Poll Question 360 – Would you pay to try a Half-Life 3 Demo?

31st October 2016

As soon as I heard Game were charging for VR demos, I thought would crazy Half-Life fab boys, like me!, pay for a HL3 demo?

of course, it’s a pretty open question and I want us to discuss the general idea of paying for demos and whether it would backfire for developers.

I should mention that I’m not talking about a HL3 VR release, just a regular format.

Surely to goodness you must wanna read the original BBC article.

The Video

Vote

Would you pay to try a Half-Life 3 Demo?

  • You Mad Bro? Paying for demos is for idiots! (53%, 38 Votes)
  • Hell Yeah, Bring it on BABY! (47%, 34 Votes)

Total Voters: 72

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7 Comments

  1. the only reason I wouldn’t do that is because I want to go into Half-Life 3 without knowing anything about it. I won’t watch trailers neither when they came out, maybe the announcement trailer, but no gameplay trailers.

    I started to do that with movies too, especially recent trailers tend to spoil the whole movie …

  2. btw I have the best idea for Valve how to monetize Half-Life 3.

    Users can make custom maps and mods like always, but sell them on the steam workshop, if they want to. They tried paid mods with Skyrim and it failed, but custom maps and mods are not just a weapon reskin and stuff. This could encourage tons of mappers to put a lot of work into user generated content and keep the game alive forever. Of course there are always more details that Valve would need to figure out, but that would be their job.

  3. You know what? I wouldn’t. After all the delays, the silence, and some might even argue disdain and exploitation of their fans, expecting them to pony up for the privilege of playing a HL3 demo would be in horrible taste and I wouldn’t support it based on principle alone.

    That said, back in the days before the Internet was mainstream, it wasn’t unusual for stores to sell demos. Not everyone had the Internet, or downloads took too long on dial-up. I still remember waiting for 3 hours for all 8 MB of the Quake demo to arrive. Heaven forbid someone pick up the telephone.

    Of course, that demo usually represented a full third of the game and gave you some physical media as well. And before the advent of YouTube and Internet-enabled consoles, renting video games was also common practice. That was, in essence, paying for a demo.

    So, I don’t feel that strongly about it. But it misses the point of any demo, which is to promote the game and build word-of-mouth. I remember back when I played on the Xbox 360, I hated how those who paid extra for Gold membership would get demos, but those on the Silver tier wouldn’t. It’s like you’re holding the privilege of watching a commercial hostage.

  4. You used to have to pay for demo discs back in the day… Though having said that, I wouldn’t pay out for a single demo. If there ever was an HL3 demo, I think I’d be content in just knowing the game was coming. 😀

  5. The idea of paying for a game demo is in my mind a weird concept.

    If a new car was announced that piqued my interest, I would go to a dealer of that particular make and ask for a test drive, I would be rather shocked if they asked for payment, as they hope I would like it after the DEMO and pay for one in full.

    I like good food and Live in London, so I often frequent the Borough Market (if you’re not from London or the UK but visiting London its worth checking out) across the road from London Bridge Station, many of the sellers have free samples (DEMO’s) of the products to taste and I buy the full product if I like or am impressed by it. Paid for sample=no sale! I’ve even had a sample of a new brand of Malt Whisky there, I liked it so I bought a bottle, that sample=a £32 sale.

    Many years ago I bought a magazine (PC Gamer, I think?) that had a cover disc, the disc contained a DEMO (along with other stuff) of a soon to be released new game called HALF-LIFE. Guess what? I purchased the full game (I still have the original CD in it’s box with the manual (as well as OP and BS)).

  6. Half-Life 3 is one of those games I want to know as little about as possible.
    I think a short demo would just spoil some features and make the complete experience when the complete game comes out worse.
    The people who have playtested Half-Life 3 are like sacrifices. They know what is in there and it will make the full experience for them worse.

  7. Hi, It mainly matters how much content and how much money it is. My most content I would be is with a 3 dollar half hour game. This just for half life though. Any other games I would probably not pay for demos especially for VR games. I am just not into them yet. But I expect valve to release it for free if they even do. But also I agree with Urby who said he would be happy that it was coming out. Thanks, bye.

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