When Halo 3: ODST first came out, a friend asked me if I'd bought the map packs for Halo 3 beforehand. I told him I had, which emitted a huge "Ahahaha I bet you feel like a moron now!". So do I? No, not really. One of the big draws to ODST is obviously the second disc for Halo 3 multiplayer, complete with all map packs and the second part of the Mythic pack. While some can say that I've wasted 1,600 moon points on maps I just rebought, you can never predict these kinds of things before hand.

Fallout 3, Gears of War 2, Fable 2, Burnout Paradise, Star Wars TFU, Oblivion... the list goes on. Re-issues of games bundled with already available DLC is rapidly becoming a trend in gaming, and while I'd like to say it's cheap and easy for publishers to pump out another quick edition of their star game and package in a code for us to download the new content, it's not entirely new. Films have been doing this for years, especially now that DVDs are the standard and Blu-Ray is slowly but surely winning over fans. Music suffers from the same idea too, with anniversary editions, remastered albums and special editions released constantly. Extra discs of b-sides and rarities you can't hear anywhere else, and the only way to get your hands on them is to buy that album again.

Take Watchmen for example. Here you can buy the theatrical version, the theatrical 2-disc version, the director's cut, and coming this Winter is the extravagant 10-disc edition. Now think of the fans who bought, say, the director's cut on Blu-Ray, who are now caught between a rock and a hard place. Do they sell it and buy the ultra mega super 10-disc set, or leave it alone, or maybe buy both? In the end, it doesn't make that much of a difference. They have the movie, which is potentially the only thing that matters. It's just a question of how dedicated to the franchise they are to bother looking into the bonus material.

You can say the same for games and it's similar strategy. I haven't played Star Wars TFU, especially after it's less-than-inspiring reviews. But I can't say the Sith Edition hasn't peaked by interest into the title a little more. The same goes for Fable 2's GOTY edition, which I've looked into more. Both games I had next to zero interest in when they came out, but the temptation of more content all bundled up in one package does make me wonder if I'm missing out on something good. In the end all these "new-and-improved" editions are for is the passionate fans of the series, or late newcomers looking for all the material in one place. The only difference is that you can't re-sell DLC. So if a new retail edition of your favourite game comes with some bonus content just for them, it's understandable to be a little upset.

More and more I find myself looking at a game sitting on the shelves and thinking "Is it worth my money to buy this now, I wait for a potential extended edition?". 'Potential' is the key word here, as you can never know if such edition will be released. I have owned Skate 2 since it came out, and while the DLC isn't overly expensive (Bundled together costing 1040 points), the fact that I have to by those stupid Microsoft points in bulk makes them less appealing. So I've sat patiently for a retail copy with the DLC slapped on, but alas, nothing has been announced so far. The same goes for Borderlands. I already partially regret buying it, not because it's a bad game, because I absolutely loved that game. But because I'm betting it's inevitable another version of the game will hit stores once enough DLC has been released. So now I have a choice. Do I sell my copy of Borderlands, hold off on the DLC and wait for a sweet deal that might not even be released, or do I accept my losses and dive head first into the Xbox Marketplace.

I can't imagine publishers feel much strain from this. There's always a sense of urgency and hype that goes into a big game's launch, where people feel the need to buy them on the day of their release. I can't imagine the same publishers will worry if they don't buy an extended super-duper edition of the same game they just bought. Hell I'd bet those same people will buy downloadable content on it's release date as well.

So does it bother me? In certain cases, of course. You can't help but feel cheated after spending money on content that is now inexplicably cheaper to buy bundled from the shelves. But we sacrifice the cost for the time we spend with a game, and the amount of enjoyment we get from it. Downloadable content is, for the most part, extended material that is either used to tack on content for a single player game or give a multiplayer game new life through maps and game types. The idea of fretting over losing this extra content seems pointless, but it's still worth thinking about the next time you see a triple-A title on the shelves when it's finally released.