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Businesses Cellphones Iphone Portables (Games) The Almighty Buck Games

Dollar Apps Killing Traditional Gaming? 343

Posted by Soulskill from the transitional-period dept.
donniebaseball23 writes "There can be no denying that the rise of smartphones and tablets has had a major impact on the gaming business. The prevalence of free and 99-cent apps has changed consumers' perception of value. Mike Capps, president of Gears of War developer Epic Games, said, 'If there's anything that's killing us [in the traditional games business] it's dollar apps. How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it? They're used to 99 cents. As I said, it's an uncertain time in the industry. But it's an exciting time for whoever picks the right path and wins.'"
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Dollar Apps Killing Traditional Gaming? More

Dollar Apps Killing Traditional Gaming?

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  • That makes me think of an ancient Chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times."

  • You shouldn't have to (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Draaglom ( 1556491 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @06:46AM (#35891334)
    Your $60 game should be incomparable to a $1 game, in terms of both gameplay and technology. If it's not, you are Doing It Wrong.

    • Exactly.

      I didn't even think twice about buying Portal 2 earlier this week, and it was worth every penny.

      This is like the movie industry being worried about television - they are two different products, loosely related to each other.

    • Your $60 game should be incomparable to a $1 game, in terms of both gameplay and technology. If it's not, you are Doing It Wrong.

      I think that's what they meant when they said "a $60 game that's really worth it".

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Svartalf ( 2997 )

        Heh... They're a fine one to be commenting on that subject. All I need do is point to Unreal Tournament III... After that, any $60 title from them is a hard sell.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Svartalf ( 2997 )

      Indeed. If you're worried about trying to convince people that your $60 title is "worth it" against the $1 backdrop- you''re Doing It Wrong. If you can't people sigining off on the price, it's OVERPRICED out of the gate- and it matters little what the "why" it is happens to be. Either make it really worth the money in question or lower your costs, etc. so it can be worth $30 or something comparably cheaper. You're not going to get that rapacious rate out of most people for much longer. They can't affor

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by LWATCDR ( 28044 )

      I can't imagine any game being worth $60 at all. They all tend to come down in price after a few months and then you know what is crap and what is gold. Plus on the console Used games rock. I do very rarely buy new games but it really is rare. That is just me but I can not speak for other peoples proprieties.

  • Most are crap (Score:3)

    by Rik Sweeney ( 471717 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @06:49AM (#35891352) Homepage
    That depends, on the iPhone a lot of $1 games are made free for 24 hours. It only takes 5 minutes of playing to realise that most of them fall into one of these categories:
    • Run left to right, tap to jump
    • Tap the screen to shoot the monsters walking from left to right
    • Farmville clone
    • Angry Birds clone

    Most of these get deleted after 5 minutes (and in the case of the first item, within 30 seconds). Games like Street Fighter IV are completely unplayable on a touchscreen. I don't think Epic really has anything to worry about.

    • Yes, but it's not about quality. Everyone knows that 90% of any given app store is crap whether it's paid or free, games or other. The point is that there exist a good number of games for less than $5 that will entertain for several hours. They might not be deep or graphically impressive or anything else, but that doesn't matter to most people so long as they're fun. If I can get 10 hours of fun out of a $2 game, how do you justify $60 for 6-8 hours of fun? Even with deeper gameplay and super high productio

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AJH16 ( 940784 ) *

        I think that the quality of the entertainment is a measure too though. I may be able to kill a couple hours with a stupid $1 app store game, but it isn't something I'll look forward to or remember or probably ever want to come back and play again. It's just something to kill time that I would otherwise be bored. Major game titles on the other hand, I look forward to for months (on some titles), truly enjoy playing and would actively take time to play and will likely come back and play multiple times in t

  • Daft (Score:5, Insightful)

    by symes ( 835608 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @06:57AM (#35891410) Journal

    Isn't this the same as asking whether short scruffy videos on You Tube are going to usurp Blockbuster films? I think the only threat would be if smart phone games could be developed so that the game arena was the real world and the phone was some mission interface. That would be neat - best it isn't a FPS though...

    • I think the only threat would be if smart phone games could be developed so that the game arena was the real world and the phone was some mission interface. That would be neat - best it isn't a FPS though...

      Too late. It's already happening on the West Side of Chicago. The saddest part is the real world FPS going on there is most popular with a demographic that skews to the 11-17 year-old range. By 18, there's a good chance you're in jail or dead.

  • Of the phone games I've bought that cost maybe 1€ or 5€, most of them have been pretty bad. Either the game is so easy to beat that it only lasts a few hours, or it is so boring that you won't play it. For example, the chess game I bought for 5€ was so simple to beat even at the highest difficulty level that there was no point in it. So for me the $60 console games still provide a lot of value because they provide many more times entertainment than the cheap phone games.

    • Re:99c games suck (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Eponymous Coward ( 6097 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @08:10AM (#35891908)

      But for every person like you, there are lots like me who only want to play Angry Birds for a few minutes a couple of times a week. Honestly, I've spent more on phone games in the past year than I have on PC or console (PS3 and Wii) titles and frankly I've been disappointed with purchases on all the platforms. The difference is that when I buy a crappy phone game, I'm only out a few dollars. When I buy a crappy PS3 game (like I did twice last year - GT5 and ModNation Racers), I'm out $60 each time.

  • I don't expect to get multi-player FPS HD blah blah blah on a 4" screen. I expect to get a little doo-dad game limited to what I can do with a touch screen, a couple buttons, and accelerometer input. Something to occupy a few minutes at a time here and there.

  • There were few $60 games to begin with. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by unity100 ( 970058 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @07:04AM (#35891448) Homepage Journal
    Really. Most of what you game dev studios/industry was producing, was CRAP. $60 was the perception of the 'price point' that the marketing types came up with - "hey, what is the maximum people in america will pay for a game ?" turned out, that perception was wrong.

    you were rehashing the same crap over and over and pushing it to masses with marketing. just like movies. trailers, marketing hype, ads, showing only the best few parts you added to the game, whereas the rest was rehash of the previous version or other games. taking no risks to please shareholders. a few cents per share more for every shareholder, more important than satisfaction of your customer.

    that was why there was rampant piracy.

    thank mobile apps. this '$60 blockbuster' bullshit will end.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by JamesP ( 688957 )

      Well, EA is the monster it is for a reason.

      People keep buying Fifa Y+1, Madden Y+1, NHL Y+1, etc, etc, etc, every year. For $60

      While (semi-)independent game developers struggle.

      • of course. ea is the foremost monster that 'industrialized' gaming and deteriorated it into a milking operation for shareholders.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Lumpy ( 12016 )

        They claim those games are expensive because of the rights fees.

        Guess what, the same game without the NFL branding and fake teams and names on generic faces IS JUST AS FUN. you dont have to pay a bunch of prima donna babies for the right to their "branding".

        If the game is a great football simulation, real gamers will buy it.

        I personally dont know, those games have a -100 interest to me. IF I can run up and punch an opposing team player for grandstanding, or pick off a spectator's head in the stands with t

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by JamesP ( 688957 )

          Yeah, they're not expensive because of licensing, 'sports games' are on average the same price as 'non-license' games.

          But of course, if EA sold "NFL 2012" and "Generic Football 2012" being $5 cheaper, same engine but with no real names, NFL would probably still outsell by a large margin.

        • Nice in theory but totally invalidated by actual activity in the industry. I once worked at a small company that made a licensed sports game for a few years: company made big bucks. Then the license expired and EA bought it up. Company I'd been at tried to sell the exact same game (with improvements) unlicensed. After a few years it was out-of-business.

          Right now, I couldn't name a single unlicensed sports game of any success level at all. (I've been out of the industry for some years, so my knowledge base i

  • Perception of value (Score:3)

    by mrjb ( 547783 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @07:04AM (#35891450)
    Our perception of value is distorted anyway. Example- It takes about 100 days to raise a chicken to the point where it's slaughtered, plucked, driven to your supermarket and refrigerated. It'll cost 5 GBP. At that price, 5p/day per chicken, someone manages to feed the chicken, clean after it, vaccinate it, transport it, keep it cold and apparently still make a profit on it. But don't expect to be getting premium stuff at that price.
    • If you are spending a full workday per chicken to raise chickens, you probably aren't a very good farmer.

  • The Multi-Player experience is what provides the gaming console experience with value and makes it "sticky." A player buys the latest $60 game because the people he hangs with online -- his guild, his clan, platoon, his whatever -- are buying it and want to "move on" to the next shared experience. It's a proposition that works for the developer, the online service, and the player.

    But the solo-only game? I have not purchased a solo-only game at full price, within the first months of its launch, since the

    • Developers just aren't in general focusing on providing a challenging single player experience that one needs to keep playing to master. I mean, look at a game like Super Meat Boy. Single player, but there's no way you'll explore everything it has to offer even in 20 hours. Maybe more. I continually spend a great deal of money to import Cave shooters from Japan. These games can easily be beaten in 30 minutes on free play. The appeal, is that to actually get good enough to 1CC them and get a good score, tak

      • It still boggles my mind that so many game developers pay so much attention to "story." It is like the producer of an opera worrying himself over whether his cast looks athletic enough.

        Now, I'm sure there may be some people who refuse to buy an opera ticket because the performers aren't good-looking, just as I'm sure there may be some game players who fret over whether their new game will have a good "plot," but it is madness for the producers of either form of entertainment to be concerned about these con

    • Re:No *SOLO* Game is Worth $60 (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Xian97 ( 714198 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @08:20AM (#35892010)
      My feelings are the exact opposite. I prefer the single player experience, whether it be on the PC or Consoles. I am looking forward to games like The Witcher 2, Elder Scrolls Skyrim, and other single player games. I have zero interest in multiplayer; when I get home from a hard day's work after dealing with difficult people the last thing I want to do is to have more social interaction. The games I play are usually 40 hours or more in length, that's pretty cheap entertainment and well worth the $60 price tag.

      I find very little of the $1 games that can hold my interest for very long at all, where many PC and Console games I have played for hours on end.

    • The Multi-Player experience is what provides the gaming console experience with value and makes it "sticky." A player buys the latest $60 game because the people he hangs with online -- his guild, his clan, platoon, his whatever -- are buying it and want to "move on" to the next shared experience. It's a proposition that works for the developer, the online service, and the player.

      If we want to compare and justify the pricing models here, then perhaps you should be a bit more realistic as to the true cost of the average multi-player game, because the cost usually doesn't stop at the store where you just paid $60 for the game.

      How much does it cost you per month to enable your online mult-player experience? How long did you play your last REALLY good multi-player game? A year? Maybe even two years? Much like a cell phone, that $60 game just turned into a $300+ game.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Mike Capps, president of Gears of War developer Epic Games, said, 'If there's anything that's killing us [in the traditional games business] it's dollar apps.

    I thought if there was anything killing you it was piracy. That's what you guys have been sprooking about for years on end, anyway.

    • And, strangely, the rate of piracy is often correlated to the number of digits on the price.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

        Not really, there have been claims of sub-10$ games having up to 90%+ piracy on android (essentially tracking amount of automated log-in attempts from copy of a game without a proper key on some server they used from a game or two).

        They still sell enough though, and how many of these are actually "I want to try it before I buy it" is a question thrown in the air. But piracy (or more correctly copyright infringement) isn't going to just vanish because price goes down.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Svartalf ( 2997 )

          Actually, it will. Which titles have less piracy in the app store situation that you brought up? Those priced $1-4. For a mobile phone and a casual game...that's the price point people will pay without thinking twice for it. $10 for a phone app's pricey, based on the pricing I've seen for apps. I know I definitely won't consider most of them worth that price point- and I'm sure as heck going to want a better than basic demo evaluation before buying it. Now, for PC and many Console titles... $10-20 s

    • Epic complained about piracy then used game sales and now $1.00 apps. Basically their problem is everything except their lack of innovation and complete reliance on making the same game in a prettier package every year and charging a high price.

  • A $60 game that's really worth it. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mwvdlee ( 775178 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @07:23AM (#35891562) Homepage

    How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it?

    Perhaps it isn't worth $60.
    If a $1 game provides me with about 1 week of entertainment, a $60 game should provide me with 60 weeks of entertainment.
    There aren't many games that can do that, and there are even less that give me the convidence to pay for those 60 weeks up front.
    I fear TFA calculates "worth" as "the amount of money we had to spend to make it". There used to be a day when games could be fun without gigabytes of graphics and sound. That day has never really gone, it's just been obscured by an increasing focus by developers on adding stuff that isn't part of the actual game.
    If I bake a cake and package it in a golden, diamond encrusted box designed by some guy that changed his first and last name into a single, unpronouncable word, the cake hasn't increased in value at all. Sure, it looks much nicer with all the shiny bits, but it can't compensate for the fact that I can't bake a decent cake.

    • In fact, I find a game to be more worth it when there is LESS cutscene crap. I want to interact with something when I'm playing a game - if I want to watch some rendered 3D stuff, I'll go down to the local theater.

    • Ah! The economics of fun!
      If a free game can entertain me for 10 minutes, how long should a $0.99 game entertain me?

    • More to the point, if people won't pay $60, then it's provably not worth $60, since nothing is worth more than what someone will pay for it by definition. They are not basing the worth on the cost to produce, but on nothing at all. We already know what the only valid basis is, he's just making shit up.

      Further, this isn't even about baking a cake someone would want to eat. It's baking a cake compelling enough to spend $60. When you spend hundreds or even thousands on a wedding cake you're paying for an exper

    • Re:A $60 game that's really worth it. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Idarubicin ( 579475 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @09:44AM (#35892890) Journal

      If a $1 game provides me with about 1 week of entertainment, a $60 game should provide me with 60 weeks of entertainment.

      If I can buy a $15,000 car that drives 100 mph, why can't the $60,000 car hit 400 mph?

      If I don't mind a five-minute commute in my $1,000 used clunker, I should be just as happy with a five-hour drive to work in the $60,000 Lexus, right?

      A $200 bottle of wine probably isn't twice as "good" as a $100 bottle of wine (though a $10 bottle probably is twice as good as a $5 bottle).

      My $1000 camera doesn't do five times as much as a $200 point and shoot, and it definitely doesn't do twice as much as a $500 camera. I've got it for the small but perceptible improvement in image quality, plus the ten percent (or so) of photographs that would be impossible with the cheaper cameras.

      The price of luxury, leisure, and entertainment goods does not necessarily correlate linearly with simple measures.

  • Provide the right games! (Score:3)

    by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @07:24AM (#35891568)
    One game I have been desperately looking for on both Android and IOS, and failing to find a suitable version of, is Baldurs Gate - put that on the mobile scene and I would be more than willing to pay more than a few bucks for it. But it doesn't exist, and nothing is rising to replace it, so I dont spend my money.

  • Hello? Portal 2

    There you go. You sold it for more than a buck. The truth is that a dollar game should not be a direct substitute for a $60 game and if it is you're making it wrong. This is true almost everywhere - you can rent a movie for your family for $1 or go to the movies for $50 (or a football game for hundreds). You can buy $2 flip-flops or $400 designer footwear. You can get $0.50 ramen or $30 steak, Two buck chuck or a $100 bottle of wine.

    The gaming industry has always been volatile and unpredictab

  • Casual Gamers (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Bigbutt ( 65939 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @07:40AM (#35891678) Homepage Journal

    There was a report here a few months back or so that linked to a game company's discovery that quite a few people only played a $60 game for a few hours and many never completed it before moving on to the next game. These are the folks that are being lost. Instead of spending $60 on a game they don't complete, they spend a buck or a few bucks on a game for their phone. It lets them play a little when waiting or idle without having to go to their computer, power it up and go back in.

    I was a pretty heavy gamer back when Doom, Command and Conquer, Red Alert and StarCraft were popular. As multi-player became more popular, I found I didn't have the time to invest in trying to beat some twitchy 15 year old who had nothing better to do all day. I still get the newer games like StarCraft II and even play them, but I haven't finished it yet. I'll get the other two when they come out as well and may finish it they, or not.

    I also have several "games" on my iPad and iPhone ranging from Angry Birds (it's really a puzzle solving game), Popper, and Pocket God to Small World, Rage, and Red Alert with several others in between. They're fine when I'm sitting here at work at lunch or in the car with my wife going somewhere.

    The game companies have less of my money because I'm not interested in sports or super realistic multi-player gaming (battlefield 2 or crysis for instance). I like the games like Castle Wolfenstein, Duke Nukem, Doom, Quake, Command and Conquer, Red Alert (the original one more than the newer ones), Carmageddon, and StarCraft. Heck, I'd be excited to get many of the games I played back then simply updated to work on the current tech.

    [John]

  • 99 cent games aren't changing consumer's perception of value. Your intolerant, draconian treatment of your customers are changing their perception of your value.

    Premium downloadable content? What the hell is that? I once bought two 3.25" disks full of Doom2 WADs because it was convenient to do so versus downloading them off of ftp.cdrom.org, not because Doom2 was defective by design unless I pay even more for "premium content".

    But then, isn't that a problem with the rise of consoles? Not exactly a great pla

  • "The prevalence of free and 99-cent apps has changed consumers' perception of value"

    No it hasn't.

    'If there's anything that's killing us [in the traditional games business] it's dollar apps. How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it? They're used to 99 cents.

    And you're president of Epic Games? I think the reason your company is being "killed in the traditional gaming business" just became obvious...

  • Epic's games lack decent scripts and stories. They're all a bit samey and lacking any real variety or innovation. They rely on making games prettier than their last ones which is expensive. They can't compete against cheaper games but the thing is no one was ever really happy to pay $60 for a game especially when it's yet another sequel with another hulking space guy spouting cheesy rubbish.

  • Games are worth about $30 tops. These game makers need to adjust to reality. They have been over-charging for entertainment for too long and just like Microsoft, are having a difficult time adjusting when the market changes.

    So yes, tiny tablets (phones) and larger tablets are making changes in the software industry. Compete, change or get out of the way. And certainly stop complaining about market forces which you once commanded being taken away from you.

  • Now refuses to buy a game that costs more than $1.00?
    I don't believe it. Cheap apps have expanded the market to people that wouldn't buy a console. If you're having a hard time selling console games, don't blame the casual gamer who wants to spend 15 minutes on the subway playing a game. Blame the glut of "me, too" games at the high end.

    • Not $1, but definitely not spending more than $29.99. I opt to buy used games than new. I haven't bought a new $59.99 game in about 5 years now. All it takes patience - I'll probalby be enjoying Dragon Age II in 2013, but what is the benefit of playing it now and paying 30 dollars more? With that said, I never hesitate to buy a good game on my iPhone: World of Goo, Plants vs Zombies, Secret of Mana, etc.

  • "...it's an uncertain time in the industry. But it's an exciting time for whoever picks the right path and wins.'"

    Sheesh. I really get sick and tired of hearing "who is me!" from the gaming industry as they continue to turn record profits.

    Bottom line is there is enough demand out there to satisfy damn near every single major player in this industry. If you can't thrive in this world where reality is so bad and stressful that mind-altering legal and illegal drug use is at an all-time high and people are literally craving that alternate reality to escape to every day, then either your product really sucks ass or you're

  • Traditional gaming? You mean, like cards and chess and parcheesi?

  • How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it?

    I have no idea. Let me know when they create one.

  • 'If there's anything that's killing us [in the traditional games business] it's dollar apps. How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it?

    I have seen lots and lots of $.99 games which were worth more than that. And I have seen really really few $60 games which were worth the $60. And they were worth the $60 not because they had loads of content, but because I really enjoyed playing them.

    And that's the core of the pricing problem IMO: pumping more content into a basically $10-20 game doesn't make it a $60 game. The wasted $40-50 bucks are just that: wasted.

    I wish the game developers went back to basics and started making simpler games a

  • No sympathy for Epic (Score:5, Insightful)

    by NoSleepDemon ( 1521253 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @08:31AM (#35892124)
    I feel compelled to write this because I recently played the diabolical port of Bullet Storm on PC. I have absolutely no sympathy for Epic, nor for any other studio that shovels millions of dollars into a 10 hour title and can't even be bothered to support 4:3 aspect ratios. I remember when Epic actually released games with any sort of longevity - Like Unreal Tournament. Now they, like many other 'AAA' developers ship bloated, 'HD' (nonetheless held back by aging console hardware), soulless games that focus more on treating the player like, frankly, a fucking idiot without any free will than a thinking, feeling human being. Unsurprisingly, $60 IS too much to charge for a title and hopefully consumers will vote with their wallets. Perhaps soon we'll get back to having games with well thought out and engaging stories, instead of gratuitous crotch shots and a script that seems to revolve almost exclusively around killing dicks (no matter how funny that occasionally is). In recent years I've had more fun playing 'low-key' titles like Pixel Junk Shooter, Scott Pilgrim and Amnesia than any major title shipped by a big developer.

  • incorrect (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ephemeriis ( 315124 ) on Thursday April 21, 2011 @08:32AM (#35892128)

    'If there's anything that's killing us [in the traditional games business] it's dollar apps. How do you sell someone a $60 game that's really worth it? They're used to 99 cents. As I said, it's an uncertain time in the industry. But it's an exciting time for whoever picks the right path and wins.'

    I've got a Droid, but I'm not a big mobile gamer. I'm used to spending $50 on a video game for my PC, or Nintendo, or whatever.

    And what's killing you [in the traditional games business] is that your games are not really worth it.

    Used to be that I'd buy a game for $50 and get 20+ hours of gameplay - not counting multiplayer. And I'm not talking about an RPG either... RPG's would be a good 60+ hours of gameplay.

    I remember playing the first Unreal, or Quake, or Marathon, or Half-Life - and they all took me over a week of late nights to finish.

    And then you'd have multiple hours of multiplayer on top of that... Usually with some terrific mods bolted on... And then some mods for the single player... Often the modding community would double or even triple the gameplay you got from your original purchase...

    Now you shell out $60 for a game and get 5-10 hours of gameplay, plus the multiplayer. Then they'll start releasing more single player content, and multiplayer map packs, and skins, and whatever else as DLC. And the game will be designed around consoles, so there'll be very limited support for modding.

    $50 for 20-80 hours of gameplay... Compared to $60 for 5-20 hours of gameplay...

    Is it any wonder you're having a hard time selling your games?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by JSBiff ( 87824 )

      It's kind of funny. When I first started playing video and computer games as a kid in the 80's, arguably a lot of the content for Nintendo and PC was not worth the 40-60 that they were charging. The games were, overall, smaller, less technologically advanced, there were less art assets, and simpler art assets, smaller levels, etc.

      For many years, the 'value' you get for your $40-60 increased every year as the technology improved - prices stayed about the same, but the games got bigger, with more content, etc

      • It's kind of funny. When I first started playing video and computer games as a kid in the 80's, arguably a lot of the content for Nintendo and PC was not worth the 40-60 that they were charging. The games were, overall, smaller, less technologically advanced, there were less art assets, and simpler art assets, smaller levels, etc.

        To a large degree, that was a limitation of the hardware.

        You just weren't going to put full-motion video, speech, high-poly models, and whatever else on an NES. Just wasn't going to happen. The cartridge only had a few MB of storage. The machine only had a few K of RAM. It could only handle a few colors. Those were just limitations of the hardware.

        But, at the time, that was still pretty impressive. Metroid, with its chunky graphics and crappy color palette and simplistic gameplay was, arguably, just a

  • Some pieces of software should cost $0.99 and some should cost $59.99. Suggesting either is killing gaming is silly. If anything price structures on many platforms are too rigid where the platform vendors can't handle a game because its the best price is neither $0.99 or $59.99.

  • if you cut out the big box store price can be $40 and you just need to pay the hosting fees + CC fees.

  • The simple fact of the matter is, that most people are not serious hardcore gamers, and/or don't have enough free time to devote to such levels of gaming...

    As a result, very few if any games are worth $60 to most people... Now when there was no other choice, it didn't seem so unreasonable to buy a full priced game to only play once or twice, but now we finally have an alternative which is not illegal.

    For me, and many other people i know, most games will only provide a couple of hours of entertainment at bes

  • You don't. First of all dollar apps are not a big threat to the big $60 games. What is threatening those big $60 games is the $60 + paid DLC. If I pay $60 it should be all-included with free DLC like StarCraft 2. Portal 2 is a bad example of that as well - a full priced game ($50) but every little outfit I want costs $1-5 and the game isn't all that big and very linear. The rest like Dead Space is again linear and just another zombie shooter. It has some cute concepts in it but it's not worth my money. Then

  • Those dollar apps are really filling the void that the decline in arcades. Where you have games designed to kill a few hours of your time, without really feeling ripped off, if you don't like the game. It is kinda of a funny turn of events. The Arcade was more popular then game consoles because they did better graphics and had more cooler stuff. Then the consoles got better then the Arcade systems. But because they are expensive to have games were a good gamer could complete in a few days. There is inter

  • I will admit I buy more $1 apps than traditional games now. My gaming time has been scarce for years, but back before the app store I would shell out $60 for a game and half of them would get played for an hour or less. Now I actually play more just because of the convenience, yes most of the games are more casual but are a entertaining enough experience that I just dont miss console gaming anymore, in fact I sold off both my 360 and PS3 a few months back. That said I dont mind paying for good games, I p

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