Just a pointless rant about the misconception of game demos... (even if no one cares)

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Zuon

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#1  Edited By Zuon
Member since 2008 • 505 Posts

First, demos are not dead, and not even stagnating. Every day, 4 or 5 new ones are added to Steam. If all you count are current gen AAA titles, then let's not forget Dragon Quest Builders 2, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, The Evil Within 2, Hitman 2016, Shadow of Mordor, almost every Bethesda/ID published game (DOOM, Wolfenstein 2/Youngblood, etc), the Quantic Dream PC ports, The Surge, the Prey reboot, even Dishonored 2 got a demo, which no one thought would happen.

Second, the Steam refund policy was NEVER MEANT as a substitute for a demo. In fact, the terms of service explicitly state that using the refund mechanic for such purposes is against the very policy. If we choose to blindly and collectively believe that Steam Refunds and Demos are one and the same, then we're no better than those who initially swore Oblivion's Horse Armor DLC would never catch on (which was cosmetic by the way), who always trusted games would be released bug-tested and stable without needed patches, who were fine with micro-transactions and loot boxes in free-to-play games, as they would SURELY never pop up in full priced store-bought titles.

The same thing's happened to the internet in general, by the way. Remember those 2000's internet days, where you were always encouraged to use an alias and NOT your real name, where MMOs you subscribed to made it clear their staff will NEVER email you, for your safety, etc. Now look at where we are, willingly telling every new social media site our full name, where we live, what our birthday is, and what are credit card numbers are. FACEBOOK has our credit card numbers.

I'm going off on a little bit of a tangent, but my basic point is, demos are still here, and big ones still frequently pop up not much less often than they used to. The only thing that's changed is our perception of it all, as well as our cynicism. If demos ever DO stop cold turkey though, we only have our short memories to blame. Eventually, the big companies may see that we already believe there are no more demos, and will absolutely stop releasing them just to make our claims accurate while leaving them without the extra work on cutting up a demo for us in the first place. Win-win from the developer's angle.

I'm done. Just wanted to rant a little into the void, is all. Say what you will, I've made my incessant babbling known. c:

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Black_Knight_00

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#2 Black_Knight_00
Member since 2007 • 77 Posts

I hear you: I get so pissed when people tell me to just "buy and refund it" when I lament the absence of a demo. However I have to disagree with you that demos are alive and well: the vast majority of games doesn't get a demo, because they supposedly hurt sales (of the games you mentioned, most flopped). It all goes back to this research. No idea what the factors are, but apparently forcing people to buy with a leap of faith pays dividends and letting them try your product does not, at least for AAA productions.

As for social media: don't use Facebook, every other social media site doesn't necessarily want your name and personal info; you can even skip two-step security if you don't want to give them your phone number. If anything real identity internet has been a failure: it was an experiment 5 or 6 years ago and people said no, so sites like youtube rolled it back, and there is no real push for it anymore.

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#3  Edited By Zuon
Member since 2008 • 505 Posts

@Black_Knight_00 said:

I hear you: I get so pissed when people tell me to just "buy and refund it" when I lament the absence of a demo. However I have to disagree with you that demos are alive and well: the vast majority of games doesn't get a demo, because they supposedly hurt sales (of the games you mentioned, most flopped). It all goes back to this research. No idea what the factors are, but apparently forcing people to buy with a leap of faith pays dividends and letting them try your product does not, at least for AAA productions.

As for social media: don't use Facebook, every other social media site doesn't necessarily want your name and personal info; you can even skip two-step security if you don't want to give them your phone number. If anything real identity internet has been a failure: it was an experiment 5 or 6 years ago and people said no, so sites like youtube rolled it back, and there is no real push for it anymore.

Well, let me put it like this for how I came to my conclusion demos are released at around the same frequency. Think in your mind, on a yearly basis - say 2002, 2003, 2004, etc, and name in your head as many demos of each individual year you remember. Then, go to an old legacy site like Fileplanet, or a web archive of the GameRevolution downloads page so you can see a list of those demos for yourself. You might find that the total amount of notable demos, in a yearly basis, is far shorter than our nostalgic memories make us believe. I used to also believe demos were a dime a dozen, until I looked at those old demo hosting sites to find the list wasn't as long as I thought it was. Even the "Classic PC Games" section of Internet Archive is a lot more anemic than I was expecting.

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#4  Edited By Black_Knight_00
Member since 2007 • 77 Posts

@Zuon said:

Well, let me put it like this for how I came to my conclusion demos are released at around the same frequency. Think in your mind, on a yearly basis - say 2002, 2003, 2004, etc, and name in your head as many demos of each individual year you remember. Then, go to an old legacy site like Fileplanet, or a web archive of the GameRevolution downloads page so you can see a list of those demos for yourself. You might find that the total amount of notable demos, in a yearly basis, is far shorter than our nostalgic memories make us believe. I used to also believe demos were a dime a dozen, until I looked at those old demo hosting sites to find the list wasn't as long as I thought it was. Even the "Classic PC Games" section of Internet Archive is a lot more anemic than I was expecting.

Back in the early 2000s the idea of a game releasing without a demo was almost absurd. I genuinely can't think of a game that didn't have a demo off the top of my head. Max Payne's demo was basically a third of the game. Maybe by 2005 it started to decline, I don't know.

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#5 Zuon
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@Black_Knight_00: I can't find a way to PM, but do you have anywhere else to be reached? I think we could have an interesting positive discussion about this. Max Payne's demo actually ended right after the first Subway level when Max witnessed Alex getting shot. But my brain remembered being longer because, just like the Max Payne 2 demo, beating it once unlocked additional difficulties and game modes.

I'm also working on a youtube video of 5 of the longest free demos I've played, in terms of content, and have already recorded full playthroughs of all of them (longest lasting just under 6 hours - main objective only - 20 side objectives remain).

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#6 Black_Knight_00
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@Zuon said:

@Black_Knight_00: I can't find a way to PM, but do you have anywhere else to be reached? I think we could have an interesting positive discussion about this. Max Payne's demo actually ended right after the first Subway level when Max witnessed Alex getting shot. But my brain remembered being longer because, just like the Max Payne 2 demo, beating it once unlocked additional difficulties and game modes.

I'm also working on a youtube video of 5 of the longest free demos I've played, in terms of content, and have already recorded full playthroughs of all of them (longest lasting just under 6 hours - main objective only - 20 side objectives remain).

Go to my profile, there is a white Message link right under the name.

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Zuon

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#7 Zuon
Member since 2008 • 505 Posts

@Black_Knight_00: It seems that link is hidden from me, as according to gamespot, you only accept private messages from people you follow. Ah well. ^^

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mrbojangles25

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#8 mrbojangles25
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@Black_Knight_00: I remember playing the BF3 (I think) demo for months. It had one map, but I am pretty sure you could unlock everything.

That's a good argument both for and against demos: for, because it gets people interested; against, because they might just be happy with the demo hahaha.

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Black_Knight_00

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#9 Black_Knight_00
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@Zuon said:

@Black_Knight_00: It seems that link is hidden from me, as according to gamespot, you only accept private messages from people you follow. Ah well. ^^

No idea. I DM'd you, see if you got it.

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#10 Black_Knight_00
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@mrbojangles25 said:

@Black_Knight_00: I remember playing the BF3 (I think) demo for months. It had one map, but I am pretty sure you could unlock everything.

That's a good argument both for and against demos: for, because it gets people interested; against, because they might just be happy with the demo hahaha.

BF3 had an open beta where you could unlock loads of stuff, but I don't recall if being online for that long. Maybe it was, dunno.

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#11 Starshine_M2A2
Member since 2006 • 5593 Posts

I miss those magazine demo discs so much...

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#12 Zuon
Member since 2008 • 505 Posts

@Starshine_M2A2: Now demo discs ARE something I miss, even if it was rare to get a single disc without any duds. That did seem to happen more frequently on the PS2 though, with the Jampack collections. Very rarely was there something uninteresting on them.