It's not hard to believe that publishers on Live! don't have to pay -- you'd expect the bandwidth costs to be covered by the Live! subscription. And really, Sony can't foot this bill itself, and it certainly can't charge for PSN at this point -- since it's free, it's easier to overlook the places where PSN is inferior to Live! today (because they are fairly close). I don't really see what else Sony can do.
Sony charging editors for PSN?
- Thread starter liolio
- Start date
It's not hard to believe that publishers on Live! don't have to pay -- you'd expect the bandwidth costs to be covered by the Live! subscription. And really, Sony can't foot this bill itself, and it certainly can't charge for PSN at this point -- since it's free, it's easier to overlook the places where PSN is inferior to Live! today (because they are fairly close). I don't really see what else Sony can do.
But are any of these tied to this fee, or to exclusivity deals Microsoft signed with the publishers? We know the story behind L&tD, I believe we do for Fallout 3 DLC. Not sure if we know anything about Tomb Raider... but for Resident Evil, releasing a demo later almost certainly has nothing to do with this, since even late they'd have to pay the fee for the first 60 days.
Also, though it's not that much to write home about, the PS3 got free exclusive Mirror's Edge DLC. Sony almost certainly paid for that.
Charging for free content may become a problem though, and Sony could probably figure out something better than that. Still, we don't have all the details -- MTV Multiplayer broke the story and their accuracy isn't really 100% (remember the super-duper extra confirmed 360 Wiimote?) What I'm wondering about is patches. For instance, the Burnout Paradise patches included a lot of stuff that nowadays is sold in the store.
Precisely, it's, as the MTV article that broke the story notes, just a different way of paying for it.
The plus is obviously it remains free to the consumer, the minus is if it starts affecting content.
Im guessing the recent no show of the COD WaW demo on PSN for example was due to this.
I think what this might really hurt is say, a free map pack. Now the publisher is going to actually have to pay for the privilege of giving people free stuff. I dont see a lot making that decisions.
Demos should be less affected, lets assume they are like an ad for a game, they seem more "necessary"
People should just look at the original MTV article btw, it includes all the publisher comments other sites are cribbing etc.
Last edited by a moderator:
One thing that not everyone is aware of, is that Sony also still releases BluRay cover discs. These often contain demos that aren't even out on either Live or PSN. I'm not sure if this is a Europe only thing? The demos for Guitar Hero: Aerosmith and World Tour were examples of this. I haven't looked at the most recent one so I don't know if Metallica is on there as well.
Although we as users may not be paying for it directly with money we might be paying it for it indirectly and non-monetarily.
Those that provide us the content pay, and this should affect their decisions which consequently translates to how, when and what content becomes available to the user.
Isn't that the same as OXM? besides exclusives (demo's, Beta's etc.) they even spread NXE through the OXM discs for the internet impaired.
There are things like Demo's that were/are never released on XBL and things like gamerpics etc.
So i should be upset if someone raises the prices on Billboards, Banners and TV-Commercials?
We pay those that provide the "content" when we buy their games. I am ok with them raising the price for a game by 16 cents. But only for the first 60 days it´s out.
As long as it's driven by market forces and helps to sustain the ecology, I'm all for it. The ability to keep PSN free has been one of my top questions.
Best if the advertising + vendor cost sharing (i.e., Sony + publishers pay for the infrastructure jointly) help to keep the service free. That in turns will grow the online population faster.
Sony first parties will anchor the initial content to attract crowd first anyway. it's not ideal for all developers but as long as the economics work, the better ones should thrive. The rest will be up to Sony execs to tweak as they go along.
Best if the advertising + vendor cost sharing (i.e., Sony + publishers pay for the infrastructure jointly) help to keep the service free. That in turns will grow the online population faster.
Sony first parties will anchor the initial content to attract crowd first anyway. it's not ideal for all developers but as long as the economics work, the better ones should thrive. The rest will be up to Sony execs to tweak as they go along.
NathansFortune
Regular
So let me get this straight, you would rather pay $50 a year than have the publishers charge a "bandwidth surcharge" of sorts on large DLC to make up the costs.
I said earlier that bandwidth costs of the demo could easily be written off into the marketing budget and it wouldn't make a scratch (the average demo is about 1GB, 2m downloads = $320k) on TV/print advertising budgets. Demos are afterall adverts.
To each his/her own. Let us not dwell upon these preferences for the sake of discussion. The topic deals with developers footing the bill for bandwidth.
NathansFortune
Regular
Is it possible to discuss that subject without the context of other platforms though?
What seems to come across is that publishers will add the cost indirectly to consumers over PSN (though I'm not sure about this), and over XBL; MS pay for it out of Live subscription revenues. This is something PSN doesn't have, a premium paid for account (unless you count Qore which has a few thousand subscribers and costs money to produce) and it seems quite logical that Sony need someone else to pay the bills for them and decided it would be the Publishers rather than the consumers.
Either way I think it is better for consumers to pay for a bit of bandwidth by way of a surcharge than the other option because instead of encouraging MS to drop/lower charges for XBL it will embolden them and in some ways vindicate their stance of paid for services.
Edit: this relies heavily on the accurate reporting of MTV which is something over which I have my doubts, and the accurate interpretation by other websites and blogs, which again I have my doubts. I have spoken to plenty of publishers and none of them seemed bothered by this charge when it was introduced, maybe SCE are talking about raising the fee and publishers decided enough was enough and went public, but I have yet to hear that SCE are raising bandwidth fees.
You dont use the commercials, banners and billboards. You use the products and services. And PSN is a service that you use.
And yes you could be upset under some circumstances if banners, ads or whatever may become more expensive, because the less ads they would make, the less people will see, the less the product would sell, the less the userbase thus the less the support of the product you bought.
I didnt say which one I prefer. The cost you pay in money for Live as a consumer, could be translated into a non-monetary cost for the consumer in PSN.
Do you prefer subsidization or direct cost on you? Both have their affect on the consumer. The difference is that the second's consequences are perceived directly while for the other is not
Uhh? PSN demos is purely marketing from a publishers viewpoint. Asking for money for Premium software (full games like burnout) is imho not a problem at all, each download would equal money.
The question is, is it cheaper to get a Disc than to get the game on PSN.
I see it from a different perspectives. Most of the demoes today s*ck. The developers better learn how to make good demoes that sell their games to recover the bandwidth cost. It's also an automatic moderation for download size. There is no need to cap a PSN game size artificially. The consumers will understand if a bigger game costs more.
In general, bandwidth should be a variable cost proportional to (i.e., subsidized by) sales. I see that from archie4oz's post, Sony has lowered the fixed cost of dev kits: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22864
So it's cheaper for developers to get on-board, but they need to be smarter on how to market their games over PSN (Yes, I am somewhat "mad" at developers for hurting themselves with lousy demoes).
EDIT:
The other possible way to sell game is to tap on the (limited) game sharing facility. Make use of the customers' infrastructure and effort to help create buzz and showcase the game.
Yup we are. I'm actually surprised this one took that long to leak, but looks like it's public knowledge now
Just add this one to the long list of Sony blunders this gen. Every action has a consequence and this one certainly does, but fortunately the costs can be recovered. Just yank a few members from the PS3 team and move them to a Wii or 360 project, or always release the 360 demo first meaning less two system owners will download the PS3 version saving us money, etc... The costs get recouped one way or another.
Yup we are. I'm actually surprised this one took that long to leak, but looks like it's public knowledge now
Thanks joker.
Man, think about it, being an indie developer you can't sell your game on psn because you can't afford the bandwidth for the demo.
