I've written about this phenomenon before and I'm sure it will continue for a while yet (there's a new Call of Duty out in a few weeks, after all). But I think that its end is in sight and that speculating on how much Tesco's will be selling FIFA 2020 just will not happen. A digital download only future will kill this type of undercutting (I wonder if the supermarkets even made a profit on some of the deals available) and scanning newspapers adverts in the days before a big release will go the way of tape-loading, dial-up internet and, well, newspapers themselves.
Monday 4 October 2010
FIFA 11 Scramble
The new FIFA came out last week and, as is usual with 'big' games where large retailers are expected to undercut specialist retailers at launch, there was considerable speculation on the Internet as to what supermarket would have the best deal. Obviously, the shops themselves weren't giving that information out to the public (and so to their competitors) but, slowly, rumours (some true, some false) filtered out, ahead of their 'official' advertisements in Thursday's papers, ahead of Friday's release of the game. The deals available weren't as good as some of those from last year but I ended up going for the Sainsbury's one (£24.97 when you spend £30 on booze groceries).
I've written about this phenomenon before and I'm sure it will continue for a while yet (there's a new Call of Duty out in a few weeks, after all). But I think that its end is in sight and that speculating on how much Tesco's will be selling FIFA 2020 just will not happen. A digital download only future will kill this type of undercutting (I wonder if the supermarkets even made a profit on some of the deals available) and scanning newspapers adverts in the days before a big release will go the way of tape-loading, dial-up internet and, well, newspapers themselves.
I've written about this phenomenon before and I'm sure it will continue for a while yet (there's a new Call of Duty out in a few weeks, after all). But I think that its end is in sight and that speculating on how much Tesco's will be selling FIFA 2020 just will not happen. A digital download only future will kill this type of undercutting (I wonder if the supermarkets even made a profit on some of the deals available) and scanning newspapers adverts in the days before a big release will go the way of tape-loading, dial-up internet and, well, newspapers themselves.
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It's an odd phenomenon isn't it? I think it can only work on the massive titles that supermarkets can shift in enough volume to make the discounts worthwhile. What is odd is to buy a game on day of release at a discount price that it won't match again until the January sales. (I'm skipping FIFA this year, brilliant as the series is currently).
ReplyDeleteThe discounts weren't as good as last year's - last year, it was a straight cash discount, this year you had to buy something else in store ( so they could make back their losses on the game). I ended up with two FIFAs last year - a cheap Tesco's one and a cheapish one from Shopto that got caught up in the postal strike. I made my money back when I px'd my spare the following week.
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