147
rate

There Isn't Any Reason To Buy A Full Price, Single-Player Only Game

March 24, 2009 in Blog comments 15

Ryan Rigney of SlapStic.com shares his thoughts on what rental stores and services like GameFly are doing to developers who want to charge players full price for a game that doesn't provide much playtime. Why pay $60 for God of War 3 when you can rent it and beat it in a week for $5? Click to read more.

With services like GameFly, and even old-school, slightly disease-infected brick and mortar rental stores, single-player games like Bioshock can be simply rented and completed over the course of a week, all for less than $5. Is Bioshock worth $60? Absolutely. That's not my point, however. If I could get a fully trained, elite war elephant with mounted machine guns in place of its tusks for a huge discount, I'd jump on the opportunity in a heartbeat. Then I'd parachute into battle while riding it. That's not the point either.
RKRigney via slapstic.com »
Favourite this article Add source
| More
Report!
Latest comment:
Most recently commented on by on Mar 27, 2009

Comments

Register as a member to subscribe comments.
  • 0
    Anubis Mar 25, 09
    That's a very good point.

    However, some games, while it's possible to beat them in a week, have such a high replay value that thier completely worth the $60 cost.
  • 0
    Storm Mar 25, 09
    True, but it won't help the developers much to rent and buy used. Then those who prefer single-player games will be left in the mud. Sure I don't play a game more than three times (usually), but regardless of replay value, the game is great and worth keeping...never know when I'll go back to it, but I tend to try out older games during the 'dry' seasons.
  • 3
    Zero and X Mar 25, 09
    It depends on the game, if its an rpg like Persona 4, than there's a very good reason why you should play it, 100+ hours of gameplay. However God of War 1 and 2 had great re playability with unlockables and multiple difficulty settings, so unless you're the kind of gamer who refuses to replay their games, I don't see way you shouldn't pay full price.
  • 0
    Disillusioned Mar 25, 09
    I do think that he has a very good point but when I like a game I just rather going out and buying so I can always have it and replay it.
    It is good if you don't like replaying games or just want to try it out though
  • 6
    HisServant77 Mar 25, 09
    Well, why buy books? Why not just go to the library? Or why buy movies on DVD? Why not just watch them at the theater or rent them? I mean once you've read it, you've read it, and once you've watched it, you've watched it!

    The fact of the matter is that some like to have games at their disposal . . . to play whenever they want. So they buy the game. Plus if the story is good enough and the gameplay fun enough, it's well worth full price. ESPECIALLY if there are unlockables and so forth.

    This is why you also should not rush to finish a game in as short of time as possible! You're cheating yourself out of your own money if you don't take time to actually relish and enjoy the game. Spread it out over more than a week.
    • 0
      Onvacation Mar 25, 09
      Let me know when you buy a $60 book
      • 2
        HisServant77 Mar 26, 09
        What about an $80 book? or a $112 book?

        Well it was a few years back . . . some good learning books that included some software too But I bought the books.
      • 0
        RabidChinaGirl Mar 27, 09
        Many art books and "educational" books are well over the $100. They're nice to look at, you should get some.
  • 0
    Livewire_19 Mar 25, 09
    The problem I have with Gamefly is that I would always be rushing through games in order to get a new one, or I would always be playing games instead doing more important things. In short GameFly would destroy my life and ruin the fun of games. But that's just me, it's a good deal if that stuff isn't a problem for you. I prefer skipping new releases and buying games when they are $30 or less, even then I have more games than I have time to play them.
  • 2
    kspiess Mar 25, 09
    I see what he is saying but don't agree. Take Mass Effect for example. I much rather buy it, and play it for a while, instead of renting it for week and spend my entire waking life trying to finish it in time.

    And for PC games you have all the mods. Not that anyone rents PC games though, I guess hehe.
  • 0
    Murray3 Mar 25, 09
    I still play Wind Waker and Sonic Adveture 2 Battle (both of which contain a small amount of secondary multiplayer but that's beside the point), and I got both near release.

    My theory: The Gamecube's amazing.
  • 3
    Slumpy monkey Mar 25, 09
    Games like Elder scrolls, mass effect, X3 etc keep drawing the players in.

    Like in ES I play it hardcore for a few weeks, then I'll get bored, but then maybe a week later I start playing it loads again. Plus I don't like renting games tbh, I play my games over quite a lot.
    • 2
      RabidChinaGirl Mar 27, 09
      Was gonna bring up Mass Effect, but you beat me to it!
  • 2
    Gamesta100* Mar 25, 09
    I have a perfect reason to buy full priced single player games, I basically collect games and will never have enough games.Plus I'm VERY impatient and don't like to wait till games prices go down.
  • 0
    Chad Mar 26, 09
    It seems as though most single-player games without online support lately aren't really worth buying. I could rent them for four days for about $7 at the local Blockbuster and get enough out of them to write up an in-depth review, which usually if I can beat the game this fast, the replay value will be low anyway. However, this is definitely not the case for older games. N64, PSX, and even games for the GC, PS2, and Xbox that are single-player without online support are definitely worth buying.

This news story is archived and is closed to comments now.