Are we spoiled by long games?

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Mevvem

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Edited By Mevvem

Just feeling that no matter where i go i'm hearing stuff about, "Man, i shount have spendt 600NOK (85,5$)on that game! it was over in 8 hours!". But seriously, take Cod 4 as the perfect example, ok, most people buy it for the online part. I havent been so fortunate due to a crappy ISP provider. but i bought it, played the singleplayer and it was SO worth it! It was damn short, but oh man, so many epic moments, and it wins on the same points as the movie Crank, for those of you who have seen it. It just never stopts throwing action in your face untill its over. So lets put a price on constatnt entertainment.

We have one movie and one game, CoD 4 (wich i spendt about 9h on (yeah, i got stuck by the stupid bumpercars :P )
and crank, at 1h27min to be exact. Crank's fullprice was 179,90(25,6$) and cod 4 was 599,90(85,5$).
I will do this small calculation in dollars for you:

Cranks price: 25,6, divided by playtime: 87minutes gives you 0,29$ of entertainment per minute.
CoD4's price 85,5 divided by playtime 540minutes gives you 0,16$ of entertainment per minute.

SO as you can see, a "short" videogame is alot cheaper than a fullprice movie. the game has to be 4 hours or shorter for it to be more expencive. Think about that before you start complaining about not getting your moneys worth in videogames.

And by the way, i find the shelf of games that i actually have completed alot more appealing to look at than the ones i havent completed.

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Mevvem

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#1  Edited By Mevvem

Just feeling that no matter where i go i'm hearing stuff about, "Man, i shount have spendt 600NOK (85,5$)on that game! it was over in 8 hours!". But seriously, take Cod 4 as the perfect example, ok, most people buy it for the online part. I havent been so fortunate due to a crappy ISP provider. but i bought it, played the singleplayer and it was SO worth it! It was damn short, but oh man, so many epic moments, and it wins on the same points as the movie Crank, for those of you who have seen it. It just never stopts throwing action in your face untill its over. So lets put a price on constatnt entertainment.

We have one movie and one game, CoD 4 (wich i spendt about 9h on (yeah, i got stuck by the stupid bumpercars :P )
and crank, at 1h27min to be exact. Crank's fullprice was 179,90(25,6$) and cod 4 was 599,90(85,5$).
I will do this small calculation in dollars for you:

Cranks price: 25,6, divided by playtime: 87minutes gives you 0,29$ of entertainment per minute.
CoD4's price 85,5 divided by playtime 540minutes gives you 0,16$ of entertainment per minute.

SO as you can see, a "short" videogame is alot cheaper than a fullprice movie. the game has to be 4 hours or shorter for it to be more expencive. Think about that before you start complaining about not getting your moneys worth in videogames.

And by the way, i find the shelf of games that i actually have completed alot more appealing to look at than the ones i havent completed.

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JoelTGM

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#2  Edited By JoelTGM

When I buy a video game, it's not for a few days of fun, I want to have fun for weeks or more.  If I put the game away after a few days I will be left to think about that money I lost.  If the game can be beat in a few days then I rent it.  If it has good multiplayer then I buy it.  If it's like Oblivion where I spend a couple hundred hours on it then it's totally worth every penny.  We're paying more than we should have to anyway, well as a console gamer I am.

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Mevvem

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#3  Edited By Mevvem

But, ok, now we don't have videogame rentals in norway, and i don't know the standard "new game, and movie price" in the states (would be intresting if i could have that by the way), but it seems to me that it has leveled out. Ofcource, games like Oblivion, Forza 2 etc does give you more bang for the buck, but still, is it really something to complain about when the average entertainment value per minute is under half the price of a movie? (ok, i know some of you download movies and don't pay a penny for that, but remember, piracy is stealing etc etc. Hehe)

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StaticFalconar

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#4  Edited By StaticFalconar

how ever "long" a game really is, it doesn't matter if you spend 50+ hours on it. Whether you play the 5 hours of short gameplay 10 times over or just do 50 hours multi, as long as you spend about 50 hours or so and was entertained through-out most of it, then yes; the short and long games are worth it.

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Shadow

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#5  Edited By Shadow

........what?   I mean I agree but your logic is wierd.

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Red

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#6  Edited By Red

No. No we aren't. I'm paying $60 for a game, unless the entertainment is really good if I'm practically paying $10 an hour to play a game then why don't I just go see a movie? Plus, dude, anyone who calls CoD4 short and doesn't play the Online mode should just die.

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ArchScabby

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#7  Edited By ArchScabby

I actually restarted my gamefly account because I didn't want to pay $60 for a game that I would only play once and was pretty short like dead space.  (Even though I loved it)  So now I use gamefly for most shorter single player games, and buy bigger games like rpg's and open word games or games that have a good mulitplayer.

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Mevvem

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#8  Edited By Mevvem

Red: I called the singleplayer mode fairly short, i have played the online part, and i love it, but as i quite clearly stated my ISP has blocked the ports for playing online. So in case you didn't get it i was talking about the singleplayer. But thank you :P

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Shinryu

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#9  Edited By Shinryu

No we are not spoiled.

£40 - £50 for a brand new game is NOT cheap and for an 8 hour game would be very frustrating especially in times of reccession. Hence why i rent most of the shorter games i want to play.

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Rowr

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#10  Edited By Rowr

80 hours of meh?

or 5 hours of awesome?

game length means almost nothing, depending on whats being charged.

Its all about what you get out of it.

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ArchScabby

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#11  Edited By ArchScabby
Rowr said:
"80 hours of meh?

or 5 hours of awesome?

game length means almost nothing, depending on whats being charged.

Its all about what you get out of it.
"
Most people don't see it like that.  Apparently they would rather spend 90 percent of the time just walking from one location to the other while doing nothing in between just because it makes the game longer.
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Hdfisise

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#12  Edited By Hdfisise

I actually prefer shorter games as they are way easier to fit into my lifestyle, for example I finished Mirrors Edge easily but I still have to finish Last Remnant despite owning it for like a month.

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Rowr

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#13  Edited By Rowr
ArchScabby said:
"Rowr said:
"80 hours of meh?

or 5 hours of awesome?

game length means almost nothing, depending on whats being charged.

Its all about what you get out of it.
"
Most people don't see it like that.  Apparently they would rather spend 90 percent of the time just walking from one location to the other while doing nothing in between just because it makes the game longer."
its all well and good when you havent seen the same mechanic in the same 30 games.

one pet peeve is when developers try and increase game length using difficulty, or useless ocd collectables.
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starhawk

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#14  Edited By starhawk

Rowr said:

"80 hours of meh?

or 5 hours of awesome?

game length means almost nothing, depending on whats being charged.

Its all about what you get out of it.
"


I agree with this pretty much.   I think a true sign of a great game is one you actually feel like going back to again and again over time, regardless of how long it takes you to beat it.  However, I do think there is a sweet spot for single player game length, depending on the genre, and if a game falls below it it can feel too short and become a genuine fault(Beyond Good and Evil is one example I can think of that I played...great game, too short for a platformer/story-driven game).

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Mevvem

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#15  Edited By Mevvem
Rowr said:
"80 hours of meh?

or 5 hours of awesome?

game length means almost nothing, depending on whats being charged.

Its all about what you get out of it.
"

So true!