Have you noticed how some "blockbusters" are released with the "standard" price tags of 59.99, or 49.99 and when the hype and smoke is cleared and all see the titles for what they really are, their prices drops significantly to 29.99 or 19.99 (-50%)? And that usually happens in about 6 to 12 months after initial release...
Let's make a list for old, awesome games with still higher price, which should reflect the ongoing interest in them, stronger community and overall higher quality. As far as the price goes I think $14.99 or $19.99 should be the lower margin and for the age requirement, getting in mind some series spawn sequels, prequels, DLCs and also the competitive nature of the sub-genre I'd say for blockbuster series 2 years back is old enough and for medium studios and unique titles let's say 5 years back.
I'll start with a suggestion for listing 2 blockbusters that I didn't personally play but they have overwhelmingly positive reviews, they are in the highly competitive genre of FPS and still have they high price mark (+ the second one is sequel to the first one):

Call of Duty: Black Ops - 39.99

Call of Duty: Black Ops II - 59.99

What do you think - are those so good to be included in the list?

Make your own suggestions.


P.S.: Please don't start some flame war CoD vs. Battlefield or something like that, I just want to know are those so good to justify me spending so much for them, and also any other awesome, lasting games.

Also feel free to comment on price-quality-age relationship in the game industry :)

It's a little confusing to me because of on line distribution. You can get Total Annihilation on Amazon for $60 and in here for $6 because of digital distribution. That makes pinning down the actual selling a price a little tough. :P

And since you said we could elaborate.

A few months ago I remember someone coming in here raising a HUGE stink about GOG not basing their price structure on game age and size. As far as I remember the forum chewed his ass off because he failed to see that a new big game can suck and a small old one can be timeless. Hopefully this shows in pricing over time but I'm not about to do the research to prove it. :D All I know is that I will gladly pay a lot more for a used beat up copy of Diablo 1 then I will for a shiny brand new copy of Diablo 3 (if such a thing existed, there is no such thing as a physical copy of D3).

Transformers: Fall of Cybertron has remained at full price for almost 3 years now. 49.99


edit: it just dropped this month from 59.99 to 49.99. I knew 49.99 seemed low !

Tetris. Out in 1984, priceless even today. :-P Huh?

This is easy, just check Ubisoft games. In fact, I have not see a Ubisoft Humble Bundle or something like that.

Even their DLC cost 10$, containing only 2 customes, 1 weapon and being just 100kb download size because the base game already came with the item, but Ubi wants you to pay for it.

All of Blizzard's new games are essentially digital. All the physical versions are basically just installation discs, and require internet connection- it's basically little different from buying a SteamWorks game in-store.

Mostly Activision's games. Just check their Call Of Duty, Prototype, Spider-Man or Transformers games. After all these years since release they are still kind of expensive or barely with a price drop.

There is a reason why I linked the console versions page. :-)
<i>A newly-designed loot system and offline gameplay mode ensure that missions are fast-paced and immersive &ndash; essential for console gaming. </i>

But otherwise - yeah, no love for PC gamers from Blizzard as of late.

Operation: Inner Space - Currently still $25 and $15 more for the extras... I did buy this as a teen since it's one of the few games i put 100 hours into :P

Well, they made eleventy hojillion dollars on WoW. Though I haven't bought a game from them in years, it seems understandable that somewhere in their golden palace, some of the C*Os sailing Swarovski crystal sailboats in lakes of champagne thought "Maybe this thing where people give us money all the time instead of once is something we should keep doing."

Hopefully it's a pendulum metaphor waiting for a backswing.

Not sure if you consider all those games awesome but the Daedalic catalog seems decidedly overpriced to me (prices even went up a while ago), anyway I think most of them cost too much except for A New Beginning (only $9.99) and maybe Journey of a Roach ($14.99, less than two years old so kind of acceptable, very short game though)

http://www.gog.com/games##search=daedalic&amp;sort=bestselling&amp;page=1

I meant only digital distribution, physical extras it's normal to cost more. I don't make you do a research, I'll do it for myself :) that's why I ask for your opinions. Please see Ubisoft's WatchDogs, Anno 2070 and their flagman Assassin Creed they drop prices at a normal pace (Well Anno 2070 maybe it's at the border). We are not talking about bundles here but you're totally right we have to see more big players on the bundle stage with their once flag games like EA origin bundle, WB Batman bundle and Eidos bundles -> C'mon Ubi, Activision and Blizzard what are you waiting :D Blizzard games are top notch quality and they have some drop in price with time, but the complete editions still have quite high prices (Star Craft 2 will be a trilogy, and that's the single player campaign). I still wait for complete edition of SC2 and a -50% discount on D3, I will not pay them the regular price because of their draconian always-connected DRM. I see, so this indeed may be a publisher specific issue after all. Wow, just wow never heard of that game before but it's from 1994 and they still sell it for 35 bucks ?!?!?

They seems fairly new, except Deponia for which I've heard very positive feedback but it's price it's not so high, here it costs ~ 18 euros and 40 for the complete edition on steam, but if it's indie it qualifies.
Edit: Daedalic entertainment seems to me, not an indie studio with their 120 employees, they are just new and interesting, so I'll keep an eye on their games from now on :)

I waited for more than a decade for Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 2 for PS2 to come down. It's still $40. I finally just bought it. Stupid $40.

I think it may have dipped down to $30 at a brief point. But it was brief.

Activision :p

And I kinda respect them for it.

All of Telltale's games... The first two seasons of Sam & Max are more than 7 years old now, but they still have their $30 price. I know, it's to do regular 90% off sales, but still...