RiME is unsurprisingly attracting quite a bit of attention at present, with its stylised look and potential gaining a fair bit of hype ahead of its release later this month on PS4, Xbox One and PC. That said it's not been entirely smooth with the Switch version - it's currently undated for the Nintendo console and, on top of that, was given a higher cost than on other platforms. Reasons given for that pricing discrepancy have been "additional development, manufacturing, and publishing costs involved with that port."
Developer Grey Box has now sought to address those points and offer solutions in a blog post, confirming that the Switch version will now cost $29.99USD / €34.99 / £29.99 on the eShop, matching other consoles. It's then explained that the retail version will still cost more ($39.99USD / €44.99 / £39.99) but include a code for a download of the official soundtrack, to enable the company to avoid a loss while upping the value on offer. The post also promises that a release date will be confirmed soon.
On the physical side, we can’t lower the price without selling at a loss, but we can add more value to the package. And that’s what we’re doing. For the Nintendo Switch version of RiME, all physical copies will include a printed code for a download of the complete, beautiful soundtrack by David García (a sample of which you can find here). You will be able to download the music via Bandcamp in one of the multiple high-quality formats. The soundtrack is planned on being sold separately for $10 in the US (and equivalent prices elsewhere), and so the value you’re going to get out of this will be the same as somebody who purchased a different version of RiME, and then bought the soundtrack.
Like I said, Grey Box’s goals are to provide a great product at a great value. We hope you’ll find this new offering to be fair. Personally, we’re excited about it, because we want as many people as possible to hear David’s music! Regardless, we can assure you that no matter which version of RiME you play – and we hope to have a Switch version release date announced shortly – you’re going to have an amazing and touching experience. Thanks very much for your support!
It's certainly a positive that the Grey Box is seeking to compromise and address complaints around the Switch pricing and release details; it also recently gave a Q3 window as it continues optimising the game.
Let us know what you think of this update on the Switch version; are you happy with the compromise being offered?
With thanks to electrolite77 for the heads up.
[source greybox.com]
Comments 70
Glad that they are offering a retail version. As long as Best Buy gets this I may just pick it up there and save a few bucks!
They do have it up for pre-order. I can almost get the retail version for the same cost as the digital.
Did they say exactly why the Switch version is costing more, cartridge perhaps?
And a nice full color manual or artbook, please?
Wow, a company actually acknowledging their unfair treatment towards Nintendo gamers and fixing it? This... this is May right? Not April Fools?
Fair compromise. Still getting it digital, like most of my Switch stuff. Now bring on that release date!
@Spoony_Tech Yeah, earlier in the blog posts it says "The reason for the higher price was due to the additional development, manufacturing, and publishing costs involved with that port." I'll add that to the article as some extra context.
@ThomasBW84 Thanks!
Not sure I follow their math... by releasing on an additional console, wouldn't they already be getting more income from the game than they would have done otherwise? Surely that could have been used to cover the cost of the additional development.
That said, I'll probably still get a physical copy regardless of the bonus soundtrack... most places end up selling games for below RRP, so it'll likely end up around the same price as the digital version anyway.
Good idea and kudos for using Bandcamp the only download service worth paying for. If you've not used it before, the files are available in almost any format and are free of digital rights management stuff
Grabbed this when Amazon had a price error, so I'm only looking at paying $25.79 for it with tax and shipping included, which I am very okay with! Hope people get over the small pricing fiasco soon and don't hold a grudge against the title. It looks wonderful and I'm very excited to check it out! At the price I'm paying and with the soundtrack included this should be quite the bargain!
Fair enough! Everyone can now choose between value or cart, but its the cart release for me! As long as its good!
@DragonEleven Paying someone else (Tantalus, in this case) to port the game over isn't free. I'm assuming that since that was once a PS4 exclusive that they're charging the base $30 cost to cover the original development platform and the X1 (which probably won't take as much optimization as the Switch since it's more powerful), and the Switch version was never part of the original plan, hence the external company handling the port and the extra cost. I imagine most of the extra cost comes down to paying for the additional porting to the system, since I'm sure a small developer and publisher don't have the cash laying around, or all the extra time themselves, to make all that happen easily.
With Amazon Prime in the US, you can preorder for $31.99 right now.
Something still doesn't smell right to me. When they state, "we can’t lower the price without selling at a loss," that would mean that that it either costs them more than $10 per physical copy in manufacturing fees (and such), or they are selling the digital copy at a loss. Do the physical components really cost that much more to manufacture and ship?
Lol I got the physical version for the same price as other consoles because Amazon's listing had an error that gave it 40% off for Prime members instead of 20%. $24 with Prime discount in that scenario, same as X1 and PS4.
I'm just happy they are not rushing the port out to match the current release date of the other platforms
Same strategy as PPT's release, then. I'm okay with that. Still not sure I'm getting it, though.
@dsiebert812 It's not just the price of the physical components, but the distribution and getting the code in those physical components, whereas digital is just make a build and upload it somewhere. Sounds fair to me.
@dsiebert812 Switch games cost more to physically release, so it makes sense.
Seema like Nintendo doesn't actually have much of a problem with publishers selling games with different digital and retail prices...as long as the physical version comes with a "bonus".
I have a Switch retail version pre-ordered through Amazon. With the Prime discount, it's cheaper than what the Canadian eShop version will likely be so overall it's the best one to have pre-ordered. Looking forward to the game and if it ends up not being my thing, at least it's a physical version I got for less that can then be traded in for something else!
Good. Now when we're treated the same as psbox owners(except the later release) then i will buy this. Happy to see they do seem to listen.
Curious to see reviews on this. Reminds me of ICO.
Physical all the way.
That works for me. Especially with BandCamp.
Awesome! Now I'll buy it on Switch. Man but I want that soundtrack. I'm such a sucker for physical stuff and gifts.
Glad to see they saw reason on the digital version to match the other platform's prices. However Amazon currently lists the PS4 and X1 physical editions at £24.99 a pop. A £15 mark up for the Switch version with only a digital soundtrack is a questionable sell.
Unless of course Amazon goes for a £34.99 price which I can dig.
Glad to hear they came to their senses! The price discrepancey was pretty blatant. Though I agree with the above it does imply they're selling digital at a loss now, as there's no way physical distribution is costing $10 per unit. Still sounds better!
A pleasing development. Still beyond my price range probably, but I'll be interested in how it reviews etc and take it from there.
^ How can you say digital is selling at a loss if there's no specific cost for producing each copy sold? If they sell 10 million digital copies, I suspect that will cover their costs.
Wow, good company practice from these guys. Apparently they can't help the cost of the physical version, but they're still doing something about it. Adding this game to my watch list.
Good to hear them listening to the criticism. The physical versions price is still not great though.
I can't wait! This game's art design is amazing in my opinion. I love games like these. Day one purchase for physical copy.
What a wonderful solution!
im loss for words... in a good way!
glad to see they lower the price!
I initially planned on picking it up on eshop to begin with, so this is good news for me. However, if it comes too late, I cannot guarantee that I'll still get this if it comes later as RiME was never on my "have to have" list. The later it comes, the worse it will be for them in that regard, in my opinion.
This is a great compromise and hopefully a good example of a solution other companies can use to make switch owners not feel taken advantage of due to higher retail cost. Saw a preview for this game on gamespot and it looks good. I'm looking forward to reading what the reviews will have to say. I just hope the game isn't pushed back too far on the switch. Nintendo still needs comparable software sales, to what the other consoles will get, in order to keep encouraging devs and publishers to put their games on the switch.
That headline is misleading because it ignores the context. Something like 'Rime Switch eShop price lowered to crossplatform par" would much better inform anyone who sees this article.
Nice, I'll still skip this one though.
Good. This puts the game back on my radar. Happy to hear it.
Something that could have been easily overcome by simply making a slight increase on the price of all versions of the game, no one would have been any the wiser and they could have a bit more of a profit too.
Very happy to see this happened. I'm very glad they're listening to gamers. I was going to buy this before they mentioned the digital price cut, but now that they have, I think myself and others included will have much less a chance for buyer's remorse. Just having a game in the visual style of winder waker is enough for me to get excited.
@DragonEleven I believe they are probably in business to make money. It would be incredibly gracious of them to use any profit they get from the additional port to simply cover all the costs of developing said port.
I'm placated. I will get the physical version and enjoy the included soundtrack. Nice that they came up with a compromise. I hope it doesn't hurt them too much at retail.
The game itself has gone through development hell on all platforms, so i'm ok waiting to see how it plays out before making a purchase.
That's nice the Eshop Version will be less than the Physical version. This is the way things should get done. Nice job. Hope the game does very well. Im buying Physical and have Pre Ordered from Amazon.
Yes! For that price I'll get the digital version on day one!
Still buying physical
Very nice.
I was always going to buy this, but I know alot of people were feeling unfairly treated. I don't think anyone really took issue with the price so much as feeling unfairly treated with respect to other gamers. Which is understandable. This here is enough for people to feel valued and not feel like they're intentionally being taken advantage of
Great news, I preordered the physical copy because of the Amazon discount.
There we go! Just as I expected, but much better to hear that it's confirmed
Yeah nah
I heard somewhere that each specific Switch game, box cart and distribution, costs $9. I don't remember who said that or where they got their info. This however seems to match that in perspective. I am honestly quite glad that a developer is willing to listen to the community. I will once again take a close look at this and determine if I want to buy it. Retail only for me.
Really excited for this!
That is much better! Sure I understand that cartridges are more expensive to make but that had absolutely no bearing on what the eshop price should be. Glad they changed their minds because gamers shouldn't be punished just for wanting the game on Switch.
Not sure I will get it, but I appreciate the price matching on the digital version.
I'm happy if they include the soundtrack. That seems like a fair compromise if they are going to sell it for the difference in price. I'm going for mostly physical still so I'll be happy to support them that way as a way to indicate that physical third party games are definitely still in demand on Nintendo systems.
So how would I swing the download into my iTunes library? Or will the code work on iTunes site?
@MarioPhD
But there is always a lead platform and a cost to port to any other system whether internal teams do it (spending hours/salary) or it's outsourced. The Switch is also supposed to be easy to port to and it seems unlikely that the cost would be that much to port and by adjusting the digital price to keep parity with the other consoles kinda shows that porting cost wasn't significant. At the end of the day they are expecting sales and revenue from Switch owners. So even if it did cost a nominal amount to port, they wouldn't bring it to the Switch if they didn't expect to profit from it.
@locky-mavo It was a exclusive game for the PS4 fro a long time. I'm sure that Sony and them accord a price that wouldn't change in the future. Microsoft wouldn't allow an increase in price neither.
It is VERY clear that it's NINTENDO who will only allow these publishers to release their game cheaper on the eShop if the physical release comes with some kind of trinket to justify it's cost. It's smart in a way because most of these keychains and soundtracks cost nothing to produce, thus increasing profit margins on the physical releases. For me it's a good thing because I always like when there's a bonus with my game, as a collector.
Fine by me, retail only. I like to be able to keep games I like and use long into the future, get rid of those I don't to recoup some of the loss. I don't care it costs $10, the value is there for that reason alone. I also have Prime, so well, chop $8 off that and I'm paying a $2 premium — I'll live. (We can call the $2 an up charge for in state shipping from the local Amazon warehouse.) >:]
This is how you do proper PR. Good on them for finding a way where everyone wins. I'm going to support them and buy the physical copy.
@joey302 You'd have to download the files from Bandcamp and then drag and drop them into the desktop version of iTunes. From there put them onto you iDevice. Unfortunately thats the only way you can get music outside of iTunes onto iDevices.
Still very expensive. I wonder how Switch download-prices compare to other consoles (and Steam). Nintendo was always notorious for offering very expensive downloads, compared to other consoles. You always pay the "Nintendo" premium. And most Switch downloads are very expensive in my eyes too. But yeah, times may change and the prices may increase (development gets more expensive I guess). But I am still in the "everything above 10 Euro is a no-no" camp, regarding downloads. And then there are the free ios games, that do cost money on Nintendo devices. But that's another story.
im digital all the way and was getting it ether way but the price drop should help sales
Has anyone (in the UK) managed to find somewhere stocking this? I can't find anywhere offering the Switch version for pre-order.
in my mind this is what they should be doing anyway, keeping the download price cheaper than the physical. I don't mind buying either but I don't want to pay £40 when I could spend £30 on a download. hopefully other studios may follow this example.
Sounds fair. I'd just get the cheaper digital version if I were interested in the game, but it's a good compromise for the retail release.
Glad the loophole exists to buy from the stores in other territories as $29.99 is £23.
Didn't Nintendo require same price between retail and digital versions? If that's the case they won't be allowed to offer the digital version cheaper even if they want to.
Hope I'm wrong though...
@maceng yeah pretty sure that's not how it works. If MS or if Sony were still the publisher, then sure they can have a say in the price, but it's completely 3rd party developed and published now, so they don't have a say in price now, or else Nintendo could have said no as well to higher price as well. Besides, why would any of the console developers care what a 3rd party game costs? They've already got their part covered.
I just think a $3.50 - $5.00 tops, increase on every version would have worked better. It would have covered the Switch development & publishing, made a little extra profit and no one would have batted an eyelid over it. The only way that wouldn't work out is if the Switch version managed to out sell the other versions.
It's nice they've tried to make a compromise though (though aussies are being shafted with no price drop digital and having to fork out $80AUD).
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