Activision's CEO Bobby Kotick has been under a lot of scrutiny ever since he made a comment about wanting to raise the price of games, on Activision Blizzard's Q2 2009 Earnings Call. It was then announced that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will sell for £54.99(Pounds), an increase of £5($8.16) more than the first Call of Duty: Modern Warfare was brand new. Some gamers have been outraged over it, promising to boycott and not buy Activision Blizzard products and asking other gamers to do the same.
Outrage and disgust against Activision Blizzard really started showing after Mr. Kotick's statement, "And Tony, you know if it was left to me, I would raise the prices even further." Many people think it's Mr. Kotick being greedy and trying to take advantage that the game is going to presumably sell millions of copies.
While that may be true, now, the question I'm thinking is, "Where is the outrage, disgust, and videos calling for the boycotting of Nintendo and their products?"
Nintendo is now just as guilty, as Activision Blizzard is, for raising prices.
Rewind a little bit and think about it. Before the Nintendo Wii, which Nintendo console sold for $250 when it was released? I believe the Wii was the first Nintendo console to retail new for $250, $50 more than their previous consoles. I don't remember a lot of people being outraged and calling for boycotts on the Nintendo Wii because Nintendo raised the MSRP by $50 on the Wii from their previous consoles in the past.
Some may say, "The Wii is a console, it's different from games." Okay, that is true, but Nintendo just recently announced that Wii Fit Plus, the sequel to Wii Fit, will retail bundled with the Wii Balance Board for $99.99. A price increase of $10 more than the original, and $1.84 more than Activision Blizzard is raising the price of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 overseas.
Nintendo is also going to be selling Wii Fit Plus as a stand-alone retail game for $19.99. Please explain for me, how the new Wii Fit Plus bundle with the Balance Board is retailing for $99.99, only $10 more than the original, but Nintendo is going to charge $20 for the game by itself...shouldn't the stand-alone Wii Fit Plus be retailing only for $10 based on the price difference in bundles? I know Nintendo of America's, Denise Kaigler, already came out in defense of the price increase and gave her reasons for it, but it's still a price increase on a sequel to a game, just like Activision Blizzard's on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
If you're a Nintendo fan like myself, you may not care a lot that Wii Fit Plus is increasing by $10 for the bundle, and that's fine. If you're a Nintendo fan that's angry about Bobby Kotick's comment and the price increase of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, I think you should be just as angry at Nintendo...
So, what do Activision Blizzard's CEO Mr. Kotick and Nintendo have in common? Price increases!
Do you think the price increases on games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Wii Fit Plus are justified?
For COD:MW2, I think the price increase is justified. Remember they do make PC versions of these games, so with the rate of piracy on PC games, it's no wonder they have to make the money up somewhere. Honestly it's so tempting and easy to pirate games if your friend has it.
ReplyDeleteActivision Blizzard in regards to Star Craft 2 just shocked gamers by stating they will NOT have LAN ability, so you can't have a group of buddies at home playing together through a local LAN. The only way to play with each other is by logging into Battle.net and setting up an account and putting in your key code that the SC version is valid and not pirated.
It used to be people would just burn as many copies of the game and just play in a local LAN.
With games like SC2, they are releasing the game in 3 phases, so it'll probably be $39.99 for each game, 3 games in all for a total of $119.97 for one stinking game makes me a little frustrated, but again, companies have to do things like that especially for the loss of revenue due to piracy.
And as far as Nintendo, I think prices are justified as well because they have their own audience and people who really want to play their games, wii fit, wii fit plus, etc, are willing to pay for them. If someone complains about prices, they don't have to buy the product. Someone can't complain about the prices on one hand and then on the other, pirate games and still wonder why prices go up.
piracy is not the cause of PC gaming's demise,
ReplyDeletein fact Piracy is just a scapegoat for poor sales figures,
poor sales which are often caused by people pirating the game and realizing it is garbage, thus not buying it.
an important note about piracy is that a pirated game doesn't neccessarily spell a "lost sale" for a company (the only way digital piracy could be said to hurt a company) for instance i could pirate a game i would never buy. either way the company gets no money.