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[Fitts]

It looks good and I'm interested, but I'm interested in NMS the same way as I was interested in Nobi Nobi Boy. It's a game that I anticipate picking up every once in a while and messing around for about 30min-an hour.

That said, I'll pay what I feel it's worth to me but they're free to charge whatever they'd like for it.

 

[jogu]

I just want to know if i should buy it for ps4 or pc?

 

[NIGHT-]

Don't worry, something tells me it will be $7.50 in less than a year

It shouldn't be $60 TBH

Yea, I expect it to be extremely repetitive and lacking in depth.

 

[Daingurse]

$40-$60 seems reasonable for No Man's Sky. The amount of content it potential offers would more than justify a $60 price point. Whether it's an indie game or not makes no real difference to me. Don't think I'll be getting this at launch either way, but a $60 price point would not irk me.

 

[Booki]

Maybe it'll be the June PS Plus game.

 

[bitbydeath]

You'll need two jobs!

 

[EGM1966]

And yet people pay decent money for irrelevant cosmetics all day long...

Looks worth $60 dollars to me OP. Certainly compared to plenty of other $60 dollar games such as Battlefront.

 

[Wagram]

It'll most likely be $60, but I don't feel like it will be worth that price point.

 

[RedSwirl]

Look, the reason "indie" games tend to cost less than AAA games isn't simply because they're called "indie." It's because they tend to have fewer man-hours put into them and require a lot less revenue to turn a profit. Sure perceived value is a big factor too, and I think all Sony has done to present NMS has placed a high perceived value in it in the eyes of many people. I'm just noticing that a lot of people have forgotten what "indie" used to entail beyond the word itself.

When you're paying for a game, you're not really paying for the amount of content that's in it. That's what makes a game valuable to a lot of people, but what you're really paying for is all the money and man-hours that went into building that game. You have to factor in that plus how much the developer or publisher actually expects the game to sell. Unfortunately, we don't know any of that information. We don't know what NMS's total budget is and we don't know how much Sony or Hello Games expects it to sell.

For a comparison though, open-world survival games like Stranded Deep or The Long Dark have to start at low price points because they're breaking into Early Access with basically zero notoriety, and have to have a low asking price to entice people. To me it seems like NMS was originally going to try to stay low-key until its launch, but is instead getting noticed a lot more due to being on two E3 press conference stages as well as Conan. It's development budget however is still probably really low -- probably in line with the upper-tier indie games and some of the Kickstarter games. It's possible Sony could find a big-ass marketing campaign for it though. At that point $60 would become much more likely.

I'm just trying to talk about what the actual factors behind game pricing are. The actual amount of "content" in the game probably has less of an impact than people seem to think in terms of cost to the developer and publisher. That's how games like Titanfall and Star Wars Battlefront can end up being $60.

 

[KingV]

It looks good and I'm interested, but I'm interested in NMS the same way as I was interested in Nobi Nobi Boy. It's a game that I anticipate picking up every once in a while and messing around for about 30min-an hour.

That said, I'll pay what I feel it's worth to me but they're free to charge whatever they'd like for it.

I'm with you, it has all of the warnig signs of a game thats a mile wide and an inch deep. I think the developers have been somewhat straightforward about it too.

I think it will be a $40 game that reflects that it is more of a technical showcase than a compelling game.

 

[Tar-Miriel]

Why do indies have to be priced lower than AAA games
Some indie games are better than some AAA games

This. I feel like we are coming to this point where, with better tech indies and aaa are kind of converging. Not all indies of course, but games like no mans sky and the witness have no difference in quality and length than aaa titles. Games should really at this point be categorized by their length/quality, not who's making and publishing them.

look at it the other way around. no one is saying grow home should cost 60 bucks because its an Ubisoft game.

 

[Skux]

$60 seems like a reasonable ask. Open world games have the perception of having more in them compared to puzzle games.

 

[Rising_Hei]

This. I feel like we are coming to this point where, with better tech indies and aaa are kind of converging. Not all indies of course, but games like no mans sky and the witness have no difference in quality and length than aaa titles. Games should really at this point be categorized by their length/quality, not who's making and publishing them.

look at it the other way around. no one is saying grow home should cost 60 bucks because its an Ubisoft game.

Length?? that'd be a bad practise, more stupid padding/grinding to make the game more expensive? no thanks, it's the disease of today's industry.

Quality? That's not something that you can measure since it's abtrasct, it is something that only exists in our brains, and each person measures it in a different way; and entrusting it all to metacritic is pretty dangerous

In the end what determine the price of a game is a mix of various factors, like:
- How much the development costs were (Localization and suchs included)
- How much they spent on advertising (this is the main reason AAAs are so costly)
- The % they have to pay to the owner of the system for publishing the game (they pay less if they are indie on consoles, and even less on PC)
- A research about how much is people willing to pay for the game based on the interest
- IF PC (with lower requirements they can release the game at a better price since the game will run properly on more systems, so you have more potential buyers)

ETC ETC ETC

Videogaming is pretty different from the music and cinema industries, it can't work like them

 

[The Dutch Slayer]

$60 digital and retail release.
And I'll pay it no problem I want to believe its real.

 

[Uzzy]

Indie developers should just stick a bloody Ubisoft logo at the start of their games. Obviously that'll cause millions of people to suddenly happily hand over their £40/$60, as apparently that logo and logo's like it is the real source of value in games.

 

[WaterAstro]

I don't think NMS indie-ness should matter to its price, but I also think the game didn't cost that much to make that they would need to put it at $60.

 

[JTripper]

$40-$60 is most likely.

 

[Freeman76]

I've just come back from the future, unfortunately i cannot tell you how much it will cost as i might mess up the space-time continuum. Sorry.

 

[Yagharek]

After seeing The Witness for $40, I'm scared NMS will be $60. Way too much for an indie title. Even $40 is too much.

$20-$30 will be a sweet spot for me.

Unlike halo, cod, asscreed etc, the cost of a game is not related to how much saturation marketing it launches with.

 

[Lebneney]

Maybe it'll be the June PS Plus game.

Nah son that will be KNACK BABYYYY!

Spoiler

It's going to cost $60 at launch and going to go to $44.99 as a sale towards winter with PS+. Calling it from now.

 

[Aenima]

Acording to some sites that i saw the game on pre-order, it will cost 60$. Can be a placeholder price, but would not be surprised if that will end being the final price.

 

[MMaRsu]

After seeing The Witness for $40, I'm scared NMS will be $60. Way too much for an indie title. Even $40 is too much.

$20-$30 will be a sweet spot for me.

Pfffff come the f on stop it with this bullshit nonsense.

way too much for an indie title

Just because the game is not published by a big house, and the dev team is small regardless of the content the game shouldnt be over 30 dollars cause indie?

Im getting damn sick of this bullshit

 

[Arcayne]

$40-$60. Realistically $60. On that note, why would we expect any less; it's a massive game.

 

[RPGam3r]

To be honest I hope that it is 40-60 so we can stop with this shitty attitude about indie titles.

 

[Arthea]

I was planning to pick it day one, but if it's $60, I won't, I still hope it will not be priced that high.

To be honest I hope that it is 40-60 so we can stop with this shitty attitude about indie titles.

what if it has nothing to do with indies? I'm not paying $60 for a digital game, period.

 

[Fat4all]

To be honest I hope that it is 40-60 so we can stop with this shitty attitude about indie titles.

I agree, I don't see a problem with sommit like "premium indies".

If a developer put a ton of time, money, and energy into making a game they think is worth $40-60, then they should ignore the current market stigma.

 

[kswiston]

As I said in an earlier post, the fewer man hours/not that much to make arguements lose some of thieir bite when no one bats an eye at Japanese games releasing at full price. Do you think developers like Gust or Vanillaware are bigger than some of the larger indie devs?

Everything being put out by Platinum costs a small fraction of what a GTA V costs but thry still release at full or near full price.

The "more man hours" that Activision or Ubisoft put into some games are already compensated by the fact that they reguarly sell 5-15M units.

Other than the odd Minecraft, smaller games have smaller markets regardless of price.

 

[ironcreed]

I have no problem paying $60 for it. I just want some new info and footage, with a solid release date.

 

[Yagharek]

I was planning to pick it day one, but if it's $60, I won't, I still hope it will not be priced that high.




what if it has nothing to do with indies? I'm not paying $60 for a digital game, period.

How many threads has there been complaining about why AAAA blockbusters cost 60 dollars?

I mean, I'm with you on digital. I won't pay full price unless it's a physical copy, but whether it is indie or from a top three publisher is immaterial.

 

[Fushichou187]

If a developer put a ton of time, money, and energy into making a game they think is worth $40-60, then they should ignore the current market stigma.

What if, regardless of how much of any of that was used, the developer simply thinks their product was worth $40-$60? For you personally, does a game's development cost heavily factor into what you're willing to pay?

 

[D1renegade]

It would be in their best interest to release it at $30...

But they most likely won't so I'll be waiting for a nice discount while I enjoy reading the meltdowns that are to come.

 

[Grover]

60$

 

[ViciousDS]

I have no problem paying for a game like no man's sky $60.

The witness though.....I won't pay more than $20.

 

[novaGT]

Theoretically infinite content and games as a service

What if it costs $20 per month
MMORPG pricing lol

 

[ViciousDS]

Theoretically infinite content and games as a service

What if it costs $20 per month
MMORPG pricing lol

Yes, my biggest concern with the game is how the servers will be handled and how much lag we could possibly experience

 

[Evolution of Metal]

40$ Max, unless they are confident that this is THE GAME and it will have no problems regarding gameplay, balance, content or functionality.

 

[Dance Inferno]

Look, the reason "indie" games tend to cost less than AAA games isn't simply because they're called "indie." It's because they tend to have fewer man-hours put into them and require a lot less revenue to turn a profit. Sure perceived value is a big factor too, and I think all Sony has done to present NMS has placed a high perceived value in it in the eyes of many people. I'm just noticing that a lot of people have forgotten what "indie" used to entail beyond the word itself.

When you're paying for a game, you're not really paying for the amount of content that's in it. That's what makes a game valuable to a lot of people, but what you're really paying for is all the money and man-hours that went into building that game. You have to factor in that plus how much the developer or publisher actually expects the game to sell. Unfortunately, we don't know any of that information. We don't know what NMS's total budget is and we don't know how much Sony or Hello Games expects it to sell.

For a comparison though, open-world survival games like Stranded Deep or The Long Dark have to start at low price points because they're breaking into Early Access with basically zero notoriety, and have to have a low asking price to entice people. To me it seems like NMS was originally going to try to stay low-key until its launch, but is instead getting noticed a lot more due to being on two E3 press conference stages as well as Conan. It's development budget however is still probably really low -- probably in line with the upper-tier indie games and some of the Kickstarter games. It's possible Sony could find a big-ass marketing campaign for it though. At that point $60 would become much more likely.

I'm just trying to talk about what the actual factors behind game pricing are. The actual amount of "content" in the game probably has less of an impact than people seem to think in terms of cost to the developer and publisher. That's how games like Titanfall and Star Wars Battlefront can end up being $60.

People don't pay based on the amount of man hours and investment that went into a game, they pay based on what they expect to get out of the game. Indie games generally have smaller teams working on them, so their graphics might be less advanced, their worlds might be smaller, and their mechanics might be less fleshed out. This line of reasoning can often be incredibly wrong, but like it or not that's what people are basing their purchase decisions on.

 

[Fat4all]

What if, regardless of how much of any of that was used, the developer simply thinks their product was worth $40-$60? For you personally, does a game's development cost heavily factor into what you're willing to pay?

If they feel it's worth that much, let them price it that much.

 

[etta]

Pfffff come the f on stop it with this bullshit nonsense.

Just because the game is not published by a big house, and the dev team is small regardless of the content the game shouldnt be over 30 dollars cause indie?

Im getting damn sick of this bullshit

What if Undertale or Her Story were $60?
I'm not disagreeing with you, by the way.

 

[Fushichou187]

Yes, my biggest concern with the game is how the servers will be handled and how much lag we could possibly experience

Why would this be an issue? If they're handling "multiplayer" in the way Journey did, asymmetrically, then why would there be lag?

 

[Fat4all]

What if Undertale or Her Story were $60?
I'm not disagreeing with you, by the way.

I don't see how hypothetical help the argument. The developers of those games charged what they felt was fair.

 

[Tevious]

50% off or less after a month or two from release.

I have a feeling people are getting WAAYYY too hyped for this game than they should. People are blown away by the sheer size and amount of content in it, but probably don't realize it's going to be all randomly generated content of the exact same plants, animals, and same stupid robots over and over again. I have a hunch it's the next Titanfall, in terms of popularity reversal.

This game is going to be a wait and see for me.

 

[etta]

I don't see how hypothetical help the argument. The developers of those games charged what they felt was fair.

So why should people pay the same price for a massive game like GTA and a two-hour long, simple game like Her Story?
Production and entertainment value should have a somewhat strong, positive correlation with price.

 

[Roddslayer]

No doubt it'll be $60 which I'll gladly pay. Development should have no bearing on it's price cap. Whether it was an eight man team or a thousand, in the end it's how you see the value and experience offered.

 

[Jedi2016]

I've always expected this to be a $60 title. In fact, I'll be very surprised if it isn't.

 

[Fat4all]

So why should people pay the same price for a massive game like GTA and a two-hour long, simple game like Her Story?
Production and entertainment value should have a somewhat strong, positive correlation with price.

I just said that, the developers of Her Story didnt charge $60 for their game.

Are you positive of the length of NMS? No one is.

You're arguing hypotheticals.

 

[CarbonFire]

Why would this be an issue? If they're handling "multiplayer" in the way Journey did, asymmetrical, then why would there be lag?

Plenty of P2P implementations can be laggy, especially since the chances that you happen across someone else in the vast game universe who ALSO happens to be relatively close to you IRL are probably astronomically low. And let's say you do happen to meet up with someone from thousands of miles away in game. How do the two games keep each player's actions synced to the other? What about all of the wildlife? Sentinels? NPC ships? Local destruction?

I'm still very skeptical about the "multiplayer" part of NMS. I strongly believe it's going to end up like a dark souls-esque ghosts populating your world thing, except they'll look like NPCs you won't be able to interact with.

 

[T.Slothrop]

With or without VR?

 

[GuitarAtomik]

It's because they've already projected their mass-appeal product will sell millions.

This will be my last post in the thread, because I've made enough points in the last page, along with other posters. Games are priced out based on fixed costs, a break-even point, and their wishful sales target. Indie games are priced lower because the amount of man hours have translated in the quality of their product. That's it. You wouldn't pay a thousand bones for a Moto X, even though it gives you the same functionalities and services; it doesn't nearly have the same amount of research and development and material cost behind it like an iPhone 6s and a Samsung Galaxy s6...

Indie games means a game developed by an independent studio, which Hello Games is entirely. That's it.

Comparing this to physical products is dicey ground. Especially phones where performance, build quality, and thus experience are most definitely tied to the material cost and tech inside.

The movie comparison is more apt in this scenario. It doesn't matter what tech is behind it. It doesn't matter if it cost $100 million to make or $5 million. You're paying for an experience as opposed to a physical utilitarian product (like a phone) which is why no matter the budget or crew size, your movie ticket costs the same. If No Man Sky gives you an enjoyable experience on the level of a AAA $60 game, there is no reason it shouldn't cost $60 itself. The budget and dev team size is irrelevant.

 

[grosvenor_92]

I expect it to cost $40