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It’s madness I tells ya, absolute madness!
Gamers are highly dedicated creatures; when a big game comes along they happily swarm to games emporiums in droves and spend their coffers, yet when it comes to Christmas time, many of the poor little blighters just can’t cope as there are just too many good games all being released at the same time!
In short: Christmas = too many games and too little time/money.
As the nights get even colder now, with a biting chill in the air, slippery frost underfoot and the usual lack of snow, the long hot hazy lackadaisical summer days are but a distant memory, but think back if you will to last summer (and the summer before that, and the summer before that etc) and the usual summer games drought will spring to mind. Not many games were released around July and August time, whereas in the run up to Christmas time, we are now suddenly bombarded with too many top quality games.
As Jesus’ 2002nd birthday draws ever nearer, the time to start drawing up Christmas wish lists begins, but you look in the shops and in the catalogues to decide which games to put on the list, but to your (and your parent’s) horror you find the little wish list is starting to grow into epic proportions! It looks like poor little Timmy will have to overlook some great games this Christmas because there’s too many :(
Look at the release schedule for the last few weeks and the weeks ahead, we have: GTA: Vice City, The Getaway, Smackdown 4, Red Faction 2, 007 Nightfire, Kingdom Hearts, Star Fox Adventures, Colin McRae 3, Ratchet & Clank, Splinter Cell, Unreal Championship, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Mario Party 4, Tony Hawks 4, Harry (rubbish but will sell) Potter, Metroid Fusion, Medal of Honor: Spearhead add-on, Eternal Darkness, Timesplitters 2, Burnout 2, Pro Evo 2, FIFA 2003, Mario Sunshine *gasp for breath* and there’s probably a few more decent games I forget about at this moment in time. Some of those have been around for a fair few weeks now, but could still be considered Christmas contenders, but there are also plenty of new ones on that list, some great, some good and some bad. It’s the same every year, but it seems more apparent this time around because there are now three big next-gen consoles fighting it out, and not forgetting the GameBoy Advance and PC as well.
All this begs one little question; why is there a summer games drought every year but an overly packed Christmas schedule?
At Christmas, there are basically too many games for the average gamer to get their grubby mitts on. Although it is nice to be able to walk into a games shop near Christmas, enjoy the warm Christmas atmosphere, talk to the whimsical staff and see all the shelves packed with new releases and be spoilt for choice, but deep down I know that I’m missing out on some great games because of the sheer volume of releases that are packed into a few short weeks of the calendar.
Although we all know that Christmas is the boom time for consumers to go crazy with their credit cards spending money they don’t have, so it’s the biggest and most profitable time for the industry, the majority of punters don’t have the money to get them all, meaning some great games will get left on the shelf. I’m pretty sure that lots of potential game sales of ‘game X’ will be lost because there’s just too much strong competition around from ‘game Y’. Some great games like ‘game X’ will not get the financial rewards in sales they deserve because the competition is too strong. Surely if the schedules were spread more evenly with more games being released in the summer there’d be a bit less competition to get your game sold and gain a much higher percentage of sales than it would at Christmas.
However, the potential loss of sales for a company due to high competition at Christmas could be a good thing as it might lead to a “survival of the fittest” style ethic, whereby developers need to increase the quality of their games if they hope to sell them in a competitive Christmas market, so overall, gamers might end up getting better quality games with the increased competition that Christmas gives?
Also, the Christmas rush could be good for the consumer in that games from Xmas time that flopped due to poor sales in the hard competition will be reduced in price much quicker, meaning that people who wanted them but couldn’t get them before can get them a bit later for a reduced price. Plus, in summer time you don’t get that many great releases, so you get time to catch up on all the great games you’ve already got or missed out on in the previous games packed Christmas.
Perhaps there’s a summer games drought because games firms think that people don’t stay indoors and play games in the summer? Maybe they think that all people are interested in outdoors activates and dangerous water sports or do they just assume that because it’s summer everyone’s on holiday abroad?
Along with uncomfortable heat and horrid wasps, summer time brings with it a long summer holiday for kids, meaning that surely game sales are reasonably high then as you have hoards of youths hanging around town centres spending their parent’s money, so big new releases would sell quite well I’d have thought?
I know that me and many others are going to miss out on some great games this Christmas because of all the games being released, so what’s wrong with releasing a few more games in summer meaning we aren’t forced into this annual gaming traffic jam?
I look forward to another game packed Christmas and another summer games drought next year, but in the mean time, I’m off to rob a bank...
Gamers are highly dedicated creatures; when a big game comes along they happily swarm to games emporiums in droves and spend their coffers, yet when it comes to Christmas time, many of the poor little blighters just can’t cope as there are just too many good games all being released at the same time!
In short: Christmas = too many games and too little time/money.
As the nights get even colder now, with a biting chill in the air, slippery frost underfoot and the usual lack of snow, the long hot hazy lackadaisical summer days are but a distant memory, but think back if you will to last summer (and the summer before that, and the summer before that etc) and the usual summer games drought will spring to mind. Not many games were released around July and August time, whereas in the run up to Christmas time, we are now suddenly bombarded with too many top quality games.
As Jesus’ 2002nd birthday draws ever nearer, the time to start drawing up Christmas wish lists begins, but you look in the shops and in the catalogues to decide which games to put on the list, but to your (and your parent’s) horror you find the little wish list is starting to grow into epic proportions! It looks like poor little Timmy will have to overlook some great games this Christmas because there’s too many :(
Look at the release schedule for the last few weeks and the weeks ahead, we have: GTA: Vice City, The Getaway, Smackdown 4, Red Faction 2, 007 Nightfire, Kingdom Hearts, Star Fox Adventures, Colin McRae 3, Ratchet & Clank, Splinter Cell, Unreal Championship, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Mario Party 4, Tony Hawks 4, Harry (rubbish but will sell) Potter, Metroid Fusion, Medal of Honor: Spearhead add-on, Eternal Darkness, Timesplitters 2, Burnout 2, Pro Evo 2, FIFA 2003, Mario Sunshine *gasp for breath* and there’s probably a few more decent games I forget about at this moment in time. Some of those have been around for a fair few weeks now, but could still be considered Christmas contenders, but there are also plenty of new ones on that list, some great, some good and some bad. It’s the same every year, but it seems more apparent this time around because there are now three big next-gen consoles fighting it out, and not forgetting the GameBoy Advance and PC as well.
All this begs one little question; why is there a summer games drought every year but an overly packed Christmas schedule?
At Christmas, there are basically too many games for the average gamer to get their grubby mitts on. Although it is nice to be able to walk into a games shop near Christmas, enjoy the warm Christmas atmosphere, talk to the whimsical staff and see all the shelves packed with new releases and be spoilt for choice, but deep down I know that I’m missing out on some great games because of the sheer volume of releases that are packed into a few short weeks of the calendar.
Although we all know that Christmas is the boom time for consumers to go crazy with their credit cards spending money they don’t have, so it’s the biggest and most profitable time for the industry, the majority of punters don’t have the money to get them all, meaning some great games will get left on the shelf. I’m pretty sure that lots of potential game sales of ‘game X’ will be lost because there’s just too much strong competition around from ‘game Y’. Some great games like ‘game X’ will not get the financial rewards in sales they deserve because the competition is too strong. Surely if the schedules were spread more evenly with more games being released in the summer there’d be a bit less competition to get your game sold and gain a much higher percentage of sales than it would at Christmas.
However, the potential loss of sales for a company due to high competition at Christmas could be a good thing as it might lead to a “survival of the fittest” style ethic, whereby developers need to increase the quality of their games if they hope to sell them in a competitive Christmas market, so overall, gamers might end up getting better quality games with the increased competition that Christmas gives?
Also, the Christmas rush could be good for the consumer in that games from Xmas time that flopped due to poor sales in the hard competition will be reduced in price much quicker, meaning that people who wanted them but couldn’t get them before can get them a bit later for a reduced price. Plus, in summer time you don’t get that many great releases, so you get time to catch up on all the great games you’ve already got or missed out on in the previous games packed Christmas.
Perhaps there’s a summer games drought because games firms think that people don’t stay indoors and play games in the summer? Maybe they think that all people are interested in outdoors activates and dangerous water sports or do they just assume that because it’s summer everyone’s on holiday abroad?
Along with uncomfortable heat and horrid wasps, summer time brings with it a long summer holiday for kids, meaning that surely game sales are reasonably high then as you have hoards of youths hanging around town centres spending their parent’s money, so big new releases would sell quite well I’d have thought?
I know that me and many others are going to miss out on some great games this Christmas because of all the games being released, so what’s wrong with releasing a few more games in summer meaning we aren’t forced into this annual gaming traffic jam?
I look forward to another game packed Christmas and another summer games drought next year, but in the mean time, I’m off to rob a bank...
It's all to do with the Christmas Advertising period that we're going through right now, where companies will show what they really can produce - they don't want to sell too many good games in the Summer because they know people will be out playing football and doing other outdoor activities - so they wait for the Winter, just when all of us have run out of money, which we've spent on half as good games in the Summer.
Ah well. :-)
Ah well. :-)
AfroJoe wrote:
> I've droned on a bit too much here. :-D
Just noticed.
anyway Good post
> I've droned on a bit too much here. :-D
Just noticed.
anyway Good post
I've noticed this as well - particularly when I was on SR a lot in the Summer.
I had won a few games, and had quite a lot of money to spend, but when I looked at the selection of new games on offer, I quickly put away my money and left my GADs to be picked another day. There was nothing that interested me in the slightest. I eventually bought some games that I *thought* I might've enjoyed, and picked some as GADs likewise.
The games I got myself in the Summer weren't really that good at all, with the odd exception of a few - and I was slightly disappointed with myself for picking games that I wasn't too sure of when I was sure there was a great selection of games that I *would* enjoy on the horizon.
So here I am - sitting staring at my games magazines, gazing at the wonderful selection of games that're either now on offer, or will be on offer in the next couple of weeks - this is the moment that I think to myself, "Why didn't I save that money and those GADs to get these games instead of getting ones that I knew I'd enjoy?" - ah well, I suppose that's jus the way things are, and instead of playing some top quality games on my PS2 and GC, I'll be sitting stuck with just 1/3 of the games I wanted to get.
I've droned on a bit too much here. :-D
Good post.
I had won a few games, and had quite a lot of money to spend, but when I looked at the selection of new games on offer, I quickly put away my money and left my GADs to be picked another day. There was nothing that interested me in the slightest. I eventually bought some games that I *thought* I might've enjoyed, and picked some as GADs likewise.
The games I got myself in the Summer weren't really that good at all, with the odd exception of a few - and I was slightly disappointed with myself for picking games that I wasn't too sure of when I was sure there was a great selection of games that I *would* enjoy on the horizon.
So here I am - sitting staring at my games magazines, gazing at the wonderful selection of games that're either now on offer, or will be on offer in the next couple of weeks - this is the moment that I think to myself, "Why didn't I save that money and those GADs to get these games instead of getting ones that I knew I'd enjoy?" - ah well, I suppose that's jus the way things are, and instead of playing some top quality games on my PS2 and GC, I'll be sitting stuck with just 1/3 of the games I wanted to get.
I've droned on a bit too much here. :-D
Good post.
we are the dedicated creatures
gotto agree there ...good post... :)
It’s madness I tells ya, absolute madness!
Gamers are highly dedicated creatures; when a big game comes along they happily swarm to games emporiums in droves and spend their coffers, yet when it comes to Christmas time, many of the poor little blighters just can’t cope as there are just too many good games all being released at the same time!
In short: Christmas = too many games and too little time/money.
As the nights get even colder now, with a biting chill in the air, slippery frost underfoot and the usual lack of snow, the long hot hazy lackadaisical summer days are but a distant memory, but think back if you will to last summer (and the summer before that, and the summer before that etc) and the usual summer games drought will spring to mind. Not many games were released around July and August time, whereas in the run up to Christmas time, we are now suddenly bombarded with too many top quality games.
As Jesus’ 2002nd birthday draws ever nearer, the time to start drawing up Christmas wish lists begins, but you look in the shops and in the catalogues to decide which games to put on the list, but to your (and your parent’s) horror you find the little wish list is starting to grow into epic proportions! It looks like poor little Timmy will have to overlook some great games this Christmas because there’s too many :(
Look at the release schedule for the last few weeks and the weeks ahead, we have: GTA: Vice City, The Getaway, Smackdown 4, Red Faction 2, 007 Nightfire, Kingdom Hearts, Star Fox Adventures, Colin McRae 3, Ratchet & Clank, Splinter Cell, Unreal Championship, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Mario Party 4, Tony Hawks 4, Harry (rubbish but will sell) Potter, Metroid Fusion, Medal of Honor: Spearhead add-on, Eternal Darkness, Timesplitters 2, Burnout 2, Pro Evo 2, FIFA 2003, Mario Sunshine *gasp for breath* and there’s probably a few more decent games I forget about at this moment in time. Some of those have been around for a fair few weeks now, but could still be considered Christmas contenders, but there are also plenty of new ones on that list, some great, some good and some bad. It’s the same every year, but it seems more apparent this time around because there are now three big next-gen consoles fighting it out, and not forgetting the GameBoy Advance and PC as well.
All this begs one little question; why is there a summer games drought every year but an overly packed Christmas schedule?
At Christmas, there are basically too many games for the average gamer to get their grubby mitts on. Although it is nice to be able to walk into a games shop near Christmas, enjoy the warm Christmas atmosphere, talk to the whimsical staff and see all the shelves packed with new releases and be spoilt for choice, but deep down I know that I’m missing out on some great games because of the sheer volume of releases that are packed into a few short weeks of the calendar.
Although we all know that Christmas is the boom time for consumers to go crazy with their credit cards spending money they don’t have, so it’s the biggest and most profitable time for the industry, the majority of punters don’t have the money to get them all, meaning some great games will get left on the shelf. I’m pretty sure that lots of potential game sales of ‘game X’ will be lost because there’s just too much strong competition around from ‘game Y’. Some great games like ‘game X’ will not get the financial rewards in sales they deserve because the competition is too strong. Surely if the schedules were spread more evenly with more games being released in the summer there’d be a bit less competition to get your game sold and gain a much higher percentage of sales than it would at Christmas.
However, the potential loss of sales for a company due to high competition at Christmas could be a good thing as it might lead to a “survival of the fittest” style ethic, whereby developers need to increase the quality of their games if they hope to sell them in a competitive Christmas market, so overall, gamers might end up getting better quality games with the increased competition that Christmas gives?
Also, the Christmas rush could be good for the consumer in that games from Xmas time that flopped due to poor sales in the hard competition will be reduced in price much quicker, meaning that people who wanted them but couldn’t get them before can get them a bit later for a reduced price. Plus, in summer time you don’t get that many great releases, so you get time to catch up on all the great games you’ve already got or missed out on in the previous games packed Christmas.
Perhaps there’s a summer games drought because games firms think that people don’t stay indoors and play games in the summer? Maybe they think that all people are interested in outdoors activates and dangerous water sports or do they just assume that because it’s summer everyone’s on holiday abroad?
Along with uncomfortable heat and horrid wasps, summer time brings with it a long summer holiday for kids, meaning that surely game sales are reasonably high then as you have hoards of youths hanging around town centres spending their parent’s money, so big new releases would sell quite well I’d have thought?
I know that me and many others are going to miss out on some great games this Christmas because of all the games being released, so what’s wrong with releasing a few more games in summer meaning we aren’t forced into this annual gaming traffic jam?
I look forward to another game packed Christmas and another summer games drought next year, but in the mean time, I’m off to rob a bank...
Gamers are highly dedicated creatures; when a big game comes along they happily swarm to games emporiums in droves and spend their coffers, yet when it comes to Christmas time, many of the poor little blighters just can’t cope as there are just too many good games all being released at the same time!
In short: Christmas = too many games and too little time/money.
As the nights get even colder now, with a biting chill in the air, slippery frost underfoot and the usual lack of snow, the long hot hazy lackadaisical summer days are but a distant memory, but think back if you will to last summer (and the summer before that, and the summer before that etc) and the usual summer games drought will spring to mind. Not many games were released around July and August time, whereas in the run up to Christmas time, we are now suddenly bombarded with too many top quality games.
As Jesus’ 2002nd birthday draws ever nearer, the time to start drawing up Christmas wish lists begins, but you look in the shops and in the catalogues to decide which games to put on the list, but to your (and your parent’s) horror you find the little wish list is starting to grow into epic proportions! It looks like poor little Timmy will have to overlook some great games this Christmas because there’s too many :(
Look at the release schedule for the last few weeks and the weeks ahead, we have: GTA: Vice City, The Getaway, Smackdown 4, Red Faction 2, 007 Nightfire, Kingdom Hearts, Star Fox Adventures, Colin McRae 3, Ratchet & Clank, Splinter Cell, Unreal Championship, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Mario Party 4, Tony Hawks 4, Harry (rubbish but will sell) Potter, Metroid Fusion, Medal of Honor: Spearhead add-on, Eternal Darkness, Timesplitters 2, Burnout 2, Pro Evo 2, FIFA 2003, Mario Sunshine *gasp for breath* and there’s probably a few more decent games I forget about at this moment in time. Some of those have been around for a fair few weeks now, but could still be considered Christmas contenders, but there are also plenty of new ones on that list, some great, some good and some bad. It’s the same every year, but it seems more apparent this time around because there are now three big next-gen consoles fighting it out, and not forgetting the GameBoy Advance and PC as well.
All this begs one little question; why is there a summer games drought every year but an overly packed Christmas schedule?
At Christmas, there are basically too many games for the average gamer to get their grubby mitts on. Although it is nice to be able to walk into a games shop near Christmas, enjoy the warm Christmas atmosphere, talk to the whimsical staff and see all the shelves packed with new releases and be spoilt for choice, but deep down I know that I’m missing out on some great games because of the sheer volume of releases that are packed into a few short weeks of the calendar.
Although we all know that Christmas is the boom time for consumers to go crazy with their credit cards spending money they don’t have, so it’s the biggest and most profitable time for the industry, the majority of punters don’t have the money to get them all, meaning some great games will get left on the shelf. I’m pretty sure that lots of potential game sales of ‘game X’ will be lost because there’s just too much strong competition around from ‘game Y’. Some great games like ‘game X’ will not get the financial rewards in sales they deserve because the competition is too strong. Surely if the schedules were spread more evenly with more games being released in the summer there’d be a bit less competition to get your game sold and gain a much higher percentage of sales than it would at Christmas.
However, the potential loss of sales for a company due to high competition at Christmas could be a good thing as it might lead to a “survival of the fittest” style ethic, whereby developers need to increase the quality of their games if they hope to sell them in a competitive Christmas market, so overall, gamers might end up getting better quality games with the increased competition that Christmas gives?
Also, the Christmas rush could be good for the consumer in that games from Xmas time that flopped due to poor sales in the hard competition will be reduced in price much quicker, meaning that people who wanted them but couldn’t get them before can get them a bit later for a reduced price. Plus, in summer time you don’t get that many great releases, so you get time to catch up on all the great games you’ve already got or missed out on in the previous games packed Christmas.
Perhaps there’s a summer games drought because games firms think that people don’t stay indoors and play games in the summer? Maybe they think that all people are interested in outdoors activates and dangerous water sports or do they just assume that because it’s summer everyone’s on holiday abroad?
Along with uncomfortable heat and horrid wasps, summer time brings with it a long summer holiday for kids, meaning that surely game sales are reasonably high then as you have hoards of youths hanging around town centres spending their parent’s money, so big new releases would sell quite well I’d have thought?
I know that me and many others are going to miss out on some great games this Christmas because of all the games being released, so what’s wrong with releasing a few more games in summer meaning we aren’t forced into this annual gaming traffic jam?
I look forward to another game packed Christmas and another summer games drought next year, but in the mean time, I’m off to rob a bank...