Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - General Regarding the GOG issue.

I said it in the other post.
All you posted before was known by Larian at the time the kickstarter started.
If their where already issues at this time to publish the game on GOG for whatever reason they shouldn't had included it in the Kickstarter.
If there weren't any issue at this time but something happened after the kickstarter finished they could have communicate it with the backer.

Neither way it was at least bad communication.

http://www.gog.com/news/letter_from_the_md_about_regional_pricing





Larian is not responsible for GoG's business decisions.

Larian isn't "maybe" (no official statement of them yet) responsible of that. But Larian could stand against it! Thats what the thread is about and official statement that the are neither pro regional prices or against regional prices.

How about being pro staying in business and selling enough games to be able to afford to complete the next game?


Larian said GOG 'if available' before they knew for sure if they would be able to offer the game there, and dropped the 'if available' once the details were finalized enough that they could do so.

Even if the retail deals were not already in place before the kickstarter began, Larian can not, and should not, make major business decisions based on a poll of people who are not personally invested in the game or company, and (more importantly) do not have all the applicable information. That's also a likely reason why GOG didn't have a poll over this issue, either.

They could have dropped retail. It is a significant portion of the market, they would have been sued, there would be no localizations, some kickstarter backers would be angry it would at least be released English only, Larian would have a much harder time getting any future distrubution deals and the lost sales and extra expenses could drive them out of business (or greatly reduce the scope of their next project), but at least you could say they stood by your opinion of fairness.

Digital prices are connected to retail prices, because retailers will not sign agreements with distributors who plan to undercut them.


Instead when digital distribution was introduced all claimed how wonderfull it is for the customer cause it can make products cheaper.

Yes, and when politicians introduce new taxes and spending programs they quite often claim they will be temporary. Do you believe them, to?


I'm angry that D:OS is used as one off the brands which forces GOG to go the same way as Steam.

Again, do you really think GOG was not going to have regional prices for Witcher 3 (having the same publisher that brought them to court to force regional pricing for Witcher 2), but yet somehow D:OS was responsible for that?


that is not i as a backer wanted to happen when the kickstarter asked me to help.

GOG made a business decision, that they would have made regardless.


Why is there no official statement?

They are working on a game. Swen is in San Francisco and Minneapolis showing the game to the US press. They have already stated the retail pricing and made multiple comments about distribution deals. Many people, including GOG, have mentioned the issue of retail contracts forcing regional pricing for digital sales.

What exactly is left for an official statement?


Noone would have cared in any way for it cause noone ever complained that GOG had one price for all regions.

Really? Nobody ever had an issue with some people being able to work for an hour and buy a couple GOG games, while some in other countries had to work all day (or more) to buy a game?
You can argue Steam's regional pricing is less fair overall, but a flat price is hardly perfect.

I do not want to fuel the discussion but I honestly fail to understand what is so bad about regional pricing for games:

- Regional pricing for games can be abused. But so can each and every system including Steam Early Access, Kickstarter, Ebay and everything else. Just because there are bad examples for regional pricing does not mean that the idea is inherently bad.

- As Raze stated there is regional pricing for everything - for food, clothes and even medicines. In Germany, for example, you are likely to pay 10 times as much for medicines (!) as for the same medicines (same ingredients, same manufacturer) in Russia. And moreover, you are not even allowed to use online pharmacies for certain medicines in Germany. So, why should games be excluded from regional pricing?

- There has always been regional pricing for games - long before the invention of Steam and Gog. The only difference was that back then people were less aware about this difference because they could hardly compare retail prices.

- No regional pricing for D:OS does not mean that the game will become any cheaper in Europe. The price will stay the same 40 € and players who can not afford it now (there are unfortunately always people in every country of the world who are on the lower end of the income distribution), will not be able to afford it afterwards either. Instead, the only effect this change will have is that an average guy in Russia will not be able to buy this game anymore. To me this really seems to be "schadenfreude" rather than anything else.

- When I buy the game, I always ask the following questions: Is the game interesting for me? Is the price reasonable so that I can afford it with my income? I never ever ask the question whether some guy somewhere else in the world can get the game cheaper. Why should I bother with regional prices for games since I do not really care about regional pricing for food and clothes?

Okay, it’s Larian’s fault for signing distribution deals. Let’s take a trip back in time to before Larian did that so we can save the day.

Sarcasm Theatre presents:
“The Ghost”

GHOST: “SweNNNNN… wake up SweNNNNN!”
SWEN: “Aaa. A ghost.”
GHOST: “IIIII am the GhOOOst of Morons FUUUture, here to save yoUUU from making a teRRRible mistaKKKe!”
SWEN: “Oh no! What’s going to happen? Tell me, Ghost?”
GHOST: “In the fUUUture, Good Old GAAAmes will make a busIIIneSSS deciSSSion to change its policYYY of no regional prIIIcing.”
SWEN: “Oh no, that is terrible. How can I help?”
GHOST: “YoUUU must not mAAAke those deals with rEEEgional disribUUUtors.”
SWEN: “What? But we’re very close and if I do that Larian will be guaranteed to break even when selling the game.”
GHOST: “AbandoNNN retail, go dIIIgital onlYYY.”
SWEN: “But retail sales still make up a large part of the market, and let us reach customers who have no or poor Internet access.”
GHOST: “ScreWWW theMMM…”
SWEN: “And even if I can still manage to find enough funding for the game without partnering with distributors, without them, I won’t be able to afford to translate the game into other languages – we need the distributors for that. It would be English only.”
GHOST: “It doeSSSn’t maTTTer.”
SWEN: “Ghost, I must know – what will happen if I ignore your advice and sign the deals anyway?”
GHOST: “You wiLLLLL have to gOOO to KickstarteRRR.”
SWEN: “Because I ran out of money?”
GHOST: “NOOO, to get extrAAA funding to mAAAke the game beTTTeRRR.”
SWEN: “But the Kickstarter fails?”
GHOST: “NOOOO! You get twOOO and a haLLLf times what yoUUU asked foRRR!”
SWEN: “But what will the bad thing be?”
GHOST: “AbouTTT fivEEE people will blAAAme LariaNNN for GoG chAAAnging it’s policYYY.”
SWEN: “Oh no. Not five whole people. I must cancel the deal that will make my next game amazingly successful beyond anything I could have hoped for!
GHOST: “YeSSSSS!”
SWEN: “And that’ll save GoG, right?”
GHOST: “NOOOoooOOOoooOOO…. TheYYY were going to dOOO that anYYYwaYYY. But noWWW you won’t be blAAAmed for iTTT.”
SWEN: “… Get out.”

AHAHA great job guy!Actually I didn`t know about that only whole five people was insulted by GOG price politics,thank you!

:') nice Stabbey

Lol Stabbey, that must have been painfull to create, but its great ^^

I said my opinion and i stick to it. If you don't want to follow my point there is no point in argueing. Have a good one.

How in the world are people not used to regional pricing? Just about EVERYTHING is regionally priced. Starting at disc games to bread to gas to internet access to staplers. I'm really curious what items or services are NOT region based, certainly a tiny tiny minority.

Why all the complaining?

I really didn't want to post again since I already made my argument but this argument has been iterated 3 times now and it's just too stupid to let lie.

First of all, how in the world do you equate the regional pricing of physical goods to digital ones? Physical goods have production costs that depend on the country of origin, there are taxes, there are border tolls, the cost of raw materials is different depending on where they come from and what each country produces. Digital goods have nothing to diferentiate them per country other than some potential taxes. These aren't the problem here though as GOG was already bearing the burden of the VAT for its releases in Europe. Furthermore I believe Europeans could be pursuaded to pay the American price + VAT since the issue is less a matter of cost and more a matter of equal treatement and no discrimination based on country of origin. Not a cent more though.

Second, the prices of goods flunctuate further based on the average buying power for each country. People who live in richer countries generally (though not always) pay more for the same products for a variety of reasons, which include taxes or simple offer and demand. Regional pricing for digital goods, the way it has been implemented, flies in direct contradiction to this principle. For example all the countries in the Eurozone pay the same ammount of money despite there being a huge economic gap between the countries of the north and the south. Sadly almost everything is priced with Germany in mind. That means that southern European countries are asked to pay more than the USA for a product while having 1/3 (or less) the average American salary.

Now depending on the way you look at it, flat pricing can be fair or not. It's fair on the logic that it reflects a certain development cost, marketing cost, plus the cost of getting the game on an online store. These costs don't flunctuate from country to country. The development cost is a constant as soon as the game is finished. The advertisement cost is usually higher in richer countries because they have more potential buyers but given the extend of online advertising nowadays I'd put that as a global cost, not tied to a certain market. The same goes for the cost of getting the game on a global online store.

Flat pricing is not fair if you take into account the buying power of each country. If we go by the example of other products (again this isn't absolute due to a myrriad of reasons) games should be cheaper for developing countries.

From those two the most reasonable in a global market is to hope for the first. I don't expect to pay three times less than the US for a game because I live in a developing country, that's not how the world works. On the other hand when I'm asked to pay more, that sure feels like I'm being ripped off.

Now I understand how the market works and what agreements with regional distributors mean. However, if I'm not mistaken, Dragon Commander sold an overwhelmingly larger number of copies online than in retail. It's good to have boxed copies but a medium to small sized company could opt to go full online if they wanted and just sell boxed copies at their own website, as collector's items. Or it could at the very least dictate some terms. For example sell a game that costs 40$ at the US for 30 euros, both physical and digital copies. Even if that doesn't leave much of a margin for profit on the boxed copies, they are there mostly to get the word out. The bulk of sales are digital. Sales shift towards digital even for the largest of publishers, as time passes, and I'm sure the rate of digital to retail is even greater when we address the PC space only.

Anyway, this whole matter is rather unfortunate. I understand the business standpoint but as a customer I don't have to support a company, even if it's one I like, at everything they do even if it's against my own interests. The conclusion is that I, and I hope a lot more people, will stop buying from GOG until there is (hopefully) a reversal of policy. As for Larian, I realise it would be an overreaction to stop buying their games for this. After all almost every publisher uses regional pricing, why should Larian take the blame? If they release games I'm interested in I'll keep buying. However I will stop all the support I've been giving over the years, speaking for Divinity 2, Dragon Commander and Original Sin at every relevant forum thread and comment section I could find, just as I don't support any other publisher that isn't interested in me.

First of all, how in the world do you equate the regional pricing of physical goods to digital ones?

They are tied together by distribution deals with retailers.


Digital goods have nothing to diferentiate them per country other than some potential taxes.

Neither does electricity, but even from the same power plant that can be priced differently depending on where it is going.


On the other hand when I'm asked to pay more, that sure feels like I'm being ripped off.

Then don't pay more? I don't buy new point and click adventure games because I don't think the playtime usually justifies the cost, so I wait for a sale or price drop.

In Britain and Australia, if a majority of people refused to pay the asking price for retail games, then retailers would either lower the price or stop carrying PC games, which will have the same effect of lowering digital prices.
In the EU it would be impracticable to try to get supply and demand working in unison, but you could try to make fairness an issue with retailers, publishers, game journalists, etc.

FWIW I pledged more on kickstarter for a retail version of the game than the Early Access / release price, and don't feel ripped off, even with Russians getting a better price than I could get now or if I had waited for pre-orders.


It's good to have boxed copies but a medium to small sized company could opt to go full online if they wanted and just sell boxed copies at their own website, as collector's items.

In the case of D:OS, though, it is the distributors handling the localization, as well as guaranteeing a minimum amount of sales. No distribution deals would mean Larian would need more money upfront to do the localizations (so there would be less going into the game, or the localizations would have to be delayed), and rather than getting access to an established relationship with retailers, they would have to either forget about a significant chunk of the retail market, or try to build distribution from scratch.


Or it could at the very least dictate some terms.

Larian isn't in a position to dictate terms (if CD Projekt RED couldn't for the Witcher 3, I'm not sure why you think Larian could for D:OS). If the game does well, then Larian will hopefully have more negotiating power with their next release. They will at least have more information about retail vs digital sales and regional pricing; whether that gives them an argument against regional pricing is yet to be determined.

Its always publishers who dictate price on Steam (for certain) and its the same for GOG (as far as i know)

Larian in this case is playing a dirty game u can already see this on Steam where they set price 40€=40$=30£

There is nothing to debate about this its just that simple. Steam said many times over that they dont set prices for games in catalog - that this is games publishers work.

I despise this practice and i will do anything i can to pay what i think is fair price. Since i backed DOS on KS this wont be the case here, but if Larian continues to practice this i most certainly wont play along. For me internet is one big market and these region restrictions are just silly, archaic and not fit for this kind of free digital market.

Again...

Should Larian abandon retail? Is that fair to people who simply can not download a multi-GB game, or who want a physical version and are willing to pay the price set by retailers? Does it matter if retail is a significant portion of the market?

Should Larian divert resources away from the game to do the localizations themselves (which means cutting things out of the game), or should they delay doing the localizations until after the (English only) game is released?

Do neither of these matter? Or does it only matter what you think is fair, regardless of how it may effect others?

Price of retail should more or less be based on based on this factors: base game cost+cost of hard copy+chain of retail distributors+VAT

While digital version on this: base cost+digital distributor cost+VAT

Its just as simple as this. Electronic books for example are priced in similar fashion and i see no reason why games couldnt have different prices for different media they are made on.

Is this system fair - imo yes - alot more than what they are doing right now.

That's how price of retail SHOULD be set, but here's the thing. Retailers are smart enough to know that they're not going to make much money if they sell their product in stores for $40, while the exact same product is sold online for $30. They'll simply refuse to carry the product at all, because the retailers are well aware that the sales from retail still remain a significant chunk of profits that the developers/publishers would be foolish to pass up. Other companies would be more than happy to take the shelf space.

That's why retailers can still insist on price parity between digital and retail copies. If retailers refuse to carry the title, then regional distributors have nowhere to distribute to. No regional distributors means no translations - even for digital versions, which means even less sales.

That's all right, I don't disagree with this. Afterall I don't preach cheaper digital sales. Why then not sell the game for the same ammount of money to the USA and the EU, both digital and physical? If you sell a game in the USA for 40$, sell it for 30 euros in Europe (all righ, 35 euros if you're adamant about consumers shouldering the entirety of the VAT) for both physical and digital copies.

Now don't tell me it has to do with localization. If some countries are used to localized games and publishers cater to them because they are big markets I see two fair solutions. Either price the game higher for these countries specifically or have everyone share the localization cost. Not only those who benefit from it and the other happless european countries who don't care about localization at all. Have the USA share the cost as well.

Games (almost) never get localized for my country. Everybody here plays the english version. Why should we share the same price with Germany (which is a much much wealthier country by the way) that gets localization? When there is a flat price then regional prosperity and localization don't come into the conversation at all but if we're talking about regional pricing, shouldn't these also be deciding factors?

Fanest;
There is a significant difference between a physical book and an electronic book. Even if there is a price difference in favour of the electronic version, which is not always the case, bookstores are not afraid of being made obsolete in the foreseeable future.

With computer games, once they are installed the delivery method is irrelevant. Manuals rarely get read, and if so only once, so there are much few people willing to pay a premium for that.



AlexF;
Retailers in a significant part of the market in the EU believe they can charge 40€ for a game, and since apparently some people are willing to pay that (since the retailers are still in business and still carrying PC games), they don't have much incentive to charge 30 or 35€. When people stop buying in significant enough numbers and tell the retailers that they are doing so due to unfair pricing, that may change (just the general trend of digital sales increasing and retail decreasing may be a more effective factor, if possibly slower).

Localization isn't directly related to regional pricing, but it is part of the reason Larian has signed distribution deals in the regions that they have. The distributors / publishers are handling the localization (and guaranteed a minimum number of sales), so Larian can focus on the game itself.

Weird; if you don't offer retail; folks whine; if you offer retail people whine. Hum. I wonder what would happen if you only offered carrots ?