The rising trend of charging for DLC you have already

Most of those exclusive items aren't that important. My PC version of DA doesn't have any of the bells and whistles of the pre-orders or Deluxe Edition, but it's not as if I miss any of it. And with mods it's all irrelevant anyway!

Yes, we're quite lucky companies like Blizzard and Valve still exist. Sure, it mostly benefits the PC crowd, but that's where all the best games are.

 

I'm not a lawyer, but I do know that the whole "Software is licensed, not sold" shtick in EULAs is not necessarily legally binding according to the case law. That being said, if someone can find a legal case that overturns that one, I will admit my error.

Edit: My bad, it was overturned on appeal.

 

Piracy doesn't exist in a vacuum, sure there are a small number of people who will try and pirate everything they can, but they are in a small minority. They can pirate all they want, but if people get some value for money they won't play them.

Games like FU2 with its shady dlc ENCOURAGE piracy. Expecting people to pay $60 for a 4 hour game isn't a great business strategy. So now to "combat" piracy Lucasarts are making games that are finished in less time then it took you to earn the money to buy them, for many people anyway.

And don't blame me for that opinion, Lucasarts are making the poor games. I wouldn't particate in piracy in any way.

So lets talk about your "eventual collapse of the gaming industry" idea, and take it in Lucasarts example only.

What would preferable?
Lucasarts closes now or Lucasarts stays open for five more years and continues is trend of making short shabby games? With shabby DLC. Full price with a huge profit.

I love star wars games, but GOOD ones, not shaddy cash-ins like Republic Heroes and FU2.

I think one idea would help the gaming industry:

LET ANY GAME EVER MADE BE DOWNLOADABLE OR PLAYABLE ON ANY CONSOLES OR PC THAT CAN HANDLE THEM. WITH A FEE FOR EACH GAME.

Naturally this is based on:
- The game being playable on the platform.
- Being realistic that games may need to be converted and take time.

Seriously, another thing killing the gaming industry is franchises stuck to a single platform and legal issues or greed issues allowing games not to be sold on certain platforms, or certain countries. And allowing discontinued games to fade away when pirates can still provide them online.

Yeah i know there's holes in the above, but at least its an idea

 

Umm. Not even touching the subject of piracy, but as for the rest ...

(1) They already do as many console ports as is feasible. We've come a long way from the days when PS games were PS games, XBox games were XBox games, and never the twain shall meet. But console ports are expensive, and time-consuming, and potentially disastrous especially when you do a really bad PC-to-console port (or vice versa) and the UI ends up needing a redesign from the ground up. Or when you outsource the port to another game developer and they do a really shoddy job, like the Guitar Hero PC versions.

And you can already get old games for fairly cheap from places like Good Old Games. Even older stuff sometimes ends up on Abandonia.

(2) They can't "get rid of the second hand market" any more than book publishers can get rid of second hand bookstores or libraries.

(3) I in fact think that gamer expectations have gotten a bit ridiculous over the years. OK, yes, $60 for a 4-hour game isn't very good value for money - but Dragon Age: Origins also cost $60 and it's provided me with over 80 hours of entertainment. Civilization 5, over 50 hours. Starcraft II, "only" about 20, but that's because I never really hit the multiplayer scene. And I haven't even fully 'finished' playing any of those games - there's still content I haven't seen in DA, I haven't played all the civilizations in Civ, and I've barely scratched the surface of SC2, really. Compared to other forms of entertainment (movies, clubbing, etc) gaming is cheap to begin with.

 

Good points DarthXan318!!!

 

I think I posted this earlier or elsewhere, but you MAY finish Reach in six hours alone on its easiest setting. It can be a longer experience playing on harder settings, alone or with friends (my solo Legendary run clocked at about 10 hours but I'm only an average player). But considering all the extras and MP, it is a solid game throughout and well worth the $60+ you may invest in it. The collector editions are, IMO, only for the most die hard of Halo fans.

The Modern Warfare 2 campaign was criminally short in comparison, and MW1 WAS short. Now you may argue you may get a longer campaign by playing it on Veteran, but as far as I'm concerned that's an exercise in sadomasochism and the fun factor quickly dissipates if you had previously run through it on Normal. Considering how messed up the MP turned out to be, it was so not worth the money I plunked down on it, though I guess I'm in a very silent minority considering how popular it still is.

 

I'm pretty sure this is not a change and has existed as long as personal computers have. All software is like this.

 

Hey Zac, I'd love to see Activision come to my house and try to take-back my disc, that I apparently don't own.

As for whether I was joshing or not? The answer is Dead-serious.
But, only for the ripping of LA's shady, hidden, pre-loaded DLC files, everyone else is free to hide/charge anyway they see fit. I know they are in business to make money and last I checked... FU sold 7 million copies. They made plenty. So when it comes to LA and its business practices, I hope every geek on the planet (with the proper know-how) takes their best shot at unlocking them for all. To be perfectly clear, I'm not "pro-hack", except for anything and everything the LA does with regards to hidden preloads for their latest super short SW game.

And yes, it should come as no surprise that I've been permanently banned from LA's forums for calling their MODs and VIPs liars, when they were NOT telling the truth.

 

Yep, same goes for music and movies. That's why so many people go to court for sharing them online.

 

Yes, exactly. But you can still buy second-hand DVDs and CDs.

Some devs have managed to circumvent the second-hand market, like (I assume) how Fallout: New Vegas uses Steam for validation. Or like how Starcraft II demands you create and link it to a Battle.net account. But there are always ways around this - you could create an entirely new Steam account and link it to F:NV and then sell it altogether, and so on.


And I dunno, that a good chunk of a future DLC ends up on the disc doesn't mean it's complete. Most of the time that's because the devs run out of time before release.

It's more to do with the back-end programming than graphics. It's like ... umm ... I'm a programmer so my perspective is a bit different, but it's a bit like how some programs are Windows-only, or Mac-only - because making it cross-platform would be a matter of rebuilding it entirely, and that's expensive in developer hours. (And yes, the analogy breaks down because nowadays there are things like Java that are cross-platform, but Java itself had to be specifically built to run on both OSs.)

 

I'd say that's the reason behind most DLC that's already on the disc. Developers are constantly squeezed for time, so they included half-finished content and fix it up post-release when they've got more time to spare. Of course that doesn't mean they have to charge for it, but they will anyway.

 

Speaking of Mass Effect 2, I think most or all of the DLC will be included with the PS3 version when its released, so that sort of counts as free. Except for it being a full $60 (I think?), when the 360 version is substantially less by now (I think?). Then again, these days I'm seeing a lot of "Game of the Year" editions, which basically boil down to the game+DLC, released about a year or so after the original game. Although I hope when ME2 comes out that its all on the disc and doesn't just mean it comes with a code that'll allow you to download it later, but who knows these days.

 

Thats strange, when I got VHS tapes as a kid and the legal speak was less then it was now. All I ever got was warnings not to illegal show the movie in public, schools, etc.

Its yours for personal use only.

But thats different to saying you have a "license" to it.

Legal speak aside, dealing with just common sense here, if you can destroy something without getting arresting, its because you own it.

 

It was certainly an issue when VHS and cassette recorders became popular, but it's only become a big issue now because we have the capacity to share with millions of people all over the world.

And yes, of course you own the physical media you buy. We're talking about the rights to the intellectual content, not the plastic medium.

 

Oh, man that made me laugh out loud. And hard.

 

Yup. Deadlines for game developers are a killer. I have a friend who used to work for EA. He worked on the Godfather II game and a few others that I can't remember right now. Anyway, he told me once that in order to get the games on store shelves the release dates have to be determined months ahead of time in order to get things like packaging, shipping, and store orders in order. This often means that some executive who does not work on the game at all has to make the decision on when they think it will be done and plan accordingly. Unfortunately, games are rarely finished on time but they have to be printed and shipped in order to meet the orders that stores have so they can sell it to you on the advertised release date.

What if they had delayed the release of Black Ops three weeks to fix bugs and maybe add a few more multiplayer maps? After months of advertising Nov 9, the gaming community would **** a brick if they had to wait until December! People would blame the stores for not having the game as advertised and the store would turn around and blame Activision. They would wind up taking more flak from fans for a delayed game than for an unfinished one. I don't agree with this policy but it is what it is. If anything, game developers and publishers should set more realistic deadlines.

It gets even worse when you have a separate publisher looking over the shoulder of the actual developer. KoToR II was 25% incomplete when it shipped. Obsidian had to cut an entire planet from the game and leae us with a god-awful, abrupt ending because LucasArts wanted KoToR in stores in time for Christmas rather than wait for it to be done.

That's why games often end up being incomplete when they have to start mass producing copies of the game. The unfinished material on the disc eventually becomes DLC. They're actually trying to save people download time by leaving what they can on the disc. Some companies like Blizzard and Valve can get away with "when it's done" because they are known for producing best-selling, highest quality games.

 

The best example of "done when it's done" is Gran Turismo 5.

 

Oh you wouldn't believe the backlash I got that Tuesday... I work in retail and got chewed out several times by people looking for GT5 (we had it in Ad, front page), and I had to print out a "Sorry, Sony delayed it again and we don't know the new release date" sign. They don't care if the game isn't done, they want it now!

 

I think you've summarised what we're talking about here quite well!!!
KOTOR 2 was a bit painful alright. It had none of the heart and class of KOTOR.

You're completely right about the DLC, remember were talking about two types of DLC:
- DLC included with great games, perhaps to save download time, perhaps because of deadlines. But on a worthwhile steady product.
- DLC added to short games that lack content, sold for full price anyway, like FU2.

Now if its a case of "whatever's developed" is on the disk and more will be downloaded later as DLC, then I can accept that.
But if its just downloading an "unlock" key than thats a bit tough to take.
But just downloading an unlock key on a game thats far too short anyway, is a bad joke at our expense.

I remember where Lucasarts used to innovate, TIE fighter was astounding in its day.
Jedi Knight allowed players to shoot and slash with a sword, with a great story.
Rogue Squadron showed that land based fighter games could work well.
Even Empire at War won awards for gaming before it was released.

But these last few years all Lucasarts excel in is "ripping people off".
Only now they've moved to BLATANTLY ripping people off.

 

QFT.
EndofDiscussion.

 

Indeed. So kids, just don't go gaga anymore everytime a new SW game is announced. Vegas odds say that from now on, everything from LA is gonna be turd on a CD.

 

Speaking of turds.... I'm so glad I didn't get an expensive one when I bought the FU-U.S.E. for my PS3. $10 is all I paid the second time around. Sadly, my 360 experience was WAY more costly.

EDIT:
Spelinng

 

Actually, it would be Duke Nukem Forever. That game is legendary for it's 13 year development cycle. It practically invented the "When it's done."

I'd have to echo the others. I don't mind DLC, but not as padding to fill out a short $60 game. That's when I think, "I'll pass."

 

You know, I picked up TFU 2 thinking it would make me forget about how mediocre the first game was, but after being disappointed by the sequel as well I'm not sure I want to go back for some DLC that will only add maybe an hour or two to a game I finished in 5 hours. *Sigh*

 

And HERE is the announcement for the DLC.
Thats already on the disk!!!

A new skin will cost $1.
Who knows how much this level will cost.

FU2 Lucasarts !!!

DLC Unleashed!!!