DDappallooza
Before this year, my purchase of Digital Download content was rather restrained with only some CoD multiplayer maps and a few cheap XBLA games and a Guitar hero song or two. Somehow this year, I’ve gone nuts for DLC and download titles. It never really hit me that the revolution has overtaken me and I’m hip-deep in this shit.
There’ve been Singstar tracks, Guitar Hero Tracks, one Fallout DLC pack, two Call of Duty World at War map packs, Halo 3 maps, Burnout Paradise add-ons, Grand Theft Auto TLAD. But then there’s also Battlefield 1943, Shadow Complex and Trials HD and Peggle and World of Goo. Suddenly, that purchase of the 120 GB Hard Drive doesn’t seem so extravagant. Expensive, yes. but worth it. No more juggling and deleting crap to make room.
Gears of War 12 reportedly cost $12 million dollars to make. Shadow Complex, however) would have been a fraction of that, even with the costs of licensing the Unreal 3 engine. Shadow Complex may be a small game from a small developer (recently acquired by Epic) but its managed to make a big stink with people complaining about author Orson Scott Card’s involvement with the game. Battlefield 1943 managed 600 000 downloads in its first few weeks, an amazing feat for a DD-only title. And Trials HD has every dick on my friends list beating my measly scores. DD on consoles has come of age. By come of age, I mean draining my wallet of space bucks.
DD on PC has fewer barriers to entry but a different type of dynamic. Paid DLC- such as map packs is not as prevalent. You tend to have more of the expansion pack mentality- where you still need the original game in order to play, plus the expectation of free maps and updates for some titles. The microtransaction element, that was introduced to consoles this generation is standard practice in Asia. Many games are free to play with either ads or microtransactions paying the developers and publishers for their efforts. EA has tried this with Battlefield Heroes (micro payments) and id with Quake Live (ads). You can buy a silly hat for your in-game character or a gun that shoots chocolate death. EA tried small paid map pack expansions for Battlefield 2, but theses merely fragmented the player-base between the haves and have-nots. Lousy Have-nots ruining my BF buzz.
Nowadays, you don’t even need a game in order to buy stuff that has no bearing on the game. Sony Home is the ultimate in this regard. You pay for shit to decorate a virtual apartment that does nothing. Buy designer costumes for your avatars. Now we have 360 Avatars with lightsabers- lightsabers that cost more than many XBLA titles did when the 360 was launched in 2005. AND I’M SERIOUSLY THINKING OF GETTING A LIGHTSABER SO I CAN BE COOL. So we’ve come a long way from the days when Oblivion’s Horse Armour and EA Sports pay-for-cheats where the hot topics for gamers.
Of course, PC gamers have had it pretty good with free updates over the years. Of course that means Valve these days since Activision have more or less ignored the huge player base of Call of Duty 4 in regards to DLC and expansions, a mistake they’ve readily admitted while Treyarch’s been breaking records with WaW’s three map packs. PC gamers have been so spoiled that when Valve attempted to release a sequel to Left 4 Dead a year after the original, some vocal fans feared it would mean the end of DLC for their beloved game. They even started petitions to have Valve make L4D2 DLC for the original game. Top tip- don’t buy it if you don’t like it.
Here’s the catch. There’s been a fair bit of my DLC Odyssey that I regret buyuing. And of course, I can’t sell it on. I wish I had resisted the temptation to pick up Penny Arcade Ep 1, The Burnout DLC (thanks PS3 region coding on DLC), the Halo maps (since they’ll be part of ODST) and Grand Theft Auto Lost and Damned. I’d probably have enjoyed that more if I had played it before Infamous and Red Faction but them’s the breaks. I’m sure many people bought hyped up games and then thought “hmmmm.” Thank Christ i didn’t lay down money (Real or Microsoft points) for any game that picks an animal out of a zoo directory and sticks the word ‘space’ on the front.
So while EA might be looking at the numbers for BF1943, how many of those customers will return for more maps that are almost guaranteed to trickle out of EA over the coming months? Bethesda have said their five expansions for Fallout 3 are the last they will release (never mind how much it costs to but the game and then all of the DLC). Mass Effect 2 is coming out early in 2010 yet EA and Bioware are just now releasing the second DLC campaign for Mass Effect the original. DLC is all over the place and its still unpredictable. Apart from Ubisoft trying to sell you the end of Price of Persia. Dicks!
