Maniacal
the green Napoleon
No that reaction was justified, it was an atrociously crap ending and Casey Hudson is an idiot for refusing to allow anyone else to have input on it.
GOOD NEWS! EAs future games will all feature microtransactions!
- Thread starter Maniacal
- Start date
No that reaction was justified, it was an atrociously crap ending and Casey Hudson is an idiot for refusing to allow anyone else to have input on it.
warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
Definitely, the final decisions should lie with the developers and their project leads.
Thrawn
Emperor
Game design decisions should lie with the developers and designers as well. The vast majority of gamers don't have a clue when it comes to game design.
civvver
Deity
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2007
- Messages
- 5,855
But the thing is it's a free market. If companies can put out bad games and people will buy them then more power to em! Their job is first and foremost to make money. Sure a lot of indie developers make games for the joy of it, but EA is a publicly traded company with shareholders and executives etc. If they start to compromise the quality of product to squeeze out a few more bucks the market will respond. On the other hand if they are able to release a game for full price 59.99 with less content than in the past which they now release through dlcs for 5.99 or so and it works then obviously that is what the market will bear. I hate to say it but video games are such a gigantic value from an entertainment hours to dollar ratio perspective, maybe the market is ready for an adjustment. Me personally I skip brand new games and wait for discounts. I bought mass effect 2 for $20 a year after release. It's a big reason I don't play console games too because they hardly ever discount new games. I still don't have mass effect 3. I skipped diablo 3. I waited a year before buying dragon age 2. I buy some old boxed games off amazon and the rest off steam on sale. The only game I've paid full release price for in the last 8 years has been world of warcraft expansions and civ 4 and 5. So if EA wants to release sim city 5 for $60 with microtransactions that's fine, I will stay away until they do a price drop.
I do have my issues with EA though. Any of you familar with darkspore? It's a dungeon crawler similar to diablo and also requires you to be online even in single player mode cus you play on a server instance. Well there was a weird bug on release that prevented you from connecting to the servers, but it only effected some people and if you submitted a support ticket they'd fix you in a day or so. About two months ago it started effecting EVERYONE. No one could play the game at all. Some people were buying the game off steam and immediately unable to play. The one representative left told us that everyone from the darkspore team had been moved to other projects and there wouldn't be a fix. Some people got refunds, but if you had owned the game more than a month they refused. That in my opinion is wrong and pretty close to consumer fraud because you advertised a service that stopped working and refused to fix it. Fortunately it was fixed a couple weeks ago and the game is playable now, but it took a lot of in from the players.
So yeah I have issues with EA's product quality but I can still vote with my wallet and I suggest you do the same.
I do have my issues with EA though. Any of you familar with darkspore? It's a dungeon crawler similar to diablo and also requires you to be online even in single player mode cus you play on a server instance. Well there was a weird bug on release that prevented you from connecting to the servers, but it only effected some people and if you submitted a support ticket they'd fix you in a day or so. About two months ago it started effecting EVERYONE. No one could play the game at all. Some people were buying the game off steam and immediately unable to play. The one representative left told us that everyone from the darkspore team had been moved to other projects and there wouldn't be a fix. Some people got refunds, but if you had owned the game more than a month they refused. That in my opinion is wrong and pretty close to consumer fraud because you advertised a service that stopped working and refused to fix it. Fortunately it was fixed a couple weeks ago and the game is playable now, but it took a lot of in from the players.
So yeah I have issues with EA's product quality but I can still vote with my wallet and I suggest you do the same.
Maniacal
the green Napoleon
If the free market actually worked we wouldn't be having this discussion.
warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
My point was that the gaming community can be an amazing source of inspiration and ideas. We know what sorts of games we want. It would be then up to the developers to use all that feedback to influence their decision making.
That community-to-developer-to-community dialogue is what can make games much much better. Sure, you'll get a lot of crappy feedback, but by engaging the community in that way you'll get a lot of good feedback too, not to mention the respect of the people who's money you're after.
Apparently EA said that gamers love microtransactions, and they even had the balls to try to make us feel like they are awesome because "it's complicated to create these microtransaction infrastructures", like they're making us a favor. Boohoo make me cry.
It wouldn't be too bad, I could just not care about this issue since there are all those other companies who will keep tending to my style of game consumption.
The big problem is that EA has basically stolen a lot of good franchises from us and is holding them hostage.
It wouldn't be too bad, I could just not care about this issue since there are all those other companies who will keep tending to my style of game consumption.
The big problem is that EA has basically stolen a lot of good franchises from us and is holding them hostage.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Well gaming is dead to me anyways, every franchise I enjoyed has been run into the ground or "streamlined" for casuals. I have been reduced to Android app games and 4X.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Hah, what else is there? Until the bloated AAA producers die, only the new Cyberpunk 2077 springs to mind and that is far off.
Maniacal
the green Napoleon
Mobile games are a major pusher in the microtransaction schemes...
Do I think I'm likely to pay for micro-transactions like EA is proposing? No. Do I have a problem with them being in-game? Not if they don't mean artificial limits on the core game they advertised, and don't get in my face while I'm playing.
It's a tough line for a developer to walk, and one I've seen quite a few games stumble across (or simply blatantly and knowingly stride across). So overall, I'm less than delighted to see EA embracing it as the wave of the future. That said, it's not the end of the world. There will still be tons of good games out there; it might just mean a little bit more discrimination in selecting games.
It's a tough line for a developer to walk, and one I've seen quite a few games stumble across (or simply blatantly and knowingly stride across). So overall, I'm less than delighted to see EA embracing it as the wave of the future. That said, it's not the end of the world. There will still be tons of good games out there; it might just mean a little bit more discrimination in selecting games.
Thrawn
Emperor
Customers (in this case, gamers) think they know what they want but aren't always aware of what they actually want.
Yeah there will be some good feedback/ideas from communities, but looking for it will be like looking for a needle in a haystack. While I don't play WoW at the moment, I still follow development and news, and I see it all the time with the stuff that gets asked by players. 99% of the time they just make me want to reach through the internet and punch them in the face because they are clearly stupid. I actually feel really sorry for the devs, while at the same time they have a lot of my respect for the crap they have to put up with.
Obviously, WoW is an anomaly, but in general I still find it to be true. Smaller games with smaller communities will have an easier time of it, but in general that good feedback is going to be hard to find.
Ailedhoo
wonderer
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2012
- Messages
- 7,809
EA must fall sooner or later. It is a disgrace, especilly in their handling of franchies; notably including the likes of what they did to Command and Conquer plus others. Anyrate
DRM is less destructive than the push of EA that leads into low quality.
DRM is less destructive than the push of EA that leads into low quality.
Sadly, I have to agree. Although it's not like we have to choose between fighting one or the other, DRM doesn't usually change gameplay (apart from possible technical problems which I've been lucky with thankfully). Microtransactions can have an effect on the experience in terms of game "rules", like Diablo 3 boring item drop rates being adjusted to account for the availability of the auction house (a special kind of microtransaction).
Nintz
King of the Britons
I have to admit, I don't get the massive amount of EA hate.
It could be that I am a little too young, but I don't understand why EA is seen as the ultimate villain in the video game world. Activision maybe, but at least EA's games are mostly good (so far). Maybe it was different in the past?
It could be that I am a little too young, but I don't understand why EA is seen as the ultimate villain in the video game world. Activision maybe, but at least EA's games are mostly good (so far). Maybe it was different in the past?
Maniacal
the green Napoleon
You're joking right?I really hope you're trying to be funny.
It was different in the past because they hadn't driven most their best developers into the ground if not out of business yet.
Nintz
King of the Britons
Um...no. The EA games I've played have, with the very arguable exception of ME3 been good. 8-8.5/10 or better at least. Of course, I don't play that many EA games. When I play a game from any publisher/developer, I always check reviews first. That goes for everyone in my opinion, so if EA has made an obviously bad game, I simply won't buy it.
But didn't they stop doing all of that a couple years back, after this entire debacle happened? I'm not saying they're the greatest company ever, I just don't get why people seem to have a supernatural hate for EA. It seems as if EA = The Devil. The reasoning doesn't matter. Huh? I mean, I haven't seen a franchise that "EA" has definitively killed for me. The new SimCity may be that, but it isn't yet. DA2 was a disaster (or so I hear), but EA also published DA:O.
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