I would pay a maximum of some $37,50 USA. But I think it's better to sell at a lower price (and sell more copies) rather than selling at a higher price (and sell less copies).

Oh, I'd love to be betatester.

Generally speaking I agree with Jayde, but I myself don't really have any hard and fast rules about game buying.

I'm more inclined to buy audio games anyway because I like to support the devs, but the more expensive the game, the more factors must be taken into account before I buy it.

things I considder include: a game's plot and complexity, if there are exploration elements, whether extra content (user created levels etc), is available, how varied the modes and choices in gameplay are, if a game has ongoing in game plot or not, how many possible goals etc there are in the game besides just accumulating score, how long it will take me to complete the game, how rich a game's audio is, the game's atmosphere, how generic the sound effects are, whether a game uses human or synth speech, how the game stacks up against similar free or commercial games, whether the game is available via download, and if the game's demo is replayable (I am qquite willing to reconsidder my decisions on games, ---- I actually tried Trek 2000 three times before I eventually decided to buy the game).

The lower the game's price, the more allowences I will make if it fails in certain areas.

for example, I decided against buying ten pin alley because, ---- despite the very nice audio, I found the game play slightly repetitive, simply centering an audio signal as in Crazy darts from Bsc, with many extra stuff about scoring etc.

It struck me that none of the extra game options made huge amounts of difference (bowling left to right instead of right to left for instance), and anyway, the ultimate end of the game is just a continual match winning scenario which personally doesn't appeal to me, and unfortunately sinse it's usually me that visits my friends rather than the other way round, I couldn't make extensive use of the various multi player options.

If the game had worked out at about 7 pounds, fifteen dollars or so, I would probably have bought it.

Similarly, because the level layout doesn't change, and the gameplay is the same from stage to stage (no extra weapons etc), I haven't yet bought packman talks, though it's possible if the game's price drops in the future that I will.

A game would have to be very good indeed for me to considder paying over about 40 usd, ----- or about 25 pounds in my case, and I physically don't know if I'd be willing to go up to about 50 usd for a game.

As a rough price guide to audio games, you might find this list from Pcs games to be helpful.

Well, it would still depend on the depth of the game.
A few valid questions follow. Please understand that in no way am I asking that these questions be answered publicly.

How many characters?
How complex are the movesets and how are they executed?
How complex is the fighting engine itself?
Are there any unlockables? Voices, profiles, demos, videos, sound clips, trailers, finishing moves, special moves, arenas, deathtraps, weapons, storylines?
Is there a story mode that can/should be finished with each playable character with different results?
Are there varying degrees of difficulty?
Is the game voice-acted and does it contain both accurate and well-rendered audio effects to enhance playability to the maximum?

The more questions in this list that have a potential "yes" answer, the more in-depth a game you're looking at. The price I would pay for a game like this will depend almost entirely on the answers to most of these questions.
If it's a game like Tournament with a couple extra tweaks, I won't bother; if it's a full-on arcade-style 2d fighting game with unlockables and a lot of depth and a good fighting engine, I'll definitely be keeping an eye on you.

Muso, I'd also be interested in the answers to some of Jayde's questions, though of course what information you release is up to you.

thus far, the closest things to audio beat em ups have been
Tournament by Bpc and The Savage gambit by Fantasy Storm, ---- unfortunately no longer available though someone might have a copy.

Neither has really got things right I feel though.

Realistically, if I was paying a reasonable amount of money, over 15 dollars for an audio game, I'd be looking for something at least as complex as Streetfighter 2 the world Warrior, Primal rage or Mortal Kombat 1.

Ie, 7 or 8 selectable characters with at least unique specials, a good back story, a number of different environments to fight in (knockoffs, deathtraps etc optional), variable difficulty, and either unique endings for each character or a story mode with cut scenes etc, ----- I've always enjoyed replaying something like Street fighter just to get all the endings.

I'm sorry if these seem unusually high expectations, but as you can probably gather, I've been plaing beat em ups for quite a long time, ----- something like 18 or 19 years now. I would be very interested in the developement of a true audio beat em up.

If your mailing announcements, or would like in put such as beta testing etc, please E-mail me on dark at x g a m dot org.
I might also be able to help in the matter of voice acting if you wish, ----- though it sounds like the game's developement is pretty much sorted from what you've said.

brian, I actually was rather disappointed with Chillingham, mostly because of the story and as you say, the difficulty (or lack there of). However I did enjoy the voice acting and audio in Both Chillingham and Grizly, and buying the two pack deal I actually got both games cheaper at 30 usd, ----- which is certainly a price I would've payed for Chillingham.

If I had vaguely been sensible with buying Gma games, I would've gone for their deal to buy all five games for about 80 dollars, including packman talks, sinse getting it at that price lumped in with the other four would've been fine, I've now unfortunately spend even more than that on the other four games over the course of a year or so which certainly wasn't clever.

Thanks all for your points of view. Many of the questions put forward are indeed being considered, although I will not yet reveal what, as the game is still in the plan/design phase. The two biggest tasks in this are the fighting engine itself, and the artificial intelligence (AI), so it still may be quite a while before even an alpha is produced. It will be released when its ready.

Thanks again.

By artificial intelligence, I am referring to how the computer can play against you, and appear to counteract what you are doing.

ok, i thought there was a character with that name in the game... sorry.