5 May 2008, 7:38 AM
I've been thinking about this a lot, spurred by the release of Grand Theft Auto IV and the subsequent slew of perfect reviews the game has garnered in its wake. I've never wanted an XBOX 360 nor a PS3, yet hearing about a game that is supposedly *this good* is making me wonder about what I'm missing.
The question is: Can a game really be so good that is worth the purchase price of a console during its current generation?
I strongly dislike both Microsoft and Sony; I see them as being opportunists that displaced the traditional Japanese gaming companies I grew up with and left only Nintendo from the original generation. In this sense, it's not so much that I'm a Nintendo fanboy (although I am; that's just not the relevant point here), it's more that I dislike their competitors enough to be unwilling to support them financially.
However.
Though I hate the parent company that produced it, I can't reasonably deny that the PS2 is a great platform. I see it in a way as being the Sega Genesis of its generation: tons of games, some great ones, mostly just good ones, but a library so vast and varied that it's most certainly worth it's current bottom-of-the-barrel price tag. (I was actually torn momentarily between spending that money on a DS or a PS2. The DS won, to my credit
) The PS3, however, at both its initial and current price points, is an obviously overrated system with an excruciatingly limited library with disgustingly high price tags. The reasoning behind both of these things seems relatively clear to me: keep the PS2 around and very cheap, because they will continue to sell to gamers like me who have yet to purchase one, and keep the PS3 at a premium price for hardcore gamers who are desperate for the newest/fastest/best/most powerful machine despite the pricetag or any other limitations. It's an extremely prudent move and pretty much standard operating procedure for Sony--see the PSX for more details.
IMO, the XBOX 360 is the PS2 of its own generation; most games that see release on other platforms also get ported to the 360 (including PC games, since in a way it's simply a gaming PC in its own box) and its pricing is competitive enough to make it far more attractive than the PS3, at least currently.
Then there's Wii. The tiny, nothing-fancy Wii that doesn't really do anything but play games (I still haven't beaten that damned News Channel yet) with an affordable pricetag, innovative control schemes, and hopefully a bright future. Nintendo is breaking a lot of rules here--if they'd charged even $25USD their profits would have been even further through the roof. But their goal was to get as many consoles in the hands of people as possible (even if the supply chain management has proven mostly faulty--I question whether that was intentional or not). Note that I said "people" and not "gamers." It's already proven its ability to host legendary titles in a whole new way, but more important its simplicity and elegance draw a lot of people to games and gaming who never would have touched a controller otherwise.
Let's valuate entertainment expenses. Let's say that we prorate all forms of entertainment by dollars-per-hour (USD, sorry). A $20 DVD with a two-hour movie clocks in at $10 per hour. If you include the special features, the cost could drop a little bit. Going to the movies costs about the same. A CD can cost up to $18 with only as much as 77 minutes of entertainment--an expensive proposition. Sporting events are ridiculously expensive--a night at the baseball park here costs at least $28 per ticket, which doesn't include parking, food, or drinks--and it's $7 for a beer, $4 for a soda and $5 for a hot dog. Not a cheap meal.
Games? I spent $44 on Metroid Prime 3. I played it for well over 50 hours. Super Mario Galaxy? $49, 75 hours. No More Heroes? $44, so far around 60 hours. Within a month of owning my Wii, using the figure of $1 per hour of entertainment as my guideline, I got my money's worth out of it...it's amazing how quickly 250 hours of gaming can rack up. If you jack up the figure, it took even less time. (I've now owned my Wii for 9 months and I cannot begin to count all the accumulated playing time) Final Fantasy III DS? $40, over 250 hours. (haha, yes, I know I'm crazy) In this context, video games are a hell of a bargain. Granted, DVDs and CDs do have a great deal of "replay value," but there is only so much "real" value to music and movies--they're passive entertainment that is easily supplanted by other media of the same type, and chances are if you watched your brand new DVD today it won't find it's way back into your player for weeks or even months, whereas after finishing a game it's not at all uncommon to start the whole thing over for the pure joy of replaying it.
In the context of this discussion, then, can Grand Theft Auto IV really be worth $350+$60?
[Sorry this was long and rambling; I hope it is at least somewhat coherent and can spawn some real discussion for Lynk's sake]
The question is: Can a game really be so good that is worth the purchase price of a console during its current generation?
I strongly dislike both Microsoft and Sony; I see them as being opportunists that displaced the traditional Japanese gaming companies I grew up with and left only Nintendo from the original generation. In this sense, it's not so much that I'm a Nintendo fanboy (although I am; that's just not the relevant point here), it's more that I dislike their competitors enough to be unwilling to support them financially.
However.
Though I hate the parent company that produced it, I can't reasonably deny that the PS2 is a great platform. I see it in a way as being the Sega Genesis of its generation: tons of games, some great ones, mostly just good ones, but a library so vast and varied that it's most certainly worth it's current bottom-of-the-barrel price tag. (I was actually torn momentarily between spending that money on a DS or a PS2. The DS won, to my credit
) The PS3, however, at both its initial and current price points, is an obviously overrated system with an excruciatingly limited library with disgustingly high price tags. The reasoning behind both of these things seems relatively clear to me: keep the PS2 around and very cheap, because they will continue to sell to gamers like me who have yet to purchase one, and keep the PS3 at a premium price for hardcore gamers who are desperate for the newest/fastest/best/most powerful machine despite the pricetag or any other limitations. It's an extremely prudent move and pretty much standard operating procedure for Sony--see the PSX for more details.IMO, the XBOX 360 is the PS2 of its own generation; most games that see release on other platforms also get ported to the 360 (including PC games, since in a way it's simply a gaming PC in its own box) and its pricing is competitive enough to make it far more attractive than the PS3, at least currently.
Then there's Wii. The tiny, nothing-fancy Wii that doesn't really do anything but play games (I still haven't beaten that damned News Channel yet) with an affordable pricetag, innovative control schemes, and hopefully a bright future. Nintendo is breaking a lot of rules here--if they'd charged even $25USD their profits would have been even further through the roof. But their goal was to get as many consoles in the hands of people as possible (even if the supply chain management has proven mostly faulty--I question whether that was intentional or not). Note that I said "people" and not "gamers." It's already proven its ability to host legendary titles in a whole new way, but more important its simplicity and elegance draw a lot of people to games and gaming who never would have touched a controller otherwise.
Let's valuate entertainment expenses. Let's say that we prorate all forms of entertainment by dollars-per-hour (USD, sorry). A $20 DVD with a two-hour movie clocks in at $10 per hour. If you include the special features, the cost could drop a little bit. Going to the movies costs about the same. A CD can cost up to $18 with only as much as 77 minutes of entertainment--an expensive proposition. Sporting events are ridiculously expensive--a night at the baseball park here costs at least $28 per ticket, which doesn't include parking, food, or drinks--and it's $7 for a beer, $4 for a soda and $5 for a hot dog. Not a cheap meal.
Games? I spent $44 on Metroid Prime 3. I played it for well over 50 hours. Super Mario Galaxy? $49, 75 hours. No More Heroes? $44, so far around 60 hours. Within a month of owning my Wii, using the figure of $1 per hour of entertainment as my guideline, I got my money's worth out of it...it's amazing how quickly 250 hours of gaming can rack up. If you jack up the figure, it took even less time. (I've now owned my Wii for 9 months and I cannot begin to count all the accumulated playing time) Final Fantasy III DS? $40, over 250 hours. (haha, yes, I know I'm crazy) In this context, video games are a hell of a bargain. Granted, DVDs and CDs do have a great deal of "replay value," but there is only so much "real" value to music and movies--they're passive entertainment that is easily supplanted by other media of the same type, and chances are if you watched your brand new DVD today it won't find it's way back into your player for weeks or even months, whereas after finishing a game it's not at all uncommon to start the whole thing over for the pure joy of replaying it.
In the context of this discussion, then, can Grand Theft Auto IV really be worth $350+$60?
[Sorry this was long and rambling; I hope it is at least somewhat coherent and can spawn some real discussion for Lynk's sake
]