The game is not worth the candle, it costs money: on what do the prices for games depend and how do they change?

Hi, Geektimes! In this publication, we decided to talk about the pricing of games - primarily in online stores. Why PC games in Russia are still cheaper than in other countries? When will the games become cheaper due to the rate reduction? How to predict a new sale, and on what discounts for new games depend? How much does the publisher get from selling games, and how much does the developer and store get?

To understand this all of us helped a man who knows the answers to the absent. Meet Vadim Andreev, Playkey Head of Game Publishers.

Vadim, hello! Let's start with the favorite question of consolopods. Why is the same title on the PC several times cheaper? Is this only in Russia?

Q : Yes, there is such a feature, and so far it exists only in Russia and some other countries. Worldwide prices for PC games are the same as on consoles.

For example, how much is Outlast 2 in the Russian Playstation Store:

Here is its price tag in American Steam, in the Windows version:

( that is, about all the same 1800 rubles )

And now - his price tag in the Russian Steam:

Only 499 rubles. More than three times cheaper. PC games in Russia are still noticeable - sometimes at times! - lower than in other countries. But price increases are a matter of time.

I think that if there are no crises and collapses in the country, then gradually, for about 3 years, the cost of PC games in Russia will rise and equal the prices on consoles.

The forecast is not comforting for PC gamers, but this is a market, and gradually everything will come to the same level.

Why is Russia so unique that prices for PC titles are lower here?

Historically, in Russia there was a very pirate market. Against the background of a large abundance of pirated games, the prices for the originals were made as low as possible in order to somehow attract people and increase sales. Now the rules are changing, and it becomes unprofitable to pirate the game to the end user. Pirate game today is, as a rule, a game with limited functionality.
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For example, if a user decides to save Star Wars Battlefront, then what will he get as a result? At most, this is a 7-hour single gameplay. At the same time, he will not have multiplayer, and this is the main component of this game. Many people understand that pirating games on the PC becomes meaningless. Although there is an alternative point of view, and in Russia the percentage of “pirate” supporters is still high. We are for legal copies simply because it allows us to develop our service and replenish the catalog with cool titles.

Why, then, prices for console games in Russia are the same as in the west?

The main reason is the same - just on consoles, in principle, less piracy. PC games are much easier to play than on consoles. If the previous generation of consoles still managed to hack, then the Playstation 4 and Xbox One - no. It is also important to understand that piracy on consoles is often a question not just of downloading games from torrents, but rather requiring serious intervention in software, you need to look for a service that reflash the console (and to contain such a service is generally a criminal offense, and very active ). Then you need to search and download huge pirated distributions on obscure sites. In short, the process is complex, dreary and risky.

And how will the price increase on the PC? All publishers at once?

Everything goes gradually: first, a large publisher raises the bar with a sales hit, then others will look at it and also raise prices for their titles. Of course, this process begins large publishers.

As a rule, prices go up on top releases. If the publisher is satisfied with sales with a new price, then all future releases will most likely come out under the new price tag. Much depends on the expectations for a particular release and how much resources have been invested in it.

The exchange rate and its impact on the price of games in Russia

How do the prices of games change in case of an unstable ruble exchange rate?

In moments of unstable course, publishers, as a rule, try to smooth out the problems that have appeared. At the start, most often, they take all financial risks on their side. They understand that there is a well-established market, and if suddenly the exchange difference falls on the distributor or the store, then sales will simply stand.

In Playkey, for example, they began to sign an additional agreement, where all exchange differences are automatically transferred to the publisher. Therefore, publishers who are in Russia take full responsibility. Most major publishers, like Ubisoft, have full-fledged offices in Russia, and this more often, as a rule, allows fixing prices in a contract in rubles. For such a contract, a jump in the course is not so terrible - the price in the store will remain at the same level. And already the publisher will take over the exchange difference, then he bears all the risks and will decide what to do next with the price of the games.

Now the dollar has become much lower than a couple of years ago. And when will the games become cheaper?

Today, games bring good returns, so it's hard to talk about falling prices. It is likely that the price, given the depreciation of the course, will slightly decrease. But, in my experience, this change will be quite insignificant.

On the day when the rate grew by 2 times, our market became less interesting to Western publishers by 2 times, some publishers even, in principle, left this market, leaving sales only through Steam. We now need to regain the interest of publishers, and this can only be done by increasing sales and revenues.

People are already used to buying games at higher prices, which are established on the market. And publishers are unlikely to want to greatly reduce them. In addition, consoles now have additional offers that involve various promotions. The same Playstation has, for example, a Playstation Plus, with a subscription to which the user can receive both “packaged” games for a year, special offers for other titles, discounts, and many other offers. Therefore, consolers special decline in prices for the main gaming titles clearly does not shine.

Well, how do discounts for new titles work - the publisher knows in advance which game and when he will make a discount?

Most often, new games are sold without any discounts. The week before the release and the week after it - this is the peak of popularity among users. Further, if the game shoots well, discounts can not wait for another in the next 2-3 months. Six months after the release, even the “hottest” title begins to gradually lose its popularity, sales decrease. And as soon as the demand for the game falls, immediately "into battle" launch discounts and promotions. As a rule, the maximum "first" discount is 30%. Then you can wait for more attractive offers with a decrease in price by 50% or even 70%. It all depends on how high the sales figures of the game during the release. As I said, the hit novelty is given for the first sale in about six months.

As for plans for discounts, then, as a rule, the publisher for about a month knows and plans to start stocks. He takes the decision based on the analysis of sales dynamics.

Discounts for a new title entirely depend on sales figures in the first 2 weeks or a month.

How are the sales seasons?

The biggest discounts and interesting offers come at the end of the year, in November-December, and in the spring, in March. There are still regular promotions back to school and out of school - this is the beginning and end of summer. With such seasonal offers, publishers are trying to support sales in summer periods, when there are no releases, and the sales bar must somehow be maintained.

And as a publisher, a developer and a sales platform, share the revenues from the sale of games?

Most of the sale of games always goes to the publisher. Large take, of course, more than small. This is understandable, because from their remuneration, they must also pay the developers.

On average, the store revenue is 20-30% of the price of the game, the rest goes to the publisher and developer.

Piracy is understandable, but what about the "gray" market of keys and accounts?
Resale and transfer of their accounts on Steam and on other sites - today is a more urgent problem in the gaming market than piracy. I have been following the situation for several years, and I see how the “gray market” is actively gaining momentum, associated with buying keys on sales and their subsequent online resale. When boxes were actively sold in retail, there were cases when a discount campaign was launched for a game in an offline store like MVideo and Eldorado, dealers buy discounted games offline, skip the codes and give them to stores like G2A. Because of this, when the publisher launches discounts in a digital store, they are no longer needed. Major publishers today are trying to release a promo either at the same time, or still maintaining certain time limits for launch. With the "gray" market and the resale of accounts are actively fighting and Steam, and Origin, and other stores.

With Playkey, everything is simpler: for publishers, we are not just “another store with keys”, but a stand-alone platform that offers its users a rare opportunity to run a powerful game on a weak PC, and gives users special offers. We make discounts for our players even on new items, because we can afford it at the expense of the margin from our core business - in fact, we are taking it off ourselves. And this discount is pleasant, sometimes the lowest price on the market is obtained in Playkey: for example, it was at the start with Ghost Recon Wildlands (1679 rubles instead of 1999 rubles) and Watch Dogs 2 (1649 rubles instead of 1999 rubles). But this also creates a restriction: you cannot buy a game from us if you are not a subscriber of the service, special offers are available to active Playkey users.

Is it legal to use VPN to simulate a cheaper “country” on Steam to buy a game much cheaper?

Many large publishers and stores are trying to limit the possibility of buying from other regions. But to implement it is quite difficult. On Steam, it’s enough to change the IP address, and you already see all the information from the fake region. The sites understand that tight restrictions can lead to errors - when you drop out the buyers from the “honest” country.


Out and the price is three times cheaper! (and all the chances to get banned on Steam)

Interestingly, in contrast to the "gray" sites for the sale of keys, on the Playkey, the user always buys the game of "his" region. In Playkey, the option of replacing a region is simply excluded - there is no reason for the platform to sell keys that cannot be used when playing in the service itself - and this, of course, is a salvation for publishers. Just because on the Russian Playkey servers only the Russian game keys are launched. VPN in our case will lead to bad ping, and normally playing a game from an “alien” region will simply not work. In rare cases, if a player is redirected to a data center that is not physically located in Russia, for example, German, you should first activate the game from your local computer, and then you can play with Playkey. All these subtleties, as a rule, are already described in the “ Knowledge Base ” of Playkey's technical support, and we are also working to eliminate such errors in the future.

PS If you also prefer to play licensed games and want to try how Playkey works, here’s a promo code for 300 minutes of the game (24 hours from the moment of activation) - GamersOfGeektimes