I'm not even surprised anymore.

[owsf2000]

In fact I'm sure I called it years ago.

This is just insane. $260 dollars of DLC. The game isn't even released yet (Although will be this week or next or something I think.)

Some people have mentioned that you need to buy some of that DLC just to complete a tour/season in the game.

For a golf game, the tour season is basically akin to "story mode". So essentially the ending has been gutted from the game to be sold back to you separately. Again, this is assuming what people are saying is true.

Regardless. $260 dollars of DLC for what will be a 60 dollar GOLF GAME. To get the full game, you have to pay 320 dollars. (plus tax where applicable.)

And people wonder why I seem to have all the patience in the world with buying into the current generation consoles.

I'm getting flashbacks to this already. We're not there yet, but we're well on our way!

Comments

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Wow, it's EA. Why am I not at all surprised by that.

$260 worth of DLC for any game, let alone a golf game, released at any time, let alone at or before release of the game, is beyond the pale. This kind of crap needs to stop, but unfortunately I'm sure there will be plenty enough people who will buy it all up such that EA and others get the mistaken idea that this is acceptable.

"Some of the DLC simply unlocks portions of the game that you would otherwise have to play to unlock"

This is the most retarded bit of all, though this is definitely not the first game to do something like this. Basically, if you're lazy, you can just fork over some dough to unlock stuff rather than bothering with such trifles as, you know, playing the damn game. It's like that dog potion in Fable III. You can actually play the game and find items that will power up the dog in the game... or you can just pay money IRL to the in-game DLC store in the Sanctuary and buy a potion that will max out all of his stats right at the very beginning. I have to ask again, what the hell is the point of stuff like this (aside from the obvious response of "because the game companies are incredibly greedy and many gamers are incredibly lazy and braindead")?

I mean, this is as retarded as people who pay other people to play WoW for them (http://wow.joystiq.com/2007/09/29/why-would-you-want-someone-else-to-play-a-game-for-you/), except worse because it's being facilitated by the game companies themselves, rather than just a stupid under-the-table deal between players.

[hikarugenji.livejournal.com]

This is the most retarded bit of all, though this is definitely not the first game to do something like this.

I still think that's preferable to stuff that's already on the disc but you have to pay to unlock, and that's the only way to unlock it. I wouldn't personally pay for this or those XP/gold DLCs, but at least I don't feel like it hurts my own enjoyment of the game. (At least, not at present -- I have yet to play a game that was designed to be so difficult as to force you to buy the XP upgrades.)

Well, if the companies keep doing dumb stuff like this I think there will be an inevitable backlash. Or so we would hope.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Or so we would hope, indeed.

But the era of DLC with a price-tag has been going on for at least 5 years now* (e.g. Horse Armor (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Horse_Armor_Pack) was one of the first times I'd ever personally heard the term "DLC" being bandied about, and that was released on April 3, 2006**), and aside from people ranting about the whole thing in blogs and the occasional tsk-tsking from game news sites (when they aren't being cheerleaders for it, that is), it shows absolutely no signs of slowing down any time soon. If anything it's only been gaining more and more momentum as time passes.

* - Though apparently it's been closer to 10, since Wikipedia claims (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downloadable_content) that "Microsoft was the first company to charge for downloadable content, with the 2002 video game Mech Assault.[2] (http://xbox.ign.com/articles/442/442554p1.html)"

** - I remember that because when it was released, some people just assumed at first that it was a late April Fool joke, especially since they were actually charging money for it. Keep in mind that this was the very first bit of official content for Oblivion from Bethesda, and was coming upon the heels of the tons of free official content (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Official_Plug-ins) that had been released for Morrowind. People just assumed it would keep on being free. Oh how wrong they were.*** At least for PC, anyway, since there was already some DLC stuff out for console games by that time, though I'm not sure if the acronym "DLC" had completely caught on yet. IIRC (though I admittedly can't find any sources for it at the moment****), someone from Bethesda at the time was complaining that they had to charge money for it on the 360, since Microsoft wouldn't let them put out free DLC on the 360, or some such bullshit, and that because of this it wouldn't be fair to 360 owners if they released it on the PC for free. Yeah. In any case, I'm sure it didn't tear Bethesda up too awfully much that they were "forced" to charge money for it.

*** - I was apparently a little bit more lenient (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/72993.html) about this kind of thing back then than I am now, since I ended up buying all of the DLC for Oblivion except for Horse Armor, though I ended up facing other problems (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/79222.html) with at least some of it.

**** - While it doesn't directly relate to the Horse Armor thing, I did find this (http://forums.highdefdigest.com/game-consoles-smackdown/5066-microsoft-doesnt-want-devs-put-out-free-dlc.html) and this (http://forums.gametrailers.com/thread/microsoft-s-limits-free-dlc-th/1114101) during the minute or two I spent searching for an example. Here's a gem from that thread in the first link: "Major Nelson put up some guidelines about 2 months back (after getting mass-complaints about stuff like Horse Armor in Oblivion) and within that, it stated every DLC within the first 30 days is free" No seriously, "every DLC within the first 30 days is free." Really? Perhaps this was true back in 2007, but it certainly isn't the case now.