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Chris

Idle Thumbs 158: P is for Podcast

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That Watch_Dogs chart is immediately flummoxing, though I think somebody rearranged it in a way that makes it a little more readable since it was on the front of the wiki. I'm still not totally clear what is actual game content, like "pack" vs "dlc" which on steam seems to talk about missions. All around, I'll agree on the yuck factor.

 

If I can also dig up an old horse to beat: I don't get mad about the Day One DLC thing, as I understand the whole thing about cert time, but is there some limit on that? This looks like 10 different playable missions? How about putting some thought into a neat cohesive work? (sidebar: Fallout New Vegas, best game of the generation also had the best DLC, which did that, plus had some cool through lines that tied all the DLC together) 

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I'm pretty sure the lower half of that Watch Dogs table is all physical real-world tat. "Aiden Pearce's iconic cap" refers to something that goes on the actual player's actual physical real-world head. The important artistic decisions regarding the protagonist's headwear remain intact. What this item actually offers is a way for purchasers to publicly declare how much they were willing to pay for the game.

Yeah, it's part of the EU CE. It's a physical cap, not an in-game item.

 358423.jpg 

 

Huh... so Aiden Pearce's iconic cap is a physical black hat with a fairly subtle symbol.  No branding.  Actually a pretty cool bonus game thingie comparable to paying more to get the soundtrack, etc.

One upside to all editions -- seeing full game codes on ebay selling for 30 dollars.

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I just played some You have to win the game: http://store.steampowered.com/app/286100/

And I think I'm actually stuck already. There's no way out except to get past some wizard which is shooting things which kill me instantly. I have no special abilities yet.

 

Edit: nope... my bad. This game is just hard. VVVVV hard.

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That Watch_Dogs chart is immediately flummoxing, though I think somebody rearranged it in a way that makes it a little more readable since it was on the front of the wiki. I'm still not totally clear what is actual game content, like "pack" vs "dlc" which on steam seems to talk about missions. All around, I'll agree on the yuck factor.

 

If I can also dig up an old horse to beat: I don't get mad about the Day One DLC thing, as I understand the whole thing about cert time, but is there some limit on that? This looks like 10 different playable missions? How about putting some thought into a neat cohesive work? (sidebar: Fallout New Vegas, best game of the generation also had the best DLC, which did that, plus had some cool through lines that tied all the DLC together) 

 

This was an issue with Company of Heroes 2 where there was a deluge of DLC on the first day, and it just kind of caused your brain to shut down and not really want to play the game because who wants to sift through all that junk to see if there is anything you actually want in there?

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The glaring offender to me was the squad member Javik in Mass Effect 3.  It was frustrating to hear how much he added in party dialogue as reviewers remarked that it seemed a strange omission.

Javik was from a DLC mission that was generally available (i.e. not restricted to special editions), but you're right, his insight was a weirdly important thing to relegate to DLC. You could make the argument that a player with Javik available could still fail to take him on the missions with his additional dialogue (I didn't always take him because I wanted to bring characters I had history with in the previous games), so it was already designed in a way that allows the player to easily miss that material, but failing to include him in the core game is a further barrier on top of that, and a significant one.

I wonder how well that worked for EA. Did all those reviewers talking about what a strange exclusion it was drive people away, or push them towards the extra purchase? Or did they get it but feel bitter about it? Who knows?!

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It drives me nuts in Mass Effect games.  Adding DLC into the middle of a game, sold after the game launches, that's so directly related to the main narrative of the trilogy....  ME3 is much better with Javik and with the later DLC, the whole story holds together more, the ending doesn't seem quite as random, etc.  

 

At least the Citadel DLC as clearly written as a coda rather than something meant to be played in the course of the main game.  

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Mass Effect 3 seemed particularly strange because without Javik there's only one new party member character. The fact that they were presenting it through marketing as a great place to jump in makes it even weirder.

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I think the Dragon Age in-game DLC advertisement was worse

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At the very least if you buy Dragon Age now, you almost certainly get all the DLC.  If you buy ME3 now for 10 dollars you'd still have to separately purchase at full price  each DLC pack so tons of players likely never play with them.

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Oh my god, I totally thought the White Hat pack was literally a white hat the whole time they were discussing it. I feel so dumb! It just sounds like such a stupid cosmetic preorder thing.

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I feel like whoever made that now infamous Watch_Dogs wikipedia chart must have tried to obfuscate it as much as possible for effect. I can't think of a reason to include every region in one chart and future DLC AND physical collectibles in one chart other than to make some sort of 'what a weird industry this is smh' statement

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This was an issue with Company of Heroes 2 where there was a deluge of DLC on the first day, and it just kind of caused your brain to shut down and not really want to play the game because who wants to sift through all that junk to see if there is anything you actually want in there?

 

Also that you need to know what you want, BEFORE you play it? Seems like a weird order of operations, right? Oh you love this game? Sucker! You should have bought in Nairobi! 

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I feel like whoever made that now infamous Watch_Dogs wikipedia chart must have tried to obfuscate it as much as possible for effect. I can't think of a reason to include every region in one chart and future DLC AND physical collectibles in one chart other than to make some sort of 'what a weird industry this is smh' statement

The reason is to be complete in its presentation of information, I think.

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I feel like whoever made that now infamous Watch_Dogs wikipedia chart must have tried to obfuscate it as much as possible for effect. I can't think of a reason to include every region in one chart and future DLC AND physical collectibles in one chart other than to make some sort of 'what a weird industry this is smh' statement

Yeah but those are all actual SKUs that are being sold. It may include DLCs that aren't PLAYABLE yet, but they are still being SOLD as part of these SKUs.

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I don't think any developer or publisher would deliberately risk restricting anything that would have any real bearing on review scores to a non-standard edition.

 

Sorry to pick a line out of your post (which I generally agree with), but I don't think that this is true unfortunately. Publishers as a company care about money, which is why they care about review scores. If they deem that the money gained from splitting important content out of the game into DLC would be greater than what's lost from review scores, most would probably do it. Really exploitative free-to-play mobile games are a good example of this - they are often given lower scores in reviews, but publishers don't reduce the exploitation because (they believe) they will make more money from it than they'll lose from a lower review score.

 

That said, you're probably right in that core pieces aren't usually taken out and offered separately.

 

This very consumerist approach to AAA releases by publishers definitely makes me care about them less. If it's a game with a purportedly serious tone, it's really hard for me to take it seriously when I know I could have gotten a gimmicky toy or piece of "equipment" for a few dollars more with the purchase.

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I would prefer it if preorder bonuses went back to the way they were when they tried to emulate extra features on DVDs.  I like stuff like interviews with developers and commentaries.  I think that stuff is fascinating.  Look at the interest in 2 Player Production's Double Fine documentaries.  One of my favorite things in Valve games is the dev commentary mode.  Those are things that I would pay extra for.  Neither is necessary for the game itself but they totally add value to the product.  Swag and in-game items don't really interest me because they'll be easily forgotten or replaced within the game itself after I get bored of it.  I think I remember Jake once mentioned that he would buy Duke Nukem Forever if there was a version that came with previous builds.  I would be really into stuff like that.

 

As for DLC gripes, one that always bugged me was Assassin's Creed II (the first ACII, not one of the thousand games that followed).  There's two whole memory sections that are "inaccessible" IN THE GAME because they were later released as DLC.  I never played either of them so I have no idea what they brought to the narrative, but it really bothered me to have the placeholder for the DLC shoved in my face like that.

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Especially because they counted towards 100% completion (and they weren't great, from what I remember).

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At the very least if you buy Dragon Age now, you almost certainly get all the DLC.  If you buy ME3 now for 10 dollars you'd still have to separately purchase at full price  each DLC pack so tons of players likely never play with them.

I can affirm this. I didn't play ME3 until this past Christmas when I picked up the edition with the Javik DLC for cheap. I'd also been on the lookout for a special edition packs with the story DLC for either ME2 and 3, but never found any. Contrast that with being able to pick up Dragon Age: Origins with all the DLC for $5.

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I just started listening to the episode with my morning bowl of cereal. I hear about the chart when it's first mentioned, Google it, and have the same reaction as Jake apparently at the same time (while listening).

 

WHAT IS THIS.

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