Current Events > "This is just the beginning." - Take-Two CEO on Microtransactions

(+) Yeah! (+)

whitelytning posted...

Alucard188 posted...

Just how much abuse can consumers take?

I just don't get why so many of you see it as "abuse" or some sort of personal attack. Companies make these games to make money -- it shouldn't be news or upsetting when you see examples of it.

Why do some of you expect them to not make money on segments of the game that are shown to be very profitable? And why does it amount to abuse or some other synonym that implies a personal injury by the purchaser when they do?

Abuse is not the right word for this, this is exploitation by using well known psychology tricks to get people to buy stuff.

Which is unethical.
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$20 shark card: 1.25 million in game money for gtao

$11: 1 month mod menu subscription where you can give yourself and friends unlimited money among other things

:thinking:

Well I know what I'm gonna do for Red Dead 2
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I do think there's a sort of ethical and legal boundary being pushed, to the extent that lootboxes replicate gambling. But largely I agree with

whitelytning posted...

I just don't get why so many of you see it as "abuse" or some sort of personal attack. Companies make these games to make money -- it shouldn't be news or upsetting when you see examples of it.

This is the system working as intended.
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I'm honestly surprised this hasn't happened sooner. Gaming is one of the few major forms of media where you get WAYYY more bang for your buck compared to everything else.

$60 can easily get you hundreds of hours in a lot of competitive game and like 30-200 in a good singleplayer game.

movies/tv/music don't come close to that level.
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For the huge publishers like this they're leaving money on the table if they don't implement them unfortunately.

Hardcore gamers will complain but when it comes to sales it is evidently not a deal breaker. Making a 20 hour single player game is more of a deal breaker than microtransactions.
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whitelytning posted...

Alucard188 posted...

Just how much abuse can consumers take?

I just don't get why so many of you see it as "abuse" or some sort of personal attack. Companies make these games to make money -- it shouldn't be news or upsetting when you see examples of it.

Why do some of you expect them to not make money on segments of the game that are shown to be very profitable? And why does it amount to abuse or some other synonym that implies a personal injury by the purchaser when they do?

It's never optional it's going to affect you one way or another. They're not just going to have it as an optional thing. They're going to do everything they can until they empty your wallets, purses, and bank accounts as much as possible. Star Wars Loot Boxes isn't optional when your opponent gets a clear cut advantage over you because your opponent is either a fucking rich or mentally defective enough to spend thousands of dollars first just so he can get them early bird wins easier.

Even the "It's just cosmetic statement is bullshit". People who won those costumes through loot boxes just became a fucking walking advertisement in the games. They make them cooler and more interesting than the base outfit. And those who have them is always the envy of those who do not have it. It is there always psychologically assaulting the player to buy their shitty gambling loot boxes to get the cool costume. Were it was any other game in the old days would be a simple unlocked. You know like Super Mario Odyssey where you get the in game money to unlock costumes in game like a fucking actual real game.

Unfortunately two of my favorite games are Civilization and Xcom if Firaxis have to implement 2KGames insipid bullshit, I'll have to drag my love of these two games out in the woods and shoot them in the goddamn face figuratively, like I did with Metal Gear Solid when I saw FOB Insurance... Yeah when they took my fucking offline MY FUCKING SINGLE PLAYER RESOURCES FROM METAL GEAR SOLID V PHANTOM PAIN FROM OFFLINE TO MOTHERFUCKING ONLINE IN MY STUPID FOB BASE WHERE IT CAN BE STOLEN! Is fucking bullshit. I got blackmailed by Konami essentially. It either pay them real protection money for protect my digital worthless goods or let them get stolen.

Yeah microtransactions are so optional... Anyone who believes that has the fucking intelligence of a Pakled from Star Trek. Oh look Star Trek. Star Trek Online! You know how they don't have money in Starfleet? Well they fucking do in Online! You can either buy a quintillion keys with real money to open loot boxes and hope you get the ship out of the box or drop $20-$60 for a ship just so you can have a much bearable time in the end game. But wait there is more! To get specific abilities you have to buy specific ships to unlock a perk that's only available to that ship so you can use them on your other ships!
That's a glorious Ferengi Business model right fucking there. Quark lobes would be fucking wet at the anticipation of the money.

I knew some time back that GTAO was a truly horrible thing. Not just in how badly designed and how awfully it ran, but more.

GTAO probably ruined Rockstar. They came out with one of the biggest games to ever exist, GTA5. It was the best in a series that was not only great, but truly transformative of gaming as a whole. It was very influential.

And they took all that...and squandered it. They squandered it into a low quality shit tier online mode, and devoted all their focus there. They didn't grow GTA5 and build on it like they did with GTA4. Instead they made new content...for GTAO. That you can't even use in GTA5, because then people would have a way to enjoy the game without enduring the endless bullshit and microtransactions of GTAO.

GTAO was...is, like a parasite, that latched on to the host, GTA5, and killed it. And this is them saying that that's just the beginning, that corruption will spread.

Gamers don't seem very good at voting with their wallets. It will take some extreme persistent overstepping of the line to get meaningful pushback, and so many contrarians, trolls and fanboys will resist any pushback every step of the way too.

What an obnoxious, annoying time in gaming. We're going full circle. Back to the days of shitty coin-guzzling arcades.
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All the shark card buyers did this. It's your fault. Shame on all you fools

People will say "Well, I'll just play offline!" without remembering what happened with NBA 2k18.

Either we get lucky, and RDR2 was too far along before they were able to riddle the story with microtransactions.

OR

We got royally screwed and RDR2 was specifically delayed to re balance it for micro transactions.
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MacadamianNut3 posted...

$20 shark card: 1.25 million in game money for gtao

$11: 1 month mod menu subscription where you can give yourself and friends unlimited money among other things

:thinking:

Well I know what I'm gonna do for Red Dead 2

Don't expect a PC version of RDR2 anytime in the next decade.
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There are so many damn games to play.

If the microtransactions suck in RDR2 don't buy it. Play something else. If enough people didn't buy the game maybe it would change.

I don't think this is gonna happen though. RDR2 will have a bigger launch than the first game and will be one of the best selling games of 2018. Whining about it and buying the game anyway accomplishes nothing. Cancelling a preorder only to buy the game when reviews are good anyway accomplishes nothing.

Microtransactions are either a dealbreaker or they aren't. I'm tired of people whining about games like Shadow of War, Battlefront 2 etc. only for them to sell gangbusters anyway. Meanwhile games like Prey and Wolfenstein 2 sell barely anything in comparison. Gamers are picking their poison.
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Even if 100,000 boycott micro transactions , along with the bs that nickels and dimes gamers there is something call a whale who is the 1% that can be 5 or less people who are the assholes who spend $100,000 or more on the game.

Those whales are why microtransactions have gotten so far, a very small group of people wasting stupid amounts of money on the game cause they can afford to piss it away.

Voting with your wallet means jack fucking shit when whales are how the companies can keep pushing this shithole business model.
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I am glad I am doing my part by no longer buying games.
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Ive never been bothered by microtransactions. Im mean theyre abundant in most FPS but its mostly cosmetic crap that you would slowly unlock anyway, Im fine maximizing my replay value by unlocking it myself
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Alucard188 posted...

Silly_Topic posted...

No, you won't be doing this.

Lmao wrecked!
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I think one reason a lot of gamers are annoyed by this kind of thing is because they're old enough to remember a time before microtransactions. When all the cool stuff was just part of the game you bought. On the disc or cartridge. You could either just earn it through play time or skill challenges.

We can see, and often resent, how developers will basically cut out content that would have been part of the initial purchase back in the day. On disc DLC was the most blatant example of that, so that's why it is so hated. The content is already on the disc at launch, but they lock it behind a paywall.
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Esrac posted...

I think one reason a lot of gamers are annoyed by this kind of thing is because they're old enough to remember a time before microtransactions. When all the cool stuff was just part of the game you bought. On the disc or cartridge. You could either just earn it through play time or skill challenges.

We can see, and often resent, how developers will basically cut out content that would have been part of the initial purchase back in the day. On disc DLC was the most blatant example of that, so that's why it is so hated. The content is already on the disc at launch, but they lock it behind a paywall.

That's not all, it's aggravating to miss out on content because you're not willing to pay extra and even more so when said content gives other players a competitive advantage, which is happening more and more.

This will blow up in their faces eventually, because these models that develop entire games around the small percentage of people that are willing to pay for microtransactions while screwing over others who aren't will inevitably push away the others.
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I'll probably skip this game. It will probably be great but I can't imagine it will do anything new or innovative enough that I'll be sad to miss it. I'm already too cheap to buy a lot of games in general but when they try to nickle and dime me, I just feel put off by the whole thing and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

The online will probably suck anyway if its anything like GTA V's. It felt like the whole thing was built around getting you to buy shark cards.

Gaming needs another crash for real.
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the complaints about these things are so incoherent
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LJRENEGADE posted...

The online will probably suck anyway if its anything like GTA V's. It felt like the whole thing was built around getting you to buy shark cards.

Ding ding ding.
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GTAO wasn't like that at first. Like, things were priced at a reasonable level and to play wasn't to be in a constant state of hemorrhaging money unless you were one of those chucklefucks who just wanted to lockdown into endless wannabe deathmatches in freeroam, blowing all your money on weapons, hospitals and penalty fees.

But what I imagine is a combination of wanting to push shark cards, and also a reaction to the flood of cheated money, all the extra content they kept adding was just stupidly overpriced. It was especially jarring when comparing motorbikes. I'm sure it's changed now but for a LONG time the best bikes, hands down, were the Akuma, and the Bati. I think the Bati was the more expensive of the two and it was like...15k.

Then they started pushing out all these new shitty bikes costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. It was insanity. I never took any cheated money, which was hard, literally, because of how rampant it was at one point. So all these price inflations made the game almost unplayable in terms of progress (nevermind how literally unplayable it was for 9 other reasons).

There was a time the most expensive car was 1 million, and it wasn't even the best card even though inept people seemed to think it was. But more and more expensive and not even better cars were pushed out. There was a solid gold plane that wasn't anything special stat-wise and basically screamed "I'm an asshole" to fly it but people were buying that, whether it be with the cheated money, or shark cards. But it basically came to a point where the entire GTAO environment, was for cheaters. Whether those cheaters cheated the system, or paid the system for the cheats, didn't matter. Someone who just wants to play and enjoy the game and progress that way could basically go fuck themselves.

I might've put up with it, if:

- The community wasn't atrocious
- It wasn't horribly designed at every turn, the worst game I've ever played
- Buggy as fuck with Rockstar showing no desire to fix a god damn thing

So I mean, it was better early on, but it was also randomly deleting people's save files early on too, so...

Fuck GTAO.
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I never felt the need to buy shark cards, but I don't necessarily object to this as it's the reason GTAO continues to get new content years after it launched.
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Godnorgosh posted...

Haha. Publishers are so short-sighted if they're not worried about the long-term repercussions of this.

To which there are zero
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Didn't they also nerf one of the supercar's stats and essentially release a new supercar with the same stats as the old one, but for a higher price point? @Tmk
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GTAO makes me afraid for RDR2.
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Alucard188 posted...

Didn't they also nerf one of the supercar's stats and essentially release a new supercar with the same stats as the old one, but for a higher price point?

That's what I heard, but I left the game by then so I don't have first hand experience with that.

GTAO is just fascinatingly mishandled. A look into the heists debacle is a good window into that, because that was something advertised alongside GTAO, like it'd be in from the start or soon after...and I think it took well over a year to come out, and the intro to it had a dig at the players being "impatient" about it which is just bafflingly oblivious to the situation, and then the heists themselves were buggy as hell so clearly they weren't polishing it all that time.
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Looks like I didn't miss much skipping on GTAV multiplayer.

Fuck these companies and fuck anyone who supports microtransactions
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What I dont get is the whales have shown time and time again that they will spend money on anything whether it is cosmetic or not. So basically there is no need to bring in pay to win if you arent trying to alienate your fan base
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Where's zombie pelican at
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josifrees posted...

What I dont get is the whales have shown time and time again that they will spend money on anything whether it is cosmetic or not. So basically there is no need to bring in pay to win if you arent trying to alienate your fan base

Companies aren't content with merely making money - they want _all_ of the money. It's why we saw so many companies attempting to ape CoD last gen, because CoD was making piles of money. They ape whatever is popular, and right now, Overwatch's fuckery is what's king. It's what drove Visceral's game to the ground. It's what's driving BFII. It's what's driving Destiny 2. It's what's going to happen with Bioware's new Destiny clone.
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Sure, you can just sell cosmetics, but why stop there and alienate those who want to compete to win with fancy leader boards and p2w items and to show their superiority
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Well you could just be like Bungie and make all multiplayer P2P so the people you're playing against can DDOS you for easy wins.

And then when they get caught they only get suspended for 2 weeks.
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JSancton posted...

Some of you preordered a game that has over a year to come out? Unless it's the limited editions, there will be places to buy the standard version day of, I promise.

I preorder all the games i'm interested in on Amazon, cause they don't charge me until it ships, I can cancel anytime, and if the price is lowered for any reason at all (including a glitch) I get that price
plus there's a 20% discount (admittedly recently not every game has had it) and it delivers it to me on release (never experienced the horror stories i've read about)
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Offworlder1 posted...

Even if 100,000 boycott micro transactions , along with the bs that nickels and dimes gamers there is something call a whale who is the 1% that can be 5 or less people who are the assholes who spend $100,000 or more on the game.

Those whales are why microtransactions have gotten so far, a very small group of people wasting stupid amounts of money on the game cause they can afford to piss it away.

Voting with your wallet means jack fucking shit when whales are how the companies can keep pushing this shithole business model.

its the dumb shit fanboys spout that enable fleecing
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Need to start making a blacklist of these companies, and post it on Reddit/4chan.

You gotta start somewhere to stop their greed.
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Vote with your fucking dollar.

Is RDR2 still going to have a complete full single player experience I don't have to shell out more money to enjoy?
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DoubleDare posted...

Is RDR2 still going to have a complete full single player experience I don't have to shell out more money to enjoy?

I mean, probably. GTA5 did still.
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but rdr2 was supposed to be goty, its so surprising its just another rockstar trashfest
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Spooking posted...

AAA titles are going to take this route while indie games won't (at least for now). I suggest people who are upset about this take a look at indie games instead.

Ideed. AAA are creatively bankrupt, corrupt and greedy industry and the enablers are just as bad
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darkprince45 posted...

You know what's funny about all this? For all the hate capcom is getting. They're staying away from this lol. RE7 was perfect

Japanese companies in general seem to be staying away from it. Not sure if it will last though.
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Y'all realize that the monetization of rdr2 will come from it's online mode right? Rockstar have already stated that it'll have an online mode similar to GTA5.

Meaning there'll be a single player mode too. So long as that is still there and excellent, I'll get it. I stopped GTA online after a week.

Also, what were you expecting? You know they made almost a billion dollars on shark cards alone, right?

It'll be more of the same in rdr2. Just be cow cards or somryhing now.
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Rika_Furude posted...

but rdr2 was supposed to be goty, its so surprising its just another rockstar trashfest

It's going to be identical to gta5 in how it's set up. Take that as you will.
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Rockstar and Take Two need to get the same treatment as EA got. I mean the CEO is outright admitting there's going to be more microtransactions there to fuck us.
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Samaellives91 posted...

darkprince45 posted...

You know what's funny about all this? For all the hate capcom is getting. They're staying away from this lol. RE7 was perfect

Japanese companies in general seem to be staying away from it. Not sure if it will last though.

It's not only Japanese companies either, Bethesda, outside of paid mod nonsense, is staying away from it too. Wolfenstein 2 and evil within 2 didn't have microtransactions in them.

It's honestly the other big 5 that are digging in with the microtransactions:

Ubisoft
Activision
EA
Take two
Warner brothers

With ea and Activision being the worst.
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Southernfatman posted...

Rockstar and Take Two need to get the same treatment as EA got. I mean the CEO is outright admitting there's going to be more microtransactions there to fuck us.

The pushback against microtransactions is sadly a minority. Most of the average casual gamer doesn't care.
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