O Ubisoft Why Must You Tempt Me

Part of the reason why I dislike Digital Distribution so much is that I like to collect things and most of the time always go for the collectors edition of a game. 

Having a quick browse of Play.com I noticed that yet again Ubisoft have made a collectors edition for Assassins Creed II. Coming in at a whopping £69.99 on Play.com is the Assassin's Creed II Black Edition, which comes with the soundtrack, a Ezio (the character) statue, a book, videos and 3 exclusive in game quests. This might just be enough for me to be yet again handing over more than £40 for a video game.

Looking back there have been some good collectors editions in the past, the most expensive one I bought was the MGS4 one which came with the Snake figurine, a blu ray documentary disc and the soundtrack and of course the game. Being a Metal Gear fan I loved all this bonus content but might have been a bit too much money for the casual Metal Gear fan.

The Halo & the Mass Effect collectors editions were also good, coming with art books and a bonus disc which is always good. 

One of the weaker collectors editions was the Prince of Persia one, it came in a beautiful box but lacked really any bonus content, fortunately the price wasn't much more than the standard edition. The Resident Evil 5 steelbook was ok but the bonus DVD was a bit disappointing.

Some companies are taking it to the extreme though. The upcoming Modern Warfare 2 Prestige Edition will come with a pair of fully working night vision goggles and will clock in at $150 and about £110 I believe. Quite why you would need a pair of working night vision goggles is beyond me and to be honest this is starting to take the mick.

Speaking of Modern Warfare 2 it seems Activision is starting to take the mick with the price of the standard edition of Modern Warfare 2 by raising the RRP to £54.99. Most sites have it for £44.99 and bear in mind officially games are supposed to have an RRP of £49.99, it still looks cheeky as Activision know they can get away with it. This coupled with increase in price of Band Hero, Tony Hawk and DJ Hero (£108!) is ridiculous and Activision should be ashamed of their behaviour.

As mentioned though people will probably pay this money as the games are popular, but I hope there is a bit of a boycott of this games so that others won't try the same in future.

So whilst the Assassin's Creed II Black Edition may cost a lot of money, that should be the most people pay for games and should be only because the package is full of content.