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Other Zen Pinball Games & General Discussion
Satisfied with price of digital pinballs? Willing to pay more? Less?
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<blockquote data-quote="shutyertrap" data-source="post: 289459" data-attributes="member: 134"><p>Zen has stated selling tables in packs and not individually is what allows them to sell at the price they do. In other words, it's sorta like how in order for a cable company to carry ESPN, they have to also buy Disney channel, National Geographic, and a host of other channels you the consumer probably couldn't care less about. While you the consumer might be happy paying the $8 for just ESPN and maybe another $5 for one of the others, the stockholders want to justify the reason for all those other channels existing. So they charge the cable company $12 for the whole block and then can brag about their install base for all 8 or 9 channels.</p><p></p><p>When it comes to the actual pricing of digital pinball tables, there's a few ways to look at it. </p><p></p><p>Take FormSlinger's Pinball Wicked, which is a single table costing $10. It looks phenomenal, is pretty fun and plays well. It's higher than what I'd like to pay, but the price is justifiable. </p><p></p><p>Now imagine they released the FormSlinger's platform, a collection of 50 pinball tables for the single price of $500. How many will they sell now? Suddenly that one time $10 purchase seems absurdly high, doesn't it?</p><p></p><p>I've always felt the model FarSight took up was earily similar to what Rock Band did except for one thing; they skipped the base game and went straight to DLC. I mean what a deal, you buy Rock Band 3, there's well over 60 songs to play, making each cost less than a buck per, and you don't even think about the fact you only wanted to play a third of them. Then there was the monthly (or was it weekly?) DLC that was $3 here, $5 there, until next thing you know, a library of over 5000 songs exists, and some people actually bought EVERY SINGLE ONE! At full price.</p><p></p><p>FarSight did a bit of a bait and switch on us, in that we were getting 2 tables each month, for $5 (bargain) and then introduced the season pass for season 2, which discounted the tables even further (super bargain!) Of course that blew up in everyone's face when 3 months in a row we got Gottlieb releases. Then comes season 3 with the announcement of only 1 table per month but the price would remain the same. By this point you probably knew if you were one of those people that was going to own every table no matter what (pot committed) or were happy to be selective (fold that hand!)</p><p></p><p>Zen's packs cost slightly more than what FarSight introduced ($3 per table) but seem to be at a sweet spot for value. If you have the patience, Zen also runs sales all the time. At one point, I picked up 24 tables in a Humble Bundle deal for $6, and then another 30 in a Steam sale for less than $20 due to many being 75% off. That was a few years ago, but still. </p><p></p><p>A table here, a table there, it all seems manageable. Then you decide to switch platforms (I had switched from PS3 to Steam) and are gobsmacked at how much it's going to cost you to buy everything once more. That's why I don't get it when people are like, "gimme any Stern table FarSight, I'll pay $20 just to have something new" because they're not seeing the forest for the trees. The burden of cost should not be passed on to the consumer simply because of a license. The development time Zen puts into an original table (Castle Storm, Son of Zeuss, even Tesla) probably costs in man hours close to what a fully developed license does. </p><p></p><p>Let them work out the economics of it, as sometimes you take the loss just to get more exposure which will in turn bring in more new revenue. Zen is releasing the 19 Star Wars tables to the Switch in 2 months. They've already started hyping it, they are beyond thrilled to be the FIRST Star Wars game to come to the Switch, but I guarantee they had to sign a new license agreement to get it on the platform, and I bet it wasn't cheap. Will it be worth it though when unsuspecting Star Wars fans that don't play pinball suddenly find themselves wanting more? Into the Nintendo eShop they go, and wow look at all those tables! Saw it happen in a video posted from the SWCC where two gals that knew nothing of pinball totally got sucked in because of the Star Wars theming, only to come away wanting to play more pinball. So even if the licensing cost went up (pure speculation on my part), Zen chose to keep the cost the same as it's always been. This creates a positive ecosphere where no one pack is viewed as 'premium' and others viewed as 'bargain basement'.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="shutyertrap, post: 289459, member: 134"] Zen has stated selling tables in packs and not individually is what allows them to sell at the price they do. In other words, it's sorta like how in order for a cable company to carry ESPN, they have to also buy Disney channel, National Geographic, and a host of other channels you the consumer probably couldn't care less about. While you the consumer might be happy paying the $8 for just ESPN and maybe another $5 for one of the others, the stockholders want to justify the reason for all those other channels existing. So they charge the cable company $12 for the whole block and then can brag about their install base for all 8 or 9 channels. When it comes to the actual pricing of digital pinball tables, there's a few ways to look at it. Take FormSlinger's Pinball Wicked, which is a single table costing $10. It looks phenomenal, is pretty fun and plays well. It's higher than what I'd like to pay, but the price is justifiable. Now imagine they released the FormSlinger's platform, a collection of 50 pinball tables for the single price of $500. How many will they sell now? Suddenly that one time $10 purchase seems absurdly high, doesn't it? I've always felt the model FarSight took up was earily similar to what Rock Band did except for one thing; they skipped the base game and went straight to DLC. I mean what a deal, you buy Rock Band 3, there's well over 60 songs to play, making each cost less than a buck per, and you don't even think about the fact you only wanted to play a third of them. Then there was the monthly (or was it weekly?) DLC that was $3 here, $5 there, until next thing you know, a library of over 5000 songs exists, and some people actually bought EVERY SINGLE ONE! At full price. FarSight did a bit of a bait and switch on us, in that we were getting 2 tables each month, for $5 (bargain) and then introduced the season pass for season 2, which discounted the tables even further (super bargain!) Of course that blew up in everyone's face when 3 months in a row we got Gottlieb releases. Then comes season 3 with the announcement of only 1 table per month but the price would remain the same. By this point you probably knew if you were one of those people that was going to own every table no matter what (pot committed) or were happy to be selective (fold that hand!) Zen's packs cost slightly more than what FarSight introduced ($3 per table) but seem to be at a sweet spot for value. If you have the patience, Zen also runs sales all the time. At one point, I picked up 24 tables in a Humble Bundle deal for $6, and then another 30 in a Steam sale for less than $20 due to many being 75% off. That was a few years ago, but still. A table here, a table there, it all seems manageable. Then you decide to switch platforms (I had switched from PS3 to Steam) and are gobsmacked at how much it's going to cost you to buy everything once more. That's why I don't get it when people are like, "gimme any Stern table FarSight, I'll pay $20 just to have something new" because they're not seeing the forest for the trees. The burden of cost should not be passed on to the consumer simply because of a license. The development time Zen puts into an original table (Castle Storm, Son of Zeuss, even Tesla) probably costs in man hours close to what a fully developed license does. Let them work out the economics of it, as sometimes you take the loss just to get more exposure which will in turn bring in more new revenue. Zen is releasing the 19 Star Wars tables to the Switch in 2 months. They've already started hyping it, they are beyond thrilled to be the FIRST Star Wars game to come to the Switch, but I guarantee they had to sign a new license agreement to get it on the platform, and I bet it wasn't cheap. Will it be worth it though when unsuspecting Star Wars fans that don't play pinball suddenly find themselves wanting more? Into the Nintendo eShop they go, and wow look at all those tables! Saw it happen in a video posted from the SWCC where two gals that knew nothing of pinball totally got sucked in because of the Star Wars theming, only to come away wanting to play more pinball. So even if the licensing cost went up (pure speculation on my part), Zen chose to keep the cost the same as it's always been. This creates a positive ecosphere where no one pack is viewed as 'premium' and others viewed as 'bargain basement'. [/QUOTE]
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