EA has been SUED 5 TIMES MERRY CHRISTMAS EA MUHAHA ARR!

[JMZ]

And that's not even getting into the whole 'USED GAMES MUST BE DESTROYED!' online only/limited activation bullshit, like you're supposed to get paid over and over for one sale...WTF?  I understand wanting people to buy new and buy more, but to attack and dismiss the inherent advantages of any used goods market is so incredibly foolish, especially when they could offer the same service themselves if they wanted - they don't so Gamestop, etc. fill that void to their huge profit.

Agreed totally on this. I would never have got into Sims 2 if I hadn't purchased a used copy of the base game as I had no intention of paying out megabucks for a game that I might not even like. After that I purchased new all of the expansion packs as they came out and the Festive Holiday Stuff pack. Monies they would not have had if it weren't for the used games market.

[SoggyFox]

Considering that with the RIAA, musicians make pennies from album sales, and the albums cost around 50 cents to print, [more likely less], musicians are better off giving the music for free, like Trent did, because they make money from merchandising and concerts.  And when giving it away [I got the new album the day he released it for free], people are more inclined to buy a 'hard copy' just to support the artists who are being generous.

When Spore came out, Penny Arcade ran a three part essay thing, with three different views on DRM - the best was the game designer who said the best way to do it is to make a game that is awesome and make it -free-.  Because people will come to love it, the donations will more than pay for further development.  And PA was fair, they even had someone who supported DRM, which added validity to the anti-DRM folks.

[neriana]

If gaming companies catered and took care of their fans, they wouldn't have to worry about pirates as much.

Yep. First, they need to remove DRM, and thereby not treat their customers like criminals. Let's see, I could buy the game and have to go through hoops when I install it and want to play it, or I could download it and be playing it easily, forever, whenever I want. Punishing the people who give you money is so so stupid.

Second, game companies need to step back from the "bleeding edge". If your game can only play on 5 or 10% of customers' computers, you've narrowed your customer base artificially, and for what? A point more on game reviewers' "graphics" scales because of the pretty sheen off weapons? World of Warcraft does so well partly because it's a good game, but also because it runs well on relatively cheap and old systems. Gaming companies need to stop sinking money into the black hole of technical graphical prowess, and start putting that money into game design. Beef up your gameplay, story, and art design, eliminate most bugs -- your consumers are not people who care about the new shiny sexiness of light glinting off a gun just perfectly. And if they do, most of them can't afford it anyway.

Too many PC game companies, EA very much included, seem to think the customer base for Saks Fifth Avenue is larger than the one for Target. And now we're in a depression. How did these people end up running companies again?

[pickles]

Target sells the same shit as Walmart, for twice the price. I mean, if you're going to have everything produced in china for pennies, at least pass the savings on to your customers!
/shun Target

[neriana]

Target sells the same shit as Walmart, for twice the price. I mean, if you're going to have everything produced in china for pennies, at least pass the savings on to your customers!
/shun Target

Walmart has absolutely atrocious employee practices. Also, it's "organized" like a 12 year old boy's closet. Also also, their supposed "cheap prices" are often more expensive than other stores. I fucking hate that place.

[SoggyFox]

Walmart also practices sexually discriminating practices, including not promoting many women to positions of authority and holding 'meetings' in strip clubs, and I don't mean male strippers either.

Walmart also screws their wholesalers by selling most everything on consignment which makes the consigners suffer losses, not walmart.

I have to go to Walmart and Target on occasion, but for most things I try and hit local shops or somewhere online.

[JFederated]

I bought TS1 base game while idly meandering through Tar-jay in the year two thousaaaaand.   

And I agree that game-making needs to be more widely accessible as far as hardware.  A few games for the Saks players, but more for the Walmartians, since they are teh horde.  And pricing:  you wanna go digital, make it cheaper, like the rental it really is.  Those who want hard copies will be willing to shell out (as long as you're not crapping on them w/crappity Securom or obnoxious inconveniences, dynamic ads, activations, any crappity crap that's server dependent for single player games - lemme buy it and get outta my face).

Making a good game is obviously not an exact science, and of course what does work will be emulated.  But if you take TS2 as an example - it obviously works for a great number of people.  POLISH IT!  Make it the best it can be, raid the giant comms that have sprung up and supported this game for ideas, good, sensible ideas, fixes and innovations, and employ them.  IMPROVE IT!  Shine that sucker up, release patches that matter frequently...SUPPORT YOUR PRECIOUS IP!

That's how you keep customers.  Hold dearly, in a possessive and spiritual sense, that which brings you success, like those that pay you and advise others to do the same because the game is that good and only gets better.

Ugh.  EA is so damn lazy where it counts the most.  They have the weight and the manpower to be the pinnacle of success, but throw it all away to be the pinnacle of immediate greed.  I think their moronically shortsighted business decisions disgust me more than anything else some days.

ETA:  So sorry, I feel extra rambly today...

I find it insane on all fronts that buying and playing a video game has become so freaking complicated, all because publishers want to track/control/prevent/protect/whatever the very product they want someone to buy.  It absolutely galls me that they expect anyone to follow along these increasingly labrynthine install processes (see the 20 step install for GTA4 on PC), and I am gobsmacked that some are willing to even consider going to those lengths to play a game.  This is above and beyond the flipping research one has to do now prior to purchase regarding restrictions that aren't even on a game package or description!  GAh!

As Redisenchanted said, it's a map to TPB they're drawing for soon to be former customers.

[kenmtl]

Walmart is the fifth horseman of the Apocalypse.

[Devilfish]

I remember a time when I simply walked into a store and picked a PC game that looked cool. Not anymore. Now before I buy I spend ages on the internet finding out what the glitches are (there are always glitches), how bad they are, whether the company cares about said glitches, whether there's fan pachtes available if they don't, what DRM (if any) they use, whether I happen to have that one graphics card the game won't run with...

PC gaming has become a nightmare. I'm spending more and more time on the consoles (although they have their own set of retarded problems) out of sheer exhaustion. There's another video game crash coming, it's going to come soon and it'll come because of greed. The future of PC gaming looks bleak. The future of console gaming is filled with bright racing games, balance boards and digital Pilates programmes.

[SoggyFox]

I don't know.  I suspect the crash will come, but some of the steady, respectful PC game companies will come through.

[Ashbashtus]

Walmart has absolutely atrocious employee practices. Also, it's "organized" like a 12 year old boy's closet. Also also, their supposed "cheap prices" are often more expensive than other stores. I fucking hate that place.

I can't stand it either. My mother dragged me in there to go Christmas shopping a couple of days ago. It was a fucking madhouse! We spent three hours in there! I vowed never to go to Walmart between Thanksgiving and New Years again. Speaking of the employee practices, I have to agree. During my high school Sociology class we read Nickled and Dimed. The author decided to see if she could live on minimum wage jobs. Walmart was one of her employers and it does not seem like a great place to work .

[Lowell]

Too many PC game companies, EA very much included, seem to think the customer base for Saks Fifth Avenue is larger than the one for Target. And now we're in a depression. How did these people end up running companies again?

This comparison is even more amusing when you consider that Saks Fifth Avenue might be closing down permanently thanks to the recession. Maybe it'll pass onto the game companies who only think of the consumers who can constantly shell out their money to upgrade their systems every time a new graphics card comes out, and we'll start getting ones who will make quality games for everyone to enjoy.

PC gaming has become a nightmare. I'm spending more and more time on the consoles (although they have their own set of retarded problems) out of sheer exhaustion. There's another video game crash coming, it's going to come soon and it'll come because of greed. The future of PC gaming looks bleak. The future of console gaming is filled with bright racing games, balance boards and digital Pilates programmes.

Greed and shitty games. PC and console games alike are really just the "same old, same old" now; every now and then, you find a rare gem, but give it a couple months and everyone copies it. Game companies are all sticking to the formula now because they know that people will buy the games - and keep buying them - even though they've played it all before. Hell, I can't even find replay value in a lot of games anymore.

[Devilfish]

PC gaming has become a nightmare. I'm spending more and more time on the consoles (although they have their own set of retarded problems) out of sheer exhaustion. There's another video game crash coming, it's going to come soon and it'll come because of greed. The future of PC gaming looks bleak. The future of console gaming is filled with bright racing games, balance boards and digital Pilates programmes.

Greed and shitty games. PC and console games alike are really just the "same old, same old" now; every now and then, you find a rare gem, but give it a couple months and everyone copies it. Game companies are all sticking to the formula now because they know that people will buy the games - and keep buying them - even though they've played it all before. Hell, I can't even find replay value in a lot of games anymore.

Good point. I just sold my DS because I've played the four or five games worth playing (twice) and every game that comes out now is a carbon copy of those. And the DS looked so good when it came to originality. Forget about the Wii, the PS3 is being strangled and I don't own an XboX because Microsoft practises make me physically ill. I've been on the lookout for a decent, original PC game for a while now and it's just not happening, my game budget is just sitting there. Instead I find myself replaying games I've had for years (Vampire, Morrowind, even Theme Hospital ferchrissakes) because I'm unwilling to sell my blood and ova to buy another copy of a game I played ages ago, only shinier.

[Piratey]

It absolutely galls me that they expect anyone to follow along these increasingly labrynthine install processes (see the 20 step install for GTA4 on PC), and I am gobsmacked that some are willing to even consider going to those lengths to play a game.

Blargh. GTA IV for PC is a big fat DO NOT WANT. It's a diabolical port. In fact, it's actually almost worse than anything EA has ever put out; and at least they aren't bribing reviewers to pretend their turd is shiny flawless perfection.

PC gaming has become a nightmare. I'm spending more and more time on the consoles (although they have their own set of retarded problems) out of sheer exhaustion. There's another video game crash coming, it's going to come soon and it'll come because of greed. The future of PC gaming looks bleak. The future of console gaming is filled with bright racing games, balance boards and digital Pilates programmes.

I totally and utterly agree. It was a lack of quality and trust that almost killed off the consoles and actually bringing those things to the table that saved them. A console crash could be prevented if the big three were to impose some degree of their own quality control on third party games, so we don't get barely playable "Imagine: Crap!". As for PC, it's the whole criminalisation of the consumer and extreme control and paranoia which doesn't seem likely to change. For the companies that are giving us this crap, things will catch up with them soon because you can't treat people like crap forever; one day they fight back.

I don't know.  I suspect the crash will come, but some of the steady, respectful PC game companies will come through.

And yes, I agree with this. The companies that actually bothered to care will be saved by good ol' Karma. As for the others: Good riddance.

[neriana]

I have to go to Walmart and Target on occasion, but for most things I try and hit local shops or somewhere online.

Local shops are best. Unfortunately I live in chain store and chain restaurant hell, though luckily we have a really good local grocery store chain. I've been trying to find more independent places online, because I'm sick of amazon. I like powells.com for books.