Pay what you want for Champ Man 2010

One of the things I talk about a lot on this blog is video games (my fifth most popular topic at this moment in time). One of the reasons for this is because of the interesting stuff that happens in the video game industry as a business. The latest thing worth talking about is that Eidos are effectively giving away Championship Manager 2010 for free.

That's right - up until September 10, you can preorder CM2010 and pay whatever you want (minimum charge of 1 penny plus GBP2.50 transaction fee). And despite the comments in that article, this isn't similar to what some bands tried to do. In any event, I agree with Techdirt that 'Give it away and pray' isn't a business model and doesn't really work.

What Eidos have actually done is a really clever marketing move. And I'm surprised that no-one commented on this in the comments section of the article (is this an indication of the quality of the readers?). To understand why this is a clever move and why it differs from what some bands tried to do, you have to understand a little about the history of Championship Manager.

Not that long ago, the Championship Manager games were developed by sigames and published by Eidos. The game allows you to be the manager of a football club and was highly successful in its day. However, for some reason, sigames and Eidos parted ways. As part of the settlement, Eidos kept the Championship Manager brand name and the look of the User Interface of the game. Meanwhile, sigames kept the fundamental programming and player database and continued developing football management games under a new brand name (Football Manager).

And this is when we get to the key point. The footie management games created by sigames are by far the most detailed and comprehensive simulations of football management that are available in the market. It is definitely NOT for the casual fan and is firmly targeted at the hardcore audience. What happened next was obvious.

When sigames left and created Football Manager, most of their fans ditched Eidos. I don't have any definite numbers but I'm pretty sure the sales of Championship Manager would have plummeted. And again, this should have been obvious to anyone who understood the nature of the games existing hardcore fanbase.

Which brings us to the current situation and why this is a clever move by Eidos. My guess is that, currently, the Championship Manager franchise is probably in deep trouble. It doesn't have the large dedicated hardcore fanbase that sigames has. Similarly, it probably doesn't have the name recognition that EA has (EA also has a footie manager simulation in the market). However, by effectively offering the latest game for free, Eidos have managed to generate a lot of publicity for their game while also ensuring that lots of people will be able to legitimately play the game at a dirt cheap price this year. And if some of those new players like the game, then Eidos will have a fan available in future years who may be willing to pay full price.

Eidos are only running this promotion up until September 10, at which point the game goes back to normal pricing. This isn't really a 'Give it away and pray' scenario as Eidos, although taking a short term hit, are really doing this for the long term market share and future profits which is a very different business model to what some bands like Radiohead did. Its also worth mentioning that the clever bands don't rely on 'Give it away and pray' either as, whilst effectively giving away their music for free, they also have a business model in place that allows them to generate money from the sale of scarce goods (you can read the Techdirt links above to find out more).

All in all, a great move to try and generate market share at the expense of short term profits.