Does gaming as a hardcore hobby make much sense?

U

UntoldDreams

Member
When you think about it we consistently see that the price of any new release will go down after a year or two (greatest hits version or bad sales... either way). Further, if you dip into the used games bin you should be able to get any title at a pretty good bargain after just a year.

So the question is this... Why the need to play the new games "day one" even though you are paying the absolute highest price and the game will be just as fun a year later?

Sometimes I think those PS2 ONLY straggler's who buy $20 games and greatest hits...

Perhaps they are the smartest bananas in the bunch. They are playing the same games we all enjoyed at a fraction of the cost. They just waited a year+ to do so.

When I try to rationalize why I need things "quicker" than other people I can't determine any damn good reason other than being spoiled.

Heck, I bet most people have a back catalog of 20-50 games they probably wanted to play but never found time for and can now get them at bargain prices.

Any opinions GAF? Are we all just a bit crazy when you evaluate this hobby more rationally?
 
Some people want to be on the cutting edge, playing the newest games, hyping themselves up for releases. Ain't nothing wrong with that if you can afford it.

Myself? I straddle the line between playing the new releases and the games that are a few years old.
 
The same goes for just about anything. Time is worth money too, I spend extra to not have to wait that long. And online games are in their prime at launch, in many cases you won't find anybody to play with if you wait until they hit the bargain bin.
 
UntoldDreams said:
Any opinions GAF? Are we all just a bit crazy when you evaluate this hobby more rationally?
Click to expand...
I am completely crazy when I evaluate this hobby more rationally.

Also when I walk into Blockbuster and find them selling Xbox 360 games that have hardly been out a couple of months for $14.99.
 
Zek said:
And online games are in their prime at launch, in many cases you won't find anybody to play with if you wait until they hit the bargain bin.
Click to expand...

Aye, that's a pretty important point. I'm probably going to wait awhile to buy COD4 and only play the campaign. I'd hate to try and start playing now, I'd get owned. =P
 
Threi said:
I personally see making time to do a time-wasting activity counter-productive.
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I don't play like I used to as my responsibilities in life have changed, but I thought the reason to game and have a hobby was to pass the time by in a manor that is enjoyable and relaxing to whomever is doing it. Otherwise ... life becomes a repetitive mess of work.
 
The people always buying games day one seem to complain about having backlogs... funny that.
Unless there is a fun but short lived online community, there's not much point.
 
Thanks to the internet, even Single Player games have a social aspect. So once that game finally gets a price drop one year later, everyone else moved on to the sequel and you're left behind.

Even worse, waiting that long to play a game could easily ruin the intended experience. Just look at Portal, a great game when it first came out then the internet drove it into the ground. Anyone who played a few months after release just didn't get everything the game had to offer.
 
Playing a game when it comes out, you're part of the mutual excitement (or disappointment) with a large group of people. It makes the experience more fun with some games, particularly the "big event" games and franchises (Halo, GTA, MGS, WoW, Half Life, new Bioware and Square RPGs, etc.).
 
VALIS said:
Playing a game when it comes out, you're part of the mutual excitement (or disappointment) with a large group of people.
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I hate that I completely understand this. The experience of sitting up to 3am EST waiting for Half-Life 2 to unlock on Steam probably sticks in my mind more than actually waking up the next day to play it properly.
 
I always tell myself that I'm going to wait for the price drop, or just rent it...

Doesn't work to well once reviews start rolling out.
 
Kinda true about any type of entertainment. Pay more for a hardcover book, wait a little longer to get it in paperback or reserve it at the library for free. See a movie day one in a theater, catch it at a cheap showing, wait for DVD or rent it from Blockbuster. Games aren't really any different. It's always best to buy behind the curve, but it can be pretty hard to wait if you are any type of fan (as pretty much anyone posting on the gaming side of GAF is).
 
Halycon said:
Just look at Portal, a great game when it first came out then the internet drove it into the ground. Anyone who played a few months after release just didn't get everything the game had to offer.
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? I haven't played it yet. What will I miss when I finally do?
 
poppabk said:
? I haven't played it yet. What will I miss when I finally do?
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Being one of these:

18.png
 
So I've waited 4 years for Final Fantasy XIII just so I can wait another year in HOPES that it will be reduced in price by then? Remember Gears of War JUST dropped price not too long ago, almost two years after launch.

And it's not like every game costs the price of a new car, or has major overhauls that are a major hassle to fix due to problems that pop up while in owners hands. There really is no reason to wait for your favorite game once it's out.

I almost feel silly responding to this topic, but it's cool. Good for killing time before I go home from work.
 
Multiplayer games are awesome Day One, but the experience often quickly degenerates thanks to things like:
-a shrinking player base (moving onto other games or fractured by DLC)
-glitchers (Gears) & cheaters (PSO)
-only "teh 1337" stick with it and "pwn ur n00b a$$" if you are LTTP
 
ZealousD said:
Aye, that's a pretty important point. I'm probably going to wait awhile to buy COD4 and only play the campaign. I'd hate to try and start playing now, I'd get owned. =P
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Nonsense, some people play 12 hours a day and are still awful.

But on topic, as long as people have time and money, any hobby will be the same.
 
There' something to be about being part of the launch hype of a game, especially when you're part of a community like neogaf that encourages and rewards such behavour. That in itself can be an incentive for many people. I'm certainly an at or around launch kind of guy, but I'll never understand people who buy games that they know they have no time to play and have a backlog of any size. Games are for playing, people, not hoarding.
 
It's worth it to me, to play new games a year earlier, even if it costs a *whopping* $30 more. I can barely wait to play games I've hyped up on launch day. I absolutely couldn't wait another year or two on top of that.
 
TheFightingFish said:
Kinda true about any type of entertainment. Pay more for a hardcover book, wait a little longer to get it in paperback or reserve it at the library for free. See a movie day one in a theater, catch it at a cheap showing, wait for DVD or rent it from Blockbuster. Games aren't really any different. It's always best to buy behind the curve, but it can be pretty hard to wait if you are any type of fan (as pretty much anyone posting on the gaming side of GAF is).
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Yep. Being a fan of anything pretty much guarantees some amount of irrational behavior so I don't see why games should be some special case.
 
I only buy about 3-4 new games a year (get the rest from gifts), so if there's a game good enough to look forward to, I like to get it when I feel like it or have time to play it.

Sometimes the release date for a game I'm looking forward to creeps up on me, and it's fun to do an impulse buy every once in a while.
 
I so excited about some games that I just can't wait to play them, so I get them on day one. But most time, I just buy and sell them as soon as I'm done with them. Instead of paying 70€ or game it cost me 5-10€. If I really want it again, I buy it again when it gets cheaper.

That way I can play pretty much everything I want without spending too much money.
 
Jaded Alyx said:
Tell that to Nintendo.
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Not their problem

Buy smart and online and games will lose their value at a rate of about 0.4-0.6% per day until they stabilize at some substantially lower price. It is exceptionally rare on any system for any title to maintain MSRP.
 
Sometimes it is a gamble. This problem isn't confined to big or small publishers. Most will think of Atlus USA games first when we talk about availability and scarcity, but there are 2 examples that show otherwise. Let's take a look at PS1 Suikoden 2 (Konami) and Valkyrie Profile (Enix, now SquareEnix). Where are their reprints? Suikodens are repeatedly reprinted in Japan, ditto for VP. However, the English audience is stuck playing Ebay with Suikoden 2, and if you can stomach the shitty slowdown, then yes you get to play VP on the PSP. But in VP's case it took a long time, something like 5 years for a port to materialize, without any certainties of a reprint happening. As for Suikoden 2, hopes were raised at one point when Japan gets a Suikoden I+II port, but Konami never capitalized on localizing it. Now whatever hopes are left for Suikoden fans to play the first 2 rare games legit is via digital distribution.

Bottom line is if you wanted to pick up these games cheap by playing the waiting game, you might actually end up paying more for them.

The 2nd reason is collectors tend to prefer 1st print runs, which isn't a practice unique to games. In comics as well, people are willing to pay top dollars for first appearances of popular characters (Sandman #8 :p), and trade paperback reprints are just to cater for casual fans of the series without breaking their wallet.
 
I buy games day 1 when I'm genuinely interested in them and want to play them (If I'm actively deciding to wait a year before getting a game, I probably wasn't very interested in it in the first place). I also support the companies making such games, thus increasing the likelihood of getting similar future games developed. Sometimes I buy them day1 anyway, even if just to support the company, despiting having a backlog of other games to play first.

Gaming isn't a particularly expensive hobby, relatively. If you have the income, it shouldn't matter too much. Ultimately, though, it IS a hobby. Different priorities, etc.
 
It depends.

I was always a day one person, but with this generation, I'm really only day one with 360 games because of online.

Generally with the 360 releases, if you buy it a year later, there'll be no one onlnine to play with. Which means you're either playing with no one, which is boring, or can't get achievements you want online.

I personally don't like the online achievements and think most of them are too hard to get, but that's just my theory on why 360 games are often day one purchases.

I'm more of a SP gamer, so I'm happy to wait for MOST PS3/Wii/DS/PSP games. You have your exceptions like MGS4 and the like.

I mean, I only just bought Strikers charged over a year later pre-owned. Barely play it too.

But I do play a lot fo the 360 games online, so I tend to buy them day one. But I'm getting better at breaking the habit.
 
UntoldDreams said:
When you think about it we consistently see that the price of any new release will go down after a year or two (greatest hits version or bad sales... either way). Further, if you dip into the used games bin you should be able to get any title at a pretty good bargain after just a year.

So the question is this... Why the need to play the new games "day one" even though you are paying the absolute highest price and the game will be just as fun a year later?

Sometimes I think those PS2 ONLY straggler's who buy $20 games and greatest hits...

Perhaps they are the smartest bananas in the bunch. They are playing the same games we all enjoyed at a fraction of the cost. They just waited a year+ to do so.

When I try to rationalize why I need things "quicker" than other people I can't determine any damn good reason other than being spoiled.

Heck, I bet most people have a back catalog of 20-50 games they probably wanted to play but never found time for and can now get them at bargain prices.

Any opinions GAF? Are we all just a bit crazy when you evaluate this hobby more rationally?
Click to expand...

Well, honestly i'm not buying my games new and day one because i want to play them day one.
This might come as wierd but the most important thing for me is to encourage the market for genres and games i like and i'm also too lazy to search for games. I want them easily accessible, new, in my shelve when i will feel like to play them.
 
The games will always be there, no need to buy Day one. Best wait until its Cheaper.

Its is somewhat funny/sad to see people rave about a game then get day one and be massively let down like GTA4. Examples like that make me less hyped about games, and make me enjoy them better.
 
2 Minutes Turkish said:
I was always a day one person, but with this generation, I'm really only day one with 360 games because of online.

Generally with the 360 releases, if you buy it a year later, there'll be no one onlnine to play with. Which means you're either playing with no one, which is boring, or can't get achievements you want online.
Click to expand...

I'm not a 360 owner, so I must ask: is there almost nobody online a few days/weeks/possibly months after the games are released? Obviously, Halo 3 must be an exception (and maybe GoW, but I'm not sure), but what about the rest?

I'd find it fascinating if that was really the case for most 360 online games.
 
civilstrife said:
There' something to be about being part of the launch hype of a game, especially when you're part of a community like neogaf that encourages and rewards such behavour. That in itself can be an incentive for many people. I'm certainly an at or around launch kind of guy, but I'll never understand people who buy games that they know they have no time to play and have a backlog of any size. Games are for playing, people, not hoarding.
Click to expand...

Makes sense. I buy games day one simply because I want something new to play. I can see if you buy games like RPGs that tend to not be sold on the shelves months later and go up in price, too.
 
stuminus3 said:
Also when I walk into Blockbuster and find them selling Xbox 360 games that have hardly been out a couple of months for $14.99.
Click to expand...

ARE you serious ?? i must go check out my local Blockbuster stores then..i honestly havent been into a blockbuster for some years... but if you can find bad ass deals there compared to ebgames,walmart,gamestop,etc..then im gonna go check it out
 
The same reason's people buy newly released novels and music, I suppose, because someone into that is generally waiting for something new and interesting. Sure, you can hunt through back catalog stuff, but if you've been consistently waiting for new stuff for say, twenty years worth of playing, there probably isn't a significant back catalog of stuff to go through.

I rarely find something in the used bins that I'm very interested in, and I'm almost always looking forward to a new game. Regardless, I find the value of gaming to be higher than most other entertainment mediums, so the price doesn't seem that off to me. I pad $60 to buy Oblivion and then got 200 hours of enjoyment out of it. That's $.30 an hour, which makes it much cheaper than a movie ($4/hour new, $2/rented) or even most books ($2/hour paperbacks, and as much as $5/hour for hardbacks). Broadcast TV has better value but less interest for me.
 
Kilrogg said:
I'm not a 360 owner, so I must ask: is there almost nobody online a few days/weeks/possibly months after the games are released? Obviously, Halo 3 must be an exception (and maybe GoW, but I'm not sure), but what about the rest?

I'd find it fascinating if that was really the case for most 360 online games.
Click to expand...

I dont mean LITERALLY no one. That's near impossible.

Big releases are the exception. You'll find someone on Halo 3 for the next 5 years plus. No doubt. Ditto for COD4 and Gears. Even PDZ because it's online is the best there is.

But a game like say Kane and Lynch, will be trickier to find people on. A lot of it depends on the game. But lesser hyped game would become VERY hard to find matches on because people are simply moving on to newer games.

That's why friends lists are so great. You can always hit people up for an older game.
 
Everything drops in price, it seems. If you want to enjoy something while it's fresh and can afford it, why not?

DVDs, music, etc. all drop in prices too (DVDs often end up going for like $3.99 at Best Buy just a few months after release).

For me, the only used bins I find interesting are those consisting of games from generations I didn't follow closely (or had little money during). I don't mind spending money to support development either. People work hard to bring you new games and it has become a hobby so I see no reason NOT to support good works.
 
Not keeping up with new games.

Good Single Player: Some douche is going to spoil the story/gameplay twists for me before I get to play it.

Good Multi Player: HAH! The most fun (for me) is to be had while the community is active and evolving the mechanics. Very few games last long enough (2 years+ healthy) to keep me interested in hopping in.

in conclusion

farts

p.s. I really enjoy games and supporting Devs with a checkbook vote of confidence is something I don't mind doing.

p.p.s. CAG is fucking great for saving money on new games.
 
While generally I only buy old games, certain games I will buy day 1 or month 1. Starcraft 2 will be one of them :lol

There's nothing irrational about any of this anyway, people will do what they enjoy and obviously find some value in buying games early.
 
I think that as someone gets into buying a lot of games they eventually catch up and have to play new ones if it is one of their largest hobbies. Sequels will also make a person go out and buy new games if they bought an old one.

The smart cookies are anyone who still buys games like they are 10 and play even short ones for a year or more.
 
Threi said:
I personally see making time to do a time-wasting activity counter-productive.
Click to expand...

I believe that's called enjoying life.
 
I almost never buy day 1. A little patience saves a ton of bucks. I figure a game will be just as fun a year from now as it is today. It's also a real good time to grab last gen games. Lots of games for a fraction of the new price.

The only exception would be the occassional sports game, even though they're the ones that are super cheap as they age. I want the upgraded rosters, and that makes it worth a day 1 purchase.
 
Nah, there's nothing wrong with your train of thought. I have been doing this more and more recently. I have bought games a few months later not only because I have a backlog but because they are cheaper. Some games I buy on day one to support the developers and show my support of the game. Maybe that's a good reason. If you buy games new the money goes to developers, if you buy it from Gamestop used, you support Gamestop. I think what you are saying makes sense, especially with the high price of games now adays. It's also probably why I have bought more downloadable games recently, they're cheaper AND easier to get while still supporting the developers.
 
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