Why don't videogames give away free demos any more or other free stuff? I mean think about it...

Why don't videogames give away free demos any more or other free stuff? I mean think about it, Free comic book day has been a tradition for years and has been a great way of getting people interested in comic books and specific series so why don't videogames do the same any more? They can have a big events where they give away free pokemon, demos, DLC, ect to get people interested.

Because the price point is usually $60.

Thats why you can give away free DLC or indie games instead or possibly posters.

GoG gives games for free from time to time, such as Fallout 1,2&Tactics, Neverwinter Nights, Witcher 2, Age of Wonders and others.
SEGA gave a few games for free last year such as Binary Domain and Jet Set Radio.
Steam also gives free games from time to time, such as Portal 1.

If you want to go even further at least with videogames you could theoretically earn money by getting good and participating in e-sports, or sell rare games, something you could also do with comics, but you never earn money by how fast you read a comic-book.

OP, what you are looking for is vidya back in the mid 90s. Sorry you missed the boat. It was pretty fucking neato getting a psx demo disc when you got a pizza.

Nioh did it and made people actually interested in the game. They put 3 or so levels as demos
I'm not sure why demos are not more popular. They can definitely make a game more interesting to someone who doesn't know about it. Revelator 2 for another example

I miss pizza hut demo discs. I remember playing Tony hawk on one of them while eating Pizza.

...

Because people can tell if the game is garbage with a demo.

That, and devs are too lazy to properly dummy their content out.

Because if the demo is shit, people won't buy the game because of the bad taste in their mouth & publishers don't want to take risks anymore, they want to jew $60 out of people & inflate more of their already ridiculous budget.

Basically requiring some free-to-play aspect for titles was just about the only thing the Ouya did right.

Apart from Satan here being right , there was also this mentally retarded man who suggested that demos make people not want to play the game because the demo and the real game were the same thing and therefore giving it out for free was bad for profits.

hmmmm I wonder…

A freely accessible demo is a good way for possible consumers to see whether or not your upcoming game is going to be shit in advance. With the current state of the industry, it's most likely in most companies best interest to not let people readily catch on to it prior to release.

Some games do indeed still see demos, but that's usually a sign of a company having good faith in what they're putting out, as opposed to knowing their game is kind of shit.

Oy vey, goy. This would be a complete shoah.

why give a demo out for free when you can call it a pre-alpha and sell it at full price?

Why do people fall for it?

So anyone here going to participate in Free Comic Day? I'm going to get judge dredd and the street fighter comic.

If this diversity kick keeps tanking sales like it is, every comic that marvel makes will be free.

A lot of indie devs do it because they're selling a game. AAA devs don't because they're selling a marketing campaign.

AAA games do go on sale on Steam and occasionally have free weekends. I guess there's that.

They're fucking stupid, is why.