Video Game Trader Iphone App coming soon... input needed

[VGT Magazine]

Hello,

Video Game Trader is set to release an Iphone Price Guide application. This app will allow you to access our price guide without needing an active internet/network connection, except for price updates. We are due to release this application around July/August.

We are at the point in development where we need to start thinking about how much to charge.

Thanks for taking the time to answer the poll.

Sincerely,

Thomas Sansone

PS. Starting with Issue #13 (Aug/Sept), shipping in July, the magazine will be full size.

[jay]

Any iPhone app needs to be under $2.99 for mass market appeal.  As this is effectively the same directory one could get free at DigitalPress (or right here at the J2Games Rarity Guide) or online at 100 other sources, you need to appeal to the casual gaming audience.  I would actually suggest $0.99.

[VGT Magazine]

I agree when it comes down to an application that would appeal to the masses. But a $0.99 or $2.99 application of this nature, I don't think appeals to the masses. I could be wrong, but my assumption would be that only collectors, flea market, and garage sale hunters would want this type of application. It is definitely going to be some sort of subscription service (as this is now allowable under Iphone 3.0) but I am researching the pricing.

Thanks for the comments. Anyone else?

[VGT Magazine]

Please keep voting. But it looks like we are going to release a subscription based application for $2.99 yearly and an application that includes a subscription to the magazine for a higher price. We need to see if the app store will support the 2nd option.  Since the Iphone 3.0 software is not out yet, we may offer a $0.99 cent application that will be updated throwout the rest of 2009 and call it VGPrice Guide 2009.

Opinions?

[Flack]

I voted less than $4.99. If it were more than that I would probably set out to make my own lists or just put the PDF of the magazine on my phone and use that. For less than $4.99, it wouldn't be worth the effort to do all of that and I would just buy it.

[VGT Magazine]

UPDATE!!!

I just uploaded the application to the Apple Store. We are going to be offering the first version at an introductory price of just $0.99. I would expect Apple to approve the application in about a week or two.

Currently the application is a simple price guide with search capabilities. The first feature we are going to work on adding is a "checklist" function where you can check which games you have in your collection. This feature will also have a switch that, when turned on, will only list games that are NOT in your collection.

What else would you like the application to do?

[GamesOgre.net]

Sounds like a great potential iPhone app!  I love the fact that you're considering making it more interactive than a simple price list.  However, as the only iPhone pricelist app out there that I know of, just accomplishing that alone would be sufficient to gain my praise.  If you pull off that checklist of games already in collection, that would be phenomenal. 

Right now my biggest challenge with checking prices on my iPhone is quickly navigating through all the content.  I've been able to manually store a couple price lists offline with other programs, but it's far from an ideal setup.  Those NES and PS1 lists get pretty long when you want to look up a couple games from each.  Thus, while designing your app, when you're at the list for a given platform, making sure that you can jump to a letter of the alphabet or jump down a quarter of the list at a time would be wonderful.  Additionally, instead of just a scroll and browse feature, having a search mode with keyboard input would be nice. 

All that being said, if you even do two simple things you'll be a huge success:
1)  No matter how simple, just make sure that a user can easily look up prices.  Do this without any bells and whistles, and you've already hit a home run.
2)  Keep it reasonable priced (i.e., under $2.99-3.99).  The iTunes store is brilliant in teaching companies that you can sell 50x more at 1/10th the price than you would at the traditional video game / software pricing scheme.   

UPDATE!!!

I just uploaded the application to the Apple Store. We are going to be offering the first version at an introductory price of just $0.99. I would expect Apple to approve the application in about a week or two.

Currently the application is a simple price guide with search capabilities. The first feature we are going to work on adding is a "checklist" function where you can check which games you have in your collection. This feature will also have a switch that, when turned on, will only list games that are NOT in your collection.

What else would you like the application to do?

[VGT Magazine]

Sounds like a great potential iPhone app!  I love the fact that you're considering making it more interactive than a simple price list.  However, as the only iPhone pricelist app out there that I know of, just accomplishing that alone would be sufficient to gain my praise.  If you pull off that checklist of games already in collection, that would be phenomenal. 

We are looking to add the checklist to the next version. As that is the most asked for feature.

Right now my biggest challenge with checking prices on my iPhone is quickly navigating through all the content.  I've been able to manually store a couple price lists offline with other programs, but it's far from an ideal setup.  Those NES and PS1 lists get pretty long when you want to look up a couple games from each.  Thus, while designing your app, when you're at the list for a given platform, making sure that you can jump to a letter of the alphabet or jump down a quarter of the list at a time would be wonderful.  Additionally, instead of just a scroll and browse feature, having a search mode with keyboard input would be nice. 

The current version does have search capability. And its pretty quick. You can also just browse platforms. Future plans will allow you to search within a platform and jump to a letter of the alphabet.

All that being said, if you even do two simple things you'll be a huge success:
1)  No matter how simple, just make sure that a user can easily look up prices.  Do this without any bells and whistles, and you've already hit a home run.
2)  Keep it reasonable priced (i.e., under $2.99-3.99).  The iTunes store is brilliant in teaching companies that you can sell 50x more at 1/10th the price than you would at the traditional video game / software pricing scheme.   

1. We are going to keep the application pretty simple. However, an enhancement, that are planned for the next, and future versions are as follows: Ability to jump to the Video Game Price Charts page for each game to view the pricing trend of the game in questions, Ability to jump to the amazon.com, half.com, ebay.com and/or chasethechuckwagon.com, or any other reseller page for the game to purchase (this depends on those sites sponsoring the program), and the ability to jump to MobyGames.com information page for the game selected.

2. The price will be kept low. We are looking at $2.99 for a 1 year subscription to the application that will include free updates. The new iPhone 3.0 will support subscription functionality.

So, what else should be added?

[VGT Magazine]

Video Game Trader Magazine has released the "Video Game Price Guide" iPhone & iPod Touch application. The introductory price is $0.99 & will provide free updates through the rest of 2009.

You can get it by searching "video game price guide" in either the app store, or iTunes.

Or you can just click here: itms://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=316807153&mt=8&s=143441

I encourage you to leave your feedback and suggestions as this is just a version 1.0 of the application. However, a couple things being added to the next update: the ability to "check" an item that you have in your collection; and the ability to click on a game and view the VideoGamePriceCharts.com data page for that game.

Sincerely,

Thomas Sansone
Video Game Trader Magazine & Price Guide
www.VideoGameTrader.com

[triverse]

Hey Thomas, I have popped in a couple times on this topic before at other forums and was reading this one here and had something come to me that I would like to see included if at all possible.

Some form of note taking capability (especially helpful for when meeting someone that has that one game you just have to have at a store or something).  Where you could goto the page of the game in question and write there contact info and such.
I apologize if that idea has already been implemented (I am still using a cell phone from the late 90's-they can't make me upgrade but applications like this are making me wonder why I haven't yet).

[VGT Magazine]

Hey Thomas, I have popped in a couple times on this topic before at other forums and was reading this one here and had something come to me that I would like to see included if at all possible.

Some form of note taking capability (especially helpful for when meeting someone that has that one game you just have to have at a store or something).  Where you could goto the page of the game in question and write there contact info and such.
I apologize if that idea has already been implemented (I am still using a cell phone from the late 90's-they can't make me upgrade but applications like this are making me wonder why I haven't yet).

Thanks for the idea. We are going to slowly implement what we can. Remember, it costs a lot of $$$ to develop these things

Tom

[triverse]

Yes, it is a costly endeavor to produce custom software, but if you start with a quality product, then the purchases will come (at least you would hope so). 
I think it is a great idea and I hope you have plenty of success with it.  As time goes on you can implement more details like pictures of the games and such, but that is obviously something for later updates.