Pleading My Case to Overhaul- Availability Other than Beamdog.

bigdogchris

When BG:EE was announced as a BD exclusive, I totally supported it because I understand the revenue issue. I proudly pre-ordered and can't wait to pre-order BG2:EE directly from you. I was OK with this exclusiveness until last night.

Last night I was reading a forum elsewhere and read a comment by someone stating how they couldn't wait for the crack, and am looking forward to further enhanced edition games and BG3. My instantaneous thought was this persons comment was an oxymoron. How can you pirate a game, but expect further titles to have funding?

I believe the most sales and most pirating of a game take place within the first few months of release. While I said I agreed with exclusiveness, due to reasons stated, I also think that in order for a PC game to be profitable in the modern era you need to put the game in front of people who are willing to pay for it. Steam, GoG, GMG, Impulse, and Amazon all offer digital download purchases. People who browse these sites for games are there because they are paying customers. Currently not a single one has BG:EE available to buy. To further muddy the issue, there are many PC gamers who are very loyal to their preferred digital distribution method. If you don't offer it on their platform, some just won't buy it and others will pirate it.

I'm not going to pretend to know the numbers being crunched, but in a worst case scenario, wouldn't you rather have a sale on Steam than that person pirate it? Also, as PC developers and gamers, does Overhaul think that exclusiveness/closed architecture on the PC works? I don't think that is the case, so why should exclusiveness apply to PC game sales? I also do not think you guys want the iPad sales to have to carry the PC game due to poor sales.

I just want whats best for the company that's making the kind of games I like, whatever direction you take.

guhcampos

I signed up just to give your comment some support.

Man, you are completely right.

So to start: I'm an old school nerd and big fan of Baldurs Gate. I had my freak out when BG:EE as announced, and had my small depression when it was said exclusive on Beamdog. I am also a hardcore game collector, even if I don't have time to play every game I own.

This: http://steamcommunity.com/id/guhcampos/games?tab=all is my steam games list. It's kind of a big one. It doesn't have BG:EE. You see the point? I've been building a game collection on Steam for years. I like Steam, like the service they provide, the software, their policies, their support. I'm completely satisfied with it and have never been to a game shop after Steam. And I don't want to be forced off it. Never. In any case.

I'm a huge Mass Effect fan. When EA announced it to be Origin exclusive, I seriously thought about pirating it. Thought, but gave up. I decided to completely boycot EA, I would not even pirate their software, because even the illegal downloads can be a measure of success for a game. No, I wanted it to be a complete failure. The EA case is different, of course: they are being just greedy and trying to force themselves on a unfair competition. Unfair not because Valve is a bad company, but because they are in the game since 2006 and the other distributors are arriving SIX years late. I'm sorry guys, it took you too long, I'm not moving away from the platform I chose.

I made a single exception to my "only Steam" rule and it was for Blizzard games. The only reason I considered that an exception was because Blizzard was already on the game with Battle.net since even earlier than Valve. They were the first company to really provide servers for players to use, and I respect that and believe they can bring me a service just as good as Steam.

Well, this is the point of view of the buyer, now to yours.

You say you avoided Steam because of revenue. Well, sorry to be so harsh, but you are wrong. Terribly wrong. We are living on a globalized, digitally distributed era. Single Unit revenue doesn't matter anymore. You want scale. You want a lot of zeroes on your number of copies sold, not in the single copy revenue. We live in an era where 99 cent apps make millions on platforms even more cutting than Steam, like Apple. You, by staying out of Steam, are chosing to sell so much less, for so little improvement. It will not pay off.

Please, listen. You are neglecting a huge, and I mean HUGE, number of players - lots of them BG fans - because you are crunching the numbers wrong. Think again. Greenlight the game if you want. It will be worth it.

Zeckul

This has been requested many times. Unfortunately it's a matter of contractual obligations between Overhaul and its publisher. We can hope to see the game on other stores once these obligations expire, I don't know when exactly.

Btw, this is the technical support forum.

Nathan

Hey folks, just backing up what @Zeckul has said. In this case, the game being up on Steam wasn't really up to us. Some of you might quote MDK2HD being up on steam as is the case, and I point to the Interplay company name plastered all over that as a response.

In the future, this might change (and we want it to), but in the meantime we had to go with what we've got.

bigdogchris

Zeckul said:

This has been requested many times. Unfortunately it's a matter of contractual obligations between Overhaul and its publisher. We can hope to see the game on other stores once these obligations expire, I don't know when exactly.

Btw, this is the technical support forum.

Oh I absolutely know it has. I will continue buying directly from Beamdog, but I'm not so sure about other people.

vaslo

ok.. i bought the game and the game doesn't play. i searched the forum to make it play and now i cant save... sorry my but thats my last time i buy anything here. i paid and i have to wait a torrent with a crack to enjoy the game.

sorry guys...

bigdogchris

Why would you think that a crack would fix your problem?

vaslo

no. i ment a torrent and a crack (for the torrent). they come together..

Mungri

You can play the game as a standalone installation, you don't need to use the beamdog client.

bigdogchris

Zeckul said:

This has been requested many times. Unfortunately it's a matter of contractual obligations between Overhaul and its publisher. We can hope to see the game on other stores once these obligations expire, I don't know when exactly.

I just hope that they can get the game in front of a broader audience ASAP. Phil has already been commenting on the cracked version being passed around.

rderekp

vaslo said:

ok.. i bought the game and the game doesn't play. i searched the forum to make it play and now i cant save... sorry my but thats my last time i buy anything here. i paid and i have to wait a torrent with a crack to enjoy the game.

sorry guys...

You buy a game on release day and you are surprised that there a few bugs? Have you ever played a game on PC before? Do you understand how hard it is to develop any program that works 100% of the time on every single configuration out there? (PROTIP: Not possible) The devs are working very hard to fix every issue they can as quick as they can. Post your bug and your configuration and they will do their best to get it to work.