The Malgorian Blog

So more out of curiosity than anything else I bought one of the two "DLC" characters for Utawarerumono Zan as mentioned in my game night review. The idea was to see if unlocking these "bonus" characters would add more battles to the story mode as well - a very painfully clear sign that they deliberately cut material out to sell separately. Especially if it's just an unlock code for content on the disc.

Here's the results.

It was most certainly an unlock code. Nothing was downloaded/queued to download for the character.

It converted the two dialogue-only entries in the story mode that dealt with the character into complete battle entries.

It added those two story-mode battles to the Battle Recollection mode, with normal and hard modes as per the usual for those.

It added a brand new Special Ops level to the free mode.

It added a battle arena stage for the character (where they unlock an extra special attack.)

One of the story modes and the special ops level included a brand new boss character.

All of this of course without downloading anything.

So yeah, it's all been cut out of the game as far as I'm concerned. So I hope NIS America and the developer behind the game enjoy that extra 6.99 I paid for the character to satisfy my curiosity. It's cost the developer any chance of me buying Zan 2, and apart from the original Utawarerumono game due out early next year I'm placing NIS America on the boycott list for another few years. I doubt I'll miss much of any substance anyway.

It'd be nice if we had an industry that spent nearly as much money into trying to make video games more mainstream so as to massively increase their actual sales numbers rather than trying to maximize profit from each and every gamer, causing a drop in overall sales and turning gamers off. The only reason they're making billions right now by doing this is because there are quite a few whales out there that currently make up for the lost sales imo. Sure there are always new gamers to fill the ranks, but I suspect fewer of them stick around after they realize how fucking expensive it's become to play a mainstream game.

So I was tempted to buy Death End re:quest when I saw it at ebgames/gamestop the other day. I held off, mainly because I had little choice - couldn't afford it that day. But also because they didn't appear to have any non-gutted copies out on display, it was a full priced title, and where it was primarily a niche jrpg - I've seen way too many cases of DLC whoring in that genre since the day they started launching on a console that could easily do digital downloads.

The main game seems to play similarly to games like .hack and probably SAO - games where you're in another game. This one apparently tries to have you go through multiple game genres and the "real world". So I thought that was interesting enough to at least consider. But not until I saw what kinds of things they ripped out of the game to offer separately.

It's important to note I've been playing jrpg titles since the NES. And while the NES and SNES flavor hold little similarity to what these games do, the best way to determine if they're lacking "basic features" is to compare them to PS2 jrpgs. (As seriously I see very little innovation overall past that era - graphics look nicer, sound is generally still ok, but I'll be honest there's a lot of repetition and stagnation. If you like how jrpgs were back then, then this isn't a negative in and of itself. And I don't particularly mind how they were back then - so long as the story is at least trying to be somewhat unique on it's own somehow and the battle system isn't a colossal screwup (I'm looking at you Ar Tonelico 3!) then I can play through it and feel like I've gotten my money's worth. Usually.

When it comes to looking at the DLC for new JRPGs I look at what types of things were commonly available as bonuses or extras. I also look at if they do the common "item set/stat set/etc" DLC. You know - the one time limited set of consumable items you'll be given at the start of the game. This is harder to judge with new series starting on the DLC-able systems but are so blatantly obvious when you're dealing with a series that started on the PS2 or earlier. (I'm looking at you Disgaea!)

This game is pretty much new, so I just end up assuming if the DLC is of the type of shit that use to be common additives in old games but are now routinely cut out at launch (or offered as preorder bonuses) that it's been cut out of this as well. As otherwise it just means the game was inferior to start with.

So here's the type of DLC shown in this game that was -accidentally- released by the developers during a promo stream of the game. Basically when starting the game Compile Heart games tend to reveal what DLC was added. Oops! So much for "announcing it later". More on this after the breakdown.

1. Character Costumes - There's apparently 12 of these in the DLC for the main character(s). I can't even tell you how expensive they are offhand because the 4-5 of them that are currently listed on PSN are showing it as "unavailable".

2. Bonus areas - There are two of these. I consider this gutted content entirely since it would usually be akin to extra stages unlocked in a games epilogue. (Consider Lunar 2 and the various stages in Disgaea 1.)

3. Item Sets. 6 different item sets. one or two of them are free, the others are being sold for a buck or two each depending on your country of origin. These tell me two things. 1. The game is badly balanced so that you need the starting crutch of items, or the game was deliberately balanced to make these item sets desirable if not needed. 2. The game has probably had it's item drop rates, or shop prices/xp/gold-drops adjusted to make them desirable. (kinda goes with the second half of #1 really but from a different angle.) Devs of course will say "Oh no! we never did anything like that!" but can you really trust them at their word? You'd really have to play through the game twice from scratch and ask yourself how much more of a grind was it to go without the item drops.

4. There's an xp boost item. This immediately sets off a red flag for me, making me think they deliberately set the XP gains too low. Even if you could get the game for free by playing the game, and getting it only near the end of the game. Meaning you had to deal with the xp nerf the entire game.

5. 1 hidden boss. Yeah, no. It's not "hidden", it's "removed". So I count these things as optional bosses and as removed content. Hell consider the original Final Fantasy's "Warmech". A randomly encountered boss you could meet in the final bridge leading to Tiamat. Power-wise Warmech was probably on par with Tiamat if not stronger. This boss is one of two DLC quests. IE: they cut quests out.

6. A bunch of weapons/equipment. Basically these are treated the same as item sets, just not consumable/temporary. I consider all items to be removed rather than bonus content.

7. One extra playable character. Also removed content. Consider all the extra characters you would unlock in old games - especially Disgaea as an easy example. (Of which those bonus characters in Disgaea are all now DLC characters.)


So yeah, a whole lot of content I personally classify as "removed content".

Now for the more offensive take away I had from the devs/pubs promo stream. When asked about DLC they kept saying "We'll announce that at a later date!" ie: we're not telling you before the game is launched so go buy it without knowing!

The devs however accidentally gave away the full list of DLC because as I mention above the game popped up notices of all the DLC being added when they launched the game. Which is not what they wanted based on their refusal to actually talk about DLC prior.

What this tells me is that, whether intentionally or not, they were passing off a fully DLC loaded game as the base game you would get with your 60-80 dollar purchase. IE: intentionally or not, they were attempting to engage in false advertising. If Compile Heart's basic game design didn't throw all those pop-ups on the screen, who would have known all those extra costumes were DLC? That the items you started the game off with weren't what you would REALLY start the game off with? That those extra quests would not ever become available? That those items, XP-boosting item, cool extra weapons and equipment, would never be found as you played? (Or found only after doing the most insane of requirements, etc) and the list would go on.

So. For the DLC state of the game alone, I'm passing on this game permanently. I have WAY too much to play already purchased. I'm never going to miss it, and I think my 80+ bucks can be better spent on other things. But for their attempt at avoiding the DLC issue in their promo stream only to be ratted out by the game itself and their potential attempt to show the game as something more than what you will get if you pay the full price tag, I'm boycotting Compile Heart and Idea Factory games in general for at least a year or so. Again. 9_9

For those who don't care about that and buy and play and enjoy the game anyway - go for it. Just don't whine about the missing content or level/gold grind if you refuse to buy the DLC. And if you buy the DLC, don't whine about the cost.

Over at kotaku they have an article saying after months of controversy the ESRB will now add "In Game Purchases" label to games with in-game purchases.

Is this a step in the right direction? Or is it being applied so badly that it will end up doing more harm than good?

Here's the issue, this warning will be applied to any game that has ANY DLC purchases available for it. It might just be a couple item packs that are completely unneeeded, or it might be a perverse lootbox scam linked completely to character progression in addition to other things.

In either case the only warning to the player before purchase is "In Game Purchases".

The ESRB didn't want to focus on lootbox scams directly, which is the exact thing that caused the controversy to begin with (And really most of the conspiracy was wondering why they were so insistent they weren't a form of gambling. ie: a game of chance played with money. To be clear, they STILL hold to that misguided mindset. They, and the game publishers themselves, are about the only people that refuse to see it as gambling.

Their reason for not harping on lootboxes however is because "parents don't know what lootboxes are, and those who claim they do still don't know what they are."

The future of this tag is that it will be applied to 99% of all games released from here on out, and it will be so watered down that it will not do a damned thing. Granted I know at this point you'd need a full box all to it's own these days to be specific about what DLC is available in a game, but still grouping it all together under a single little line isn't helping much.


I would like to know what happens to a publisher that doesn't have the tag added to their label because they decided to go without DLC at launch, but then add DLC 6 months down the road. So maybe this will help people sue companies that try to avoid the label by delaying their plans when the customer is explicitly trying to avoid DLC.

So I was watching Angry Joe's impressions of the first chapter of Telltale's Batman story/game/quicktimeevent. I pretty much agree with his assessment, although personally I'm not interested in it anyway. Essentially Gameplay low scores, Story high scores. That's kind of what you expect out of Telltale anyway, and by now it's the story that their fans are buying the games for in the first place. So that's all cool.

He does bring up one point near the end however, regarding the season pass thing they do. Full cash up front, while releasing the game chapter by chapter. What it comes back to is this, why do people still give Telltale a pass on releasing the games piece-meal like this after they've been in the industry this long and in theory should be doing fairly well for themselves by now.

As a company starting up, I could certainly understand the episodic nature of their releases. You gotta get material out there ASAP to start bringing in money ASAP. You're new, you're likely a bit strapped for cash flow. But instead of developing into a more proper release schedule - releasing the full story on day one, they simply opted into getting you to PAY for all the episodes on day one instead. To the point where they nag you at the end of the chapter to buy the season pass. (As seen in Joe's video.)

At this stage of the game they SHOULD be capable of releasing the full story on day 1. They've gotten to the point where they're now losing, or drastically delaying money from fans who are no longer putting up with the episode release and wait (Quite intelligently imo) for the full story to be available.

Their season passes could be, as Joe points out, essentially additional chapters after the story - kind of like what they ended up doing with Minecraft Story Mode - although that opens up a new can of worms as well. For instance, if the main story isn't satisfying, people will start looking at the season pass as ripped out content. (Like most DLC appears to be these days, especially for game franchises that have been around since before DLC became a Thing. (Disgaea, I'm lookin' at you.) (Hell, I'm lookin' at you too Ar Tonelico))

At any rate, I don't a reason for them to refuse to release the full game at launch now. They're already charging full price with the season pass at launch of the first chapter. Why not just stop pretending the season pass isn't a preorder. Let them preorder it at that same price tag, then make everyone wait an extra month or two. Don't worry, they'll keep waiting for it. And they won't have that excuse of "Oh I'll wait until the full thing is out." to buy it at launch - although the excuse of waiting for it to be on sale will still be valid. But that's what those people are already doing anyway.

I haven't played any Telltale games. Not entirely sure why, as I rather like story driven games, even if they're hitting on 100 tropes/second. Although episodic game release has been on my shitlist since the first day I saw it. If you have a successfully released and finished episodic game and feel offended by my shitlisting you with the rest you can thank the multiple examples we've had for the last decade of story driven games not making it to the end due to poor sales. (Even this before DLC was a Thing.) (Legacy of Kain in particular, I'm lookin' at you.)

That being said, I can easily understand this "wall" Joe references in the whole episodic release setup. You get into the game, it starts to get good then BAM! Gotta stop and wait 2-4 weeks or whatever before you can see more. (We won't even talk about the Kings Quest thing will we Kane. ^_^) After doing that a few times, I can easily see people losing entire interest in the story which is probably why Telltale tries to push the Season Pass as hard as they do. Get all the money up front, then it doesn't matter (to them) if 50% of the people who were into it for the first chapter or two even bother to download the remaining chapters.

Yerg. Turned this into a much bigger rant than I originally expected.

According to this report on PC Gamer, the new Tomb Raider that's coming out soon (Xbox first) is to have hundreds of DLC.

Essentially 300+ of these are "cards". The cards essentially confer either graphical/cosmetic changes, or gameplay changing stats (Bullet resistance, etc). There will be two types of cards - "foil" and "common". Foil cards are permanent (or at least reusable) and generally offer stronger effects while the common ones disappear.

These 300 are the ones that are going to be offered on launch day - with "even more" being released in the weeks that follow.

The justification for such things? It's the increasingly familiar excuse. "Oh, you can buy these things with in-game credits. Using real money is just an option."

What they always glaze over is that buying these things with purely in-game credits (in ANY game that does this kind of tactic) is designed to be tedious and time consuming. And why is it DESIGNED to be that way? To encourage people to open their wallet. In other words, the fact that you can get a couple things bought in-game without a credit card is simply there to placate people. As an argument to hold up when people try to get vocal over this nickel and diming tactic.

It's the same kinda thing as what's happening with Metal Gear Solid V, and there were many games to do this before that. (Just about all of the Disgaea games started doing this once the game(s) were on a system that supported DLC)

This is the natural extension to buying bonus stats or bonus gold DLC which are very much done the for the same reasons with the same detrimental effects on game design. In the stats/gold issue, certainly you never needed to buy them. You got stats when you leveled up, and you could in some games level up into the thousands (Disgaea) so stats would eventually become abundant, and you get gold all the time right? But levelling, particularly at the start is tedious as hell and time consuming like you wouldn't believe as you redo level after level after level since you're too weak to do anything else. And for some reason the gold you get each fight just seems a bit on the low side compared to the effort put into it, requiring you to redo even MORE battles just to get enough money to upgrade your equipment.

Once you clear the game a time or two, your levels end up being pretty high and equipment fairly decked out and you fight things strong enough to gain multiple levels with one kill. But at that point you're already way past end-game. Most people buy the stats and gold at the beginning when they actually NEED it. And why do they need it? Because the game was designed to MAKE you need it. So you'd open your wallet.

I don't doubt that these 300 card microtransactions are going to be on-disc lockouts. The additional cards are probably going to be patched with a software update when you try to start the game, or as a "compatibility" pack for you to download (for free - I would presume) from the store. (No other approach would really make sense since these are suppose to be obtainable purely in-game as well.)

Oh yeah, there's also going to be a season pass with "3 major updates" selling for 30 bucks. Price of the game is 60. So to get the full game experience you're putting down 90 bucks minimum. (assuming you're buying new mind you.) And that 90 bucks won't be buying you access to the 300+ perks. You'll have to forfeit a healthy lifestyle or open your wallet to get those.

As it states at PC Gamer, these details are only confirmed for the Xbox launch - the PC launch doesn't even have a date yet. However with no information to the contrary, there's no reason not to expect it to infect the PC version as well. The publisher's "no comment" stance on the PC version might be that they're waiting to see how it boils over with the Xbox crowd, or maybe they're still not sure how to force PC gamers to pay for things they normally just mod in themselves. (Like "big head" mode. Yep, that joke mod is also a card.)

"Blame console peasants for dlc becoming popular and season passes"

I'm like... wtf. We'll ignore the whole elitest attitude as the guy seems to have swallowed the "PC master race" bull hook line and sinker, but I'd go a step further and blame the PC gamers for making DLC a thing at all to begin with, and getting that fucking rubbish imported to the console market. Thank you PC gamers for enjoying your fucking horse armor.

I -was- going to rant about how the latest Batman game on PC was apparently so poorly put together and released to the point where the devs have actually stopped selling the game on PC until it's been finished. This is apparently their second PR damage control action. I don't know what their first response to PC gamers being pissed off at them, but apparently it just added fuel to the fire - much like how people are now up in arms over the Destiny DLC bullshit and the dev's interview that basically told long term players who had spent 100 dollars on the game that they'd have to buy the 80 dollar collectors edition if they wanted the couple of exclusive DLC items added to it - even though they already owned 75% of the collectors edition. (So it'd be like spending 80 dollars to get "40" dollars of DLC after spending 100 dollars on the game.)

Oh I shouldn't get started on a rant about that. Especially since I have no interest of ever picking up the online only game.

Yeah, I was actually going to talk about Anime conventions and how I'm going to go to one this weekend, but now I don't feel like typing it up after the mini-rant above. (I could say lots more about what I think of it.) Anyway, yeah, I'll be offline for a few days this weekend as I go to one. I'll probably talk about it on here on Sunday or Monday. Only downside of it is probably going to be me not being able to work on my Atari 7800 game over the weekend. It's starting to take shape! Links to the current beta/alpha/whatever of the game are in the first post of the thread. You'll need an emulator to play it. Either Prosystem or MESS will work. MESS will be more accurate with colors/etc. I'm not going to be optimizing the colors for real hardware until I can sit down and play it on real hardware myself.

This is actually old news, and admittedly I don't care much for the game in question - I have the game prior to it for free on PSN but still haven't actually played it.

But anyway the rant is about gutting things out of the game to put as DLC, or in this case as a pre-order incentive. That's right, if you preordered, you got it for free! If you do something stupid like just buy it on Day 1 you'd be expected to pay an extra 5 dollars for a game mode within the game. Angry Joe on youtube tells it much better than I could so I'll just show the video!

Yes he's ranting, yes he's angry. So it probably isn't SFW so to speak. If just due to the swearing he'll get on with now and then. ^^

Against my better judgement, I was reading Kotaku comments today.

Yes, I know.

The comments of course were under the article about the whole finding of entire levels (unpopulated of course, except for 3 ghost objects you can apparently pick up) on the disc of Destiny. And the whole DLC shitstorm started again.

My bitching won't be about that in particular, I'm sure I've already bitched about it before and will do so again at a later date. I'm already formulating a way to describe all the DLC methods used with games I end up reviewing in the future. :P It's taking a long time to compile.

Anyway, one commenter made this very stupid remark. "Here's a shocker for people who hate On-Disc DLC: When you go to McDonalds and you buy french fries, there's actually a whole cooker full of fries that they AREN'T giving you. it's RIGHT THERE and they are deliberately not giving all of it to you."

I mean.... what? This isn't just off the mark, it's completely irrelevant to the situation. That cooker full of fries behind them are extra copies of the game that other people will be buying. Unless of course you actually ordered a cooker's worth of fries.

So instead, I'll give you the real comparison. Let's say you order a Big Mac. Inside a small plastic box you receive a 3-piece bun with 2 burger patties. Next to that, you are also given a locked glass jar that contains a few pickles, some lettuce, a cheese slice, and a small cup of sauce. You are not given a key to this jar. But you may purchase one for a few extra dollars. Have a nice day.

So the PSN store has updated for Tuesday and the verdict is in from the last post.

Fairy Fencer F's DLC is now standing at 11 items. 6 free, 5 paid I believe.

Tears to Tiara II is finally listed. I believe it was 6 items. Mostly bonus characters from the Aquaplus universe.

In all cases, it's things that either shouldn't have existed in the first place, or are things that use to be free hidden things in a game.

Tears to Tiara II shows me not to buy a game before it's listed, period.

Fairy Fencer F shows me not to buy a game FOR AT LEAST 3 MONTHS AFTER RELEASE. To watch them drip out the DLC each week.

Looks like they've indeed learned to hide DLC as much as possible to avoid lost sales. This means I can't properly determine if a game is worth buying or not on launch day.

As a result, I will never again, EVER, buy a game at launch. Minimum of 3 months before I buy something, and if I still see DLC increasing near that 3 month mark - as I will follow their progress for the games I'm interested in until the DLC makes me lose interest - then I'll add additional months onto the wait time.

Being JRPGs, these things get small runs usually. If I can't find a physical copy at an acceptable price at the end of the wait time, they've still lost a sale.

Atlus is now on the shitlist due to Fairy Fencer F btw. They can join NIS America on the list with all the others over DLC whoring.

This being said, while Ar Nosurge will be waiting until after Christmas as a result of this, that game is still only at 1 DLC item. Not sure what I think about that as I'll have to re-read what the content of that DLC is, but at least it's a good sign compared to the BS the other two games have demonstrated.

sigh.

I liked Atlus too...