op, the incentive for them to keep adding more stuff when they've gotten our first payment is to make sure that their publisher is paying them money. the publisher trusts the developer to make a game that is good. if the game is good and sells well, it provides the publisher incentive to keep paying the developers to make another game, or in sc2s case, 2 more expansions.
that said, i approve of the idea of DLC when it comes to more content. more missions, fine. things i don't really need. flavour, if you will. the ME2 DLC was great if you ask me. perfect, almost. loads of extra missions, none which i have any complaints about. chat rooms, however, or being able to watch replays with friends, infrastructure like that doesn't make sense to shell out for.
On August 17 2010 04:59 ROFLChicken wrote: You may think it's being greedy, but who are you to demand more for nothing? The customer-that-is-always-right? The loyal follower who help build Blizzard up from nothing? Be realistic. Just because a previous installment of the game had certain features does not entitle you to them now. Just because Blizzard could implement a feature at minimal cost does not mean it should have to, much less for free. Yes, it may mean that you're getting less bang for your buck than before (debatable), but the game was still worth purchasing without the additional fluff and that hasn't really changed. If this option had never been announced most people would have been just fine sticking with their current handle. Asking for more things for free then getting mad at Blizzard for either not giving them to you or providing them in some slightly altered form (only one free name change) seems kind of silly.
The realism here is that blizzard is making billion(s) of dollars hand over fist and you're sitting here defending them for nickle and diming us to death on something you may have already paid 60$ USD for. I know I paid $140 AUD for the CE and I expect to be offered more features for free, even if they are after the fact. Where are your balls son, you are happy to lose more and more free functionality in your game just because blizzard is allowed to make a buck? The point isn't that I wouldn't of used the feature anyway, the point is blizzard is making billions and are still glibe enough to charge us for a tiny tiny action on their behalf. You should be insulted, is your money and therefore hours of hard work worth nothing to you?
What incentive is there for them to produce additional extra content if they are going to be getting nothing out of it?
Its business, and if you were Morhaime or Kotick, I imagine your goal wouldn't be just to appease your fans, but also to make money. Just because you're a multi-billion dollar company doesn't mean you give away developed products for free- that is a stupid business idea
Lets throw out some random numbers just for shits and giggles. Company spends 100 million developing a game. Sales exceed over 200 million. Company is happy. What happens next? Company decides to create some new DLC, expanding the single player with a new scenario that lasts 3-4 hours or some such. 3-4 hours of in-game playtime probably accumulates hundreds of man hours to develop, maybe (again, random numbers sake) a million dollars.
Projected sales, if sold, would be 10 million. What kind of business plan do you have written down that is willing to, not only spend a million dollars to produce this DLC, but to not profit 9 million dollars?
You talk as if, not only are you entitled to free content, but that a multi-billion dollar company wouldn't be giddy for another 9 million dollars. I know I would, I'd fucking love 9 million dollars.
On August 17 2010 05:11 friendlybus wrote: The realism here is that blizzard is making billion(s) of dollars hand over fist and you're sitting here defending them for nickle and diming us to death on something you may have already paid 60$ USD for. I know I paid $140 AUD for the CE and I expect to be offered more features for free, even if they are after the fact. Where are your balls son, you are happy to lose more and more free functionality in your game just because blizzard is allowed to make a buck? The point isn't that I wouldn't of used the feature anyway, the point is blizzard is making billions and are still glibe enough to charge us for a tiny tiny action on their behalf. You should be insulted, is your money and therefore hours of hard work worth nothing to you?
On the contrary, it is exactly because my money is worth something to me that I don't see a problem here. I am willing and able to pay for the things that give me entertainment and make me happy. Value for value. You believe I'm bending over and taking it from Blizzard. I think it's the exact opposite. I don't have to debase myself by begging or whining about the little things that don't affect the substance of the game. There are times for complaints, but this probably isn't one of them. Do you really think it's more dignified to have a fit until the company gives you something for free, something that you didn't really care about to begin with? When the game is no longer worth the money I spend on it, I will stop buying it. Until then, I am perfectly happy to pay for the things that entertain me.
If they stick to skins, portraits, decals, name changes, I am fine with microtransactions. YAY.
They want to implement a map marketplace. I am scared of this, because the current Custom Map stuff is just horrible. I will never be able to play a good Custom Map until I pay for it? NAY.
It also depends of the type of microtransaction. There is the "one time pay" stuff. And there is the "monthly fee" which we have seen in WoW (Online Auction House). I would really be NAY if they offer new ladder maps / clansupport / chatchannels as a monthly payment. I maybe (!) could live with small 1-time payment options (<= 5$).
On August 17 2010 05:11 friendlybus wrote: The realism here is that blizzard is making billion(s) of dollars hand over fist and you're sitting here defending them for nickle and diming us to death on something you may have already paid 60$ USD for. I know I paid $140 AUD for the CE and I expect to be offered more features for free, even if they are after the fact. Where are your balls son, you are happy to lose more and more free functionality in your game just because blizzard is allowed to make a buck? The point isn't that I wouldn't of used the feature anyway, the point is blizzard is making billions and are still glibe enough to charge us for a tiny tiny action on their behalf. You should be insulted, is your money and therefore hours of hard work worth nothing to you?
On the contrary, it is exactly because my money is worth something to me that I don't see a problem here. I am willing and able to pay for the things that give me entertainment and make me happy. Value for value. You believe I'm bending over and taking it from Blizzard. I think it's the exact opposite. I don't have to debase myself by begging or whining about the little things that don't affect the substance of the game. There are times for complaints, but this probably isn't one of them. Do you really think it's more dignified to have a fit until the company gives you something for free, something that you didn't really care about to begin with? When the game is no longer worth the money I spend on it, I will stop buying it. Until then, I am perfectly happy to pay for the things that entertain me.
I'm pretty sure the people who scream I WANT USELESS COSMETIC CHANGES FOR FREE is small. The rest just don't want them in the game AT ALL. I don't want to pimp my Helion, not for five bucks a skin, not for free. I don't want that. This is an RTS game not some glorified chatroom. There is no need to buy stuff for your avatar. And to the OP: Are you still willing to pay for more mission knowing there are TWO more expansions coming out? the map making community is bound to make some nice single player maps while you wait.
I'm all for companies making money and microtransactions but I think being able to have 3-4 accounts and be able to reset one of the accounts each month should be free. Maybe I'm too used to iccup but if someone wants to have an account for each race and random then I think that's totally viable. Also if I want to try out some weird builds and get everything straightened out I'm not going to be able to do it playing in diamond league. It's better to work up from gold league and see how it does. Oh and where the f are chat channels?
On August 17 2010 05:11 friendlybus wrote: The realism here is that blizzard is making billion(s) of dollars hand over fist and you're sitting here defending them for nickle and diming us to death on something you may have already paid 60$ USD for. I know I paid $140 AUD for the CE and I expect to be offered more features for free, even if they are after the fact. Where are your balls son, you are happy to lose more and more free functionality in your game just because blizzard is allowed to make a buck? The point isn't that I wouldn't of used the feature anyway, the point is blizzard is making billions and are still glibe enough to charge us for a tiny tiny action on their behalf. You should be insulted, is your money and therefore hours of hard work worth nothing to you?
On the contrary, it is exactly because my money is worth something to me that I don't see a problem here. I am willing and able to pay for the things that give me entertainment and make me happy. Value for value. You believe I'm bending over and taking it from Blizzard. I think it's the exact opposite. I don't have to debase myself by begging or whining about the little things that don't affect the substance of the game. There are times for complaints, but this probably isn't one of them. Do you really think it's more dignified to have a fit until the company gives you something for free, something that you didn't really care about to begin with? When the game is no longer worth the money I spend on it, I will stop buying it. Until then, I am perfectly happy to pay for the things that entertain me.
I'm pretty sure the people who scream I WANT USELESS COSMETIC CHANGES FOR FREE is small. The rest just don't want them in the game AT ALL. I don't want to pimp my Helion, not for five bucks a skin, not for free. I don't want that. This is an RTS game not some glorified chatroom. There is no need to buy stuff for your avatar. And to the OP: Are you still willing to pay for more mission knowing there are TWO more expansions coming out? the map making community is bound to make some nice single player maps while you wait.
If you dont want to pimp out your hellion, then just don't buy it? I don't understand the argument that it shouldn't exist because you, or a majority of people even, don't want it, especially when admitting that some people (small as it is) would enjoy them. Just don't buy it and you lose nothing. We'll buy it and everyone can be happy.
And yes, I'm absolutely willing to buy another mission arch or something. Even if its just useless flavor to the real story (ala Dr Hanson's story arch playing absolutely no role in the result of the game.) I love extra stuff- I eat it up. Would love to play a few side missions involving Valerian's trip to meet Raynor, dodging his father and what encounters and difficulties he met on the way. Would absolutely love for another potential crew member to have some financial opportunities for Raynor, culminating in some kind of rivaly developed with a new protoss faction that, again, doesn't impact the overall ending to the story in any way. The expansions are going to be something new entirely- what I enjoy in regards to DLC is flavor, new voice acting, excetera- a quality which unofficial mapmakers won't be able to sell to me, because they can in no way contribute to the official story. They can try, but it'll just be fanfiction, and I care little for that.
On August 17 2010 00:32 HubertFelix wrote: If those micro transactions let us play on a good and free battle.net I'm ok with it. But since bnet2.0 is a big joke, they are announcing this way too early. This doesn't sound like a fair trade with a free bnet.
Add the essential features to bnet, then talk about taking our money.
I dont mind people buying models decals portrait, new music or whatever. Name change? i dont care either. I dont see why someone should feel they should change their name all the time.
However anything changing gameplay is holy ground, you cannot do this if you want to be even semi serious esports. Also, if they go crazy about models i would not allow them in tournament play however. Im not too hot about seeing huk microing a wall-e probe or tlo destroying a drone line with bumblebee hellions.
I will have to say yay and nay oddly enough. while I believe we shouldn't have to pay to change our name or do a stat reset. I realize ppl do these far too often. I believe things like that should go on a timer (say 3 months?) and if you want to change it more often you should have to pay for that.
The problem with buying microtransactions for me is that i find it hard to price. I just don't know how much dlc that will exist with the game in the future and if it's overpriced, and how much of future dlc i want since it's largely unannounced :|
I 100% support purely aesthetic microtransactions... I 100% hate ANY other forms though, additional content -> game balancing changes. I do not believe companies should add more to the game short of an expansion pack without it being a charitable exercise.
If it's purely aesthetic, sure, I'm all for it. However, the moment those micro-transactions touch on the gameplay aspect in a significant way? I'm 110% against.
Race skins, imo, should only exist if the change is minor and doesn't effect as much. However, I think it'd be really awesome to have small things like unique insignias for teams and clans. For example, if a clan had to pay $X in order to implement their own unique clan insignia rather than use the pre-rendered ones, that would be amazing and would impact gameplay in a non-significant, positive way. But, if they make a skin for Zerg that turns them all pitch dark black and makes it impossible to see them, that would be bad.
Basically, just depends on the type and significance of the micro-transactions on actual gameplay.
It feels greedy like they are trying to rip you off. I don't mind paying more for a game or if a product increases in price, but I hate hidden costs. I used to love Bungie b/c of halo even though halo 2/3 single player sucked (multi was ok). I had bought books, collector's edition, 3 copies of halo 1 (one PC), a second xbox, two copies of halo 2 collectors, and I got limited halo 3 just for the end of the story and the only reason I got a 360. I loved halo and spent a ton of time and money on it. But as soon as they forced you to buy maps to play rated, I quit, and barely bought halo 3 or a 360. In fact I regret it almost and have not bought the other books/game/etc that are coming out.
I bought dragon age/mass effect with DLC for dragon age which wasn't bad (although not worth it really). But that was optional that didn't affect gameplay, so even though they are ripping people off its not forced.
So basically it irritates me they are being greedy jerks but as long I can play the game competitively without being forced to buy things that aren't upfront I'm ok with it. If Blizzard pulls a Bungie and makes you buy maps for ladder or something I will never ever buy another blizzard game again.
In comparison if blizzard charged $5 a month or $50 a year to play SC2 I would gladly pay it as long as it was upfront and they did chat rooms and all the stuff they should have. I find it very insulting and actually morally wrong to have micro-transactions if they interfere with gameplay (like Bungie did). It consider it stealing if they force you to buy extra stuff after to continue playing (for the life of the game). Its not about money its about being underhanded and forcing purchases.
I would love to pay for really unique aesthetic changes that are public. Of course, it all depends on the price. Your example is a bit big, because it could impact the game visually, like not seeing units or what have you. I'd gladly pay for a model or a re-skin. Like a re-skin of a hydralisk:
The name system? It was just a horrible design in the first place. Having non-unique names just ruins everything. Have you seen Xbox LIVE? They have been running in good terms with unique names, no trouble at all, for a long time. I'm fine with paying for a name change, but it doesn't mean I'm going to do it. It's just a way to monetize a feature.
What if all the trolls just changed their name to TLO? Damn, Blizzard is a bunch of retards. I blame Activision partially but Blizzard should know better.
"Somebody used a maphack!" "What was his name?" "TLO" "I'm sorry, there are 58 registered TLOs in this game." FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
On August 17 2010 09:15 Lysdexia wrote: I wouldn't be able to stand looking at that zerg retexture in the op. I'm only okay with custom skins if I don't have to see them.
That picture was merely an example. I, too, think that any custom skins ought to not only have some relevance to the story and make sense, but that they shouldn't rip your eyes out.
However, there's absolutely no point in being able to buy skins if you can't show them off. Such cosmetic changes, if not an eye-sore and developed correctly, should be displayed publicly, and not be intrusive, such as how the collectors edition Thor blends in.
Another skin idea would be one that is already in the game, even. I believe its the third Zeratul mission, when you encounter an entire protoss force wearing dark armor. That just looked bad ass to me, and frankly, playing through that mission, I had no misconceptions as to the types of units I was fighting. Everything looked perfectly normal gameplay wise, just a different color scheme. Ideally if I'm paying for DLC I want more than a recolor, but you get the idea.
Also, I love someones idea of having custom clan insignias.
On August 17 2010 00:04 Tump wrote:When it starts actually harming things that matter (which it won't) then I'll be against it.
Yes it does, it shifts development importance for gimmicks that they can sell, and it often makes companies arbitrary remove something just to sell it later, like cross realm play possibly, or changing a nick name.
Micro transactions also makes marketing even more important then development, if you promote companies for trying to find new ways to charge you more, then they will grow to do it.
This guy is spot on. Also OP should have the shit kicked out of him for spending money he admittedly doesn't have on stupid shit like Thor wings.
EPT
