For the past 10 years a new trend has emerged in the gaming industry: downloadable content.
There have been times when DLC improves the gaming experience and other times it doesn’t add anything new to the gameplay and exists solely for making money.
One of the more notoriuos exmaples of DLC money swindling comes from Capcom’s “Street Fighter X Tekken.”
Upon purchase, gamers found that there were 12 locked characters on the roster. They were only available if you purchased the DLC for the price of $14.99 on the PlayStation Network. This sparked an angry fan rage all over website forums.
What does that say about how the gaming industry sees its fan base? It tells them that gamers will fall for their greedy marketing tricks. Most gamers fall for game developer’s “pre-order and you get this” tactic.
Another game is “Metro: Last Light.” This game revolves on a post-apocalyptic Russian society that habitats in the metros (subways).
Months before the game was launched, publisher Deep Silver announced a pre-order special. “Ranger Mode” was arrogantly introduced as “the way it was meant to be played”. “Ranger Mode” was just another difficulty setting that was not included in the game.
Afterwards, fans who couldn’t afford to buy the game on launch day, could buy the add-on for $5. Well if it was “the way it was meant to be played,” then why wasn’t it included in the $54 game?
This is the “trickle-down” of the gaming world. “We’ll sell some of the game(s) for $60 and then you can buy the rest piecemeal as we release it,” said EA, Deep Silver, Treyarch and other game developers.
Gamers who haven’t been crushed under the band wagon of DLCs or “season passes,” as they’re sometimes referred to, have to stand up to these and other video game developers.
