The most lauded game in Steam’s history was given away as a freebie alongside that one.
But you do to make others, just because some games are easier and cheaper to make doesn’t mean every game can or should be like that. I never got into Path of Exile but I have over 3000 hours on Marvel Heroes and I’ve spent probably between 800 to 1000 dollars on it. That is a bargain compared to what I spent on cable TV over the same amount of time, it’s a bargain compared to what i spent on books over the same amount of time, i only go to a few movies each year but the overall amount of entertainment time per dollar still makes all the money i spent on that game a bargain. Not every game can be like Dark Souls, I don’t even know why you’d want them to.
Well, sure. Because you were playing video games instead. Had you spent $1,000 on Marvel Heroes and then spent 3,000 hours watching cable you’d probably have different opinions on your investment 
and presumably reach a wider, multi-platform audience to offset that?
In any case it really doesn’t matter as these things are self-correcting. They will not purposefully set out to not make a profit. They are free to charge what they want and people are free to buy it or not. If they make the game too much of a pain in the arse to play without coughing-up endless microtransactions then they won’t sell so much and they’ll have to re-assess. If it is too expensive then people won’t buy, if it is hamstrung by clunky protections or the inability to access all the game then people won’t buy. etc. etc.
What really matters is the gameplay, it always has and always will and it isn’t something that you have to throw mega-backs at.
They don’t have to make every game way more complicated than the last, nor more graphically complex and if they wake up one day and realise that by ratcheting up the costs of development they can no longer make a profit…so what? they’ll have to find ways of doing it cheaper and I suspect that the actual playability of games will not suffer one jot.
There’s really 2 issues here:
- Is it acceptable for video game companies to make most of their money through DLC.
- Is it acceptable for video game companies to issue DLC that requires players to spend money for a chance to gain a significant advantage in a primarily multiplayer game.
Even if you consider 1 to be okay I don’t see how 2 is.
That’s true on the surface and assuming a rational customer. In reality, game companies make heavy use of psychological tricks and manipulation (incremental cost increases, sunk cost dilemmas, dopamine from scientifically timed ‘wins’, player envy, etc) to get you to pay up and keep paying. Which is part of why so many are using a microtransaction model – customers wind up paying far more than they expected to or planned and certainly more than the game appeared to cost when they started.
My solution is simple. I don’t play games that require multiplayer and lots of microtransactions. (Even before it was official, it was a bad sign for Mass Effect Andromeda when the only things available to purchase was for the bolted-on multiplayer.) If it has a multiplayer component, I might play it, but I don’t pay extra.
Now, I don’t really mind the idea of DLC. I remember the days of expansion packs that could cost half as much or more of the base game. But it had better be something more than new cosmetics or weapons or I won’t purchase. The new X-Com series is the closest I can think of to that old expansion pack model in the last few years.
Personally, I’m still trying to ascend in NetHack for the first time. That alone could probably last me a couple more decades.
the “$60” myth was dunked a while ago,The Sixty Dollar Myth (The Jimquisition) - YouTube
It’s so masochistic,it’s like,you just pretend to actually hate stuff like this,but in reality,you LOVE when they rip you off and want to force it upon other.Pfft,it make me mad to see how masochist are ruining everything!
That’s what Budget Player Cadet is advocating in the OP: Hopes that Battlefront II fails due to people saying “This is bullshit” but isn’t terribly optimistic that it will happen.
additionally(since i can’t edit for some reason)game are not “that” expensive to make.Hire mentally sane developer,don’t hire madman.Most game developer are sicko with gigantic ego nowaday…just go listen to them when they stream/see how they reply on steam forum/see all the horror story and proof on youtube!/go check the steam curator shitlist and itsshit.It’s so crazy,they have no moral/ethic,they only care about lying to you and hiting you in the back until you start to like it,the sadist!
Let’s face it, companies sell this kind of thing because people buy this kind of thing.
Jim forgot to add to his list that game developers no longer need to publish physical copies and absorb the cost of printing boxes and disks and shipping them all over the world in substantial quantities.
Further, long gone are the days of really nice manuals and other goodies in the box. I recall massive manuals, cloth maps and other cool stuff. I loved just reading the backstory stuff in the manuals. That’s all gone now. Perhaps they’ll give it to you in a PDF if you pay extra. Just not the same.
In the end this is it.
They would not do it if they didn’t make money doing it. I have only seen a few cases where the gaming community successfully pushed back. Most of the time they make a lot of money doing this.
I partly blame it on kids who are spending their parent’s money for this stuff. The calculation changes a lot when you have a limited budget and need to be careful what you spend it on having to worry about things like food and the rent/mortgage. Of course adults buy this stuff too.
In the end it always comes down to whether the game is good or not. It’s easy to boycott a shitty game nobody is playing, but if all your friends are playing Battlefront 2 and having fun you are a lot more likely to cave.
Here’s how I look at it, as a gamer and consumer…
If a developer/publisher creates a game that’s a rip-off and makes tons of cash from rubes who spend hundreds to thousands of dollars in microtransactions for Game A, then that money allows them to make Game B which doesn’t have that problem. I avoid Game A and enjoy Game B.
If they only make games that are a rip-off, then I buy none of their games.
Really, unless the entire industry gives up making Game Bs because they don’t make profits like Game As, then I have no reason to be concerned. And I still see lots of Game Bs so all is well.
I’m a ridiculous Star Wars fan but neither Battlefront has any interest to me; I hate PvP-only games which have no real “content” except running around ganking and getting ganked. Like Overwatch. You can make it as pretty as you want but if I’m playing a game that has entertainment value dependent on the actions of random idiots on the internet then I’m not wasting my time. I like the occasional PvP match for variety in my games but if that’s all there is it feels like having a salad bar with nothing but croutons in it. Give me well-written stories and innovative challenges, not just random deathmatches and flag captures.
If a company makes a bajillion dollars from Game A with microtransactions, why on earth would they NOT include the same microtransactions in Game B?
The industry is moving towards this model, not away from it.
I don’t think that model is indefinitely sustainable. The “rubes” as I call them are not inexhaustible. If the market gets flooded by Game As we’ll hit another video game crash like the early 80s and the death of Atari.
I don’t think it’ll get that far though. I think for every rip-off that makes money you have a bunch that don’t. I believe quality is going to have more chance for success than flash. And indy developers love making high-value innovative games. If nothing else, you’re going to always have those people who want to make the next cool, interesting game. And these days those developers have platforms to get those games out to people. It’s easier now than ever.
This just isn’t how it works, though. Instead, they make big-name game A with predatory practice X, just tuned down a bit. Then, when people grumble but still buy it, then make big-name game B with predatory practice X turned up a little bit more. Loot boxes in full-priced games were never a good thing (Jim Sterling, prescient as ever) due to the way they function as psychological manipulation, much in the same way gambling does. But now that we’ve been warmed up to the idea, they’re pushing it harder, in more and more games. They’re not just going to say, “Okay, this was super profitable last time, but kind of predatory, so let’s skip it on the next title”, they’re going to double down on it.
It doesn’t have to be. It just has to work long enough for the current CEO to cash out.
…A grand on Marvel Heroes.
You’re not the average gamer. You’re a whale. I don’t mean that as a criticism of your personality or anything, it’s just that I’d keep that in mind in these discussions - your experience is not the norm.
I bought the last Battlefront sight unseen and regretted it the first day I played. Very pretty, but no depth at all. I won’t be buying BF2 unless it has great reviews.