Namco Bandai is usually the king of shameless DLC garbage, but Electronic Arts is going to give the Japanese publisher a run for its money. Its ill-gotten, blood-soaked money. Hot off the heels of its awful Dead Space downloadable content, EA is now offering ludicrous Skate 2 crap -- where you can pay money to have things already available in the game unlocked.
"If you are busy, or just plain lazy, "Time is Money" will unlock all locations, skaters and gear that can be earned by playing through Skate 2's career and online modes," claims EA, basically saying that the game will be played for you.
This is pathetic on several levels. First of all, paying 400 MS Points for stuff that's free is a bit of a sham, not to mention the fact that if you like playing the game, you'd be a complete toolbag to not want to earn the stuff yourself. Why pay more money to play less of the game? The sheer stupidity of this DLC is actually astounding, a situation made worse by the fact that I know some people are going to be moronic enough to buy it.
I just hope other publishers don't fall prey to such a greedy scam, which would of course rely on consumers not being idiots and encouraging it with sales. Paying for content that is already on the disc is stupid enough, but when that content was put their to encourage further gameplay, it shows just how little publishers actually care about videogames. Horrible crap like this makes me ashamed to defend games as an art form sometimes, since those in charge of the industry contradict that argument at every step.
Jim Sterling serves as reviews editor for Destructoid.com, head of the Podtoid podcast, and produces a number of news stories, original features, one-of-a-kind videos. With his passionate argumentative style, controversial opinions, harsh delivery, and dedication to brutal honesty Sterling is a name that you can't help but recognize.
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Contest:
10:20 AM on 01.23.2009
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Because if you need to use 400 points to 100% the game, you shouldn't even bother playing video games.
Pretty soon they'll offer DLC that will simply reveal the plot, all the twists in it, and the ending. You don't even need to won the game; just plop down 2000 points and it's yours. A-wheee...
Personally, I don't have a problem with this sort of DLC. If you don't want it to compromise your experience, you don't have to download it.
To be perfectly honest, I wish I could have done this for Smash Bros. Brawl. I didn't enjoy the single player game enough to finish it, but I wanted to be able to use some of the unlockable characters in games with friends.
I would have gladly paid a few dollars to save a few hours of my time to get to the stuff I wanted in the first place. Sure, it's cheating, but I'd feel better about a little cheating than I would about sinking hours of my life into something I wasn't really into to get to content I paid for.
There's plenty of people that would buy it though, and its kind of brilliant idea from a profit standpoint.
And certainly, the people buying that unlock are getting what they paid for!
What makes this less of a funk, in my mind, is that Skate 2 gear doesn't give you a buff or anything: its all skill based so far as online competition, etc.
I don't think I'd buy it, 'cuz I like my personal sense of accomplishment. But I can see this catching on for competition-inconsequential games, like Guitar Hero tracks and outfits.
Like they say, time is money, and some older gamers that just don't have that kind of time can still get in on the content.
At this point, I think there's not DLC beyond criticism
I mean, look at Tales of Vesperia. I love the game, but for a measly like, 100 points each I can skip hours upon hours worth of sidequests to get the alternate costumes for all my characters without the "bother" of all those silly and inconvenient ingame skits that add depth to the characters.
Similarly, when you can spend a mere 400 points on unlocking EVERYTHING in Skate 2, really, it just says, at least to me, that the devs would rather cater to the abysmally lazy to get a few more dollars rather than reward people for taking the time to play what is likely more than 400 points worth of time on gameplay to unlock them. If they undervalue my time that much, why should I bother buying their game when they obviously don't think too highly of me?
I personally wouldn't be so quick to chastise the developers for not caring. Theycertainly went through the trouble of designing the game, and there's clearly a passionate enough core of gamers (judging by the comments and article) that will play it straight and enjoy the full game experience. So their effort and care in design isn't lost on the people that actually care about enjoying that.
But for the geezers and jerks that don't give a shit about challenge, e-peen or appreciation of the craft put into game design, they can still get thier trendy in game t-shirts.
With the game playing market as huge as it is, there's plenty room for all sorts of gaming habits and values.
Is it stupid? Yes. Is it a shameful, corporate "greedy scam"? Not at all. It's just another way to leverage the game's content and turn it into revenue, which, by the way, is what allows designers and publishers to continue bringing new product to market.
As Tubatic pointed out, "With the game playing market as huge as it is, there's plenty room for all sorts of gaming habits and values." Not everyone can log 40 hours on one game to unlock every piece of in-game merchandise or every level. Whether it be work or family that prevents it, they just don't have the time. This is an OPTIONAL way for those people to be able to have the full experience, even if there schedule doesn't allow for the marathon play sessions that are required to unlock the content on their own.
Could they just make a cheat code available instead? Sure, but why shouldn't they have the option to charge for it? It's their fucking game.
It's obviously for people who don't have all day to waste on a game. It's not in the same league as charging £2.50 for the joke weapons in Soul Calibur 4 which are both worthless and easy to get.
I like skate because of the challenges. Getting it just right is rewarding and what you learn is useful. Even if you already know skate and have endless amounts of cash, getting this just because you can is insulting.
It's their choice and I wouldn't look down on someone for doing it.
If it becomes an issue where it is like "400 points needed to see the end of this game", then I think we have something legitimate to complain about.
Black Box is dead.
we don't feel like we're missing any of the game because we aren't losing out on the rewards....playing the game itself is the reward, we just have access to everything.