THQ's Farrell: $59.99 price point is "keeping people out" of gaming

THQ CEO Brian Farrell believes games need to be less expensive, otherwise, there's a risk of losing new customers.

Speaking at the BMO Capital Markets conference in New York today, Farrell has said this a few times before, but today he told attendees he believes the average price point of $59.99 is "keeping people out".

To counter the expense of games, THQ plans to try out a new pricing scheme starting with MX vs. ATV Alive, which the firm outlined during its financial call to investors earlier this month and announced back in September.

"What we're thinking about the business is we're turning it on its head a little bit," said Farrell, per Gamasutra. "It's not, 'how high a price can we get', but 'how many users'. If you can capture everyone under that economic curve, that's where you can make the most money.

"When we launched [MX vs. ATV] at $59.99, we'd do some units, and then when we brought the price down to the mass market-friendly price of $39.99, it would just pop. So the thinking this time is, let's initially launch at $39.99 -- it's a very robust game, very high quality, so this is not about trying to get a secondary title out. It's an AAA title, at that price point, but then with a series of DLC so people can extend their experience.

"We think this is the future of gaming. We think that's the way games are gonna go in the long term."

According to Farrell, revenue from digital sales doubled for THQ during its last fiscal year and the release of MX vs ATV Alive in 2011 could help digital revenue exceed projections even more.

THQ expects its digital sales to double next year, and continue to grow from there.