31 July 2007

Pay For This Service To Pay For Other Things

Pile of Money

So I recently read that a magazine is to sell coverdisc content via Live. So we pay for a subscription to XBox Live to pay for a demo of a game they are then hoping that we buy. I guess it is a result in the magazine offering something in exchange for an exclusive demo from a publisher (be that cheaper advertising or such) and they are looking to recoup that expense. But really; Microsoft are just happy to let this happen, to charge for the demo for games for an online distributed medium? It's interesting as Penny Arcade were saying a while back:

After downloading something like six demos last week, to go to the store and buy them was a bizarre anachronism.

I wonder what Tycho thinks of now paying for a demo on Live! instead? Now I know that you don't have to pay for Live! to get downloadable content but the fact that we pay for the service in the first place would imply that you get some value for money rather than paying for things that are a way of tempting you into a purchase. It will be interesting if publishers feel that this puts them off signing exclusive deals (after all if the main purpose of your demo is to sell a game and people get annoyed at the fact the demo is been charged for will that negatively impact game sales). I expect that, post exclusive, the demo would be made available for free from the publisher. Furthermore I wonder whether Microsoft will frown on the Official XBox Magazine doing things like this?

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