GTA V

[Paelos]

I didn't like the way they would dump you into firefights after cutscenes with no cover. It was like...okay and fuck you too.

[Yegolev]

First a disclaimer: GROVE STREET FOR LIFE

I preferred the driving in GTAIV over SRII.  Cars felt more like cars than karts.

My main beef with GTAIV was that I basically disliked everyone in the game and Liberty City itself.  So, unless they recycle Cousin Nico, Roman, Gay Tony, and BEEG AMERICAN TEETEES, I'm probably going to like V better than IV.

[Cyrrex]

I thought GTA4 cars felt too much like boats.  I like the fact that they behaved differently depending on which vehicle you were in, but even sports cars behaved like boats to a large degree.

SR cars are way too arcadey (thinking primarily of SR3 here).  They are too easy to drive.  I want something in the middle.  Something like NFS: Most Wanted - where the driving is actually quite a bit arcadey, but they make it feel like it is based on real physics. 

[Hawkbit]

I didn't like the way they would dump you into firefights after cutscenes with no cover. It was like...okay and fuck you too.

The character swapping part could potentially create this problem, too.  They've said that you might swap into a character that's in the middle of a gunfight. 

[Yegolev]

I expect I won't be bothered by that in most cases.  Probably twenty hours in I'll be a good enough shot that I'll only get angry if I'm plopped in front of military vehicles.  But we shall see.

[Sky]

I prefer GTA's driving model, but I'm not sure how much of that is due to GTA allowing me to set the camera angle higher so I can see over the damn car, CJ. I hate driving a sports car in SR because the camera nagle is too low and I'm constantly trying to bump it up to see better. So now I only use a UFO to get around, or sprint (in SR).

Lock on targeting ftw, I hate thumbstick shooters.

[Samwise]

I picked up SR because somebody told me it was like GTA with just the fun parts, but I turned it off after ten minutes because the driving was ass.  Arcadey is a good way to describe it.

[Jeff Kelly]

and another release where the companies urge you to preorder to avoid the rush only for you to find that almost all retailers already broke street date. So the people who preordered have to wait for the 17th while there are already people leaking stuff all over the gaming sites and have since thursday.

If you are unable to control the launch of such a hugely anticipated game (I guess there's really no way to prevent such things) then at least make it so preorders get to play it first not five days after everyone else who just stumbled in his/her local retailer.

It's my own fault really but there's really no reason to preorder shit anymore or is there? If I hadn't I could have played GTA since friday at least.

[Cyrrex]

Not only that, but for any significant release, you go down to your local retailer and they have eleventy billion copies anyway, and is some cases at a lower price than the pre-order price.  We no longer live in a world where you might risk not being able to easily find a copy on release day.  Pre-orders should either give early access, or some kind of special edition types of perks.  Free hookers in this case, or something.

[Hawkbit]

Enjoy the misery while it lasts; I believe the retail game model has ~5 years max because it's too easy to buy digitally now.  If the owners would pass along part of the savings to the customer that involve physical production, then we'd be golden.

However, I suspect a few years into the next generation they'll keep digital games at the $60 price point and push up retail games to $70.  Call it a hunch.  They can blame it on the rising production costs, when the reality is they've been planning this all along.

 

[Cyrrex]

I'm sure you are exactly right.  Look at e-books.  Electronic versions of a book are seldom cheaper, and it seems to be getting worse rather than better.

[Merusk]

Fuck e-books right in their ear.  A less convenient, harder-to-use product that costs me more money than the physical version. Joy!

[Miasma]

I was going to comment about how I remember some publisher got in a disagreement with an ebook company and all the user's books from them got deleted without consent but then I looked at the thread's title and thought "how the fuck would such a comment make sense in the GTA V thread?".

Then I posted anyway.

[rk47]

Well the cheaper digital retail is part of the reason why I rarely pirate anything nowadays.
If they go that route, I'll just pirate again.
Never liked buying $50 boxes. Sure as hell not paying $50 digital copies.

[Ceryse]

I'm actually similar; I used to pirate.. 90% or so of my games simply due to cost. Nowadays, with Steam Sales I don't pirate at all. I mean, it helps I've actually got money to spend on games these days compared to when I was pirating games. I buy an average of 2-3 games a year at full price (and at least one of those tends to bite me in the ass), and around 15-20 via Steam Sales. If Steam Sales never happened again I'd probably buy 1-2 games a year at full price and pirate the rest.

Similarly; I don't buy e-books. Not enough value for the money. That and I actually like the feel of a book in my hands when I read (even if books still cost way more than they should, all the same).

[Jeff Kelly]

When Apple first started the app store a few game developer studios published and disclosed their cost breakdowns. When Popcap released Plants vs. Zombies on the app store there was some bruhaha over how an established game dev could sink so low as to only charge $2,39 (I think) on a game that was in retail for $20 or more.

Maybe I'll try and dig it up again but the gist was that after subtracting the costs for manufacturing of the game disc and box and subtracting the cost of shipping and handling of the merchandise and after the cut the distributor, wholesaler and retailer took, Popcap made about $1 to $2 on each game sale for a $20 to $30 boxed game. They actually made more money by selling the game for $2,39 on the app store even considering the 30% cut Apple takes and they don't have to compete for shelf space with bigger releases. That's why Popcap was already keen on digital distribution by then.

With GTA or other big budget releases the cost breakdown and profit margings might differ, there's no reason however why a digital release should cost the same (or even more) than a physical release. Companies do this  however - and ebooks are no different there - to protect retailers and the existing sales channels that are still important and for fear of a slow price erosion. One statement in the apple ebook price fixing case was that publishers feared that Amazon's purchasing policy would lead to prices of all books even blockbuster hardcover releases to drop from the usual $15,99 or $19,99 to $9,99 since that was the price tier Amazon set with its policy of buying wholesale and setting its own price (so no MRSP)

The saw what had happened to the music industry and didn't like it.

[Merusk]

Thing is those publishing houses and game publishers are obsolete and they realize it. They're fighting tooth and nail to maintain an old business model instead of transitioning to the new one.  They still have *some* relevance in their marketing knowledge and connections, but the retail world is dying.  Change is scary, etc.

It will never totally die-off but it certainly isn't going to be a large portion of their sales in the very near future.  It's going to be wholesalers like Amazon and digital for those who don't want physical copies.  Prices are going to have to drop because consumers are getting savvier to this model and saying, "fuck it, I'll just buy directly from the producer." 

The big guys will continue to say, "No, you have to buy it over here." for fear of being cut-off by the pubs. The smaller guys who have nothing to lose and everything to gain will continue to push things in this direction.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Case in point: GAMESTOP EXCLUSIVE CONTENT(please buy from us...)

[Cyrrex]

The early reviews coming in are all basically perfect scores.  Gamespot only gave it a 9, of course they cited it being "profoundly misogynistic" as a negative thing.  On the bright side, I have seen a few comments mentioning that great driving mechanics, which makes me hopeful.

[Jeff Kelly]

Well unfortunately the early reviews are almost always rather glowing. Have been for Dead Spave 3, Mass Effect 3 and other blockbuster releases so I'd not put to much faith in them.

GTA being profoundly mysoginistic, as if that was a new development in the GTA franchise and not something that GTA had always.

[Fabricated]

No media outlet will dare give a main GTA title anything but glowing scores at this point.

I don't think I've ever actually completed the main story of any GTA title since they're so fucking boring to actually play properly. Futzing around in the sandbox has lost its appeal for me so I spent all of 7-8 hours with GTA4 and didn't enjoy most of it. I'm not buying this one.

I did however complete Red Dead Redemption...

[Sky]

I did however complete Red Dead Redemption...

Dammit.

[Cyrrex]

No media outlet will dare give a main GTA title anything but glowing scores at this point.

I don't think I've ever actually completed the main story of any GTA title since they're so fucking boring to actually play properly. Futzing around in the sandbox has lost its appeal for me so I spent all of 7-8 hours with GTA4 and didn't enjoy most of it. I'm not buying this one.

I did however complete Red Dead Redemption...

That's because Red Dead Redemption was stupendously good. 

But yeah, I know what you mean.  I watched a couple of review videos and couldn't help but think to myself "this is pretty much EXACTLY what they said about GTA4".  That was a good example of a game that was somehow worse than the sum of its parts.  Should have been great, but just got too boring to slog through.

[Rasix]

I'm going to wait.  My PS3 is currently being held hostage by my family as a bluray player, anyhow.

[MisterNoisy]

I'm picking up my copy at midnight, and have already taken tomorrow off, since I'll invariably end up playing until it's light out once I get back home, which always makes work a pain the next day.

[HaemishM]

Maybe I'll try and dig it up again but the gist was that after subtracting the costs for manufacturing of the game disc and box and subtracting the cost of shipping and handling of the merchandise and after the cut the distributor, wholesaler and retailer took, Popcap made about $1 to $2 on each game sale for a $20 to $30 boxed game. They actually made more money by selling the game for $2,39 on the app store even considering the 30% cut Apple takes and they don't have to compete for shelf space with bigger releases. That's why Popcap was already keen on digital distribution by then.

Take that same pricing issue and transplant it to authors and you understand why you are getting fucked on eBook pricing. I sell my eBooks for $2.99 and make $2.07. For the same book in paperback using print-on-demand, I charge $10.99 and make $3.10 (I make more if they buy it directly from the POD house instead of Amazon but no one does that). I played with the pricing calculator a whole bunch to try to get the paperback costs down so I could charge $9.99 or less and just couldn't do it.

There's just an assload of fat in the distribution of physical goods, whether that be games, books or knickknacks. There are 3 links in the chain that all add a profit margin to their piece of the pie - the publisher, distributor and retailer, all wanting their 5-10% profit.

[Simond]

GTA being profoundly mysoginistic, as if that was a new development in the GTA franchise and not something that GTA had always.

It's pretty pathetic that the series that started off as a pretty blatant GTA3 rip-off is now more progressive in comparison.

[Ingmar]

GTA being profoundly mysoginistic, as if that was a new development in the GTA franchise and not something that GTA had always.

Not sure what you're getting at here. They should get a pass on it because it was always bad in that way?

[HaemishM]

Probably more like calling GTA misogynistic is like saying water is wet.

[Stormwaltz]

The Escapist's review has doused any embers of desire I might have had to play this game; "The three men you take control of throughout the game aren't even anti-heroes. They're just scumbags."

[Rendakor]

Yea, that saves me the time and money too. One of the reasons Red Dead Redemption was so good was the fact that John Marsten was a decent human being and not a total douche.

[Jeff Kelly]

Not sure what you're getting at here. They should get a pass on it because it was always bad in that way?

No, but if a reviewer is only just now realizing it then he clearly spent the last decade in a coma or in North Korea. GTA's authors had always a mysoginistic streak but I guess it's OK as long as it's about kiling hookers for money or something. To put it another way criticizing the umpteenth installment in a series for a tendency that is ingrained in the series and that the gaming press as a whole tends to ignore or even glorify is like being grand master of the blinding obvious.

It's also pretty hipocritical coming from a sector of the press that has no problem whatsoever with objectifying and margilazing women in general

[Margalis]

The Escapist's review has doused any embers of desire I might have had to play this game; "The three men you take control of throughout the game aren't even anti-heroes. They're just scumbags."

So it's every GTA game?

[Velorath]

The Escapist's review has doused any embers of desire I might have had to play this game; "The three men you take control of throughout the game aren't even anti-heroes. They're just scumbags."

I'd rather have characters that are just outright portrayed as scumbags, compared to someone like Nico who ended up being a scumbag that the writers seemed to think they were portraying as an anti-hero.

Also Jeff Gerstmann gave the game five starts, and I trust his reviews generally.

[Samwise]

The mute GTA 3 guy was an emotionless sociopath, and Tommy from Vice City was a manic sociopath.  CJ was far and away the most sympathetic protagonist in the GTA series, and he was still pretty much a scumbag.