, I'm looking at you!), and even more by games that were hyped up so much, showed so much promise, then were just 'meh
'... at least were meh in my humble opinion.However, one game that I knew I was going to buy, knew I was going to love, and was super hyped about was Batman: Arkham Asylum
. Back then, I didn't have a blog, but every one of my friends heard me talk about how friggin' awesome this game was. We as gamers have been treated to hosts of terrible comic-games, but this was the title to redeem them all! If you haven't played this game yet, go find the demo somewhere. It did an amazing job of showing you the ropes of every element of gameplay, and wasn't just the first 10 minutes or so of story to wet your whistle. Just the demo got a 10/10 for me, but the game? 11/10. Seriously. I still go back and play it, and I've beaten it... four times now?Which brings me to my real point. What ever happened to game demos? I remember back in the late 90's every game came with at least one demo! Sure, there were some smaller titles that didn't, but nearly every game had something. I was mostly a PC gamer (couldn't afford to keep up with the consoles, and we were lucky to have a decent pc), but as I recall even PS1 and some n64 games came with demos, or at least trailers built in.
Sure, with the advent of the internet and social networking, demos included with games have become obsolete. Why take up precious space on your disc when you can just post a trailer on youtube?
But I have to admit, even as hyped up as I was about B:AA, I still had my doubts, and for me 50-60 bucks for a game is a big deal. I have a hard time paying 30 for older, proven games (less than a year but more than six months). So what sold me on buying, and not just buying but preordering, this game? The FREE demo! I played through the demo TONS of times.
Just to side track a bit, a lot of 'pirates' try to justify their illegal downloading/cracking of games as a way to "try out" the game instead of dropping 60 bucks on something they aren't sure they're going to like. While I agree that's a valid point... I'm not so sure I can agree with the justification because 1. they never uninstall the cracked game, and 2. even if they try it and love it, they usually don't buy the game anyway. But that's a topic for another time.
What we are starting to see is demos pop up on xbox live, or app markets, or whatever for a small fee... but see, I have a problem with paying for something I'm not sure I'll like. I don't have 3-5 dollars to drop on a demo I'll play once and never touch again once the game comes out. Arkham Asylum did an amazing job with their demo, and I hope that other game companies see that and implement their own similar demos, but that's wishful thinking.
So I'm going to try something new. I don't have a lot of followers/readers yet, but I still want to get y'all's opinion. What do you think we as the gaming community (or gamers, if you don't consider yourself part of the community) can do to get companies to see the value of putting out a free demo?
Leave a comment, try to keep it clean, and whee discussion time!
Oh, by the way, here's the B:AA homepage. You can DL the demo from the site =)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.batmanarkhamasylum.com/start
i would agree that more games need good demos to help you decide if you wanna buy the game or not, but i don't know if they should be completely free. i would say that it should depend on the level of depth that the demo goes into. you have to consider that people that made the game had to put time and effort into the demo just as they did making the game itself. honestly, i don't think that $3-5 for a demo isn't too bad, but i do still see your point.
ReplyDeleteTrue, but when you look at the scope of a full price game (less some games like Halo ODST which weren't intended to be full price), I liken a 10 minute demo to a free sample of shampoo, or a food item. I won't pay 3-5 dollars to try out a cologne/perfume that sells for 60+ dollars a bottle (some people do, and more power to them), but I'm more than happy to scratch and sniff something out of a magazine and if I really like it, I'll probably look for that brand next time I find the money to spend on cologne (just an example).
ReplyDeleteI see your point, and I'm sure if I had a full time well paying job and didn't have to worry so much about day to day finances, then I'd have no problem paying a pittance for a demo. However, at this point in time, especially with the economy in the US, I'm lucky to have enough cash for food at the end of the month, let alone money to spend on game demos.
Thanks for the input, it's much appreciated! :)