ATAVUS DEI'S PROFILE

Attempting to point them out in a condescending way makes you a condescending twat. It is possible to point things out without, at the same time, being patronising. However, there were no mistakes aside from your assumption that I am trying to say the companies should price their products based on effort. As far as I am concerned, the companies can price their products at whatever amount they like based on whatever principles they want to, I am simply saying that if I don't think something is a fair price I reserve the right to say that price is bullshit. Understand?

If you think I was being condescending and/or patronizing, then you'd have no chance in a real-life argument. My second reply to you could've been much, much more harsh. In fact, I'm still being relatively "nice" to you right now.

Also, please don't backpedal, it's rude to the spectators' intelligence:

Effort does not equal time. It takes a larger pool of talent to create a commercial videogame than it does to write a program like Photoshop, ergo the game should be worth much more.

The effort put into making them, regardless of quality, still isn't equal to that of making a console game, so programs like Photoshop still shouldn't be worth in excess of $100. My problem is that I don't like being ripped-off.

What you base the value of something on how well made it is and on how much effort was put into making it, and when it comes down to these qualities there is no comparison between a program like RPGMaker and a (good) videogame.

...repeat ad nauseum.

And let me throw that last statement back at you: If I think what someone says is completely idiotic, false, and stupid, I reserve the right to say it is pathetic. Understand?

And yet without someone with enough talent to use the compiler, the compiler is also useless. Circular logic is circular.

Strawman and a violation of Occam's Razor. Your creating of a circular logic problem is outside the scope of what I said, and completely useless.

I have learned to live with it; my way of living with it is to decide not to buy things I don't agree with the price of and to instead pirate them. Also, I am not trying to dictate prices, I am simply calling out prices which I personally believe are bullshit.

What is it you don't get about that?

My way of living with it is through a life of crime! You know, I'm very cynical of how software companies have been trying to punish piracy as of late, but this kind of claptrap just makes me even more cynical of certain groups of pirates. I guess it's bullshit that programmers should be compensated for the amount of effort they put into making this stuff you oh-so-love to pirate. And before you mention it, game code is not harder to program than productivity suite code.

Actually, you insinuated it when you said this:

these home users should pay for these games more than what people pay for Adobe Creative Suite or Microsoft Office... I'm quite sure if that was done, the game wouldn't sell nearly as well...

By saying that the games would not sell nearly as well if they were priced higher than Adobe products, you are stating that changing the price would have a negative effect. For the price change to have a negative effect, the price change would have to be one that increased the price. Ergo, you are saying that the games should increase in price when, in fact, it is entirely possible that the Adobe products could instead drop below the price of the games.

QED.

OH LET'S TAKE A QUOTE OUT OF CONTEXT AND SEE WHAT WE CAN DO WITH IT! I think you missed the "by your logic" part which isn't even consistent anymore, and the "just because 'more effort' was placed into it." bits. Let's go back to your original argument, and don't try to deny it please: Photoshop, Word, and <insert productivity program here> should be worth less than a video game because, in your view, "less" work was done to create them. You trying to create a black-and-white fallacy out of what I said is ridiculous, and will be called as such.

You're right, the world would be such a better place if people didn't have opinions on how things should be and simply accepted the world as it is.

It's one thing to have dreams of a utopian society, where everything's nice and shiny, fairness exists everywhere, and kittens play in a perpetual day with no end. It's another to be in outright denial and try to arrogantly state some self-serving viewpoint on how the world should work, because quite honestly, humanity doesn't work that way. You speak of Psychology 101, yet you demonstrate that you have no practical knowledge of how humans think.

author=Fallen-Griever link=topic=1867.msg58780#msg58780 date=1233139921
I am saying that an engine like Source takes about as much time and effort to develop as a program like RPGMaker, but since game developers then have to develop the game, on top of developing the engine, the game should be worth more based on the effort required. Developing a program like RPGMaker stops where the game developer has only just finished building an engine to create their game in; you then have to take into account all the extra effort placed into making a game, especially a modern game (voice acting, facial recognition, 3D modelling, all that kind of flashy bollocks).

Ergo, no game-making program should be worth more than a commercial videogame IMO.

The market does not work this way. The usage value (or "demand") of games and productivity tools differ on an astronomical scale. For example, Photoshop is used by nearly all professional graphics workers, as the program really is that expansive. Digital photography people use it to touch up their images, comic artists use it for their works, game graphics people use it for their sprites/GUI images/etc., film studios use it for movie editing along with AfterEffects...the list goes on. This is simple economics 101 here.

Now, how about a game like Team Fortress 2. Does it offer any productivity value? Can anyone else besides gamers see another use for it besides having fun? Can you create something new with it? No, I'm not talking about mods. The market for Team Fortress 2 is directed at people who play video games, more specifically first-person shooters. This is infinitely more narrow than who Photoshop targets. Thus, the demand is lower.

As for the worth of the game, who is the most likely to play these first-person shooters? The average home user, probably someone who's dependent on their parents and has no income of their own. By your logic, these home users should pay for these games more than what people pay for Adobe Creative Suite or Microsoft Office, just because "more effort" (that's such a subjective term...) was placed into it. I'm quite sure if that was done, the game wouldn't sell nearly as well...

And also, game developers usually license another engine for their use. Not all games out there have engines written specifically for them. Therefore the engines themselves have a productivity value associated with them, and thus make them worth more simply because a program that enables the creation of other programs or files is worth more than a static program with no ability to generate new content. Once again, this does not include mods.

I took Computing at A-Level, which isn't exactly the most advanced level of taught programming but was enough for me to realise I had far more difficulty making RPGMaker games than I did writing imitations of Wordpad and writing code to keep track of stock or whatever other stuff I did. And that's just making a game in RPGMaker; making a game from scratch is clearly more difficult, so yes, I am basing my opinion on personal experience.

Microsoft Word is a little more than just typing in text and applying some kind of formatting to it. There are other aspects to it which make it more valuable than a WordPad clone, such as tight integration with other Office programs and working with corporate databases. The same goes for Adobe Photoshop; it's much more than MSPaint with flashy filters and super-cool special effects.

Effort does not equal time. It takes a larger pool of talent to create a commercial videogame than it does to write a program like Photoshop, ergo the game should be worth much more. I don't care how long it took to develop.

Larger pool of talent, if it existed in the first place, still does not outbeat the concept of demand. Read an economics textbook.

Like I said, I don't think any professional computer software is worth that kind of money. For instance, The GIMP and Paint.net do nearly everything Photoshop can do and they're both free. Open Office does nearly everything MS Office can do and it is also free. Etcetera.

GIMP doesn't natively support CMYK color, which is crucial for printing on paper, and its support for raw files from digital cameras is especially lacking. Not to mention the user interface is...something that can be improved on. Those are only a few instances where it's inferior to its professional equivalents; there are much more. Likewise, OpenOffice lacks many features which MSOffice has, that advanced users take advantage of.

If what you do is simple, then OpenOffice or GIMP are fine programs. However, for more advanced work, you will need professional software.

I'm saying that all engines are too expensive, so saying that it is reasonable in comparison doesn't really suit me. Like I said, there are few programs out there I think are worth paying that kind of money for, and those that are worth it are very specific programs used in the private sector and not in home-offices.

It is reasonable in comparison. You get a user-friendly map editor combined with the expansiveness of an entire programming language, as well as a program which combines the two together. For...just a little over $100. Commercial game engines can go up to the hundreds of thousands, depending on the engine you want to get, and not all of them are as easy to use as RPG Maker.

Now, as game-making is more difficult for me than programming is, me being someone who is using a WYSIWYG editor to do the game-making and not someone who is starting a game from scratch, I assume that making a game from scratch is going to be a lot more difficult than simply programming an image editor.

Difficulty is relative; if you were making an image editor with the complexity of MSPaint, then sure, creating a commercial game is more difficult. However, if you were developing an image editor as complex as Photoshop or GIMP, then the amount of work put into these programs could easily exceed a commercial game's effort. Refer to above for the Photoshop example.

And most people use literally 1% of Photoshop anyway. Besides, the fact that a free program can do 1% of something that costs >$100 to buy shows that the >$100 is a complete waste of freakin' money (you know, because percentages stop at 100% and all?).

Have you ever heard of Photoshop Elements?

You sound like you're just bitter here because higher editions of a program, which include more features, are more expensive than lower editions. Which...makes sense. Cars with more powerful engines and stronger designs are of course going to cost more than economy models. It's all about what features you use.

The effort put into making them, regardless of quality, still isn't equal to that of making a console game, so programs like Photoshop still shouldn't be worth in excess of $100. My problem is that I don't like being ripped-off.

I don't actually use either. Spriters need nothing more than MS Paint to get by.

Comparing MSPaint to Photoshop is like comparing RPG Maker to the Crysis engine. It just...does not follow.

author=GameOverGames Productions link=topic=1867.msg58352#msg58352 date=1232944034
$150 dollars on a limited program that's only interesting feature is exporting to Xbox 360 and Flash, or $20 on registering GameMaker which can properly calculate 2*1.

That's a really hard choice right there.

Can you cite an example here on the math?

http://www.sfwa.org/writing/worldbuilding1.htm by fantasy author Patricia C. Wrede.

For you budding writers, this is a nice guide to building your new world. Note that one shouldn't take it and overthink what it suggests; rather, use it as a guideline to get you started. One can safely omit some or many parts from it, if your story does not need or mention them. :)

Interesting software you have!

Just a question I must ask though, me being a 3D modeler: Will there be any room for importing models from, say, something like Blender into a map? I realize since the mapping system is based off of RPG Maker that may be impossible, but just throwing it out there.