With the news of the skeleton crew being let go by Telltale Games still fresh in people's minds, the now bankrupt developer seems to be quietly cutting the prices of their games on numerous stores, such as Steam, and Humble Bundle.
Per tracking several prices for Telltale games such as The Wolf Among Us and Game of Thrones, Telltale has apparently been permanently slashing prices on most of their titles as recently as September 29th, with the games being priced at just over half of their original cost at $29.99. It should be noted that none of the games in question are listed as being on sale, meaning the current price is now seen as the default price for the title.
It is unknown how many games are fully affected at this time. Some titles, such as Tales from the Borderlands and Minecraft Story Mode: Season 1, remain full price on places like Steam, with the rest of the catalog has been reduced to around $14.99. Other websites, such as GOG, have seen no price reductions at all, which only muddy the entire picture even further.
One issue at hand has been the inconsistencies with Telltale since the news of their shutting down originally broke. Titles which they have had a hand in, such as Poker Night at the Inventory 2, have already been pulled from sites like Steam. The Final Season of The Walking Dead was also delisted from sale, with Telltale in all likelihood following the trend with other games in their catalog in the future as licenses expire for the properties or music. It is currently unknown if the price cutting measure is even factored into this at all - one last low price before the game officially disappears - or something to that effect.
Amid the chaos of Telltale Games shutting down, which has already includes a lawsuit by a former employee and rumors of outsourcing the final two episodes of The Walking Dead: The Final Season, one of the most consistent threads has been sympathy for the developers who lost their jobs, all without severance pay, over the studios shutdown. Many developers on social media have reached out to former employees of the company to offer support or job opportunities elsewhere, but the biggest cries have been towards game developers unionizing to help protect themselves if a development studio sees a similar collapse in the future.
There is still a lot of uncertainty regarding Telltale Games, and the mysteriously lower prices for their titles on certain websites just adds to that even more. What this foretells for Telltale, and what their plans are with doing this or if its merely an attempt to make some money to hold on for their remaining skeleton crew before the games disappear or something else is anyone's guess.
What are your thoughts on all of this? Leave your comments below.
