DLC, Again

[camazotz]

If there's one thing I've learned from Steam, its to wait six months for the price to drop to a reasonable charge ($50 for an 8 hour game is bad; $20 for the same game is acceptable), or better yet wait a year for the "Complete Game of the Year Edition" that will have all the DLC on board along with the core game for $20-30. The I buy it on the New Years Sale for $4.95.

Valve has no one but themselves to blame for my severe "sales opportunity conditioning." Only the early adopters suffer under today's pricing scheme and only the pirates and the entitlement "I want it all for free" crowd suffer under the DLC.

If the DLC is really outrageous, draconian or representative of true greed at the expense of a complete game....people will vote with their pocketbooks and we won't see that happen again, simple as that.

 

[Harry Mason]

Can you even buy these hats on Consoles (where most of the sales for this game were, anyway)?
I haven't seen them.

 

[Jumplion]

I have to wonder how you would answer these questions if you replaced "VALVe" with "Activision". Most certainly people would be up in arms, saying that it's just another way for Activision's "greedy" CEOs and whatnot to rake in more cash from their audience.

While I do agree with some of your points, I can't help but feel that the goodie-feely feelings to VALVe get in the way of people's reasoning. Not that I think it's bad of them to sell these things, though I do find it incredibly pointless and in a sense a waste of resources on their part.

 

[Grabbin Keelz]

Are we still on this? I once hated the DLC, but at the end of the week I accepted it and moved on. Don't make this issue have the same fate as MLP.

 

[Nuke_em_05]

Imagine if Valve had just stuck to their Half-Life work and never expanded.

Ahem: Episode 3.

I see your point and I actually don't care about the hats, I'm just saying, I am actually going to see Duke Nukem Forever before I see Episode 3. Thanks for TF2 and Portal, but seriously, we're still waiting to see the fruits of the "shorter, cheaper, and more frequent" model.

Okay, actually, I do have a problem with the hats: any time spent on hats that could have been spent on Episode 3 was wasted.

 

[JET1971]

what resources from the Portal 2 dev team for hats? the ones thet were already made for TF2?

 

[sosolidshoe]

If other players want to pay for this DLC and the company is willing to sell it, why do you feel the need to demand that the transaction not take place?

Because, in the long run, it moves the industry in a direction I, as a consumer, would rather it not go. Now, you can call people who review-bombed Portal 2 idiots, frankly, I think anyone who will pay five dollars for a fucking virtual hat is a grade-A dipshit, especially as P2 isn't even a persistent world game.

As to your argument about greed, why on earth should we not consider whether a company are greedy, money-grubbing bastards to be important? The simple fact of the matter is, DLC is a scam. It massively overprices content which should be part of the original game, and it illustrates, for me, the sad state of an industry that had the potential to transcend Hollywood, and has instead decided to emulate it, or at least, all of its worst business practices.

 

[mjc0961]

More hats means more games with more hats and less fun addons, you get what you plant.

As long as the original game I buy has plenty of content, it doesn't matter to me so much if there's DLC. If there's DLC and it's a good balance of content VS price awesome. If not, oh well.

"You get what you plant" sounds like more messy propulsion gel all over the place though.

 

[JPH330]

Companies should continue to expect backlash anytime they do DLC. If we become complacent, and even start arguing on their behalf, it just furthers the outcome of quality games being chopped into pieces by greedy marketing departments, because those are games I won't buy no matter how rave the reviews are.

On a case by case basis even if Portal 2 has valid/sane DLC (it does); I'd rather not see it at all because of what it could lead to. The outcry sends a message to the rest of the industry. It is the exact same reason we fight for free speech in even the most rediciulous of cases.

If you want to send a message to the rest of the industry, why send it to Valve? Like Shamus said, plenty of other big developers out there are doing DLC in a much more damaging way than Valve. And yet Portal 2 got a much bigger backlash than the others. That's the stupid part. That's the part that makes no sense.

 

[Lerxst]

The complaint I have with DLC is the part of the equation we don't see. A lot of games are designed the same as a movie or book, where a story is laid out and plans are made in advance. Prior to DLC, plans might have changed as development went forward, but they needed to stick close enough to the layout to create the game the planned on. They needed enough content from the start to make their game the game they intended.

With DLC, we have no way of knowing if a Developer views it as a way to put off development of certain aspects of their game; using it as a tool to procrastinate, or cut corners to save time and/or money. Who knows if that 25 hour RPG was supposed to be a 60 hour RPG when it started but they intend to release another 35 hours of content as DLC here and there for the new couple of months?

I don't like being "nickle and dimed" to death in order to play the game I thought I was initially purchasing - Yes Dragon Age, I'm looking directly at you. Little things like Portal 2 does, is fine by me. I could care less about hats or other people buying hats. I can tell they add nothing to the game and therefor, they didn't use the DLC as a way of putting off developing the game.

I miss the age of expansion packs though. Packs that included bulk updates and add-ons for a one-time fee. Comparing DLC to expansion packs, I'd opt for the expansions any day, mostly because they weren't rubbed in your face in teh game. You may know an expansion existed but you didn't have NPC's reminding you about it in the middle of the game every time you went to chat with them.

 

[Traun]

I like that Shamus tries to interact with his audience, it's always nice to see this.

Anyway, my biggest gripe with DLC is the cost.

A 5$ DLC is 1/12 of the game price, a 10$ one is 1/6. Have you ever seen DLC with that kind of content?

The voice actors can't hammer out texture maps once they're done recording their lines. Not everyone is going to finish their assets at exactly the same time. There will always be a few idle people here and there

A lot of the work is done by outside studios. They do the model/textures/etc. they are paid for then move on to other projects.

If other players want to pay for this DLC and the company is willing to sell it, why do you feel the need to demand that the transaction not take place?

If some other players don't want to pay for games and take them for free from internet sites, why do you feel the need to criticize them? This isn't an argument.

 

[Sutter Cane]

I like that Shamus tries to interact with his audience, it's always nice to see this.

Anyway, my biggest gripe with DLC is the cost.

A 5$ DLC is 1/12 of the game price, a 10$ one is 1/6. Have you ever seen DLC with that kind of content?

The voice actors can't hammer out texture maps once they're done recording their lines. Not everyone is going to finish their assets at exactly the same time. There will always be a few idle people here and there

A lot of the work is done by outside studios. They do the model/textures/etc. they are paid for then move on to other projects.

If other players want to pay for this DLC and the company is willing to sell it, why do you feel the need to demand that the transaction not take place?

If some other players don't want to pay for games and take them for free from internet sites, why do you feel the need to criticize them? This isn't an argument.

because you know piacy is immoral when it's simply because you don't want to pay for something. I can't believe you just compared those 2 thing. That's the worst analogy I've heard in a LONG time. This idea that "I don't like the product therefore it shouldn't exist." pisses me off. Just cause YOU don't want it, doesn't mean everyone else doesn't as well. Don't like it, don't support it, don't by the damn hats. If they don't sell, then valve may try something different next time, and if they do sell then the consumer base has spoken that hats are something that they want, and are willing to buy and thus are valuable. Who are YOU to tell people what they should and should not be interested in?

 

[Chirez]

One point I would make is about the 'If your boss offered you $100 an hour to play Tetris, would you refuse because you hate "greed"?' analogy.

What if we change it to 'If a homeless guy offered you $100 for directions to the nearest McDonalds, would you refuse because you're blatantly taking advantage of someone who clearly can't afford it?'

I suspect there is a sliding scale between taking money from someone who has more than you and taking money from someone who has considerably less. Personally I feel that taking more than someone can afford to give is taking advantage of them, perhaps others feel differently.

This is no way an issue with the Portal2 stuff, unless you assume that people paying $5 for digital hats in a two player game are actually suffering from some kind of mental illness. In which case it would be a terrible thing to do.

 

[Snotnarok]

I'd like people to stop being absolute greedy idiots with this portal 2 DLC. The DLC is absolutely optional and effects nothing in game, it's all cosmetic stuff that they are not making you buy.

Most people don't get that some DLC isn't chopped out of the game because they wanted to make money, it got chopped because there wasn't time to make it. Sonic and Knuckles, that whole Kratos climbing Titan video was supposed to be a level, these were cut out and one was actually charged for. These are just the easy ones to pick out, there's TONS games where stuff gets cut out and it's never seen from again.

BUT the companies who run out of time now, can still finish these levels and offer them AFTER the game is out but that's still time spent after the game went gold. Is there some BS DLC? Sure but calling it all out on that is just ignorant because it's not possible to know what wasn't finished when the game went gold/printed.

My ending statement is, this stuff is optional to buy, either do or don't whining about is just insane.

 

[Pat8u]

Im just going to ignore all the portal two dlc haters from now on

 

[vivster]

the real problem here is that people can't differentiate between their own opinion and the opinion of all other players
the "Need" and "Worth" of a game or DLC is COMPLETELY(and i can't stretch that enough so i say it again) COMPLETELY SUBJECTIVE

companies have to balance between all the different subjective thoughts of the whole demographic to get the most bucks out of them
that's why games cost 60 bucks and not 30 or 100 because there are enough people to buy it at 60 so they can max their profits as opposed to 30 or 100

if they would put out Mass Effect 3 for 200 Bucks a copy there would still be a lot of people to get this game
not because they are idiots but because that game is so much worth to them or even more

and if valve releases the next DLC with stickers you can put on your hats but are barely visible there would still be people buying it
and again not because they are idiots but because it's worth the money for them because of a myriad of different reasons

of course those are extreme examples and they will never be reality because the company wouldn't get the best possible profit out of it

the point that i'm getting at is that there is no simple answer to if a DLC is useful or needed or worth the money and it is not on us to judge people who buy DLC or companies who put out DLC to make more money
it is their decision and we have absolutely no right to say anything about that
either we buy it or we don't
and if we don't buy it then we kindly shut up because it doesn't concern us

thank you for your attention

 

[Clonekiller]

Hmmmm. Can we elect Shamus the most intelligent and levelheaded guy on the Escapist? No? Can we elect him to congress? He's not running? Can we elect him lord emperor?

All kidding aside, I love the incite here. I have often surmised how people will criticize an action while doing it themselves. (Though in a different context) Ever notice how rich people like to criticize others on being greedy? How the cocky disparage others for pride? How a person will judge a people group for being judgmental? Crazy. I'm just bummed Portal 2 had to be the most recent victim. I mean, DA2 is sitting right there, just asking to be torn apart. Anyway, great article. Very nice follow-up to the last one.

 

[swampus]

The problem with it is that it's sleazy. They're selling simple models for real world money. All you get are low effort models that in total cost practically nothing to make in the first place. They're selling something that shouldn't be sold in the first place.

For five dollars you shouldn't be getting a hat, you should be getting a new character, complete with new animations and dialogue. Something with substance. They're selling bottled air and sure you don't have to buy it if you don't want it but that doesn't change the fact that it is nothing more than a greedy attempt to pocket undeserved money.