Category Archives: Data

Are games actually shrinking rather than growing?

Value for money in the games industry has been in the spotlight recently. Wading into the debate this week was Adrian Chmielarz, former creative director at People Can Fly, the studio behind the critically acclaimed, though undersold, Bulletstorm.

He thinks that charging “$60 for a game is a little insane” and said that developers are obliged to pad things out with filler to justify the prices. He argued that lowering development costs and making games just as long as they need to be would be better for everyone.

This made me wonder how much longer games are now than they used to be. With bigger worlds cropping up all the time, it can be possible to spend months in some games without discovering everything. Continue reading →

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The cost of pre-owned games vs digital copies and DLC

Even these were expensive once. Photo credit: KaptainKobold on Flickr

Video games depreciate at an alarming rate.

If you’re willing to wait just a few months for pre-owned copies, you can pick them up for a fraction of their initial £40 or £50 price tag.

But downloadable versions of games and their downloadable content don’t seem to depreciate at nearly the same rate, meaning that getting the extra content can often mean spending much more than you paid for the main game.

I’ve had a look at how the pre-owned prices compare to the digital ones, as well as how they compare with the DLC. Continue reading →