GOG: Pricing games too cheaply tell gamers “this game I made isn’t worth very much”
GOG managing director Guillaume Rambourg is of the belief too high of a discount on titles sends the message that particular games aren't "worth very much."
Speaking with RPG in an interview, Rambourg believes the larger the discount, the more damage it does to "the long-term value" of the brand.
"Selling games at too high a discount – one often sees discounts above 80% off here and there - sends a message to gamers: this game, simply put, isn’t worth very much," he said. "Of course you make thousands and thousands of sales of a game when it’s that cheap, but you’re damaging the long-term value of your brand because people will just wait for the next insane sale.
"Slashing the price of your game is easy. Improving the content of your offer when you release your game, that’s more ambitious."
According to Rambourg, if value is offered on day one along with an attractive price point, there's no need to convince consumers to wait for a sale to occur.
"The industry failed to provide gamers with a fair and attractive offer on day one and therefore convince them to buy games when they are released, which is the best way to support a publisher or developer from a financial standpoint," he said. "GOG has always been trying to add as much value as possible into their offer; and we hope more gaming companies will follow this direction.
"Heavy discounts are bad for gamers, too. If a gamer buys a game he or she doesn’t want just because it’s on sale, they’re being trained to make bad purchases, and they’re also learning that games aren’t valuable. We all know gamers who spend more every month on games than they want to, just because there were too many games that were discounted too deeply. That’s not good for anyone."
Rambourg conceded that while sales can encourage consumers to "try games that they’re not sure about," a happy medium needs to be reached between "giving someone a chance to take a risk" without leaving behind the feeling "they’ve gotten a bad deal."