Xbox One and Forza's Shameless Micro transactions

[Topweasel]

They provide the updates for free unless I'm wrong? I haven't played tf2 in years

When have you had to pay for an update on the Xbox. If you want to say more content. Well that can go back and forth. But it's not like CS:GO is free. Where do you cut off between updates/content increases/and something they can charge for. PC market is a bit different because they have to compete with mod and map makers. So by including a couple extra content updates here and there it allows them to refresh the default play environment to something they have control over.

 

[Skel]

Forza 5 economy update adds drag racing, makes cars cheaper, making money easier



Kudos to Turn10 for addressing problems a lot of people have/had with the game.
Once again though, it shows with MS, if you don't bitch and make your voice heard, they will do as they please. This is why people complain and simply don't just ignore or it or don't buy it as solutions people tried to use.

Just so I'm clear here.. yay for Turn10 for fixing it, but boo for MS for forcing them to make it that way in the first place? I also will say that at least MS listens to it's users and fixes things. 99% of the companies out there keep pushing forward with their ideas that aren't working. Of course none of that logic will stop some people in this thread from twisting the whole thing into some conspiracy garbage with MS at it's source. They're the mostest evil company in the entire universe that only wants to bring doom down upon it's users.

No they used the mediums that were available at the time. They were the fathers of current day DLC when they launched the idea of episodic content with HL2 E1 and E2. It backfired on them horribly with E3 because they thought they had it mapped out enough and didn't start work on one episode until the previous was finished and didn't even start on EP1 till a year or two after the release of HL2.

Other companies learned from their and other companies failures. Hard clocks with several teams developing the games and extra content allow the development to flow more smoothly from game to game and keep a high mindshare.

Valve if they still were a regular development team that created HL1 and 2 would have had to close their doors a lot sooner than 3D Realms did. Steam is the only reason we even have a chance of seeing HL3 and it pushed the ability to create and distribute DLC just as much if not more than the 360 or PS3.

I've always felt that Valve pretty much invented DLC with it's episodic crap. The whole thing felt like a huge rip off to me. Instead of a full game here's only 4 hours of it. Yeah we're charging you less for it, but by the time you get to the average game length you'll have spent $30 more than if we just released the whole game. As Smackababy has rightfully pointed out, it's Valve so it's nothing like DLC, it's the mostest awesomeest thing ever created. They only were trying to get us the game quicker cause they loved us so much. Money isn't what they're about..

 

[smackababy]

When have you had to pay for an update on the Xbox. If you want to say more content. Well that can go back and forth. But it's not like CS:GO is free. Where do you cut off between updates/content increases/and something they can charge for. PC market is a bit different because they have to compete with mod and map makers. So by including a couple extra content updates here and there it allows them to refresh the default play environment to something they have control over.

CS:GO is an even better example of you being nickle and dimed by Valve. You can get chests containing "extra" content already in the game, but you have to pay for a key to unlock it. If people cried about Valve like they do MS, this would be an outrage! They charged you for the game and are now charging you for the chance to get extra content (and you can get the same garbage item over and over).

 

[Topweasel]

Forza 5 economy update adds drag racing, makes cars cheaper, making money easier



Kudos to Turn10 for addressing problems a lot of people have/had with the game.
Once again though, it shows with MS, if you don't bitch and make your voice heard, they will do as they please. This is why people complain and simply don't just ignore or it or don't buy it as solutions people tried to use.

I like the fact they are tweaking it. But I do have a problem with people whining about something they have no experience with. Very few of the people who complained about the in game economy had played the game. Money already flows to people hand over fist in the game. Most have just been people on the sidelines that either hate DLC, or read some review that mentioned stuff missing or changed and did a couple theoretical number crunches to decide it took to long to get all of the cars. Most of the time without doing the same to previous or competing games.

 

[smackababy]

As Smackababy has rightfully pointed out, it's Valve so it's nothing like DLC, it's the mostest awesomeest thing ever created. They only were trying to get us the game quicker cause they loved us so much. Money isn't what they're about..

This just reminds me of a thread where everyone was praising Valve and Gabe for saying "hell no" to an offer from EA to buy them out. The part people were missing was EA was offering half of what Valve was worth. Of course, Gabe was going to say "hell no". But, as with all things Valve, he was the savior of PC gaming and leader of the "PC master race" Lord Gaben and Volvo savuth us and gibbed Diretide.

 

[Topweasel]

This just reminds me of a thread where everyone was praising Valve and Gabe for saying "hell no" to an offer from EA to buy them out. The part people were missing was EA was offering half of what Valve was worth. Of course, Gabe was going to say "hell no". But, as with all things Valve, he was the savior of PC gaming and leader of the "PC master race" Lord Gaben and Volvo savuth us and gibbed Diretide.

Lets not turn this into a pissing on Valve contest either. Valve and Newell aren't saints. Steam isn't perfect and as much as I love HL and specifically HL2, it isn't the best game ever and their trouble with E3/HL3 are huge black eyes for them.

But they have done a lot for PC gaming and kept PC gaming competitive with the console eco system. Allowed us access to games that used to just disappear forever when the last copy left the store shelf. And the sales they have done have not only made PC gaming content cheap, it has caused it's competitors and even the walled garden consoles to keep their prices competitive with Steam. I got TR on the Xbox 2 months after release for $15. That doesn't happen without Steam.

 

[Skel]

Lets not turn this into a pissing on Valve contest either. Valve and Newell aren't saints. Steam isn't perfect and as much as I love HL and specifically HL2, it isn't the best game ever and their trouble with E3/HL3 are huge black eyes for them.

But they have done a lot for PC gaming and kept PC gaming competitive with the console eco system. Allowed us access to games that used to just disappear forever when the last copy left the store shelf. And the sales they have done have not only made PC gaming content cheap, it has caused it's competitors and even the walled garden consoles to keep their prices competitive with Steam. I got TR on the Xbox 2 months after release for $15. That doesn't happen without Steam.

I'm going to hate myself for this.. but how is Steam responsible for MS having a sale on the Xbox Marketplace? Every outlet has them, some more than others, but they are there. Giving Valve credit for another company's decisions is beyond fan service.

Also is Valve a developer that runs a distributor arm, or a distributor that has an inhouse dev team?

 

[ImpulsE69]

It happens because Steam creates competition. If you think MS would just magically drop prices if Steam or other digital distribution services (Including Sony PS but less so) weren't around you are sorely mistaken. It took them quite some time to even come around to price drops to begin with. Obviously this has more impact on multi platform games than exclusives.

Also, it's hard not to praise Steam when they pretty much started the pennies on the dollar games pricing wars. Now you have Amazon, and all the others jumping in, creating even more competition.

On topic, I am glad to see that they have made some changes to Forza. +1 for the whiners and entitled.

 

[Skel]

It happens because Steam creates competition. If you think MS would just magically drop prices if Steam or other digital distribution services (Including Sony PS but less so) weren't around you are sorely mistaken. It took them quite some time to even come around to price drops to begin with. Obviously this has more impact on multi platform games than exclusives.

Also, it's hard not to praise Steam when they pretty much started the pennies on the dollar games pricing wars. Now you have Amazon, and all the others jumping in, creating even more competition.

On topic, I am glad to see that they have made some changes to Forza. +1 for the whiners and entitled.

I wish I could see into the future and tell what companies that I don't work for are going to do. Even if I put on the "Microsoft is a totally evil company that will grind every last cent out of me because it hates me and wants me to suffer" hat I have a hard time believing that Steam.. a product that distributes software to a PC market effects the console market at all. It's be like saying because Steam is having sales Apple is dropping the price of Angry Birds. Two different markets with two different drives. The only thing they share is people wasting time gaming. If anything the PSN+ with it's free games caused MS to shift direction a bit, but odds are they were just putting a sale in the slowest cycle of the year to bump sales...

 

[ImpulsE69]

I wish I could see into the future and tell what companies that I don't work for are going to do.

You don't need to. Just look at their history. It speaks volumes, however yes you could be right about PS+ pushing them.

 

[Topweasel]

I wish I could see into the future and tell what companies that I don't work for are going to do. Even if I put on the "Microsoft is a totally evil company that will grind every last cent out of me because it hates me and wants me to suffer" hat I have a hard time believing that Steam.. a product that distributes software to a PC market effects the console market at all. It's be like saying because Steam is having sales Apple is dropping the price of Angry Birds. Two different markets with two different drives. The only thing they share is people wasting time gaming. If anything the PSN+ with it's free games caused MS to shift direction a bit, but odds are they were just putting a sale in the slowest cycle of the year to bump sales...

Games for Gold was direct result of free PSN+ games (cept you actually own the GfG games). Which Sony only rolled that out as competition for Live Gold accounts, without the networking a party options baked in that they could not match.

But digital pricing wars started and caried over from the Blowout sales on Steam. Now you see non-exclusives having round robin sales where each week a different digital distributor is offering a sale on it. For the longest time MS ignored the late income from previously released games and something would stay $50-$60 until the greatest hits version came out in the stores. But MS learned through sales requests from other companies that increased interest and new income from sales and gradual reducing the pricing on digital offers. They are slower than everyone else but competitive pricing models have never been their thing.

It's been a slow process and if you followed game prices digitally on all of the services you can see the change over time.

 

[Skel]

Games for Gold was direct result of free PSN+ games (cept you actually own the GfG games). Which Sony only rolled that out as competition for Live Gold accounts, without the networking a party options baked in that they could not match.

But digital pricing wars started and caried over from the Blowout sales on Steam. Now you see non-exclusives having round robin sales where each week a different digital distributor is offering a sale on it. For the longest time MS ignored the late income from previously released games and something would stay $50-$60 until the greatest hits version came out in the stores. But MS learned through sales requests from other companies that increased interest and new income from sales and gradual reducing the pricing on digital offers. They are slower than everyone else but competitive pricing models have never been their thing.

It's been a slow process and if you followed game prices digitally on all of the services you can see the change over time.

So Valve invented sales? While the sales from Steam can be awesome I don't know why people think there wouldn't be any sales without them. Odds are a different digital distributor would have built up in Steam's place and followed what almost every single retail place would have done... had a sale. Of course none of this really means much as I'll point it out again.. it's a completely different marketplace. Sadly PC gaming doesn't make the impact saleswise on the console market that a lot of people (sometimes even myself) want it to. It's like saying that because Google Play is selling Angry Birds for 99 cents that the version on Live will have to be that... which I 99% sure it isn't. (I saw a disk for $30 bucks, but don't know if that's the same game.. I honestly don't really follow the Angry Birds franchise.. I'm sure it's lovely though). No one from Xbox is looking at Steam and going "man, I wish we had those sales numbers." because the console versions of the games outsell the PC versions, so if cost was the only factor there would be a lot more people looking to game on the PC. Steam is awesome for a lot of things, effecting the console market it isn't... well yet of course. While I don't think the SteamBox will do much, I freely admit I could be wrong and it'll change everything.

I don't think you're correct in regards to the Live Marketplace not dropping prices of the games over time. I bought quite a few games off the service and I didn't pay retail. This was not too long after they started offering full games for sale. I'm guessing like most, you didn't look for the games because you already had them or you figured that they were still $60. I will say they dropped much much slower than buying the physical version from Amazon, but they did drop.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Just to clarify, Sony offeres discounts on many digital games on PSN+ and offers full game trials which allows you to download the full game and play the full game with a time limit imposed. So you have an hour or so to play the full retail game and see if you like it. A lot of games dont get demos which I wish would change. Even games that get demos often dont show you the real representation of the final product and are based on months old code from before gold status. It is just one more value added bonus to the service.

Anyway the main point was that as a psn+ member you get access to exclusive discounts on digital games.

 

[Topweasel]

So Valve invented sales?

Actually as far as software goes and games in particular, yes in a way. Old software may have seen a drop or two to clear shelves. But even in the retail world sales on games where pretty limited and mostly at the oddest time, launch to get more people into stores instead of competitor to sell other things. Most of the time before big movies, cd's and games ever hit the clearance bin they are returned to the publisher and recycled/destroyed.

Steam brought a life of the never dying game and almost all developers working with valve have said the same thing. That Steam sales not only brought in an incredible % of income from a source they had by then written off but the residual increase in purchases back at normal price post sale where nothing to sneeze at. PC sales may not have had the number of units pushed. But a trend in purchasing habits is a trend in purchasing habits. Other digital distributors followed with the same plan. Developers wanted the same options on the consoles where the returns would be even richer. Sony and Microsoft saw first hand how this was working on their systems and they started slowly doing the same for their titles.

Not trying to toot their horn. They have warts with everyone else. But they are pretty much the father to everything we love and hate about digital distribution.