Jailbreaking Videogames

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Wandering_Demon888

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OK so I know some of you guys are aware and some of you have not been aware for awhile, about the somewhat conniving concept about DLC (Downloadable Content)these days. Now to my knowledge not all game companies perform this practice. Some games have DLC content already on the original disc you purchased. Then what happens is that they make you pay extra money to unlock the content on the disc that you already own. I mean really people how can we let game companies get away with this kind of thing?

Now for gaming fanatics/extremists who defend their favorite games to the death for some creepy reason, I don't expect them to see this as outrage. As a matter a fact, a gaming fanatic/extremists will start listing off reasons as to why these game companies don't have to be so honest with us about the products we purchase from them. For people who primarily play PC games on a regular, i don't know....maybe they see this as normal I guess...But so far from what I've been seeing, Capcom is notorious for this less than honest practice (Not to mention being buttholes about putting out multiple versions of the same game: MVC3 & Street fighter 4 for example).

I'm just waiting for jail breaking videogames to go mainstream for the large majority of gamers out there so that game companies will finally start to take a hint that this practice is not cool. That 60 dollar game you purchased winds up actually costing you 70, 80, 90 maybe 100 or 110 dollars when you start adding up all that DLC stuff. Now sit down and think about how much of that content was actually already on the original disc you purchased....Doesn't seem so fair now does it?

I remember long ago when the internet was still pretty young and p2p music sharing was still a new concept to the majority of people out there. The movie and music industry didn't really give shit that people were still paying 30,40 or even 50$ for a ten year old CD album or movie.

People complained about the high prices for years, but they didn't care as long they kept getting money from it and also because they thought there was nothing the consumers could do about it.

P2P music sharing came on the horizon, movie and music industry was quick to jump up and say THEY were the ones getting ripped off by this. They ignored the consumers and the consumers found a solution on their own. For the first year or two, they fought hard against music sharing even going so far as to lock people up for it.

Eventually they started to figure out that this new concept was not going to go away. And it was in THAT moment they started to reconsider lowering their prices for movies and music. That's why nowadays the most expensive CD or movie you see is no more than about 20$ (excluding Blu Ray movies) That was their big kick in the mouth. The question now is when will the gamers start fighting back SERIOUSLY on these issues like DLC.

All we're doing right now is giving them more leg room to keep slapping on "hidden fees" on games you guys already own. If we keep making excuses for these game companies they'll keep tossing DLC at us. Sooner or later we'll be paying 90-100$ for a game and people will consider it normal because they will think they can't do anything about it and because no one will speak up about it. When will we as a community say enough is enough?
 

DeadlyYellow

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Won't cost me any more than usual.

I wait until the complete pack is released for $40 or under.

Kinda averts your point though.
 

Squilookle

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Well there was once this interesting game called Prisoner Of War that had you busting out of prison camps and it was kinda...

Oh, you meant cracking disks. HOW AWKWARD.

I see where you're coming from though. Even when DLC first appeared I just knew it would come to this. Gone are the days where a developer released a game, and that was it. They had to be absolutely sure that everything was finished and polished before release. These days? slap anything together and release it half-baked. Then just fix it later. If you're lucky.
 

Ordinaryundone

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Aww, for a minute I thought this thread was going to be about games featuring jail breaks. I was kind of excited.

But nope, just another ill-informed, badly written soap box. Until someone can definitively prove to me that any so called "On Disk DLC" is actually complete and playable on the disk, without patching or extra data, then I do not get mad about it. And even if it is, why should I bother getting mad? Its never anything important, and most games have far more content these days than ever before. If the devs want to leave mostly completed stuff on the disk to expedite the release of DLC down the road, more power to them.

Also, SSFIV and UMVC3 are/were both bargained priced on release and contained a ton more content and updates than their vanilla releases. If Capcom wants to do their updates in big blocks rather than charging for DLC every month or so, I'm fine with that.
 

Ordinaryundone

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Squilookle said:
Well there was once this interesting game called Prisoner Of War that had you busting out of prison camps and it was kinda...

Oh, you meant cracking disks. HOW AWKWARD.

I see where you're coming from though. Even when DLC first appeared I just knew it would come to this. Gone are the days where a developer released a game, and that was it. They had to be absolutely sure that everything was finished and polished before release. These days? slap anything together and release it half-baked. Then just fix it later. If you're lucky.
When were those days? PC gaming has always had patching, except more often than not the devs would forget the game and make the fans do it themselves. And console games have always had examples of half-finished content and bugs. What was worse, since there was no way to update or patch on the pre-internet connection consoles, there was no way to fix it. If your game had a game breaking bug that wasn't caught before release, your game was broken. Period. How, exactly were these better times?
 

Wandering_Demon888

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DeadlyYellow said:
Won't cost me any more than usual.

I wait until the complete pack is released for $40 or under.

Kinda averts your point though.
True but complete package versions of games don't come out until months or almost a year after it's been released. Or some games just don't produce complete packages even after they've been released. Call of Duty is good example of this. They have yet to produce a Call of Duty game with all DLC maps already included on the disc.
 

Squilookle

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Talking about the console side of it. And you're right- If your game had a game breaking bug that wasn't caught before release, your game was broken. Period. Everyone knew it was like that to stay, with no hope of being fixed. As a result the game was avoided, sales were down, and the developers had to live with their crap product forever.

If that isn't a good motivator to do a decent game the next time around, I don't know what is.

Besides, the games back then weren't often as complex, so the bugs were usually quite livable- sometimes even fun to have around. Bottom line is it really seperated the great games from the poor ones, and there was more pressure (no really, FAR more pressure) on dev teams to deliver a finished product first time, EVERY time.
 

Wandering_Demon888

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imahobbit4062 said:
First off, that was a pain to read. Paragraphs are your friend.

Second, this has been going on for a long time, and also been discussed to death. No matter how many people try to boycott games or companies, it will still sell.

Third, can some please explain to me how hacking generated the term "jail breaking"? Surely I can't be the only one that finds that term fucking stupid?
First off, who said anything about boycotting games or companies?

Secondly the the term "jail breaking" sprouted out your generation's "epic" use of words to describe everything.

Third it sure as hell beats looking at the other 4000 Skyrim topics raping the shit out of the front page....
 

IamLEAM1983

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I'm not so sure as to where I'm sitting with this. I understand that it's more than a little disappointing to see a developer put off fully functional content simply because it decides DLC would be a nifty way to monetize the game even further, I can get behind cases where I'm absolutely certain that what I'm paying for qualifies as additional content. The major Fallout 3 and New Vegas downloads come to mind, whereas cheap cash-ins would be Fable 3's need to pay for what essentially amounts to selective unlocks - like extra dyes.

Basically, what really bothers me is when a developer goes "See? SEE?! We stuck a big, fat hole in the overall experience right here and oh *sure*, you can hop right across it and keep on going if you want - but you'll always have this damned HOLE in your face until you fork out an extra ten bucks!"

What's fine, on the other hand, is stuff where the dev basically is saying. "Oh, you're enjoying the core content? Cool, here's some more if you'd like - but don't worry, it's not in any way needed for you to feel like your purchase is justified. This is our way of saying thanks, we're not trying to fleece cash out of your pockets."

A game that got it right would be Oblivion or Fallout 3, minus the Horse Armor scandal. Someone who gets it woefully wrong would be EA, especially with how Dragon Age: Origins handled DLC.

"You wanna help me do X or complete quest Y? Sure thing, just COUGH UP THE CASH, FIRST!"

That... Was a delicious, delicious failure. Seeing DA:O's DLC guy for the first time and realizing the sort of con EA was running was both hilarious and painfully sad. Needless to say, I stuck to my guns and the vanilla content.
 

Twilight_guy

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So, If you don't like a companies policy then be a dick to their policy until they change it? What ever happened to angry letters and protests like not buying the game? Oh well, I guess it's still non-violent, so whatever.

I don't have a problem with it. In fact the zealotry on both sides of the issue has encouraged me to ignore everyone's arguments because of how stupidly adamant people can be.
 

Epona

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I would imagine jail-breaking refers to unlocking locked content. Makes perfect sense to me.
 

DeadlyYellow

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Wandering_Demon888 said:
True but complete package versions of games don't come out until months or almost a year after it's been released. Or some games just don't produce complete packages even after they've been released. Call of Duty is good example of this. They have yet to produce a Call of Duty game with all DLC maps already included on the disc.
I could make the point that there's no need to, what with the series being a such a massive cash cow, having a new iteration released every year, etcetera etcetera. Although I'm having trouble thinking of an EA or Activision game that does release complete editions. Mine are from other publishers: 2K, Rockstar, Bethesda...

Though I can't really see myself buying a complete Call of Duty game for that matter. I predominately favor single-player, to which the DLC adds nothing of value. It's a really bizarre case, as I originally got the games to play with a few friends. The multiplayer couldn't hold my interest very well and the entire series just seems an exercise in eye strain, meaning the games were quickly shelved and forgotten. Hell, I just started going through the campaign on Modern Warfare 2, but that's more for trophy collecting.
 

Wandering_Demon888

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Crono1973 said:
I would imagine jail-breaking refers to unlocking locked content. Makes perfect sense to me.
That's my point why keep paying for something when you've already paid for it? If it's not an online upkeep fee why you gotta keep paying for something that's supposedly yours?
 

Epona

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Wandering_Demon888 said:
Crono1973 said:
I would imagine jail-breaking refers to unlocking locked content. Makes perfect sense to me.
That's my point why keep paying for something when you've already paid for it? If it's not an online upkeep fee why you gotta keep paying for something that's supposedly yours?
DLC that's on the disc would be no different that DLC that isn't on a disc except for the fact that the data was finished before the game went to press and should therefore not be considered DLC at all but rather part of the game.

I think ahead and realize that if we allow this to happen, we will begin seeing entire levels and maybe even endings locked just because the publishers can get away with it. You will be buying games in pieces but the initial investment will not decrease.

As for online upkeep. Why are people paying for Live if that isn't covering the "online" upkeep of p2p gaming?
 

Owyn_Merrilin

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Crono1973 said:
As for online upkeep. Why are people paying for Live if that isn't covering the "online" upkeep of p2p gaming?
For the same reason Microsoft charges for Live in the first place: because people will pay it. Seriously, neither Xbox Live nor the online infrastructure for pretty much anything short of an MMO involves upkeep fees so high that the customer needs to be charged for it -- and as a matter of fact, all of the heavy lifting is done by the consumers, on the internet connection that they pay yet another company for. Even with MMOs, the profit margin on that $10-$15 a month is huge; Blizzard is making a fortune on WoW because the average user is paying them $15 a month and costing them something more on the order of $1. It's all about what you can convince people to pay.

OT: I fully support any methods that unlock locked content that's on a disc I paid for. The way I see it, it's no different from going through the data files to find stuff that was on disc, but not added to the final game -- anyone remember the Andyfall mod for Daggerfall? It was exactly what the OP is talking about, except that Bethesda never intended to sell that stuff as an expansion pack, it was just some partially completed data files that an intrepid modder added back into the game.
 

Wandering_Demon888

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Owyn_Merrilin said:
Crono1973 said:
As for online upkeep. Why are people paying for Live if that isn't covering the "online" upkeep of p2p gaming?
For the same reason Microsoft charges for Live in the first place: because people will pay it. Seriously, neither Xbox Live nor the online infrastructure for pretty much anything short of an MMO involves upkeep fees so high that the customer needs to be charged for it -- and as a matter of fact, all of the heavy lifting is done by the consumers, on the internet connection that they pay yet another company for. Even with MMOs, the profit margin on that $10-$15 a month is huge; Blizzard is making a fortune on WoW because the average user is paying them $15 a month and costing them something more on the order of $1. It's all about what you can convince people to pay.

OT: I fully support any methods that unlock locked content that's on a disc I paid for. The way I see it, it's no different from going through the data files to find stuff that was on disc, but not added to the final game -- anyone remember the Andyfall mod for Daggerfall? It was exactly what the OP is talking about, except that Bethesda never intended to sell that stuff as an expansion pack, it was just some partially completed data files that an intrepid modder added back into the game.
I completely agree with you. It would be the same as like if someone sold you a car and told you the radio and the four tires would be an extra fee for the car you just paid for. Which would just sound ridiculous. It almost seems like to a certain degree that DLC is simply a euphemism for the term "hidden fee" in the world of videogames anyway...
 

Space Spoons

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The gaming community has allowed this DLC thing to get completely out of hand, and if even jailbreaking became more of a common thing, it's still going to continue to get worse. I believe it will take nothing less than a second Great Videogame Crash to curb this insanity.
 

Wandering_Demon888

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Space Spoons said:
The gaming community has allowed this DLC thing to get completely out of hand, and if even jailbreaking became more of a common thing, it's still going to continue to get worse. I believe it will take nothing less than a second Great Videogame Crash to curb this insanity.
Yeah something like that just might happen...Or worst case scenario, if they keep on with this DLC scheming given enough time on a long enough timeline, people just might start treating it like we do movies and music these days.

People are going to start looking for "alternative methods" to get their DLC. It won't be until some gamer(s) finds a way to start passing around his/her DLC to other gamers, that game companies will start have concern about it. By then game companies will start looking at the gamers like they're the bad guys for actually doing something about the concerns they have been voicing about for so long....
 

Space Spoons

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Wandering_Demon888 said:
Space Spoons said:
The gaming community has allowed this DLC thing to get completely out of hand, and if even jailbreaking became more of a common thing, it's still going to continue to get worse. I believe it will take nothing less than a second Great Videogame Crash to curb this insanity.
Yeah something like that just might happen...Or worst case scenario, if they keep on with this DLC scheming given enough time on a long enough timeline, people just might start treating it like we do movies and music these days.

People are going to start looking for "alternative methods" to get their DLC. It won't be until some gamer(s) finds a way to start passing around his/her DLC to other gamers, that game companies will start have concern about it. By then game companies will start looking at the gamers like they're the bad guys for actually doing something about the concerns they have been voicing about for so long....
It seems like many game companies already look at gamers like they're the enemy, given how hard they fight to prevent gamers from buying games used or sharing games with their friends. The message they're sending is that "we don't want you as a customer if you aren't willing to pay $60-to-$100 per game". Not a great way to build a relationship with a userbase.
 

Wandering_Demon888

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imahobbit4062 said:
Wandering_Demon888 said:
imahobbit4062 said:
First off, that was a pain to read. Paragraphs are your friend.

Second, this has been going on for a long time, and also been discussed to death. No matter how many people try to boycott games or companies, it will still sell.

Third, can some please explain to me how hacking generated the term "jail breaking"? Surely I can't be the only one that finds that term fucking stupid?
First off, who said anything about boycotting games or companies?

Secondly the the term "jail breaking" sprouted out your generation's "epic" use of words to describe everything.

Third it sure as hell beats looking at the other 4000 Skyrim topics raping the shit out of the front page....
How else do you see a way to combat this type of practice? The only way they wouldn't get away with it, is if people did not buy it.
Sooner or later on a long enough timeline, gamers will find a way to unlock the DLC data on the disc they paid for. Or they'll find a way to pass on their DLC to their friends and other gamers. Sooner or later they'll get fed up with this ordeal....