Star Wars Battlefront II

Hekotat

FoH nuclear response team
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11,551
This does not give me high hopes for the the new Battlefield game coming out next year, which I'm sure will be BC3 and I will be furious.
 
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Adebisi

Clump of Cells
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So there's crates, cards, crystals, and crafting parts.

Can someone please explain this fucked up process of obtaining items in a game you paid full price for?
 
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xzi

Mouthbreather
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I don't think anyone can explain their design decisions but they've been greedy fucks for quite a long time, apparently the rest of the internet is just catching up.
 

Adebisi

Clump of Cells
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Thing is this definitely the pot calling the kettle black. Blizzard are notoriously greedy with shit like Hearthstone and HotS. I even find them pretty greedy with overwatch.
Hearthstone? American Inventor, please.

It's he only place where microtransactions are pretty much accepted as part of the game system.
 

Amzin

Lord Nagafen Raider
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I don't think anyone can explain their design decisions but they've been greedy fucks for quite a long time, apparently the rest of the internet is just catching up.
EA was voted most hated company in America 2 years in a row 4 years ago, I don't think anyone is catching up. The fact is this is just another low for a company known for pushing the bottom.
 

xzi

Mouthbreather
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6,763
Yeah that's great but people kept buying the fucking games until this point where people are mass refunding. Not like it matters, it's star wars and it will sell, but for once people are actively not purchasing the game.
 

Adebisi

Clump of Cells
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If only nerds would stop buying their games.

I guess we can dream while they continue to buy up our favourite IPs, fire all their original designers, then push microtransactions into the next update.

I just bought 50 Factorio Loot Crates!

Hopefully I'll get the long-arm inserter this time!
 

Adebisi

Clump of Cells
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Sweet dude but you really want to get your 20% increased turn speed box when you can

I'm not sure. I'm holding out for the Pharah Jetpack hover upgrade. Payday's on Friday so I can get some crates then...
 

skribble

Golden Knight of the Realm
488
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Games industry seems to be heading into the same mass marketed, how much money can we gauge out of our consumers experience that movies are, with a few exceptions of course.

I remember Bobby saying a long time ago that people should be paying more for their games, something about guitar hero and how once people bought it that was it and it shouldn't be that way. And here we are in 2017.

Games like overwatch which update over time and add new content im fine with dropping some money on or paying a small monthly subscription, for the server costs etc (bare with me). I'm so over lootboxes though, it's fucking gambling and in no way is this designed for a consumer to support the developer, rather to gauge as much money as possible. I could see someone sit down and explain with DLC why teams had further content to use but didn't have the time/funding etc to release it on the date, so its good that a big project can get supported with expansion in the future. Thats fine. And again servers aren't free to run so if implaying something which has updated content /servers i'd expect them to have some form of income.

But no-one could sit down and explain to me why its better for me as a consumer to get a lootbox full of shit instead of paying a few bucks for a skin i want or whatever. I'm also over games such as lol/hots/guild wars having to have a game currency, because again its a convoluted system which solely exists to get people to drop odd amounts of money and spend more than they have to. 'Guys you know whats better than just exchanging items for money, well we're gonna make up this fake currency which you can only buy in odd amounts that never fit the items you want, instead of just buying the item straight up, its great trust us'. How this ever become mainstream I have no idea.

I like a lot of blizzard games, but them talking about family on their blizzcon was a fucking joke. You're family but you can't buy a skin in hots or overwatch directly without buying moneyboxes, oh and we're increasing hearthstone prices again. Also those are random boxes too. I guess our family has a gambling addiction
 
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gshurik

Tranny Chaser
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I mean I get the circle jerk that's going on, but seriously; Overwatch isn't immune to criticism just because you enjoy playing the game. There are far better cosmetic loot systems done, and the seasonal shit is insanely predatory.

1446071335467.png


There's a reason that's a meme.
 
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xzi

Mouthbreather
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All lootboxes are shit but it's that with cosmetic only items or we go back to 15$ dlc every 2 months. I'd rather have cosmetics.

I mean really I'd rather have zero lootboxes, but we're never going back to that being the norm in AAA. The good news is indie games and devs are out there innovating and making amazing quality games without shitty predatory weird practices that the current industry is doing. For now anyways.
 

Pyros

<Silver Donator>
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I mean I get the circle jerk that's going on, but seriously; Overwatch isn't immune to criticism just because you enjoy playing the game. There are far better cosmetic loot systems done, and the seasonal shit is insanely predatory.

View attachment 156368

There's a reason that's a meme.
It is very shitty, but it is restricted to cosmetics, which is mostly acceptable. Some people are OCD about having all the skins or all the tags or whatever and spend retarded amount of money when there's a new loot box, but at the same time you get the same gaming experience regardless. When you monetize content and power is when it starts to become real shitty, especially when there's a competitive aspect. Getting killed by a guy doing 30% more damage than you doesn't feel very fair, and especially when it involves unlocking shit for 50 or 100hours or whatever or paying 20bucks(numbers are probably off just random example).

I'd say there's basically "tiers" of bullshit with microtransactions and DLC in general, and different people have different tresholds for them, plus some people will just ignore them if they like the game enough anyway. Still, this particular case is easily one of the worst. There's a bunch of korean mmos and shit worse for sure where you have to buy shit with IRL money because the upgrade items or whatever don't even drop or are accessible ingame, but this is an AAA western game so that's definitely amongst the worst offenders.

Thing is even with all the noise and bad press, game probably sold well. That said they're probably still going to be "losing" money based on their projections, so it should hurt them a bit. Not that it will stop them from doing the same shit again though, they'll probably disguise it a bit better next time. Maybe.
 

Denaut

Trump's Staff
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But no-one could sit down and explain to me why its better for me as a consumer to get a lootbox full of shit instead of paying a few bucks for a skin i want or whatever.

Short answer is that it isn't, which is the point. For anything mass market there is little reason to offer people value, value shoppers rarely make good customers because you have to put in more work for smaller returns.

The reason loot boxes and other gambling mechanics are so successful is that the obfuscate cost while also providing that dopamine hit people crave. In some sense RPG mechanics work this way. The point is they are trying to find ways to get people to pay for more for less, so it isn't surprising that these gambling mechanics (which are the ultimate example of poor RoI decision-making) are what works best.

In fact they work so well you can expect it to continue until the government intercedes.
 

gshurik

Tranny Chaser
<Gold Donor>
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It is very shitty, but it is restricted to cosmetics, which is mostly acceptable. Some people are OCD about having all the skins or all the tags or whatever and spend retarded amount of money when there's a new loot box, but at the same time you get the same gaming experience regardless. When you monetize content and power is when it starts to become real shitty, especially when there's a competitive aspect. Getting killed by a guy doing 30% more damage than you doesn't feel very fair, and especially when it involves unlocking shit for 50 or 100hours or whatever or paying 20bucks(numbers are probably off just random example).

I'd say there's basically "tiers" of bullshit with microtransactions and DLC in general, and different people have different tresholds for them, plus some people will just ignore them if they like the game enough anyway. Still, this particular case is easily one of the worst. There's a bunch of korean mmos and shit worse for sure where you have to buy shit with IRL money because the upgrade items or whatever don't even drop or are accessible ingame, but this is an AAA western game so that's definitely amongst the worst offenders.

Thing is even with all the noise and bad press, game probably sold well. That said they're probably still going to be "losing" money based on their projections, so it should hurt them a bit. Not that it will stop them from doing the same shit again though, they'll probably disguise it a bit better next time. Maybe.

I'd absolutely agree that EA does it worse, and anything that gives you a demonstrable advantage is much worse than lootboxes with cosmetics, but I don't think that just because it's not as bad as the way EA handles it should be an excuse on how they handle boxes.

I believe this has recently changed, but the last time I played Overwatch all I got out of the boxes I seldomly got from leveling was voice lines and sprays. This is such a predatory way to hook people into buying crates because they want something specific.

If they want to charge for cosmetics then charge for specific cosmetics, the only reason there's an RNG system tied to it is because it activates our lizard brain and makes us want to buy into the "what's in the box" mentality.

DOTA 2 does a similar thing, but at least you're guaranteed your drop (out of the regular pool) if you get enough boxes. The absolute RNG nature and low returns you get from duplicates makes this system seem way more rewarding than it actually is.