Final Fantasy IV: The After Years Review

[Blue]

Check it out (http://www.allrpg.com/site/?p=44)

[Nickoten]

I wonder what the fan and critical reaction would be if Chrono Trigger DS retailed for $70.

[Blue]

Why would it ever retail for 70?

[Nickoten]

If people were willing to pay that price for it, it would. In other words, I'm wondering why a port of a cell phone game can be available for digital distribution for $37. Considering the new games that can be had for less, it certainly strikes me as a poor value for your money. Chrono Trigger DS was already an offender here. It cost more than your average original DS game, and while nothing needs to be said for the quality of the base game, we get nothing new that's worthwhile save for a new translation. The rest of what they threw in was pretty awful.

Not to knock on your enjoyment of the game or your review, I just feel that paying a ridiculous price like that only positively reinforces them. We all laughed at horse armor for Oblivion, but you know what? It sold pretty quickly. It pretty much established that people will spend a shit-ton of money if publishers divide it up well enough, and it shows in the pricing strategies for many games and services now. Steam is just about the only service I can think of off the top of my head that makes digital distribution a good deal price-wise for the end-user as well as the publisher.

And for reference, if you asked me whether I thought people would pay $40 for a port of a cell phone sequel to Final Fantasy IV, I would probably say, "Why would it ever retail for $40?"

[Blue]

SE is guilty of that all around, though, especially for their DS games. They cost ten dollars more than other company's titles. I agree, it sucks, but I'm not buying all the chapters anyway. Games in general are too expensive nowadays anyway. Look at Rock Band or Guitar Hero. Look at Madden which is just a 60 dollar roster update every year. Look at MMOs. We're all guilty of buying overpriced things.

[Devil King]

We're all guilty of buying overpriced things.

Ah, how true. The actual value of some items could very well be under a dollar, and yet we're paying over ten.

By the way, great review.

[Blue]

Thanks, dude. :)

[Nickoten]

Ah, how true. The actual value of some items could very well be under a dollar, and yet we're paying over ten.

By the way, great review.

Well, the value is what someone is willing to give for something. It's not just how much it costs to make. Thus it's kind of subjective whether you overpay for something. A product that costs $5 to make and retails for $50 might not sell well at all, but it might sell like hotcakes once the price drops to $20. Thus the customers' value for that item is closer to $20 than $5 or $50, since they weren't willing to pay $50 and yet were willing to pay more than $5.

SE is guilty of that all around, though, especially for their DS games. They cost ten dollars more than other company's titles. I agree, it sucks, but I'm not buying all the chapters anyway. Games in general are too expensive nowadays anyway. Look at Rock Band or Guitar Hero. Look at Madden which is just a 60 dollar roster update every year. Look at MMOs. We're all guilty of buying overpriced things.

I won't argue that, I bought my little brother a Kirby plush (Of my own volition, no whining or anything here, even!) for like $20 once. It was imported from Japan and I bet the markup on it was tremendous.

By the way, one of the "cons" you listed - having to wait for the games to be released - especially sucks since you already have all of the data on your Wii right now, and you're waiting for Square Enix to let the games sell enough to release the next ones. =/

[Devil King]

Well, the value is what someone is willing to give for something. It's not just how much it costs to make. Thus it's kind of subjective whether you overpay for something. A product that costs $5 to make and retails for $50 might not sell well at all, but it might sell like hotcakes once the price drops to $20. Thus the customers' value for that item is closer to $20 than $5 or $50, since they weren't willing to pay $50 and yet were willing to pay more than $5.

Yes, and it's just ridiculous. Things should be the price of what it takes to make them, unfortunately that's never going to happen.

[pigeon_of_doom]

Yes, and it's just ridiculous. Things should be the price of what it takes to make them, unfortunately that's never going to happen.

Why should it be? The markup is extreme, but it's a bit much to expect all those involved in producing items to merely earn enough just enough to live on?

As for the review, I'd like to comment on it but I'd just nit-pick about the writing like I always do. Seems solid, but some kind of comment on the length of the game would have been useful.

[Blue]

It's admittedly not my best work, but in terms of length, it's hard to say because it could last as little as 5 hours if you only buy one chapter, or it could last as long as 100 if you buy them all. I don't know know how long it could take because the entire game isn't out and I've only played 2 chapters. I could guess and say it might take 60, but who knows? I did go back and edit in a guesstimation on how long it might take.

[pigeon_of_doom]

It's admittedly not my best work, but in terms of length, it's hard to say because it could last as little as 5 hours if you only buy one chapter, or it could last as long as 100 if you buy them all. I don't know know how long it could take because the entire game isn't out and I've only played 2 chapters. I could guess and say it might take 60, but who knows? I did go back and edit in a guesstimation on how long it might take.

Yeah, you can't really judge the overall length until the entire thing comes out, and if they take the Tell Tale approach of tweaking episodes as they come out it could change substantially. I just meant the general length and amount of content of what you played, which you didn't seem that clear on, despite explaining what is currently available to (I assume) NA audiences. Still, possibly 100hrs? Very impressive for a mobile game. I thought it would be a quite short, insubstantial experience along the lines of Dirge of Cerebus.

Sorry if I'm being overly critical, I'm not quite sure how seriously the site is taking these reviews, it's hard to tell based on one. I'm quite involved in a user review section on a different forum, so believe it or not, this is actually me being nice. I have fundamental problems with nearly all game reviews anyway (even my own attempts) so I'm open to the possibility I'm just a miserable nit-picker.

[Blue]

It's ok, dude. And yeah, supposedly, there are extra challenging dungeons for each chapter that have goodies tailored to the characters of each chapter, so if you grind all the way to the level caps in each one and then do the dungeon, I could see it taking upwards of 100 hours. This probably osmething only a small subset of the players will do, though.

[Devil King]

Why should it be?

Because I'm a cheap ass, and I hate paying more than something is worth (and by that I mean what it costs to make). In all honesty it probably has something to do with my genes, so don't mind me.

[Nickoten]

Yes, and it's just ridiculous. Things should be the price of what it takes to make them, unfortunately that's never going to happen.

Only if you don't understand economics. There are more resources expended than the money used to get the materials. The other resource is the time spent to produce the product - that's where the saying, "Time is money" comes from. We could theoretically learn to make everything we need and perform every service we need, but we don't have the time to be self sufficient like that, at least not by the modern definition of the word.

In other words, if you bought, say, a little wood carving from someone for $5, and it cost them $5 to make, they're losing out on the deal. Why? Because they spent time to make it, time that could have gone towards something that would have actually been productive.

[Devil King]

Yeah, to be honest I've never really thought of the whole situation before until LataKali pointed out to me the various factors that go into making a product. I admit to my ignorance.

I'm a Jew.

[freeflow^]

Being a massive FFIV fan (It was the first RPG I ever played) this game interests me immensly, but unfortunately I don´t own a Wii, so I probably won´t be able to play it. GRRR! I guess there´s still hope for it to come out on mobile phones or the DS. It´s such a simple game graphically, maybe it could be modded too. Here´s wishing :( A sequal to FFIV deserves mass exposure!

[moogleman]

It´s such a simple game graphically, maybe it could be modded too.
Actually, you know what would be amazing? Someone could create a hack for the FFII/IV rom to recreate The After Years, I bet. Would be very difficult and probably could never be a perfect recreation, but I'm sure someone could do it if they were dedicated enough. But it will never happen, we all know how Square-Enix is with protecting their IP. I'm still pissed about that near-completed CT romhack sequel that we'll never see.

[Nickoten]

Well at least you can watch a play-through of the entire thing on Youtube.

[freeflow^]

Ya a hack is something we can hope for. I guess I can hope for it to come out on the Ipod touch too or something.