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[ebullientprism]

Waiting for sale it is then I guess.

SMH at some posts in this thread. You would think the developers were entitled to your money just for doing their job. Complaining about people wanting it cheaper is the equivalent of someone calling the developers greedy for pricing it at 40$. Both of those points are bullshit.

They are free to price it whatever they want. People are free to wait till its in the price range they are willing to pay.

 

[PolishQ]

Modedit: some context regarding the price:

In addition to confirming the release date, Blow shed some light on how long the game will take you to complete. He tells GameSpot that most people will need about 20-25 hours to beat the game's 667 puzzles. However, completionists could spend closer to 100 hours before they're done, he said.

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ps4pc-the-witness-release-date-announced-average-p/1100-6430658/

I think Gamespot is a little confused here. Blow has stated in the past that there is a completion state that can be reached without solving all of the game's puzzles. For example, if you solve 7 of the game's 11 areas (to say nothing of hidden stuff after that), you can get something resembling an ending. That's probably the 20-25 hour mark. But to solve ALL of the 667 puzzles, Blow has said you're looking at potentially 80-100 hours.

 

[Briarios]

Thing is, most people aren't completionists -- I mean, an Assassin's Creed game is either 20 hours or 60, but for most people length is how long it takes to conplete the story.

I just don't have enough information one way or the other to decide if its worth $40 or not. At $20, I'd chance it blind ... At that price, I wait for reviews and for people here to play it.

Everyone has a different calculus for determining when to purchase a game. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[mentallyinept]

I expected this, but the price does mean that I will be waiting for the physical edition to come out before jumping in.

 

[brau]

Any chance I had of trying this game is gone unless there's a fire sale.

Fire sale eh?

 

[Kureizu]

So beating every puzzle takes about 20-25 hours? I wonder what else is there to get to the 80-100 hours Blow mentions.

 

[HotHamBoy]

I expected them to be so cheeky and price it at $40. No indie game is worth that much to me. I'll patiently wait it out for $15-20.

You'll win no favor today with a comment like that. Enjoy your microtransaction, episodic future!

 

[More_Badass]

Games have been devalued to a point where $40 for a "downloadable game" seems crazy to many people. And to be fair, it will probably cost half that in a few months.

From what I've seen, $40 seems like a fair price for this game. I'm excited.

It shouldn't the most of the larger, more anticipated indie games are in the $20-$40 range in recent months.

$40
The Witness
Kerbal Space Program
Divinity Original Sin
The Talos Principle
Wasteland 2
Planetary Annihiliation
Offworld Trading Company
Wreckfest

$30
Warhammer Vermintide
Prison Architect
SOMA
Endless Legend
Satellite Reign
The Age of Decadence
Descent: Underground

$25
Darkest Dungeon
Grim Dawn
Space Engineers
Chivalry
Infinifactory
Depth
Hand of Fate
Kentucky Route Zero
Else.Heart.Break
Broken Age

$20
Ori and the Blind Forest
Oxenfree
Hard West
Banished
This War of Mine
Outlast
Axiom Verge
Door Kickera
Distance
Transistor
Invisible Inc

 

[Robert at Zeboyd Games]

At $40, The Witness should have a physical release in my opinion.

They've already said that they're looking into a physical release and that it's highly likely but they didn't want to delay the digital release while they work out the logistics.

 

[Z3M0G]

How much did Catherine cost at release?

 

[S1kkZ]

only thing that will keep me from buying, would be a bad/unstable framerate on ps4.

price is fine. game looks more polished than most 60$ retail releases and has tons of content.

 

[Ambitious]

Fine by me. I'd pay €60, too.

 

[RK128]

Considering how massive this game is (over 100 hours of content to dive into) alongside its very long development period (ever since.....Early 2013 I think), it being 40 bucks is not only fair, but somewhat expected.

Hope it does well and that many give it a shot .

 

[Deadstar]

I expected them to be so cheeky and price it at $40. No indie game is worth that much to me. I'll patiently wait it out for $15-20.

I don't understand this logic. There are a ton of AAA games that are not worth $60.

 

[GhaleonEB]

It has exploration to find the puzzles as well yes? Is that all?

I've not watched too many videos, I'm mainly going off comments I've heard on podcasts.

Release date trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ytwNUMdbcE

It essentially shows a mix of panel maze puzzles, environmental puzzles, and exploration. Blow has said they're showing relatively little of the game in previews so as to preserve the experience of discovering the game.

 

[Pai Pai Master]

Sorry but I don't think that ANY xbla/psn game should be more than $20 and that's being generous.

Fuck this. Why?


Just because the game doesn't come in a physical box it should be $20 max?

 

[Tagyhag]

So beating every puzzle takes about 20-25 hours? I wonder what else is there to get to the 80-100 hours Blow mentions.

Considering this is Blow we're talking about, there's probably a bonus puzzle where you have to stare at it for 5 hours or something.

 

[InsaneTiger]

Everyone always assumes that if the game is not AAA and digital only it is automatically $20.

 

[DNAbro]

How much did Catherine cost at release?

full price

 

[PolishQ]

Considering how massive this game is (over 100 hours of content to dive into) alongside its very long development period (ever since.....Early 2013 I think), it being 40 bucks is not only fair, but somewhat expected.

Hope it does well and that many give it a shot .

8 years of development time, IIRC.

 

[More_Badass]

Considering how massive this game is (over 100 hours of content to dive into) alongside its very long development period (ever since.....Early 2013 I think), it being 40 bucks is not only fair, but somewhat expected.

Hope it does well and that many give it a shot .

More like 2009
http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/698006/jonathan-blows-next-game-is-called-the-witness/
http://www.destructoid.com/braid-creator-s-new-game-is-the-witness-142653.phtml

 

[OrbitalBeard]

How much did Catherine cost at release?

$60

Edit - I may be wrong about that. I'm thinking it may have been $50.

 

[giancarlo123x]

I shall await the reviews and gafs opinion.

 

[xxracerxx]

Waiting for sale it is then I guess.

SMH at some posts in this thread. You would think the developers were entitled to your money just for doing their job. Complaining about people wanting it cheaper is the equivalent of someone calling the developers greedy for pricing it at 40$. Both of those points are bullshit.

They are free to price it whatever they want. People are free to wait till its in the price range they are willing to pay.

No one is saying that.

 

[KORNdoggy]

I got the talos principle for £25 and its the maximum i'm willing to spend on the witness. Seems i'll be buying this one much later down the line!

 

[Visualante2]

Think I'll be waiting a few days to hear impressions before biting on that. Maybe if they did a 10% launch discount...

What a fucking joke! Get your shit together Sony, this shouldn't have been an issue at all.

Embarrassing... for both parties.

 

[entremet]

Fuck this. Why?


Just because the game doesn't come in a physical box it should be $20 max?

XBLA doesn't even exist for MS's current platform.

A great choice, IMO.

Even they saw that the monicker was influencing pricing perception.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Waiting for sale it is then I guess.

SMH at some posts in this thread. You would think the developers were entitled to your money just for doing their job. Complaining about people wanting it cheaper is the equivalent of someone calling the developers greedy for pricing it at 40$. Both of those points are bullshit.

They are free to price it whatever they want. People are free to wait till its in the price range they are willing to pay.

Yeah, no one is saying otherwise. What they are saying is that an unwillingness to support the cost realities of making ambitious middle-tier games is what is making it so difficult for such games to exist, despite the demand from the internet.

 

[Z3M0G]

full price

$60

Yah... this mini meltdown is silly...

Edit - I may be wrong about that. I'm thinking it may have been $50.

Even so, I suspect this is much more game.

 

[Shibalan]

In addition to confirming the release date, Blow shed some light on how long the game will take you to complete. He tells GameSpot that most people will need about 20-25 hours to beat the game's 667 puzzles. However, completionists could spend closer to 100 hours before they're done, he said.

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ps4pc-the-witness-release-date-announced-average-p/1100-6430658/

This quote bugs me. Once you've finished the game's 667 puzzles, what do you do during the remaining 75 hours ? I mean, it's a puzzle-game, what can we expect to do when all the puzzles are done ? During 75 hours ?

 

[Heel]

He tells GameSpot that most people will need about 20-25 hours to beat the game's 667 puzzles. However, completionists could spend closer to 100 hours before they're done, he said.

4 to 5 times as long if you want to do more than complete the 667 puzzles? This is a very intriguing statement, and makes me think there's more than meets the eye than spending 75-80 extra hours sightseeing. Day one.

 

[Vyrance]

$40 is a good price for it imo, been waiting on this one for a while

 

[TheMrPliskin]

That price is fine by me.

 

[cyba89]

I've not seen or heard enough about the game to say if it's worth $40 or not but to the people saying he needs to make the money back; Do you think pricing it this high is creating a bigger risk of it bombing? I mean it's better to sell 1 million copies at $20 than 200k at $40 right? I think it's risking missing out on a lot of impulse buys at this price


Again not saying it's not worth it, Just that it seems a risky price.

It may be risky, but starting with a higher price also gives you more room for discounts later down the road.

 

[entremet]

Yah... this mini meltdown is silly...

It's because it doesn't have disc release yet. That's the only logic that makes sense.

 

[Weetrick]

All games are discounted after a few months...this is not a downloadable only game thing.

This is definitely true. My point was that people (incorrectly) associate "downloadable games" with low budget, indie, cheap, etc.

 

[paperspace]

Indie games should be free.

#freeindies

 

[toythatkills]

Guy spent seven years making this game, I think I can stretch to $40.

Bit silly the complaints about it not being "worth it." If the protag had a gun and there were enemies everywhere people would happily spend $40 on it. If you don't like puzzle games in the first place then you weren't going to buy it for $10 or $20 or any price he set, so you can't really make any comment on value.

 

[GhaleonEB]

This quote bugs me. Once you've finished the game's 667 puzzles, what do you do during the remaining 75 hours ? I mean, it's a puzzle-game, what can we expect to do when all the puzzles are done ? During 75 hours ?

4 to 5 times as long if you want to do more than complete the 667 puzzles? This is a very intriguing statement, and makes me think there's more than meets the eye than spending 75-80 extra hours sightseeing. Day one.

You can "beat" the game by completing a subset of the puzzles. Actually doing everything will take much longer, and result in a different ending.

 

[Mihael Mello Keehl]

40$? How much is it on iOS?

 

[Koh]

This quote bugs me. Once you've finished the game's 667 puzzles, what do you do during the remaining 75 hours ? I mean, it's a puzzle-game, what can we expect to do when all the puzzles are done ? During 75 hours ?

My assumption is that you don't need to do all of the puzzles to complete the narrative.

 

[JetSetRadio]

I played braid haha, no.

 

[mentallyinept]

Yeah, no one is saying otherwise. What they are saying is that an unwillingness to support the cost realities of making ambitious middle-tier games is what is making it so difficult for such games to exist, despite the demand from the internet.

Yeah, that is frustrating... we need more games of the caliber in the industry, if only to serve as incubators for new game concepts.

 

[CecilRousso]

Not gonna preorder this, but I don't see the problem with the price. 36.99€ for 20-25h gameplay, than can last up 100h? That's a better deal then most other singleplayer games today.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Yeah, but Catherine was Atlus, SMT-related Anime drama with boobies. And I'm pretty sure a lot of the people who played it also waited for a sale because it got cheap quick.

 

[Heel]

This quote bugs me. Once you've finished the game's 667 puzzles, what do you do during the remaining 75 hours ? I mean, it's a puzzle-game, what can we expect to do when all the puzzles are done ? During 75 hours ?

That's exactly what has me curious to play. I'm thinking (hoping?) it's a puzzle within a puzzle, but I guess we'll find out.

 

[SomeOneInaHat]

I expected this to be a $60 title with how much time and work went into this.

It's supposedly a huge game.

 

[Chobel]

Progression? Then explain Axiom Verge to me? It's $20 and looks exactly like an 8 bit NES game. Sorry but I don't think that ANY xbla/psn game should be more than $20 and that's being generous. At $40, The Witness should have a physical release in my opinion. Of course, this is just my own personal opinion. This generation has had some good games but in so many ways, has gotten worse than last generation but to each their own.

 

[Alec]

Still Day 1.

 

[PolishQ]

4 to 5 times as long if you want to do more than complete the 667 puzzles? This is a very intriguing statement, and makes me think there's more than meets the eye than spending 75-80 extra hours sightseeing. Day one.

Gamespot is mixed up. 20-25 hours gets you "an" ending, which definitely does not involve solving all 667 puzzles.