How will the (apparent) ESPN price drop affect Madden?

[SPTO]

If indeed this is true then this might eat into MADDEN's sales however there is the bad side to this. Most people assume that cheapie games suck. This isn't the case with ESPN tho but the casual buyer might feel that way.

[wwharton]

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SportsmanTO said:
If indeed this is true then this might eat into MADDEN's sales however there is the bad side to this. Most people assume that cheapie games suck. This isn't the case with ESPN tho but the casual buyer might feel that way.

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all depends on the release date. as long as it releases before madden then even a good number of these people would give it a shot.

[TheLetterZ]

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wwharton said:

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SportsmanTO said:
If indeed this is true then this might eat into MADDEN's sales however there is the bad side to this. Most people assume that cheapie games suck. This isn't the case with ESPN tho but the casual buyer might feel that way.

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all depends on the release date. as long as it releases before madden then even a good number of these people would give it a shot.

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Exactly what I was going to say. Except for the preorders, the price doesn't mean that much unless they release early.

[Radja]

19.99 is the magic price number for impulse game buying. games stay at 19.99 forever, because people keep buying them. its true that the shelf life of yearly sports installments is not as long. people will pick up the game at this price.

however, i dont believe this drop is not going to stay. this is clearly a marketing ploy. people are now talking about this game. they are calling their friends to order games and some are buying several copies to give to friends as gifts.

when espn raises the price to $29 or $39 at the start of the regular season, people will be surprised they missed out on the pre-order price drop. then next spring if they liked the game, they will start looking at espn a little more to see if they can cash in.

espn has to do something radical to crack ea's empire. they have to get people to play the game. while many people wont even try a game not madden for genius reasons, like "it sux!!!" "the buttons are stupid!!!", this move could sway a lot of people to see what the hype is about.

the past two years has seen a change in the view of many towards espn football. this could be worth three or four years of fan growth all by itself.

[WAZ]

Madden will obviously still outsell ESPN. The name recognition is too high. But the key is, more people will at least TRY ESPN now. The $19.99 price point makes it 1) a great "second" game, 2) a great impulse buy, 3) a great choice for gamers (and parents buying for gamers) on a budget.

I bought Tony Hawk 3 for PS2 a while back because I saw it for $19.99. And whaddayaknow? I ended up liking it enough to pay $50 each for TH 4 and TH Underground. It's $7 to rent a game just to try it for 5 days. $19 to own it? That's a steal.

I think it's a great move by Sega, as they just need to get this game out there. Even if Madden still sells 2 million copies, there will be a lot more overlap of sales this year, as more people will, at the very least, be TRYING the game for so cheap now.

Sega's banking on just making great games, and having people eventually "come around" to notice. At $19, they'll notice, and Sega's plan is that people will like the game enough to want to play it next year.

[roadpimp]

If the game is advertised correctly and VC builds up enough hype. People will realize that a great game is going for the low low.

[GTheorenHobbes]

This isn't so much for this year, but for years beyond. The ESPN board is proof positive that, if you buy and play ESPN, it makes it tough to go back to Madden. I think it's a brilliant move by Sega, if true. They've whooped EA in graphics, gameplay (I would argue), and if they release their game for $19 bucks, there's no excuse for anybody to not pick up this game. And if you pick it up, it will be tough to go back to Madden next year. Especially if they haven't updated that tired engine by then.

[Blzer]

I got too bored to go on and read the second page, but I don't think this was said in the first page.

Anyways, I heard some people say that while SEGA's number of copies sold will go up, the amount of money that they will get won't go up. I agree with that statement, no argument here. However, I think that they aren't really looking at the money, it's the number of copies sold.

VC has made great games over and over, yet nobody has been seeing it yet, they've been buying Madden. Now, here, this will, as other people said, give more customers the chance to see the other game for a $30 difference. If they like the game, then they will look at it next year. That way, more sales, and Take-Two can raise the price again.


Now the DOWNSIDE is if people all of the sudden get mad because they re-raise the price again. In some terms, that sounds unfair, but when a company/athlete/website gets that sort of reputation, they probably need to maintain it to stay liked. For instance, look at how hot Pedro Feliz and Miguel Cabrera are right now for baseball. They are so liked, they keep a reputation as good players after being nobodies from the minors. NOW, if they start sucking, they will now be recognized as KNOWN poor players from the minors.

As that analogies go, it can happen to SEGA. The question is, what does Take-Two planning on doing next year, and how will what they do affect the outcome of the number of sales, and the money that they get?