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Alchenar posted:Official Matrix response: "Reviewers are dumb and will just give our games bad reviews". The constant insistence in that thread that because wargames are a ~special snowflake~ genre basic common sense doesn't apply is pretty infuriating. Here's a couple of other good lines: quote:I doubt that even if they sold Command for $10 that it would make that much of a difference. quote:My main issue is if we consider Command an entry-level game for wargaming. Is Matrix passing up that potential market. Just knowing the naval wargaming market a little, I doubt that would be a successful strategy. The documentation and online support would be expensive. In fact, pricing at $80 keeps a lot of the needy new players out. There is sometimes something to be said for pricing at the high end of a market. Selling more copies might cost Matrix money because they would have to provide "documentation and online support". Mr. Showtime posted:hell, give Tim Stone a copy and ask if he might write about it in the Flare Path column on RockPaperShotgun, Didn't Tim Stone write a column recently complaining about Matrix prices? I think I'll email him.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 16:45 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 08:40 |
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Dark_Swordmaster posted:I just wish they'd listen to loving irrefutable proof after it's tarred and feathered on them. It's ridiculous and the fact that their business model loosely translates to, "Take the idiot first adopters' money and wait for the rest to give up hope," is a little insulting. It's not treating me like a customer so much as hostile bartering. I'm only hostile in return because the pricing is flat loving gouging, no two ways about it. Your loving metric is that people WILL buy it at that price, not what it should cost. The rest of the industry is pulling plenty of gouging bullshit too, the initial pricing for BF3 was $60+$60; and if you chose to buy the 3 $20-map-packs independently you didn't get ~premium~ access (despite having paid the same amount for the same content) - locking you out of %80 of the good servers. Furthermore, not buying the "DLC" was not an option because once a server added the new maps into it's rotation you would not be able to play there. This relegated me to either buying the thing or playing only on terrible unmoderated "24/7" servers and felt so lovely and so much like a gouge that I, personally, will not be buying any product published by EA ever again no matter how good it is or how badly I want it. Oh, and here's the kicker, it's a 64 player dedicated server environment with a queue to join a full server. So maybe you have access to half a dozen good, optimal servers that haven't locked their doors now that the "PREMIUM" feature has been released. Guess who gets to cut in line in front of you in the queue.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 16:46 |
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fuf posted:Didn't Tim Stone write a column recently complaining about Matrix prices? I think I'll email him. He actually had an interview with the Matrix Games guy, Iain McNeil where he gave him a few straight punches about pricing strategy and interface. Iain basically misinterpreted the question, went on a rant about unrelated/semi-related topics, and at one point mentioned how they were deliberately relying on cognitive dissonance in their pricing strategies.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 16:48 |
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Diet Lime posted:The rest of the industry is pulling plenty of gouging bullshit too, the initial pricing for BF3 was $60+$60; and if you chose to buy the 3 $20-map-packs independently you didn't get ~premium~ access (despite having paid the same amount for the same content) - locking you out of %80 of the good servers. Furthermore, not buying the "DLC" was not an option because once a server added the new maps into it's rotation you would not be able to play there. This relegated me to either buying the thing or playing only on terrible unmoderated "24/7" servers and felt so lovely and so much like a gouge that I, personally, will not be buying any product published by EA ever again no matter how good it is or how badly I want it. I don't mind getting gouged so much if there's actual content I get from getting gouged, it at least remains my choice to stick with the product or not. I'm even happy to pay a 'niche genre' premium (gently caress, look at the Star Citizen thread. There's shitloads of people willing to pay money that Matrix dreams of being able to charge on what is effectively the resurrection cost of the Space-sim genre). I would be happy to pay a AAA rate on a game like Command: Air Naval Operations out of my yearly 'gently caress it, have a punt on a wargame' budget. But Matrix have gone so egregiously far out of this bracket that I need to vent some.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 16:57 |
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Diet Lime posted:Price gouging and DLC I'm right there. I was on the side of "Fifteen bux for five maps!?" when CoD did it. I didn't buy BF3 until it was cheap and I will never buy the map pack for more than $5, if that. At a certain point there's a niceness of paying a developer for extra effort, but it seems (about to ) that they're holding back and then putting effort into extra revenue. $3 civs for Civ V? Not okay by me. $2 extraneous robes for Magicka? That's cool. But whatever, the rent is too drat high. Tomn posted:He actually had an interview with the Matrix Games guy, Iain McNeil where he gave him a few straight punches about pricing strategy and interface. Iain basically misinterpreted the question, went on a rant about unrelated/semi-related topics, and at one point mentioned how they were deliberately relying on cognitive dissonance in their pricing strategies. Got a link handy? I'd love to read them make an rear end out of themselves.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 17:08 |
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The problem is, even as full $60 games, most of the Matrix lineup feels extremely cheaply made, and it's tough to justify the value. It's not so much the looks, it's the design, and a lot of these games don't feel like they've been in the cooker long enough. If they remake CC3, the least they could do is fix the infantry-tank balance.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 17:15 |
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I found this one about pricing, and here's the interview itself, I think. We want a guy named Iain, right?
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 17:17 |
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I think we can all aggree its not COMMAND's fault it costs so much. We should judge command on its own merits. I got my beta tester coupon I'm gonna buy it as soon as I get home from work and then I'll show you how great the game is! (I can't post screenshots of the beta copy)
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 17:23 |
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Baloogan posted:I think we can all aggree its not COMMAND's fault it costs so much. We should judge command on its own merits. I got my beta tester coupon I'm gonna buy it as soon as I get home from work and then I'll show you how great the game is! (I can't post screenshots of the beta copy) Well... the the dumb guy making CMBN comparison in the Matrix Thread did accidentally have a point. There's a trend among wargame developers to try to make the 'one big wargame that does everything' and spend 5 years making it and it's so big and expensive (comparatively) that they have to charge $100 and are terrified of dropping the price lest a decade's work goes down the drain. COMMAND would probably benefit from having started small and then following the Battlefront model of releasing module after module that expanded the unit/scenario set. Cheaper and faster to make, cheaper to sell.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 18:30 |
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Was this one of you? Best post in that thread probably. e: yes it was. Nice work Tomn. quote:ORIGINAL: Tomn
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 19:15 |
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Yeah that's a great post and all by this "Tomn," but he's clearly a stupidface who doesn't know they have analytics and sales figures that show that if one person steals from a store everyone else has to dig into their pockets and pay $5 more. God, to count the "I'd buy it but not at that price" posts I've seen here and on another forum, if it were just $50 they'd have so many more dollars now! Someone go post some bad math in that thread for a point! Also, we should start an internet petition for as much as complaining and citing facts will loving do us. Dark_Swordmaster fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Sep 25, 2013 |
# ? Sep 25, 2013 19:49 |
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I hope one day they go steam crazy. I would buy every single Close Combat for ten bucks each. Then again, feeling bitter about getting drunk and buying WitE for 80 bucks is probably the only reason I play it.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 19:51 |
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Tim Stone responded to my email.quote:I was intending to share some first impressions of CMANO in this week's FP, but the combination of an extremely slow download (I've given up twice) and some other topical stories (Steel Beasts 3.0 and the end of the DCS WWII kickstarter) means I'll probably hold fire until next week. When I do get round to it, I'm not sure how I can avoid talking about pricing. Where Slitherine/Matrix's business model is concerned I'm always happy to "waste my time". (I mentioned that in the thread the Matrix guy said we were wasting our time.) Also this trailer got posted: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLc-iSbiV5g&feature=youtu.be
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 20:15 |
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I have a bad habit of making long-winded posts in debates where the folks on the other side have already made up their minds and are unlikely to change it. vv But yeah, the last time I tried arguing with Matrix about this (in the very thread the dude linked earlier, in fact!), they basically said "NOPE WE DID OUR RESEARCH BASED ON DATA WE ALREADY HAVE THERE ARE NO SIGNIFICANT NEW BUYERS OUT THERE." They're INCREDIBLY WEDDED to the idea that wargaming is this special and unique niche that is completely and utterly different from anything else on the market. There is some hope, though - they mentioned that they've expanded their staff pretty significantly lately in response to reasonable success (in particular mobile app successes which they've been flabbergasted by) and one of the reasons they shut down the last thread was "We've had these arguments internally already so we don't see any point in reprising them with forum users." It might be possible that their new hires will eventually convince their old guards to get with the times. The amount of doublethink going on in the company is impressive, though. "The wargaming industry is doing well and we are expanding steadily and increasing sales constantly. There are not enough untapped gamers to justify lowering the price" is their best one. Jakse posted:I hope one day they go steam crazy. I would buy every single Close Combat for ten bucks each. Proof that the Matrix system works!
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 20:18 |
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Oh my God! We're in an abusive relationship!
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 20:38 |
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Jakse posted:I hope one day they go steam crazy. I would buy every single Close Combat for ten bucks each. WitE is actually a great example. When GH did his LP of it I, like most grognards, went to the matrixstore to look at the price, did a doubletake and hit the back button, because haha what the poo poo, right? A few weeks later I ran across a translated version in a store in Germany for 39 euros and bought it without a second thought.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 20:50 |
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Common people just buy it at the price they want; what else are you going to spend it on? Chillycheese dogs you horrible goons! 105bux is only a nice dinner! You might get laid after a nice dinner, while wargames are guarenteed to safeguard your virginity! What else do you want from wargames?!
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:04 |
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It would be cool if when matrix games put out 80 dollar games they actually had some replayability and random scenario generators. If you want to put out a low-feature wargame that's fine, but price it like one. Unity of Command is cheap so it's fine not to have too many features and such, but when you put out games with about as many features at 60 bucks it's very hard to stomach. Command Ops could really use that random scenario generator and better multiplayer features because gosh that game could be so good.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:10 |
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I'm working on a dynamic campaign generator for Command, which is why I hope lots of you buy it I plan to release for 30,000 bux tho. Its what the market can support!
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:24 |
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Baloogan posted:I think we can all aggree its not COMMAND's fault it costs so much. We should judge command on its own merits. I got my beta tester coupon I'm gonna buy it as soon as I get home from work and then I'll show you how great the game is! (I can't post screenshots of the beta copy) The worst part of this is that I'm genuinely interested in/excited about Command; the price is what's holding me back. You'd better not make my buy it anyway
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:35 |
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Baloogan posted:I'm working on a dynamic campaign generator for Command, which is why I hope lots of you buy it That's only a nice car!
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:42 |
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Panzeh posted:It would be cool if when matrix games put out 80 dollar games they actually had some replayability and random scenario generators. Goddamn, this so hard. Decisive Campaigns gave us a (relatively) easy to use editor and alternate scenarios and even a full-fledged variable set-up while WITE has the temerity to charge 15 bucks for Sudden Death rules and they're probably not going to release a "milder First Winter" variant for another 2-3 months and their editor isn't just user-unfriendly, it's downright hostile.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 21:46 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:Goddamn, this so hard. Decisive Campaigns gave us a (relatively) easy to use editor and alternate scenarios and even a full-fledged variable set-up while WITE has the temerity to charge 15 bucks for Sudden Death rules and they're probably not going to release a "milder First Winter" variant for another 2-3 months and their editor isn't just user-unfriendly, it's downright hostile. For real, even though DC is just a few scenarios, the variant and set-up options are loving endless. Have they ever posted their full data? I want to link them to baby's first supply and demand curves and scream at them.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:03 |
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The hell? Matrix has mobile app games?
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:08 |
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Jakse posted:Have they ever posted their full data? I want to link them to baby's first supply and demand curves and scream at them. Spoilers: There is no data. Or if there is, it would probably prove the exact opposite of Matrix's sale strategy.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:12 |
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All this bitching about wargaming companies got me in a cranky mood, and then I saw a thread over on Battlefront about someone who couldn't play their game because of their nutty DRM, and the support guy says:quote:If you have made certain changes to your computer, this could invalidate your activation and produce this error. Is this specifically for AoD ? Please open a ticket in the Helpdesk and we can send you some utilities to delete your current AoD activation and allow you to reactivate with your current hardware configuration. Hey, buddy, if you must leave your new USB drive or controller plugged in all the time you'll need to submit a support ticket and get approval to download a special app to reset your games license. It sounds like that's not even the problem the guy is having, but hey, it speaks volumes when that is the first thing support thinks might be wrong. I really shouldn't waste my time... Irritable Fintilgin posted:Or, maybe, if adding a new USB device to your computer could potentially require you to relicense your games, you guys could, oh I dunno, come into the 21st century with your digital distribution and drop the draconian DRM?
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:17 |
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I'm going to be the Devil's Advocate here and say that a game like Command _should_ cost $80 because it's far too groggy to ever get a big enough uptake, even at $20, to make the same amount of money. That's all I have to say about price. As for the GAME... ruddy loving brilliant. It's a Harpoon that works, with the entire globe as your playspace. I've had no crashes, the AI has tossed my rear end silly on the first few small-scale missions, but, in retrospect, I know what I hosed up and how it hosed me... this game is really good, and it's basically a universal toolkit for any naval/air op of the modern era. I've heard some folks are having download issues, but I did not have any. It's been perfectly stable as well. The UI is bog-standard Windows GUI widgets, so no typical dumb wargame custom UI poo poo is getting in the way. If anything bugs me, it could use a bit more chrome. The devs were asked about the lack of pics and text in a huge db for perusal like used to be somewhat standard (thinking of Steel Panthers' impressive OOB Encyclopedia) and they stated that a) the cost for media on all the pics of all the gear that you can actually choose to use in the game was beyond prohibitive and b) they figured the community would take care of that sort of wiki-esque stuff. And it has: http://www.warfaresims.com/?page_id=1876. The database viewer in-game was designed to be able to pull in graphics and text files from elsewhere, making it easy to mod in. The groggiest of the grogs, ie, the veterans of Sissy-Pigs, aka comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.war-historical, just about the last text Usenet group about games that has ANY on-topic traffic, all concur that this game is very, very good (disclosure: I'm one of like the last 8 regulars that still posts there). If you can get past the pricing thing, which I can understand _for this type of giant wargame and scenario kit_, it's really fuckin' brilliant. I can finally toss the buggy piles of poo poo that are the last few versions of Harpoon I've bought over the years into the trash where they belong.
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# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:32 |
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Saint Celestine posted:The hell? Matrix has mobile app games? Ayep. They were shocked when it sold thirty times better than their PC offering, and are yet incapable of parsing that perhaps the price might have an influence (even if the price is pretty high for an app) or that such success helps prove the existence of a large wargaming market. By the way... Alchenar posted:Actually their business apparently grew by 100% over the last year, which they're really proud of. Do you have any hard data about the growth of digital distribution available? Tomn fucked around with this message at 23:56 on Sep 25, 2013 |
# ? Sep 25, 2013 23:49 |
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smr posted:Usenet Grog That's the thing, YOU are who they are pandering to. You're not the problem or at fault, so this isn't meant to be aggressive, but they're selling the game to you and 7 dudes (argument number) willing to pay $80 who have been in a grognard usenet chat since its inception. That's 8 x $80 = $640. They COULD have a LARGE number of people buy it at $50, maybe even $60 (though that's still a bit high) and make a TON more, in addition to the guaranteed purchases you and your ilk represent. It's not like lowering the price is going to make you NOT buy it. The only thing it would possibly do is give them more purchases, and more money. We're talking about a potential loss of $30 (argument number) per copy for the sales that they don't sell to the mainstream crowd, but they're not going to buy it at $50, $80, or any number that isn't below their "I can afford to throw this money in the garbage" amount. Meanwhile, there's several of us who would willingly purchase the title if it were a more reasonable price. I'm literally unable to see a monetary downside to them having a lower price, at least not one that tanks the company or forces layoffs.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 00:15 |
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Tomn posted:I have a bad habit of making long-winded posts in debates where the folks on the other side have already made up their minds and are unlikely to change it. vv This is the thing, Matrix consists of a bunch of guys from an old wargamer rag that got together and started publishing. They actually consider themselves to be the god-saviours of the genre and really their first priority is going to be to make sure that the games they like keep getting made and not let anything threaten that.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 00:44 |
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Some days it feels as though I account for a quarter of Matrix's revenue.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:10 |
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Someone should show one of the Matrix guys Steam and what Valve managed to do.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:18 |
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Baloogan posted:Some days it feels as though I account for a quarter of Matrix's revenue. Just imagine if they lowered their prices and they couldn't milk you for all you're worth, they'd be ruined!
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:19 |
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code:
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:25 |
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I ... I think I have a problem.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:35 |
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So, how is the game in terms of delegating command to AI, or in other words, how true is the "Command Ops: Harpoon" thing? Horrible tediousness is my biggest pet peeve with non-cardboard wargames, there's so much unnecessary poo poo to micro around. I love games like Airborne Assault/Command Ops or Scourge of War where I can immerse in my role and simply deal with my direct subordinates and once in a while intervene directly with some sort of "brilliant" plan. Or, on the second though, don't make me want it.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:44 |
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Its my favorite game; its one of the best naval warfare simulations ever. I'm thinking of streaming some gameplay at some point on twitch.tv. But to awnser your question, it has a tactical AI; but the AI will not automatically decide that it should attack some radar instalation. You create misisons which have say a flight of escort F16s, a flight of SEAD aircraft, a flight of strike aircraft and they will then go attack the radar instalation. Quite a few things happen automatically, you don't need to tell your inbound Migs to Hi-Lo-Hi strike, they do that sort of thing automatically; and its attached to loadout, so they will use long range standoff weapons at high altitude to get the most range out of the weapons. Baloogan fucked around with this message at 01:54 on Sep 26, 2013 |
# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:51 |
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Looks like we've got a fuckin' narc boys...
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:52 |
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Baloogan posted:Its my favorite game; its one of the best naval warfare simulations ever. God, this sounds rad as gently caress and is basically exactly what I want out of wargames.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 01:59 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 08:40 |
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Baloogan posted:Its my favorite game; its one of the best naval warfare simulations ever. You're the biggest jerk. e: If you do stream it and link it in here I'm giving 50/50 odds I cave and buy it.
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# ? Sep 26, 2013 02:17 |