Games-as-a-Service

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TedEH

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I think if you're actively thinking about DLC during development time, you're doing it wrong
I get where this is coming from, but I don't agree at face value. From a production standpoint, it's not practical to push that so far out. I tend to think of it more such that a game should be able to stand on it's own without that extra content - in a sense, if the DLC never happens, the experience shouldn't feel incomplete because of it. It makes sense to be prepared for what the DLC is going to be though - especially if the core of the game needs to be made to support it in some way.
 

Ordacleaphobia

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I get where this is coming from, but I don't agree at face value. From a production standpoint, it's not practical to push that so far out. I tend to think of it more such that a game should be able to stand on it's own without that extra content - in a sense, if the DLC never happens, the experience shouldn't feel incomplete because of it. It makes sense to be prepared for what the DLC is going to be though - especially if the core of the game needs to be made to support it in some way.

I'd say this is also a fair summation.
I know lead time for that is insane. There's a ton of work that goes into that that all takes time. I never really got too into working on games, but I did do some software development, so I kind of understand the development cycle that's working here and how vast it actually is. The bit I dislike is like the example I provided, where the game ships with the DLC already being 95% functional, tested, and...ready. There was no reason for that, that was transparent profiteering.

That brings me to the bolded line. Not only is this true, but there's an additional bit that I think is also important: "nor should the game feel cheapened by the existence of the DLC."
This is gunna be one that's hard to describe but I can kind of hope that you guys just get what I mean. Circling back to FFXV, the core game feels cheapened by the existence of all of the other DLC chapters. You could say "Oh, well just buy the Royal Edition / GOTY / Complete / whatever edition. That comes with everything!" But I already bought the game. I already bought, and played, the game. So now, if I want to really see the authentic experience, I need to pay. I essentially paid $60 for an ultra-extended demo.

This isn't limited to just story expansion either, because that can somewhat easily be wrapped up in the 'shouldn't feel incomplete' bit.
There's instances like Call of Duty or Halo, where they launch map packs. Guess what dude, your $60 game is only going to be functionally relevant to the vast majority for the first 3 months following it's release, because after that there's going to be DLC. If you don't want to pay for the DLC after those 3 months are up, have fun waiting 4 times as long for a game. Have fun playing with your other friends that did buy the DLC, too. Games like Smash did this the best where if you don't want to buy a fighter, your experience isn't lessened from where it was before and you don't feel like you're missing out. You can still play against that fighter. You just can't play as them.

Hopefully that makes sense. I think we're actually pretty close on this one.
 

TedEH

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nor should the game feel cheapened by the existence of the DLC.
Hopefully that makes sense.
I think that really is the core of it. Charging to unlock something on that's already on a disk you own feels like you've been had. A lot of DLC is created/sold in such a way that feels like a way to gouge your existing customers, as opposed to augmenting a product that stands on its own.

Even something like unlocking fighters in a fighting game kind of rubs me the wrong way a bit. Cause those fighters are... kind of the point of the game? At the same time, I'm not sure what else there is in a game like that to monetize outside of the maps and player. I suppose it boils down, again, to whether or not it feels like they were added on vs. stripped out of an otherwise complete product.
 

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Ordacleaphobia

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I think that really is the core of it. Charging to unlock something on that's already on a disk you own feels like you've been had. A lot of DLC is created/sold in such a way that feels like a way to gouge your existing customers, as opposed to augmenting a product that stands on its own.

Even something like unlocking fighters in a fighting game kind of rubs me the wrong way a bit. Cause those fighters are... kind of the point of the game? At the same time, I'm not sure what else there is in a game like that to monetize outside of the maps and player. I suppose it boils down, again, to whether or not it feels like they were added on vs. stripped out of an otherwise complete product.

I think it comes down to the spirit in which it's done, and whether it feels like a way to gouge existing customers, or augmenting a pre-existing product like you say.
Smash gets away with it because the whole game feels like a love letter to the fans, and you can tell that there's a never-ending pile of stuff they want to put into the game that this stuff literally just spilled over and rather than cut it, they want to put it in- but later.

If a different game tries the same model with only say, 12 fighters and 6 stages, it has a different impact. It's touchy. The funny part is that I don't think it'd be anywhere near as touchy if the system wasn't as abused as it is, lol. Even as a mega-cynic, 10 years ago I would have let them get away with a lot more than I would now just because of how sensitive I am to it these days.
 

TedEH

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Maybe to me, Nintendo doing it makes it sort of "feel worse". In my head, Nintendo is where you go for a game being a single one-time purchase for a complete package and that's it. Obviously, that's nostalgia talking, but still. Seeing characters as paid DLC in Smash makes me think "no, Nintendo, not you too. :("
 

Ordacleaphobia

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Haha well that's fair- tough to argue with that.
At least it seems like people are starting to get fed up with the more predatory practices. I've seen more consumer outcry in this past year than previous, hopefully things change soon. In the meantime, the classics aren't going anywhere. I should play through FFX again. It's been a couple years.
 

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As far as Games/software-as-a-service, I think it's a good idea to have it as an option, but I don't like it being the only option. Sometimes I know that I'm only going to get a limited amount of usage out of a game or piece of software, so in those cases I'm perfectly amenable to paying a subscription fee to have limited time access. Other times I know that I'm going to want to be able to use/play it for a long time, and when that's the case, I want to be able to buy it full-stop and be done with it. If I had to choose one over the other though, I would prefer ownership rather than as-a-service.

The main reason why a lot of publishers are going with the service approach is clear: profit. Especially from long-term users, it guarantees a steadier stream of income. The other relevant issue is piracy. If someone only has limited need of a piece of software, they're more likely to simply pay for it if they can license it short-term for $20/month instead of paying $700 for it. I think the company that really started to popularize this model is Adobe, and it's pretty clear why. For years and years, Photoshop was one of the most pirated software titles out there. It didn't matter that Adobe offered lite versions such as Elements for much less money, because people are wired to want the best, and they're not content to pay for a stripped down version simply because that's what they can afford. Now, I'd bet money that even current iterations of Photoshop are still being pirated, because the fact is there are people out there who will never pay for it, mainly people such as teenagers who want to learn how to create Photoshop art but would have a very difficult time coming up with $700+ to spend on the software because a) they have other things they need to spend/save on and b) because they're simply too young and inexperienced to reconcile the cost of the software compared to their head-view of what they think it's worth. However, I'd also bet that the subscription model does capture more revenue that they would have otherwise never received. I don't like it, but Adobe has stuck to this model despite the pushback for years now, so it's not likely to ever go back. I also still have my old copy of Photoshop from when I was in high school (I did some web development for them when I was in grade 12. They actually bought me a full copy for myself. I didn't realize until after I had graduated how incredibly weird that was.). It's ancient, as in version 7, pre-CS, but miraculously it actually still works. While it's missing some current features that have been out for well over a decade at this point (such as snapping text to a line), I don't do nearly as much photo editing or PS art as I once did, so it doesn't bother me all that much.

DLC is really dependent on the value proposition, ultimately. What we call DLC now is simply expanding on the paradigm of the expansion packs of yore. If it's a quality addition to the base game, I have no problem spending money on it. When I have issue with it is when the value is clearly poor, or when it's on-disc DLC that has no justifiable business demanding a surcharge.

There was a point in time where I believed that if a person couldn't handle their addiction to gambling, that person should be left to their own devices. That time has long since passed. Not only because these people oftentimes don't realize that they have a problem, but also because they're not the only ones who suffer for it. This is compounded by the fact that ours are really the first generations that are being "sold" games on an F2P basis, as well as free services from sites like Facebook. In the past, even when people paid for something, it was still treated as a vehicle for them to be advertised to, such as cable television and magazines. Instead of taking our money, now video game publishers and other large tech companies are offering their wares in exchange for our personal information, then effectively double-dip by commanding money for in-game luxuries such as skins. By lowering the barrier for entry and then getting people addicted before they start asking for money, they've come up with a far more insidious and effective way of monetizing our time.

When it comes to things that are marketed to children, this is unacceptable. Say what you want about it being the responsibility of the parent, blah blah blah. The fact is that a) a parent is not the only influence in a child's life, b) even generally good children will disobey good parents, and c) the brains of children are still developing right up until their twenties. It's basically smoking all over again. The minimum age for smoking (in Canada the law is that you can't sell tobacco products to a minor, not necessarily that it's illegal for them to use them, unlike alcohol) has been 18 for over 30 years, and yet teens still smoke. More importantly, tobacco producers managed to skirt around laws making it illegal to market to minors by advertising in ways that made smoking seem cool in general. They realized that they could make their product desirable for a demographic that they weren't legally market to without having to target them directly, and they're not the only ones. Pay day loan companies were pulling exactly the same shit up until even more recently by using colorful, cartoonish mascots, and now video game publishers are doing the same thing with the added benefit that not only is their product not associated with a massive social stigma like smoking, it's actually popular on its own. It's predatory exploitation, plain and simple, of a demographic that not only wouldn't know better, but also shouldn't have to, because, and I can't say this strongly enough, they're children.

When I was in grade 11, I read a story in the newspaper about how a girl around a year younger than me had recently been recovered from forced prostitution. Then in grade 12, I formed a short-lived band with some friends. As it turned out, the drummer was actually a friend of hers and had actually dated her until shortly before it all happened. As it turned out, she had been lured into a limo by what she thought were college girls who were going to party. The entire thing was a setup. She was kidnapped and driven hundreds of kilometers away and forced to work as a sex worker (now that I think about it, it's actually basically the setup from Taken, but this happened years before that movie was released, and also there was no Liam Neeson). She actually ended up getting really lucky, because a man who solicited her ended up actually taking pity on her, helped her escape her pimp and paid for her to return home. This girl wasn't stupid. She was just a teenager, was specifically targeted, didn't have the experience to recognize the situation for what it was, and was exploited in a horrific way as a result.

If you have a problem with this, but don't have a problem with children being exploited for profit by game publishers who knowingly target them using finely tuned psychological conditioning, then you need to re-evaluate your priorities, because make no mistake, this kind of conditioning can destroy someone's life just as effectively.
 

TedEH

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That's one area where I'll give the as-a-service model its credit - piracy is a tough nut to crack. As I get older, it gets harder and harder to justify any kind of piracy anymore (that, and working in a field that produces things that get pirated frequently). I've reached a point where there isn't personally an excuse anymore. I'm not in a position of lacking the means to spend on entertainment products, and I know a lot of people who do still pirate aren't doing so because they're broke. If it's not worth paying for, then I have no right to it. Obviously, not everyone shares that view - so inevitably it's incredibly difficult to keep products out of the hands of people who have no rights to them. Products like Steam are, IMO, great as anti-piracy measures. If your service is more friendly and convenient than the alternative, that's a step in the right direction in terms of rights management, IMO. I'd personally really like it if there was a Steam for old Nintendo ROMS - but much more complete than what Nintendo already offers.

If someone only has limited need of a piece of software, they're more likely to simply pay for it if they can license it short-term for $20/month instead of paying $700 for it.
Can confirm - whenever I need video editing software, I'll pay for a short time with premier or after effects just cause the free alternatives such so much in comparison. I would never pay $700 for a video editing program though.

too young and inexperienced to reconcile the cost of the software compared to their head-view of what they think it's worth
Sometimes it's not just the perception of that worth, but what the value of that software really is in certain contexts. I'm well aware of the cost of creating and maintaining software, but at the same time, I can't justify paying hundreds of dollars for one program. Someone in a professional context might be willing to pay it because it's necessary for them to be able to work, but it's not worth that to the average person, not by a long shot. I'd argue that Adobe's piracy problem was, at least in part, a result of their pricing model. I would still prefer to own a program outright - and I really hate the idea of paying for a program and then losing access to it later, but when you need it you need it. I would pay for the subscription before considering "alternatives". But I would never, as an individual, pay $700 for premier or photoshop or something. If the options are $700 or "...find another way", I'm going to find another way every time.

I can't disagree with anything you said about gambling. The biggest thing that bothers me about it is how self-aware companies are about it. And how much effort goes into masking what is really going on. And the refusal to outright call it gambling when that's what it is.
 

Ordacleaphobia

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Sometimes it's not just the perception of that worth, but what the value of that software really is in certain contexts. I'm well aware of the cost of creating and maintaining software, but at the same time, I can't justify paying hundreds of dollars for one program. Someone in a professional context might be willing to pay it because it's necessary for them to be able to work, but it's not worth that to the average person, not by a long shot. I'd argue that Adobe's piracy problem was, at least in part, a result of their pricing model. I would still prefer to own a program outright - and I really hate the idea of paying for a program and then losing access to it later, but when you need it you need it. I would pay for the subscription before considering "alternatives". But I would never, as an individual, pay $700 for premier or photoshop or something. If the options are $700 or "...find another way", I'm going to find another way every time.

Yeah, pretty much.
I remember when my mother wanted to get into web design in like the early~mid 2000s she straight up paid the ~$2,000 for the Adobe creative suite. I was a kid at the time so I knew it was a crazy amount of money but I didn't really "get" what it was for yet.

By the time I was a teenager and making alternative album covers for records who's art I disliked and stuff I pirated the absolute shit out of Photoshop CS4 though, no regrets. Because my first instinct was to pull up Adobe's site to try and get my mom to buy it for me and imagine my 14 year old shock when I saw that 4 figure price tag :lol:
So that was when she told me about how she bought the suite years ago and it all clicked. The nail in the coffin though was that we couldn't use that software she spent thousands of dollars on. It only had a limited number of activations, so it was just a dead disk.

So I pirated it. With conviction. My logic was that it's that expensive because people make it their careers, and since I'm just using it once every other month or so on a dumb personal project, that didn't apply to me (lmaoooo). Plus we already "bought" it before.

Of course, I didn't know this then, but turns out Adobe was more or less "okay" with that line of thinking at the time.
I have firsthand knowledge that their older pricing model was done specifically to account for piracy, even with the knowledge that the inflated price would lead to more piracy. Because Adobe knows that any professional / enterprise use of it's software HAS TO HAS TO HAS TO be licensed. And since it's designed as enterprise software (that's just really really fun for normal people to screw around with), they knew if they leveraged the license fee properly they could ignore piracy and still turn a reliable profit.

I don't really talk with the people I knew at Adobe anymore, but I would imagine that the pivot to a newer pricing model is because as the web expanded and people in general became more computer-savvy they likely realized that they could make even more money by netting in more casual users as paying customers as well.

This is also likely why stuff like WinRAR lets you get away with ignoring the "For real, you need to buy a license!" prompts (actually, I think WinRAR in particular actually confirmed this too). They know the average user doesn't care and would likely just pirate the program to get around the prompt. But businesses will buy a license 100% of the time.

Software piracy and prevention is honestly fascinating. I love reading about this stuff.

I can't disagree with anything you said about gambling. The biggest thing that bothers me about it is how self-aware companies are about it. And how much effort goes into masking what is really going on. And the refusal to outright call it gambling when that's what it is.

This...though...is not fascinating. The fact that EA's response to -a literal country- flagging their ridiculous lootboxes as gambling and regulating them as such is to publish a statement that is just the CEO equivalent of "nuh-uh" is an embarrassment to the entire industry. Blatant, blatant exploitative profiteering. The fact that they all across the board also straight up refuse to publish odds unless it's literally a legal requirement in that jurisdiction is also a complete and utter joke. Makes me sick.
 
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wankerness

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Here's the actual article instead of a summary on a site that really wants you to pay for a subscription: https://kotaku.com/the-past-and-present-of-dragon-age-4-1833913351

TLDR: DA4 was going to be good and self-contained until EA told them to start over again on a shittier engine and with an emphasis on "live services." I still don't really even get what that MEANS with single player games. Like, what's the difference between a single player game that gets DLC later (ie, all the mass effect games and DA games to date) and a single player game that's a "live service?" Is it purely that there's a calendar for the DLC?
 

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"this new version of the fourth Dragon Age is planned with a live service component, built for long-term gameplay and revenue."

:barf:

That article was a depressing read. I hate reading about cancelled games that had so much potential.
 

TedEH

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Like, what's the difference between a single player game that gets DLC later (ie, all the mass effect games and DA games to date) and a single player game that's a "live service?"
DLC is not really the same as "a live service". DLC is just that... DLC. A live service could mean any number of things - constant content changes, maybe saves that persist in the cloud or something, passes and lootboxes and things to provide an "economy" around the game could be called a live service, etc. Things that take an offline experience and force you to stay connected so that they can monetize your time usually fit into that box.
 

wankerness

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DLC is not really the same as "a live service". DLC is just that... DLC. A live service could mean any number of things - constant content changes, maybe saves that persist in the cloud or something, passes and lootboxes and things to provide an "economy" around the game could be called a live service, etc. Things that take an offline experience and force you to stay connected so that they can monetize your time usually fit into that box.

AFAIK cloud saving is tied to platform and can't be linked to a certain game, except I guess cross-platform saving?

What's the difference between season passes and DLC? Just that it's a different way of selling the exact same thing that is more likely to get people to buy it since it tricks them into thinking that it will all be worth getting and thus you'll be saving money upfront? Or is it a "live service" because if you buy it that keeps you following the news? I really just don't get how a single player game described as a "live service" is necessarily different from any previous single player games with DLC. Like, this term didn't exist way back when Bioshock Infinite had a "season pass." (that's the oldest game I can recall seeing one for) They just called it DLC! Future DLC. :p Is this just an industry buzzword that's been created to describe something that's existed for several years and has a nebulous definition but is used by all the out-of-touch execs to hype things up to shareholders?

Microtransactions on single player games confuse me, too. Like, those are obviously a bad thing and I don't think I've been tricked into buying one since ME3. But, how do they make something a "live service?" Just if they change offerings over time to keep people checking back?

"Things that take an offline experience and force you to stay connected so that they can monetize your time usually fit into that box."

This just...seems so nebulous. Like, how exactly is your time being monetized if you bought a single player game with a season pass and never buy anything further? What was the difference between what you bought and any other game with DLC, other than you bought it all upfront? Ex, I did that with Spider-Man, AC: Odyssey, Bioshock Infinite, and...that might be it. I bought DLC piecemeal or GOTY editions for tons of games over the last decade or more but no one ever told me I was a victim of live services till now.

Diablo 3 forces you to stay online, but has no microtransactions. It has free updates for new "seasons" that I think let you build new characters to get unique gear for a limited window. This sounds like a "live service," but how is time being monetized?

This whole concept confuses me. I'd be curious for some hard examples of things that are "live services" that aren't just the same things as the last 10 years with a new fancy label.

I definitely see how it is with like, EA's big sports franchises cause there's constant pushes for microtransactions that aren't purely cosmetic crap that's useless once you beat the game, as you CAN'T beat the game! But single player RPGs that aren't MMOs?
 

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AFAIK cloud saving is tied to platform and can't be linked to a certain game, except I guess cross-platform saving?
Not always. Some game do implement their own server based saves outside of the platform it's on.

What's the difference between season passes and DLC?
Season pass is just a marketing term. It doesn't necessarily mean one thing or another. It might be just DLC. It might not be.

This just...seems so nebulous.
On some level, it's supposed to be. In my mind, it's again mostly a marketing term. If you can just keep pumping out DLC and claim that this is "a service" to players, then you can use that term to throw a positive spin on what you're doing. It's not a word on concept that IMO has a firm definition, and it's not supposed to be.

Diablo 3 forces you to stay online, but has no microtransactions. It has free updates for new "seasons" that I think let you build new characters to get unique gear for a limited window. This sounds like a "live service," but how is time being monetized?
Most of the examples you gave aren't ones I'd call online services either - but this is a case that I would. If the world of the game is constantly changing to try to keep you engaged, then it's functioning more as a service than a static product. I also didn't say it's always monetized that way, but it often is.

That's, I guess, where I draw the line. If the product is functioning as a static product, it's not a service. If the game/product is more of a client giving you access to something that might not be the same thing 6 months from now, you're looking at a service.

Bioshock Infinite? Not a service in my mind. Diablo 3? A single player game with some "as a service" junk jammed into it. I also put any single player games with microtransactions in that camp. Full on game-as-a-service? Fallout 76 fits that category, and it speaks for itself.
 

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It seems so FUTILE for single player shit. Practically everyone I know just beats the last boss/level and goes "cool, I finished that one" and throws it aside.

I just don't hear of many of these hypothetical players staying in single player games over time just running around after the story's over and maybe the sidequests are done if they're achievement hunters. I guess if the games are built from the ground up as functionally MMOs with content patches (ie, it's not really a game meant to be beaten, the whole point is the endgame)? Diablo 3, Monster Hunter World, Borderlands, etc - coincidentally most of those are designed to be multiplayer!

With games like, I dunno, Persona 5 or The Witcher 3 or Nier Automata or Horizon Zero Dawn, most people just hit the end and say they're done, except people who loved them enough to fully replay them. And I'd say, same deal with any game that is being referred to as a "live service" game in which the DLC cycle has run its course, ex Assassins Creed Origins or Odyssey - people just boot them up if there's new DLC they want to buy, beat that, and close it again just as any "regular" single player game. It's not like the presence of microtransactions makes them play it for longer!

How is the studio benefiting more from the "live service" category? It seems like they'd actually be LOSING money with them if there aren't microtransactions as with the former category they just could dump out the game and be done with it and put everyone on their next project.

I guess they're big studios so they just saw the monstrous success of...something, I don't even know what, and are trying to chase it. Like DC with its catastrophic attempt to force the DCEU without understanding anything about why the Marvel one worked. Maybe this "live service" bubble will just pop soon and leave behind a bunch of old games that have some odd features embedded in them.

Hooray for late capitalism!
 

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How is the studio benefiting more from the "live service" category? It seems like they'd actually be LOSING money with them if there aren't microtransactions
When a studio says "we're moving towards a live service model", they absolutely mean microtransactions or some other form of continuous monetization. That's the whole point of it. They don't mean "we're gonna update the game for free forever for the people who paid once for it".

You're absolutely right about the idea of a lot of people just tossing a game aside when they're done with it. And those are very different experiences than the kinds of games that lend themselves to newer monetization models. I'm worried that good standalone single player games are at a risk of not being made anymore in AAA spaces.
 

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When a studio says "we're moving towards a live service model", they absolutely mean microtransactions or some other form of continuous monetization. That's the whole point of it. They don't mean "we're gonna update the game for free forever for the people who paid once for it".

You're absolutely right about the idea of a lot of people just tossing a game aside when they're done with it. And those are very different experiences than the kinds of games that lend themselves to newer monetization models. I'm worried that good standalone single player games are at a risk of not being made anymore in AAA spaces.

I just still find this whole thing a giant question mark. Like, can you explain exactly what you think a "live service" version of Dragon Age 4 will look like vs what it would have looked like in the first place? Obviously they're, objectively, being told to restart the project with an emphasis towards live services, but what do you think it is exactly that had to be changed so severely to become "live service"-ready that they couldn't just shoehorn into what they were already doing? I legitimately don't get it at all and can't think of anything. AC: Odyssey, a game I've seen disparaged as "live service," plays just like a damn Bioware RPG with a true beginning, middle, and end in the base game and the microtransactions are things like tons of cosmetics, weapons, and then in-game currency/exp boosts that don't do anything other than let you skip lots of sidequests to get to the end faster. With THAT model, it doesn't seem like there's any conceivable reason a Bioware RPG would have to be razed and rebuilt to allow for that kind of thing. Clearly EA has a different idea than Ubisoft? Or it's primarily an engine thing with their mandating of Frostbite?
 

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When a studio says "we're moving towards a live service model", they absolutely mean microtransactions or some other form of continuous monetization. That's the whole point of it. They don't mean "we're gonna update the game for free forever for the people who paid once for it".

You're absolutely right about the idea of a lot of people just tossing a game aside when they're done with it. And those are very different experiences than the kinds of games that lend themselves to newer monetization models. I'm worried that good standalone single player games are at a risk of not being made anymore in AAA spaces.

They will be, just by particular studios that excel at them, and not under the EA umbrella that doesn't realize that single player games don't lend themselves to the same simple DLC as a multiplayer game.

So, congrats to all you PS4 owners who will get to play them
 


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