Level treadmills...level treadmills...level treadmills! ! !

[Clive Howlitzer]

It seems like every game I pick up nowadays has some kind of level treadmill arbitrarily inserted into it's multiplayer. All a level treadmill screams out to me is "My game is so boring that if I don't insert arbitrary level requirements on everything, you'll stop playing it."
Am I really so alone in the fact that if everything is unlocked at the start in multiplayer, I don't really get bothered by it? In fact, I tend to enjoy all the options, so I can play the way I want and go nuts.
Although I guess lately it is so companies can monetize it, and try and gouge people like for extra money.
So, if you enjoy level treadmills in your games, can you tell me why? Is it a sense of achievement or will you really just get bored if you can pick from more than 1 gun or 1 class at the start?

This is probably mostly focused on Shooters, although it comes up in RPGs as well, especially F2P ones. Which I understand lock stuff to get you to pay, but sometimes its to an extent that it boggles my mind that anyone would want to pay. I guess I"ll add that it was trying Warframe just now that caused me to get annoyed.

Also, partially aware this is a dead horse, just curious to read the replies, if any.

 

[hazabaza1]

I guess it sort of gives you a goal in a mode with no real "motivation". It annoys me once it starts getting grindy, so that's usually when I stop playing.
Something like how Dota2 does it is good. Basically, you get points per match, (about 30-70 based on several factors) and every 1000 points you level up. And that's it. No unlocking anything per level (though cosmetics can be unlocked by simply playing), but all characters and such are available from the moment you press play.

 

[Zhukov]

I am ambivalent.

I generally don't play multiplayer all that much. I'll play for a bit and generally enjoy it, but the repetition and general pointlessness of it always gets the better of me. I will never understand those people who have played 1000+ hours of TF2 or whatever. I usually get bored well before 200 hours, and that's with the multiplayer games that I like.

An unlock system can alleviate that somewhat by giving a sense of progression across matches.

On the other hand, once I find myself grinding matches to get unlocks, I quit. There're better ways to spend my free time than filling up an XP bar.

 

[King Aragorn]

It's the sense of achievement for me, and that you have a goal for you to actually word towards. In alot of games, after I get everything, while I still play and can get some enjoyment, it's never the same as seeing your XP bar finally complete, and get a new toy to mess around with.

 

[Korica]

Really not into the shooter genre so I cannot comment on that, but from what I hear, it is pretty bad.

Now an example I can cite is Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, which is basically a melee-focused medieval version of Call of Duty.

There is unlocks in that game, but there are two key features they got right to make the unlocks tolerable.

1 - They are very easy to unlock. Get 75 Kills with an axe-type weapon and you have unlocked all the axes. Permanently. For all characters that can use them.

2 - Nothing important is locked from the start. All utility items are available. The only thing you unlock are different types of weapons, and none of them have better stats than the standard weapons, they just have different stats. Sure, the Knight's unlockable Maul is the hardest-hitting weapon in the game, but it is also the slowest - it does not hit that much harder than the Battleaxe, which is available from the start.

This is a well-done progression system.

 

[Delerien]

What i like about the system is that it kinda forces a sort of tutorial on you. In the beginning you only have the basic stuff and step by step you unlock one gadget/weapon after another and can test them one by one. It protects you from being overwhelmed by choices. Having said that it's often terrible done. Take CoD where you have to unlock everything again and again for every Prestige lvl and where sometimes very important/useful stuff is unlocked pretty late.