Faster, Pussycat.
What is a mobile video game worth? Quite a lot, say Square Enix, who are stubbornly sticking to their gunblades on mobile game pricing strategy. Their iOS port of PS2 JRPG Dragon Quest VIII launched back in May at the price of $20 — it’s on sale this weekend for the very first time at $15, still a vertigo-inducing price tag by App Store standards. It’s tempting to look at Squeenix and see a doddery old man complaining that kids these days listen to their music too loud and expect their games to cost a dollar.
Cas Prince of PC game developers Puppygames recently wrote that game prices are dropping so precipitously that the rich and diverse ecosystem of game creators we’ve come to enjoy is in danger. That long post includes apparently self-immolating statements like “[customers] are worthless to us[.]” But hear him out.
“Once upon a time, back in the early 2000s or so, games would sell for about $20 or so. Some developers did really well at that price point -– I mean really well. Most of us didn’t do that well, and made beer money, but we carried on making games anyway because that’s what we liked to do, even if nobody wanted them. When we got a customer we were able to treat them like royalty.”
“Then came the Humble Bundle and all its little imitators. It was another cataclysmically disruptive event… You’ve sold 40,000 games! But you’ve only made enough money to survive full-time for two weeks because you’re selling them for 10 cents each.”
Obviously, Prince is talking about one- and two-man indie studios here, not publishing behemoths like Squeenix. And casting Squeenix as the defender of the “premium”-priced game is problematic when the other fork of their mobile games strategy is pushing free-to-play bilge. But at least Square Enix have resisted the temptation to rip out Dragon Quest’s spine and turn it into a freemium cyborg like Namco did with Tales of Phantasia.
I wonder sometimes about publishing this (mostly) weekly price drops post. Am I aiding the forces pushing game prices down? I love getting a game for a dollar as much as the next guy, but many of the games I love can’t be sold profitably at a price point that low. I don’t know. I’ll keep doing it out of inertia for now, but I’m open to the notion that there’s something better to be doing on Saturdays.
Right, so… Dragon Quest VIII. Originally released for PS2 way back in 2005, it’s widely considered one of the best JRPGs of its generation and is so stuffed with content that you could conceivably start playing today and ride side-quests straight into 2015. We didn’t review it here, but Kill Screen‘s Erik Fredner was of the opinion that the gameplay hadn’t aged very well. Your mileage will vary based on your appreciation for JRPG grinding.
Dragon Quest VIII is on sale for $15 and it’s a Universal app.
The beautiful, hypnotic surreal puzzle game 2 Dreams is free this weekend — it’s a creation of Marcel-André Casasola Merkle, who designed the Coding Monkeys’ Rules. If you enjoyed last year’s Puzzle Game of the Year runner-up Device 6, you should give this a shot.
2 Dreams is gratis, iOS Universal.
You can now find out for free if our first impressions of the iOS port of medieval RTS Stronghold 3 were on the money. Judging from the abysmal user reviews, I figure they were. But it will only cost you precious, precious time on this mortal coil to find out this weekend. Stronghold 3 is iPad-only.
Terry Cavanaugh’s instant classic lo-fi indie platformer VVVVVV (is that the right number of Vs?) is on sale for a dollar. This would be the man’s definitive game if it weren’t for Super Hexagon. VVVVVVVV is iOS Universal.
I never got around to trying the beautifully designed puzzle game Strata when it came out last September, but I intend to remedy that this weekend. You layer ribbons atop one another to match a given pattern, which sounds soporifically relaxing. On sale for one dollar.
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