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[Mongol13524]

The tragic thing is that development studios are forced to even make it. A team puts years of work into something, hoping to make a great experience, and a rich man in a suit says that they have to cut a fifth of the stuff out in order to screw over the customer as much as possible.

Offensive DLC in general seems to stem from men in suits who only view gamers as consumers for them to exploit. It's a great thing technology has has indie development so accessible and prevalent, small guys can't afford to pull this kind of crap off.

[nenjin]

urrently Bioware requires PC users to still purchase "Bioware Points" for DLC, not only my stupid games are stored in Origin but i have to purchase separate ass currency just so i can purchase DLC off of Origin, what the fuck?

It's the Token System. Popular at amusement and theme parks all over like Disney World, and F2P games.

Basically, the thinking is instead of being bound to the dollar economy, you make people tokenize their spending money, so you can control the exchange rate. People are less willing to do the math on what something costs when it's gone through a token system.

I'm kinda surprised more major games haven't tried their own currency systems so they can maximize the dollar profit from DLC. But the public generally knows it's a raw deal.

[zombat]

Honestly I am surprised that the horsearmor gets all the worst rep when the worst DLC I saw was the vampire cave.

Which was the only way to make being a vampire viable in Oblivion. In other words they made a vital piece of DLC required to use on of the features in the game properly, paid DLC.

Pretty sure horse armor was the first bit of DLC for Oblivion, which itself was one of the first AAA PC games to get DLC.
So it has the honour of being the bearer of all bad stigma in regards to DLC.

[Cthulhu]

Token systems also have the advantage of never really syncing up.  You always have a few hundred odd points that you can't spend on anything, sitting on your screen and nagging you with the threat of wasted money.

[Mephisto]

Token systems also have the advantage of never really syncing up.  You always have a few hundred odd points that you can't spend on anything, sitting on your screen and nagging you with the threat of wasted money.

I daresay that's the point. You don't want to feel like you've wasted money, so you buy more tokens in order to buy more things in a vain attempt to zero your balance.

This is just speculation. If I can't buy something with cash, I'm not going to buy a fake currency in order to buy it.

[Rolan7]

Honestly I am surprised that the horsearmor gets all the worst rep when the worst DLC I saw was the vampire cave.

Which was the only way to make being a vampire viable in Oblivion. In other words they made a vital piece of DLC required to use on of the features in the game properly, paid DLC.

I never had that DLC, and being a vampire wasn't so bad... I just ate at whatever tavern was nearby, plenty of people sleep there at night.  Sometimes houses.  I did have a high lockpick skill, though.

[Talvara]

The tragic thing is that development studios are forced to even make it. A team puts years of work into something, hoping to make a great experience, and a rich man in a suit says that they have to cut a fifth of the stuff out in order to screw over the customer as much as possible.

Offensive DLC in general seems to stem from men in suits who only view gamers as consumers for them to exploit. It's a great thing technology has has indie development so accessible and prevalent, small guys can't afford to pull this kind of crap off.

Yeah I too have the feeling that its mostly men in suits that are to blame, Developers are generally more focussed on making and distilling awesome than to worry about money.

[engy]

Hey guys; you want speech in your game?

That is extra:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/wing-commander-privateer-speech-pack
1993

Lets not get all high and mighty. 

If you don't like DLC - Don't buy it.  It is however not new in any way shape or form.  That content that is in DLC would not have been in the game.  That Ranger DLC for metro; wasn't going to exist - people wanted it so they made it DLC and charged for it.  That horse armor wasn't going to exist.

Yeah some of it were concepts they originally wanted to include; but they ran out of money and couldn't do it.  DLC lets them provide support and more content for games.

If you don't like DLC - Don't Support it.  Don't buy it.  But its been around forever just under other names.

[Wiles]

If you don't like DLC - Don't buy it.

Sure, that helps, but speaking up about it is equally important.

Some of the larger companies have no qualms using exploitative methods to make more money from its user base. DLC is one of those methods. I don't mean all DLC obviously, just those that are designed to milk more cash from consumers.

For some games it's turning into a case where they put in obstacles in games that are unfun to grind through where players are encouraged to pay money to speed things along. That sort of thing will diminish the gaming experience for everyone.

[nenjin]

Hey guys; you want speech in your game?

That is extra:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/wing-commander-privateer-speech-pack
1993

Lets not get all high and mighty. 

If you don't like DLC - Don't buy it.  It is however not new in any way shape or form.  That content that is in DLC would not have been in the game.  That Ranger DLC for metro; wasn't going to exist - people wanted it so they made it DLC and charged for it.  That horse armor wasn't going to exist.

Yeah some of it were concepts they originally wanted to include; but they ran out of money and couldn't do it.  DLC lets them provide support and more content for games.

If you don't like DLC - Don't Support it.  Don't buy it.  But its been around forever just under other names.

And yet, if you tried to sell a speech pack today in what would be consider a major title, the internet would be in an uproar. The concept of DLC isn't new. The way it is utilized has changed though.

Yeah some of it were concepts they originally wanted to include; but they ran out of money and couldn't do it.  DLC lets them provide support and more content for games.

Except now DLC is pre-planned and dev'd and even ships on the disk. (Resident Evil being the most recent example of this in memory.) Studios backed by AAA publishers don't run out of money to make DLC. It is a long-term monetization strategy that is right in the design doc. Day Zero DLC is a thing that happens all the time now.

So I don't buy your argument. Resources for a game are specifically devoted to making DLC for a game, that we pay for in addition to the base game. When a game has had a sales cycle, THEN DLC comes out, your argument holds. Day Zero DLC shoots it in the face.

[Mephansteras]

I'm ok with the way XCOM has been doing it. Small scale DLC that doesn't add much other than some cosmetics and variety and a large full-scale expansion that adds a bunch of stuff to the game.

Now, I think their DLC was overpriced (which is why I waited until a major Steam sale to get Slingshot), but the core concept I'm fine with. You might enjoy the game more with the DLC (I love the customization options from the Elite Soldier Pack), but you're not missing actual pieces of the game without them. Now, I have stuff that I'd have rather had than what they gave us for Slingshot, like map packs or complete soldier language packs, but at least they've been trying to use DLC in a fairly ethical manner.

It was also nice to see Enemy Within show up as a proper expansion that actually changed the game and made it fresh again.

[BurnedToast]

And speaking of money grabbing, remember when digital distribution was heralded as the bringer of cheaper game sales?
I remember when it was rare for a game to be over £30 on release.

$20 used to be bargin bin price, never got cheaper then that. I now regularly buy games for $2.50 - $5. People still pay a premium for brand new games... but the average price has gone down massively for me.

You don't have to buy a game when it's brand new, and in fact because of the stagnation due to unchanging console hardware (which won't change because the next gen consoles are already mid-range PCs at best) you're not even missing anything by waiting a year for it to drop to $5.

[nenjin]

Agreed. The ease of digital shopping hasn't made me willing to spend more, it's actually made me willing to spend less. With the easy accessibility of a huge library of games, every single game has to justify its price against an entire market of competition. Even games I definitely want to try end up waiting until a 50% off sale before I actually get it.

[Elephant Parade]

Anybody mentioned App Store games yet? Those games don't always have DLC, but they do have microtransactions for gold/energy/gems/whatever.

[Felius]

My main issue with DLC is when modability is deliberately reduced to make way for more DLC. The newer Total War games have been somewhat guilty of this.