Digital download, $$ straight to SD/IC's pocket (I do not know how the costs are split up).

The digital download price is higher then the recommended manufacture price of $39 to please the distributers, judging from the silence from Europe I think they still need to s.. er get all the help they can get.

Oh, and for the FIRST TIME I've seen 2, yes "2" copies side by side on a shelf (and several dozen Bioshock copies piled in the corner). They have begun to put them on the shelves as fast as they are selling.

$40 too much? Maybe if you're a homeless person...

Right now I think its on sale at Bestbuy for $30. So get it while you can.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp;jsessionid=KHKZAPFHDHSV3KC4D3EFAFQ?_dyncharset=ISO-8859-1&id=pcat17071&type=page&st=Sins+of+a+Solar+Empire&sc=Global&cp=1&nrp=15&sp=&qp=&list=n&iht=y&usc=All+Categories&ks=960

I've probably already gotten 40 hours worth of enjoyment out of my $40 purchase and I'm sure I'll be playing this great game for months if not years to come, especially if there's a strong online multiplayer scene.

$40 isn't much if the game proves to be one of your favorites but it would be rather steep for a disappointing game that leaves a bad taste in your mouth. I'd say that if you enjoyed the likes of Civilization or Alpha Centauri then you'll probably enjoy this. It's different, but you basically get to confront the same types of problems only with far less micromanagement. (Did anyone really enjoy clicking on squares to order your population to farm/mine it and then doing that over and over throughtout an entire game or micromanaging your engineers to build roads? It was fun the first couple times but became boring quickly.)

My best gaming buy was Unreal Tournament (1999) Game of the Year Edition for $10 back in early 2001. I've probably spent 3000+ hours playing that game, released a couple custom CTF maps, and still play the game semi-competitively online. (That's how awesome that game was--folks still play the Original greedily today.) I figure that I must have received hours of enjoyment for every penny spent. I hope Sins can come close to matching that.

The local Wal-Mart had five copies the last time I was there (Thursday) and there were five copies the very first time I saw it on the shelf and every time I went between then and Thursday, so I don't think it's in any danger of selling out there anytime soon. I'll probably see the same five copies the next time I go.

$40 is a lot of money when you consider that $40 buys barely enough gasoline to get me back and forth to campus for two weeks of classes, and that's just for classes. I think that if I was fiscally irresponsible enough I'd buy Sins right now on the basis that it's just $40 and probably every other game that looked good too with that same logic, and then I'd have a ton of games and I'd also need to borrow money from my parents.

I will content myself with MUDs and my N64 until such time that Sins shows up on the bargain rack at Wal-Mart for $9.96 or the discount GOTY edition is released.

I can name a lot of people who would be shocked to hear that, given that most brick and mortar stores can't get them in stock for any length of time. Then again... who goes to Wal-Mart to buy games?

FYI, Bestbuy has it on sale this week @ $30. Enjoy it, cause it will be a while before they put it on sale again. I've never seen GalCiv or GalCiv2 on sale at bestbuy or any other retailer so this is a real treat.

If that price is too much for you, then you should really look into another hobby. Gaming just isnt for you (and neither is any other hobby worth its medal).

No other store in my city sells video games.

Bestbuy.com FTW! They deliver it right to your door step and you get the fantastic price, save for a mild shipping cost. An clearly you can get online to purchase it as you are posting in these forums so there is no longer an excuse!

Latah!

I should add that most stores will price match another large retailer. You just have to go in and ask if they will price match this and bring the bestbuy ad from this week (or a printout of the website). There are lots of options available for those who look.

What with the way the American dollar is going atm, I got Sins downloaded at bargin prices. Usually I would have had to pay $70-$90 Australian dollars at a store to get a new PC game instead of $49.00. ($90-$120 for a new console game.)



I saw the same thing with The Witcher, I rang around all the game stores I could think of trying to get a copy, then when I went to look at furniture at Harvey Normans they had five or six sitting there on the shelves along with some collectors editions.

I don't buy games on the internet, so I do have an excuse. Even if I did, $30 is a lot for a video game.

Good grief folks, way back in post 16 I mentioned it was $29.99 this week at Best Buy. Read!

-HM

That's gonna be one sorry piece of software that sits on a shelf to be discounted to $10. And forget about any game being retailed at that price, it just wouldn't be worth it to distribute anything for $10/unit.

I commend you on being budget conscious, but if you think $30 is too steep for a new video game, then I'd suggest you're turning your entertainment budget to the wrong area. Your best bet is to either cruise the bargain bins for older games and play them, or just forget about playing new titles altogether. $30 is a bargain for a new game, and even the $40 price point is a good deal.

If this does happen, there won't be an Ironclad or Stardock to develop new games 

The game is $36 at newegg.com with free shipping. Not a bad price. I generally don't go over $40 when buying games.

funny craig.. assuming that the game has already sold 100k copies at 40 a shot, that's 4million bucks in revenue.. lets say that the company got 10% of that, that would still be about a half a million bucks.. no idea what your bills are, but I wouldn't spit at that..
The thing I don't understand is that if there have been 100k copies sold, how come the online usually only has 300 players at a time

bestbuy this week $30

Then again, if you're a student you probably shouldn't be playing a game that can eat as much time as Sins does.

Because you're complaining about the extremely reasonable price of a NEW game that is incredibly well made.

Could you image if people started saying "$50 is too much for a cell phone" or "$500 is too much for a computer" or "$6 is too much for a meal" (all US based pricing)? All of those things could be much much lower in price and the companies would still make outrageous profits. Gaming companies generally try to keep the prices of their products consistent. I mean come on, games have been coming out brand new at $50 for 20 years now. Thats almost 0 inflation in that market for 2 decades. Be grateful that the prices havent gone up much (newer consoles have of course, but very few PC games exceed the $50 mark). Lord knows everything else has inflated.

Housing is nearly 8x higher then it was 20 years ago, food is about 3x, gas is 4-5x, professional sports are insane. So long story short, if $30-40 is too expensive for a product that entertains for 100+ hours, then I dont know what hobby would suit you. Try getting tickets to a sporting event that will give that price to entertainment value.

At best, you sit through 5 hours of an event for $70 and a week later everyone has already forgotten about it, not to mention you cant simply watch it over and over again unless it was recorded, and even then, nothing changes, no decisions can really be made to make it new and exciting again.

Anyway, I wish you luck on finding a new hobby. Almost every form of entertainment in the 1st world requires large amounts of currency. The few things that dont would include used books, used electronic games, skipping rocks on a lake, jogging around the block, and cutting the grass by hand with a pair of scissors. Each of which will have a cost associated with it (gas or bus fare to drive to the store, library, or lake, scissors to cut the grass, shoes to run in, etc...) of under $20 if done properly.

Personally, I'd rather spend the $40 and get a game that I will be playing for years to come (assuming spore doesnt take over) and not sweat the 2 hours it took me to earn the money to buy it.

It's already cheap, and I have spent I'd guesstimate $300 on games that suck.(Over the last two years alone)

This is bar-none the best value I have gotten for a game with the most returns. This game is replayable, immersive, fun, and most importantly dynamic and heavily supported by the developer.

I'm actually surprised you want it 'cheaper' for a game of this quality it doesn't get much cheaper than this and they priced it very aggressively.



When a game this good comes along you don't dicker about price, you pony up and buy it because it's worth it and the dev's deserve their cash.

They could have been much more greedy and still sold as many because the game frankly is that good.

In patch 1.4, the Devs are going to change the black market so you can buy Sins at a lower price

Well here is the thing. For *you* $30 may be a lot for a video game but $30 is dirt cheap for a game. Normally a game is $49-$59 on release. It will take at least a year to get that price down to $30 and that assumes it's a crappy game. Usually takes a couple years to get a game down under $30 and most games don't go under $20-25 unless it's really old. Only really old games (5+ yrs) or really crappy games are you going to find in the $9.95 bargain bin.

So a game like Sins, which has hundreds of hours of game play, for only $40 new is a bargain to begin with. And as shown you can get it as low as $30 on sale right now. If you're going to wait for Sins to hit the bargain bin of under $20 then you're going to be waiting at least 2-3 years, which is normal for a game.

Good luck.

LOL.

Think $40 is alot? Try buying Chrono Trigger when I did in 2000 for $100.