There was a loud uproar when Blizzard said that they would be splitting each of the three parts of the story behind Starcraft 2 into three installments. Sure each part would be as long as the sum of the original game. Sure the original game had Brood War. Fans saw it as a cash grab, a way to charge 60-bucks three times.
That will not end up being the case.
Image by Blizzard Entertainment
Heart of the Swarm is an expansion pack which will be priced as an expansion pack would. The standard edition will retail for $39.99 and is not hindered in any meaningful way. The Digital Deluxe edition will be priced at $59.99 and include only cutesy perks such as a Baneling pet for World of Warcraft or unique portraits for your character profile. The retail-exclusive Collector’s Edition includes the digital deluxe edition bonuses as well as novelties such as an art book, a mouse pad, a soundtrack, and a behind-the-scenes DVD and Blu-ray set.
Basically unless you want nerd-perks, the expansion is just $40.
The expansion pack will be released on March 12th, 2013.
Mmmm $40, Canadian so 29euro?
Mmmm $40, Canadian so 29euro? sounds close enough like full price to me. This is PC gaming not XBOX or the poor souls who bought the WiiU. Some eye watering nintendo game prices there.
Diablo was was over priced and I didn’t get it.
So will give this pass too.
That’s fine.
Personally I’m
That's fine.
Personally I'm not much of a stickler about game prices. I'd would have no issue paying even hundreds of dollars for a game worthy of a few-hundred-dollar price tag. In fact if you add server donations there have been a couple of games which I've ultimately paid over a hundred dollars for.
You might not find Heart of the Swarm worth 40$ and that is your decision. It will eventually go on sale probably a year or so after its release.
We need, and are starting to, get out of the mindset of set prices for games. The intrinsic value of games are not a universal constant.
My beef with console game prices is not the 10$ increase, it is where the 10$ goes. It goes to a middleman who only restricts — intentionally or otherwise — how the content can exist.
I am one of those people that
I am one of those people that believes games are UNDER priced for the big AAA titles. Remember back in the 80s when you were buying PC or Nintendo titles? They werwe $50-60 as well. And games definitely cost MORE to make today than they did in 1987,
I’m not sure I understand the
I’m not sure I understand the article…
You say it won’t be a cash grab, then go on to explain that they will charge $40/$60 for each additional?
The standard addition is hindered, as development time that could have been allocated to the game was instead used to make perks.
My biased opinion, based on
My biased opinion, based on vague feelings and “research” that I pulled out of my recticular orifice, is that big AAA games are over priced, because they are over-done. They may be underpriced for what they are, but it’s the “what they are” category that is overpriced. 🙂
Less graphically intense games still offer gameplay as good as those AAA titles. When I get a game, I get it to play a game, as opposed to just looking at it and saying to myself “how purty!” I think that I’m not the only one who thinks this way either, since games like Torchlight and Minecraft are insanely popular, and offer gameplay that is just as good as any AAA title offers at a MUCH lower price point, since you don’t have as many artists painting every rock and blade of grass on a map or making insanely detailed animation sequences.
Folks in the industry may lament the “limitations” of their medium for expressing their art, but those “limitations” can be a GOOD thing, which focuses their creative energy on the main targets of their art. As an example, I point to the Star Wars films. Compare the original films where he couldn’t bring out everything in his head and put it on film, with the later trilogy where he could express all that artistic energy.
These triple A titles with their lack of limitation, have had their gameplay held hostage to all the graphical glory, so that the games are too long in development, or too short to be fun, or stuck on a rail (Final Fantasy, are you listening?) from beginning to end.