Microtransactions Hit Games Industry and Trigger a 3X Value Bonus
This is why your favorite games became slot machines.
Bethesda’s release of horse armor DLC for its 2006 hit RPG marked the beginning of a new era. At the time, a vocal group of alarmists argued that the stupid horse armor was a slippery slope into games being full of micro-transactions and a country where people would try to marry horses because the institution of marriage was now a sham. I guess those folks were right. According to a report from monetization service Digital River, the rise of microtransactions have led to a massive rise in digital revenue for traditional, non-free-to-play games. More than a quarter of total digital revenue on such titles comes from loot crates and the like.
The increase in revenue has resulted in the industry as a whole tripling its market value. Digital River notes that publishers are throwing money away by not running the operation with the “Games as a Service” model. It is better for the bottom line to hook a player on a single title and drip feed them over time than to hope they are willing to hop from full-priced title to full-priced title. Revenue per user is expected to double in the near future and more publishers push their offerings in this direction. Scmhlerpff. That was the sound of the money vacuum being installed on every game or franchise you ever cherished.
Digital River also touches on PC gaming buying habits. They report that the average PC gamer waits 21 days to buy a new release in hopes of a sale. This behavior has driven the rise of third-party key resellers. Digital River implies that all of these keys come from using stolen credit cards or other types of fraud and that publishers would prefer piracy over the losses incurred from said fraud.
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replyChris Jarrard posted a new article, Microtransactions Hit Games Industry and Trigger a 3X Value Bonus
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It wasn't a problem with MMO's, we understood why we were paying a monthly fee then. It seems more problematic when they mix this into games that don't fit that model.
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except a lot of games are expected to have similar features, like DLC content and dedicated servers
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I remember a day when server software was given out so 'dedicated servers' didn't cost extra.
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that's nice and all, but how would that work on consoles?
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A number of games allowed users to run their console as a dedicated server. I know of at least one that let PC users host a server for console users.
The excuse that dedicated servers implies games need microtranactions is entirely untrue. After all, it was EA that started this trend (when the stopped releasing BF server software and started partnering with hosting companies only.) -
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In the short term, maybe, but that has negative consequence in design and gameplay, the same way US TV was seriously limited by being designed around commercial break structure.
I won't buy games that insist on being a 'service' even for single player stuff.
I've got plenty to play, I can be choosy. It's not like sticking with things like Hollow Knight is hurting me.
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"Digital River implies that all of these keys come from using stolen credit cards or other types of fraud and that publishers would prefer piracy over the losses incurred from said fraud." What?
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Devs do this because it works, and it will always work, because the human brain loves to gamble. It's unlikely to be legislated against in the US any time soon. The best we can hope for is that the market will reject games where gameplay-affecting items are included in this. But it's not looking good for that prospect so far.
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