Downloadable Content
 

I'm making a seperate, dedicated thread to discuss DLC here rather then in the DragonAge thread (here):

I just watched my brother play the game for a bit, he showed me a guy with a DLC mission and how it frustratede him when he found out he would have to pay (after making an account and all that). I quite agree, downloading content is weird enough (just include some stuff in patches or expantion sets) but having to pay for it is even worse. It has "money hungry bastards" (EA) written all over it.

Since I don't know anything about DLC (I am a PC gamer) I did a quick google to understand what DLC is all about. Wiki explained how paying for DLC through "points" was introduced by MS (what a suprise.. :rolleyes: ), and how you can buy fixed packages of points such as 100 or 500 points. Sounds like a rip off if when you can't just buy the exact amount of points you need, it makes it more tricky to determine the price for the content and I find it a sign of pure capitalist greed to begin with. *spits on EA and MS* . The hell with DLC.

I much prefer thegood old "extra missions and gear through patches, expantions and collectors items editions" such as the extra options available for those that bought NWN2 collectors edition (and could laster on also be downloaded of the internet, for free, for everyone else).

So this DLC stuff looks to be a bit of a stain to me. :( I just ain't too font of the idea of DLC (for money/points). Bleh.

To sum up the advantages that I can think of:
- It potenially allows the developers to keep supporting a game after it's release with "bonuses" that are too large to release as part of usual patches, yet are too small to release as part of an official extention.
- This extra income can be used to offer better/more services to the customers

To sum up the disadvantages that I can think of:
- The risk of patches being release just to visit tecnical issues and not to improve or extend gameplay a bit (ie polishing the game experience)
- DLC may be the death of "community care", being a kind developer that gives out small extra's at no charge. showing how much the developers cares/loves both their product and the people who play/bought the game.
- Hindering or even outright preventing community releases: custom content made by people in the community such as custom maps, missions, items and such by the peoplel for the people. At no charge. Again under the banner of "I hope you like the game as much as I do". Since if you'd allow mods or "even' support them people would be less inclined to buy for such additional content.
- Cashcow: Try to suck every dollar/euro/yen out of your customers, putting profit above customer care, introducing a cooling in relations with the public and so on (just look how many people feel about EA and MS...). In the long run people might even become to dislike, hate or distrust you. Which could mean you loose (once loyal) customers.

Compare it to the customer who still goes to the shop around the small shop around the corner. Where the owner knows most of his/her costumers and doesn't seem to hold on to every cent. The relaxed atmosphere, putting service above profit. Were the customer feels like the owner will do his/her best to be of service and won't rip you off or see you as a walking bag of money. No BS about "sorry but your warrant expired yesterday" or "technically this isn't covered by our service/warranty/whatever but let's not mkae a fuss about this". Where the customer and the owner feel a bond of some sort. A bond that neither party sees to be broken and keeps up be continuing to shop there. Which is in the interest of both parties ofcourse as both profit from this.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

You summed that up really well, I agree to the note that DLC ain't all that.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

This is just a new form of an old trick used by game developers to make some additional money.
Most of the resources involved in creating a videogames are related to the game's various engines. Creating content for such an engine (additional quests, weapons etc.) is rather easy in most cases. It is in fact so easy that players create additional content themselves in form of mods, even if they don't have access to the tools used for creating such content.

Back before the days of e-commernce developers either used the same engine with a different story to sell a new game or to ship an expansion. In both cases it was easy to notice just how much effort went into it though.
Nowadays additional content can be delivered in smaller and smaller packages up to the point where the money you pay doesn't really have much of a relation to the work that went into it. If you pay 5 dollars/euros for DLC today the costs behind that are probably mostly related to the delivery method of the DLC rather than the content.

I think DLC will become very popular for developers since there are enough drones out there who will gladly spend money for everything bearing the official logo of their favorite company (just as it is in most other markets).

Re: Downloadable Content
 

I guess they'd have to rely on the "drones" that don't wonder if the price is in any relation to the production costs.

I myself would question say a 5 euro fee for one hour of gameplay or one euro for a new item. I'd wonder what the cost would be for the time spent on developing that item and how much a fair charge would be to charge every customer. That item, made in say a day (and very likey much less) would be bought by hundreds, probably thousands of clients, the actual cost would be very small. I'd could get away with paying a few cents and they might still make a very small profit.

Add that to the effort it requires (accounts, making the purchase, what to do when you reinstall the game and so on simply puts me off. I rather wait for a nice expantion on a CD/DVD that pay for once and can install and deinstall as much as I want. Install the game, install the 1-2 expantions, download the patches and play... no trouble with having to download a ton of small "updates" one by one and such on. Ugh.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

I do miss CD/DVD distribution and I hope that never dies. DLC doesn't bother me. But complacency is how the companies win.

I wished that as well as paying for X-Box live time. You can buy it over the X-Box, but I'm not sure if it's pre-set time. Also, a think I hate about subscription time is that it runs even when you're not playing online or at all. Makes it a waste of money for those who don't have much time to play online.

I used to think the Live fees were in support of servers, but with IW going the same route and learning that it runs on someone else's machine, I'm questioning that now.

Also, Sony uses actual money and not points or another currency for their products. I don't know if the Wiki mentioned that. I also like how MS is fueling the console wars by tacking their logo on the end of multi-platform gaming commercials.

Also, I think Microsoft does include handling fees in their DLC prices. This is probably why the last L4D DLC was free on PC but not the 360.

Overall, I think DLC charges are to pay the companies for the work they did on these maps. I may be wrong. Charged DLC did start with consoles, so maybe they moved it over to the PC.

Also I do love how IW blatently screwed PC owners over. I don't know if the game is any different, but Mr. Bowling didn't care. His interview w/ Best Buy showed that. "PC game will have keyboard and mouse support." Don't all PC games have that? "Adjustible graphics." Don't all PC games have that? It's bad that IW took the CoD series, their only series, that was rooted in the PC and was focused on having a great story and SP game to something obviously geared to console multiplayer with a short tacked-on SP campaign, which I heard was only 5 hours long and that is inexcusable. For all of the hype put into this game, they should have made the SP at least twice that. To be honest, though, I haven't played MW2 so I don't know if it is good for the time. A lot say it is, but those reviewers are accused of being bribed, and the story with Activision and IGN supports that. All I know is that actual player reviews, especially on IW Net, are mixed.

But hype is what sells games, no matter how shitty they are, and companies get away with this because hype sells the games before anyone realizes how good or bad they really are.

The worst thing of all, again, is complacency. This is why these companies get away with this shit. It's the same reason why US politics suck. There are too few people that will actually do something to stand up against these companies, and thus are negligible against those that are pissed off by the tactics pulled off by the companies, but shrug their shoulders and buy it anyway mainly because they want the game. Fortunately and unfortunately, these companies are running out of ideas. For me, it seems like the games coming out recently have a similar formula based on their genre. This means that everyone will start becoming complacent to these games and start buying less from those companies unless one of them actually delivers something good. This also means that we're going to see less and less interesting snd innovative games though, so it's lose-lose.

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

For someone who doesn't know about DLC and did some research, you hit the nail on the head to hard to spiked through the earth and came out the other side.

I see it this way: there is good DLC and bad DLC. Good DLC can be seen in a game like Fallout 3. Now, I didn't like Fallout 3, but they way it was supported by it's DLC to extend the games life much farther than originally intended was fantastic. It was a true effort to give worthwhile DLC to people who enjoyed the game. Bad DLC is horse armor (from Oblivion on 360). That is just a complete waste of money to anyone who buys it and shows no effort from the developer trying to use DLC as a benefit to the people who play the game.

Now, as far as DLC is concerning Dragon Age, that is good DLC. It extends the games life a bit, enhances the game, and supplies one of the most hilarious characters ever (Shale is awesome). I don't mind paying for Dragon Age DLC because it holds the same high standards as BioWare's full games.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

They stopped making "cookie cutter" games (games that use proven gameplay mechanics and are essentially reiterations of stuff you've already played before) not so long ago either. Tried stuff like Dead Space and Mirror's Edge, but after all the complaining no one actually bought them. Right now the Burnout guys are working on a new Need for Speed.

They keep making some DLC cost money, like Madden NFL 10's DLC, because they know that people are going to pay money for what are essentially cheat codes.

Obviously some games have DLC for extra content, such is the case with the Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter series- those had several co-op mission packs. Meanwhile other stuff is an obvious cash-in, such as Oblivion's... horse... armor...

Usually the bigger the publisher, the more overpriced the DLC is. But it also depends on the distributor- for example, Valve wants to release some PC mods to the Xbox 360, but Microsoft wants to make sure that MS can make a profit out of it.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

Uh, Dead Space sold very well, to the point where they are announcing a new one December 22. Both games sold over 1m in '08. While it's not a winner in EA's eyes, that's not bad for two new IP's.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

Well that's the thing, because those IPs and some other recent titles did not do nearly as well as they should have, EA has had to lay off people like crazy. In case you haven't heard, they recently shut down Pandemic Studios (killing off all hopes for a Star Wars Battlefront 3). They are also are planning to lay off a total of 1,500 workers by April 2010.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

I agree that paying for DLC is total BS, unless its an actual expansion (Shivering Isles from Oblivion). Game developers like Naughty Dog who release content for free make me happy.

You want to know who is really money hungry? Capcom. The Resident Evil 5 DLC came with the game, but you had to pay to unlock, all you did was download a file which unlocked it, and it wasn't even worth it in many peoples eyes.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

No. Capcom is not that terrible of a company.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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). :)

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. =p

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...").

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

I said money hungry, not terrible.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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?

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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. :uhm: 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....

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

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.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

Nowadays there isn't, but when you had only the option of selling your expansion packs in shops you had higher production costs and more of a risk. If a particular DLC isn't succesful noone cares as it costs almost nothing to produce, but if you printed 100000 CDs you have a bit of an incentive to make sure that people actually buy them.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

There is still plenty of incentive, making money. If DLC is successful it brings in huge sums of money for the developer. And I think people might be underestimating the costs of producing DLC. You have to pay the map makers, model makers, texture painters, concept artists, and whoever else is working on it. A slice of the money also goes to the publisher, of course, which adds far too much to the cost. I'd imagine thats really what jacks up the price the most.

Theres nothing inherently bad about DLC, it just needs to be done right and given a good price. Fallout 3 is a good example of DLC done right, while Oblivion, from the same developer has both good and bad examples.

Dragon Age: Origins is an example of REALLY bad DLC. I don't know what is even in them, but the fact they were availbe at release for more money is just ridiculous.They should have been included in the game as standard.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

To be honest in the end I don't think that DLC is a dev's dream, instead a publisher's one.
It allows publishers to ship smaller games than their predecessors, have already existing content that will then be marketed as extra and deluxe.

Though the biggest and absolutely aggravating problem of DLC I see, is the limitation of modding usually attached to DLC titles.

If a Dlc is merely a few textures, which could easily be put in by fans, you will attempt to limit their ability to do so, and we can observe exactly this happening.

Not always, but it's still pretty common to show a worry-some trend.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

Being a game dev myself (an indy one, but a dev nonetheless), the whole point of DLC is to add on to the game with assets that you didn't have the budget to otherwise place into the game. So, we make a game, we don't think we have enough time to make this content, so what do we do? Expansion sets and DLC, by george!

I agree, small DLCs are utter garbage. If you're going to make DLC, it should be as great as the original game, if not better. A good example is the title me and my crew are working on now. It's a tactical shooter. It has a long singleplayer campaign (30+ hours, pretty long for an FPS, no?), and because of this, and the fact that multiplayer is just so simply huge, we're only going to work on multiplayer if we have enough budget/time to work on it. It's probably going to either be DLC, expansion set or sequel material, because it's so freaking huge. Now, all game companies should make expansion sets and DLC on the same par as the original game, where one DLC doubles the gameplay, two triples, three quadruples the original face game.

I have seen some pretty pathetic DLC/expansions in my day. Ones that are just a few missions, maybe a new weapon or two, perhaps a new multiplayer game mode (Jedi Academy is so bad at this, that it adds next to no improvements to JK2 other than Siege and all the bugs associated with it)

Re: Downloadable Content
 

Usually the size and price. You're not likely to find a 1 hour expantion pack in the store or something else pretty small. Not sure how much large DLC are out there (ea DLC of 1 gig and over, adding several hours of gameplay, a barrowload full of new content and such on).

So then one naturally looks at the price for the amount of content gained, charging one dollar for a single item or 5 bucks for a handfull of items is a bit of a rip off.

In theory thought the DLC and expansion packs could be of the same level and pretty much equal in every way (with the DLC allowing for more flexibility at the cost of being a bit more complicated). So in theory there ain't anything bad about them, but the risk of unfair prices, cashcows, seems very prominent to me.

But if we would have a game and the publisher/developer would have the choice of releasing a reasonably sized expantion/add-on on either a disc or as DLC, where the discs may sell for 30 bucks but have the atvantage of being supplied on a CD, in a package and with a game manual and the DLC being a bit more cheap (no costs for making CDs, packaging, a manual etc.) then yes it's all fair and square.

But reading about so much DLC that are an absolute rip off doesn't exactly put DLC's in a good light.

Re: Downloadable Content
 

If it adds real content to a game, instead of just weapons or cosmetic additions, then I say pay away!

It's not new, it's been around for a long time, and it's not going away.

None of DA's DLC is mandatory.
One is free for new purchases of the game (any edition).
Other things can be gotten for free by playing the browser game Dragon Age: Journeys (items that are quite handy tbh).
DA:J has more being developed, and probably more items to go along with it, all free.

So far, of all the DLC that was available for release, only one thing has an extra cost after buying a new copy of the game.
What's more, it's cheaper than what is free for all new copies, if you buy a second-hand copy.