Debate Over Whether Fans Are Getting Money’s Worth
If you’ve purchased all of Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing‘s downloadable content thus far–assuming you have an XBOX360–you’ve doled out more than the value of the game itself, and there’s more to come.
Together, the five dollar cheat code, the array of Avatar clothing that altogether runs almost $38, last week’s $7 release of Metal Sonic and Death Egg (which, for some, ran $10), and the $4-5 purchase of Ryo-F adds up to about a $55 bill. Most fans aren’t such adamant supporters, but it’s still spurred debate on the value of what players are purchasing.
“Maybe we could get more than, what, one character and one track for 560G ($7)?” wrote staffer T-Bird on the Sonic Stadium forums. “Come on Sumo, a bit more content for our coinage please!”
“The DLC looks great, but nowhere near value for money,” added Blue Blood on the Sonic Retro forums. “I won’t consider buying it until there’s a price drop or special offer.”
The cries appear valid at the first sight, when you consider the value Sonic fans received in the past. Sonic Unleashed‘s DLC packs, in totality, cost less than $20, and brought over 40 additional playable levels to the game. The difference between Unleashed and ASR, however, is how much of the Adventure Packs unlocked content that had already been partially constructed on disc. So far, Ryo-F appears to be the only DLC that’s accessible in such a way. It’s that mostly brand new DLC smell, though, that has some other fans not as bothered by the price points.
“I would have bought it at the 800 point price,” wrote Sonic Retro administrator Aquaslash. “It’s actually all new content and not an unlock key.”
Still, fingers are pointed to the content found in other major franchises’ DLC as a call for Sega to offer better value.
“Resident Evil, Grand Theft Auto 4, and Borderlands are all great examples,” wrote Sonic Yoda on the SSMB over the weekend. “They may be a little more expensive but look at what you’re getting. [....] Sega’s DLC strategy essentially rips off the hardcore fan by making them pay silly prices for little add-ons that should really be free.”
The debate eventually saw the involvement of Sega Europe community manager Kevin Eva, under his ArchangelUK handle, who disagreed with the above sentiment.
“Comparing ASR to RE, GTA, and Borderlands is frankly silly when they are completely different types of games that lead them to completely different types of DLC,” he wrote on the SSMB. “Is the pack worth more than an avatar hat? Is it worth more than a T-shirt? Is it worth more than a prop…or two props? Is it worth more than one character alone?”
To be fair, ASR may be the first proper kart racer to test the water when it comes to DLC, pricing and all. However, it will soon have some competition, at least on the PS3, when ModNation Racers is released next month. Should Sega be looking at ASR DLC solely as a means to quickly balloon profits, there may be cause for concern. If developer United Front Games assumes the same DLC approach as Media Molecule has with LittleBigPlanet–regularly offering material at mostly cheaper prices–ASR’s competitive advantage on PS3 may be cut off. This may be especially true, given how the same DLC typically costs more on Sony’s console, compared to XBOX360. Though it is no consolation for those who have willingly paid more than $50 thus far for all the DLC, it could force Sega to listen closer to its consumers for the future.
“We’re paying customers, they should respect our opinions more,” wrote SSMBer PsychoJosh.
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Wanna get rid of my quote there
Nope.
-T
I do not think 7 dollars is horribly overpriced for what it is, but I would prefer it to be 5 instead.
My real problem is that on XBL 7 dollars in America somehow translates to nearly 10 here. Microsoft are idiots, PSN does it normally.
It’s pricey, I’ll admit, that makes me a little hesitant…But the sheer quality of it makes it worth while.
If you want to make it out of the Sonic and Sega All-Star’s Racing game alive I’d suggest skipping the unlock code, the avatar goodies, and Forlkift Ryo UNLESS you’re a diehard Shenmue fan.
$7 is a really steep price for something that should realistically be more like $2 or $3.
There’s a lot of things that factor into the price of a product, and you people buying the crap in the first place is one of them. If it’s too “expensive,” how and why are you buying it?
Nearly all DLC is overpriced. They should all be about 99 cents. I can’t stand spending 2 dollars for characters on Disgaea. The 20 dollars for the extra story in Disgaea 3 was also steep considering that Disgaea 1 and 2 had extra stories and the full original games for 30 dollars!
Rock band DLC is terribly overpriced. $2 for something you can get for 99 cents on iTunes!? I actually find playing the songs by ear on my keyboard and just listening to the songs more enjoyable
Quoted!
Just to clarify, I actually bought the DLC, and I must say I am quite fond of both the Egg Hangar track and the Metal Sonic character – I think both are a testiment to how much time, effort and love the team have pumped into the game (and I think everyone appreciated the Ristar cameo!).
I’ve found after talking to both sides in this that there is a real segregation between those who think this is, and those who think this isn’t a worthwhile purchase. I’m still of the mindset this is a very expensive DLC for what you get, and I think a more reasonable price would be something around the 400G mark. Again however, I have absolutely no clue on what it costs to put DLC onto the marketplace, or whether the pricing is the result of either SEGA, Sumo, or Microsoft’s decisions.
Again I think this raises the issue on the pricing of DLC across the board, but in a positive way I think if there is a big enough reaction from the community this will be heard by those higher up.
I think the pricing for DLC in general is usually a bit steep, save for first-party Sony games, which tend to undercut the pricing of similar DLC packs for other games by $2-4 each.
There is also the unlock key vs. all-new content thing to consider. Forklift Ryo is a crap deal even if you ARE a die-hard Shenmue fan, ’cause there’s really nothing in the way of actual content or work gone into it. So is the unlock code, especially since it’s so easy to unlock things in-game anyway.
The Avatar items really shouldn’t be considered in this, as it’s unrealistic to say that ANYONE is going to buy a majority of them, let alone all…plus, it’s not technically game DLC at all.
I say the Metal Sonic/Egg Hanger pack coming with a character, race track, AND five music tracks for $7 is pretty sweet. Shame I’ll have to pay $8…but I don’t pay for online play, so I suppose it balances.
Im from Chile, the 1600 Mpoints cost around 20.000 pesos, is like pay $40 dolars, i hate this injustice.
Honestly the thing that miffs me the most about the DLC is the fact that Ristar makes a non-playable cameo.
If I had to choose between seeing him make a non-playable cameo, or no cameo at all, I would definitely choose no cameo at all. Seeing him not among the other racers is just a gigantic tease and only serves to make me angry.
$7 is too expensive for a single track and a single extra skin. If you want to compare to something more directly than Borderlands, GTA, etc. let’s look at other racing game DLC on the Xbox Live Marketplace:
One Forza Motorsports 2 “track pack” – that is, one environment with three tracks in that environment, is 400 points ($5). A “car pack” for Forza 2 typically contains ELEVEN NEW CARS, also for $5.
Project Gotham Racing 4 had a “Premium Challenge Pack” with seven new cars, for $5.
Project Gotham Racing 3 sold cars individually for less than a dollar each. (60msp).
On top of that, you have to consider Microsoft’s pricing system. You can’t just buy $7 worth of Microsoft points. Microsoft points are only available in increments of $5, $10, $20 or $50.
It is a bad price in a bad pricing system.
I haven’t paid, even Metal Sonic alone is too expensive.
Seriously, some people complain too much. Let´s tell some facts:
1) The game hasn´t selled that well. Comparing it to games like Fallout 3, GTAIV or Resident Evil 5 is plain stupid.
2) DLC, in most cases, is really overpriced. I would list many examples, but it would easier to just list the not overpriced list, which in most cases are either a key or a game that have sold millions of copies.
3) Comparing it to Sonic Unleashed makes me laugh. You know, that content has nothing new in it period. It just uses current maps that are already in the game, and just changes some object placement. It´s a lot less work than doing a completely new track, you know (an adding the programming necessary for a new character).
If people complain about this download, I don´t think you buy DLC content that much, as this has a better price and content that most of the DLC out there. And I repeat, all those great DLC are usually for bestsellers or the content is already in the disk.
All of this talking about the Metal Sonic DLC. The rest is all overpriced, although you know… Avatar items are ALWAYS overpriced, I don´t think anyone could complain about a unlock all DLC (just don´t buy it)… Ryo Forklift isn´t that good to start with. If you want to pay for that, good for you. If you wanted it free, sorry, that´s how this world usually works.
[quote]3) Comparing it to Sonic Unleashed makes me laugh. You know, that content has nothing new in it period. It just uses current maps that are already in the game, and just changes some object placement. It´s a lot less work than doing a completely new track, you know (an adding the programming necessary for a new character).
If people complain about this download, I don´t think you buy DLC content that much, as this has a better price and content that most of the DLC out there. And I repeat, all those great DLC are usually for bestsellers or the content is already in the disk.[/quote]
Really? You must not get out much because Capcom gave us 2 additional storyline chapters (about 2-3 hours long each) that were entirely new, not on the disc, with 2 new multiplayer characters each, new enemies, and new multiplayer maps for Resident Evil 5 and each chapter was $5. I dropped a total of $12 and got 8 new characters, 5-6 hours of brand new not on the disc single player gameplay, and 8 new multiplayer maps. If we went off of the SaSASR rate I would have shelled out over $70 for all of that. This DLC content is really not that grand of a deal compared to that.
Or what about Gears of War 2? I shelled out 12 dollars and got 15 new maps and a new single player segment. At SaSASR prices, I’d spend about $70 for that same amount of material.
Metal Sonic and one new track for $7? Its milking the franchise for cash. i won’t be buying this until the price is less then $3, preferably $2. As is, I would like to remind Sega that most weeks I can purchase entire games for less then $7 on live. Last week Lumines was $5, and that’s a full GAME. Metal Sonic is horribly overpriced.
The only reason I don’t have ASR right now is cuz I can’t randomly fork over 50 bucks for it. People are broke nowadays. I think SEGA should’ve considered the economy when pricing it. It’s not like it used to be.
Price rarely translates precisely into the amount of time you spend on content, even in full retail games.
Fact is, SEGA All Stars Racing is a very different beast from Grand Theft Auto, Resident Evil 5, and Borderlands.
Let’s look at GTA for a second. This game is MASSIVE. You could, quite litterally, spend 50 hours of your life going through the story mode, exploring the city, taking on side quests, all that stuff. Exploring new content all the time.
In ASR, you can experience every track….in about three hours. You can beat all the missions…in maybe another 4 hours, given some of them are rather difficult. Beating all this stuff will allow you to experience the entire game and unlock everything, in a fraction of the time it takes to beat a game like GTA4, and yet the game costs only $10 less. With a fraction of the content and production values.
And yet, people don’t complain about the price of ASR…
So…why don’t they? Well, it’s simple: ASR is an arcade racing game, GTA4 is a sandbox adventure game. Sandbox games tend to have loads of content and hours upon hours of game play in the story mode, where as arcade racing games tend to have considerably less content. An arcade racing game’s hook is REPLAYABILITY.
That’s where your content comes from, that’s where your value comes from. You can spend hours racing in Time Trial mode with either Metal Sonic (which ISN’T a “skin”, but a completely new, painstakingly detailed and animated character), or the new course. You can spend hours racing in it online with friends. You can spend hours racing it in single player, working on improving your skills on the course.
I’ve gotten plenty of value out of this course, because it’s meant to be played more then once. I’ve spent plenty of time playing as Metal Sonic, because it takes time to hone his character and learn every facet of how he controls and how to best race him in certain situations. I know I didn’t master the Death Egg course I’m first try. I’m STILL working on trying to race on it consistently and find the best path through. I’m still trying to get the hang of Metal Sonic’s hover bike. I’m still playing this content.
As a fan of arcade game play; of improving my scores, my times, homing my skills, not just “experiencing the content” then moving on to something else, this content holds plenty of value to me. It’s easy for people to neglect this value and dismiss it as over priced and compare it to COMPLETELY DIFFERENT GENRES that hold much more content in the actual retail releases then the retail version of ASR does, because they simply don’t understand this.
Sonic fans just need to get used to DLC. This is how this stuff is typically priced. It has never exactly matched the content of play value of other types of games. Heck, I downloaded a new mission for Mass Effect that took me two hours to get through. Cost the same amount as ASR’s DLC, but now that I’ve played through the mission I can’t access that mission or the area it was in ever again until I start an all new play file; I’ve easily gotten more time out of ASR’s DLC then Mass Effect’s.
Rats, look at all those spelling and grammar mistakes…
I WOULD like to also say that Ryo IS overpriced because all your paying for him is a key. However, he is also nothing new, people like to use RE5? Capcom released a multiplayer mode that was around the same price….except it was just a KEY for content already on the disc. Keys are also nothing new at all. A horrible practice, though.
@Viking ZX
How many millions of copies have either of them sold? Oh, and good titles. Didn´t Epic released the exact great same content you are talking about for around 2800 points before screwing many of their fans? Didn´t Capcom released a key for 400 points for the multiplayer content?
How many copies do you think SSASR has sold? How many copies of those ones will buy any kind of DLC? You know, it´s easy to sell DLC to great price when you have like 5 million potential costumers. That isn´t the case for this game. And still, if you compare this to 80% of the DLC content out there, it´s really good.
I don’t think seven bucks is outrageous. I mean, iTunes (where I live) sells music tracks for 99 cents each.
I’m getting five music tracks, a new racing track, and a new character. That’s seven objects for seven bucks. I can tolerate it.
That said, if it was cheaper, I’d be a happy camper
@Knuckles MetalMind
Epic released an earlier Map pack with 5-6 new maps for about five dollars, but when they released the other maps, they added the new maps as a package deal for 12 dollars or separately as a 6 dollar pack. So no, they didn’t screw over any of their fans. There was a screw-up where Microsoft incorrectly priced the pack at $20 in pre-release announcements, and GameStop sold it at that price, but no one who bought it was screwed out of cash unless they went to GameStop. Additionally, RE5′s Versus mode was NOT on the disc, it was a download, not just an unlock and did bring new features to the game. And although one mode sucked, the other was worth $5 and very enjoyable.
As far as pricing goes, Sega should know that there is a price pitch point, and this isn’t it. The only ones who will buy Metal at this price are a smaller percentage of dedicated fans, whereas the larger percentage would buy it if the price was lower. Supply and demand, they would actually make a lot more money if the content was say $5 instead of $7. Volume, volume, volume. Especially considering that it is DIGITAL content which, once made, can be copied and pasted at near no additional costs.
This is plain and simple bad marketing and execution by Sega.
Ah, so it WASN’T an unlock key. Good. I “lost” an argument when I was defending Capcom’s position on this when this news came out…
But it DID use assets that where on the disc, so calling it “all new content” like this is, is a fallacy.
Yes, too much. I haven’t still downloaded it.