Length and "Value for Money"

[toythatkills]

A novella will often cost the same as a 1000 page novel in paperback.

Seeing an 80-minute film at the cinema costs the same as seeing a 3-hour epic.

I've never heard anyone complaining that these "lesser" experiences represent bad value for money.

So why is it that games have to suffer that kind of judgement? What makes them different? Just because one game lasts ten hours and one lasts five, why shouldn't they be the same price?

Limbo, for ?10, around the price of a cinema ticket, will offer you around four hours content on average if you wanted to play through it once. That's better value for money than the aforementioned cinema ticket, yet it's been widely criticised as being horrendous value for money. Where is this mythical line?* How many hours of content do gamers expect for every pound they pay? Why is length the only consideration on whether a game is good value for money? Why doesn't quality come in to it?

If a game was crap, really crap, but offered 100 hours of content for ?10, does that make it a more worthwhile purchase than Limbo, a game which is short but incredible for its entirety?

And then there's the double standards within gaming itself. At least five games this year, for ?40 when they were released, offered around ten hours content as a single player experience. Again, worse value for money than Limbo if we're doing pounds for hours, yet retail games seem largely immune from this criticism.

I'm all for games being derided as too expensive if they're ****, but the length of the experience should in no way be the deciding factor as to what a game costs. Why do people do it to games? Why don't people do it to other media?

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?

(*I appreciate that there has to be a line, ?100 for a ten minute game isn't realistic however good it is, but that's not a realistic example and I don't think that line is ever going to be reached, it certainly hasn't been with Limbo.)

To end on an interesting fact:

Playdead was founded in 2006 by Arnt Jensen and Dino Patti. The founders made the development studio specifically to produce LIMBO. 30 man-years later, in the Summer of 2010, LIMBO releases on the Xbox LIVE Arcade.

That's what you're moaning about getting for ?10. 30 years of work.

[Skull Commander]

Personally I percieve Limbo as bad value for money as it's a very limited experience that I would likely only go through once. It has absolutely no resale value and is 50% more expensive than the once "standard" price for such a game.

[toythatkills]

Personally I percieve Limbo as bad value for money as it's a very limited experience that I would likely only go through once.

Again, you're basing the value on how long you'll play it for. If you think it's a bad game, fair enough, but if you enjoy it enough to play through to the end, then your complaint is solely about the length, WHY?

You have never said a movie was rubbish value for money because it was only 80 minutes long, nobody has, ever. It's OK to say that about Limbo?

[Skull Commander]

Games are not films. The two things are entirely seperate. You will always reach the end of a film, maybe not a game. Comparing the two is ultimatly fruitless.

[Malc]

All I know is that I bought a XBL game many years ago for 400 points called Geometry Wars 1. I got a tremendous amount of replay value from that. Then a few years later I bought Geometry Wars 2 for 800 points and got even more replay value out of that. Now I'm having to pay 1200 for a 'linear' 4 hour experience, when I have just payed 800 points for Monkey Island 2 which I am still playing at over 5 hours.

Maybe it's Microsofts/other developers fault who have chosen to raise the 'default' price of XBL games over the years to 1200, when they offered even more quantity of gameplay years ago, which has lead people to question the length they get for the price these days.

I must say that I love everything about Limbo and don't neccessarily agree with price per hour of gameplay methodology, but I can't help feel this way when buying the latest XBLA releases.

[toythatkills]

Games are not films. The two things are entirely seperate. You will always reach the end of a film, maybe not a game. Comparing the two is ultimatly fruitless.

I'm not saying they are, but they're both entertainment mediums, so the comparison is perfectly valid.

Most people complaining about the price of Limbo haven't even bought it, they're basing their moaning on it's assumed length if they were to reach the end, so again, the comparison is valid.

[Skull Commander]

To be honest I would only ever purchase a film at full price if I knew I'd watch it more than once anyway.

If I go to the cinema that is different as your paying for the use of the cinema as well as the film, BUT if they were showing a 20 min feature instead of the normal 1 hour and a half then I would expect the price of the ticket to be less and reflect this.

*EDIT* Forgot to mention, I don't know where you go to the cinema, but the Vue cinema up here is only £5.10 for a standard adult ticket.

[Vince]

The short answer is that a lot of gamers, especially new school ones, are really tight. This probably comes from 2 things:

1) it is possible to buy some reasonably priced games with real long term playability, think the PC type games like Civilisations, Counter Strike etc
2) piracy is rife, a large group of gamers would rather not pay anything at all, and don't believe they should as they can get emulated games, DS/PSP games etc from the net

The problem is that there are many long games, which just involve you doing the same thing over and over (think FFXIII), so really do they offer good value? The reason long games were invented in the first place was just to stop people trading/renting games. What is value anyway, wouldn't it be better to have 5 minutes of awesome than 5 of hours of OK? Would people pay to watch an OK 5 hour film rather than a good 1.5 hour one? Of course not, but for some reason with games that's the accepted way.

Its not even like games are expensive these days, the most expensive games in shops are only £40, which isn't that much really, and most PSN/XBLA/WiiWare games are £10 or under which is the kind of thing I'd pay just for an evenings entertainment. I guess its just modern society really, everyone wants everything for nothing, but wants themselves to get paid high wages, unfortunately it just can't work like that.

[Charlie]

I don't think anyone here has said they like Limbo but refuse to buy it because of it's length, have they? I've seen the length questioned a few times (including by myself) but always as an accompaniment to questioning the gameplay and enjoyment of the game.

[Skull Commander]

My main reason for not buying it wasn't just the length, but the length along with the fact that I see zero replayability once I'm done with it. I went through the demo and it didn't feel like the game had any meat on it's bones.

[toythatkills]

My main reason for not buying it wasn't just the length, but the length along with the fact that I see zero replayability once I'm done with it. I went through the demo and it didn't feel like the game had any meat on it's bones.

That's still the length. You're basing the its perceived value on how much time you'll spend with it, not how much fun you'll be having during that time.

[mr-monday]

The short answer is that a lot of gamers, especially new school ones, are really tight.

This is unfortunately true. Me being an old gamer used to pay ?9.99 for premium Spectrum games on tape - like the Ultimate Play the Game (now Rare) titles. Big box ST and Amiga games were often ?25. I paid ?45 for a JPN import of Strider on the Megadrive. Compared to these, and taking inflation into account I think Limbo is a bargain. I'm paying for the experience, nothing more.

[Skull Commander]

That's still the length. You're basing the its perceived value on how much time you'll spend with it, not how much fun you'll be having during that time.

No, I based it on both. As I said in the quoted post there didn't seem much to the game. I walked around, pulled some objects around and didn't really have to think about what I was doing.

There is nothing that I saw in the demo apart from the presentation that convinced me that the game was worth spending 1200 points on.

Would I play it through once and enjoy it? Yes, I likely would.

Would I think it was amazing? I doubt it.

[Charlie]

The short answer is that a lot of gamers, especially new school ones, are really tight.

Haha. I'm an oldschoool (or maybe just old ) gamer and I'm really tight. But, really, the whole issue concerning value is a dead-end street because something's worth is wholly subjective and entirely dependent on the pleasure a purchase provides.

[ItsThere]

People don't treat indie DL based studios with the respect that other niche media outlets get.

Everyone I know loves arthouse cinema, small theatre productions and unknown authors.

They are discussed and perceived as an important part of the consumer culture we live in, you can't just read Dan Brown, watch Transformers and play Call of Duty, the rich experiences that are hidden away in each entertainment medium are important.

In many cases people are prepared to pay more for the 'arthouse' experience and I cannot see why this isn't followed through with Games. You pay more for an original portrait than you do for a print, because it takes the artist more time. The point about Limbo taking 30 man years to make seem to ring true with my concerns in this area.

A lot of effort takes place in 30 years, £10 is not an excessive amount of money at the end of the day, if anything it should be more expensive to come in line with other forms of entertainment because of the small team / niche market / labout of love points that can be made about it.