DCS Newsletter discussion 17th February 2023 - RAZBAM F-15E Pre-order

[Dannyvandelft]

Yes, just out of courtesy RAZBAM should have announced that pre-order would not include Steam. I get that.
But on the other hand, people are getting hysterical and yelling “GREED!” over $8.

It's not about $8 It's about principle. Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players?
There's only one reason, because RAZBAM wouldn't get enough money from their Steam sales. There's a word for that.

Greed.

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[AdrianL]

7 minutes ago, Dannyvandelft said:

Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players

Because steam takes 30% so DCS partners are already getting substantially less that through the ED store. 

So not greed, just good business sense. If it was greed then steam prices would be at least 30% higher. 

Edited February 18, 2023 by AdrianL

[Dannyvandelft]

Because steam takes 30% so DCS partners are already getting substantially less that through the ED store. 
So not greed, just good business sense. If it was greed then steam prices would be at least 30% higher. 

Charging half your customers 10% more than the other half is good business sense?

That's new.

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[AdrianL]

1 minute ago, Dannyvandelft said:

half your customers

If you think steam is half the customer base then you are delusional.

 

[Dannyvandelft]

If you think steam is half the customer base then you are delusional.
 

I don't know the split. Do you? It obviously isn't exactly half. But yeah, I'm the delusional one for wanting everyone being treated equally

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[MAXsenna]

In my country, credit card or PAYPAL is not our main payment method, which is one of the reasons why we are not used to using ED e-shop. Using Steam instead of ED e-shop is a failure in life? What a strong and strange sense of pride! You must have a very successful life. interesting

Sincerely humble question. How do you pay for it then. I assume it can't be cash?

Cheers!

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[MAXsenna]

It's not about $8 It's about principle. Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players?
There's only one reason, because RAZBAM wouldn't get enough money from their Steam sales. There's a word for that.

Greed.

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I kind of agree with you, but let's say the module was USD 100. With a 30% it's 70. Steam takes 30%, which brings it down to USD 49, and AFAIK, ED takes an additional 30%, which leaves USD 34 for Razbam.

Cheers!

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[Dannyvandelft]

I kind of agree with you, but let's say the module was USD 100. With a 30% it's 70. Steam takes 30%, which brings it down to USD 49, and AFAIK, ED takes an additional 30%, which leaves USD 34 for Razbam.

Cheers!

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Then they should have been smarter about it. It's not like this is their first ever module.

They could've said (weeks ago),

"we planned to do a 30% discount across the board, but because of (the situation at) Steam, we'd lose too much revenue. We also don't want to be unfair to the Steam users, and charge more to them, so we are setting the discount to 20% across the board."

Fairness, transparency, and understanding in one little paragraph.

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[Cab]

2 hours ago, Dannyvandelft said:

It's not about $8 It's about principle. Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players?
There's only one reason, because RAZBAM wouldn't get enough money from their Steam sales. There's a word for that.

Greed.

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Even in real life not all retailers sell the same products at the same price. We choose where we shop accordingly.

[sthompson]

2 hours ago, Dannyvandelft said:

Charging half your customers 10% more than the other half is good business sense?

That's new.

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It makes perfect business sense to give a better price to the customers who cost you less to serve.

[MAXsenna]

Then they should have been smarter about it. It's not like this is their first ever module.

They could've said (weeks ago),

"we planned to do a 30% discount across the board, but because of (the situation at) Steam, we'd lose too much revenue. We also don't want to be unfair to the Steam users, and charge more to them, so we are setting the discount to 20% across the board."

Fairness, transparency, and understanding in one little paragraph.

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Agree that this should have been clear from the get go.
I'm on standalone and I won't get miles. That's disappointing, but not the end of the world. But if they introduce Miles at a later point, that will be very bad.

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[Dannyvandelft]

Agree that this should have been clear from the get go.
I'm on standalone and I won't get miles. That's disappointing, but not the end of the world. But if they introduce Miles at a later point, that will be very bad.

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I'm not on Steam either, so it doesn't affect me. But I just feel it should be the same for everyone. Either charge everyone the same, or don't charge anyone anything until EA.

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[Beirut]

10 minutes ago, MAXsenna said:

Agree that this should have been clear from the get go.
I'm on standalone and I won't get miles. That's disappointing, but not the end of the world. But if they introduce Miles at a later point, that will be very bad.

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They'll sell a bazillion copies no matter what. That guides the thinking.

[pii]

19 hours ago, Rudel_chw said:

 

but I'm glad for Razbam, the pre-purchases must have been quite a lot, to collapse the e-shop   good for them and for ED 

Thats because it was priced incorrectly at 24.00 bucks . lol They delayed the preorder twice and still screwed it up.  

16 hours ago, MadKreator said:

30% is what I have seen/ heard. Whether that's 100% accurate, isn't for me to say.. anything in that range seems pretty steep to me, especially over thousands of sales

Which is why ED would like to ditch them. 

[pii]

1 hour ago, Dannyvandelft said:

I'm not on Steam either, so it doesn't affect me. But I just feel it should be the same for everyone. Either charge everyone the same, or don't charge anyone anything until EA.

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I think you should look at this from ED's point of view.  Do they want to give away 30% to Steam or keep it for future projects? 

I think they should charge you more for using Steam, like 30% more. DCS is the BEST and they deserve to be paid fully for their work. IMO

[pii]

4 hours ago, Dannyvandelft said:

I don't know the split. Do you? It obviously isn't exactly half. But yeah, I'm the delusional one for wanting everyone being treated equally

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Don't buy on Steam and you will be. Thats a BIG chunk to take from a small niche market developer.

4 hours ago, AdrianL said:

If you think steam is half the customer base then you are delusional.

 

How much is it then?????

[pii]

15 hours ago, Sr. said:

Same.

Same here but I didn't do it to keep Steam overhead off my PC I did it to support the BEST military flight sim platform on the planet.

[BIGNEWY]

Folks there is a lot of incorrect assumptions here about steam. 

Steam is great for many people, and for many reasons.

Steam has a reach in the millions for advertising a product, we have no intention of ditching steam. 

The Eshop is our own store and we have more control, and can offer more sales, miles, and trials. 

which ever one you use is fine by us.

thank you

[pii]

On 2/18/2023 at 6:15 AM, Dannyvandelft said:

It's not about $8 It's about principle. Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players?
There's only one reason, because RAZBAM wouldn't get enough money from their Steam sales. There's a word for that.

Greed.

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Greed? How about you pay them the 30% that Steam will take from them?

It sounds more like a good business decision to me, unless Steam generates far more sales its just not worth it to them.

They are entitled to make a nice profit and not the few pennies that you think they should get so they aren't, according to you, "greedy"

Edited February 21, 2023 by pii

[Mars Exulte]

8 hours ago, Dannyvandelft said:

It's not about $8 It's about principle. Why should the Steam players have to pay more than the stand-alone players?
There's only one reason, because RAZBAM wouldn't get enough money from their Steam sales. There's a word for that.

Greed.

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 They're a business, ffs, that just invested a great deal of time and money in a product. The sheer mind numbing idiocy exhibited in this thinking makes my face tingle. They are understandably not interested in heavy discounts or losing an extra 30% on top of the cut ED takes. It's not that complicated, and nobody cares about the handful of snowflakes acting all uppity over the choice of marketplace. The world is not going to end and nobody is going out of business because a 133764M3R is walking away @@

Edited February 18, 2023 by Mars Exulte

[Dragon1-1]

Keep drinking the kool-aid, meanwhile those who didn't really have a choice when it comes to platform (again, e-shop sucks in many different ways, especially when your country doesn't do USD) will continue to feel like they've been hung out to dry. Steam does account for quite a large chunk of the community, and leaving them out doesn't feel right. 

Need I remind you, not only was this not announced in advance, RAZBAM had reassured Steam users that preorders will, in fact, be on Steam. We have every right to be miffled that it suddenly turned out not to be the case. 

[Gierasimov]

There is always some dispute over DCS Shop now and then. 

My country doesn't do USD, and yet I buy in ED shop always. I also make gifts to others in the same shop. 

I deal with currency conversion by paying with my USD account card that costs me nothing. I mean literally 0 USD to uphold. Currency conversion rate is better than Steam too. 

There are ways, just saying. 

You do you, whatever you want, just stop fighting which way is better..

RAZBAM may have mishandled this a bit, sure, but end of a day, I guess most of folks will buy in EA. RAZBAM said it already presales are aimed at their fan base. It must mean that they somehow know, probably through their own metrics and sales telemetry, where to sell their product and at what price. It's RAZBAMs choice, and ours is to buy or not...

[Cab]

1 hour ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Need I remind you, not only was this not announced in advance, RAZBAM had reassured Steam users that preorders will, in fact, be on Steam. We have every right to be miffled that it suddenly turned out not to be the case. 

Absolutely. It was definitely an unforced error on their part.

[Dragon1-1]

52 minutes ago, Gierasimov said:

There are ways, just saying. 

For some. Not for everyone, particularly in countries where payment by credit card is not big (not the case for me, but in some other countries that's a big deal). Financial systems and usage patterns differ a lot, particularly once you get out of Eurozone. If you can get a free USD account with a good conversion rate, good for you, not everyone can. I would pay more on e-shop even if I could somehow convert at exactly the market rate, so for me, Steam is the only way to go.

[Beirut]

25 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

For some. Not for everyone, particularly in countries where payment by credit card is not big (not the case for me, but in some other countries that's a big deal). Financial systems and usage patterns differ a lot, particularly once you get out of Eurozone. If you can get a free USD account with a good conversion rate, good for you, not everyone can. I would pay more on e-shop even if I could somehow convert at exactly the market rate, so for me, Steam is the only way to go.

 

I like the Steam wallet function. I pump up my Steam wallet during our busy season so I can buy new DCS modules - pre-paid, so to speak - during the winter months. That works for me.