[Ogrekiller]

I'm sorry? You're saying it's *wrong* that someone publishing a game gets to define what that game is?

And you are saying that the person that is actually BUYING the game is?

[Femmeworth]

Why? Who would define it?

Ideally the developer would.

[mclem]

To get the full sfxt experience you will need all the characters (personal call because it is a fighting game and so many characters are unlikely to be ignored). This will cost say $80. People can decide if they want to spend this or not as they know exactly what they are paying for (in reality it will be cheaper due to price drops, but stick with me). But many only learnt this after paying our $60. If i had known, i would not have bought the game till the whole thing was available for purchase. Hence i am somewhat unhappy with the way it played out.

How many characters do you need to get 'the full Street Fighter II experience'?

[Skilletor]

And you are saying that the person that is actually BUYING the game is?

The person selling the game defines what it is.

The person BUYING the game decides whether or not that's worth it.

[Crewnh]

Mass Effect 3 represents great value without the extra party member.

Considering that Javik is arguably the most important party member in a heavily story focused game, no, making him as dlc was wrong. And that "great value" is debatable.

[DanielJr82]

Not buying this game out of principle. I'm tired of this practice.

[-PXG-]

Congrats gamers! In an era where you can select from a variety of legitimate complaints about publishers, you've chosen the most banal and asinine one to get up in arms about... and you won! Instead of being on-disc, your DLC will now take longer to download and take up more room on your hard drive, well done!

Why am I not surprised that you completely don't get it. It's as of you go out of your way bout to give a shit

[Ponn01]

What about if you completely exclude the theatre showing and compare the LOTR extended edition with the standard edition? After all, all the content's complete, they could easily throw it into the standard edition with just the cost of a disc.

The biggest problem with the comparison you are trying to make, among others, is that people were not ok with the double dipping of the Extended Editions either. Especially when they released the theatrical editons first on bluray. That was an extremely dick move and they got called out on it big time. So what is your point really then? They didn't hide the extended editions on the standard edition discs either and then 6 months later have your dvd player popup with the option to enter a credit card number to unlock it. In the original DVD release of Lotr they really didn't have time to cut the extended editions. Those releases were as close as you could get to legitimate after film work processing you can get. And thats ok, just like legitimate after game release DLC is ok like Shadow Broker or the Skyrim DLC coming up seems to be.

Ask yourself why you are not seeing this type of bullshit in other media like movies. Can you imagine the press and outrage people would be in if they released The Avengers on blu-ray and people got their discs home and found an option to unlock a directors cut or deleted scenes for only 99 cents to 4.99! People would flip their shit, why? Because your average person who doesn't do mental backflips to excuse their hobby or is in bed with the studios themselves can clearly see how shady and unethical all this is. Only in gaming.

[Femmeworth]

I'm sorry? You're saying it's *wrong* that someone publishing a game gets to define what that game is?

It goes against what the development team wants, presumably.

[Ogrekiller]

The person selling the game defines what it is. The person BUYING the game decides whether or not that's worth it.

The publisher is the only one who gets to decide what the game is worth. All the customer can do is to fork out what the pub thinks the game is worth for a product that they classify as what they (the pub) calls a "game." The only thing preventing this from being completely one sided is the fact that the costumer ACTUALLY owns the item that is of most value- the cash itself in the first place.

[toddhunter]

How many characters do you need to get 'the full Street Fighter II experience'?

The number of characters is irrelevant. There is no definition of how many a fighter should have, or even how much content should be in a $60 game. I am probably agreeing with you that any such argument is a waste of time.

But what is very real is my decision, weighed up against a number of factors to spend my money on a certain game at a certain point in time. Given the choice of:

* Pay now for $60 now, and an extra $20 for more characters later
and
* Pay later for $80 to get the "entire" game

I would personally, at this point in time given my financial circumstances, opt for the latter. Why? Well the money isn't really an issue, but time certainly is. I would rather be playing the full game with all the different options later, and playing something else in the meantime. I feel at the moment sfxt is almost 'half a game' compared to what it will be at some point in the future. Others may disagree, that is ok.

It is a personal call, sure. But these options were denied due to lack of information until it was too late. My only solution would be to not buy any game for a couple of months to see what the true plans for DLC etc are. This is not ideal for anybody.

[mclem]

Ask yourself why you are not seeing this type of bullshit in other media like movies. Can you imagine the press and outrage people would be in if they released The Avengers on blu-ray and people got their discs home and found an option to unlock a directors cut or deleted scenes for only 99 cents to 4.99! People would flip their shit, why? Because your average person who doesn't do mental backflips to excuse their hobby or is in bed with the studios themselves can clearly see how shady and unethical all this is. Only in gaming.

It's amazing how all those hotels haven't shut down due to people being enraged at the minibar.

[Skilletor]

The publisher is the only one who gets to decide what the game is worth. All the customer can do is to fork out what the pub thinks the game is worth for a product that they classify as what they (the pub) calls a "game." The only thing preventing this from being completely one sided is the fact that the costumer ACTUALLY owns the item that is of most value- the cash itself in the first place.

I get to decide what a game is worth to me. The publisher can say a game is worth 60 bucks, but the consumer is what decides that. There's a reason so many games don't sell well and drop in price by 50% two one or two months after release.

An item is worth as much as the market will pay for it. The consumer decides that.

[Haunted]

Capcom used to make 100% of a game. I think Capcom is still making 100% of a game.

So of course I'm going to be skeptical when they suddenly tell me they have 20% extra to sell me.

[SolarPowered]

SFxT was never lacking in quantity of content. The issue is one of quality. Capcom did a wonderful job of making people feel like they weren't getting a nice quantity. People buy stuff of questionable quality all the time. Capcom just made it that much harder for people to buy in once those 12 characters leaked.

DD looks like it'll be one of their more solid efforts, but Capcom is definitely in a rough spot right now.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

I thought DLC would be a pretty cool thing at the beginning of this generation--more of an a la carte choice where you could buy only the things you wanted and probably end up paying less than an expansion.

And yet, for whatever reason, hardly any of it ever ended up appealing to me, and I'd honestly prefer publishers just went back to big-ass $30 expansion packs every two years or so. It feels to me like they somehow managed to produce less significant content than they ever did for expansions.

[Ponn01]

It's amazing how all those hotels haven't shut down due to people being enraged at the minibar.

Keep doubling down on the bad analogies. Go make a game or something and keep ignoring your consumers. Thats always the best business practice.

[2&2]

It's amazing how all those hotels haven't shut down due to people being enraged at the minibar.

Ha! This gave me a good laugh.

[RDreamer]

Ask yourself why you are not seeing this type of bullshit in other media like movies. Can you imagine the press and outrage people would be in if they released The Avengers on blu-ray and people got their discs home and found an option to unlock a directors cut or deleted scenes for only 99 cents to 4.99! People would flip their shit, why? Because your average person who doesn't do mental backflips to excuse their hobby or is in bed with the studios themselves can clearly see how shady and unethical all this is. Only in gaming.

You absolutely do see stuff like this in other mediums. Yeah it's not exactly the same, but that's because the tech. isn't really there. There isn't an easy way to lock thing out of movies, because there isn't one or two standards like there are in gaming (Microsoft's Live and Sony's PSN). But there are examples of things being held back for more money. Going back as long as there has been albums, pretty much, bands (and labels) have held back songs that were recorded at the same time as everything else to put on singles or special editions or special store versions. And no one really bats an eye. And in other avenues where things are able to be locked behind paywalls, like with apps, people don't give a shit there either. The average person doesn't do your mental backflips to be outraged by shit that doesn't matter to them. What matters is whether they're getting their money's worth or not, not when something was made or where it was sectioned off. And every average person I've talked to really doesn't give a shit about gaming DLC or where it's located, either. Most of my 'average gamer' friends are just excited to get moregame. If the game they bought in the first place doesn't have enough content they'll be angry about that, but not about some DLC and when it was made.

[Femmeworth]

You absolutely do see stuff like this in other mediums. Yeah it's not exactly the same, but that's because the tech. isn't really there. There isn't an easy way to lock thing out of movies, because there isn't one or two standards like there are in gaming (Microsoft's Live and Sony's PSN). But there are examples of things being held back for more money. Going back as long as there has been albums, pretty much, bands (and labels) have held back songs that were recorded at the same time as everything else to put on singles or special editions or special store versions. And no one really bats an eye. And in other avenues where things are able to be locked behind paywalls, like with apps, people don't give a shit there either. The average person doesn't do your mental backflips to be outraged by shit that doesn't matter to them. What matters is whether they're getting their money's worth or not, not when something was made or where it was sectioned off. And every average person I've talked to really doesn't give a shit about gaming DLC or where it's located, either. Most of my 'average gamer' friends are just excited to get moregame. If the game they bought in the first place doesn't have enough content they'll be angry about that, but not about some DLC and when it was made.

I do. iTunes exclusive songs piss me off. >:|

[NeonZ]

Ask yourself why you are not seeing this type of bullshit in other media like movies. Can you imagine the press and outrage people would be in if they released The Avengers on blu-ray and people got their discs home and found an option to unlock a directors cut or deleted scenes for only 99 cents to 4.99! People would flip their shit, why? Because your average person who doesn't do mental backflips to excuse their hobby or is in bed with the studios themselves can clearly see how shady and unethical all this is. Only in gaming.

Isn't it actually the other way around? No one would blink at a separate disc release for the Director's Cut version of a movie, but an update like UMvC3 in gaming is heavily rejected by the current gaming public. It seems like the gaming audience in some ways is harder to please than the average person.

[MercuryLS]

Capcom has been so bad this gen that I haven't bought a single title from them. Fuck them.

[alr1ght]

It seems like the gaming audience in some ways is harder to please than the average person.

That's because games cost 3x more than movies.

[RDreamer]

I do. iTunes exclusive songs piss me off. >:|

Eh, a few people here and there do view it as an annoyance, but I spend most of my time on music forums, almost moreso than gaming forums, and it's really never a topic of discussion like this stuff is here. People really don't care. They know what they're getting on the disc, and they know what they're getting elsewhere. They'll buy it if they think it's worth it and won't if they don't. I've literally never heard of someone saying "I'm not buying their new album, because they have a single out with another song that isn't on it" like people do here with games.

[mclem]

Keep doubling down on the bad analogies.

But I haven't done pizza yet!

Go make a game or something and keep ignoring your consumers. Thats always the best business practice.

Actually, to get serious for a moment, highlighting why I'm so fond of the Kickstarter model: a dev's consumer in the traditional model is the publisher. The publisher pays them money for the service of developing a game. The dev is beholden to the publisher. They can make suggestions to the publisher, but ultimately they are likely to have to make concessions in order to secure funding.

The publisher is the one whose consumers are the gaming market. They don't believe that they see profit in a single boxed product at $60, so instead they look into releasing a range of related products at different levels of profitability - and if they're going to do that, best to plan for it from the outset.

I'm fond of Kickstarter because it takes out the bit that *feels* wrong. I like the fact that, under KS, devs are beholden to their consumers. I like the fact that there's no obligation to make a profit. Profit's what's shitting all this up at the moment - and we're not talking big profits, just trying to maintain the profitability of old. Devs generally just want to keep meeting payroll.

[MercuryLS]

Personally most of this DLC stuff just devalues a game to me. Either I feel like I'm missing out or getting ripped off, so it just encourages me to wait for a massive price drop or a "GOTY" edition or both.

Bingo. I've got no problem with post-release DLC that doesn't seem like content held back from the disc release (expansions to GTA, COD map packs). But what Capcom is doing here is scummy as hell.

[impact]

I love how on disc is in quotes in the title

[Ponn01]

You absolutely do see stuff like this in other mediums. Yeah it's not exactly the same, but that's because the tech. isn't really there. There isn't an easy way to lock thing out of movies, because there isn't one or two standards like there are in gaming (Microsoft's Live and Sony's PSN).

Stop right there, if its not the same then we are not seeing the same stuff in other platforms. You're basically just trying to bring up another analogy but in a different way.

But there are examples of things being held back for more money. Going back as long as there has been albums, pretty much, bands (and labels) have held back songs that were recorded at the same time as everything else to put on singles or special editions or special store versions. And no one really bats an eye.

These songs were not on the cd's or cassettes you bought behind a paywall. Music CD's have a certain set number of songs they can reasonably sell for certain prices. Thats why people weren't upset about Guns N Roses Use Your Illusion 1 and 2 and they were released at the same time. With the advent of iTunes and paying about 99 cents per song no matter what i would say that industry has actually gotten better with consumer relations since i don't have to pay 10 to 20 bucks for a whole album to get only one or two songs I like.

And in other avenues where things are able to be locked behind paywalls, like with apps, people don't give a shit there either. The average person doesn't do your mental backflips to be outraged by shit that doesn't matter to them.

Can you give a more clear example of what you are talking about? Do you mean all those free apps like Hero Academy or Draw Something or the 99 cent apps? And i'm not exactly sure Rovio or Robot has the same fanbase as say Capcom or Nintendo. The main problem in my view why gaming publishers like Cacom can get away with what they do is because their relationships have gotten so intimate and close with their base that the fans are emotionally invested in these companies.

What matters is whether they're getting their money's worth or not, not when something was made or where it was sectioned off. And every average person I've talked to really doesn't give a shit about gaming DLC or where it's located, either. Most of my 'average gamer' friends are just excited to get moregame. If the game they bought in the first place doesn't have enough content they'll be angry about that, but not about some DLC and when it was made.

Well I have a couple of the opposite anecdotes so I don't know where we go from there. And there has been how many threads about this and I see the same people so I don't think any minds are getting changed. If the content is good enough for you then thats great, i'm happy for you. Some people don't like the sleazy unethical slope we have been going down though so if you feel i'm wrong for not purchasing games like this and voting with my money I don't know what to tell you.

[HK-47]

same way that they could decide when starting Mass Effect to plan for a trilogy. why should they have any scruples planning for DLC if the base game is sizable and good? if Capcom were doing this on games that were skimpy on the content i'd see an issue with the planning of DLC, but i don't think anyone can make that argument with a straight face.

If ME3 was actually planned and not just "hey lets make a trilogy" they did a poor job.

[mclem]

These songs were not on the cd's or cassettes you bought behind a paywall,

Wait up: I thought earlier in the thread most people against this had established that it wasn't the fact that they were *on the disc* that was the problem, it was the fact that they were *planned and developed from the outset*. I think you might still be arguing against 'on the disc', while I believe RDreamer's point was about the development process; I may be wrong on one or both counts, though.

[Darknight]

So they deliberately planned from the start of a game's development to put some of the game's content behind a DLC paywall. What. The. Hell.

This is a losing battle for devs.

[Ogrekiller]

This is a losing battle for devs.

The real war hasn't even started yet. Sales are ultimately the deciding factor in this scenario.

[mclem]

The real war hasn't even started yet. Sales are ultimately the deciding factor in this scenario.

I suspect they already have been.

[Haunted]

The pizza place analogy was the best damn DLC analogy I've ever heard.

Damn that slice they took out.

[2&2]

The pizza place analogy was the best damn DLC analogy I've ever heard. Damn that slice they took out.

Eh, you can poke holes in any analogy you want pizza, or otherwise. There's not gonna be a true 1:1 if you start splitting hairs on these things. Personally I think the hotel mini-bar one's pretty good.

[Riposte]

What if the game is fun?

[RDreamer]

These songs were not on the cd's or cassettes you bought behind a paywall.

Why does this matter? Seriously, why? Why does the location of your content matter? So, it's okay if it's somewhere else and you have to go get it, but if it's located in a more convenient spot it's no longer ok?

Can you give a more clear example of what you are talking about? Do you mean all those free apps like Hero Academy or Draw Something or the 99 cent apps?

Doesn't matter. People don't really care in either instance from what I've seen.

Some people don't like the sleazy unethical slope we have been going down though so if you feel i'm wrong for not purchasing games like this and voting with my money I don't know what to tell you.

I don't feel you're wrong... I mean you can spend your money however you want. I do feel like you've got a crusade against something that will lead nowhere and accomplish nothing that you want and is based on some odd notion that you need everything all at once for only $60 regardless of budget. I feel like you want them to change to practices that make game development harder or more expensive and produce products that are worse. If you got your way, my experience gets worse. That's what I don't like.

[Ponn01]

Actually, to get serious for a moment, highlighting why I'm so fond of the Kickstarter model: a dev's consumer in the traditional model is the publisher. The publisher pays them money for the service of developing a game. The dev is beholden to the publisher. They can make suggestions to the publisher, but ultimately they are likely to have to make concessions in order to secure funding. The publisher is the one whose consumers are the gaming market. They don't believe that they see profit in a single boxed product at $60, so instead they look into releasing a range of related products at different levels of profitability - and if they're going to do that, best to plan for it from the outset. I'm fond of Kickstarter because it takes out the bit that *feels* wrong. I like the fact that, under KS, devs are beholden to their consumers. I like the fact that there's no obligation to make a profit. Profit's what's shitting all this up at the moment - and we're not talking big profits, just trying to maintain the profitability of old. Devs generally just want to keep meeting payroll.

I agree 100 percent with you. I want to make this clear, I can't speak for everyone else but i'm not like a raging nerd here throwing something upset. I understand perfectly the argument people are trying to make for developers on this issue I just don't think this is the answer they should be looking at and feel they are cutting off their arms trying to save a finger in the long run. And its just frustrating in this day and age to see integrity, trust and honesty thrown out the window with the attitude of "Well, we know they are going to develop this content that MAY or MAY NOT have been part of the game so lets just accept it" I just personally won't support that.

I support kickstarter for that very reason. It's a very easy way to weed out games that really shouldn't be made in the first place and hurt publishers profits so they feel they have to make it up by doing this type of stuff on their other games. And it makes the game development more transparent and developers more culpable for what they do.

Wait up: I thought earlier in the thread most people against this had established that it wasn't the fact that they were *on the disc* that was the problem, it was the fact that they were *planned and developed from the outset*. I think you might still be arguing against 'on the disc', while I believe RDreamer's point was about the development process; I may be wrong on one or both counts, though.

Call it a weird amalgam. I'm smart enough to know when i'm being nickel and dimed for content. What makes it feel like someone is twisting the knife while its in there is the fact it is on the disc, the blatant flaunting of it is hard to swallow. The truth of the matter is when you are developing DLC from the very beginning of a games development none of us will truly ever know if it would have been part of the game or not. Publishers and developers will never tell us the truth either way and honestly if they planned it from the beginning they themselves may never know either unless they have a portal to that splinter reality. In the end though it was part of the original game development and either your game was large enough to include it and charge 69.99 or it wasn't. I'm a much bigger fan of after game developed content because the game was out there, the developers got feedback and they had time to think about stuff and come up with content that really feels separate or an extension of the original game and not just cut content (example of good dlc ME 2 Shadow Broker or the upcoming Harley Quinn DLC which does look like an extension or epilogue.

[plagiarize]

The pizza place analogy was the best damn DLC analogy I've ever heard. Damn that slice they took out.

for me it depends. if we're talking about a small pizza and the price is such that i'd expect to leave full, fair enough. if we're talking about an extra large missing a slice that's the same price as a complete small pizza... well... then i really don't give a shit that they took out the extra slice to sell to me later when i'm not full, because missing slice or not, i'm getting way more pizza for my money than if i buy that 'complete' small pizza for the same price.

and that's what i think we're looking at with Dragon's Dogma, which is a 40+ hour game as far as i've heard, and that's not a 'do every sidequest' completion time either.

[CTE]

for me it depends. if we're talking about a small pizza and the price is such that i'd expect to leave full, fair enough. if we're talking about an extra large missing a slice that's the same price as a complete small pizza... well... then i really don't give a shit that they took out the extra slice to sell to me later when i'm not full, because missing slice or not, i'm getting way more pizza for my money than if i buy that 'complete' small pizza for the same price. and that's what i think we're looking at with Dragon's Dogma, which is a 40+ hour game as far as i've heard, and that's not a 'do every sidequest' completion time either.

Here is a video on how big the game is by that Robert guy.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5q3BJUgm-fI

[toddhunter]

The pizza place analogy was the best damn DLC analogy I've ever heard. Damn that slice they took out.

Except the pizza did not take multiple years and cost millions of dollars to make. As such the analogy is not valid in any way. Realistically, such an expensive pizza simply would never be made. Which is the whole point.

[Ogrekiller]

Except the pizza did not take multiple years and cost millions of dollars to make. As such the analogy is not valid in any way. If you can make a similar analogy with the same risk profile on the producer, then you may just have something.

But a million pizzas will cost a few years to make and millions of dollars to make. So the analogy is valid just like the minibar example.

[Crewnh]

The pizza place analogy was the best damn DLC analogy I've ever heard. Damn that slice they took out.

I still like Arby and Chiefs cookie analogy.

"True but Im trying to draw your attention to the questionable ethic of trying to sell a "whole" tray that is quite visibly not whole"

"I decide what a whole tray is, fuckface"

[toddhunter]

But a million pizzas will cost a few years to make and millions of dollars to make. So the analogy is valid just like the minibar example.

Not so. Each individual pizza will take about 20 minutes. If successful, this can then be reproduced a large number of times or production can be stopped or the pizza recipe changed at any time with minimal impact if the anticipation of sales or the market changes.

[ultron87]

I'm still pretty fond of the mini-bar analogy. The booze is right there in the hotel room I paid for!

[Psi]

The mini-bar analogy doesn't work because hotels never used to give you mini-fridges with food and drinks in them for free in the past. It would be more like a hotel deciding to start charging for the little soaps and shampoos and to use the ice machine.

I felt like adding my own bad analogy :P

[Slavik81]

Except the pizza did not take multiple years and cost millions of dollars to make. As such the analogy is not valid in any way. Realistically, such an expensive pizza simply would never be made. Which is the whole point.

Those differences are irrelevant. The absolute cost of creating the product does not affect anything that's being discussed here. They do not need to be of equal cost for comparisons of other factors to be made.

[Ogrekiller]

Not so. Each individual pizza will take about 20 minutes. If successful, this can then be reproduced a large number of times or production can be stopped or the pizza recipe changed at any time with minimal impact if the anticipation of sales or the market changes.

The game can be mass produced easily once the factories are up and running and once the game goes gold. True the game cannot easily be altered once the discs are printed, but that's the quirk of producing non perishable goods. Pizza recipes are not lightly changed and the potential loss of money due to large amounts of money spent on worthless ingredients make up for any change in market. Furthermore any change probably came with mass marketing and focus testing, both which can be very costly. One does not lightly remove all beef from the meat supreme pizza, as an example.

The mini-bar analogy doesn't work because hotels never used to give you mini-fridges with food and drinks in them for free in the past. It would be more like a hotel deciding to start charging for the little soaps and shampoos and to use the ice machine. I felt like adding my own bad analogy :P

Complimentary breakfast is now $20 a day. If you complain you're entitled. Oh, and beds are $10 a night too, on top of renting the room. Doing the sheets ain't cheap you know.

[Ponn01]

But a million pizzas will cost a few years to make and millions of dollars to make. So the analogy is valid just like the minibar example.

What about the hot dog stuffed crust pizzas?

[ultron87]

What about the hot dog stuffed crust pizzas?

Were the hot dogs planned from the start or added on later by a subset of the team?