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Precinct - Police Quest spiritual successor by Jim Walls

buzz

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I assume there's also the psychological effect of seeing the game being partly funded at an early stage. Makes you confident that the project might be funded and you actually read/watch the video and maybe even contribute.
 

gromit

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I really don't understand these limited 'early bird' tiers. Isn't EVERY level of a Kickstarted project an early bird tier?
Why penalize people who are going to back your project, because they didn't back it early?
Answer: It's a way of making the Kickstarter seem more affordable than it actually is. "See, the minimum price to get the game is 20 dollars, not 30 dollars! CHEAP! Oh, you missed it? That's your fault, not ours!"

Psychology.
You need to, like, go back to Psychology school, man. I'm not sure what kind of crack you're smoking to think that showing a different, lower, unavailable price somehow creates the illusion of thrift. That makes it seem more expensive.

Time-limits on exclusive goods or prices are a way of encouraging timely purchases. Quantity limits -- more obviously when dealing with things that have potentially infinite quantity, like a digital sale -- are just super-duper spooky time-limits that could end at any moment. And you don't want to be the sucker paying an extra $10, do you? Especially if you're not sure.

Even in this thread, someone mentions dropping $10-15 could get them to commit to it, because they "weren't sure" about the end result. It seems like less risk to the consumer, being 33% less out of their pocket... even though it's more risk as you likely have less information, and the project may not come to fruition. (Yes, you'll get your money back in that case, but it's ear-marked until then... so if you can only "donate" to one cause at a time, you're still choosing it over another project, possibly for good.)

Anyway, if the early discount works, then you have the benefit of being over the initial hump, and gain some legitimacy. And once you're legit (and in the case of KS you look less likely to disappear) you can get away with charging a little more, as (visible) demand is higher, and we still haven't figured out that S/D is by-and-large a ridiculous model to follow with digital goods. (To be fair, it works okay in high-investment projects with niche targets -- hence why a legit copy of high-end A/V software will cost you out the ass. Games are somewhere in between, especially ones that won't exist if you don't buy them up front.)

Jesus, man. Even the infomercial people figured this out -- "call within the next 10 minutes, and we'll charge you a high-but-reasonable price, instead of this one we've pulled out our ass!" And it doesn't even have to be true to work.
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I really don't understand these limited 'early bird' tiers. Isn't EVERY level of a Kickstarted project an early bird tier?
Why penalize people who are going to back your project, because they didn't back it early?
Answer: It's a way of making the Kickstarter seem more affordable than it actually is. "See, the minimum price to get the game is 20 dollars, not 30 dollars! CHEAP! Oh, you missed it? That's your fault, not ours!"

Psychology.
You need to, like, go back to Psychology school, man. I'm not sure what kind of crack you're smoking to think that showing a different, lower, unavailable price somehow creates the illusion of thrift. That makes it seem more expensive.

Time-limits on exclusive goods or prices are a way of encouraging timely purchases. Quantity limits -- more obviously when dealing with things that have potentially infinite quantity, like a digital sale -- are just super-duper spooky time-limits that could end at any moment. And you don't want to be the sucker paying an extra $10, do you? Especially if you're not sure.

Even in this thread, someone mentions dropping $10-15 could get them to commit to it, because they "weren't sure" about the end result. It seems like less risk to the consumer, being 33% less out of their pocket... even though it's more risk as you likely have less information, and the project may not come to fruition. (Yes, you'll get your money back in that case, but it's ear-marked until then... so if you can only "donate" to one cause at a time, you're still choosing it over another project, possibly for good.)

Anyway, if the early discount works, then you have the benefit of being over the initial hump, and gain some legitimacy. And once you're legit (and in the case of KS you look less likely to disappear) you can get away with charging a little more, as (visible) demand is higher, and we still haven't figured out that S/D is by-and-large a ridiculous model to follow with digital goods. (To be fair, it works okay in high-investment projects with niche targets -- hence why a legit copy of high-end A/V software will cost you out the ass. Games are somewhere in between, especially ones that won't exist if you don't buy them up front.)

Jesus, man. Even the infomercial people figured this out -- "call within the next 10 minutes, and we'll charge you a high-but-reasonable price, instead of this one we've pulled out our ass!" And it doesn't even have to be true to work.


Nice wall of text, bro. Unfortunately for you, I've got empirical proof for what I said.

During the lead-up to Torment's Kickstarter, it was originally planned to have no early bird tier. The minimum pledge would have been 25 dollars.

The result? Tons of people saying "BUT INXILE, PROJECT ETERNITY WAS CHEAPER!!". Why? Because Project Eternity had a 20 dollar early bird tier. People were thinking of the early bird tier as the minimum price.
 

gromit

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Well, then that's the answer to "is 25 greater than 20?" not "why penalize people who are going to back your project, because they didn't back it early?" The minimum price for the early-bird tier was, indeed, the minimum price -- jsut not forever. So, they wanted an early-bird tier, that had a lower price, that I'm guessing from your description they got. Nobody was psychology'd into thinking they were paying less after that window passed, whether you meant to imply that or not.

I see what you're saying, this time* it's interesting and I didn't know that, but it just makes me wonder more wtf that had to do with the guy's question. Or psychology, other than the implied reward of displaying your loyalty early, and how that rapidly became an entitlement. Bro.

*because you bothered to say it; funny that
 

tuluse

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Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Shadorwun: Hong Kong
I think the early bird tiers are designed to get some momentum in the project. If you don't get a good chunk of funding lots of people won't bother contributing, thinking the project will fail.
 

Infinitron

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I think the early bird tiers are designed to get some momentum in the project. If you don't get a good chunk of funding lots of people won't bother contributing, thinking the project will fail.


Sure, they do that as well, but I was pointing out they also have a secondary function of lowering the perception of the product's costliness.
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
by lowering the cost of the product


By lowering the cost of the product insignificantly. The perception of a lower cost is disproportionate to the degree that the cost was actually lowered. That's the psychological bit. It's like how every price in a store ends with 99 cents.
 

gromit

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Well for fuck's sake, man, you should have said what you meant in the first place, or in the second or third places, and not acted like I answered the man's question incorrectly.

Anyway, moving on...
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Precinct, Police Quest and the Sierra renaissance

"I think it's an interesting idea," Lindsley added. "Because these adventure games are doing really well, and succeeding on Kickstarter, it would be interesting to see a mini-publisher start up that just focuses on these types of games. You have individual development teams, because we're all in different locations now and it would be tough to sort of get together under one roof the way Ken and Roberta [Williams] did in Oakhearst. But I could see a mini-publisher that focuses solely on Sierra-style adventure games, for sure."
 

Stabwound

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Well, this has about zero chance of succeeding. Try again, Jim Walls. Maybe this time with an actual PQ spirtual successor and not some popamole first person shit.
 

buzz

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Well, if I recall correctly, 2 out of the 6 six games were in first person. Also some games had "action" and "driving" moments, including the first one. Nothing too exciting or crazy, true, but it was still there.
Point is, if there's any Quest series where it's okay to experiment and introduce action components (but not too many though), it's this one.
 

Name

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Jim Walls
Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel - AGI(original)/Point&Click(remake), has driving
Police Quest II: The Vengeance - AGI, no driving, has shooting range minigame
Police Quest III: The Kindred - Point&Click, has driving

Daryl F. Gates
Police Quest: Open Season - Point&Click, no driving
Police Quest: SWAT - FMV, mostly First Person
Police Quest: SWAT 2 - Real-time tatics

SWAT
SWAT 3 - Tatical FPS
SWAT 4 - Tatical FPS
 

suejak

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Well, if I recall correctly, 2 out of the 6 six games were in first person. Also some games had "action" and "driving" moments, including the first one. Nothing too exciting or crazy, true, but it was still there.
Point is, if there's any Quest series where it's okay to experiment and introduce action components (but not too many though), it's this one.

You are a dumb, confused motherfucker.
 

suejak

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My favourite PQ minigame was adjusting the screws in the sights of your gun in PQ2. So characteristic of the series: dumb-ass procedural shit for its own sake.

Almost as good as my memories of walking one loop around my car before boarding, every time.
 

Keshik

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My favourite PQ minigame was adjusting the screws in the sights of your gun in PQ2. So characteristic of the series: dumb-ass procedural shit for its own sake.

Almost as good as my memories of walking one loop around my car before boarding, every time.

Dying on the plane because the sights got out of whack after hitting the wall at the motel was a nice hair pulling moment. The airport crosswalk was also fun.
 

Aeschylus

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Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Divinity: Original Sin 2
This'll be the first ex-Sierra KS I don't donate to. Jim Walls made Codename: ICEMAN. Some things cannot be forgiven.
 

Skunkpew

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One of my funniest memories of the series was trying to finally beat Police Quest 3. In the pre-dosbox days, the driving sequences were just absurdly fast, and I could never get CPUkiller working. Yet I had a computer that constantly overheated, and slowed down whenever it did so. So I loaded up Police Quest 3, waited until it overheated, and then completed the driving sequence like a boss once the game slowed down to a crawl.

Such good times with the first two games back in the day. Back when it took weeks and sometimes multiple playthroughs just to find a solution to advance through to the next puzzle (like with any classic adventure game).

Here's something totally random too, the box for Police Quest 2 is still kicking around here, with the old 5 1/4 diskettes still inside.

f5oe.jpg


d1ib.jpg
 

RK47

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As memorable as Police Quest related in-game deaths I can remember, I still think they really hit their mark on SWAT4.That's an acceptable evolution of the brand.
It was a good co-op shooter. PQ is dead after the 4th game was released.
I played all of them. I learned English from typing out the commands in the first two. Great games.
PQ3 wasn't that great TBH. I was happy with the series - but point and click is just not the same.
PQ4 - Ahahha, what the fuck. I played it and didn't understand half of what the developers intended to create.
PQ4 finale is one of those 'meh whatever'. All I know is I won't be buying PQ5 if it's ever released.
 

Aeschylus

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This'll be the first ex-Sierra KS I don't donate to. Jim Walls made Codename: ICEMAN. Some things cannot be forgiven.

Didn't play this one, it was really that bad ?

Yes, a million times yes. It was filled to the brim with the procedural bullshit that plagued PQ, but much more irritating. It had tons of borderline unplayable action sequences. It contained an annoyingly hard, completely random dice game that you had to win like 20 times, without quitting, while only being allowed 3 saves in order to beat the game. Tons of 'surprise! You're dead! oh ho ho!' moments where there was no indication at all that there was even a puzzle.

It was not a 'so bad it's funny' kind of bad. It was a 'so bad I want to melt the disks' kind of bad.
 

Sceptic

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Divinity: Original Sin
It contained an annoyingly hard, completely random dice game that you had to win like 20 times
Lies. You didn't have to win it. The EMP thingie you get at the end wasn't necessary to bypass the force field, as there's another way around it.

Through one of the most annoying Sierra mazes ever :troll:

Oh and getting full score in the game? you had to get the EMP thingie AND go through the maze :troll::troll::troll:

It's a shit game anyway even though it has a great MT-32 soundtrack
 

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