Pay for Advanced Demos? Not for this guy.... - RaychelSnr's Blog

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Pay for Advanced Demos? Not for this guy.... Stuck

Posted on March 30, 2010 at 11:16 AM.

(7)

Pasta Padre wrote an article last week about paying for demos and while I've been on the road for the past few days, I have been wanting to touch on the subject he touched on: paying for more advanced demos.

I don't know why, but I think it's a bit of a stretch to ask gamers to pay for more advanced demos (with a basic free demo already available), when they are a demonstration of the final product -- made with the intention to get us to buy the final product. I know a lot of people want better demos, but I just think there are better ways to handle the situation.

Here are three ideas for how gaming companies can do demos better -- and this only begins to scratch the surface on what could be done which doesn't include customers paying to play a more advanced demonstration version of a product:

1 - Make demos available much earlier as bonafide late-stage betas with online play and/or single player play, giving gamers the chance to do what small QA teams seemingly can't: Identify glaring bugs before the game is released so a patch can be available upon release.

2 - Go with the NHL 10 Approach and make demos a bit less static. Allow gamers to play different scenarios of the Super Bowl, National Championship or whatever you desire.

3 - On a more basic level, when gaming companies release very limited demos it makes many customers ask, "What are they hiding?" So perhaps simply make demos longer?

I have to admit, the idea of customers paying for demos seems to be the ultimate oxymoron. I must issue a caveat, EA is NOT planning on charging for basic demos, but the idea has been floated around about making more 'advanced' demos which they will charge for. What do you think? Would you pay for a more advanced demo?

Comments

# 1 sb24 @ Mar 30

The worst thing about this..... people will buy it and encourage companies to continue this trend. If I am going to pay anything it will be for the game not a demo.

# 2 TracerBullet @ Mar 30

Basic demos and betas like halo/blur are good enough for me. No need to get the advanced ones.

# 3 Acedeck @ Mar 30

Hell no EA. By the way, this will improve your image tremendously. You know how currently the majority of gamers feel your company is an evil, money hungry machine? Yeah, this will help a lot. *sigh*

# 4 GlennN @ Mar 30

No way, no how. At the very least, EA should be willing to apply the money spent on a demo to the purchase of the full game (since the function of a demo is to sell the full game).

# 5 CreatineKasey @ Mar 30

Nope. I wouldn't pay for demos. I like your first idea... that's what a lot of other games do.

# 6 seeuatthemovies @ Mar 30

I agree with Acedeck. It might be different if the cost were applied to the final product, but I'm not paying to for a tease. It defeats the purpose. . .

# 7 deaduck @ Apr 4

I think it might depend on the cost and game.

I wouldn't mind spending a few books to try something I'm not sure about versus buying the full game and hating it.