Gamer Rant: Don’t worry, it will be good in 6 months! – By Sean “Blazek” Emes, Edited by Jordan “Doomhammer” Kahn

This topic has always been infuriating to me, and it’s about time I shared those feelings with everyone. Gaming is an experience the player should find joyful and immersive. The deeper the story, the more interactive and the more difficult a game is, the better a player can enjoy themselves within the world of the game. At least, this is what gaming should be, and thanks to the wonders of the internet we have seen the growth of game updates and Downloadable Content (DLC). The idea is a brilliant one, allowing a developer to extend the life of your favorite game or fix issues that may have been missed during the testing phase, but as it is with all good ideas someone finds a way to exploit them. Only this time it is not the hackers or the cheaters. It is the developers.

"If only you waited a year..."

Before this generation of consoles, developers had no means to send out regular updates to everyone who purchased a game. This meant that a game had to go through heavy testing and sometimes extended development to ensure no gameplay issues slipped through the cracks and caused the game to be a failure. This resulted in better quality games with a more polished feel. Now, a developer can skip a great deal of the fine-tuning on a game, push it out the door, allow the players who to spend $60 on the game to find the issues for them and slowly patch in corrections that should have been done prior to the game launch! While I am glad they have the ability to fix issues that may have slipped under the radar, it should not be the case that half the games I purchase are effectively still beta versions that will need to be fixed in time.

While we’re on the subject of beta versions, let’s talk about DLC. Originally a good idea as a way to get an additional 5+ hours of content for a few bucks, is now an industry standard to deliver half the game up front, and the rest of the game over a course of months, for a price. And the sad part of it all is that if you’re willing to wait about a year you can usually get the “ultimate” edition, which will include all the DLC with the game at the same price as the original release a year prior. That’s $30 or more you can save if you’re willing to let the developer just finish their game.

First Strike... to your wallet; and certainly not the last!

Also, when did paying for maps become acceptable? It costs players $15 for another 3-4 maps every few months, and while console gamers put up with this, PC gamers are scratching their heads in bewilderment. Prior to console FPS popularity PC shooters would get additional maps on a regular basis, many times made by the community itself. The only time PC shooters would pay for anything was for game title expansions, which would usually give a graphics overhaul and add in a decent amount of new content.

Now, it’s finally happened. Developers have hit an all-time low: making you pay for content already on the disc. This appears to be a standard that Capcom is pushing for, forcing players to unlock characters that were already on the game disc for Marvel vs Capcom 3! Let’s get this straight. We pay $60 to buy the game, but we don’t get the entire game until we are willing to pay more to play the rest of the game that we just bought… are you kidding me?!?

It appears that the one thing developers never wait to do is milking their customers for all they’re worth.

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