non usa download 100% more expensive

[Laffertytig]

its not that fact that 15euros (£10) is a lot of cash but why are we bein charged double the price cos we dont live in the us? ive downloaded games from direct to drive before no probs yet i keep gettin kicked cos im not in the us!

obviously by downloadin there isnt any packaging involved so what gives with the price difference? ive never heard of such a thing

[Dowly]

its not that fact that 15euros (£10) is a lot of cash but why are we bein charged double the price cos we dont live in the us? ive downloaded games from direct to drive before no probs yet i keep gettin kicked cos im not in the us!

obviously by downloadin there isnt any packaging involved so what gives with the price difference? ive never heard of such a thing

I had this happen when I downloaded BF2142 from the EADownloader. The price was $49,90, yet I still had to pay 49,90€ for it. :shifty:

[Laffertytig]

very strange. maybe the best way put my question would be, why is the us download cheaper? isnt ubi a french company?

the game still isnt listed on amazon.co.uk so is this just a usa release or what? and if it then how so?

[Wild_skipper]

isnt ubi a french company?
Always thought it was Canadian :hmm:

[Laffertytig]

well whatever it is it shouldnt affect the price should it? i mean if theres some logical reason why its double the price then im all ears cos i cant think of any.

[danlisa]

You know, UK'ers/EU'ers always get a raw deal when it comes to price point on content that's comparable with US releases.

IIRC, it's all down to the licensing laws and the same said charges that are applied to all retail.

Just be thankful, those same licensing laws have not delayed the the release for you because they frequently do. I've been waiting 3 months for something that was released in the US to finally get it's EU release.:damn:

Sucks to be us in so many ways.:stare:

There are ways to Pay & Download US only content, I do it all the time on my PS3. F'ing US store gets everything 2 months before we do. I'll see if I can find the details......(BTW, it's totally above board & legal. Before the forum police come running).

EDIT - http://www.entropay.com/:arrgh!: :up:

[Rockin Robbins]

It's all very logical. Ubi is a French company. They manufacture the electrons there and ship them overseas to the US. If you want to purchase the download they have to be returned to Europe, where the electron transport charge from the US makes the download more expensive.:smug:

Would you believe global warming?

How about it's George Bush's fault.:shifty:

No, huh?:oops:

[DeepIron]

Would you believe global warming?

How about it's George Bush's fault.:shifty:
Hugo Chavez? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? Hilliary Clinton?

[Boris]

isnt ubi a french company?
Always thought it was Canadian :hmm:

There's a canadian branch, they're the ones who did Assasins Creed, but Ubisoft is based in Frankreich

[Laffertytig]

It's all very logical. Ubi is a French company. They manufacture the electrons there and ship them overseas to the US. If you want to purchase the download they have to be returned to Europe, where the electron transport charge from the US makes the download more expensive.:smug:

:damn: why didnt i think of that!!! i knew there had to be a logical reason non usa customers are payin double for a download.

thanks for clearin that for me buddy!! :up:

[Taurolas]

The thing i've always noticed when buying things from outside the UK is this:-

Product A in the US, which in this case is the U-boat Add-on is listed at $9.99

Product A in the UK is listed at £9.99.. see the interesting thing here...oh god forbid they might actually do a currency conversion...

Its just a way for us in the UK to get ripped off, dont convert the currency just change the actual $ to £ sign and double the cost!

i dont mind paying a fair price but when this happens all the time it just annoys the hell out of me. :(

[Laffertytig]

think im gonna wait a few months anyway until any bugs are fixed and the modders have had a field day with it. this is what i did with SH4 and it was worth the wait

[Banquet]

Has anyone got a link to the non US download? I can't even find it!

[Rockin Robbins]

The thing i've always noticed when buying things from outside the UK is this:-

Product A in the US, which in this case is the U-boat Add-on is listed at $9.99

Product A in the UK is listed at £9.99.. see the interesting thing here...oh god forbid they might actually do a currency conversion...

Its just a way for us in the UK to get ripped off, dont convert the currency just change the actual $ to £ sign and double the cost!

i dont mind paying a fair price but when this happens all the time it just annoys the hell out of me. :(I'll bet you wish they would do that with gasoline!:up: But I forget. You don't have gasoline, you have petrol and that's a completely different product: thus the price disparity.

[Zero Niner]

You guys have it easy. I live in the Far East, and I can get only the boxed copy - it costs the equivalent of roughly US$30 or 20 euros!! :damn: :x :/\\!! :mad:

[Type941]

I also think its rather messed up that they htink its ok to charge people on download different money, but, since US is main markets they would be rather upset to lose them, then few people in europe. Sad, but true and thats how most companies think.

Thats why my 3 series bimmer costs 56k USD here when new, and 38USD brand new in USA. Think about how that makes me feel. It's not 5 euro difference, oh no.

[stabiz]

10 dollars is approx 50 Norwegian kroners, I paid 220 kroners for the addon.:cry:

[Rockin Robbins]

The Ubi, a French company, would charge less in the US than in its home. You would think that equivalent money is equivalent money and values sould be equalized. This makes it look like they think "Europeans are much more prosperous than Americans, they'll pay double or triple and smile in our general direction." They also must think there is not instantaneous comparison across the pond to reveal price inequities.

Of course, any solution would go along the lines of making all prices equally high, not equally low:rotfl:, just like socialism has succeeded in making everyone equally poor (except those actually running the government, who tend to live very well), not equally rich.

I work for a newspaper. Once upon a time, not long ago, newspapers were exempt from sales tax in Florida because of constitutional freedom of the press. If you bought a magazine, you paid sales tax. The magazines said, "Hey, we're the press, too. We use printing presses and our publications contain words, just like newspapers, it's not fair that we have to charge sales tax and they don't."

The Florida legislature looked at their protest, and after many drinks and irrelevent conversation, decided that the magazines were right, it wasn't fair. Solution: sales tax on publications of all kinds. This had the additional benefit of keeping protesters in other merchandise categories from complaining about exempt status of similar products. It clearly would not pay and this eliminated much future work for our legislators, who were now free to spend the time they saved at fundraisers to finance their reelection campaigns.

Wow! Governments and corporations work the same way!:rotfl:

And Type941, the European market is larger than that of the US, so where does preferential treatment for the US market make sense? I'd rather have paid $20 for a non-SecuROM infested CD. I understand that's what Europe is getting (except some of you are paying even higher than $20).

To paraphrase Arthur C Clark: Economics is not only stranger than you imagine, but stranger than you CAN imagine.:roll:

[Uber Gruber]

To be honest, after the disasterous early release of SHIV I decided to hold off buying any UBI product for at least 6 months. If they wish to release things early then that's their choice, and mine is to buy it later. As the only logic for releasing it early is so some chump in a tie (why do chumps always wear ties?) can fill in some box on a spreadsheet so some bigger chump in a bigger tie, with stripes, can present a quarterly sales report to a bunch of management type chumps, in very loud ties around a sterile office table, so some really big chump sitting at the end of the table in a bigger chair, wearing two ties, and some garters perhapps, can bathe in the power he feels he has over quite a small bunch of chumps. At least until he's hit by a bus...but that's another story.

Definately feeling a bit "anti-chump" at the moment.:up:

[Rockin Robbins]

To be honest, after the disasterous early release of SHIV I decided to hold off buying any UBI product for at least 6 months. If they wish to release things early then that's their choice, and mine is to buy it later. As the only logic for releasing it early is so some chump in a tie (why do chumps always wear ties?) can fill in some box on a spreadsheet so some bigger chump in a bigger tie, with stripes, can present a quarterly sales report to a bunch of management type chumps, in very loud ties around a sterile office table, so some really big chump sitting at the end of the table in a bigger chair, wearing two ties, and some garters perhapps, can bathe in the power he feels he has over quite a small bunch of chumps. At least until he's hit by a bus...but that's another story.

Definately feeling a bit "anti-chump" at the moment.:up:
You forgot about the sterile office environment with no windows and mind-numbing flourescent lighting. And all the formulas in the spreadsheet were overwritten with hard numbers seven months ago by a temp worker. Management just can't figure out why no matter how many units they move, sales just stagnate.:rotfl:They laid off the guy who wrote the spreadsheet and nobody else cares enough to look for the problem. After all, the spreadsheet says sales of Pong are as good as ever!

Beware of stupid people in large groups: government, corporations and labor unions. OK, school boards, civic organizations, consumer advocates, conservation groups, condo associations, please don't feel bad if I left your organization out! Let me know and I'll be glad to include it.:up:

Oh bullhockey, here comes another story. During the American Civil War, General Grant worked for General Halleck, who hated him and wanted to fire Grant. Unfortunately, Abraham Lincoln had noticed Grant and taken a shine to him. So Halleck hatched an evil plan. Grant had asked to attack Corinth, so Halleck gave him the order to attack, adding that Grant should attack with 50,000 men.

Grant couldn't begin to find more than half that. So he was in the typical corporate chump double-bind. He could round up as many as he had and attack. If he lost, Halleck would say Grant disobeyed orders to take 50,000. Put the rope around ole Grant's neck and pull the lanyard.

Or Grant, not being able to raise the 50,000, might not attack (wouldn't be very Grant-like, would it?;)). Then he disobeyed a direct order to attack and put the rope around ole Grant's neck and pull the lanyard.

So Grant attacked with what he had, won, was promoted to Halleck's job, and of course, Halleck was promoted and moved to Washington where he could be among like-minded chumps.

It's a wonder that anything gets accomplished by anybody!:rotfl:

[BarjackU977]

Gents,

Don't blame it on Ubi, it's like that on Steam as well. And with Apple products too... It's like if there was parity between Dollars and Euros.
So, if Ubi is evil, Valve and Apple are equally evil, to cite examples.
If I remember well, "Steam" (whoever represented them) blamed it on local taxes, highers in Europe. But I heard that a long time ago, I don't remember who said that when.

I hope that it's does not matter to anyone that Ubi is French, and that it was mentioned here just to point out that it's located in Europe.

[SilentOtto]

But of course all corporations are evil (by definition) when it comes to our money, that cannot be news to american people.

And of course it is a shame for us european customers having to pay double price for a european product. It's normal to buy local products cheaper, but more expensive???

I'll wait for the bargain bin this time because I find it disgusting. I got the deluxe box because I totally support this unique product line. But this kind of marketing makes me sick. C'mon Ubi we are in the global era, have you heard???

[Rockin Robbins]

It is much cheaper to deliver a download to the public, even with Sony's traditional rapacious prices for the SecuROM "bonus", than it is to box up a bunch of DVD's and instruction sheet/manuals. I personally would have preferred to purchase a $20 DVD without SecuROM instead of my $10 SecuROM infested download. I would consider that a better value. That is what Europe is getting.

It's one thing to have fun with "corporations are evil" and "government is evil" but neither observation is true. There are lots of good corporations and a few decent governments. We spend most of our time sneering at the bad ones because that is much more entertaining.

The real problem is large group dynamics. The skill set for obtaining a position of leadership within most large groups is totally different and often in conflict with the skill set of being successful once you get there.

This is especially a problem with democratically elected government, where a great campaigner can be a lousy administrator and the whole shebang falls apart under him once he's elected. An example would be American President Jimmy Carter. He said all kinds of wonderful things while running for president, looked like a winner, wrote the inspiring book "Why Not the Best", wiped out a capable administrator who couldn't persuade his mother to tell him how to get to the bathroom, and the rest is destruction of the American economy for five years.

The fact is that corporations are better than no corporations. Governments are better than no governments. Ever been hired by a poor person? You won't be. Ever had your rights protected by a non-government policeman? It isn't going to happen. Both entities are necessary for any semblance of civilization. Otherwise, start learning to rub sticks together to make fire. We may not live in the best of all possible worlds, but we live in the best world there is.

[SilentOtto]

I'm not so naive as to say corporations are bad in themselves. I think they are intrinsically bad when it comes to our money, since a corporation's objective is getting our money. That's the reason for their existence.

In this case, for me, what Ubi have done is lower the price in the USA to a product without much appeal there (German U-Boote) while they kept it up in Europe where it will probably have more success by itself. You can call it supply/demand. In the 21st century, and talking about a product than can be instantly delivered anywhere in the earth in the same conditions, I call it abuse.

[Rockin Robbins]

I'm not so naive as to say corporations are bad in themselves. I think they are intrinsically bad when it comes to our money, since a corporation's objective is getting our money. That's the reason for their existence.

In this case, for me, what Ubi have done is lower the price in the USA to a product without much appeal there (German U-Boote) while they kept it up in Europe where it will probably have more success by itself. You can call it supply/demand. In the 21st century, and talking about a product than can be instantly delivered anywhere in the earth in the same conditions, I call it abuse. That doesn't make it true. Every complany must make a profit to survive. Profits are good, no matter what over 100 years of socialist indoctrination have tried to establish, and profits are to be celebrated as the badge of achievement that a company has produced something that the public sees value in.

The myth that profits are bad, the myth that corporations are bad, the myth that only government can make everything bright and rosy, the myth that you can and should tax those evil corporations, stand exposed as utter foolishness in Europe. Only in the US do we continue to punish our shining achievers with the highest corporate taxes in the world. Fact: it is impossible to tax a business. You can only indirectly tax the customers of that business while you pretend (hilariously) to punish corporate evil. Socialism: the freak dog with three heads, none of which has the sense to squat before it deficates.

Corporations, like government, labor unions, condominium owners' associations are necessary functions that we can only do imperfectly, hoping for more good than evil to be produced. Since they are all made from the same human race, they are all subject to human abuse and misuse. Attacking the institutions because of the evil of the people within is nonsensical. Our alternative is to pick up our clubs, wear animal skins, live in caves and die at age 30. Oh, kiss Silent Hunter goodbye in the process.:yep:

As I said before, given the choice of the download for $10 or a boxed DVD without SecuROM for $20, even with the price difference I would have bought the DVD and called it great value, not abuse. Your position fails because you say that are the same product. They are not.

[SilentOtto]

Well we are wading totally off-topic here :) and maybe a little too deep into the matter...

My point is the same, anyway. They can get away with it because we are "tied" to them since no one else is developing hardcore subsims nowadays. But releasing the same title the same day, with so many distribution restrictions, and such price difference, it is just not fair.

[Rockin Robbins]

So far off topic I can't find any roadsigns out here at all!:rotfl:

[SilentOtto]

You are approaching the outskirts of Troll Land, where I live! ;)

[kampf]

I have ran into the same thing in reverse downloading from european countries. I play microsoft flight sim and found the cost was double for us U.S customers to download addon content from certain flight sim mega online stores.When i complained I was told the EU taxes everything going out even downloads.So you are not the only one getting hosed.Maybe that's why europeans are always paying higher.

kampf

[hyperion2206]

I'm not so naive as to say corporations are bad in themselves. I think they are intrinsically bad when it comes to our money, since a corporation's objective is getting our money. That's the reason for their existence.

In this case, for me, what Ubi have done is lower the price in the USA to a product without much appeal there (German U-Boote) while they kept it up in Europe where it will probably have more success by itself. You can call it supply/demand. In the 21st century, and talking about a product than can be instantly delivered anywhere in the earth in the same conditions, I call it abuse. That doesn't make it true. Every complany must make a profit to survive. Profits are good, no matter what over 100 years of socialist indoctrination have tried to establish, and profits are to be celebrated as the badge of achievement that a company has produced something that the public sees value in.

The myth that profits are bad, the myth that corporations are bad, the myth that only government can make everything bright and rosy, the myth that you can and should tax those evil corporations, stand exposed as utter foolishness in Europe. Only in the US do we continue to punish our shining achievers with the highest corporate taxes in the world. Fact: it is impossible to tax a business. You can only indirectly tax the customers of that business while you pretend (hilariously) to punish corporate evil. Socialism: the freak dog with three heads, none of which has the sense to squat before it deficates.

Corporations, like government, labor unions, condominium owners' associations are necessary functions that we can only do imperfectly, hoping for more good than evil to be produced. Since they are all made from the same human race, they are all subject to human abuse and misuse. Attacking the institutions because of the evil of the people within is nonsensical. Our alternative is to pick up our clubs, wear animal skins, live in caves and die at age 30. Oh, kiss Silent Hunter goodbye in the process.:yep:

As I said before, given the choice of the download for $10 or a boxed DVD without SecuROM for $20, even with the price difference I would have bought the DVD and called it great value, not abuse. Your position fails because you say that are the same product. They are not.

I have to agree that profit aren't bad, but only under one condition: The profit must be shared with the employees. Nowadays the big corporations make zillions of $, the CEOs get millions of wages and the normal worker is being fired.
This is the reason why leftist parties in parts of the world are becoming more and more popular again.
Ok, that's enough off topic for now folks.;)