The Value of a Game

[Ronin Storm]

I had wondered about a "stickiness" factor. Portal is a decent example for this.

( 5 hours * 10 quality) / £5 = 10

Compare that to, say, my score for Fahrenheit of 21ish and I then wonder how they balance up against each other. Actually, Fahrenheit still comes out top but the scale probably isn't correct. Fahrenheit wasn't twice as good as Portal, for me, in terms of value.

That stickiness factor, though, would need to have parity with the original hours-quality product. If it's purely additive then it becomes a fudge factor with no balance. Needs some thought.

As for WoW, and other longer games, where the experience is great in parts and pretty average in others, then I believe the correct thing to do is to break that experience into parts, for example:

( ( 100 hours * 10 quality ) + ( 60 hours * 7 quality ) + ( 40 hours * 4 quality ) ) / ( £20 box price + ( 18 months play * £12 monthly subscription ) ) = 6.7

Of course, your maths will vary.

Coming back to stickiness, I'm of a mind that quality has a play in this space too. Perhaps its a formula along the lines:

( ( hours * quality ) + ( number of positive afterglow thoughts * quality ) ) / ( box price + ( subscription cost * subscription payments ) )

That might be a bit crude as that equates an hour of play time to a positive afterglow thought (i.e. those times where you felt happy that you'd played the game). Not sure they're that neatly balanced.

 

[BiG D]

I think, if anything, this thread illustrates the ultimate futility of trying to express the overall quality of a game using a number.

 

[Wol]

How about 4.....

.... you know the rest

 

[Ronin Storm]

I think, if anything, this thread illustrates the ultimate futility of trying to express the overall quality of a game using a number.

That said, the point of an analytical approach and giving a game a "score" is to quantify an otherwise qualitative subject so that a measure of objectivity can be applied to choosing games. I've bought games that were fun for a few hours but at full price they turned out to be a poor purchasing choice. Other games cost me a moderate amount and I've played them to death, or used them as a platform for a mod that I really like. Just trying to figure out the difference in an analytical way. Which is very me.

 

[Panda with issues...]

Really interesting thread actually.

I kind of disagree about a bias towards playing time. If anything, for me, there doesn't really need to be a 'quality' qualification, since play time is generally to do with how good i think a game is - These 2 things are NOT independent variables. If anything, i'd say the completely abitrary (and unscientific) 'quality' number muddies the waters.

A good value game is one i tend to go back and play multiple times, particularly through single player campaigns. Classic examples include: Thief 2, System Shock 2, Half Life, KOTOR, Freespace 2, etc.

Ultimately the units for this shouldn't really be Funs/pound, it should be more like pounds/hour of fun. Which brings us to this point:

How much is an hour of pure fun worth? £1? £5?

To investigate this further I had to look at both gaming, and other activities I enjoy.

Lets look at 3 examples: Listening to music, watching a film and going to the pub.

Music:

For various reasons, I buy hard copies of music. I.E. cd's and vinyl. Say i buy a new cd at prices I feel acceptible. (usually £5-8). For simplicity's sake, lets assume they normally contain 1hr of music.

That's ~ £5/Fh (from this point on, Fh = Hours of fun). If i listen to that cd twice though, the price halves, and so on and so forth.

Now lets look at films:

Average film say 2hrs long. Prices of films vary from extortion at the cinema (~£6-7 a film), to ~£6-10 per DVD to free via tinternet. Assuming we're not obtaining our funs illegaly (no crack jokes please) that makes cinema and dvd's initially similar at ~£3-5/Fh.
DVD's clearly have the edge though due to replayability, again, putting the cost/Fh down rapidly. I am less likely to watch films as often as i am likely to listen to albums again though, making them relatively more expensive in £/Fh than music for me.

Now lets look at the pub:

Lets say i drink 1 pint an hour (optimistic at best, its normally more than this). Lets say thats a price of £3 a pint (rounding up, as i normally drink more than 1 an hour). That's
£3/Fh.

Although this is a brutal simplification, we I can now estimate a fair price in £/Fh my entertainment costs. What we also see is that replayability and longevity are actually the most important factor to consider when buying ANYTHING. (Thus drinking is an expensive habit. Once that pint is drunk, I can't replay it.....unless i drink too much, and thats not really a fun sort of replay....)

I'll assume I listen to a cd/watch a film at least twice, and so i'll half the £/Fh I've calculated for those. If i then average from the 3 above examples i get roughly:

Cds: ~£2.50/Fh (at most expensive likelyhood)
DVDs: ~£4/Fh
Pints: £3/Fh

Averaged to: £3.2/Fh

I can now calculate how much I SHOULD have paid for a game based on how many hours it lasted me.

Average games these days seem to last about 10 hours, which would mean that they should be pitched at about £32. Broadly in line with newly released games. Obviously games which last longer have better value.

Sorry for the ramble. We'll discuss more on Sunday Ronin.

(I'm also convinced books have the best value of all my hobbies, since a book that costs me ~£7 often lasts me more than 2 hours. Books RULE).