I’m from Russia. Of course, I can afford to buy the game, and quite for myself for the full price, in principle, in our time, this is the normal price for a new game. But here it is not the price of AoE 4 that should be discussed, but the prices of the games in principle, the latter games have become very expensive. AoE 4 in Russian rubles costs 2,500, the average salary in the country is 25-20,000, I think it is clear that this is a fairly large part of the budget. At that time, the new Battlefield, the complete edition, cost as much as 7.000 rubles, and that is already a lot. I don’t think game development is getting that much expensive. I repeat again, new games should not be cheap, but the prospect of price increases worries me even more, 2.000 rubles ($ 30) is quite an acceptable price for a new product, but $ 60 is really overkill and this cannot be allowed, games are certainly not a product the first necessity is the luxury and leisure, the availability of which is not guaranteed by any legal acts, but I would also like to say that the greed of large corporations is increasingly squeezing those who are addicted to games, and this is sad. But I would not say this about Microsoft, the corporation has recently shown itself as a “good guy”, I hope this will continue. I repeat, of course, I definitely take the game.
The words of NineFlazberry fit Brazil situation. I think AOE 4 could be cheaper here, but it’s not as bad as many AAA games we got in the last 2 years. Games price skyrocket, though they still cost 60US$. Persona 5, for example, is almost pure US$ → BRL money conversion, there is no regional balance to our market.
I agree in almost everything you said, 60 usd full price is ok, just in USA. Other countries does not have same economy as them and as i said in a post (Regional Pricing Issues - #69 by RegeMurk) some countries also add taxes.
This post is meaningless for players who have already pre-ordering the game in advance. Will Microsoft modify the price of the game in advance according to the problems reflected in the post? If the price is lower and unfair to the players who have already pre-ordering, will Microsoft return the price difference?
Regional Pricing of AoE4 in India is set to double that of other South Asian Countries. It is not affordable at this cost. Please fix it otherwise there is no point of pre-ordering.
Already happened something like this at launch of AOE 3 DE, at least in my country and yeah they did return money on steam
If there is a price reduction of pre-ordering, and they didn’t return money, can only choose to refund…And then buy again…
Steam has a system to adjusts a constant regional prices of games based the USD price tag it has. This based on currencies purchasing power, taxes etc.
These are the current prices.
- $9.99 = Rs. 349
- $14.99 = Rs. 459
- $19.99 = Rs. 529
- $24.99 = Rs. 569
- $29.99 = Rs. 699
- $34.99 = Rs. 759
- $39.99 = Rs. 899
- $44.99 = Rs. 959
- $49.99 = Rs. 1,099
- $59.99 = Rs. 1,299
Even AoE DE, AoE2 DE, and AoE3 DE prices are set correctly based on this system.
In India AoE4 should be of Rs.1299, but right now it is set to Rs. 2499.
In many other countries this issue is the same, for example in Turkey steam says that a 59.99$ game should be 92 Turkish liras but microsoft put it as 299 liras…
1 dollar is 8,74 Turkey liras. This means that 59,99 euro is 524 Turkish liras. If Microsoft put the game to 299 Turkish liras as you say, this means that is half the cost than in every other country.
That’s because Purchasing Power Parity of the currencies. You can actually afford a lot more things in Turkey with Turkish Lira than exchange rates will lead you to believe. And thus the income is lower, things are cheaper and so is everything adjusted based on that.
Take purchasing power of Indian Rupee for example. It is ~ Rs. 21.350 per dollar.
That is, you can buy the same thing for 21 rupees in india that you can buy for 1 dollar in US.
But the exchange rate is set to Rs. 74.14 per dollar which in no way reflects the actual purchasing power. International exchange rates are set based on export-import. It does not reflect the actual purchasing powers of the respective currencies in their home countries.
Ever heard of different countries having different purchasing power? Hence why steam has suggested prices for game developers that gives recommended prices that convert US prices for regional stores in steam according to the country’s purschasing power. Steam suggests 92 liras for AoE4 for Turkey but Microsoft put it as 300 liras. Steam recommends 649 Argentina pesos for the game but Microsoft put 2999 pesos. Steam recommends 1299 indian rupees for the game but Microsoft put 2499 rupees. Steam recommends 1085 Russian rubles for the game but Microsoft put 2499 rubles. There seems to be a trend here as the examples I gave aren’t the only countries that have such a drastic difference between recommended and actual price. If Microsoft wants larger number of players to buy the game then they should listen to the demands. As it stands Microsoft is isolating a significant portion of the community with high prices which would lead to the game to flop if not taken seriously.
I totally agree, and I know it is happening. But as I said and above, special prices I don’t expect to happen in pre-order phase. The almost half price that already has, is already I think a very big “discount” for a new game in the preorder phase.
One week later, still not any official answer for the pricing issues.
I already tried to multiple ways to contact Xbox Game Studios to find a justification for the regional pricing issues, without any answer at the moment. I don’t think Relic can do smth with the pricing issue, not even Xbox Game Studios… I think that Microsoft fixes the prices. That’s why I opened a topic on the official Microsoft forum :
Xbox Game Studios (AoE IV) pricing justification - Microsoft Community
Feel free to press the “I have the same question” button if you feel concerned.
Seems like this post was unpinned meaning they won’t do anything… Very greedy move that might be the doom of the game, but nothing can fix the cooperate greed I guess.
It has been maybe automatically unpinned due to less activities. 
Let them some times…
People want to buy the game with reasonable price. If microsoft dont change the regional price, people wont buy the game. As we know there are many games around so people wait the game when ıt comes to sales. Microsoft will take more damage with this greedy move. They will see it.
Hmm, if they go by Valve suggested price, it will be even lower than the price in Viet Nam. Since when did Turkey and Argentina have weaker economy than Viet Nam?
Maybe it cant be valve suggestion price but ıt can be lowered the price. For example the game is 299 Turkish Liras. if it is 150 or 200 TL, it is more reasonable price than current price. 299 TL is so absurd in Turkey’s standart.
It doesn’t have to be what valve suggests but it is quite high right now too, a middle ground can be reached… Any discount is better than no discount 