KoA: Reckoning - Premium Edition Details

Dhruin

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Information on the various premium editions of Reckoning that will be offered (in NA?) has been revealed at GameSpot. Beyond the basic game, various special editions will apparently range from $80 - $275:
The $80 Special Edition is the least expensive of the premium bundles and includes Kingdoms of Amalur, a parchment map of the game world, a seven-piece dice set, a soundtrack, a set of 40 Destiny Cards, and a downloadable content pack of nine weapons that grants experience point boosts. When gamers step up to the $200 Collector's Edition (limited to 700 copies), they will receive all of the aforementioned swag, as well as an individually numbered 12.5-inch solid resin Prismere Troll figurine designed by McFarlane Toys and one of 1,000 lithographs signed by designer Ken Rolston.
The top-tier, $275 Signature Edition of Reckoning is limited to 300 bundles and includes all of the Collector's Edition swag, with a couple key differences. First, the troll figurine will be signed by one of the game's celebrity frontmen, either Spawn creator Todd McFarlane, best-selling author R.A Salvatore, or Major League Baseball Hall of Famer (and 38 Studios founder) Curt Schilling. Additionally, the Signature Edition packs in an individually numbered sketch screen print by Todd McFarlane.
More information.
 
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And we thought that IGN was worried no one would try the game... ;)

Heavy prices for "stuff", I will be going for a digital standard retail version. Can someone who is into the special edition business let us know if this is wow or meh?
 
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I don't think there's anything wrong with a collectors' edition in general as long as they don't hold meaningful in-game content hostage (I don't consider a few weapons to do this) then whether they're worth it is entirely up to the people who want the random swag they add. They're a luxury item that does not actually add or detract to the overall value of the game so its hard to care too much about what they have or don't have as long as they don't withold base-game content.

Heavy prices for "stuff", I will be going for a digital standard retail version. Can someone who is into the special edition business let us know if this is wow or meh?

Well I used to buy collector editions all the time, until I started to become a little mor concious of the piles of useless junk I was accumulating and the money I was wasting. I would typically say they're all pretty meh, but I suppose we can talk about the items in these particular ones and perhaps some missed opportunities.

Besides the presence of some signed items, it seems fairly similar in "stuff" put into the higher end special editions when compared to Skyrim's collector's edition. While they are even more expensive than the often criticized Skyrim collector's edition, its probably important to point out they offer a far more standard collector's edition as well at a far more standard price for those sorts of products.

The inclusion of in-game items exclusive to more expensive version of the games (or possibly purchaseable by normal users as DLC) is a little bit annoying and reminiscent of past Bethesda and Bioware offerings. Some people like these sorts of extras but some people also feel like they cheapen the base game. Luckily, unlike some bioware offerings, none of this content is substantial as it does not include new locations, characters, or sub-plots.

So I guess you could call these collector's editions sort of wow in that they offer an unusual variety in terms of how much you can chose to spend and how much special swag you can get. If you are a fan of Todd McFarlane then the lithographs and individually autographed sketches might be particularly enticing.

For me though, I've got so much junk sitting around that most of these extras - for this game and others - have always been more "meh" to me. I do like the special edition maps typically included in special editions of RPGs and I do like artbooks though - particularly if they feature extra bits of lore or behind the scenes information. The map appeals to me, but the inclusion of lithographs and one or two sketches in lieu of a coffee-table artbook is particularly "meh" when I consider the two highest priced versions. A Todd McFarlane mini-graphic novel co-written with R.A. Salvatore would have been far far more appealing.

Considering they have both of them available, it is a little disappointing they didn't go with something like that instead. I'd probably try to get a physical copy of something like that - possibly off ebay or from amazon if published seperately - even though I am certain I will be getting the vanilla edition of this game.
 
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I want the dice, cards and map, and am quite happy to pay a little bit extra to get them. As for the rest... I'll leave that for the collectors. I like how they have made it exclusive to 300 and 700, I just hope that other regions have a chance to get some of them if they so choose.
 
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I have zero interest in any of that stuff. I'm still debating whether or not I'm even going to purchase the standard edition.

I hate to be pessimistic, but I've yet to see anything about this game that really makes me want to play it.
 
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I have zero interest in any of that stuff. I'm still debating whether or not I'm even going to purchase the standard edition.

I hate to be pessimistic, but I've yet to see anything about this game that really makes me want to play it.

I can understand that. I'm hopeful that it will be as good as the previews where the authors had some hands on time with it suggest it is, but I will also likely be waiting until after reviews and first hand user accounts on sites like this come out. That's usually how I take any first time release of a gaming property though - and probably how I should have approached installments in my favorite series in some instances.
 
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Yeah, they can keep that junk. Digital download ftw, keep your wrappings and crap, oh and discount me btw since you didn't have to make a box and cd's and such, kkthnkx!


-Carn
 
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Cynical thoughts:

And they generally release very little information in the international versions of the game.
For example i still don't know who the voice artists will be ... And that they dion't release that information, combined with the fact they they had announced well-known names for the English-speaking market means to me that they just don't care. Over country-specific versions, that is.

I notice a trend to put out LOTS of informations for the English-language versions of games (in general, I mean !) - and meanwhile totally neglecting the country-specific versions in term of marketing.

They're going for the big money. Why care care about those tiny little countries no-one has heard about ? ("Here be dragons !")
 
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The signature edition sounds like a good ebay investment ~.~

The troll figurine looks pretty cool too. Not quite $200 cool, though.
kingdomsofamalur_99292_640screen.jpg
 
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From the above linked thread :

Hey Mungo. I just posted this on Facebook, but it's worth post here as well. The decision to only sell in North America was a remarkably painful one for us. We are a small new company with massive dreams and well aware of how important our international community is to us. The bottom line is that the decision escalated to a breaking point where it was either sell the Limited Editions in North America or not sell them at all. Obviously, it was in our power to avoid the latter so that was the decision. I can't explain how much work the folks in the 38 office have poured into making sure we could provide something like this to the community. Rest assured, that as our company grows we will be better positioned to do awesome things like this world-wide.

Thank you so much for your interest and support of our company. We do not take that lightly.

Source : http://forums.reckoning.amalur.com/...ndles-Announced!&p=27910&viewfull=1#post27910
 
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I was interested in the base premium edition one.. but then again I can't get it over here so won't be :(
 
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FYI: This was also posted on their forums by Ngruk, aka Curt Schilling, CEO of 38 Studios:

This was a herculean effort. Treehouse was awesome about this in so many ways but remember this much. For the most part when someone like Treehouse does this (and there aren't a ton that do) they actually take a ton of risk because THEY create the items, they warehouse and store.

We are an unknown IP, an unknown entity in the industry, and we have no games out. Not sure many, if any, have ever done ANYTHING close to this quality with those two factors in play. There was much talk about not even doing it because no one knows us.

Every item IS A BIG DEAL to us, everything we EVER sell, or show, has our name on it. That matters to us, more importantly that means these things take time, and for us there are two things never in enough supply, time and money. Cycles spent on ANYTHING not directly related to the launch of our games are things we take very seriously.

In the end it came down to timing, and that's where we are at fault. Had we had the team, the manpower, and the resources 18 months ago to act on this we likely would have been able to pull whatever we wanted, off.

We didn't and for that we accept the blame here. But as I stated before we are a new company and we are learning our lessons as we go, and I always tell my team the same thing "I don't care if you screw up or make mistakes with the right intentions and effort, what I do care about is making the same mistake twice".

We will learn from this, figure out how to get better, and make sure we execute on it the next time (ala Copernicus) this comes up.
 
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I would also like to add that I'm personally very pleased that they offered different teirs of these limited editions. All I want is a map and a soundtrack, and I was really afraid I'd have to fork over $150-$200 and get a McFarlane toy that I don't really want in order to get the stuff that I do want.

Not only can I get what I want without paying too exhorbitant of a price, but I also get a pack of destiny cards and a set of dice (and c'mon, one can never have too many dice!). So yeah, I ordered the $80 version, and consider it money well spent. Still really looking forward to this game.
 
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I dont understand why someone would want all that stuff. Isnt hoarding games themselves enough?

Collectors will want the autographed statue at least...

Curt Shilling signature itself have a price range of $60 to $175 (when it's on photos/baseball).
 
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People tend to associate experiences with material objects in a way that increases their perceived value.

Not something I personally recognise in myself, but it's very common. Well, I do associate experiences with material objects (or locations and several other things) - but, to me, the experience in itself is the thing I hold dear - and not the object/location/thing that provokes remembrance of the experience.

Personally, in this case, I think it has to do with the emotional weight of wanting the game - and wanting as much out of the experience as possible. This emotional need overrides the "pragmatic" side that would otherwise dismiss the value of physical objects existing outside of the actual game. At least, I've never heard an argument about their value that I could understand that went beyond this emotional fulfillment.

Except, of course, the potentially high value of resale - which is quite clever. It can be a very sound investment to "waste" money on these things, because as much as you - personally - associate something positive with them - there will be others out there who either do it even more so, or have more money to burn.
 
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