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Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
Apple have no influence on pricing at all.



In terms of how pricing works the only difference is Apple base the prices using international exchange rate. Steam allows for manual pricing in different places.

Apple believe using the direct exchange rate figures from US $ means everyone get the same price (so Europeans don't get charged more than the US for example). Once you set the US price the rest of the world automatically gets placed in a pricing band.

Valve believe that you can set it all yourself so you can do things like make games in Russia cost less than in Europe because the economy in Russia means people won't want to pay as much for games, this allows you to charge what the nations economy will stand.

Both ways have their advantages and disadvantages.



Based on Steam & MAS I know sometimes games are cheaper on one service or the other. It's harder to perhaps notice flash sales on the MAS than Steam but they happen very frequently if you keep a look out.



They have always had this since the beginning of the store. I know at any time there is at least one Feral or Asypr etc game on deal often more. There was even an All Feral games discount week last year where the AppStore had a banner in the gaming area and all Feral games sold had some kind of discount!



I can't see how you could get anyone to say making less money was a positive ;)



Some games might have a higher price (usually on the latest consoles) however they cost more and more to make due to the complex technology and vast budgets needed. When I started on Mac games just over a decade ago my first game was less than 100MB installed and the source code and assets were perhaps 300MB in total.

The game we have in development right now is over *50GB* installed and the source and unpacked data game on a multiple TB drive! Now numbers don't mean much but it's a simple way of saying it costs a hell of a lot of time and technology to get games working compared to a decade ago.

Anyway the prices of games has dropped it's an inconvenient truth but it's true!

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2010/10/an-inconvenient-truth-game-prices-have-come-down-with-time/

*strokes beard contemplatively* Interesting…

That might include uncompressed assets... it might not.... ;)

What game? :D .... sandbox.... MMO...
 

Dirtyharry50

macrumors 68000
May 17, 2012
1,769
183
What game? :D .... sandbox.... MMO...

I hope not personally.

Hopes: Sleeping Dogs

Dreams: Every Bethesda RPG from Morrowind on and from EA/Bioware the Mass Effect Trilogy as well as Dragon Age Inquisition.

"You may say I'm a dreamer... but I'm not the only one." - John Lennon
 

madeirabhoy

macrumors 68000
Oct 26, 2012
1,620
576
I agree with anybody who says Apple should be like steam and have limited time offers. I know I would buy a lot more from the iTunes Store if they did that. That's how steam steals all my money....

steam fall and christmas sales are lethal, i always pile up games i never get around to playing but i cant help buying coz they are 80% off or whatever

----------

I didn't know that. Though I suspect that Apple has quite a big say when it comes to what prices to charge.

For the game developers it is great that there are other platforms such as Valve, to choose from.

Right now the dollar is rising dramatically against many major currencies. Apple and those who sell in US dollars need to keep an eye on the prices they charge in the European market. I understand that prices have had to rise, though I think the over 30% rise last night annoyed me, especially when I tried to buy it at the old price that was stated on the app when I clicked on it to buy it.

Sure Apple is a premium product and offers a trustworthy service. But as prices rise people will look for alternatives, such as Steam. And if it is legally cheaper to buy the same product then why not?

I would also like to add that in many cases it is actually cheaper to buy a physical CD from somewhere like Amazon, then to buy the same album on iTunes.

sure, but to be honest steam angers me more (maybe coz i use them more). whereas apple has a fixed price per game with an exchange rate, as ed says, steam offers more flexibility, and that leads to annoying anomalies, in particular Football Manager (apologies if youve read my rants on these before), every yearly release is always €50 to europe and £30 or thereabouts in the uk. so even when they apply a 50% off sale, the uk version is still far cheaper.

and it puts me off buying it just on principle so i either wait for a sale, or now you have the slightly unethical but legal sites that sell codes taken from boxed copies of russian or other nations with cheaper prices. Football manager 15 cost me 12 quid i think on one of their sales, which means ive a legal copy and the producers probably got buttons, when if they'd just charged me what the uk cost was they'd have had that.
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
I didn't know that. Though I suspect that Apple has quite a big say when it comes to what prices to charge.

For the game developers it is great that there are other platforms such as Valve, to choose from.

Right now the dollar is rising dramatically against many major currencies. Apple and those who sell in US dollars need to keep an eye on the prices they charge in the European market. I understand that prices have had to rise, though I think the over 30% rise last night annoyed me, especially when I tried to buy it at the old price that was stated on the app when I clicked on it to buy it.

Sure Apple is a premium product and offers a trustworthy service. But as prices rise people will look for alternatives, such as Steam. And if it is legally cheaper to buy the same product then why not?

I would also like to add that in many cases it is actually cheaper to buy a physical CD from somewhere like Amazon, then to buy the same album on iTunes.

I'm not sure of the correlation. Apple sells hardware, OSs, and access to information services. Steam sells games. Developers develop games for successful platforms of which Apple now qualifies.
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
http://store.steampowered.com/app/333950/

Medieval Engineers
- In early release, a medieval building game by the same company Keen Software, who is also developing Space Engineers. This is the kind of game, maybe not this game specifically, but the type of game that will threaten Minecraft's dominance of the voxel building world. Oh, it's on sale until Early March for $14.99 I think. Kinda hard to go wrong at that price.

If there is anyone who plays this, can you create trees, and/or remove trees? Is there just one color stone, gray? Or can surfaces be painted? Thanks! :)

Medieval-Engineers.jpg

promo_scr_14_logo_a.jpg
 
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soulsyphon

macrumors regular
May 3, 2014
192
3
not that anyone cares but i much prefer buying games through app store... although steam prices are cheaper so that rarely happens.

for some reason, companies think selling in apple store should cost more to the apple customer than a steam customer.

total bs.
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
not that anyone cares but i much prefer buying games through app store... although steam prices are cheaper so that rarely happens.

for some reason, companies think selling in apple store should cost more to the apple customer than a steam customer.

total bs.

Id think that would hurt Apple sales. Not disagreeing with you.
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
But it's all the Homeworlds! Remastered!

It was a fun game and gorgeous! This is how I view space battles. One of the reasons I ventured to the dark side, that and Half Life and System Shock 2. :) I may waiver, lol. Not Mac though. :(

Homeworld+2.jpg

Homeworld_2_2_0_showoff_by_skywalkerpl.jpg
 
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Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
The screenshots don't do it justice. You have to see it in motion to really appreciate all the remake does.

YouTube: video

Yes, a beautiful game and it's on a small sale for a day or two.

Update: It's on sale until tomorrow when it's released, but it's only a 15% sale not a big deal.
 
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Dirtyharry50

macrumors 68000
May 17, 2012
1,769
183
The screenshots don't do it justice. You have to see it in motion to really appreciate all the remake does.

YouTube: video

Thanks for posting the trailer. I hadn't seen that yet.

I hope either Aspyr or Feral, both of whom have worked with Gearbox before, will port this to Mac. That would be awesome.
 

madeirabhoy

macrumors 68000
Oct 26, 2012
1,620
576
some great deals in ubisoft sale just now. not sure whether to hoover up every assasins creed game

watchdogs 15 euro
far cry blood dragon f €4
anno 2070 €7.50
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
I've been playing KSP for a long time, back when it was $10 and nowhere near Steam. Fun game.

Your lander seems overengineered though. Haha.

I'm doing the tutorials. Are there any other online guides? Such as if you want to land on the moon, how the heck do you figure trajectory and required fuel?
 

Mackilroy

macrumors 68040
Jun 29, 2006
3,922
586
I'm doing the tutorials. Are there any other online guides? Such as if you want to land on the moon, how the heck do you figure trajectory and required fuel?

Fuel: the amount of fuel is irrelevant--the delta-V is all that matters. An ion probe and a huge transport may have the same delta-V, but an inordinately different amount of fuel. That same probe has a high Isp, and therefore a huge change in velocity. However, its TWR (thrust to weight ratio) is pathetic and you'll be tearing your hair out at hour-long burns. The LV-N is usually what people use for interplanetary missions, as it has a high Isp and acceptable TWR.

Trajectories: short answer: math. Long answer: lots of math. In all seriousness, the navball is your friend here, and really all you have to do is match the inclination of your target and then burn until you're caught by the gravity of wherever you want to go--as KSP does not use n-body physics, but rather patched conics. Certainly simplifies spaceflight...

A good many people enjoy Scott Manley's videos on YouTube. Personally I've never watched his tutorial vids, but his Interstellar Quest and some others are great.

If you don't mind using mods, MechJeb is a great autopilot that will fly your launches and spacecraft for you. Some people consider it cheating, but they're the types that enjoy flying everything. It does much more than that, such as tell you the weight of your spacecraft and how much delta-V you have, but if you don't want the autopilot and just the vessel information, Kerbal Engineer is just the ticket.

As for the amount of delta-V you need to get to other planets, the KSP wiki has a handy reference list on the page for Kerbin. However, I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt, as they assume completely nominal trajectories, which you will rarely have. In my experience you can expect those numbers to double, if not more.

There's also a handy-dandy delta-V map, again on the KSP wiki, but as I said before: take the numbers with a grain of salt.

You may be interested in these articles on Wikipedia:

If there are any other questions you have, feel free to shoot me a PM, email, whatever.
 

txa1265

macrumors 65816
Aug 15, 2002
1,035
291
Corning, NY
City Skylines- $30 (Mac/PC)

Can anyone report how good this game is as compared to the SimCity series? It looks amazing...
Thanks!


The *worst* I have heard is some saying it is 'what the SimCity reboot SHOULD have been' ... all the way up to 'the best city builder ever designed.' Regardless, acclaim is universal, and I will definitely buy it at some point soon - just so backlogged it is hard to justify full price right now ...
 

Huntn

macrumors Core
Original poster
May 5, 2008
23,492
26,609
The Misty Mountains
Fuel: the amount of fuel is irrelevant--the delta-V is all that matters. An ion probe and a huge transport may have the same delta-V, but an inordinately different amount of fuel. That same probe has a high Isp, and therefore a huge change in velocity. However, its TWR (thrust to weight ratio) is pathetic and you'll be tearing your hair out at hour-long burns. The LV-N is usually what people use for interplanetary missions, as it has a high Isp and acceptable TWR.

Trajectories: short answer: math. Long answer: lots of math. In all seriousness, the navball is your friend here, and really all you have to do is match the inclination of your target and then burn until you're caught by the gravity of wherever you want to go--as KSP does not use n-body physics, but rather patched conics. Certainly simplifies spaceflight...

A good many people enjoy Scott Manley's videos on YouTube. Personally I've never watched his tutorial vids, but his Interstellar Quest and some others are great.

If you don't mind using mods, MechJeb is a great autopilot that will fly your launches and spacecraft for you. Some people consider it cheating, but they're the types that enjoy flying everything. It does much more than that, such as tell you the weight of your spacecraft and how much delta-V you have, but if you don't want the autopilot and just the vessel information, Kerbal Engineer is just the ticket.

As for the amount of delta-V you need to get to other planets, the KSP wiki has a handy reference list on the page for Kerbin. However, I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt, as they assume completely nominal trajectories, which you will rarely have. In my experience you can expect those numbers to double, if not more.

There's also a handy-dandy delta-V map, again on the KSP wiki, but as I said before: take the numbers with a grain of salt.

You may be interested in these articles on Wikipedia:

If there are any other questions you have, feel free to shoot me a PM, email, whatever.

Thank you!! Very helpful. One of the major issues I have with Elite Dangerous is hand flying space craft due to lack of an autopilot and minimal use of computers. It's just unrealistic and while dogfighting is fun, I am constantly reminded of how unrealistic this is. Therefore, I have no problem in KSP with an autopilot mod, which is how real space rockets are flown. There are times that manual flying might be required with a breakdown, but the notion of cheating is stupid. Regarding long burns, can't you just time warp through them? I'll search youtube for KSP content. Thanks again! :)

The *worst* I have heard is some saying it is 'what the SimCity reboot SHOULD have been' ... all the way up to 'the best city builder ever designed.' Regardless, acclaim is universal, and I will definitely buy it at some point soon - just so backlogged it is hard to justify full price right now ...

It looks eons ahead of Sim City. I may buy it if and when it goes on sale.
 

Mackilroy

macrumors 68040
Jun 29, 2006
3,922
586
Nope, not unless you're using the ion engine. Otherwise, you have to sit through every painful minute. ;)
 
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