Rayman Origins came out just five months ago and was reduced to $39.99 only a month later. Now it's less than 15 bucks. No platinum/greatest hits treatment, just bargin bin banishment
(Culture, Industry, Rayman Origins, Target, Xbox 360)
Yeah, its not a new IP but its a brilliant game. Rayman Origins brought the platformer back to it's roots. I got in on PS3 for $60 and it's worth every penny. Funny, 1080p @ 60 frames, it's gorgeous and I would have to say it's probably the most polished game to release this year along side Portal 2.
Wait... because Target has the game on clearance it's somehow a disservice to the game??? The game was a critical success with high scores all around and stores like Target have limited shelve space and carry games that sell well for them... that's how a retail store works. I see this as someone is going to get a great game at a great price. If you want to pay more, then feel free to shop around... I'm sure you can find a higher price somewhere. Worthless article.
No matter how good the game was, they were stupid to release it as they did.
It might be worth every penny of 60 dollars, but you just don't charge that much for a title like Rayman: Origins these days because it's a niche title more suited to a downloadable environment. The game probably would've sold 10x more at 20 dollars with a simultaneous release on all platforms. Even now, it's probably doing pretty darn well on Steam (and probably will for years to come).
But still, it was a stupid mistake for Ubisoft to release the game this way.
this could be a way to just clear out existing stock. Not actually reflective of the new price but just maybe they have so much on hand they wanted to blow it out.
Case in point. While I was at target a few months back I saw guitar hero warriors of rock with a clearance sticker on it for $9.98 so i picked it up for my kids. Go to the same target a few days later and the game is selling for $29.98.
I saw rayman origins at target just this past saturday for $29.98 and it was being offered as part of their buy 2 get 1 free. I almost got it but if it is at my target for $14.98 then i'm definitely getting it.
They do this sort of thing from time to time. If they get an over abundance of a certain title that they expect will be a big seller and it doesnt sell to what they expected. They put a few clearance stickers on them to move inventory.
Ubisoft just became too greedy by releasing this as a full-priced retail-game. ... they should have just released it for 15 bucks on PSN/XBLA, and I'm 100% certain it would have sold at least 10 times as much in it's first week, and would have continued to sell great for years after because it would have been one of the best downloadable games of this gen.
Ubisoft was just too greedy, and by wanting more, they received a lot less than they could have.
what attitude, some cry baby writing a worthless article because rayman is in the bargain bin. What has company risk and new ip's got to do with anything. nice one genius
Thats a very bad attitude, you're the kind of gamer who doesn't care for innovation, who only plays Call of Duty, no-scoping and thinking he's such a pro.
see now that comment shows how much of a douche you are. I haven't bought a cod since cod 3. You're the gamer who is holding back the industry because of your stupidity. Rayman is in the bargain bin at a store who cares
It's pretty obvious why this particular game didn't do well at retail... It was announced a 10 to 20 dollar downloadable title. It's extremely difficult once that precedent has been set and that expectation is in the consumers' mind to then just say "Well, now it's better than it was gonna be before, so it has to be a disc title and 60 dollars" and expect those people to just get over it. The game still looks like the same game they expected it to be when they thought they were going to pay a fraction of the price for it. It just makes it look unappealing to them, like they're getting ripped off because it wasn't supposed to cost that much. Not that it isn't a huge game that became much bigger than originally announced and that they weren't right to charge 60 dollars for it... but, the viewpoint of consumers on this one has a point as well.
same thing happened to Halo 3: ODST yet it went on to be one of the best selling exclusives of the generation.
It didnt do well at retail because.......who knows really. many critically acclaimed games sell poorly, it just happens. Rayman Origins is the most beautiful game this generation, bar none, IMO - and its fun as hell to boot. 4 player local co-op too. its a shame it didnt sell 5+ million, but the tech that it was made on (UbiArt) has now shown what it can do which will hopefully lead to more incredible and gorgeous 2D platformers.
Come on, you truly cannot compare Rayman to Halo when it comes to sales. You're right, a similar thing happened with ODST, but it also had the Halo brand name at the height of its popularity to push it forward.
Idiots, Target is the one Retailer who knows wtf they're doing. Instead of hanging onto games for half a decade or longer like *cough, Shopko, Kmart, Walmart* hoping that 5 years from now when they finally mark it down to $20 people will buy it.... What I'm saying is this isn't a news flash!! Target is a great company and they don't keep old stuff on their shelves. They'd rather discount, flip and be rid of said games to make way for sellers. Rinse & repeat. It's a good business model and apparently it works because they've been doing it for years. Not only that but you walk into a Target and they don't have hundreds of outdated games still priced @ $20-40.
For those of you who don't have Rayman Origins. Do yourself a favor & see if it's available around you. It's a brilliant game.
This was one of the best games of 2011, defiantely deserved more than this. At least it made money (although not much). Hopefully it sells well on the PS Vita.
I was thinking of picking this game up for the PSV but it is not more expensive than the 360 and PS3 versions so I may pick it up for one of them over my psv.
But I have fond a lot of good games have not sold well this gen. It has all been about fps this gen and if its not got guns in people are not picking the game up unless its a Nintendo game.
Its a brilliant game but this is just how things go. I remember seeing this at E3 and was amazed by it.
Ubisoft always have a good conference tho. No hype like EA and MS, they just say it how it is and show the game. Then let us decide if its good or not :)
Never in my life, have I seen a game so good, get so little recognition. It's such a shame. Having a blast with the Vita version. I'd go so far as to say its platforming perfection. Will definitely remember it in 15 years time, personally.
It's going to be this gens Beyond Good and Evil (A game that had little success but everyone will remember for being great in 5 years), which coincidentally enough was also created by Michel Ancel.
$60 was too much for this game, $15-$20 is probably not enough. At $39.99 with a good ad campaign, it would probably have done better.
It's not the fault of gamers that games don't do well, it has everything to do with marketing, launch window, and pricing. Most people, including myself, don't see a Rayman side scroller as a $60 buy, no matter how solid it is, and by the time it was $40, it was way off of everybody's radar.
Publishers like Ubisoft need to change their pricing models to something other than slapping $59.99 on every game. If they don't, more good and great games like Rayman Origins will suffer from it.
There are usually only 2-3 games/year that I consider worthy of a $60 price tag for me personally. If you feel like a game like Rayman Origins is one of those games, more power to you. In the end, I paid $20 for it new, played through it, and felt it was worth probably double that amount.
I don't believe that being a sheep to publisher game pricing is going to save good video games anytime soon, it's only going to open the door wider for what companies like Ubisoft feel like they can slap a $59.99 price tag on and expect people to buy at that price.
Again that comes down to personal opinion. I find it amazing that COD gets so much hate when people bash the FPS genre and BF3 gets a tap on the shoulder.
Only fully fledged shooter im buying this year is GR:FS. Will be getting Rayman: Origins, AC3 and kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning. Should be a Really fun year :3
Didn't this release right behind Call of Duty? It's never smart to release a game after CoD that doesn't have it's own hype train. I mean, it's not even that it's not a good game it's just retailers know CoD sells like hotcakes and keeps it's value so they advertise it everywhere.
Just as well, to anyone who gives the "This is why developers don't do new creative IP's!" line, Rayman has been around for quite awhile, so it's not what I'd call new. Hell, if you count Raving Rabbids as a Rayman game (which I do) then it's got more entries than CoD. Want something new? Try Journey
I don't think it makes sense to blame just CoD. Batman, BF3, Skyrim, Uncharted 3 and AC: Revelations were all released extremely close to CoD and were hugely successful. But that says it all really. It was a ridiculously crowded holiday season.
I rented this game and loved it, was funny, and my girlfriend enjoyed it too. Its been on my must get list for a while now but havent got to it yet. But I will be buying it new, they deserve it.
It's a great game. I bought it for $40 during the Black Friday sale, but I would have probably paid full price if it was released at a different time.
It's easily one of the best platformers out there, new or old. Unfortunately Ubisoft has a habit of only advertising "TEH AAA" franchises like Assassin's Creed.
I got this game with my Vita and absolutley love it, although i can see why it would have been overlooked due to the sheer amount of titles released last Christmas season, I haven't even got round to half of them i want to play.
I dont think it was greed but more over confidence. They thought the game would be a hit (which it kinda was) but i think it Definatly would have been more successful as ana arcade title.
It could have been a cheap download title if they cut about 90% of the game.
I mean for 60 bucks it was one of the most content packed games in the last couple of years. The game had about 70 something levels, what more could you ask for in a full game? Unlockable characters, unlockable levels, challenge levels, time trials, hidden areas and co op? Well yah, its all there.
I don't see how they got greedy when they literally included everything imaginable in a full disc game. I mean, they even used a brand new engine. PSN/XBL download only for 15 dollars would have completely watered down and ruined Rayman Origins. They made the right choice by expanding the game to full retail.
Which would have made sense. The market offers too many brilliant platformers at 10$-15$ price tag (even Rayman 3 HD!) for Rayman to be released as a 60$ retail game. But at 15$, a lengthy campaign and co-op, it does bring more value than your average XBLA/PSN game. Maybe they decided to maximizing the profits by charging the hard fans first before bringing the price down to this level, but I'm not sure if this is the best strategy.
You guys are actually bitching about paying for a great game like this $15? Are people really this stupid these days? This is a typical guy "What only 15 dollars for a videogame? That's an outrage!! I want to pay more!!!" Don't tell me it's about the developers if they're selling the game at that price it's their problem. Watch the disagree's come on rolling for stating that people are dumb to expect to pay 60 dollars when it's 15 dollars now
You're absolutely right buddy. If anything, OP should be encouraging people to go out and pick up this masterpiece. I can't understand how anyone could possibly complain about not being able to purchase a game for $60. It's mind blowing.
I've just added it to my "Will Buy" backlog, and if I didn't have Prototype 2, The Witcher 2, Minecraft 360 Edition, Bloodforge, and Fable Heroes coming down the pike at me, I'd have picked it up already.
It was the first game I bought for my PS Vita and I love it... probably going to buy it again for the 360 or PS3 if I find it for that price at my local Target.
I think it had the bad fortune (and utterly stupid release logic by Ubisoft) to get brought out during an exceptionally crowded holiday season, which is too bad because it's one of the best platformers I've played in a long time.
In some aspects this game is superior than any super mario game....level design is genius, visuals are crisp 1080p (?), animation is flawless, difficulty is great....in fact I think this game surpasses anything mario has offered in the last decade ( mario galaxy was going to the exception as the level design in that game were magnificent however I felt it was far too easy not like its 2d counterparts in the old days which were notoriously hard).
Was this for PS3 version too? I paid $30 for it awhile back and still am playing it! Platforming old school gameplay perfection, with modern day HD graphics! Man, some people really dont know a good game if it slapped them in the face! This is ashame.
i really do not see COD fans being interested in animated platformers. "oh hell should i get a fps where i can epeen on the internets or an animated paltformer? im so torn to choose"
if anything marketing was to blame for poor sales if the sales were even poor to start with. anyone have sales numbers? alot of you gamers assume that everyone reads up on new games and release dates and know what companies make what games. you all fail to understand that this is not the 90s when gaming was a hobby only geeky nerd gamers engaged in. now 80% of "gamers" could not even tell you what company makes megaman. they can tell you who makes angry birds or farmville.
this beloved hobby of ours has expanded and is now a pastime a huge portion of the public enjoy in one way or another. developers and publishers love this huge market and try to appease the masses and cash in. if you are a hard core gamer, you are not the majority anymore. do not expect devs to make games for you. expect them to attempt to fleece the ignorant masses. ignorant masses buy shit that is marketed to them, and that is never the best games.
of course "best games" is a completely a subjective term. there is someone out there that thinks angry birds is the shiznit believe it or not.
It's sad to see Rayman Origins not nearly as successful as it deserved to be. I bought it for $40 on black friday and it was one of the best games I played in 2011. Probably even the greatest 2D platformer I've ever played. It's a must buy for any system.
I disagree that this should've been a cheap download only title. I think Rayman Origins deserved a retail release and I would love to see more 2D and 3D platformers with high production values get retail releases. I'm also happy to pay more just to have a physical copy of the game.
Why do 2D platformers have to be so niche these days? If all these shooters flooding the market deserve full priced retail releases, why shouldn't platformers? I'll take a colorful 2D platformer over a mindless FPS anyday.
a crying shame, as it was a phenomenal game, easily one of the best platformers I've ever played, rivaled only by Donkey Kong Country Returns on the Wii.
I got it in the mail from amazon today (Paid $26) and it's a good game. Though it shouldn't have released at $60 it should have been at least like Sonic Generations and launch at $50. Still I heard that it somehow exceeded Ubisoft's expectations so that's good, not enough 2D platformers this gen.
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It might be worth every penny of 60 dollars, but you just don't charge that much for a title like Rayman: Origins these days because it's a niche title more suited to a downloadable environment. The game probably would've sold 10x more at 20 dollars with a simultaneous release on all platforms. Even now, it's probably doing pretty darn well on Steam (and probably will for years to come).
But still, it was a stupid mistake for Ubisoft to release the game this way.
a way to just clear out existing stock. Not actually reflective of the new price but just maybe they have so much on hand they wanted to blow it out.
Case in point. While I was at target a few months back I saw guitar hero warriors of rock with a clearance sticker on it for $9.98 so i picked it up for my kids. Go to the same target a few days later and the game is selling for $29.98.
I saw rayman origins at target just this past saturday for $29.98 and it was being offered as part of their buy 2 get 1 free. I almost got it but if it is at my target for $14.98 then i'm definitely getting it.
They do this sort of thing from time to time. If they get an over abundance of a certain title that they expect will be a big seller and it doesnt sell to what they expected. They put a few clearance stickers on them to move inventory.
... they should have just released it for 15 bucks on PSN/XBLA, and I'm 100% certain it would have sold at least 10 times as much in it's first week, and would have continued to sell great for years after because it would have been one of the best downloadable games of this gen.
Ubisoft was just too greedy, and by wanting more, they received a lot less than they could have.
It's not like we haven't warned them.
Wikipedia is the most unreliable source on the internet...
It didnt do well at retail because.......who knows really. many critically acclaimed games sell poorly, it just happens. Rayman Origins is the most beautiful game this generation, bar none, IMO - and its fun as hell to boot. 4 player local co-op too. its a shame it didnt sell 5+ million, but the tech that it was made on (UbiArt) has now shown what it can do which will hopefully lead to more incredible and gorgeous 2D platformers.
All he does is compare things to 360 exclusives and claim on the 360 is the best. God do I wish they still had the gamer Zone and the Open zone.
I demand all games stay at full price forever! That'll learn 'em.
In other news Rayman made its money back from game sales...so it's totally profitable at any price now.
A critical AND financial success. Write a damn article about that!
For those of you who don't have Rayman Origins. Do yourself a favor & see if it's available around you. It's a brilliant game.
My girlfriend loved it a lot more than the idiotic new super mario bro. which is just a bunch of screaming at your friends for jumping on you.
But I have fond a lot of good games have not sold well this gen. It has all been about fps this gen and if its not got guns in people are not picking the game up unless its a Nintendo game.
Ubisoft always have a good conference tho. No hype like EA and MS, they just say it how it is and show the game. Then let us decide if its good or not :)
u say poor rayman, i say poor us
You cry about lack of innovation and taking risks but when they do you don't support them.
How sad.
For about £15 its definately worth buying if you're into the platformer genre.
I am playing both games on the Wii.
It's not the fault of gamers that games don't do well, it has everything to do with marketing, launch window, and pricing. Most people, including myself, don't see a Rayman side scroller as a $60 buy, no matter how solid it is, and by the time it was $40, it was way off of everybody's radar.
Publishers like Ubisoft need to change their pricing models to something other than slapping $59.99 on every game. If they don't, more good and great games like Rayman Origins will suffer from it.
This is the mentality that's killing good video games. Congratulations, you're part of the cancer!
I don't believe that being a sheep to publisher game pricing is going to save good video games anytime soon, it's only going to open the door wider for what companies like Ubisoft feel like they can slap a $59.99 price tag on and expect people to buy at that price.
Only fully fledged shooter im buying this year is GR:FS. Will be getting Rayman: Origins, AC3 and kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning. Should be a Really fun year :3
JK
Just as well, to anyone who gives the "This is why developers don't do new creative IP's!" line, Rayman has been around for quite awhile, so it's not what I'd call new. Hell, if you count Raving Rabbids as a Rayman game (which I do) then it's got more entries than CoD. Want something new? Try Journey
But that says it all really. It was a ridiculously crowded holiday season.
It's easily one of the best platformers out there, new or old. Unfortunately Ubisoft has a habit of only advertising "TEH AAA" franchises like Assassin's Creed.
it would have been a release of the year for PSN /XBL. instead they got greedy with it
It could have been a cheap download title if they cut about 90% of the game.
I mean for 60 bucks it was one of the most content packed games in the last couple of years. The game had about 70 something levels, what more could you ask for in a full game? Unlockable characters, unlockable levels, challenge levels, time trials, hidden areas and co op? Well yah, its all there.
I don't see how they got greedy when they literally included everything imaginable in a full disc game. I mean, they even used a brand new engine. PSN/XBL download only for 15 dollars would have completely watered down and ruined Rayman Origins. They made the right choice by expanding the game to full retail.
But at 15$, a lengthy campaign and co-op, it does bring more value than your average XBLA/PSN game. Maybe they decided to maximizing the profits by charging the hard fans first before bringing the price down to this level, but I'm not sure if this is the best strategy.
/s
I've just added it to my "Will Buy" backlog, and if I didn't have Prototype 2, The Witcher 2, Minecraft 360 Edition, Bloodforge, and Fable Heroes coming down the pike at me, I'd have picked it up already.
i loved the demo for PS3 and vita, but couldn't afford the full game. if it's the same deal where i live, i may just pick it up at that price.
I think it had the bad fortune (and utterly stupid release logic by Ubisoft) to get brought out during an exceptionally crowded holiday season, which is too bad because it's one of the best platformers I've played in a long time.
i really do not see COD fans being interested in animated platformers. "oh hell should i get a fps where i can epeen on the internets or an animated paltformer? im so torn to choose"
if anything marketing was to blame for poor sales if the sales were even poor to start with. anyone have sales numbers? alot of you gamers assume that everyone reads up on new games and release dates and know what companies make what games. you all fail to understand that this is not the 90s when gaming was a hobby only geeky nerd gamers engaged in. now 80% of "gamers" could not even tell you what company makes megaman. they can tell you who makes angry birds or farmville.
this beloved hobby of ours has expanded and is now a pastime a huge portion of the public enjoy in one way or another. developers and publishers love this huge market and try to appease the masses and cash in. if you are a hard core gamer, you are not the majority anymore. do not expect devs to make games for you. expect them to attempt to fleece the ignorant masses. ignorant masses buy shit that is marketed to them, and that is never the best games.
of course "best games" is a completely a subjective term. there is someone out there that thinks angry birds is the shiznit believe it or not.
I disagree that this should've been a cheap download only title. I think Rayman Origins deserved a retail release and I would love to see more 2D and 3D platformers with high production values get retail releases. I'm also happy to pay more just to have a physical copy of the game.
Why do 2D platformers have to be so niche these days? If all these shooters flooding the market deserve full priced retail releases, why shouldn't platformers? I'll take a colorful 2D platformer over a mindless FPS anyday.