DICE presentation reveals startling sales figures
Industry analyst Jesse Schell used his speech at DICE to reveal that games with demos actually see worse sales than those with just a trailer, according to a report by PC GamesN. Schell added that games with demos don’t just see a few less sales: they see about half, according to his figures.
Schell’s presentation was based on Xbox 360 sales for games that had various combinations of a trailer, a demo, or neither. Those with no demo and no trailer were unsurprisingly the lowest sales figures. As illustrated, however, a demo can actually severely diminish a game’s sales.
Schell explained the reasoning behind the numbers, saying, “The things with no demo, you’ve got to buy it if you want to try it.”
Schell fleshed out the point by putting it into the context of consumer plans, “When you put the demo out, people have seen the trailer and say ‘That’s cool!’, and they made a plan: ‘I gotta try that game!’. Then they play the demo and say ‘Alright I’ve tried that game, that was OK, alright I’m done.’”
Adding a trailer to promote a game universally helped sales, according to Schell’s findings. Games with both a trailer and demo did better than those with just a demo. According to Schell, some players have their curiosity about a game fulfilled by a free demo.
Although Schell did not suggest that game developers stop releasing demos, he certainly showed that they may not serve sales figures as healthily has consumer satisfaction.
In his 2010 DICE presentation, Schell gave a speech about the gamification of everyday life.
Follow Anton on Twitter: @virussixzero