Your thoughts on In-Game-Purchases after paying $60?

I'm not referring to DLC (downloadable content) but someone paying to gain an unfair advantage in multi-player mode which is worse than IAP on mobile. I've been following reviews of games I'm considering adding and this is worrisome and, if true, we need to send them a virtual middle finger to attempt to raise awareness and halt this practice. Review of NBA 2K14 on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R3I28OVPBUBKDE
"One of the first $60 console games to adopt a pure "PAY TO WIN" online model, November 20, 2013
By PC Gaming Fan
= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars
This review is from: NBA 2K14 - PlayStation 4 (Video Game)
From a basketball perspective, NBA 2K14 is not awful but not good either. They do a decent job of replicating the game of basketball despite assorted glitches and flaws that should not have made it past testing. Load times are embarrassingly long, especially for a game installed to the hard drive of a next gen console. Graphics are good, but then again the last gen graphics were good too. From the zoomed out playing view, you'll need a 1080p TV to tell much difference, but the differences show up more in the closeup. Main downside to the gameplay is that it feels like the game plays itself...once you get a high defense stat your character is automatically following his man, reaching out for steals, and blocking shots without you pressing any buttons.

However the worst part is that the online game is PAY TO WIN. Usually this is seen in free to play games, not $60 games. You create a character and start taking him through seasons, earning points to level up his stats and buy clothes. Then you can take him online to a MMO-style lobby area with a bunch of basketball courts and other players running around playing games (well really it's usually just other players running around and not much actual gameplaying...the process to start a game is extremely glitchy so almost no games are going on). Sounds like it could be fun in theory, except that if you play the game the game without cheating you'll get destroyed. See, the point values you get are set up to where you HAVE to purchase points with REAL MONEY to make your player competitive. An offline season game takes a long time with 8 minute quarters and will probably get you 200-300 points (very occasionally there are challenges to make it higher). An online game is shorter but gets you 150 points. A pair of shoes is 7500 points. Your player stats cost 300 to add a point at their highest level and there are a TON of stats that could start out as low as the 30's and need to be raised to 90+. So basically, it takes probably over 1000 games to max a created player, or you can just buy the points and be a 99-rated on day 1.

Online is a freakshow...you have blinged out 99s who bought points running around at turbo speed and throwing dunks like its NBA jam and unable to miss 3 pointers if open. Then you have people who didn't buy points and are super-slow, can't even catch passes a lot of the time, and blow easy layups (that's if they get to shoot, because usually the shot was blocked or the ball was stolen by a 99). You literally cannot do ANYTHING in this game online without buying points because the player quality disparity is so great. And by the time you legitimately level up a player, NBA 2K15 will be out and nobody will be playing this."

Holy shit. If this continues in games, I suggest we raise a stink bigger than the original Xbox One bullshit, because I do not want this shit to continue into games. I'd rather play full price for a complete game and have it balanced out than have to deal with that shit. It shouldn't even be a option. In fact, there should be no upgradeable stats period online. Just, best tactics and use of players wins the game... Not some bullshit like, "Well, i've played the game more so I get better skills and my team in turn is better overall." No... keep leveling and stats in RPGs.

It comes down to what is reasonable. If I can max out everything in under 100 hours, I don't mind leveling systems too much. But it's when level 45-46 takes 9 hours of grinding, and level 99-100 will take 40 hours of grinding that turn me off of the game really quickly. Unfortunately, there will always be those people who have tons of disposable income, and they'll put more money into the game than bringing in 1000 new players buying at full price . To companies, that's the better bargain, and unfortunately, I think it's our future as gamers.

Lol. This is about equally as stupid as actually hiring someone to sit around playing your game, leveling up for you. Or maybe, they can let me drop $200 for a trophy that says I beat a game I've never played.

$60/game plus $60/year for PS+ or Live is asking more than enough to play a single game.

Forza 5 seems to be the worst of all.

After learning a bit more about how Forza 5 works, I must say, they definitely have made some changes that are, without a doubt, designed to encourage people to buy cars with real money to the detriment of the game experience.

Seems like earning potential and car prices haven't changed. That's the good news.

But these few things all combine to make a pretty big and noticeable difference:

- No cars unlocked as you level. There is no logical, game-enhancing reason this was taken out. Its something that most everyone enjoyed. Some tweaks could have been to the 'progression' of cars you unlocked, but certainly no one wanted the whole system taken out.

- Manufacturer affinity is gone. This was something that also could have used some tweaking, but was otherwise a very good idea. Before, you could basically get free upgrades quite quickly. That could have used changing. It was definitely too quick. But again, people liked the system and it didn't warrant taking out. The fact that you can use tokens to buy upgrades now makes it blatantly obvious what the intentions were here.

- Free Play no longer allows you to drive any car in the game. Before, while some cars were quite expensive, it didn't stop people from the enjoyment of driving them if they wanted to. You just wouldn't own the car, couldn't customize it or race it in career. This was a fantastic compromise, as you could test drive anything you wanted and even if you couldn't afford an expensive car you really liked, you could still get to experience it out on-track. With that gone, it really pushes at the car collector types to pay real money.

- No buying/selling paints/setups/vinyls. You can still make some money off of this, but there will clearly not be any sort of ecosystem built around this like before. No reason for this to have happened. People *loved* the way it was.

- Buying cars and upgrades, the game definitely treats 'car tokens' as an equally viable way of bartering. Every step of the way, prices are given in credits and tokens, with equal font size and all, even going as far as having a little pop-up menu to 'confirm' whether you're going to buy with credits or tokens.

It all amounts to a blatant attempt at encouraging people to spend more money. All at the detriment of the game from several important angles.http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=721448

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And then....

Token cost of all cars in the game comes to 168993
if bought at simplest token value cost of 8000 per $100 usd, that comes to $2200. you could probably bring it in a bit cheaper by buying the remaining balance with smaller amounts instead of the 8000 lot.
if bought at the least value cost of 1250 per $20 that comes to $2700.
cheapest overally brings it to $1690 with 100 tokens per dollar..

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Spreadsheet of all the car costs:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RVVRQmVJanVNVE9ic2t4VnpvRVE&usp=sharing#gid=0

Ridiculous.

LeviathanZERO said:

"No cars unlocked as you level."

..

Spreadsheet of all the car costs:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RVVRQmVJanVNVE9ic2t4VnpvRVE&usp=sharing#gid=0

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Am I totally missing something, or is the only way to get a different car in Forza 5 done by purchasing it??

Or is there a different method for obtaining credits/tokens, other than paying for them?

The only way to stop this is to stop buying games that do it, but do any of you have the ability to do that? This was exactly the same thing as the whole DRM battle, some people always complaining, trying to get others to see the light, but at the end of the day, a majority of people just kept spouting off the same old line, it doesn't bother me so why should I. Boycotts do work, they only don't work if not enough people participate. The problem is people want their fix no matter what, and most will cave in eventually if they lower the price enough and with this new system, maybe get you that way for what they missed with the initial purchase. Don't let anyone tell you that you cannot make things change, you can, but you can't alone. Your wallet and nothing else matters to these publishers. You stop buying they will listen to you. You keep buying but complaining, they'll just keep making it worse and worse because who cares if the people hate it if they keep buying it up.

NBA 2K14 was in my B group to buy but not anymore. Forza 5 is an easy no because it doesn't look much better than mobile app to begin with. Not any different than how I treat mobile games with IAP.

First of all you can play 2k online with the quick team match up and play with all NBA players. You don't have to pay shit. If you pay to max out your my player in NBA 2k your a damn fool

LurkerLito said:

The only way to stop this is to stop buying games that do it, but do any of you have the ability to do that? This was exactly the same thing as the whole DRM battle, some people always complaining, trying to get others to see the light, but at the end of the day, a majority of people just kept spouting off the same old line, it doesn't bother me so why should I. Boycotts do work, they only don't work if not enough people participate. The problem is people want their fix no matter what, and most will cave in eventually if they lower the price enough and with this new system, maybe get you that way for what they missed with the initial purchase. Don't let anyone tell you that you cannot make things change, you can, but you can't alone. Your wallet and nothing else matters to these publishers. You stop buying they will listen to you. You keep buying but complaining, they'll just keep making it worse and worse because who cares if the people hate it if they keep buying it up.

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QFT. We created this monster.

AFD said:

Am I totally missing something, or is the only way to get a different car in Forza 5 done by purchasing it??

Or is there a different method for obtaining credits/tokens, other than paying for them?

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It works like this:
From eurogamer:

All that's left is the grind, and it's not a particularly pleasant one. Unlike previous outings, cars don't unlock upon levelling up. Everything must be bought in Forza Motorsport 5, and all transactions take place in a slightly misshapen economy. A series will, on average, net the player in excess of 110,000 credits for just under an hour's effort - but with some of the premium racecars costing well over a million, it's a somewhat brutal grind. Good job, then, that there are tokens purchasable on the Xbox One's marketplace for you to attain the car you're after, or to temporarily boost the rate at which you gain XP. When you've already paid £429.99 for a new console, £44.99 for the game and maybe even £349.99 for the only steering wheel that the game supports at launch, such tricks appear a little unsavoury, and in Forza 5, mechanics greedily smuggled from free-to-play games trample over the elegant RPG elements the series once embraced so effectively.http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-11-20-forza-motorsport-5-review

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Grinding in a racing game. This is the future

I think I may avoid the ps4 and xbone the more and more I read... Sad really, I was considering a ps4. But with my current rig and the ability to buy games on the cheap on sites like humblebundle, a ps4 doesn't make sense.

EvilViking said:

I think I may avoid the ps4 and xbone the more and more I read... Sad really, I was considering a ps4. But with my current rig and the ability to buy games on the cheap on sites like humblebundle, a ps4 doesn't make sense.

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We're kind of pushed into a corner. Deal with some of that crap or no games like Red Redemption, GTA V, etc. on PC. Prices do come down on game console games. Just saw Red Redemption for PS3 at Target for $20.

LeviathanZERO said:

Forza 5 seems to be the worst of all.



And then....



Spreadsheet of all the car costs:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RVVRQmVJanVNVE9ic2t4VnpvRVE&usp=sharing#gid=0

Ridiculous.

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Wow. After reading that I will not be buying Forza 5 ever. The gull of Microsoft to think this wouldn't be read into in depth is just disgusting. $2200? How fucking high do they think we are?

It's okay; I'll just play Zelda.

Forza is their bread and butter for a racing game and they know if some one wants the car bad enough they will literally pay for it in cash. It's no ones fault but the consumers, I personally don't care about forza or any other racing game for that matter

LeviathanZERO said:

It works like this:
From eurogamer:

Grinding in a racing game. This is the future

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Thanks, and a big WTF indeed.


So in order to get all the confirmed Forza 5 cars, it'll take at least 950 hours of gameplay (or $1700 in real cash). That's some hardcore dedication right there.

(Maths: 104,460,000 credits for all confirmed cars / ~110,000 credits earned per hour = 950 hours)

Love me some racing games, but that is just a straight up greedy way to ruin a game.

Godmachine said:

Wow. After reading that I will not be buying Forza 5 ever. The gull of Microsoft to think this wouldn't be read into in depth is just disgusting. $2200? How fucking high do they think we are?

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I think they are pretty high if they think 30 hours of racing to unlock ONE fucking car is a video game. Of course they make the alternative pay more than 100$
This is appalling. I have never seen anything like this before, holy shit Microsoft. This is what happens when the game designers aren't the ones making the game, but executives.

I thought I'd seen it all with EA, but wow, Microsoft... Nope, this is way over anything EA has ever done.

AFD said:

Thanks, and a big WTF indeed.


So in order to get all the confirmed Forza 5 cars, it'll take at least 950 hours of gameplay (or $1700 in real cash). That's some hardcore dedication right there.

(Maths: 104,460,000 credits for all confirmed cars / ~110,000 credits earned per hour = 950 hours)

Love me some racing games, but that is just a straight up greedy way to ruin a game.

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Seeing the breakdown, WOW.
They have gone completely mad.
This is not a video game. Terrible.

Megalith said:

It's okay; I'll just play Zelda.

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Best thing ive read in this thread.

I'm very much enjoying the new system in Forza. The earlier games came off as way to easy to progress in. Cars were literally handed to you as you progressed throughout the game. The only times I needed to purchase a car was for achievements or manufacturer specific events/races. If I chose to bother with them since you could skip those events entirely. A lot of the Forza veterans are favoring the change. The only ones complaining were those that just want to plow through the game in record time or weren't very good in the game to begin with .



I have a GT one as well to show that I play both franchises .

I read that article in Eurogamer and these are my thoughts on it:
Someone on Reddit asked me:

Why? You make a lot of statements but you never address the reasons behind them.

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What reasons need there be?

I want games be fair and a level playing field-- no one gains advantage over another through microtransactions and everyone works as hard as the other player obtaining similar goals.

No cheating.

No easy way out.

No buying your way to the top.

Fuck the companies that do this.

I remember buying games and all you had to do was buy a game and buy an announced expansion pack-- that was it. Nowadays it's DLC this and that and microtransactions. It's utterly disgusting. These companies make millions of dollars anyway, they should stop trying to weasel their way into getting into the pockets of every gamer out there.

DarkLegacy said:

I'm very much enjoying the new system in Forza. The earlier games came off as way to easy to progress in. Cars were literally handed to you as you progressed throughout the game. The only times I needed to purchase a car was for achievements or manufacturer specific events/races. If I chose to bother with them since you could skip those events entirely. A lot of the Forza veterans are favoring the change. The only ones complaining were those that just want to plow through the game in record time or weren't very good in the game to begin with .
I have a GT one as well to show that I play both franchises .

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Mmhm Ok, sure.



The rest of us in reality are not going to play a racing game for 950 hours to 100% it.
This is an obvious money grab. Obvious.

LeviathanZERO said:

Mmhm Ok, sure.

The rest of us in reality are not going to play a racing game for 950 hours to 100% it.
This is an obvious money grab. Obvious.

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Never said anything about obtaining 100% of the game. It's a money grab for the lazy at best. I won't need to spend a dime & will go through the game the same exact way I did with every other Forza title. Will it be a little slower, sure. Nothing I haven't done in any other game or franchise that I've enjoyed in the past. The NBA2K14 issue is far more of a money grab than Forza 5 is. If it bothers people that much though, that's great to. Less trash players that I will have to race against online .

DarkLegacy said:

Never said anything about obtaining 100% of the game. It's a money grab for the lazy at best. I won't need to spend a dime & will go through the game the same exact way I did with every other Forza title. Will it be a little slower, sure. Nothing I haven't done in any other game or franchise that I've enjoyed in the past. The NBA2K14 issue is far more of a money grab than Forza 5 is. If it bothers people that much though, that's great to. Less trash players that I will have to race against online .

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It's cute how you somehow think you are better than "trash players" because you are willing to play the same game for 950 hours.
You can't be serious. This is an obvious and serious castration of the series. I don't see how anyone that loved Forza 4 is lapping this shit up.

Megalith said:

It's okay; I'll just play Zelda.

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TheToE! said:

Best thing ive read in this thread.

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Quoted for truth.

octoberasian said:

A F2P game should be free without any pay-to-win or cheap and easy way to advance in a game, or gain an advantage over another player. This applies to MMO or multiplayer games.
​

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Megalith said:

It's okay; I'll just play Zelda.

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same here

along with Mario
Ratchet and Clank
and Uncharted

The biggest problem are those people who think it's ok to keep dumping money into these game supporting such practices. As long as people allow these company to rape their wallets just because their favorite franchise title is plastered on the game, the companies will keep doing it. They will keep holding back contents and make people pay extra for cars or whatever that was supposed to be in the game.

I never have and never will pay for things like this. The only time that the amount of money I have invested in a game is more than $60 is when their DLC is substantial (i.e. expansion quality) such as Red Dead's Undead Nightmare or even the Borderlands DLC's (which are iffy to me since they come out so quickly).

If the businesses are making money off this, you can't fault them. I'd be more pissed at the consumers for allowing this to happen with their wallets. Don't forget there's a lot of stupid people in this world. Just take a look around Wal-Mart if you don't know what I mean. Heck, you might be one of them.

I've paid to transfer characters in wow, and I've bought retail expansion packs for many games, but I've never seen "DLC" I've considered worth the cost.

I seriously hope that GT6 doesn't get to that insane level... heck i remember on GT3 that i used to think that playing 3h to make enough to buy some of the supercars was insane... holy crap.

And yes, GT6 is also trying to do that, i just hope it doesn't get to that level because i cannot accept it from either front.

Forza 5 is the biggest offender. I was already severely pissed off at Forza 4 for introducing cars that I wanted as DLC. Same issue happened in Forza Horizon. But with Forza 5 and its stupid 14 tracks, they can go suck a dick. In Forza 4, the 30+ tracks had me wanting for a lot more and in Forza 5 they have gone the extra mile to cut the game in half (atleast for me, care more about tracks than the 200 or so cars out of which I will only ever drive 30-50). I am quite certain the missing tracks will be introduced as DLC and I am not buying a half assed game.

elleana said:

I agree with most of what you said, but how do companies that publish F2P games make any money ever without microtransactions?

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As long as it isn't EXP/XP boosts, crafting boosts, and the like. Anything that gives one player with money advantage over another that doesn't want to spend money on microtransactions should not be a microtransaction. NO EXCEPTIONS. Make money in other ways..

They can be:
- Cosmetic items-- costumes or new skins
- New characters that can still be obtained by playing the game or buying it. (e.g.- League of Legends)
- Mounts
- Furniture

I don't care if you don't want to spend the time to get them yourself, but a game should be complete from the onset. No DLCs, have them in the game at launch and not later. Don't nickel-and-dime me for the same thing. I shouldn't have to pay X amount of money just to buy new cars. Provide a middle-of-the-road challenge to obtain them in game. If the company wants to provide microtransactions, let it be new skins for the vehicles or something that will be purely cosmetic to the player.

Whatever happened to playing a game and obtain achievements for the characters in the game just by playing the game?

If an F2P company wants to make money, make it some other way in microtransactions. I've seen too many bad microtransactions and cash shops everything from EXP boosts because people are too damn lazy to play the game themselves to crafting boosts to resurrection items to better weapons. Fuck that. Fuck it all. I shouldn't have to play against someone who decided to buy a better weapon that can't be obtained normally in-game. APB Reloaded is a good example of this.

These microtransactions are stupid and they give unfair advantages to people who have money. People stupidly want the easy way out in every single game. Whatever happened to spending the time playing the game as-is without any advantages that you can buy in a cash shop?

Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer it the old way-- buy a game, buy an expansion, anything else can be achieved in-game by playing it. That's it.

lol at people complaining about this stuff. I am sure myself and others have said this so many times we are blue in the face.

DON'T BUY IT at release

For $60, I should have a complete game.

Anything else that is charged for above and beyond the main game should be optional things.

"Pay to win" is digusting. It's like D3's main fail. If you wanted any real decent gear for higher level play you could grind 1000+ hours or pay for it.

950 hours would take me like at least 5 years to accomplish haha!

Microsoft/turn 10 studio's, I'll def be skipping that joke of game and that kind of gaming design.

YeuEmMaiMai said:

lol at people complaining about this stuff. I am sure myself and others have said this so many times we are blue in the face.

DON'T BUY IT at release

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Ironically, the people screaming to ignore microtransactions can't ignore a microtransaction thread.
Thanks for patronizing the thread.

LeviathanZERO said:

Ironically, the people screaming to ignore microtransactions can't ignore a microtransaction thread.
Thanks for patronizing the thread.

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and now we know why came companies do this crap...one day you'll figure it out.... it's called don't buy the game if you do not approve of what they are doing with the game....ie DLC, microtransactions, etc

YeuEmMaiMai said:

and now we know why came companies do this crap...one day you'll figure it out.... it's called don't buy the game if you do not approve of what they are doing with the game....ie DLC, microtransactions, etc

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The whole point to to have these discussions, there's no reason for you to be dismissive of this conversation. This is how we spread the word. If everyone kept silent, no one would know anything.

Eventually the masses will catch on and reject this bastardry, and then the much-needed gaming industry crash will occur.