One of the biggest issues that seems to have crept up in this generation of console games is the conflicting economics in game length, price, and overall value.  It’s a problem that I think exists in today’s pricing and development structures that could maybe benefit from some change.

Before typing this unsuccessfully I tried to find an article someone wrote suggesting that developers should start making games as short as three-hours.  That comes after comments like Entertainment Weekly’s N’Gai Croal suggesting that six hours has become the new 10 on Weekend Confirmed.  According to an April 2010 GamePro article by John Davison, generally less than five percent of people who play a game will actually finish it.  Apparently around 90 percent of people lose interest after around four hours.

On top of this we’ve got developers continually complaining about piracy and the used games business.  You have to admit the latter seems to be a bigger problem in games than in other media.  In my experience the strongest reasoning for piracy, used sales, and rentals, is that there are a lot of games that I don’t think are worth $60, but are.

Basically, I think the retail space for consoles – specifically PS3 and 360, needs more variable pricing.  The main respite we have now is $15 downloadable games, but in my opinion those games, as good as many of them are, still aren’t satisfying in the same way as retail products. 

Most of these games like Limbo and Super Meat Boy frankly feel like really good Super NES games.  I want cheaper and more digestible current generation games.  The gulf between $15 and $60 is too wide, there needs to be something in-between.

The only place where I really see working examples of this is on the PC.  The most high-profile and recent example of the kind of value that I think looks very appropriate came from Valve in 2007.

The Orange Boxwas only released as one package on consoles, but on the PC you could get each part individually, eventually even at brick-and-mortar stores.  People hold up Portal as a great example of a game made to full HD standards that was four-hours long but felt complete.  On the PC you could buy Portal on its own for $30 (now $20).  The same is true of the Half-Life 2 episodes – short and sweet pieces of gaming that didn’t feel overpriced.

Another example that came out in 2010 of succinct and cheap current-generation gaming on the PC is Amnesia: The Dark Descent.  I don’t know how long the game is but if its predecessor Penumbra is anything to go by, then only a few hours.  It sports a fully modern graphics engine but is just $20.  It only sold 36,000 copies in its first month, but apparently even that was enough for a profit.

The other side of the coin is multiplayer-only games.  Team-Fortress 2 has also always been available on its own on PC – for $30 in 2007 and $20 today.  I’m pretty sure a lot of people would buy a multiplayer-only Call of Duty or Halo game for $30.

The issue however is that virtually no pricing like this has existed on consoles.  Why not?

The reason Valve was able to do what they have with the games that comprise The Orange Box is because of how much they’ve chosen to stand by their Source Engine tech.  Perhaps further proliferation of middleware – and hopefully more creativity with it, might let other developers accomplish what they have. 

Amnesiawas actually developed by five people – an indie game with graphics almost matching those of a lot of console games.  The fact that I still can’t buy a cheap multiplayer-only game at GameStop just shows how stuck the production system is in its current ways.

The only thing close to this that I’ve seen on consoles is the larger DLC packs made on top of full games.  Things like the Grand Theft Auto IV episodes, but more recently BioShock 2’s “Minerva’s Den” and Dead Space 2’s “Severed” – tight, succinct stories offered at an affordable price.  Imagine if someone made a wholly original short game using the same engine, or if someone created Half-Life-style episodic sequels in the same production process as “Minerva’s Den” and “Severed”.

When the next console generation comes around, the industry is gonna have to do something in order to keep development costs from skyrocketing again.  A great $60 game is fine, but most games don’t reach that level of value, and every game shouldn’t be trying to grab that same pie.