One of the current hot-topics in the gaming industry today centers around the many creative ways developers can squeeze another dollar out of your $60 investment. Be it through the promise of future content patches or an abundance of smaller, less significant extras; today’s gamer now faces a world where the video games they play no longer ship 100% complete, but rather with the expectation that there will always be something more to purchase past the release date.
Let’s be real, you can’t have a discussion about micro transactions and paid DLC without mentioning one of the biggest instigators, Electronic Arts.
As one of the biggest publishers in the industry, EA makes games that sell. They’ve mastered the art of training their audience to invest in the same franchise, year after year, sequel after sequel, regardless of quality, or franchise fatigue. They are masters of market-research, they know your spending habits in-game better than you, and it certainly doesn’t hurt that they have the professional sports genre locked down.
Lately, EA’s been betting big on one of their most popular franchises, Star Wars. As the exclusive publisher of all Star Wars games, they started things off right by reviving one of the most requested games in the franchise: Star Wars Battlefront.
The game was pretty good, but it still included enough DLC to purchase the game twice-over, and as it shipped without a single-player campaign, I was left with the impression that this wasn’t meant to be a full Star Wars: Battlefront experience, but rather something to push out the door quickly and hype up an inevitable sequel.
Star Wars Battlefront 2 is expected to release on November 17th, and since the beta dropped for early adopters, an on-going back-and-fourth between fans and developers has begun over how to keep this game profitable enough to justify its continued existence.
While I’m excited for the game’s release, I think I’ll wait a bit for the reviews to come out, as these developers seem to be making some pretty dramatic changes to how their games will reward players in-game versus micro transactions. Still, I’m glad to see that the developers are taking fan feedback into account, and adjusting their pricing model based on the reactions of their player beta tests.
Source: http://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/news/facing-reddit-backlash-ea-cuts-cost-of-star-wars-unlocks-w511656
