How much do you feel Virtual Console games should cost?

[MSI Magus]

Personaly I think that with how easy it is to get roms they need to be cheap or people simply will not care even if rumors of playing them on our DS's come true. These are the prices I think are most fair.

NES/Master System Era or older Games - $0.50-$2.00
SNES/Genesis Era titles - $1.00-$6.00
N64/Playstation Era - $2.00-$10.00

I think this pricing is fair. Alot of games are just ok and still common on ebay for cheap so I dont feel most should cost that much. However, some games are rather difficult to find and are great games so with those ones I dont mind paying a few extra bucks.

[MarioColbert]

Your price scheme is right, although I feel that in reality it will be in the upper register of your proposed prices. I have no problem picturing NES games running you a dollar.

[yukine]

$5.00 for N64 games, $2.00 for SNES, and $1.00 for NES. I'd pick up a ton of games if the price scheme is more like that.

[Ecofreak]

I expect the prices to be higher, but balanced out by Nintendo giving away free downloads for game and peripheral purchases. Maybe 2-3 free downloads depending on the price of the item, along with seasonal sales.

[lordwow]

I'd expect 10/6/4

[lionheart4life]

$5.00 for N64 games, $2.00 for SNES, and $1.00 for NES. I'd pick up a ton of games if the price scheme is more like that.

That's the only price I'd really consider getting anything at. If they cost any more without any type of improvements it wouldn't be very hard to get a physical copy of the game for about the same price. Hopefully they will have a better D-pad for the Wii than GC, because that one sucked for playing the old Zelda games.

[dcfox]

$1 - $5 for NES

$2 - $10 for SNES

$5 - $15 for N64

[alongx]

$5.00 for N64 games, $2.00 for SNES, and $1.00 for NES. I'd pick up a ton of games if the price scheme is more like that.

At those prices, I'd buy a ton. At any more, there'd be very little I'd be willing to pay for.

[Kayden]

This is Nintendo people. The only thing they make cheap is consoles.

NES games will be $5.
SNES $10
N64 $15


However, seeing how this actually costs them nothing more than bandwidth, I'd say thats all we should be expected to pay.

[Americanpierg]

This is Nintendo people. The only thing they make cheap is consoles.

NES games will be $5.
SNES $10
N64 $15


However, seeing how this actually costs them nothing more than bandwidth, I'd say thats all we should be expected to pay.

NES games will be $15.
SNES $20
N64 $25
Gamecube $5.50

i win

[Follandboy]

I will not be buying any N64 games for more that $3.00

[Americanpierg]

I will not be buying any N64 games for more that $3.00

uno costs 5 bucks but yet star fox 64 doesnt warrant $3.01? true cheapass right there

[Kayden]

uno costs 5 bucks but yet star fox 64 doesnt warrant $3.01? true cheapass right there

:drool: *runs to n64 for ST64 goodness*

[MSI Magus]

This is Nintendo people. The only thing they make cheap is consoles.

NES games will be $5.
SNES $10
N64 $15


However, seeing how this actually costs them nothing more than bandwidth, I'd say thats all we should be expected to pay.


Thats very true so games may be very expensive. However, Nintendo also has a smart bussiness sense so that may keep prices down. Really, this is a tough issue to decide a price on. Hopefully Nintendo is smart enough to realize nobody is going to pay $15 for a virtual game when they can buy a REAL and complete copy for $10 on ebay.

Someone raised a good point saying that Nintendo will probally offer these games as a prize with games and other promos such as Nintendo power too.

[epobirs]

$1 - $5 for NES

$2 - $10 for SNES

$5 - $15 for N64

This is the most realistic range I've seen posted, although the minimums for 8 and 16-bit will probably be higher. Considering that ported SNES and N64 games do very good business on the GBA and DS respectively at full prices, the incentive to lowball these propoerties isn't very strong.

There is far more here than bandwidth to consider. The ongoing value of the IP is very important to all of the companies involved. If it is sold too cheaply the effect is permanent. In some cases it's better to set the price high and invent a discount to bring it to consumers at the price they'll really pay.

For instance, the NES Classics line at the original $20 list price. The amount of ROM data space used was less than one really good texture in a GameCube game. At $20 these were extremely profitable. If they sold. At $10 they were still profitable and that is where the big volume kicked in. The sales at $10 were more profitable than the lesser amount of sales at twice that price and Nintendo surely didn't have any illusions about what most people would actually pay. However, starting at $20 gave the illusion that a $10 price was a bargain rather than what it should have been all along.

So don't be surprised if Virtual Console games list a bit high but with frequently available discounts on some sort of earned points system. We may see ingame points earning ala Xbox Live and more for registering game purchases, which would just be an extension of their existing incentives program.

[epobirs]

Thats very true so games may be very expensive. However, Nintendo also has a smart bussiness sense so that may keep prices down. Really, this is a tough issue to decide a price on. Hopefully Nintendo is smart enough to realize nobody is going to pay $15 for a virtual game when they can buy a REAL and complete copy for $10 on ebay.

Someone raised a good point saying that Nintendo will probally offer these games as a prize with games and other promos such as Nintendo power too.

Just about every SNES port that has sold millions on the GBA was available cheaper in the original form. But that requires also having the original hardware, the space for it, and the space for the bulk of the older games vs. their newer editions.

One of the reasons I'm liquidating my SNES and Sega 16-bit stuff (including Sega CD and 32X) is that I no longer have room to have all the machines setup and certainly not for the many cubic feet of space their libraries consume. The Wii means being able to have continuing access to most of the games from that era I really want to play again at a decent price while consuming so little space in my home as to not matter. The Wii replaces the GameCube by the TV and in the process also replaces not only the SNES and Sega Genesis plus add-ons stack, it also reduces the libraries for those to a few SD cards.

Giving 30-something guys a way to relive the gaming of their youth without pissing off the wife with clutter has a fair amount of value. The same applies to much younger gamers who'd like to try a lot of those classics but are also limited by the clutter issue.

[keithp]

Thats very true so games may be very expensive. However, Nintendo also has a smart bussiness sense so that may keep prices down. Really, this is a tough issue to decide a price on. Hopefully Nintendo is smart enough to realize nobody is going to pay $15 for a virtual game when they can buy a REAL and complete copy for $10 on ebay.

One word that explains why Nintendo will charge higher prices than people are listing here:

Convenience.

Yeah, you can find cheap ROMs off Ebay if you want, but when you want to play a game and you have a choice of finding it on Ebay, waiting for the auction to end or buying it now, sending payment, waiting for the game to show up,

-OR-

just downloading it with the VC and BAM! you're playing in the next 5 minutes, which do you think most non-CheapAssGamers will pick?

Nintendo knows alot of people are lazy or impatient, and will gladly pay more for the convenience of downloading right now.

[jonlubbe]

I predict a gamefly style pricing structure.. 10 a month for X downloads.

That is just my prediction

[mykevermin]

I want to agree with epobirs. I don't expect these to sell for that cheap. I'd look to see something on par with XBLA: How much is Gauntlet? $5 in points? Well, if people are buying that, why would Nintendo charge $1 for an NES/SNES title that they could get $5 for?

Now, while I want to agree, part of the problem is that, while people bought NES Classics, I have to wonder if the VC is not going to be struggling against "hard" software sales, but serving as a reliable and legal alternative to emulation. It works for iTunes, but that's because the price is right. Should they highball the price because it will make them money, or will they feel compelled to sap some money out of the "emulation" market, who've been pirating this and that for years?

[wbc1228]

NES/Master System Era or older Games - $3-5
SNES/Genesis Era titles - $5-10
N64/ - $5-10
Playstation - $5-20

[MSI Magus]

One word that explains why Nintendo will charge higher prices than people are listing here:

Convenience.

Yeah, you can find cheap ROMs off Ebay if you want, but when you want to play a game and you have a choice of finding it on Ebay, waiting for the auction to end or buying it now, sending payment, waiting for the game to show up,

-OR-

just downloading it with the VC and BAM! you're playing in the next 5 minutes, which do you think most non-CheapAssGamers will pick?

Nintendo knows alot of people are lazy or impatient, and will gladly pay more for the convenience of downloading right now.

Disagree. Think more people are about the cheapeness. If you tell people you can have these four games for $40 today or wait a week and having them for $18 bet most people would save the $28.

[Aleryn]

Personaly I think that with how easy it is to get roms they need to be cheap or people simply will not care even if rumors of playing them on our DS's come true. These are the prices I think are most fair.

NES/Master System Era or older Games - $0.50-$2.00
SNES/Genesis Era titles - $1.00-$6.00
N64/Playstation Era - $2.00-$10.00

I think this pricing is fair. Alot of games are just ok and still common on ebay for cheap so I dont feel most should cost that much. However, some games are rather difficult to find and are great games so with those ones I dont mind paying a few extra bucks.

Sounds good! I'd pay those rates.

[epobirs]

NES/Master System Era or older Games - $3-5
SNES/Genesis Era titles - $5-10
N64/ - $5-10
Playstation - $5-20

Somehow, I don't think there is any need for Playstation pricing. I could be wrong but my instincts tell me we won't be seeing a lot of commercial emulation of Sony platforms on non-Sony platforms.

[epobirs]

I predict a gamefly style pricing structure.. 10 a month for X downloads.

That is just my prediction

Possible. There could also be a choice of methods, allowing subscriptions and outright purchases to be mixed.

[yukine]

Possible. There could also be a choice of methods, allowing subscriptions and outright purchases to be mixed.
I'd personally prefer to see the virtual console games to be subscription based. Remember the Sega Channel? Man, that was an awesome service.

[Sarang01]

I'd personally prefer to see the virtual console games to be subscription based. Remember the Sega Channel? Man, that was an awesome service.

Fuck that. Some games I want to own. Sin & Punishment, Ogre Battle 64 and the Enix Trilogy come to mind. However with every single one of these download I want art and other Omake with it. Little extras go a long way and I like to read the history.
SNES/TG-$3-10
NES-$1-5
Genesis-$1-5.

I also want to see VC exclusives like Treasure Hunter G from Square. It's about time they STOP being assholes and treating it like the Black Sheep of the family. The whole Romancing Saga series from the SNES would be nice as well. I also think RS on the VC would be Square's smartest bet to sell it off here since most of the Saga games haven't done well here although I liked Saga Frontier.

[Americanpierg]

Somehow, I don't think there is any need for Playstation pricing. I could be wrong but my instincts tell me we won't be seeing a lot of commercial emulation of Sony platforms on non-Sony platforms.

whys that? bleam was successful at legal emulation of the sony playstation. The problem here isnt if sony will allow, but its if nintendo will allow, which it certainly will not.

[Sarang01]

The funniest thing was why Sony bitched about it American. In essence Bleem would've been ideal for Sony if Sony had bitten the bullet and given them legal rights to use the copyright restriction crap for the PS. Think about it, people had to use a hard copy of the game, just make it have to be a bought one then Sony doesn't even have to sell systems, all profit, no loss from selling the systems.

[Michaellvortega]

I still have a copy of bleem, at the time playing Gran Turismo on my pc was CRAZY! I will pay no more then $5 a game no matter what unless it has be altered to include Online multiplayer or a lot of new content.

[pimpinc333]

Hopefully they start something along the lines of "Buy such and such game and recieve 2 free virtual console downloads. Or give us free downloads for registering our game and systems at nintendo.com. That would be cool.

[Kaijufan]

I hope to see $.99 for NES games, $1.99 for SNES games, and $2.99-$3.99 for N64.

[video_gamer324]

I think it's reasonable to expect a $5/$10/$15 pricing scheme for NES/SNES/N64 games. Nintendo knows that practically all of the virtual console games can be downloaded for free as ROM's, but they also know that gamers will pay for the luxury of being able to play the games on a TV screen with a controller instead of on a computer monitor with a keyboard. I also expect to see some games sold in bundles rather than individually, especially lesser-known titles that probably wouldn't sell by themselves.

[wbc1228]

Somehow, I don't think there is any need for Playstation pricing. I could be wrong but my instincts tell me we won't be seeing a lot of commercial emulation of Sony platforms on non-Sony platforms.

Sorry about that, didn't mean to confuse anyone.
Guess I got too happy and broke up the info from the 1st post.
I agree with you that the possibility that we'll be seeing sony games on the Wii is slim (OK...... there is a 1e-99999999% that it will happen). So, the $5-20 pricing range would be for the psp emulations of the ps1 games.

[Ikohn4ever]

I hope to see $.99 for NES games, $1.99 for SNES games, and $2.99-$3.99 for N64.


u keep hoping for those prices and you will be hoping till the Wii2 comes out. My biggest concern with VC and any all non hardcopy format is that I doubt we will see many price drops on it. If a company does not need to take up shelf space with something and they have already made a large amount of money with it they do not need to worry about lowering prices. The days of being a CAG could end when hardcopy based gaming becomes obsolete. I could def see this happening come the following generation.

The prices I see happening for the VC

NES: $2 - $4
SNES: $3 - $6
N64: $7-$10

[yukine]

I think it's reasonable to expect a $5/$10/$15 pricing scheme for NES/SNES/N64 games. Nintendo knows that practically all of the virtual console games can be downloaded for free as ROM's, but they also know that gamers will pay for the luxury of being able to play the games on a TV screen with a controller instead of on a computer monitor with a keyboard. I also expect to see some games sold in bundles rather than individually, especially lesser-known titles that probably wouldn't sell by themselves.

Yeah, I guess. But a lot of people still own a Dreamcast. ;)

[pimpinc333]

Yeah, I guess. But a lot of people still own a Dreamcast. ;)

O'Fo Sho! :)

[Americanpierg]

Yeah, I guess. But a lot of people still own a Dreamcast. ;)

yup, 0.07% of the marketshare is dreamcast, acording to gamepro

[javeryh]

Giving 30-something guys a way to relive the gaming of their youth without pissing off the wife with clutter has a fair amount of value.

Bingo.

I'm still not buying the VC games unless they are obscenely cheap. I've got a huge backlog of current gen stuff to play...

[Kayden]

I can see it now, hacked Wiis on ebay filled with thousands of roms. :wall:

[wageslave]

I think AAA NES titles like Legend of Zelda / Kid Icarus / Super Mario Brothers are worth 5 bones because they offer hours of entertainment. The more obscure stuff like Donkey Kong 3 and Balloon kid could and should sell for less. I dont' see myself downloading N64 games since I already own everything I want for that system. I also own an SNES and the only games I'd get would be Super Mario World and maybe the Square RPGs if they are avalible.

I'd love to see Solar Jetman and RC Pro Am if Nintendo can pull it off, though

[epobirs]

whys that? bleam was successful at legal emulation of the sony playstation. The problem here isnt if sony will allow, but its if nintendo will allow, which it certainly will not.

Considering Nintendo's own stance against unauthorized emulation, it's extraordinarily unlikely they would do emulation of another company's platform without express permission.

Bleem! isn't a useful data point. They didn't have any existing position within the game industry to justify and defend. While they lost out only due to the expense of fending off Sony's litigation, that doesn't really matter for Nintendo. In the case of Bleem! Nintendo was completely on Sony's side.

[epobirs]

Disagree. Think more people are about the cheapeness. If you tell people you can have these four games for $40 today or wait a week and having them for $18 bet most people would save the $28.

The people who would keep or obtain old machines to play ancient ROMs off eBay are a tiny group compared to the tens of millions of consumers Nintendo is intent on reaching.

There is also considerable value in just setting up your account once and being able to obtain any game offered on the service at a whim within minutes.

EBay is a thriving business but hardly representative of the larger market for old games on new machines.

[epobirs]

The funniest thing was why Sony bitched about it American. In essence Bleem would've been ideal for Sony if Sony had bitten the bullet and given them legal rights to use the copyright restriction crap for the PS. Think about it, people had to use a hard copy of the game, just make it have to be a bought one then Sony doesn't even have to sell systems, all profit, no loss from selling the systems.

It meant relinquishing control of their platform. That is suicide for a console company. The fear is that once people become accustomed to running PS1 games on their PC, it isn't much of an adjustment for them to just get the native PC version that cost less because its manufacture doesn't involve royaty fees paid to Sony. Pretty soon the third party revenue stream has gone bye-bye.

(Microsoft at one time, before DirectX, was pitching the idea of a virtual console that developers would use to create console games for PCs. Since they would be ignoring the PC hardware and just writing to the VM it would only require one install to get it setup correctly then all of the games would just work without a lot of the PC hassles. This was when Win95 was new and most games were still running on DOS. The company doing some of the work for Microsoft did produce versions of Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure and Earthworm Jim that worked pretty well as far as delivering a console feel.)

Also, a hacked copy of Bleem! that didn't mind running CD-R backups could be in millions of PCs almost overnight. The need to obtain and mod a PlayStation was a more satisfactory limiter on piracy for Sony.

[Sir_Fragalot]

Nintendo was selling E-reader games for $5. Then again they needed to print the cards and stuff these are downloads.

So I would say
$2.50 for NES/Master System
$4.99 for SNES/Genesis/Sega CD/32x (hopefully they have them all)
$9.99 for N64/Saturn?(I really would like to play nights and panzer dragoon saga, some on sega please add saturn support).

I think nintendo also knows that N64 games are still avaiable at some game stores and well I think they will have to price competivly for that.