Switch Discussion Thread

[Jmustang1968]

The only release truly limted were the Collector Editions. The standard editions have a 2 week preorder window.

[Michi]

The company doing the actual manufacturing might require batch sizes; LRG might have to order things in batches of 1000 or whatever.

Or they might just be greedy, purposefully creating artificial scarcity, to fleece the compulsive fans, and people desperate for physical releases in an increasingly digital world. While fueling the scalper market.

They do have to order things in batches of 1000 actually. At least, I'm fairly sure I've read them say that before.

You are indeed correct! Or at least you are when it comes to the Switch games. In fact, they mention it on every Switch Pre-order page:

PREORDERS CLOSE ON FRIDAY, MARCH 29TH BETWEEN 6PM AND 11:59PM EASTERN TIME. NINTENDO REQUIRES ORDERS TO BE PLACED TO THE NEAREST 1,000 UNITS. AT 6PM EASTERN TIME, WE WILL SWITCH STOCK OVER TO WHATEVER QUANTITY GETS US TO THE NEAREST 1,000. PLEASE PLAN YOUR PURCHASE ACCORDINGLY.

Not sure about the PS4 games. But I imagine it's a somewhat similar situation.

[Arenegeth]

Your disbelief in how manufacturing works doesn't mean it's not true. Now, I don't know the specific lot sizes they have to deal with, but it is a very real thing. Anyone who did even a cursory look into manufacturing contracts would know it's a thing.

Oh I know its a thing, I just don't think is that much of a thing, especially in their case, that you can't open a pre-order limit for a month and then order based on demand, if you do have some left over, so what? You don't have to sell out on pre-orders people can actually buy the stuff from the store after release.

The problem, and where the loss of revenue comes from, is if you have too much of a leftover stock, not 500 extra copies or any leftover stock at all, assuming the 1000 increments thing is correct of course.

I can't purchase anything they used to make. Is that in my interest?

Well to use your own argument against you, you can still buy the game, they don't 'make' anything, they just print stuff somebody else did. How is it ever in your interest to get jipped for things that already exist?

That was a good job misinterpreting what I said in order to continue your outrage train.

Please don't make assumptions like that is not fair. I did not misinterpret anything, you clarified your argument now, but I still think that you are taking about a luxury, within a luxury, within a luxury.

So my original point still stands, the whole medium is a luxury, gaming as a whole is a niche if you contextualize it, no game has managed to sell even 1 billion copies yet and we have 7 billion people on the planet, assuming one person a copy yeah gaming is a niche.

It may be hard for you to even understand how good we have it these days unless you visited destitute countries or being through very hard times, not that is your fault or anything, but it does paint my perspective. So calling a niche physical game market a luxury when our whole existence is a luxury in the west right now, feels hollow to me.

I don't see any difference or any excuse, in AAA publishers, that use similar excuses to do the stuff they do by the way, or a small time publisher catering to an even smaller audience niche.

I don't think the scale of of it makes it OK, and unless I have their books and their profit margins I don't know if they are doing the best they can (maybe a bit incompetently) or they are laughing their way to the bank on your, and mine expense.

But I would never take the side of a corporate entity over my own, even if they are provably right, because its us, versus them. And I reserve my emotional attachments for real things, in real life.

They want to sell us a bottle of air for a million dollars, we want (or should want) a mansion for one dollar, hopefully we meet somewhere in the middle and we're both happy. But sometimes, things go over towards the one side, and over the other. And if that side is opposite to my own, I want to bring things closer back to mine.

I certainly hope you've never sold an old SNES game for more than $60-80 (depending on the title); selling Earthbound for $200 or whatever it goes for now is scalping.

I actually never sold any game I bought ever, which makes me a rarity (especially being poor to begin with), but yeah I never 'scalped' anybody, by any definition (well in gaming anyway) and I think equating basically retail supply chain and scalping, is, well not worthy of a further response really.

Now, let me float an idea to you. What if they made pre-orders unlimited within a two week window, but people at the tail who fall into a partial batch can have their preorder cancelled and their money refunded (e.g. 1000 manufacturing batch size, 2500 people preorder, the first 2000 get their item and the last 500 get a refund)? Would that be a better solution for you?

Yes, that's actually pretty great and is one of the solutions I thought about myself.

It limits the loss to lets say 500 people per game, and the slowest ones to pre-order at that. Better than the potentially thousands of people getting screwed over now. And as long as people know this going in with an active pre-order counter it would help make it more fair, if you caught on an under 500 interval you know you may miss out if more people don't order after you.

Is not perfect, but I think is better in what they do now.

Or they could actually be like any other business that doesn't have to sell out on pre-orders and actually hold on 999 copies (maximum) of the game on their store for later sales, there's also that.

Look, I could have picked apart other parts of your post, but I know how these quote to quote forum circular arguments go, been there, done that.

It is obvious to me that you have a corporate axe to grind and previous frustrations with the issue (either defending corporations in general or LRG in particular) so I will boil down everything to the upcoming points.

You seem to care about their solvency and bottom line, I don't. I don't share in on their profits and they don't offer a service that's up to my standards, and I don't project my own business interests onto them, because we are not the same.

Mostly, because if I pulled off the crap gaming companies (big or small) get away with in other industries I would be quickly out of business since people are not emotionally attached to their toilet papers or brick makers or whatever, like they are for some reason to gaming companies.

Second, and this is a very common thing I hear from cooperate zealots (not saying you are one by the way, just to be clear) I'm not whining, or even complaining, I'm fighting.

I hate being submissive, I hate taking things as they stand, I seek to change them if they are harmful to me, that's called fighting.

Now to be clear, as a consumer advocate my fighting takes place in two fronts.

1. Call out the bullshit, that's what you would call the petulant child part. Sorry I don't like something I call it out, I don't magically expect them to change by the way, I just point out if something is wrong and why I think is wrong, I leave number 2 and people to make their own decisions on what they want to do or if they even agree or not. The whole idea is to make things better for the consumer, not force them to do anything.

Not to point things out is being submissive as far as am concerned. I can't forcibly change anything nor do I want to, but I'll make sure to let everyone know about it, and they can make their own minds, even if what they pick is against their own interests and my own.

2. I vote with my wallet. I will not support bad business practices (bad for me, not them, I don't care about them) and I will use whatever little purchasing power I got to guide my purchases towards fair and even transactions and will urge everybody else to do the same.

The economic realities you were talking about, the things about the company you know, is what they themselves presented about them, as if people don't lie, if it is to their benefit or just for the heck of it to be honest.

Ultimately, is it so bad to want people to have a fair chance at buying a product that has no reasonable limit in manufacture? A reasonable chance at that and not less than a minute?

But I know this company is purposefully limiting production beyond the limit that it has to, to manipulate compulsive people who are most collector's, let's be honest now , I'm one of them.

Because of things like the trading cards they got, bundles of multiple copies of the same game in different systems (because reasonable, not compulsive people buy the same game thrice at once) and most importantly, because they have no limit in their normal releases now, while the used to, and their Limited Editions have the normal copies along of some extra goodies that can be manufactured anywhere and in different amounts (like in increments of 100 instead of 1000) because they are not games from specific game companies. And are probably assembled domestically.

And I know this, because this is a practice (artificial scarcity) that done industry wide, is part of the reason why the Wii, Amiibo and the NES Mini were successful as they were (though I honestly think the Wii scarcity in particular wasn't purposeful, just fortunate happenstance).

And I know this because profiting of collector's with Limited Editions even with new IP's is an industry wide practice also.

And I also know that when you do production runs you always order a bit extra, because you have to replace faulty copies or copies that get damaged in shipping, so the strict increment is either poppycock or you are dealing with bad customer service.

And I'm somehow supposed to put up with this crap, as if I wasn't alive during a time, when I paid $60 got to keep a game forever with no DLC, limited fluff (mostly) and a definitive edition coming out the next year. And I didn't have to stay awake after a hard day during the early morning hours, so I could have less than a minute to buy something made mostly out of plastic and paper that could be printed out by the truckload.

Well sorry, but I chose to fight, in the way I described it before, you don't like it too bad (well you could ban me so you don't ever have hear from me here, though I'll still rave about it elsewhere til I drop dead), you want to argue about it some more, sure, but please take some of the emotion out if, you carry baggage from other conversations you had on the subject, and you have certain preconceptions I think.

I urge you to vote with your wallet and if you satisfied with what they do despite my points keep giving them money, I won't. But that's OK we don't have to agree on everything, or anything really.

[BogusMeatFactory]

I love hearing a person say that people who manufacture a physical cartridge, box and collectors materials are not making anything.

[Gunstar Green]

Most developers that use stuff like Limited Run don't tend to have large publishers behind them and can't afford large manufacturing runs, especially on niche games. It's literally called "Limited Run." Not "Everybody Gets One." Yes it's aimed at the collector's market. That's the entire point, because who else wants to buy a physical copy of a game in 2019? It gets even more complex when you involve consoles which all have their own rules regarding publishing.

By all means vote with your wallet but as long as they sell the full number they produce they've already made their intended profit. That's the entire point of producing a limited number, to reduce the risk of printing physical copies for a niche audience. If there's enough demand occasionally there will be another run but I think you're grossly overestimating the demand and not understanding how difficult it is to meet it exactly without financial risk.

[MrPopo]

My baggage, so to speak, is people like you who feel they are entitled to things, even if it hurts others. You deserve to order this item at any time even if the opportunity cost for a company to make that available to you puts them out of business, laying off an entire workforce. You gotta have your special toy. Your continued refusal to acknowledge that running a company is hard, and has a ton of logistical challenges that need to be managed, is irritating. And your self righteous indignation of "I'm fighting for justice!" is infantile.

You also keep tossing around "anti-consumer", except to you the definition is "things I don't like as a consumer", which is not what that word means. You have an incredibly high degree of entitlement, and it's baffling to you that you can't get something. Guess what, not everyone can get everything. That's just the way the world works. LRG, like all companies, is in the business of making money, and they've decided the best way is to do limited runs (the LR in their name) of games (the G in their name) in order to have a high margin per unit sold and keep inventory low. That business model apparently means it's hard for you, personally, to get one of their games. That doesn't make it a bad business model. Hell, the fact they continuously are able to sell out runs shows it's a great business model. And you seem to discount the cost of holding inventory and selling it piecemeal later. But I'm not surprised; it's inconvenient when facts get in the way of your desires.

And I also laugh at your good old days reminiscing. Because I remember those days too, except in those days games shipped with breaking bugs that were unfixable, you had to hope the Toys R Us got the game you wanted in stock and someone didn't buy it out before you (and if you don't think a shopping rush was a thing you never saw the holiday season) and Street Fighter II laughs at your idea of a definitive edition. We also had DLC back then as well; it was called expansion packs and many of them were far worse values than today's DLC.

Here's the thing though, I don't care if you don't want to give a company money. Just don't make those decisions on ignorance and delusions.

[ElkinFencer10]

Hey ass hole, not only is the term "gypped" racist as shit, but you can't even spell your racism correctly.

[Arenegeth]

I was gonna write another long reply, but by your post is clear to me that your entire thesis, and emotional outburst is based on projection, which is sad to me but what can you do.

Here's some clarifications though.

I don't 'fight for justice' my interests are self serving and I'm not ashamed about that, well not any more than any company is in making money anyway.

This is not a 'go out of business' or gip the consumer paradigm. They can make less profit without going out of business and the consumer can get a better service.

Well I got my special toy, though I don't need it, pity on those who missed out though. But anyway, I don't need their stuff, I don't like their practices and as I mentioned already I will not be supporting them again since I think they're purposefully preying on compulsive behavior, similar to mobile games and whales, only in a different front.

But Mr.Popo you seem to almost have loathing for me, you don't even know me dude, you didn't even give me a chance to give a more nuanced perspective on my opinion, since you pounced on me on a venting sleep deprived post and our interaction was too combative from the start.

But no hard feelings.

But just for future reference, is not healthy to project so much, is like you having 100 different arguments with 1000 different people, and talking about workers an running businesses as if your personal experience has anything to do with LRG, they are not you and you are not them, you are you and unless you are in gaming, heck even if you are, one business is not run like another.

Hey ass hole, not only is the term "gypped" racist as shit, but you can't even spell your racism correctly.

Eh, English is not my first language mate, I thought gipped meant this, not sure which race the insult is supposed to be referring to... Though looking at my link, is gypsy? Is gypsy even a race? Isn't it an ethnicity?

You are right about misspelling it though I fixed it in this post.

[Gunstar Green]

The Romani are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group and "gypped" is racist slang, yes. Just say "ripped off" in the future or something. It's no different than calling a greedy person a Jew. Don't.

But I believe you that you were ignorant of the etymology due to misspelling it in the first place.

[Arenegeth]

The Romani are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group and "gypped" is racist slang, yes. Just say "ripped off" in the future or something. It's no different than calling a greedy person a Jew. Don't.

But I believe you that you were ignorant of the etymology due to misspelling it in the first place.

Most of my colloquialisms are picked up from movies and TV, since I didn't have any formal education, so blame Hollywood I suppose.

Swindle would be a better replacement I think.

But I only see racism in intent, not words or sounds, and I'm against political correctness, still better not to use it around Americans at least, since it can be misconstrued, I forget how racially sensitive you are.

I think it rolls off the tongue better than Swindle, but I can at least type that right.