Why doesn't companies listen to consumers?

[MrPopo]

Many will say I'm "anti-Microsoft", but I don't think so. Microsoft have some great products under their umbrella.

This is truth. I have yet to find someone who can claim that Visual Studio isn't awesome.

[RCBH928]

Elvis said everything I wanted to say about Microsoft but in detail. Thanks.
I think it is time Microsoft changes their whole OS. The OS they have was built in '95 for '95 needs and it was bad considering the huge problems it came with(MAC OS X didn't have half as much. It had too little).
Microsoft has enough money to launch a new dependable OS and if I learned anything it should be based on unix/linux as these two operating systems are most dependable (linux/mac)

Fast food does high volume at low margin. Regular restaurants do low volume at high margin. Both are reasonable approaches to take. If you all move into one strategy you have to compete with more people and leave a market that's untapped (people who want a good steak). In general you tend to see a balance between the two philosophies.

Do you think that "casual" games should be priced lower like $40 and maybe newer IPs for hardcore games should be priced higher like $100? This will match the philosophies you mention, high volume low margin/ low volume high margin.

I didn't mean all companies don't listen to their customers, but I think most do not.

I also think we all show our love and positive feedback to the companies by paying them for their games. Isn't that enough? We work for money just to pay you for your wonderful games.

btw, was the title supposed to be " Why DON'T companies listen to their consumers?"

[MrPopo]

Fast food does high volume at low margin. Regular restaurants do low volume at high margin. Both are reasonable approaches to take. If you all move into one strategy you have to compete with more people and leave a market that's untapped (people who want a good steak). In general you tend to see a balance between the two philosophies.

Do you think that "casual" games should be priced lower like $40 and maybe newer IPs for hardcore games should be priced higher like $100? This will match the philosophies you mention, high volume low margin/ low volume high margin.

I don't agree with the prices you're throwing out there, but you do see something similar in the world of PC games. The casual games sell for $10-20 while the big budget titles for the core gamers are $50. You don't see that kind of pricing as much on consoles due to licencing costs. Plus, the restaurant business is different from the video game business. Video games have a high up-front cost and can be expected to sell over a period of two years, with the majority of sales in the first six months. Restaurants have lower up-front costs and are expected to do business for decades, so they have more wiggle room on the profit margins.

[elvis]

This is truth. I have yet to find someone who can claim that Visual Studio isn't awesome.

That's generally the example of a great bit of Microsoft software I use when people ask for one. And I think it's one of the few bits of software developed by Microsoft in house (unlike everything else that they buy and extend - Office, DirectX/3D, MS-SQL Server, IE, etc, were all bought from other companies, but that's by the by).

There's nothing like Visual Studio over in the open source world, sadly. Most will point to Eclipse, but honestly it's a terrible beast to try and tame.

[zarathstra]

Why don't companies listen to consumers?

Have you ever spoken to an average consumer? Why in the world would they listen to people like that. The people on this board, and techy, nerdy people in general, are not indicative of the market at large. It would be great if they listened to our needs, but let's be honest, our needs are not the needs of most consumers.

[RCBH928]

Again, I didn't say the needs of this forum only
but I am talking in general. For like the longest time I hear people complaining about bad customer service usually in the largest companies. I have seen people cry for lower prices over things we know that are actually over priced(amazingly, car dealerships where I am raised the prices of all their cars while world wide prices of commodities and economy is shooting down, go figure, and I am talking few thousand dollars at least).

There are a lot of examples, like we all know if Sega released a decent Sonic game it will sell like crazy but they like to ignore it(don't tell me Sonic game sales don't reflect that, Sonic always sold). You can think of a lot of examples. Like psp battery life I guess, there are many examples in this world.

As for examples, I am actually starting to like the idea of changing the price. Like GTA4 can be $70 and Sponge Bob can be $20. You pay for crap and quality and you can notice in the price how much effort went into each game. But if you price them all at $50-60 how is that fair?
I think they should distinguish the prices

[slowslow325]

I personally think Nintendo is truely starting a line of hardcore games, or at least getting some third party developers to make some. It takes time to make a game, don't expect instant gratification. I see this from Metroid Other M and The Conduit. I assume they will make more as time goes on.

[MrPopo]

For like the longest time I hear people complaining about bad customer service usually in the largest companies.

Customer service, like most other things, is ruled by a vocal minority. And that vocal minority tends to be the kind of people that are never satisfied. An example that I'm sure we've seen countless times at Amazon: customer calls up to cancel their order that is now showing "Item Shipping Soon". The CS rep tries to cancel, but the item's already packaged and on a truck ready for departure. The CS rep informs the customer that it cannot be cancelled, but they can return it for a full refund. The customer then gets pissy and claims we have bad customer service.

I have seen people cry for lower prices over things we know that are actually over priced(amazingly, car dealerships where I am raised the prices of all their cars while world wide prices of commodities and economy is shooting down, go figure, and I am talking few thousand dollars at least).

Something is overpriced only if the price is causing large amounts of people to not buy it who normally would. I'm guessing in the case of the car dealerships they figure that they won't do as much volume during these economic times so they raise the prices to maximize returns on the cars that do sell. The people who are in the market for a new car in this economic climate are more likely to be the kind who won't quibble over a few thousand dollars on a 15k+ car.

There are a lot of examples, like we all know if Sega released a decent Sonic game it will sell like crazy but they like to ignore it(don't tell me Sonic game sales don't reflect that, Sonic always sold). You can think of a lot of examples. Like psp battery life I guess, there are many examples in this world.

Do you honestly think that the Sonic devs, when the game is about to go gold, sit around in a room and say "Well guys, this Sonic game is pretty bad, but let's ship it anyway" ? The games are obviously selling well enough to make the execs feel more are worthwhile. The fact that you and I and every other member of this forum feels they are steaming turds doesn't matter as much.