• 21May 11

  A letter to Lionhead Studio's - Lets talk a about used games.

  So used games are a big problem for you, even "worse than piracy".
  
  Lionhead Studio's has been an exception to the rule for many years. The Fable series has always been one of my favorite, offering a fun, accessible, valued gaming experience consistently for years. I picked up Fable 1, used on the Xbox years ago,,I was hooked.. I paid full price for Fable 2 and was delighted with the game. Then, Fable 3 came out, $60.00, there were a few other games out at the time I also wanted. At $60, I had to make a sacrifice, just getting too expensive to buy each game I wanted. I passed on Fable 3 at the time but ended up picking it up used for about $25. What a great game it was. But..., according to Lionhead anyways.. Despite getting it used, I paid for the DLC. My son liked the game so much I gave it to him, he played it on his Xbox and also downloaded the DLC. Later we traded the game and im sure it was resold, who knows, Maybe, 2 or 3 times more,. I'm thinking, that's alot of milage for a game. Of course, according to Lionhead, this is equal to piracy, I mean the game was sold at full price once, (profit), then the DLC was sold at least 3 times, likely more, all pure profit. Had the game been only allowed to be sold once, that would mean only half the profit for the game studio. That's not to mention, all the word of mouth and free advertising for the studio. The truth is, if I buy a used game and it's quality, I will likely buy some of the DLC. Multiply that by every person who buys used games world wide and that's a he'll of alot of profit for the game companies that they would never receive otherwise. Like all gamers, I only have 100% to spend. The game companies themselves are at fault for the used game market thriving. They cut off there own legs by releasing tons of junk shovelware, raising pricing for console games above their PC counterparts, fake hype reviews and sometimes just releasing unfinished products. With that in mind I'm supposed to go out and buy each game at 60$ or I'm simply a problem for the game studio's. All big companies would love to force us all to buy everything. We are already criminalizing people in America anyway, for not buying Auto and Health insurance, so why don't we criminalize everyone for not buying everything that a company says we should. Let's force people to buy the way you say we should.
  
  Or,
  
  You might try a more consumer friendly approach,,,,produce quality games, charge reasonable prices, acknowledge what we already know, that the DLC used market is huge. Otherwise if you insist we buy every game at full price, overpriced, questionable quality, well, only having 100% to spend I may just choose a title I know for sure is great. Just think of all the publicity and preorders, and accessories that could not be sold because we shut down all the used game stores in the country. Good luck with that.
  • Posted May 21, 2011 9:27 am GMT
  • Category: Opinion
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