Microtransaction Debate On G4
A few days ago Toots gave us all his rant about microtransactions on XBox Live, specifically about the latest Lumines Live! download from XBox Live marketplace. As we all know there are tons of things you have to pay extra for on the Marketplace, icons, skins, extra costumes, extra weapons. But is this fair? Are they nickel and dimeing us to death? G4’s The Loop take this question on and debates it with Xbox’s Major Nelson and 1up’s Andrew Pfister. It’s an interesting debate, although I wish it would have gone on a bit longer.
Fruit Brute
Posted to Video Games, Videos on 26 October 2006
· Comments (6)
Other stuff like this: andrew pfister, Lumines, major nelson, microtransaction
I really wish the interview was longer. And yeah, people shouldn’t be paying full price for a game and then have to pay more for content that should’ve already been in the game to begin with.
Nintendo and Sony: please watch this and learn from other people’s mistakes.
I know this is off-topic, but… “Loominez”? Really? It’s not just the plural of “lumine”?
...Nevermind. Wikipedia informs us we’re both wrong. It’s pronounced the same as “luminous”.
Yay off-topic!
I think making additional skins, costumes, whatever available for a price is fine as long as it’s just aesthetic stuff.
Once you start offering things that give you an advantage in the game for an extra price (weapons, cheat codes, etc.) then the suspension of disbelief is ruined for me. At that point, it feels like all you have to do to be good at a game is pay more.
Selling new games online, however, is genius as far as I’m concerned, and I’m amazed it took so long to develop that XBLA was the first to do it. I’d prefer an “all you can eat” system like Gametap, Sega Channel and the earlier experiments with digital game delivery, but XBLA is almost enough to get me to buy a 360 even though none of the actual 360 games turn me on yet.
I heartily agree with Raindog. I am not bothered if people want to (stupidly) pay $2 to change the color of their car in a game. It’s not something I would do, but if kids want to spend their allowance on imaginary paint, more power to them.
But if money spent is related to making a car faster than non-paying players, it’s a class system based on wealth. Gaming is one of the few places that everyone is supposed to be able to compete fairly.
Not to mention the fact that Microsoft has found a way to make people pay more for the same product. A troubling trend.
I’m so over people complaining about microtransactions. Gaming costs money. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it.
It’s called voting with your dollar.