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Driveclub's microtransactions explained, can pay to unlock cars early
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
Yeah that would be an awesome way to entice people to spend money, you should be in marketing.
SmoothRunningGun
Member
Microtrans don't belong in full priced games (sorry ko-taco). I can live with cosmetic stuff but things that affect game-play should be taboo. People who say it's not a an issue: how do you know they didn't artificially increase the grind to incentivize pay? I'll stick to the PS+ version.
Jackbooted
Member
Remember all the complaining about Dead Space 3's microtransactions in a full priced game that didn't even have a competitive side to it? Wonder if we'll see the same level here or if people are just starting to accept it now?
Spottiettiedop
Member
Has a price been announced yet? I'm assuming someone can purchase any car in any order. Can't say its reasonable until a price is given. Kinda curious how quickly "fame" is accumulated.
Cheesecakebobby
Banned
Just think how many of our favourite developers of yesteryear would still be around if they had thought of this instead of giving us cheat codes? All of them, that's how many.
Because this is not the world we live in. EA established this for racing games years ago.
I mean look NFS Most Wanted 2012 had all cars (except the Most Wanted list cars which you had to beat) unlocked from the start. You just had to drive around the city, find a car and drive it.
Even in that game they sold a time saver pack which just gave you all the spots on the map, the cars were already unlocked. Such a smart bunch the folks at EA.
Neuromancer
Member
Not unexpected, and not unusual, but I won't be needing this.
Hopefully the game doesn't bug you ever 5 minutes about it like some others I could mention. *cough cough Forza Horizon cough cough*
Hopefully the game doesn't bug you ever 5 minutes about it like some others I could mention. *cough cough Forza Horizon cough cough*
Dee Dah Dave
Member
Monetizing what used to be cheat codes essentially. This crap has no place in a paid game in my opinion.
Even if it's relatively harmless stuff, it's still devs spending time thinking up sneaky ways to extract even more money from people, instead of using that time to make a better/more complete/feature rich game for everyone to enjoy - in the hope that the better the game the more people will buy it.
Game design philosophy is not what it used to be
Even if it's relatively harmless stuff, it's still devs spending time thinking up sneaky ways to extract even more money from people, instead of using that time to make a better/more complete/feature rich game for everyone to enjoy - in the hope that the better the game the more people will buy it.
Game design philosophy is not what it used to be
Whatever.. atleast they reversed the psPlus crap, right ?. Because if they hadn't, micro transactions along with that would of been a right kick to the nuts. The timing of this announcement and the 180 gets me thinking..
Anyway, so long as its not some crazy grind to unlock the better cars, it doesn't bother me tbh. This sort of crap is to be expected nowadays.
Anyway, so long as its not some crazy grind to unlock the better cars, it doesn't bother me tbh. This sort of crap is to be expected nowadays.
ScepticMatt
Member
Jackbooted
Member
Thinking about this more, does this make the game Pay 2 Win? Couldn't someone just pay the "small fee" to unlock the best car and then just dominate the online racing? Am I missing something?
kinoki
Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
I used to be addicted to Tiny Tower. I completed the entire tower and got 3/3 dream workers. I never spent a buck doing that. However, after I was finished I bought some bux. Haven't spent them. Just wanted to give some money to the developer for a good game. As long as there isn't cars "on the disc" that I have to buy with real money to unlock I'm fine with this.
To the people buying these cars, Forza's cars and boosting classes in games like Battlefield. Really? There's two sides to this: firstly the developer made a game tedious by design, something that needs to be highlighted in reviews and gamer's post in |OT|'s and LTTP's; secondly it's something that's odd as a gamer when all you have to show for your time with the game is a transaction of money and less experience with the game.
I don't get it and I'll never buy it. But if it helps make the developer/publisher get some money from gamers who don't mind I can't say I'm at the gates protesting unfair practices.
To the people buying these cars, Forza's cars and boosting classes in games like Battlefield. Really? There's two sides to this: firstly the developer made a game tedious by design, something that needs to be highlighted in reviews and gamer's post in |OT|'s and LTTP's; secondly it's something that's odd as a gamer when all you have to show for your time with the game is a transaction of money and less experience with the game.
I don't get it and I'll never buy it. But if it helps make the developer/publisher get some money from gamers who don't mind I can't say I'm at the gates protesting unfair practices.
This is how I feel about the early unlock MTs as well. If the game isn't designed around trying to make the player buy in desperation and has a decent progression to it, then I don't mind since it's mainly there for people who don't have much time to play. It's the other extreme that really sucks. I just hope that the game doesn't constantly remind you of the option.
Couldn't someone just spent all day playing the game to unlock the best car and then just dominate the online racing?
See how stupid that sounds? Well yeah...
Erm, this still sounds like it can encourage them to introduce grind. I don't see how the incentive to have grind to encourage people to pay up isn't there.
You want that shiny new car that you have to work towards level 10 to get? YOu want to skip all that work for that car? Just pay this price.
Which means to the developer, if we make the work harder to get to level 10, it will be easier to press people to pay for the car.
I'm not saying that is necessarily what will happen, but it doesn't eliminate the prime reason I dislike MTs on principle and don't want to encourage them (I don't like encouraging MTs that by design encourage developers to put more grind in).
Now, if it worked more like DLC, "get this pack of cars that we don't offer otherwise", that would actually be fine with me. There's no encouragement to developers to put grind in because putting more grind in isn't going to push people more to buy those cars. (This is why I don't have an issue with DLC, it doesn't encourage them making the game worse in order to get you to pay). I should add, as long as those cars aren't overpowered and make it easier to level up to get other level benefits. I guess then even better it would be DLC to add in more tracks (more variety to the game and you can't make the track make it easier to level up like you could with selling an overpowered car).
You want that shiny new car that you have to work towards level 10 to get? YOu want to skip all that work for that car? Just pay this price.
Which means to the developer, if we make the work harder to get to level 10, it will be easier to press people to pay for the car.
I'm not saying that is necessarily what will happen, but it doesn't eliminate the prime reason I dislike MTs on principle and don't want to encourage them (I don't like encouraging MTs that by design encourage developers to put more grind in).
Now, if it worked more like DLC, "get this pack of cars that we don't offer otherwise", that would actually be fine with me. There's no encouragement to developers to put grind in because putting more grind in isn't going to push people more to buy those cars. (This is why I don't have an issue with DLC, it doesn't encourage them making the game worse in order to get you to pay). I should add, as long as those cars aren't overpowered and make it easier to level up to get other level benefits
. I guess then even better it would be DLC to add in more tracks (more variety to the game and you can't make the track make it easier to level up like you could with selling an overpowered car).
Canis lupus
Member
In the ign vid Rushy said it's like Motorstorm RC, which wasn't grindy at all.
How does it bother you that someone else is willing to pay money to unlock cars rather than race his way to it.
If it feels okay?
Methamatics101
Member
So, a time savers pack?
SwiftDeath
Member
In this instance for Driveclub and certainly Forza 5 after all the changes [maybe before even?] it is most likely fair to players unwilling to pay but it depends solely on whether the effort to unlock cars in this instance is unfairly made more difficult to encourage higher sales of MT's. I don't expect Driveclub to be unfair in that regard but it is the exact same problem a lot of people have with FTP games. If the game design is purposely designed around trying to get you to buy MT's then it can often make the experience while not being willing to pay for them unwieldy and unenjoyable
Again I don't expect Driveclub to be unfair to players in that regard BUT I do think it further reinforces the notion that non-cosmetic MT's should be the norm in a $60 game. And personally I think it is likely we'll start seeing these full price games with MT's start to move towards less fair MT's as the general practice of MT's in such games become more accepted
I'm very curious if a PS Plus member can purchase a car that's not conventionally unlockable in the PS Plus version.
ricardokenshin
Member
you mean playing the game doesn't make you better?
Maybe I'm a little late on this, I thought they said they wouldn't have microtransaction.
Like, several times over the course of the recent batch of announcements. The distinction between consumables and microtransactions for game currency doesn't seem strong enough to explain the shift.
Like when Rushy specifically clarified that you wont be paying for money which you can use to unlock tracks or cars in-game.
Like, several times over the course of the recent batch of announcements. The distinction between consumables and microtransactions for game currency doesn't seem strong enough to explain the shift.
Like when Rushy specifically clarified that you wont be paying for money which you can use to unlock tracks or cars in-game.
In this case, yes -- there is no difference between buying a car outright and buying coins that only let you buy a car. That said, consumables in general are a different (and worse) beast than this kind of microtransaction
Jackbooted
Member
Doesn't really address my point, person 1 spends $5 dollars as soon as they DL the game and has the best car in the game and then proceeds to play online and trounce everyone as opposed to person 2 that plays the game for 100 hours and then gets access to the car. It's the same model as any P2W game. Vanity item transactions are fine in MP games but when you introduce paying for actual game affecting items is where it gets murky.
I really hate this.
I get that people might want to speed things up and are willing to pay for it so companies want that extra revenue that doesn't cost them anything but I really hate that there's a way to get things faster by just throwing money at it.
If you have the money you can get advantages, or at least things that you couldn't have that early. I hate that this exists.
I get that people might want to speed things up and are willing to pay for it so companies want that extra revenue that doesn't cost them anything but I really hate that there's a way to get things faster by just throwing money at it.
If you have the money you can get advantages, or at least things that you couldn't have that early. I hate that this exists.
Canis lupus
Member
They should introduce a new term like that, because microtransaction is a wrong term with bad connotation to describe whats happening here. My first encounter with it was in NFS MW2012, EA was selling packs to unlock cars, there was no big deal, no big grind, no one lost their shit. I guess the term "microtransaction" hadn't found it's way into console gaming back then. Now everyone is super alert and overreacting to what's happening.
That's remarkably carefully-phrased. You're not paying for money which you can use to unlock cars in-game. You're just paying for the cars.
Impeccable
Member
Time saver packs were plentiful last generation, too.
Why is it wrong? It really is a micro (sized) transaction. Maybe the negative connotation is there for a reason.
djplaeskool
Member
If the unlock rate was similar to MotorStorm RC, then I'm okay with it.
MRC wasn't grindy at all to me.
MRC wasn't grindy at all to me.
Except that there never has been a game where it takes 100 hours to unlock said car and there probably never will be a game like this.
Especially with Driveclub only offering 50 cars it will probably take a couple hours tops just like in every NFS title.
As I said earlier that was some shady shit though because the game was designed in a way that all cars were already unlocked from the start, you just had to find them. All the time saver pack did was to show you the cars on your map.
flyinpiranha
Member
I would imagine there would be car classes and limitations to most races unless it's a free-for-all.
This really hasn't been an issue for a long time in racing games. I mean, with that outlook, what about people that buy it 3 months after launch? They'll be behind also. I don't think this is as much of a P2W because just like most games, the person who spends the most time getting better will beat the person with an unlocked car they don't know how to drive.
ricardokenshin
Member
yup, people have learned that developers will nickle and dime them to death.
are you kidding me? MW2012 was the worst microtransaction offender I've ever seen. A world full of cars you're supposed to be able to use, but when you try they hit you up for money
and there is a different word for the microtransactions that Rushy speaks out against -- consumables. There is no difference between the consumable in a game like Forza and the regular microtransaction in DC though. If you buys tokens in Forza, you can only use them to buy a car you want anyway. A counter example is a game like PvZ where you can buy coins that only let you buy random packs of stickers (you need a complete set to unlock a character)
The text of the tweet of your post.
@Rushy33 said:
There is content to purchase/download in the manner of paying to unlock cars early. And there is no option to buy in game currency or items that have limited use. I don't know what you're getting at with this one. Also, all of your news articles are just reports on the same exact tweet. The last one of which, used the direct link to Rushy's tweet as clarification.
boredandlazy
Member
Not quite the same as Forza. As I understand it in Forza you could pay real money for a car, but you still wouldn't be able to use the car until you spent in game credits(which you can also pay real money for) to unlock it?
That's what I've gathered anyway, if I'm wrong I apologize.
maniac-kun
Member
Fuck this in a 60€ game. 60€ are a lot of money and they dare to ask for more?
Get away with f2p mechanics in a 60€ game.
Get away with f2p mechanics in a 60€ game.
If they based the grinding on getting more people to pay for the cheat code then yes, it affects my gaming.
I don't like this...in general. If you care about people that don't have time or don't want to spend the time to unlock everything, then make the content open to start with. This is an old argument, but we pay for games so don't give me this "time is money" shit like you're doing gamers a favor by allowing them to pay for content instead of unlocking it because we see through that facade. "You need to earn these cars...unless you don't want to then give us $5"
Was a DLC car then and you played the game after all the DLC was already out and had none of that.
Every car in the base game was unlocked from the start.
You are wrong.