Why would you pay for gamenews sites?

[Tyjenks]

I simply do not understand how this is ever going to work. It will certainly never be an option for me. Are there so few sites with gaming news that I should be forced to pay for the same story by some guy who has just re-written from a press release in his/her own words like we did in 8th grade?

IGN has had this for a while and Gamespot just started with theirs. You pay for your super-special membership and get some extra screenshots and get to read game reviews that are sooooooo insightful that they are deserving of my hard earned cash.

I never thought either one of these outlets were that wonderful to begin with and there is no way in Hell (or the 95 degree 95% humidity here in B'ham) I am going to pay even a nickel for said crap.


1. You can see plenty of the same info on fifty other sites.

B. Present company excepted, a lot of the reviews are written by people with as much writing skill and experience as a monkey or, well, me.

III. Much better information, reviews, and links to other game related materials can be gleaned from places like this....message boards for the games themselves and free sites.


I realize it costs money and more importantly time to run quality sites and that may be one reason that good sites (and by good I mean not written for 14-year-olds with endless cash and endless boners) such as Qt3, OMM, et.al. suffer from lack of updates on occasion(and by on occasion I mean months on end :wink: ). I also realize money is a greater incentive for folks with jobs and families rather than just the immense thrill you must get from running a website of your very own!

MY point or I guess question is this:


Are all sites going to eventually sort into (1) pay for the good stuff sites and (2)posts-of-links-to-wire-report sites?


Because right now we have approx. 1 million alternatives to the pay for content rackets.

Maybe you get free porn passwords with membership, but, hell, you can get plenty of free porn if you know where to look, too.

Maybe Touchstone is finally shelling out big bucks for banner ads and you guys will not have to start charging us to post nonsensical, ramblings like mine.

[Sean Tudor]

I would pay for two websites :

Quarter To Three
SimHQ

But everyone has their own favourite websites that they would pay for if pushed. I have not felt compelled to pay for GameSpot as I still use Adrenaline Vault and GameSpy and both of these sites are still free.

Although I suspect Adrenaline Vault will shortly introduce a premium service with pay content. GameSpy can't be far behind.

[Jason Cross]

I would pay a small amount for a games website, just not for any of the ones that are out there right now.

The regular content they have isn't good enough, and the exclusive stuff doesn't really seem any better - just bigger files.

I think $5 a month would be my limit, though. It still has that insurmountable metal hurdle of me not recieving anything physical for my dollar. It's harder for me to accept paying for something I have to be tethered to my computer to use, and only really exists out there on the ether of the 'net, where I just might not have access to it for reasons beyond my control. It's similar to the metal hurdle with things like Valve's Steam thing.

My main issue is this: websites are not so much good for their "content" so much as their "information." It's hard to seperate the two, but the information quickly becomes a general commodety as it's spread around to every other free website in the world. So I wouldn't pay for the info. But if the way the info was presented was good enough (consistently great writing, consistently interesting videos/music/audio interviews/etc.), that's something all the free sites couldn't steal and spread around, and I might pay for it.

Right now, none of the game websites give me that. At least not to the degree and with the consistancy that I would pay for it.

[Brad Grenz]

I've got a subscription to Gamespot Complete. Frankly, the world of free gaming websites today isn't nearly as rosy as it once was. Even the clipboard sites are waning (VE, Gaming Groove). I would never pay for a site like IGN of Gamespy whose intrusive use of advertisments in their free content has simply driven me away. But the free version of Gamespot is far less offensive and I think their content is worthwhile. I'm not as disenchanted with their writers as some crybabies are and I enjoy their videoreviews. Demo downloads is a plus too, though 3Dgamers is still free.

The unfortunate thing is there are smaller sites that just provide too little content for me to justify spending money on, but which I love. I'd gladly pay a modest amount monthly to support a network of sites that included stuff like Penny Arcade, GIA (rip), QT3...

It's funny, cause I have trouble justifying the price of a gaming magazine these days too. Most PC ones demand an obscene amount of money for cover discs filled with demos I downloaded 2 months ago. Next Generation, which I did subscribe to, died.

[Murph]

This site is the only one I would dream of paying for, because it's got that "special something" that I haven't found anywhere else.

But I wouldn't pay much for it, either. I'm sort of philosophically opposed to the idea, so it would have to be such a small amount that I literally wouldn't notice it.

[Jason Becker]

Hmm out of 20 votes recorded so far I'm the only one who picked the Free porn one...

[Murph]

The rest of us already have all the free porn we need. :wink:

[Sean Tudor]

Hmm out of 20 votes recorded so far I'm the only one who picked the Free porn one...

Well if all you want is free porn Jason then ...

http://www.thehun.net/

That should keep you busy for a while.

:twisted:

[Anders Hallin]

Free porn is easy to find these days :)
In a report a few weeks ago they had done a survey (or something) to find out how much people in different countries surf for porn and Sweden was quite a bit down on the list, with Spain topping, I think. I directly attribute the comparatively low number in Sweden to the fact that free6.com started as a Swedish site, thereby directly decreasing the amount of time needed to find the sought-after porn in question.

[Dave Long]

I'm one of the complete idiots that already pays for IGN. I did it initially to get unlimited access to their QuickTime-based console game movies. I'm finding they have some decent Insider content that's fun to read including a weekly report from Japan and some other good feature articles.

It's cool that people don't dig it. I'm finding my money is well spent. Maybe that's because I spend as much time reading about the consoles as I do PC games and gaming?

--Dave

[Tyjenks]

I guess the complete idiot line may have been a little heavy handed. I really just wanted to get some dialog going from you folks that do subscribe and if it is worth it. I am glad it is not a total scam on the poor uninformed masses.

I, for one, do not have time to read all the free stuff I want to. If I was more involved with console imports or cared more about what was coming out of Japan, I would probably take a second look. Every time I see what is coming out over there it is usually some amazingly original idea or a wonderful strategy title which is not going to hit U.S. shores or will be here 2 years after the Japanese release.

It is like going to the movies, seeing a great preview, and then see that it is coming out summer 2005.

I have the same problem with PC previews that gush over a game in development, that will be delayed for another year after it's projected release date, and in several cases may get vaporized completely and never see the light of day (Guardians: Agents of Justice, Dreamland for the PS2, etc. :cry: ).

All that being said, maybe your just a moron and not a complete idiot. :wink:

[Mark Asher]

"It's cool that people don't dig it. I'm finding my money is well spent. Maybe that's because I spend as much time reading about the consoles as I do PC games and gaming?"

It's just difficult to start paying when I'm used to it being free. I also find that I read less and less about individual titles anyway. I'm keenly interested in playing World of Warcraft, for example, but I'd rather just wait for the game to be available than read about it beforehand.

CNET's stock price is down to $1.59, btw. They are really hurting. I expect they will undergo another round or two of layoffs before the year is done. They may not be able to operate profitably at their current size. It's possible that web-only publishers may need to be small to be profitable.

[Chris Floyd]

Small and profitable like Quarter to Three, right? Wes Anderson's gotta cut you guys some big checks for that EXCLUSIVE ad space!

[Dave Long]

It's just difficult to start paying when I'm used to it being free.

I'd rather pay than have those movies go away altogether. I like being able to see games in motion and that one $5 fee a month lets me see just about every game released on consoles in motion. If I didn't pay it, I could still view stuff but I kept bumping into their 5 movies a day limit and being unsatisfied. On top of that, $5 is still less than the cost of a single Blockbuster game rental.

We're basically down to two big games sites IMO, Gamespot and IGN. I so rarely go to Games Domain for anything and Adrenaline Vault has always rubbed me the wrong way. I suppose Gamespy is ok but I can't stand how long it takes to load the site and then it's filled with ads once you get it on your screen.

So I pay for IGN and get my hardcore gaming fix from this messageboard and site while surfing the best of the fan sites for the rest of my needs. Xengamers is OK, Gameforms isn't The GIA but it's cool, RPGFan has decent Japanese RPG news, Magic Box is great for Japan news, PlanetGamecube I visit daily and then I bounce around some forums. G4 actually has a decent one of those.

Still, the IGN sub gets me a lot of good stuff and the unfettered access to movies (which they post daily), is the biggest draw. I still visit Gamespot BTW... their free reviews for the first seven days gives me no incentive to pay for their service. The stuff is still free when I'm interested in it. I can't figure out why they only charge after no one cares?

--Dave

[Mark Asher]

Gamespot is obviously worried about losing readership if they lock a review right away.

I like seeing streaming video of games, but not enough to pay for it. Frankly, the game companies should host that stuff. At least they could write off their bandwidth cost as a promotional expense.

I can still get a lot of video for free on Gamespy too. I just have to get in queue.

[DTG]

I don't mind giving Wargamer $10 every 6 months or so.

I won't pay for Gamespot - I don't care about the downloads or videos - I get CGW and CGM, and the CDs include any beefy files I want. I think subscribers to CGW should get Gamespot complete as well, but I guess that's just me. I remember subscribing to Gamespots's Gameguides a few years back, and they threw in the mag for free - - didn't they get into trouble for charging for those gameguides?

[Desslock]

>I think subscribers to CGW should get Gamespot complete as well, but I guess that's just me.

It's a good idea, but GameSpot and CGW are no longer affiliated in any way.

>I remember subscribing to Gamespots's Gameguides a few years back, and they threw in the mag for free - - didn't they get into trouble for charging for those gameguides?

No, they just decided not to focus on them as much. They're back now, however, and only part of GameSpot Complete.

Stefan

[Tyjenks]

Thank you all for your comments and votes.

I feel validated.

[algahar]

the internet contents started out free, and now u want to charge people for them ? its doomed to failure... unless all the dotcoms in the world suddenly think its no longer possible to provide anything for free. even my stupid celebrity shrine page is charging 2 pennies per page view. then ya maybe people would, very unwillingly, put down their credit card info.