Let us talk about Collector's Edition but this time...

[Hav0x]

Most "games for windows" are $60 these days. Activision might add some goodies ... So I want these for the Wings of Liberty:

An actual size gaus rifle that will resemble a guitar on "Guitar Hero"
An extended manual with extended information on units, buildings and extended art art
An online Key for a blizzard website that will grant you access to high quality poster size artworks, which you may print.
Ingame goodies within a StarCraft USB.
One out of 500 boxes will contain a ticket for a one day trip into Blizzard.
A metal Box with outstanding art and the game CD
A Raynor statue that will resemble a CD shrine or CD storage drive.

The total price would be around 150 pounds and over 9000 dollars

StarCraft II is not going to be a Games for Windows game.

[The_Blade]

StarCraft II is not going to be a Games for Windows game.

I never said StarCraft II is a Game for Windows, that was a follow up for previous posts.

[Zahar]

Not really, because IW is a small studio under activision, and blizzard is a company that owns 53% of activisions stock.

And everything is under mr. scary grin (AKA Bobby Kotick) greedy paws.

They cannot go back and sell SC2 for 50 bucks. It's also an activision/blizzard product, and that would be like saying MW2 is a better product (hence the higher price). Believe me, they won't.

At least that means they HAVE to release quality products, I hope. The sad part is, they made the move, now every damn publisher will rob us PC gamers (since at consoles 10 bucks go to the hardware manufacturers and in the PC it goes straight to their pockets - it just give them 10 bucks more than console games now. Talk about profit. No surprise the stockholders love Kotick).

[Neon]

And everything is under mr. scary grin (AKA Bobby Kotick) greedy paws.

They cannot go back and sell SC2 for 50 bucks. It's also an activision/blizzard product, and that would be like saying MW2 is a better product (hence the higher price). Believe me, they won't.

At least that means they HAVE to release quality products, I hope. The sad part is, they made the move, now every damn publisher will rob us PC gamers (since at consoles 10 bucks go to the hardware manufacturers and in the PC it goes straight to their pockets - it just give them 10 bucks more than console games now. Talk about profit. No surprise the stockholders love Kotick).

I hope the SC2 CE will be similar to the WoW-CEs: big sturdy box, full size hardcover artbook, soundtrack, making of DVD, mousepad, an ingame extra, and 1-2 gimmicks like the SC2 poker cards, a small figurine,...

[newcomplex]

For the CE to be a sell for me, two things are pretty much essential for me.

Ludicrously big and shiny box ^_^
and a art book

Most "games for windows" are $60 these days. Activision might add some goodies ... So I want these for the Wings of Liberty:

An actual size gaus rifle that will resemble a guitar on "Guitar Hero"
An extended manual with extended information on units, buildings and extended art art
An online Key for a blizzard website that will grant you access to high quality poster size artworks, which you may print.
Ingame goodies within a StarCraft USB.
One out of 500 boxes will contain a ticket for a one day trip into Blizzard.
A metal Box with outstanding art and the game CD
A Raynor statue that will resemble a CD shrine or CD storage drive.

The total price would be around 150 pounds and over 9000 dollars

Name one game that retailed for 60$ on PC except for MW2.

Exactly.

btw the PC version of MW2 sold a whole 100,000 copies. If I were making games with PC gamers a significant portion of my sales, I'd avoid as much of IW business practices as I could.

And everything is under mr. scary grin (AKA Bobby Kotick) greedy paws.

They cannot go back and sell SC2 for 50 bucks. It's also an activision/blizzard product, and that would be like saying MW2 is a better product (hence the higher price). Believe me, they won't.

At least that means they HAVE to release quality products, I hope. The sad part is, they made the move, now every damn publisher will rob us PC gamers (since at consoles 10 bucks go to the hardware manufacturers and in the PC it goes straight to their pockets - it just give them 10 bucks more than console games now. Talk about profit. No surprise the stockholders love Kotick).

No, it really doesn't. Look at PC releases after MW2, and all future PC releases (including assassin's creed, and masseffect 2, both due on january). Both are selling for 50$.

I know its easy to blame everything on koktik. And he does have a lot of fault on his hands. Activision is a company that symbolizes everything thats wrong with the game industry. Its extremely unhealthy for the industry, and it isn't sustainable. They pick up good franchises, that were preforming well-Guitar hero, CoD, Tony hawk, create shit sequels-All three of those recent additions are considered disappointments, and two of them sold very well. They bleed a franchise like leeches till theirs nothing else, then buy up new franchises. This is more or less why the game industry is preforming significantly worse financially then last year, despite last years holiday season was a fucking global recession. Essentially, over exploitation of a franchise, combined with burst of the casual customer bubble.

But at the same time he is CEO and President of ONLY activision. He has little direct control over blizzard. That doesn't mean he doesn't posses a significant amount of influence in their department, but he possess no direct power. Blizzard's financial method and its target audience are literally the direct opposite of Activison, they invest in their fanbase, and look for the long time success of their franchise. Meaning any "advice" he gives will probably have little to do with game development strategies and marketing strategies.

[Zahar]

...
btw the PC version of MW2 sold a whole 100,000 copies. If I were making games with PC gamers a significant portion of my sales, I'd avoid as much of IW business practices as I could.
...

Unfortunately this is inacurate. You can only estimate, but Amazon chart says 8% of MW2 sales are for PC. If you believe this can be used as a rule, that means that only in US, UK and Canada, MW2 would have sold 376000 (8% of 4.7 million total copies, official numbers of the first 24 hours of the game sales) copies for PC. And that only from physical stores. Remember MW2 is distributed by steam and it has not being sold on stores pretty much anywhere outside US, Canada and Europe. That means there's a TON of "secret" PC purchases from all around the globe. I know I got my copy on steam.

EVEN without steam and no sales recorded from outside US, UK and Canada, 376000 copies in a single day make it one of the best selling PC games of the year. It's only even bigger on consoles.

Kotick doesn't run Blizzard directly, but Activision/Blizzard is, for better or worst, a single company now. That means that pricing one product 50 bucks after marking the other 60 says it's not "as premium" as the first. You don't do that. Not if you have any marketing expertise (and I'm sure blizzard has great people working there).

That and they are right - they could mark SC2 up and sell it for 75 bucks, it would sell like water anyway. I hate to say it, but kotick is right, no matter how disgusting his smile looks.

[newcomplex]

Unfortunately this is inacurate. You can only estimate, but Amazon chart says 8% of MW2 sales are for PC. If you believe this can be used as a rule, that means that only in US, UK and Canada, MW2 would have sold 376000 (8% of 4.7 million total copies, official numbers of the first 24 hours of the game sales) copies for PC. And that only from physical stores. Remember MW2 is distributed by steam and it has not being sold on stores pretty much anywhere outside US, Canada and Europe. That means there's a TON of "secret" PC purchases from all around the globe. I know I got my copy on steam.

The thing is, we CANNOT extrapolate 8% amazon sales to all sales. It makes no sense.

Euro gamer puts it at 3% of UK sales.

Moreover, the original COD had 20% PC sales. That's, depending on on your source, between a 700% to 250% loss in consumers.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/in...k-mw2-pc-sales

EVEN without steam and no sales recorded from outside US, UK and Canada, 376000 copies in a single day make it one of the best selling PC games of the year. It's only even bigger on consoles.

lolwut? l4d and dragon age both sold better, the two major PC releases of this year.

Kotick doesn't run Blizzard directly, but Activision/Blizzard is, for better or worst, a single company now. That means that pricing one product 50 bucks after marking the other 60 says it's not "as premium" as the first. You don't do that. Not if you have any marketing expertise (and I'm sure blizzard has great people working there).

That and they are right - they could mark SC2 up and sell it for 75 bucks, it would sell like water anyway. I hate to say it, but kotick is right, no matter how disgusting his smile looks.

I would disagree. Their the same company for investors, but defintely not to consumers. The target audiences are so different, that they are almost different companys as far as the consumer is concerned. Go find the word activision on the blizzard site. Go find the word activision mentioned during blizzcon.

[Triceron]

Activision doesn't touch Blizzard, they let them do their own thing. Blizzard's games will be priced as Blizzard wants it to be priced. They're big boys, they can handle pricing matters. It's pretty much one big conspiracy theory to link the direction Blizz has been going with monetary systems and the merger with activision. Merchandising, collector editions and subscription fees etc all existed before that. Even with things like paid transfers, pet store and such are simply going in the direction Blizz has always been going.

[ArcherofAiur]

Quick question. Who is "Blizzard"?

[Pandonetho]

Blizzard is a pretty cool guy. Eh makes good games and doesn't afraid of anything.