[crabapple]

Originally Posted by Steve Ince

1. A number of people feel that the price of $20 for four hours of gameplay (Bone) is a little too much. What would you feel is an acceptable amount of gameplay for $20?

8 hours minimum, assuming that 8 hours is quality gameplay and not padded.

2. Now that online payment and downloadable content is here to stay, how happy are you to buy your games this way in future?

I'd rather have a physical copy. If I download a game, I expect to be able to make my own fully functional physical copy without any restrictions.

I've been buying AGON, but each episode is more like $10, not $20. (The exact price varies slightly with currency exchange rates). Each episode of AGON game has taken me more than 4 hours, though maybe not much more in the case of the earlier episodes. The people who are making AGON are working on making the next episode longer because of complaints that the game was too short. Now you're talking about charging twice as much for something that's no longer than an AGON episode.

When AGON first came out they had an online activation system that caused people so many problems that they gave it up and went to sending you a reusable key that would unlock the game after installation. So after you buy it you can copy both the installer file and a text file with your key to a CDR to back up your game. This is a very important feature in my opinion. I don't want to buy a downloadable game unless I can back it up. Hard drives don't last forever.

3. If an alternative format (CD, say) was offered for an additional charge, would you prefer this?

It would depend on the shipping charges and what was included with the hard copy of the game. I don't want to pay any $35 postage just to ship a game CD in a jewel case.

4. If you downloaded a game to play, how big would the download be before it put you off downloading it?

Oh... 10 GB maybe. Depends on the speed of the connection. I have cable but never get the download speed I'm supposed to. But a download could be pretty big as long as I could just let it go overnight and not have the download slow down my browsing.

5. Does the size of the download depend on the style of the game in any way?

Yes. Prerendered games and games with FMV are going to be larger than real time 3D games. But why are you asking this? Did you mean to ask whether I'd rather have the game real time 3D if the download would be smaller?

6. Have any of you downloaded and paid for games in other genres?

No. Usually I only download free games.
AGON was an exception.

7. Have any of you downloaded any "casual" games?

Yes. Free ones. Like "Atomix" for OSX. Or "Sloppy Sokoban." I haven't downloaded that many though.

8. Have you any other thoughts on downloading games?

I don't want my replaying the game at some future date to be dependent on the game company still being around.