On Gamer Entitlement and Digital Release

[ellf]

This is going to be posted on Kotaku TAY later

On “Gamer Entitlement” and Digital Release Gaming.

Recently, I got in a comment argument in an article on the release of Ace Attorney 5’s digital price point being $30.00. As you may or may not know, Ace Attorney 5 is going to be released in the West as a digital only title and there will be no physical release. Many people are unhappy with this decision, but some understand that it is a digital release or nothing at all. Now, I’m not going to argue the merits of digital release gaming or try to claim that Nintendo’s current eShop setup is anything less than abysmal compared to its contemporaries. However, what I will argue is against the sense of entitlement that I found in that thread.

Gaming is not a right.
Gaming is a luxury which we spend our money on. We have no right to any video game flat-out. Games are neither a necessity nor a requirement for everyday life. They are fun, yes, but you do not need them to live. As a luxury, you can purchase games you want to play at prices you are willing to pay for. In formats you are willing to pay for. However, remember that rights are a two-way street. A business has the right to dictate the forms available with which to purchase the game.

Ownership Issues
The advent of digital gaming makes game ownership a murky mess of things. When you have a physical copy of something, you own the game and can resell it in whatever way you see fit. Some people never resell their games, others do so all the time and it’s how they keep their gaming costs low. There is nothing wrong with either point of view. Digital game ownership is effectively a license on a piece of software which you download to your console or PC. In some cases, this license is tied to an account, allowing you to download it to any system which you have an account on. In other cases, the license is tied to a system. If you lose the system, it’s no different than losing the cartridge that you had in the system. You lost the game.

Digital ownership in some cases is actually better than physical. In the case of PC gaming, having the entire game on your computer and not having to put CDs in in order to play the game is a priceless feeling. However, there are those who prefer physical copies. There is nothing wrong with that view either.

Gamer Entitlement
What is gamer entitlement? Back in early 2012 when Mass Effect 3 was released, people who legally purchased the game and were unhappy with its ending complained loudly about it. They were called entitled for complaining about a product they purchased. They weren’t. You have a right to get what you pay for and if you are unhappy with a product or service, you have a right to complain. Enough people complained, and the developers and publishers both did something to try and fix it. That’s not gamer entitlement, that’s business decisions made upon the demands of your customer.

Declaring that you won’t be purchasing a product because it’s not in a format you want isn’t gamer entitlement either. That’s your right as a person who is or isn’t willing to spend on a purchase. However, what is entitlement is deciding to pirate the game and play anyway, even though you have no intention of ever purchasing the title. We saw this with a mobile title recently. Comments such as “They should be lucky I played their game.” Why? Why should they be lucky when you aren’t giving them a cent? You playing their game isn’t helping the title. You paying for it does.

When a game is released, you have two options. Purchase it or don’t purchase it. If you don’t purchase it, you are showing that you don’t support the game in some way. If you purchase it, you are supporting it. If you decide there’s a third option, piracy, understand what you’re doing. You’re contributing to a problem that causes DRM to appear on many titles. You are doing something that is, while not technically stealing, illegal.

I’ll admit to having pirated in the past, but that wasn’t due to any sense of “I have a right to this.” It was “I’m not sure about this, let’s try it.” Have I purchased every game that I pirated? No. Will I pirate again? I would like to say no, but I don’t know. Piracy is not something I advocate.

If you want to support something which is a _luxury_, support it with your wallet. If you want to boycott something, do so. Nobody forces you to pirate. Gaming is not a necessity to life, don’t claim otherwise.

[cindybubbles]

Although I've never pirated games, I HAVE, on the other hand, BOUGHT pirated or counterfeit games. They're not as great as the real deal, and one even crashed, thus, leaving me with no choice but to buy the real thing if I wanted to continue my Pokemon journey in Johto.

[Andara Bledin]

When you have a physical copy of something, you own the game and can resell it in whatever way you see fit.

Well, pedantically speaking, you own a physical copy of it and the right to play whatever is on that physical copy. You should also have the right to transfer those rights to another individual should you so choose. Steam is working on making that happen in their ecosystem.

You are doing something that is, while not technically stealing, illegal.

This isn't actually typically inherently illegal. It's a matter of copyright violation, which is a civil issue. That said, if you do choose to play a game and it's available for purchase in your region, if you're a decent person, then you'll buy a legitimate copy.

And whatever you do, don't buy a bootleg copy. Not only is that incredibly stupid (you have no idea what's really on that disk you just paid too much for), but it's supporting criminals who are actually engaging in honest to god piracy.

Not only that, but there are more free and cheap worthwhile games out there than a single person could possibly have time to play, or even try. There's zero excuse for pirating (or copyright infringing, which is what really happens with downloading) anything entertainment-related.

[Ginger Tea]

I was going to post the CS link earlier but forgot when I got back from town.

I read the comments on the kotaku site

I want this game and I will pay money for this game, but I wont be paying Capcom for this game.

His (I am assuming it to be male) reasoning that paying $x for a flash cart that he then loads a download onto gives the devs money how?
No one but those selling flash carts get the money and if he pays for a pre loaded flash cart who's to say what he's buying (as already stated).
Fan localisations work with hacking the roms to find the dialogue and apply the new ones, who's to say that he wont get a Japanese cart or someone just out right fucks with the dialogue to make "All your bass" seem like Shakespeare?

I am hoping the 2DS has no SD or cartridge slot and instead relies on either a pc based iTunes type set up or syncing with a wii/u, I've only seen pics on kotatu, I couldn't be arsed reading the write up as I have no intention of owning anything Nintendo.

Granted there is a lot to be said for physical copies over digital, no DRM or Amazon take backs etc, but the cost of producing roms for a niche dwindling market game (someone cited each game sold less and less) it starts to look like throwing good money after bad, 99% of my steam games were DVD's bought at the UK store GAME, I have a physical disc, but should my key become invalid at any time, all I have is a DVD that is useless, it is not a game that can be installed without steam but just offers steam as a bonus, it's steam archive files etc.
I don't mind this, so long as steam exists and my games don't become unbound to my account.

Consoles especially hand helds are the last bastion for physical media mainly due to them not always being a device known for being online till the ps3/360 and beyond, a game boy just needed a carry pouch of games and you were good, you didn't need to sync with a 2nd device connected to a digital store.

[lordlundar]

And whatever you do, don't buy a bootleg copy. Not only is that incredibly stupid (you have no idea what's really on that disk you just paid too much for), but it's supporting criminals who are actually engaging in honest to god piracy.

Sometimes the results can be hilarious though.

Like this or this.

[Dreamstalker]

I'm over here with the Pokemon bootleg video.

[ellf]

Well, pedantically speaking, you own a physical copy of it and the right to play whatever is on that physical copy. You should also have the right to transfer those rights to another individual should you so choose. Steam is working on making that happen in their ecosystem.

I heard something about Steam doing that.

This isn't actually typically inherently illegal. It's a matter of copyright violation, which is a civil issue. That said, if you do choose to play a game and it's available for purchase in your region, if you're a decent person, then you'll buy a legitimate copy.

Well, it's not something you're likely to be arrested for. The downloading at least. The distribution is what's illegal, iirc.


Yeah, I wrote that in a final response to the kotaku comment thread. Holy crap, that was a dickish person.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

The problem is with physical copies is you have to think in terms of economic transactions. Just keeping it simple, imagine that your supply demand curve makes a $30 price point optimal so you expect to sell 100 (again, just simple). Then you add the resale market. You lose half (simplified) who want to buy a used copy for $25. You receive none of that money, so in order to essentially recapture your profit, your game price has to go up to $60. Obviously in practice it's more nuanced, the price increments are smaller, and you don't lose half the market to used games, but that's the problem in a nutshell.

I know gamers don't like it, but the reality is we pay higher prices BECAUSE people do it. That's not to say we lose the right and the prices will go down, but it is why many companies feel like they have to do it and why many gaming companies fold. If their name isn't Blizzard or Bioware, your risk is so high and your opportunity to break even is extremely narrow.

[Nekojin]

Except that game economics approaches it backwards - they don't determine their price point based on their costs and uncaptured sales, they use the expected price and expected sales volume and work backwards to determine a budget. Video games have used a "what the market will bear" model almost from the beginning. Even if a mainstream console goes to a pure-virtual market, you can expect "first-month" game prices to remain about the same ($50-$70, plus "premium" pack-in perceived value). Eliminating the costs from having a physical retail channel will be seen as an opportunity for higher profits, not lower prices to the consumer.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

That's because costs are sticky upwards. And I hate to burst your bubble, but just about every product uses a "what the market will bear" model. Price times quantity is how you're taught to make those decisions. And it's not complicated. A financial analyst will sit there a and continue to make financial calculations based on the market effects of secondary sales, reduced turn, etc. The general market will tend to determine the price though, we're just talking about which price point they'll probably pick. Once profit is maximized, that's your price.

But the problem is for your major releases, your production costs start at a considerable level. You can't really control them IF you're trying to make something like Gears of War. So if you're not someone LIKE a major distributor or studio, it's one hell of a gamble and you'd better hit a home run with it. In other industries you'd break in through superior price to get penetration. The nature of games though just tends to make that tricky and the loss due to secondary sales is too extreme to be borne in a startup. The price gets pegged high because of the risk and because they have to break even in a market where they can assume a large percentage of their sales will not result in profit for them.

What the consumer never likes to think about is how many "sales" of a game they like result in money the company never sees. And it's considerable because local distributors will all but ask you to buy a used copy, even if the difference in price is 10 bucks.

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I'm going to have to half disagree on the whole "Those people who complained about the Mass Effect 3 ending weren't being entitled."

Now, the people who were saying "Man, that ending just sucked, wish it had been different" and left it at that - no, they aren't entitled.

The ones who were demanding that it be changed or reworked... yeah, those people are entitled dicks.

I'm sorry, but I'm a writer. If someone bought one of my books, read it, didn't like the ending/a character/a setting and then demanded that I rewrite it to something they liked... I would completely consider them an entitled dick head.

I fail to see how the writing for a video game is different.

Not liking an ending and making an idle complaint - fine.

Not liking an ending and using "WELL I PAID MONEY FOR THIS" to demand that it be changed? - Totally Entitled.

How many times do we see sucky customers claiming "I PAY YOUR SALARY" or "I PAID GOOD MONEY FOR THIS" when trying to weasel their way into getting something that isn't owed to them and they shouldn't be getting? What do we call them? EW's

Why is it when it's a gamer, SUDDENLY, it's not entitled behavior but justified behavior?

[Andara Bledin]

I'm going to have to half disagree on the whole "Those people who complained about the Mass Effect 3 ending weren't being entitled."

The issue with ME3 is that there was a certain amount of advertisement about how the final resolution would be built around the choices the players made throughout the game. Not only was the original ending shitty, but it was absolutely not what it was sold as.

I also honestly believe that the original ending we got wasn't what the creators wanted. A post, most likely originating with a specific writer on the project, stated that the executive producer and lead writer decided that they would do the endings and damn everyone else on the creative staff. Whether this was due to creative issues or time pressure issues I cannot say, as the posts in question were later scrubbed, likely to save face for everybody involved.

[SkullKing]

How many times do we see sucky customers claiming "I PAY YOUR SALARY" or "I PAID GOOD MONEY FOR THIS" when trying to weasel their way into getting something that isn't owed to them and they shouldn't be getting? What do we call them? EW's

When an advertiser lies about the product in order to get sales and does not deliver what was promised I call it false advertising. If I pay money for something that was falsely advertised I am perfectly entittled to getting angry and demand waht I was promissed

Bioware specifically said the ending wouldn´t be a simple A B or C choice. People bought the game with that promisse in mind. The ending was A, B or C.

They lied about the product. People got rightfully angry.

For roleplayers this kind of stuff is specially important. I am willing to get less good gameplay for better reactivity and story.

[LewisLegion]

It was definitely a case of producers lying about the product and not mere entitlement when it comes to ME3. I agree some people really went over the top on it but a great deal of the anger and reaction was more than justified.

You ever watch the movie National Lampoon's Vacation? You remember at the very beginning when Griswold goes to the car dealership? He specifically ordered a blue sporty wagon and instead was given the puke green wood panelled roadster. It's pretty much how ME players felt when they got to the ending of ME3. All this time, they'd been promised over and over they were getting a blue sportswagon- they paid money specifically for that- and instead, they got the green POS.

I think a bit of outrage and fury over that is more than warrented. I'm a writer as well, and the endings of ME3 was just horribly horribly written. If someone came up to me and said 'I don't like the ending of your story, you must change it' yes, they are entitled and I'm going to dismiss them.

However, if I promise throughout my series that my main is going to live at the end, and then I kill them, and hundreds if not thousands of people are coming up angry at me for my blatant false advertising, then the fault lies with me and not them.