dark souls franchise (STEAM)(SALE)(50%)

whatabout I care

Hi, my opinion was strictly related to pricing in EU where I'm located and the quality of the content offered, so I really appreciate your thoughts on this matter which added other relevant elements in the mix. Fresh perspectives are always helpful for a better understanding of an issue.

In EU prices remained unchanged from the very beginning and I'm sure there are other regions in the same situation. I guess it sucks for countries with poorer economy located in these regions. And then there were other regions, where these titles cost only a fraction of the price. For example in Argentina, according to SteamDB, Dark Souls III was around 2€ in Nov 14 2017 compared to the regular price of 60€ you had to pay in EU. While EU economy is doing much better there are still countries in EU that do maybe 2-3 times better than Argentina.
I would definitely call that unfair.

There were some regional adjustments, so in Jul 9 2021, over 5 years after launch, the price increased to around 8€ in Argentina. This was an uncommon approach and looks pretty unfair, mostly for newcomers. The rest had ample opportunities to buy the game, especially during sale. And some went further, saw this as a opportunity to profit, by reselling to other, more expensive regions. I would like to point out the titles that appeared in Humble Bundles were launched before the price increase and people benefiting the most from them, were those in expensive regions like EU, rather than poorer countries, because the latter already had similar prices. Dark Souls Remastered didn't even make it to a bundle, but then again in Argentina you could get it for a little over 3€ until the price increase in Feb 1 2023 when it got to a little over 15€, while in Europe regular price has always been 40€. Again, it sucks for newcomers, the rest had over 5 years to get the title cheap.

The fact that there's no additional content added throughout the years to justify the price is one way of looking at the situation. Another is to appreciate the fact that for all intents and purposes these games are complete, There are plenty of incomplete/buggy games these days, similarly priced or even higher, that developer still work on after launch, either to include content that should have been available at launch or to fix an ungodly amount of bugs and/or other issues. Also, I would like to think that Dark Souls games offer relevant content, not content for the sake of content, like the repetitive bloated time-sinkers from Ubisoft.

I'm not a fan of Namco prices myself, but my complaints are mostly aimed at the DLC/Season Pass pricing which is absurd for people owning the base version and want to upgrade vs new customers buying the complete package for less. They also don't like to offer deep discounts for additional content. For example Scarlet Nexus Ultimate Edition was on sale a couple of times for over 80% off, while the Upgrade To Ultimate Edition only reached 50% off, essentially making the complete package cheaper than the upgrade. Even at 80% off Ultimate Edition will be cheaper Vs Base + Ultimate Upgrade. Even smaller games like Little Nightmares suffer from this and don't even get me started on Tekken 7. But this is Namco standard pricing for you, this is the way they are conducting their business. Like you've said people could buy similar titles from other publishers rather than insist on buying from them.

In the end it's the customer who decides if the asked price is affordable and aligned with what a game has to offer. I'm definitely biased, but I personally think the Dark Souls games (especially in their final forms Remastered, Scholar, Fire Fades) are worth the asking price for what they offer. Being pissed at the fact you've missed a much better price because the publisher dared to adjust the regional pricing is not helpful. If the current price is unsuitable, wait for a price decrease or bundle like you've also pointed out, because sooner or later sales will drop.

They're way too big to need a publisher in the first place at this point, and I mean after DS2, so I don't know what the deal with that is. Maybe they just know people already expect bandai's prices to be shitty since that's a trend with bandai, so it's a good escape goat for them. Otherwise no clue what bandai could offer them. I can't imagine they don't have a final say as the dev what the price is. Like if the publisher wants to force a price and you don't, you say "ok I go a different direction you go a different direction and publish whoever else you want".

I mean look at bethesda tho. Same # of employees and revenue, much more diversified portfolio with some of the best hits of all time, yet they still get hate despite their games being much more complex than FS games will ever be. It's just weird seeing it happen to bethesda although I don't agree with al their choices either, but weirder to see all the people jump to from software's defense like no they can't be greedy it's impossible. It's fact not questionable, the data is out there. Either someone at from software is stealing money or there's no explanation.

I think part of why a indie devs give bigger discounts more consistently is because if they don't the game dies pretty fast and no one remembers it at all.

I'm not sure I can call this a problem, but you need to play the games, or consume enough media to know about the differences - the design, the tempo, the mobility - these aren't just Swordsman Hardgame, the game series.

And if somebody just yells at the developers "from outside", complaining about the price point and it not being cheaper, and being the same, it's likely that your reasoning will also fall on deaf ears. You can't convince somebody who wants supermarket prices, that there is a reason a high-end knife set has multiple knives, and they cost multiple times of a common household one.

I'll give Armored Core to you, it looks pretty indie and barebone so I've had no interest in it tho so I haven't seen much gameplay. Elden Ring is just another souls game, they did good on the formula, but it's the same stuff.

Souls games are just arpg's with certain mechanics dealing with what how you spawn, heal and deal with the boss. It's just a mechanic. I'm talking about the engine. They all look the same and play the same. Sure there's some small mechanical differences between each, but is the respawn system he same in sekiro as it is in elden ring as it is in dark souls? I think so, maybe I haven't see enough videos on it. Don't know about bloodborne but I'm guessing yes on that too. Is the travel system the same? Probably. Is the inventory management the same, I think so, I mean between elden ring/sekiro/ds I can't tell what the difference is other than some graphical one.

Nothing wrong with nurturing it, go all out, all I'm saying is it makes no sense to me why other studios can give discounts while providing a wide rage of different types of video games across different engines and fromsoftware is stuck on the same pricing despite using the same formula.

I'm also confused why their fans treat it as a small indie dev company with 2 employees and janitor that is a startup. Like they've been around a long time and they have a big ass revenue. Is it cause people like to speedrun the game and do multiple runs? Is it cause once you master parry and dodge in one game the rest become basically self explanatory so they enjoy that simplicity of not having to learn new mechanics and getting better at a new game? isn't that technically playing the same game, which they so adamantly claim it's not?

As for the discounts it has nothing to do with random people or me as you imply. I don't think I specified an exact amount and I also specified they can price it whatever they want. Fuck it they can price it $100 and desperate fans like you will buy the "remaster redone 4k reimagined game of the year edition" or something. I know that. They don't have to do so, and just because everyone does it doesn't mean they have to, but it isn't wrong to point out despite their success, despite how well they're doing, and how old some of their games are, they can't even do a more decent discount at least match what they did what 7 years ago? To make it worse why is it even mentionable that it's on sale, like.... is it relevant anymore? We already know every year it gets the same sale. You don't see me make a thread about every 50% game on steam probably because it ain't much of a deal especially when it's been this same exact sale for multiple years in a row now and it's gonna show up like idk 3 more times till the end of the year probably. PS: I never asked for a big discount on any of their newer titles for clarification. I'm just amazed DS1 is priced higher than what it was selling on a discount like 7 years ago or whatever.

I don't know what about this is calling out myself and not them. I pointed out how they're basically standing out for being the more greedy of the industry and that's calling out myself. Didn't know calling out greed is a bad thing, but I do know it upsets fanboys. You are the FS obsessed fan I'm talking about. You can kiss their ass all you want and try and reverse it on me, but you're not going to be able to prove my point wrong with "self entitlement" or other bullshit baits, I personally would like to see a proper argument not blindly following FS like it's your god. Also I already own some of their games, and I'm not interested in the other ones at the current prices since again I think they're the same and I dare you to show me otherwise(other than armored core I gave you that one).

Like you could've compared this with Bethesda if you wanted, basically the same # of employees, basically the same revenue, but they're trying out new things, working on new things, and they're not afraid to appreciate their community by giving discounts on their way older titles as they release new ones. Yes they had some flops, some mid's, and a lot of greats. Sure they got Fallout and Elder Scrolls and you could say they farmed Skyrim like a dying horse, but their variety of games dominates FS. Their engine and creativity dominates FS. Their game complexity dominates FS. Yet they receive a lot of pointless hate probably because of how intricate their games are, vs FS who made a simple ass game with a dodge, parry and travel system to have you blindly foam at the mouth like it's your drug of choice and you feel I'm in the wrong for calling them out on that practice. You can't be serious, but I'll entertain if you want to continue.