Eidos is trying out a new pricing model for Championship Manager 2010, a soccer management sim that you’ll be able to get for as little as a penny, if that’s what you want to pay.
Dubbed by some as The Radiohead Model after the popular British band’s innovative approach for the release of their In Rainbows album, “pay what you want” forms of pricing have been relatively bold new ventures in the troubled music industry, but have been yet unheard of in the games business, where everything basically sticks to the same prices.
That’ll change with the release of Championship Manager 2010, a soccer management sim being published by Eidos, which will be available for any price that you name (from a penny up) and digitally distributed. I hope I do no offense to the fans of this franchise when I say that Eidos’ pricing scheme for the game is the only thing genuinely notable about it for someone like me, who doesn’t know his strikers from his red cards.
“This is the best Championship Manager the studio has ever made and we want as many people as possible to try the full new game,” general manager Roy Meredith. Unfortunately Eidos isn’t quite ballsy enough to let this last for too long, which makes sense. The set-your-own-price feature will only last until midnight on September 10. That’s not the only limitation: you’ll also have to pay a transaction fee of 2.50 pounds regardless of what price you choose.
The pay what you want model has been successful for some – Radiohead, especially – but arguably doesn’t work for everybody. Will it work out for Championship Manager 2010? I’d like to see Eidos release the results of this experiment at some point so we can all see for ourselves.
[Via CVG]
