Yup, we lowered the price of Labyrinth since it's old (almost two years now), but otherwise no, we don't like to screw our customers. Most people seem to like it that we don't change the price every other day, I think I saw a poll somewhere. Maybe it's just me, but I personally feel screwed over when I buy something at full price and a week later it's down 50%, wouldn't you? Also if you notice that a company have sales every now and then, why on earth would I buy anything at full price when they always have a sale a week later? I would just wait for their sale. I dunno, it could be a cultural thing as well. Here in Sweden there aren't a lot of sales in stores, while in the US everything seems to be on sale all the time (especially Black Friday comes to mind)
You are right. This is why I don't mind throwing down the money on touch grind and sway, because I know a better price won't sneak up and bite me in the ass a day later from illusion labs. This has happened so much with Bigger dev's / publishers lately like Glu, Myth People, NgMoco, Chillingo, and even Popcap is starting to bite on. EA and Gameloft aren't even stable anymore. It's a tough balance though, even the bigger ones have trouble holding their original prices because of all the rat developers that change price every other day to see spikes in sales. Lowering price also creates recent activity and gets your app shown on different sites for a day or two. I'm just as bad though. I won't buy Oregon Trail now because I have seen almost every Gameloft game hit 99c, even for a day. Oregon has yet to, but Im holding out. It may never happen, but if I buy it today at full price, I guarantee it will drop tomorrow (or so it seems)
Anders, not to be a kiss ass but I love your games and appreciate you not lowering your prices. EA and Gameloft screw themselves when they drop, screw indie devs, and screw customers. Gameloft is dropping prices within a week or so of the games launch although EA has more rhyme or reason. (I.E. Most start at 10 then drop to 6) I have a feeling that the more big devs get invovled the less indie devs make. Even gameloft and EA started their own division JUST to make smaller games. We'll see. Apple needs a way to show off both so the big devs stay but keep the indies as well. Where the indies go, the big devs follow
Good to hear! I think there is room for all of us. They are HUGE companies and they really need to safe a lot. Gameloft, for instance, have over 4000 employees. 4000! They make good and polished games, but they are all safe bets. They can do the same games over and over again each year, that's fine with us. We smaller devs can afford risks more as most of us do this in our spare time or don't have as many mouths to feed. We are only five friends doing what we like and do best. If a game doesn't do very well, that's fine, at least we tried something fresh new and we can always eat noodles for a month or two if we have to. We don't have any kids to feed either.
As a policy, I tend to only put something on sale if 1- it's priced over $1 to begin with and 2- it hasn't sold a single copy over a span of multiple days. That typically is a sign that the game isn't being seen. And since I can't afford to put out updates as often as I would like, the business logic tells me to put it on sale.... and it works. I can't imagine a sensible person would be too upset for having paid $1-$2 more for a game. Everything from TVs to houses fluctuate in price. The reality of the market is that an alert and careful consumer saves money. But if the money isn't a big issue, the consumer is happier to get his product when he wants it, imo.
