It's still a shitty practice but at least it's better than what Destiny did and is doing.
I'd say the content held back in Destiny was pretty far from meaningless. Withholding strikes from a game that was starved for content was extremely shitty. Both scenarios are crappy, I just think Destiny did it worse.
The amount of content in total that was held back from Xbox One gamers could easily equal to that of any DLC drop. We're talking strikes, guns, multiplayer maps etc. It might not have any significance to the games story but it was still a lot content nevertheless.
People think this is worse than the Destiny exclusivity deal? Wow.
Destiny deal was a lot worse because you had Xbox one and PS4 players charged the same for DLC but PS4 players got extra content for the same price. That was terrible.
This is pretty much the reverse of the black ops 3 deal. Frankly I don't really care about waiting 30 days. It's no biggie. Just a bit of advertising fluff.
A lot better than the FULL YEAR of Destiny exclusive stuff that Sony BOUGHT.
I mean, I'll gladly take 30 days over Destiny's 1 year content exclusivity, but timed exclusive stuff sucks and I wish it didn't exist.
I give up. Either people who claim this aren't familiar with the depth and/or context of the Destiny exclusive stuff, or you're being deliberately disingenuous.
All exclusive content deals suck and really benefits no one on our side of the discussion (arguably not even the platform holders themselves, but if they still do it for a reason). But if we're going to be claiming which one is worse then we can't simply look at the exclusivity window, it's not the whole picture.
Destiny did not exclude anyone on any platform from doing story relevant content, new gameplay modes or end game activities (the only thing that matters by the time DLC hits) or anything even remotely important to the game. Not for a single second after it was first available. It didn't put you at risk of being spoiled any story developments, nor kept you from enjoying fundamentally new ways of playing the game. It didn't outright stop or even slow down your character progression.
What it did exclude Xbox players from were things that ranged from cosmetics (armor skins) to contextless garbage with no end game scalability or relevance (strikes). The things that hurt the most to get locked out from were a couple of exotic weapons which had a place in the meta, and multiplayer maps. It's not nice to get locked out of things. I'm not arguing otherwise. But compared to The Division I'd rather be locked out of the equivalent than the current DLC deal.
In The Division, every non-Xbox player (presumably, I don't know if the PC is included) will have to wait for all the content, no matter the extent at which it expands the game or impacts it's ongoing story. If you don't want to be spoiled it means avoiding discussion of DLC in the community, which, unlike a traditional single player game, is something a purely online game like The Division thrives by. It means being locked out of end game content (agan, the only thing that matters by the time the DLC is likely to hit) until your Xbox brethren has gone through it and potentially figured out and mastered, which, even if you avoid yourself, will affect your multiplayer experience.
The difference between this and Black Ops 3, which are under similar terms, and the reason why the former stings a bit more is that Black Ops 3 DLC tend to be contextless multiplayer maps and modes and guns. Unlike The Division, they are not supposed to add to an ongoing narrative or persistent end game progression as befits something closer to an MMO than a match based shooter. Which isn't to say that Black Ops 3 is less of a sucky situation, but clarifying that both games affect excluded players in a different way that is intimately related to the type of game they are.
I guess I didn't really give up :/