Game Demos cost too much to develop

[magus113]

The only demo I've seen recently that was different than the final product to be honest was God of War III and that was because it was pretty much almost a year old.

The engine was a lot less smoother in the final product and the game was just different by the time they got to that point in the final game.

[KillerGremlin]

Do we really need demos? This is what the bajillion gaming sites with videos, pictures, previews and reviews are for. Demos are an archaic remnant of days past. You found game demos loaded on the game you bought and they were there in an attempt to get you to buy more games.

Seriously, demos? Who cares and who in their sane mind would pay for a demo? The only way I could see paying for a demo working is if the money you put towards a demo was a deposit towards the actual game itself.

On the other hand, I fully support Betas. Beta testing is the coolest thing in the world, and I wish more companies would embrace public beta testing. Go Blizzard!

Demos....LOL. This is why I torrent stuff.

Edit: Also, screw EA.

[Blix]

Originally Posted by KillerGremlin

Do we really need demos?The only way I could see paying for a demo working is if the money you put towards a demo was a deposit towards the actual game itself.

On the other hand, I fully support Betas. Beta testing is the coolest thing in the world, and I wish more companies would embrace public beta testing. Go Blizzard!

Demos....LOL. This is why I torrent stuff.

Edit: Also, screw EA.

indeed it would have to be a deposit, otherwise, this plan is sooooo screwed up. And the rest of your post is an example of why I think this thing is not going to work.

[Dyne]

Well, to put it in perspective, demos are the lifeblood of the industry.

Without demos, publishers would rarely know what they're getting into. Demos can be a good indication of what final game quality will be like, if only in 10 minutes to an hour.

Also, a lot of developers would be scared to go to a trade show like E3 with their entire game at once. Mass Effect 2 took one of the best parts of their game before it was done, put a bit of resources into polishing it, and it got critical praise before the game even came out.

Demos made solely for the public, though, that's a different story. By the time developers have time to do one of those, they might as well be finishing the game. I can agree with him slightly. But yeah, I've been sold on more than a few games because of their free demos.

In an ideal situation, a developer would be good enough to publish their E3 demo to XBL/PSN. But things rarely run that smoothly.

But yeah, what's next? Paying for video game trailers? Absurd.