Wii Warm Up: Are Virtual Console games too expensive?

a whole repricing needs to be done especially on some of the nes games,some of those games are not even worth 5 bucks...hell some of the genesis games are not even worth 8 bucks thats way too much for a genesis game when i can get ps2 titles for that price

Right, but some games, like Breath of Fire 2 costs waaay too much for a mint condition cartridge (heck, I've seen this game for $50.00 and it was used!) Not to mention games like Donkey Kong Country are dirt cheap! Where can you find gems like that, in excellent condition, for only $8? But I do see that some most N64 games cost too much (Yoshi's Story, a game this lame should only be, like, $5!)

They should all cost between 10 cents and a buck. They're ROMS for crying out loud! Nintendo made a load of money when the games were originally released. Now that the games' costs have been seen to, the Virtual Console users should only have to pay for the bandwith that downloading the game uses.

That's the only fair thing to do. Then again, Nintendo doesn't care about fairness 'cause we're all just geeks anyway.

I think they should all be about two bucks less.

I think the games are a little too expensive, 2 euro less on every title would be perfect. Pricing by system is best for the consumer though, the games actually worth buying would be way too expensive if pricing was based on anything else.

They way they price the VC games makes sense I think, though some of the like SNES games do need to be cheaper and the fact that they amp up the price for games that were previously in Japan kinda bugs me. But making all of the games on each console in the VC the same prise makes sense, and I don't see anything on there going below five bucks, otherwise it would probably stop being cost effective for Nintendo.

On the WiiWare games, I like the prices on some of them and I don't on others. Like Lost Winds? Totally worth ten bucks. World Series Poker? Maybe worth five. The fact that I can get it on my cell phone for cheaper is kinda evidence that it isn't worth the money. So I think overall it depends on the game for WiiWare.

We just need a WiiWare version of Portal. Heck, I'd even buy it on a disk.

$2 flat rate regardless of console.

They are overpriced now.

Depends on the game's popularity.

NES - $1 to $2.
N64 - up to $8
Everything else - up to $5.

Sisyphus's idea seems about right, two bucks would put them all in the zone, but i think they should price them against the market standard if the market standard is LOWER than the normal asking price (that way we don't wind up getting slammed with $70 Magician Lord), but NES Baseball is worth $1 so they should be asking $1

Sin & Punishment for $12 is a steal.


Super Mario Bros. for $5 is way too expensive.

Sometimes I wish NES, SNES, and Genesis games were a buck or two cheaper. Or at least certain ones. But it's really not so bad.

Too expensive? It depend on the original system the game is on. 500 for NES games is fine, as is 800 for SNES, Genesis and TurboGrafx games, and 1000 for N64 games. These are all prices you see at used game stores in malls and stuff. Neo*Geo games, honestly, are great at 900 points ($9) considering they originally sold on the console for nearly $300. $9 is a steal for Neo*Geo game. MSX games, however, should not be 8 dollars (800 points) when they start coming out. We're getting NES quality games for the price of SNES games, and that's wrong. Master System games should be cheaper too, maybe 300 points. They're GameGear quality games and they should not be sold with an NES pricetag.

If you aren't happy with the Virutal Console price points, then you should do the footwork and find the original cartriges. Nintendo isn't forcing you to stop playing your classic game systems. Some cartriges are impossible to find, and if, and when you do find them, they are way too expensive. Most of the time when you are buying second hand games, people don't know about what they're selling. When they do, you can be worse off.

Somthing that everyone has to remember is the long term. Is this a game that YOU feel is justafyably priced? Are you going to get your moneys worth? If you don't think so, then don't buy it. Simple enough.

I feel that the Virtual Console prices are spot on. You won't hear people complining about dropping $5 on Super Mario Bros. or $10 on Ocarina of Time. Think about it. If you remember, when both of these games were released, you gladly would have paid $50 to buy the original cartrige, and those unlike their Virtual Console counterparts, could become lost, broken or stolen...

Considering Nintendo gave away FREE copies of some NES games in other games like Animal Crossing, Mario and Metroid games. The fact they are charging us $5 for these games now is just ridiculous.
And then ripping off European gamers by jacking up the price just because a game was never released over there isn't fair.

They should treat VC games just like any other item in commerce:

(1) The starting price should be what their market researchers say is a fair representation of the "top value" of a ROM-based version of that game (high enough to avoid wasting potential profit, but low enough that consumers don't balk);

(2) when sales decline below a pre-set number per month, the price should go down on a percentage base;

(3) when the price hits a pre-set "bottom," it should be put in a separate, virtual, bargain bin section of the shopping area so as not to detract from attention to the higher-selling games.

I would not expect Nintendo to follow a model like this, because they demonstrated that they are oblivious to the "supply and demand" concept when they allowed eBay to control the market price of their new console for 2 years.

Well who wouldn't want cheaper games?

But really, I feel they are priced as they should be.

I don't mind paying $10 bucks for an N64 game or $9 for a NeoGeo game. That seems reasonably priced to me.
I do think that they should drop the NES, SNES and Genesis games by about $2 bucks, though. I also wish they'd implement like a bargain bin type system for games that just aren't worth the asking price. Some of the NES games up there are real stinkers, but I'd probably buy them just for the Hell of it if they were one or two dollars.

they should be cheaper than they are. they should be cheap to free. hell they should pay people to actually download crappy ass games that are on there.

but those who arent lazy can go buy a 40$ copy of TP, install the homebrew loader, and play roms all day long for free.

I would say if you dropped the price 200 points across the board. Sure there will be some games still not worth it, but you would probably have to be paid to download those anyways.

Cut the price of everything in half... or more.

No work is even being done on these things other than the digital instruction manual. I could see paying a bit more classic games on a service like XBLA which offers online leaderboards at the very least.

For two bucks less, I'd try a lot more games that I haven't played before. For a 20 point card, I could get 6 NES games instead of 4 (if they were 300 points). Granted, Nintendo would be making the same dollar amount ($20), but I would feel that I got a better value, thus making me more inclined to buy points and experiment. As it is, I'm really not buying any game unless I'm solid about it.

I'm fairly comfortable with the current price structure, although I really like T's suggestions.

I paid 600 points for Dig Dug, and it feels like I was just raped.

This research and development costs hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars.

The following items are long term, continuing costs:

Maintaining the Distribution System:

The university I work at pays, I believe, close to a million of dollars to run it's own backup system per year. This is to service a mere 60,000 people.

The cost of running an international service, which must work on demand, at high speed, andhave at least one backup would be staggering. I would not be suprised to find Nintendo is paying millions per year to run this system. Keep in mind that not only must you pay for the servers, but for thier maintenance, staff to back them up, rent on the facility that holds them or taxes on the property that you own, electricity, water, heat, cleaning staff, air conditioning if needed. All of this for what is probably a fairly large building.

Credt Market:

The Wii accepts credit purchases of Wii points. If you have ever run a business you know that these purchases must be transfered through a market online. This market, which allows the user to pay with credit card, debit card, etc, takes a percentage of the price. For a high volume use like nintendo, it may pay a simple flat rate-- estimated from previous years, or determined by the market.

Stores:

Buying Wii-points online probably goes through an intermediary, but if it doesn't this method does leave nintendo with most of the profit. To place wii-points cards in stores, however, the stores must be making some sort of profit, otherwise they would not give up the shelf space. It is likely that nintendo only sees about 40% to 50% of the profit from a wii points card.

Cost of Printing:

Wii points cards are printed and packaged. This is a continuing costs which takes away from the cards profit.

Cost of Data Keeping:

Each time you purchase a game you use points, which are kept track of remotely. The games you have purchased are also stored remotely. Nintendo must have a second set of servers to store sensitive customer information. This must be kept safe and well backed up. This is another, most likely multi-million dollar affair to upkeep.

Customer Service:

If your wii is broken, I know that you can get your games transfered. Staff that takes calls, evaluates them, and decide on your transfer must be paid. More people must be paid to interface with the IT staff to transfer your data. Another computer system must be developed or bought to deal with identifying customers, matching them to data stored in one system, and interface all of this with customer service, IT in charge of customer data and IT in charge of game storage and distribution.

Marketing:

Marketing costs money. Though they are spending little on it, the VC does have some marketing budget. If only to pay for release notices.

VC Storefront:

Apart from the cost of design, the VC storefront must be updated to reflect new games. Even if this is done automatically, staff must ensure that there are no problems with each update. In addition, the system must be continually updated as the Wii's firmware is updated, to ensure the shop channel does not have any incompatibilities with the new firmware.

Bandwidth costs:

Bandwidth costs money. Running hundreds, if not more, servers at very high speeds transferring gigabytes of data per day (again, probably more) incurs a large cost by the end of the year. keep in mind that the transfer does not just occur when you purchase a game, but every time you look at games in the wii shop channel, every shop channel update-- even the change in your channel menu (the little scroll bar and "hey look this game is out" message)


There are other costs as well, but this should give you the general idea. The cost of running this system isn't "grabbing a rom and running a server". There is serious money involved.

In any case, if you still feel the cost is too high, then do not purchase the product. Video Games are a luxury item, not a necessity and if people stop buying them, Nintendo will either find a way to lower costs or stop the system all together as unprofitable.

I actually think the prices are fine -- but I don't buy many VC games because the points system is a huge pain in the ass. If they just charged your card straight up, in actual currency, each time you bought a game, I'd find it much more convenient. But playing the "hmm, how to dive 2000 points" game and finding you have to buy $10 worth more of points just to get the equivalent of an extra buck's credit is absolutely ridiculous. I'm sure the marketing data tells you that if you abstract the cost from actual currency you'll sell more units, but it's the exact opposite in my case.

ill stick to free roms and save my cash. thanks.

WAY OVERPRICED.

How dare they try to sell Mario for 5 bucks. It should be $1.49 at most. and N64 games for $10 more like $2.99.

Considering how easy it is for emulation is on PC paying 10 dollars for an N64 game is unreal.

Screw the whole buying individual games thing. I don't like the idea of buying 100% virtual content that's tied to your specific console. Even if the games were 1$ each I would still be uncomfortable with it.

What I really want is a subscription model. Now imagine how cool that would be.

Here's how it could be like: Basically you'd pay a monthly fee (something like 12$) for a "Virtual Console On Demand" channel. The channel has a frontend that allows you to select and VC game, download and play directly from it. Afterwards it wouldn't require an active Internet connection, however you can only hold one game at a time. The game itself would not show up as a channel in your Wii menu, it'd be saved inside the On Demand's save data file.

Nintendo would definitely get more money from me that way. It also wouldn't kill the normal way of buying VC games, because many people will prefer to buy some games permanently, without the hassle of going through the On Demand redownload.

Hell maybe they'd actually end up selling MORE games in the long run, because it would give people a way to try the games. Right now Nintendo has no demos whatsoever (save for Brawl "masterpieces" lol) and I'm sure I'm not the only one annoyed by this. There are many games I find vaguely interesting (like the Bonk's Adventure series), but without any way to demo them, I don't bother.

Anyway, the chances of this happening are slim to none, but a man can dream...

VC games are too expensive. The price schedule should be NES $3 SNES $5 N64 $8, with the other consoles falling in their relative places. The $10 price should be reserved for large or high profile games. No game (VC or WiiWare) should cost more than $10 - that's what Reggie promised us back before the Wii launched and Nintendo should have kept to that promise.

I think they shouldn't be more then $5. Selling one game at $10, makes you less money then 3 games at $5. Which would happen. More games (ROMS!) would be sold, increasing profits, and more Wii systems will be sold if people know they can get a bunch of classic games for cheap.

Ugh, everyone's comment are too annoying and long winded...

Honestly, I have no arguments with the prices. I might like a few NES game cheaper but then again, if they make price changes, what they REALLY need to do is make it so that I can decide on the EXACT number of Wii points I wish to purchase. If I want just 800 for an SNES game, I should be able to do that. Not 10 dollars and have the 2 left over taunting me because I can't get anything else.

I love all of the "Just play ROMs" answers. Way to kill the video game industry. If you like a developer's product, you should show your support by buying it. True enough, there are some games on the service that just aren't worth the data they take up. The solution for that is simple enough--Research the game beforehand, then just don't buy it.

I love all of the "Just play ROMs" answers. Way to kill the video game industry. If you like a developer's product, you should show your support by buying it. True enough, there are some games on the service that just aren't worth the data they take up. The solution for that is simple enough--Research the game beforehand, then just don't buy it.

I think that the prices are a little on the high side, but not outrageously so. What I think they should do is offer sales or bundles like mario 1,2, and 3 for $12 or this week's random n64 game for $8 or something like that. They could make the special new price last only a week; If you miss it it's gone. This would make me check out the shop channel once a week and I'd probably buy more games than before.

I tend to think that it depends on the game. Better games may warrant the full price or possibly even more. I think that enough people think highly of Super Mario 3 that it could easily justify another 100 points or similar. On the other hand, I just have no idea what is driving some of their pricing notions. Some of those games aren't worth the time it takes to download, let alone the money they want to charge. Where are the titles people want to see and play? Why do we keep getting titles that have reviews < 50% overall?