Should Apple to remove Tier 1 pricing?

This is a stupid thread.

Developers can choose whether games are $.99 or $1.99. Many people buy $1.99 games, as they do with $.99 games. Why axe out $.99?

1. Games like Harbour Master would fail because at $1.99 as a pick up and play game not many would buy it;
2. It's just making the app store even more restricted;
3. Developers would just do - FREE GAME, 99c to purchase the full game in game as DLC.

 

I think that will be a nice step for the Devs. on the long run.
however, remember ? Apple left the pricing decision with the Devs. ?
That game that went up $39.99 was a Great move by the Devs. screaming in Agony about the economy in the app store.

C'mon guys! we can Surely pay $1.99 for a game that we Play fro HOURS & the Devs. Update for FREE... Look @ Pocket God, I do not personally Like the concept, however... The Devs. have been pushing FREE updates for AGES now... They had announced that they will increase the price, but they havn't yet...

 

worst idea ever

 

why don't you go ahead and get the paypal address's of all the dev's you've bought games for and pay them some extra money.

raising the price of games would have a massive effect on sales for all the casual gamers on the ipod/iphone

 

why should they? the app store is doing fine at the current pricing

 

admitedly, devs put a lot of hard work into their apps, but as diffuson said, devs can choose the price. if they think its worthy of $1.99, they'll put it at $1.99.

 

You can only use the cheeseburger comparison so much until it no longer applies...at least for me (and a few others in TA that I know)

Sure, 1.99 is one thing, but I buy at least 10-20 games a week (on average)

If I buy 100 games in a month, now we are talking about the difference of 100-200 dollars - there are a lot of games I pay 5 dollars for though, so not every game counts

I know there are people who probably only buy 10-20 games per month.

I am not saying that I think it's a bad idea to go to a 1.99 floor, Im just saying the cheeseburger theory no longer realistically applies - unless your someone who eats McDonalds EVERY DAY - or - your someone who buys 1 game here and there

(sorry for the way I explain things - I know what I want to say, I just can't say it right! )

 

Interesting thread -
I see where you are coming from. I always thought movie tickets were way over priced considering the huge budgets of Hollywood style movies - $1.99 is a drop in the bucket. For some Apps though - (a majority of unknown gimmick and fart apps) I wouldn't even pay 99 cents for them. It is ultimately up to the developer or publisher to decide.

 

I don't think that having a minimum price of 0.99 is what causes so many apps to be released at that price point. Consider if the minimum price was 1 cent, and/or if there were no tiers. I can't imagine many people would bother pricing their apps at a penny, or try to undercut other developers by just a few cents.

The reason so many apps are priced low is because:
1. visibility inside the App Store is key to being being successful
2. the App Store's top lists are driven by number of downloads
3. there are a lot of price sensitive folk that'll pick up cheap impulse buys
3. the nature of software is that post release, development costs become sunk costs. Unlike bread or beer, software can be radically discounted and still leave the seller with positive profit margins per sale.

If there were no top lists, and searches/recommendations were the only way to find apps, I think we'd see a broader range of prices.

If Apple sorted apps strictly by "top grossing" instead of raw downloads, I also think we'd see a broader range of prices. This would tie visibility (within the app store) to revenue, and create a feedback loop that encouraged optimal pricing instead of trying to undercut other developers.

 

I agree with you. There are always the cost comparisons to coffee or food but there are thousands of games out there. I have tried a lot of .99 games (and liked some and hated others) that I never would have tried if they were 1.99.

Devs should price games where they want. To make 1.99 the starting price is silly because not all games are worth that much, I know because I have bought over 200 games.

 

If devs reckon that their game has enough unique gameplay they will put their game up to a different price than $.99. And games have been successful at a higher price. And they would probably get many more sales with a $.99 price tag anyway and I'm sure it would balance itself out.

And anyway, if you play, say Flight Control for over 2 hours in a time of about 2 months it won't feel that you've played it that much and you'd appreciate the lower price tag, but if you buy an epic like the upcoming Ravensword for $9.99 and play it for 5 hours straight, it would feel like you got a lot out of it and the higher price tag would justify itself.

 

That's because app store games are normally very short with limited replay value on a platform that isn't actually designed on gaming.

I have Rock Band Unplugged and Rock Band iPhone. I got Rock Band Unplugged for £18 and Rock Band iPhone for £4. I would easily pay nearly 5 times as much for the PSP version, as it:

a) Lasts longer;
b) Has better CONTROLS as the PSP is built for gaming in mind;
c) Better graphics;
d) Decent DLC;
and many more reasons.

And have you ever seen a DVD or something for £1.19? No, you wouldn't. I wouldn't actually have seen any proper software on shelf for at least £4.99 but that doesn't matter as your point deviates from the matter, which is, at the core:

Should Apple change the lowest paid app price from 59p to £1.19?

No, because the reason the App Store was so successful and these developers are clocking up thousands of purchases a day is because of the aforementioned "Cheeseburger" theory. I bet people would buy, say ten 59p games on a whim, but only 3 or 4 £1.19 games. I just bought iDracula and Uniwar in about 5 seconds BECAUSE THEY WERE ONLY 59P. I didn't buy iDracula when it was at £1.79. Nor did I buy Zombieville as it is at £1.19.

 

Initially I thought yeah, more money for the developers that way, but as I thought about it, I realized that the prices are set by the developers and it's ultimately up to them how they price their work, which is as it should be.

I can understand that $.99 Apps are incredibly cheap. Even on previous successful and even marginally successful mobile platforms (Windows Mobile for example) have never been priced THIS cheap. I think the least I ever spent on a paid WinMo app was $5 and even then, that was a rarity. $10 was much more common and for GOOD Apps I was more than willing to pay it (Orions on WinMo was probably the greatest game ever released on the platform and I was happy to not only pay for the game but pay for each of the expansion to it as well).

In the App store, $.99 is the "sweet spot". Pretty much anyone who can afford to have an iPhone or iTouch can afford to spend $.99 on an App once in a while. I'd even venture to guess that folks who can afford to own these products could afford a bit more. However, it's ultimately up to the folks who make and publish the games to decide where to price them.

Being that the App store is the only legal place to buy and sell iDevice Apps, developers have to be competitive to get noticed and drive sales. What bothers me about $.99 pricing is that way too many game developers especially seem to think that pricing their App at $.99 is enough to drive sales. It's not. Apps still need to be marketed properly. Setting your price at $.99 is not marketing your game. It's throwing darts at a wall with a blindfold on. Sure, sometimes you'll get lucky and hit the board (the Top lists). My gut says that if an App is well developed, properly marketed, has good support from the developers and is updated occasionally to address bugs or add new features and content, it should probably be priced higher and should still be able to enjoy robust sales.

All $.99 pricing does is fill the App store with low end products with low production values (if any at all). Even so, I think it's up to the developers to decide their pricing. They did the work after all.

Personally, most $.99 Apps aren't actually worth the price. Some of the free Apps aren't worth the bandwidth they cost to download. At this point the app store is 95% or more full of crap Apps. It's getting harder and harder to wade through them to find the "good stuff". I tend to only look at Apps that cost at least $2.99 now in hopes that the higher cost is indicative of higher production values and better applications in general. While there are a few rare gems at $.99, I have to wonder if the developers behind the good $.99 Apps wouldn't be just as successful at $2.99 as they are at $.99 financially. If the top lists were revenue based (I know, there is a revenue based top list now but it should have been there from day 1) instead of volume of downloads based, better apps would wind up on the tops of those lists far more often.

In the end, it's a capitalistic economy on the App store and such an economy is not driven by quality, it's driving by affordability.

Just my own $.02.

 

No.

Free market decides. The devs did this to themselves.

That said, I've seen data indicating that the devs actually stand to make more money on "free" games with ad generated revenue than they do selling even at the low price of a buck.

 

no, should stay the way it is.

altho its not quite as black and white as yes or no, but in general its good to have a bottom tier at near giveaway.

it is crazy the amount of apps ive bought whilst on 99c sale, many of which i simply wouldve left in the store otherwise. thats not to say i wont splash out. have bought equally as many at full price, only a few i felt have been worth it to.

the restrictions of the device itself mean the games (in particular EA sports titles) are cut down versions of even the psp games themselves, so it is right they are top tier prices, albeit lower than any other platform. im sure the likes of EA would disappear from the market altogether if it wasnt profitable. likewise with smaller devs releasing good quality little games at a cheaper price. in a sense they generate sales by pricing it low, getting good feedback from forums such as this and generating a hype. hook champ is a classic example, started off at 99c to generate this hype and has now increased its price indefinately. im sure the hype wouldve been much quieter if they hadnt adopted this strategy, but they had a good game to back this up, some devs simply dont.

those apps and games that are simply average, the ones that are worth 99c should also consider the iphone as a stepping stone into the demanding world of game design. ive harped on about the Amiga's public domain scene a few times. a few years back it was difficult getting a game published so bedroom game designers would release their games as shareware and freeware (yes i know the pc shareware scene still rumbles on ) and the truely stand out ones would maybe get picked up by a major company. meanwhile the average ones were out there being enjoyed and people could be proud of the games they made and gained experience in doing so, despite no profit, myself included

devs generally realise that if they're gonna make yet another line drawing game or yet another match 3, the market its saturated with em and they have to be near giveaway to compete. designers who take months to craft a game and come up with refreshing ideas are right to price it mid or hi tier as they have the game and probable hype to back them up.

anyways im waffling now ... lol