It’s Stop The Presses Thursday!
The announcement that Dead Space 3 has a microtransaction option was merely the opening salvo in what appears to be an all-out assault on your wallet by EA. The publishing giant revealed today, via Develop, that they plan to make microtransactions a major part of their strategy by including them in all future releases, at least for the foreseeable future. But let’s face it, much like an unwanted house guest, once these things get in, they are never going to go away.
CFO Blake Jorgensen, speaking at Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference, said:
“We’re building into all of our games the ability to pay for things along the way, either to get to a higher level to buy a new character, to buy a truck, a gun, whatever it might be, and consumers are enjoying and embracing that way of the business.”
He went on to say that EA has bolstered the manner they accept those payments by completing the transactions in-house as opposed to outsourcing and that this will allow the company to further reap the benefits.
One thing I would like to contest him on is the fact that consumers are “enjoying and embracing” microtransactions. I’m sure EA is making a nice bundle of dough on these itty-bitty sales, but I wouldn’t exactly say that gamers and consumer are stoked at the opportunity to have a multinational corporation bilk them even further. I understand the temptation of a quick purchase that would make your gaming life easier, but I really can’t fathom why people are so happy with parting with even more of their money.
The obvious concern here is that EA is going to start charging for things that you have no way of actually earning in the game. This reared its ugly head in a minor way in Dead Space 3, but it wasn’t too objectionable. EA and other companies have so far been very good about this sort of thing, but with this new revelation, it feels like only a matter of time before some major content will be locked behind a paywall. Gamers will be on high alert for certain. Not that they weren’t already.
What say you? Is this a reasonable way for EA to make some extra cash as long as they keep it optional? Or is this EA’s final form and the exposing of the darkest timeline, where publishers seek to squeeze as much money out of gamers as possible by withholding the goods? Comment now before we charge you for it!
Source: Develop
I’m sorry, but EA doing this is just invoking bad business practice towards consumers. It might line their pockets further but as you stated in the article, Anthony, a lot of gamers are none too thrilled with the notion of shelling out more money just to obtain something they should’ve been able to get in game. I realize I’m sounding just a bit opinionated, so you guys don’t really have to take what I said with too might grain of salt, I’m just not that big of a fan towards EA anymore. I’m certainly looking forward to what others have to share though. What say you, fellow Sushians?
As long as it’s not restricting actual content from me they can do whatever the hell they like. Day 1 DLC didn’t affect me so I’m going to happily ignore this until it becomes too great a force to stop. Then I’ll regret not saying those mean things about EA on all of those forums!
“consumers are enjoying and embracing that way of the business.” Who? Kids who’s parents let them use their credit cards whenever they want? Like I said on the Deadspace 3 post originally, I don’t care if it’s in Single player, because if someone wants to finish a game faster, then by all means go for it. But if it really is more fun to “buy the truck” than the shitty car they give you, that sucks. Give me the fun.
Eventually you’ll pay for hints like an IOS game or something. It’s just capitalizing on stupidity and lethargy. I don’t want to have ads in triple A titles, I don’t want to go up to a locked door and see “FIND THE KEY, OR $0.99 TO UNLOCK NOW!”. It’s offensive.
Wait.. They are really trying to do this AGAIN? I recall them saying something along these lines circa 2006, didn’t work then, can’t imagine it working now. All the more reason i want to see shorter, tighter single/multiplayer ONLY experiences for a lower price point
while people aren’t “embracing it” I do think people are coming to terms with it,and every one acts like micro transactions are this new thing they have been around for a while. I think it is just that console gamers are just now experiencing them,but if you look at PC they have been around for a while with games like League of legends and almost every free to play MMO so when I see console gamers shocked about micro transactions i understand but if you have played PC for the past like 2 years there is no way you could be shocked by the idea of micro transaction.Now I’m not saying I am for every game doing it but it doesn’t hurt occasionally for instance I suck at league of legends so I never get many IP (the reward you get for kills and wins that let you buy characters) so i can hardly ever use them to buy characters I’m semi decent with but because LoL also has micro transactions I can just spend 5 dollars for that champion so I can have a good time playing instead of just grinding for the points I need (about 1600).What I’m saying is micro transactions can work as long you DON’T lock content and don’t make it so they need to pay to win
Ugh, The Sims 4. Microtransactions. Noooooooo
Microtransactions were already part of EA marketing strategy, although not in a big way. I’m talking about the frequent expansion packs that EA release on a regular basis for the Sims games. Players have to keep buying new expansion packs to experience new features of the game every once in a while. However, this is reasonable considering that expansion packs take time to develop and they come with new features with the aim of improving the gameplay experience. But if microtransactions mean that people will buy EA games with limited features, it won’t be long before gamers start minimizing purchases of EA franchise games. After all, video game lovers want to buy an entire video game to get their money’s worth.
EA is runining the gaming industry nearly singlehandedly, I will never ever buy an EA game or product again for the rest of my life.
I torrent EA games just to spite EA.
Sincerly, Go fuck yourself EA.