pc/console-desktop-pc/matthew-wilson/ubisoft-explains-why-digital-games-are-more-expensive-on-console/

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ubisoft-explains-why-digital-games-stay-more-expen/1100-6428760/

[Bloodyvalley]

FUCK YOU UBISOFT

[Arty]

If they play the cards right, lower price may result in more sales.....and ya know better games also will help.

[minibois]

That's the thing that sucks about digital, still as expensive

Totally true with Nintendo, I would surely buy another Pokemon game digitally if it's like 30 euros.. But it's not..

[Alurit]

If they play the cards right, lower price may result in more sales.....and ya know better games also will help.

that is the reason why games costs half as much in russia, there are a lot of gamers there but the salary not that high so by selling at half price valve sells 3 times as much games, so increasing income by 50%

[Arty]

that is the reason why games costs half as much in russia, there are a lot of gamers there but the salary not that high so by selling at half price valve sells 3 times as much games, so increasing income by 50%

lower price more people buy

and might convince some pirates to switch (even tho pirates don't really affect sales )

[Alurit]

this is bullshit, they sells games at full price despite having a much bigger cut on digital sales. they take like 60-70% after ms/sony/valve cuts their share, and only like 30-40% after both ms/sony and gamestop or other retailer takes their cut

[Misanthrope]

I thought we agree we shouldn't listen to this Guillemot asshole...well maybe not "agreed" but we should agree not to listen to him regardless.

[EChondo]

All I read were buzz words and poor excuses.

 

Get rid of Uplay and fix your goddamn games, then I'll buy products from you.

[Curufinwe_wins]

Those comments were laughably incoherent.

[Trik'Stari]

My TL;DR for the title:

 

"because we're a bunch of greedy assholes, who believe in making money by fucking the customer, rather than offering a good product and service"

 

The end.

 

I thought we agree we shouldn't listen to this Guillemot asshole...well maybe not "agreed" but we should agree not to listen to him regardless.

 

Or we could agree to not listen to him, anyone who agrees with him, or anyone who states similar opinions as him.

[Misanthrope]

My TL;DR for the title:

"because we're a bunch of greedy assholes, who believe in making money by fucking the customer, rather than offering a good product and service"

The end.

Or we could agree to not listen to him, anyone who agrees with him, or anyone who states similar opinions as him.

Agreed.

[Kurosaki Isshin]

The problem is: Microtransactions.

 

You think they would release an $80 game and NOT add $100 worth of cosmetics/buyable boosts?

they might not for the first installment. but the second? third? forth?

 

no sir, games ARE more expensive than they used to be. the entry price is the same ($60) but back then you would get ALL of the game for $60. now? if you're lucky you get half the game on launch, buggy, and broken as all hell. a few weeks later you have the other half being sold for 50% of the games original price!

 

fuck off.

[ThatFatMan1911]

Really? Every once in a while I'll check the Nintendo eShop and most of their big name titles are $40 whereas the physical copies are still $60 in stores. 

[HeyKenGuy]

doesnt make a lick of difference to me as I never buy games at full price anymore.  I pre-ordered Arkam Knight only because GMG had the game with the season pass included at almost 50% off the regular price

 

I still havent played Mass effect 3 and just got it for $6.  If you dont care about being the first to play it, saves you a ton if you just wait. plus, by then, the majority of the bugs would have been ironed out

[Th3 Mans1ay3r]

Ubisoft, never ceasing to amaze me. When are we gonna let them burn?

[Doughnutnator]

doesnt make a lick of difference to me as I never buy games at full price anymore. I pre-ordered Arkam Knight only because GMG had the game with the season pass included at almost 50% off the regular price

I still havent played Mass effect 3 and just got it for $6. If you dont care about being the first to play it, saves you a ton if you just wait

You're so right.

That's the best with PC, if you wait you get amazing prices and bundles

I always wanted to play Hitman, I waited a little and this year I got all the Hitman Franchise for less than $5 on Steam, with all the possible DLC's, same with Alan Wake and some other good games for dirt cheap money

[Sakkura]

If anything, the constant argument is that games should actually be more expensive, as despite inflation, prices have remained relatively constant for a decade. But start talking about $70 USD games and the firestorm will make all other gaming controversies look trivial in comparison.

 

If we're going to have that argument, we should take other factors into account as well.

 

Making AAA games has actually become more expensive. But the number of people that buy them has also increased significantly. The distribution costs are also way down. So it's not unfair on the developers and publishers that games have become somewhat cheaper over time. And it's not like the industry is in trouble financially; for the biggest publishers, revenue grew by more than 10% just from 2013 to 2014.

[RagnarokDel]

I honestly dont see what's the issue with what he said. Oh but it has Ubisoft in it, let's mindlessly bash it.

 

Digital games are cheaper then physical games. You have to get off your ass and go to a store to buy a physical copy, that costs time and possibly gas.

 

It's not like Ubisoft doesnt do sales on digital platforms. Unlike Rockstar who raises the price of it's game in order to fake discount it to the same price.

[asker509]

I guess I'm of the rare minority that only buys digital on consoles for me if a game is still $60 after a year or two on psn I will pretty much never buy it. I would buy a lot more games on my ps4 if they dropped price online before I had a gaming pc.

[marldorthegreat]

So ubisoft are evil for wanting to make a decent ammount of money from a game. 

[Briggsy]

Wendell from Tek Syndicate made a good point. Ubisoft cannot undercut the retailers, so they have to charge more when selling directly to the customer - to avoid retailers sending copies back to ubisoft that don't sell. In this case, Ubisoft only sells directly through digital sales, so they will need to keep their own prices above retailers until Console gamers completely move over to digital.

[Sakkura]

So ubisoft are evil for wanting to make a decent ammount of money from a game. 

 

No, they're evil for charging more than a decent amount for digitally distributed games, despite the significantly lower costs involved compared to physical distribution.

 

It's like if you had to pay the same to send an email as you do to send a letter.