After a few days of thinking it over and doing some research, I purchased the $90 copy of Planetary Annihilation. Since there are so many threads crying foul over the Steam pricing structure, I thought it would be beneficial to walk everyone through my logic that I applied in my decision to purchase Planetary Annihilation at its $90 price point. #1: Fairness to Kickstarter contributors. Now I don't understand the full story but its my understanding that Kickstarter contributors that paid $90 received a similar package as the deal that is on Steam. A well known marketing strategy is to not piss off or ignore your existing customer base. Recent examples of this in action can be seen with the xBox One announcement of a device that appears to cater more so to the non gamer audience with Kinect, the emphasis on TV surfing capabilities, and the restrictions placed on used games. Another good example is Netflix with its plan to split itself into two separate companies. Selling the same Kickstarter package on Steam at a lower price would have been an insult to all of those who participated in the Kickstarter event. Not a great strategy to piss off your core base of dedicated fans. #2: The game is not complete yet. I know a lot if people argue that this should be a reason for the game being that much cheaper. The game still needs to be completed and the pitch for purchasing the game is slightly different since it comes with the expectation that the user will test the game and submit worthwhile feedback. Ideally, they would rather have fewer high quality testers rather than numerous low quality testers. The price point reinforces this fact by forcing the purchaser to carefully review his/her decision to buy. Imagine what it would be like if they sold at $40 today, all of the people who didn't take the time to read the description on Steam would purchase the game only to discover that it is not what they saw in the video preview. They would then proceed to wine and complain about purchasing an unfinished game. The high price point prevents this from occurring. #3: I believe in the game. From the moment I saw the video, I was sold. There is currently no game that I know of that's on the horizon and in the same vein as TA and SupCom. I did perform some due diligence on the background behind the team but all that did was reinforce my belief in the game. Now you tell me that I can assist in early development and provide feedback to a small group on a game that I have been looking to play for years and it only costs $90??? You can sign me up every time. If the game had not shown up on Steam, I would never have realized it existed. If the $90 price tag is too steep for you, then there will be a much more finished and polished game awaiting you in a couple months that will cost you $40.
