I do miss CD/DVD distribution and I hope that never dies. DLC doesn't bother me. But complacency is how the companies win.
(...)
If current trends continue in gaming, and I hate to be pessimistic, I think we'll eventually head towards another video game crash with the giants (except Microsoft) falling and the Indie game companies emerging to fill the void and start everything over again. And if these new giants please the people, they will stay alive.
I agree regarding CD/DVD distribution. It might just be me, call eb old fashioned, but I prefer to have my software around on a disc (data carrier), so that I know that no matter what I do, whether I uninstall a game, format a drive, format an entire computer and reinstall the OS or move to a new computer all togehter, I can still install the software I have laying around, install any extentions, patch it and enjoy the product. Simple and effective.
Let me turn on the computer, insert disc, install, play. Even if I'm in the middle of nowhere and only have some discs around (and perhaps some data carrier to manually patch).
Quote:
Originally Posted by gravy666
EA stopped being an empire years ago. In the only video game boycott that worked, gamers protested EA because they were planning to release DLC weapons for Battlefield: Bad Company for a price. EA listened, still managed to turn it into a marketing opportunity for a bit, and the game paved the way for Battlefield 1943 and Bad Company 2. EA eventually released the codes for four of the five guns, leaving the last one exclusive to veterans of the Battlefield series. Everyone wins.
I think the last EA game I bought was Battlefield 2. And since then I only bought a handfull of other games (NWN2 and expantions) or borrowed used games from friends or family (Bioshock and such). I'm quite picky I guess when it comes to games, I buy one and hopefully enjoy it for many many hours. Actually I only bought BF2 so I could play the WW2 "Forgotten Hope 2" mod for it.
I remember reading something about a boosterpack for BF2 (which you had to download?), though indrectly, via the FH2 forum discussions, didn't give a crap about BF2 or the follow up games. I'm not entirely sure what was in those boosterpacks, how much it extended the gameor how much it costed. The idea behind it is sorta fine I guess... it simply being the same as a good old expectantion though probably a bit smaller and also a bit cheaper (I'd still prefer everything on a disc, that's just me, or atleast download an installer file and store burn that to a CD or store it on some data carrier). Though apparantly they added those boostrpacks to the latest BF2 patch (they didn't patch the game in a year or two? Awesome customer support man!) as not that many people bought and played them online. But for SP or when well intergrated into excisting MP games it could work out just fine I suppose. IF the fee is fair and stands into a reasonable relation to the development cost and content gained.
Hence why I would still prefer to include minor addons in patches, and for serious addons, simply spent some proper time on them and release them on a disc.
But I also suppose that DCL, when tied to an account and such, could help a bit to promote people to buy the official game (ea give us your CD key to verify you owna valid copy and may use our surfaces such as addons. But even that could be cracked I'd figure so people could still use the DLC for both legal and illegal copies of a game and avoid paying incase the DLC comes as a price. Unless you would add some more security such as requiring people to register and login whenever they wish to play the game, but that limits liberties (ie "I'm without internet here, let my install & play please...").
DLC just needs to be substantial enough to be worth the money. Buying a new hat or some shit for a buck is just not worth it at all. But, for instance, some of the DLC for Fallout 3 has definitely been worth 5 bucks or so. High quality, new areas, new weapons and armor, a good story, and so on.
If developers charge a reasonable amount of money for their product I don't see the issue with it.
DLC just needs to be substantial enough to be worth the money. Buying a new hat or some shit for a buck is just not worth it at all. ...
I think Microsoft charges for clothing for your avatar. They also charge for backgrounds and even to change your nick. Other than the nick thing, I can't hold that against them because I don't know if Sony or Nintendo do the same for their avatars.
I've never had to deal with DLC before, but now with an XBOX on the horizon, it seems like a pain in the butt. DLC is cool and is a nice way to get updates and additional content, but the prices attached to the additional content is usually way too much. The main game I'm looking forward to is Forza 3, which has additional cars and tracks come through via DLC that you have to pay for. If those came through without a charge, it would be great, but almost too great to be true.
DLC is just a way for the game developers to make more money and to continue to put out games that are unfinished, because things can just be added or fixed later.
Well DLC is a way of life. Lets look at Rock band they can't put out Free DLC because the Artist that made the music would sue the hell out of then for not giving them royalties. Also would you want to work on DLC and then find out it Free? So lets say you made a level it's 3-4 hours long took you 84 hours to make and perfect and then find out it's free would that not grind your gears?
So lets say you made a level it's 3-4 hours long took you 84 hours to make and perfect and then find out it's free would that not grind your gears?
You mean as a developer? Aslong as you'd be payed your wages you wouldn't care I bet. Hell, if you'd release it for free (intergrated into a patch, downloadable content or other) you could even be quite happy as it could boost the relation/band between the developers and the community. Just look at mods and how "close" the devs and fans/community often are.
Ofcourse it's all one big tradeoff, you can't work for free so while you can do some work for "free" (ie live of the money made from the orginal game) for the sake of patches and tweaking, at some point you'll have to charge the public. But then you can decide to just get the whole team to make a large add-on and release that as for example an extention/expantion via disc or download (for a certain fee). Or offer many small tweaks/content and charge for that.
From the players side this makes it more complex though, many seperate downloads would mean the player would have to download them one by one, it could also introduce compatibilty issues between some content and if the DLC comes at a fee, all the seperate content bought by the player could be very very expensive and be totally unreasonable and unbalanced compared to the price you'd expect if everything was released in one large bundle (expantion -pack).
For example: If you'd charge 50 cents to a dollar for every piece of gear, and would have 200 pieces of gear that would already mean (200x0,50=) 100 dollars/euros to 200 dollars/euros! while the same amount as part of an expantion CD would be, say 30 bucks. Each item would have to be less then a cent each (if we assume a good old expantion pack with new levels, quests, items, spells for 30-40 dollars), and that is not likely to happen I think....
Last edited by Admiral Donutz; November 28th, 2009 at 04:34 PM.
What's the difference between an expansion pack and DLC? I mean theres no particular reason that an expansion pack would be high quality and worth the money while DLC wouldn't. In some cases I'd rather have the DLC as is because they are shorter and so are produced more frequently and you can pick and choose what you want to buy and thus spend less money.
The only problem with DLC is companies tend to over charge. There is a lot of DLC in the 10 dollar price range that is really only worth 1 or 2 dollars. It's hardly inherent to DLC though, even full games usually aren't worth the full price. Modern Warfare 2 sure as hell isn't worth 60 bucks.
DLC is generally much smaller than a full blown expansion. Actually, I guess that depends on how you use it. Fallout 3 DLC was no where near the size or time an expansion would give, but all together they are pretty hefty. Same could be said for the GTA4 DLC.
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Re: Downloadable Content 
Each item would have to be less then a cent each (if we assume a good old expantion pack with new levels, quests, items, spells for 30-40 dollars), and that is not likely to happen I think.... 
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