Sins price with TGN tokens

Tokens still give a discount, just not as big a one as usual.  We were losing some money on it due to the weak US dollar and lots of orders from European customers.

You should expect to see price increases like this on additional new games in the future.

I suppose the problem is on the shipping costs towards Europe, as I don't see clearly the problem about weak dollars for the download only version, which I though was the only possible thing when using TGN token.

I don't get your reasoning Yarlen; if you have significant costs in euros then there would be a problem but I'd expect most of your costs are in us$, since you're in the states and it is a digital download.

It also doesn't explain why the price in both $ and tokens on Totalgaming for a download is above the retail price of $40 for the boxed version(seen it for as little as $35). Since when does a digital download costs more than a boxed version? Normally I'd expect the download to be $10 cheaper since it has less costs(see Matrix Games online store) and you are not giving the retail chain its 25 points or more.

Having said that I assume the problem is that Totalgaming is part of Stardock and Stardock is the publisher and can't be seen to undercut the retail chain, but that still screws Totalgaming customers.

Finished with my vent.

I don't see how getting any discount off the regular price is screwing TotalGaming customers.

You like that word? Screwed is a lot more colorful than 'economically disadvantaged' and a lot easier to type, though a little harsh for $2(assuming the download version is of equal value to the boxed version; another debate).

I've searched the web and every site I found selling sins is selling it for $40, which would imply the true economic value is $40 and not $45 as listed at tgn. So how is paying $42 for something worth $40 is a discount? If you truly believe that I have some wonderful vacation property in Florida I can sell you at a significant discount and a bridge in Brooklyn!

It still boils down to tgn customers paying more in comparison to retail customers. As a tgn customer that doesn't make feel all warm and fuzzy and loved(where's my teddy).

TGN customers are getting the Collector's Edition of the game, not the standard version (which is what's at retail for $40). Obviously since it's a digital download, we can only provide the extras as digital files - so if you click the Download Updates button in the game, you'll be sent to a page where you can download:  the music CD (as MP3s), the hotkey card, the tech tree poster, and the artwork posters. It also gives you the ability to get a Collector's Edition box for $5 plus shipping/handling if you want by emailing [email protected].

 

I have looked at the various Stardock sites about SoaSE. Unless I have forgotten something, the pricing is the following (https://www.sinsofasolarempire.com/store.aspx):

- direct download: 44.95 $ or 6 tokens. This is the price listed on the TGN website

- direct download + Box: 49.95 $ + S/H. This is the price available on Impulse 

BTW,  I don't still understand the following:

And I don't seem to be the only one.

The only way I see that weak US $ make you lose money is if international delivery price has increased between the time of the preorder and the time where the physical media has really shipped. That is a problem essentially with preorder lots of months before the game availabilty. Maybe you should design another way to handle the preorder that will take in account the fact that S/H costs can vary over months. Perharps something like x month before the retail availability, peorders are download only until 2 month and be upgraded then to include the physical media. 

BTW, You should perhaps add a warning for International orders: that custom taxes can be expected and that they aren't included in the S/H costs. This could make some european customers to think a bit more about the overall costs for getting a box

But I still don't understand the problem about weak US $ and Europe when speaking about token price since there are available for download only version, which doesn't include S/H costs.

 

But I have no problem with the following:

 

 

It can be understandable that the effective token exchange rate, as well as the price in $, is a bit different for games in preorder status,  for new games produced/published by Stardock (where Stardock has control on all channels) and for games published by third parties (where Stardock has only a digital download delivery right).

 

 

I personally don't mind. IMO, a totalgaming.net sub is for indie games, you buy the professional ones.

I also don't get how the weak dollar makes you less money. You get paid in dollar. If I as European first change my euros into dollar, why should you care?
It's good for me but not bad for you.

I'd ignore his first response. The explanation that makes sense is the collectors edition one. Using the pricing of the CE version, the math works out much more like you'd expect it to.