iRacing Costs

> Except that the target audience is so small that the cost per player is
> going to be quite high.

Forgot to do the math:

$20,000,000 dollars / 10,000 active players = $2000 / player.

iRacing is going to need a lot more players. With the current pricing
scheme working out to be $500 to $600 / player over a 3 year period
they need about 40,000 players to break even and continue making
money. This may happen in the next 2 years, but if it does, the
iRacing of 2 years from now will be quite different than the iRacing
it is now.

> The initial funding for iRacing is about what EA spends on each NFS
> game. The high volumes justify the big budgets, and the cost per
> player is low.
>
> EA will just slap "NFS" on their first shot with a sim-oriented racer,
> (the development team includes 25 ex-GTR employees), "NFS Shift", and
> it will sell in the millions. It will probably have fantasy cars and
> lots of assists to keep the casual players happy, but the core physics
> engine is claimed to be very realistic, and aimed at the serious
> hard core simmers. EA has the budget, people, and access to the data
> to make a realistic sim, but only time will tell if NFS Shift ends
> up as realistic as it claims it will be.
>

I have to laugh, for how many years, now be honest, has it "been reported"
or "claimed" that the core physics of ANY EA racing game was "very
realistic" Uh, um fracking all of them...

The point here is, no there wont be a crapload of "oopsie, well I thought
you might like this game billy" from parents because it wasn't 25 bucks in
the bin at wallyworld, and not a lot of rFactors or iRacing cd's
tied/bundled with systems... nope. But market wise, I would bet you a
grand that they have researched and found that Hard core sim people are more
loyal, have more repeat sales, and more 'likely' to unroll the wad o cash
for a 'darn good' sim. Everyone on here has even said this while bashing
any tittle ever discussed on here at RAS or likewise forums.

The same **** happens with any product too, plus fads come and go. Want my
shares in those shoes called Crocks? at one time they were worth a lot of
$, now worth less than the paper they are printed on.

> The point here isthat a hard core standalone sim isn't going to sell
> well, but if it's included as an option as part of a more casual game
> it will, and the cost per player will be low. As an end-user, I
> know which pricing model I prefer (the lower cost one if anyone
> has trouble guessing).
>
>