$3.99 - The Biggest Problem with the Bat-Titles, For Me

[CrazyOldHermit]

At least DC has the courtesy to justify it. It isn't a blatant cash grab like is over at Marvel and hey, eight extra pages for a buck is page-for-page better than 20 pages for 3 bucks.

[Fate's Faith]

Been trying to cut back on my criticism of Marvel but their pricing (with their shipping method) has kept them from gaining at least one reader. To me its not the same as DC's $3.99 titles since theirs are once a month only.

[stk]

I think the digital first Bat-comics have been worth the price, being 30 pages rather than 20. I've also been enjoying them more content-wise a lot of the time.

[neverender]

If the backup was taken out of Batman and the pages were dedicated to the main feature I'd like the price more, but I don't mind it.

[Dr. Cheesesteak]

At least DC has the courtesy to justify it. It isn't a blatant cash grab like is over at Marvel and hey, eight extra pages for a buck is page-for-page better than 20 pages for 3 bucks.

But, don't you realize we all want a digital copy to go along w/ the hard copy we just bought??

(jk, I agree w/ you)

[Phelpzy]

I don't see the big deal of 3.99 I read Marvel mostly and Batman is the only DC title I read and 3.99 for it gives me more pages then I get out of 3.99 at marvel

[zur en arrh]

3.99 doesn't bother me. I read a lot of Marvel and a bunch of those titles are 3.99 too. Image, Dark Horse, etc have their 3.99's and 3.50's too. I don't care about page count, as long as I'm enjoying a story I'm not gonna complain about an extra dollar. Comics require money every single week, if I was gonna complain about prices I would just strictly download.

[Mace Dolex]

If the price is too high, buy the hardcovers or tpb from amazon.

That's what I do, that way with the TPB's you're getting a complete story.

[UKComicFan]

I seriously don't mind paying $2.99/$3.99, with me being in the UK I only have to pay £1.80/£2.40 and the whatnot for an average comic! And in all fairness, I think the comic books are worth this price.

I'm in the UK too, and just buy Titan's reprint comic. The stories are a few months behind the US, but each issue reprints 3x US stories working out at about £1 each.

[Shingen]

The 3.99 thing is always weird to hear complaints about, for me. These are titles everyone would gladly pay 2.99 for, so the big rumpus is over a dollar per book increase.

For example, the entire DC line is 2.99 with a few exceptions. If you pull, say 10 DC titles and 8 are 2.99 and 2 are 3.99, then you are paying 2 dollars more than if they were all 2.99. TWO DOLLARS. Is it really that horrible to pay TWO EXTRA dollars - and by the way, 2 extra dollars A MONTH? I don't see that as some giant, bank-breaking increase. I get that the books are more expensive, but many comic fans pull a lot of titles, and the 3.99 titles from both companies are going to increase your expenditures by, at best, maybe 20 bucks a month and that is if you pull 20 3.99 titles. I know it is tight for some folks and some pull very few titles, but if $20 bucks a month is absolutely a financial burden on you then maybe comics are not a good way for you to be spending your money. It always feels like a lot of it is a kind of ill-conceived angers over anti-Big 2 "greed" that people advance so they have something to be angry about on the internet. To be honest, if the cost of comics is a major consideration for you, one that dictates what you will buy, then you are probably better off getting TPBs from Amazon, where the price is MUCH better than buying singles. Problem solved.

I'm more sympathetic to the general idea of protest against reduced page counts and inflation, in general, because those are issues that need to be discussed. But since the price increase, sales have gone up. Fans are not buying less comics because they are 3.99. And the nebulous grousing of several people on the internet over a few bucks a month is not going to force them to change their policies when the only thing they care about - sales - are up.

[Fate's Faith]

What the $3.99 bothers me isn't for what I current buy. Honestly, I don't think I'd be buying something if a dollar was going to make the difference. What bugs me about it is I'm not as willing to sample as I once was. Chances are if I get hooked on a title, the dollar extra no longer will be a factor. That's my biggest complaint I think.