VIDEO Shadow of War: Microtransactions/Promo-Deals/Shady Charity

I'm kinda here too with the enjoyment being in the orcs and less so on the sieges. They tend to get pretty chaotic and messy, but I do like the personalities taking part in them. The grind part is something I've been experiencing lately, because I'm finding that my orcs in the first areas are not too high level, but their enemies are, so they need to rank up in a serious way. Only this isn't too easy when you control the area and can only really focus on one at a time.

I just bought 10 of those lootboxes you get with the in-game currency, because I was going to suggest that I'm not experiencing a real need or even a particular drive towards them (relating to Chewgumma's post above), but I noticed that the orcs I got from the boxes were all within 5 levels of my character at most. I'm level 46, and the lowest orcs that I got were 41. This would mean that the boxes are a really fast way to get way higher level followers to either replace the lower level ones or to be used as their victims, either way the levels will come. I didn't pay attention to that with earlier lootboxes, but those 10 were pretty enlightening. That said, the in-game currency seems to flow in nicely and the boxes don't strike me as terribly expensive either, so I'm still not too concerned about them.

...and I pick my orcs based on their looks, personality and name anyway, so I don't mind putting some work in some of them.

 

Ok, finally reached Act IV, the 'grinding' section. Still don't really need loot boxes, and I'm quite enjoying the challenge.

Getting high level followers isn't too tricky (though I do like how your initially high-level orcs get outclassed by this point in the game, meaning you're naturally more susceptible to attack, it feels quite natural), and the sieges aren't too difficult if you're decent at the combat.

Not sure how much longer it's supposed to last, I'm on the 4th siege, and there aren't any more regions to be besieged.

 

Well, I've finally finished SoW, 100% completion (not counting some trophies).

I liked it all in all. The Shadow War section was a bit overlong, but it rested on the solid gameplay foundations, and hey, I enjoyed the way it extended the game longer than the main story. I had fun with it, so it didn't feel grindy.

The ending was quite nice, did feel a little bit rushed though about the fate of the main character. It ends on a very touching note though.

And I didn't need to spend a single extra penny to win. The Loot boxes are wholly unnecessary, Orc followers and weapons and armour can be acquired easily in-game, and as long as you have some proficiency with the combat, no struggle is unfairly challenging. I thought that Act IV was quite well balanced all things considered.

And if you don't want to bother with all the forts sieges and re-captures, here's the ending, you can watch it immediately after playing Act III (and I'd argue it would fit better straight then):


Boom, just saved you all a couple of hours of the game.

I'm looking forward to the Eltariel DLC, which will likely flesh out her aspects of the ending a bit more.

I can also predict exactly where the DLC will be taking place, before it's even announced. As I finished Act III, an appendix entry popped up for the region of Lithlad, a desert area in the south of Nurn. As Lithlad is not visitable in the base game, this raised a bit of flag with me. The only other appendix locations not in this game were from the first game. Additonally, there's a large area on the world map, coloured red (unlike other similarly un-visitable areas, which are black). This area matched perfectly with the location describes in the appendices.

So yeah, Lithlad ho!

 

Well, I called it, DLC set for Lithlad:

 

So, is Star Wars Battlefront II the likely case where all these issues combine to form one almighty PR mess? One big enough to force a change of direction?

 

I doubt it. The Internet magnifies these sort of issues, but it's not a sustainable outrage. This practice will continue until either legislation goes forward to stop the practice, or we reach a head and have a colossal flop due to it. If we get through another week and BFII runs way below projected sales, then we'll see.

 

I'm wondering if the hit will be delayed to future games, so consumers get burnt on this current lot, the companies repeat the practice, thinking they are onto a winner but then don't get the sales expected.

 

Finally put some hours into this and HOLY **** IT'S FUN. Haven't gotten to any grindy parts yet but so far it's all the rampaging I remember from the first one with some cool additions (and my god is it beautiful at times).

Wicked-belated thanks for the reviews!

 

So here we are, six months later and two of the dodgiest triple A games in recent memory have now both performed the same U-turn.

• EA announced a week or two back that it was moving to cosmetic-only microtransactions.
• Now, Monolith have announced all the loot box progression of Shadow of War is to also go.

It's quite remarkable but utterly welcome for me.

 

Well, this whole area exploded once more:

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...estigation-in-belgium-due-to-fifas-loot-boxes

EA could be prosecuted for refusing to comply with Belgian law on loot boxes.

 

EA thinks that the profit they can make from Lootboxes is worth whatever fee they could be slapped with. And that says something about how much of a cash cow this stuff is.

 

Well, that profit, or more accurately income is apparently $3bn! Accounting for 67% of EA's income.

Well, those are the figures linked to this story - both are stunning.

 

I'm not surprised it's so much but only because there were always so many rumblings about just how big the FIFA microtransaction market is. I guess now we know for sure.

 

At least Shadow of War has actually patched out all of it's microtransactions, which were barely affecting the gameplay to start with. They've also reduced the 'grind' of Act IV, cutting it's length to a quarter of the pre-patch version.

 

Word on the internet is the endgame is actually way better now because of said grind reduction, which is kind of a massive argument against the original implementation being anything other than naked exploitation.

 

I mean, if they had to rebalance it so drastically as to cut it's length by 3/4ths, then that kind of gives the game away.

 

I played both endings. I enjoyed both endings.

Truth is I still 'grind' occasionally on the Endless siege mode. Honestly, the original version was fine too. If you enjoyed the gameplay loop, it was perfectly enjoyable.

Edit: Also the microtransactions were almost completely extraneous, even to the grind. Half the point of the game was recruiting your own Orcs, paying to skip that was pointless.

It's not like this was the only game to do this. AC Origins had even more obvious loot boxes, where it was impossible to get all the skins, weapons, and mounts without investing money.

 

If they were really that unnecessary, then why were they added, and why was the game so extensively rebalanced when they were removed?

 

It wasn't rebalanced much. The content's all the same, other than a few minor loot rewards, it was just made optional to continue the sieges, instead of mandatory. The transactions meant you skipped most of the point of the game, so they were never very appealing.

The microtransactions were always ignorable from day one, separated off into their own menu and never forced at any point. Unlike in Origins for example, which has it's own in-game daily loot box mission system, where I constantly got the same useless sceptres, and paywalls for unique cosmetics and weapons. AC Unity had a similar deal back in 2014. And they haven't been patched out, and likely never will be.

If you like the gameplay of SoW, then the 'grind' was never grindy to begin with, it was just more of the gameplay really.

 

I pre ordered the gold edition last year but haven’t touched it other then to download the DLC, kinda glad I did now sounds a lot better.

 

@MarcusP2 , @heels1785

It'd be fair if the title can be changed to make this a general loot box / microtransactions / dodgy corporate gaming stuff thread, as Shadow of War is no longer guilty, but it has replacements!