The Malgorian Blog

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!

This is an article by Stan (A person who happens to post at Atari Age as well) taking a closer look at downloadable content for consoles that brings up the question as to whether or not it's really good for the video game industry overall. In particular, the views he tackles in particular are from the collector/gamer approach than the pure gamer approach.

I tend to agree with what he says, since I love having an actual physical collection. Proof of my purchase, and a far more solid reassurance that the games are actually there rather than on some corrupted hard drive/flash disk/etc.

One thing he didn't deal with however is that DLC is a bit more insidious than simply not being able to even get a game (secondhand or firsthand) 10 years down the road if you didn't buy it when it was first released. Sure you can back stuff up in some cases, but that's not always perfect either.

Consider Heavy Rain. A game that, unlike the DL-only Mega Man 10, has a physical disc that you buy. So for collectors, excellent! You can keep it! Display it! And 10 years later you can play it just the same as now right?!

Right?!

But Heavy Rain, like what seems to be an increasing number of modern games, has a lot of bugs in it. Enough so that on zero-day there was already a large enough patch to download and install that they packed in some origami for players to play with while waiting for it to download and install.

Ten years from now are those bug patches going to be (LEGALLY) available? It's not enough to say "I'm sure they'll do something to ensure gamers aren't affected when the time comes." Because that's nothing more than hopeful guessing. Unless you have some inside knowledge to the contrary, it's far safer to assume that players will be SOL since by then they already have your money.

So 10 years later you have your physical copy of the game and you go to reinstall it to play through it a few more times. At best, you have nothing more than a bug ridden game to enjoy. At worse, the PS3 might refuse to play it at all until you download the by then nonexistent bug patches...

I'm the type of gamer that:

1. Will go back years later and play through a game I've enjoyed in the past.

and

2. Buys so many games at times that it takes years before I even get around to PLAY it for the first time.

Seriously. I have about 20 games from as far back as 2008 that are still factory sealed. And many others before that which I opened and maybe played an hour of before getting distracted by the Next Big Thing that I was more interested in. (I do plan on getting back to Doom 3 at some point for instance.)

So what does this mean for me? It means I spend less money on current gen games ... period. Last thing I want to do is buy a game that I won't have time for for a year or three (but have to buy NOW since it likely won't be easily available by then) and by the time I finally get around to playing it, I find out there are massive game wrecking bugs in it and quite likely by the time I first try to play it the patches will no longer be available.

This is why I'm interested in knowing, in particular, whether there are bugs in modern games. I need it to determine if I will be buying a game or not. Minor bugs such as Cool Ass Weapon never actually dropping from a monster you defeat I can probably live with unless you need Cool Ass Weapon in order to complete the game. Game breaking bugs and annoyances however I plan on avoiding like the plague if possible. If I accidentally buy one with a massive bug patch, I'll probably play through it once then trade it in to go buy something else. Ideally tho I'd prefer to avoid purchasing it altogether.