8 replies to this topic

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

The Steam Winter Sale is in full swing. It's the time of year when people look for discounts and dump tens or hundreds of dollars on things that they would never pay full price for but are willing to pick up, even if they never actually end up playing it, so long as it has that green -XX% tag on it.

Yet, PGI doesn't have even one of its Steam packs discounted. This is insane. Even something as low as 25% would have the potential to drive significant sales. and the number one way to get people to pay money over time for free-to-play games is to have them spend money once as a sort of buy-in. Even with Steam taking a cut from any Steam pack sales, it's essentially free money for PGI since it's purely digital content and it's really unlikely that it would be taking money away from other MWO purchases.

PGI, get on this. You have only a few more days until Christmas, and the sale itself will end on January 2. If you don't have some kind of discount on your Steam packs, nobody will even glance at them and they certainly won't show up on the Steam front page (it's Highlighted DEALS, they have to be discounted to be featured).

[Bombast]

https://mwomercs.com...e-holiday-deals

They go on sale on the 24th.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Bombast, on 22 December 2016 - 04:14 PM, said:

https://mwomercs.com...e-holiday-deals

They go on sale on the 24th.

Well, at least that's something. But for all the time when the Winter Sale is going and they're not discounted even a little it's pretty much pure lost sales. Even doing 25% off throughout and 40% for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day would be an improvement.

Edited by Levi Porphyrogenitus, 22 December 2016 - 04:20 PM.

[Bombast]

Levi Porphyrogenitus, on 22 December 2016 - 04:20 PM, said:

Well, at least that's something. But for all the time when the Winter Sale is going and they're not discounted even a little it's pretty much pure lost sales. Even doing 25% off throughout and 40% for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day would be an improvement.

... It's 40% off from the 24th to the 2nd.

So your idea of an improvement is adding two days to the sale, and reducing the quality of the sale for seven days.

For packs they just released.

I'm all for Steam sales, but this is silly.

[Johnny Z]

Tempted to get the Cyclops hero mech. Really tempted since I need an assault hero. So surprised there isn't a King Crab hero out yet, among other wonders about missing mechs not out yet. LOL its like they know how to push my buttons!

Edited by Johnny Z, 22 December 2016 - 04:43 PM.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Bombast, on 22 December 2016 - 04:34 PM, said:

... It's 40% off from the 24th to the 2nd.

So your idea of an improvement is adding two days to the sale, and reducing the quality of the sale for seven days.

For packs they just released.

I'm all for Steam sales, but this is silly.

They entirely removed the initial Steam packs? Why would they do that? I guess that's where my confusion is coming from.

You'd expect them to have their old packs be discounted more heavily and the new ones less. At the price points they're going for, even 40% off is still outside of the Less Than $10 category. Put the old packs back up and discount them at 60%, then do 40% throughout the sale for the new ones.

Even one day of lost sales can be impactful. I suspect a decent number of prospective customers pretty much just check the Steam sales once at the start since Steam no longer has a rotating sales list. Not having your discounts active for the first couple of days means you're taking a big hit. There's a reason why the Steam servers tend to go out at the start of sales and then recover.

[Bombast]

Levi Porphyrogenitus, on 22 December 2016 - 04:44 PM, said:

They entirely removed the initial Steam packs? Why would they do that? I guess that's where my confusion is coming from.

Seriously?

Performance Packs are the Starter Decks of MWO. Offering cheaper alternatives to the new ones undermine the whole selling point, while at the same time ditching a wonderful opportunity to sell 'Limited Time Only' mechs to players who are already playing MWO.

It would be counter productive to keep the old packs, especially at a lower price point.

As for the rest of your post, it's all pretty much meaningless to me. They held back their sale for a few days. Whoop de do. They really don't want people buying Steam Packs anyway if they can help it, since they have to pay the Valve tax on anything sold on the store front, but not on anything sold on their own website.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Bombast, on 22 December 2016 - 04:54 PM, said:

Seriously?

Performance Packs are the Starter Decks of MWO. Offering cheaper alternatives to the new ones undermine the whole selling point, while at the same time ditching a wonderful opportunity to sell 'Limited Time Only' mechs to players who are already playing MWO.

It would be counter productive to keep the old packs, especially at a lower price point.

As for the rest of your post, it's all pretty much meaningless to me. They held back their sale for a few days. Whoop de do. They really don't want people buying Steam Packs anyway if they can help it, since they have to pay the Valve tax on anything sold on the store front, but not on anything sold on their own website.

It all goes back to the same argument for launching on Steam in the first place. It's about volume. Even if they make a tenth per unit, if they sell more than ten times the units they come out ahead. It costs literally nothing to sell packs on Steam. Anything they make is pure profit. The only question is if they are taking sales away from more profitable avenues. Since the current MWO player base is relatively small and Steam caters to millions of people, it is very likely that if they could get a pack onto the Today's Highlighted Deals page or high up on the Under $10 list they'd make way more in volume of sales than they'd ever lose in lost sale efficiency.

[Acehilator]

The current "Performance" packs are a disgrace anyways. How this mech selection (aside from the Heavy Pack, it is at least workable) could pass through any kind of decision-making process is absolutely mindboggling. I hope not many new players fall for this scam.