More than one bite of the Apple

It used to be that developers had one shot at making money from a game. A one-off-purchase. Today it’s a different story.

Microsoft and Sony have provided a marketplace where gamers can purchase further content to extend the lifespan of a game. This content is often in the form of multiplayer maps, additional storylines, avatar accessories, even whole new games from a side-story of the original game, such as The Lost and The Damned in GTA4 or the Undead Nightmare add on for Red Dead Redemption. After the initial game purchase, gamers can spend that much again on additional downloads.

You can’t ignore the impact the iPhone’s had on gaming, relegating the likes of the Sony PSP and Nintendo’s DS further down the rankings. With its built-in payment platform through iTunes, the ‘Freemium’ model has come in to its own. Similar to demo discs included in industry magazines, this model allows gamers try out a demo of a game before deciding if they want to pay for the full version. The initial price points are much lower than its console counterparts, but when you look at in-game purchases, things start to add up very quickly.

Let’s take the current top-grossing iPhone game, Capcom’s Smurf’s Village, which has been causing a stir. The game knocked long-term favourite Angry Birds off the top spot and, unlike Angry Birds, is free to download. But, in-app purchases in order to progress in the game range from £2.99 (the minimum you need to spend) up to £34.99 (just as a comparison, Call of Duty: Black Ops is currently priced at £39 on Amazon).

The idea of the game is to build up your village as much as possible. Smurf’s Village has perhaps made it to the top by taking advantage (knowingly or not) of the fact that after signing in to your iTunes account to purchase an app or a game, you won’t need to enter it again for further purchases for another 15 minutes.

This game is obviously marketed at children. Very few children have iPhones and so would be playing this on their parent’s phone. The parent will input the password to download the game and then hand over the phone so the child can play. For 15 minutes it’s then very easy for a child to wrack up the purchases in order to build their Smurf Village as much as possible. This has obviously caused some commotion and perhaps rightly so.

The danger of in-game purchases is that unlike when you actually buy a game in a store, you’re not handing over anything in exchange, like a debit card or cash for instance. The genius and damnation of platforms like iTunes is that it doesn’t feel like you’re spending any money. A couple of clicks and ‘hey-presto’ - content downloaded. It’s extremely easy for people to lose track of how much they’re actually spending.

In-game purchases have become more and more popular and the model is here to stay and why not? It works for both parties. If a gamer likes a game, they can pay to download the full version and then pay further to enhance the experience. Developers obviously reap the benefits of making an addictive game with low barriers to entry for the gamer. The more accessible a game is, the greater chance of success, but at the end of the day gamers will vote with their thumbs as to whether a developer gets a second bite of the revenue apple.