EA CEO John Riccitiello has been speaking in a conference call about the proposed offer for Take-Two and his thinking behind the combined mega company that would rival the likes of Activision Blizzard.
Microtransactions have gotten ridiculously overpriced in recent years, with titles now offering cosmetic skins worth more than some games.
The elephant in the room tho is personal accountability. It’s easy (albeit basic) to blame the big, bad corpo, but microtransactions wouldn’t be where they are if gamers didn’t spend money on them. As it stands the MTs usually make more than the game. Publishers know raising game prices will cause backlash, so they do MTs to compensate. But the adult conversation is consumers determine the success of products with their wallets. So if MTs are a huge thing, it’s because we as consumers told them we like them by giving them a lot of money for them. So if you don’t want them to be a thing, convince your fellow gamers to stop buying them and expect that games will be decently more expensive. You all can disagree all you want, but reality is a bitch, and eventually you have to live in it.
Trying to convince people is the least realistic thing. If we are trying to be adults, actual action is what changes things not "convincing campaigns" on platforms owned by the people 'you' are going against. It's madness and idealistic.
There never was, the only time I paid for a microtransaction was on Blacklight Retribution (PS4) and it was because I enjoyed the game a lot so I felt the devs should get something for all that entertainment (€5 "membership")
The devs wouldn’t get that though, that shit goes straight to the higher ups who do f*** all let’s be honest.
Probably, but I wasn't as cynical back then and €5 wasn't a big ask to get the guns with grinding instead of renting them, and the game was good (still is on the PS5/4)
I couldn’t believe what Blizzard charged for horse armor and cosmetics in Diablo 4…
I remember back in the day when a season pass was $15 and you got everything included in it. Now, I see them at $60 and you still don’t get everything.
As soon as gaming wasn't deemed nerdy anymore, and reached the casuals this happened. We're smart, but casuals play mobile games and other stuff, and don't really have anything to compare. They think gaming is supposed to be like this and pay for in game purchases.
Deliver Us Mars developer Keoken Interactive has laid off the majority of its staff after struggling to secure funding …
The industry model and standards and who's in place to approve/disapprove have changed ^ what Keoken is feeling now is much like the Mobile burst 15 years ago. Expect more to come out of your own finances. Investors are treating games like movies and now (thank$ a lot for involving yourself hollywood) only the big (and money blind) investors get involved, effectively killing a lot of content that would come out with proper non-gate-kept and/or with incentivized funding.
Sorry but i couldn't care less, Deliver us Mars was as woke game as they come, climate change disaster, all female cast plus only a comic relief indian guy (it takes only 5 minutes into the game for the main female character to say how smart she is compared to the guy), evil white guys, ugly females, then add generic gameplay and puzzles (how many times do you have to cut things with a laser for gods sake), you can't change anything in how the events develop so 0 agency in the story, sub par graphics even while using UE4. So well, go woke go broke, that's how it works.
That stinks but with a 68 average critic rating on their games probably made it difficult for people to invest considering there is a bloat of games getting made these days.
Mat Piscatella of analyst firm Circana has revealed that the PS5 was the market leader in North America for both unit and dollar sales during not only March 2024, but the first quarter of the year as a whole.
Writing on Twitter, Piscatella revealed that spending for video game hardware in February 2024 dropped 32% in comparison to the same period last year, totalling $391 million. In addition, spending for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch each fell a minimum of 30% year-on-year.
What will happen when Sony announce a new Uncharted, Killzone, Tsushima or Horizon ..
Ah yes, Killzone that'll light the world on fire.
I'm joking but I do wish it were likely or more popular.
I'd rather an upgrade over some fps personally. Like a true rpg not some action game with a couple of rpg lite mechanics in it.
To be fair Sony usually know when to let a franchise go dormant, They gave Killzone over 6 different games and it never reached that summit. You end up in a situation like Microsoft if you just keep hammering out Halo and Gears and Forza etc. Microsoft should be smart enough to let them games go.
I thoroughly enjoy my open world games, but highest interest will always be the shooter genre lol it's just something about a good well crafted shooter with lore to it something like the Max payne series
But PS5 and Switch still outsells XBOX embarrassingly even with overall consoles sales decline.
"I wouldn't change a line of code in BioShock nor would I in GTA or Max Payne... what we would do is sell more of it"
Reads as:
"We would take your successful, well-designed franchises and - completely ignorant to the fact that the thought and craftsmanship that goes into each release is what makes them successes in the first place - mass produce those little b*tches until the only thing left of these once-admirable game franchies is the rotting husk of a corpse we have repeatedly raped and driven into the ground."
Of course, maybe I'm over-reacting.
EA Bioshock 2008, Bioshock 2009, bioshock 2010 etc...
and just think how much "better" GTA will be with real ads on the radio and buying nike clotes and you use a motorola phone.
/sarcasim
please stop buying everyone EA.
(Bubbles for freedom)
agree,I wish everyone would boycott EA games,let them know that innovation sells not stolen ideas.it's always the same thing wash,rinse,and repeat.
But at what cost??
EA would just dumb down the quality of those games the way they've done all their other franchises (skate and burnout are exempt for now).
Then we'll see a new gta and bioshock every year. Then they'll charge people $60 for it knowing the game has little to no improvements (just look at the sports games and need for speed for proof of that)
I remember back when I used to like EA. But now I haven't purchased an EA game in eleven years (and counting)
People listen, we all know EA's quality and business practices suck. But if you keep buying their crap, they'll keep giving us crap.
And that is a normal business practice. This is their take on it :
"If the people are going to buy our sub standard stuff, then why SHOULD we car about quality and innovation, the people will buy it anyway"
As gamers and consumers, we ALL need to make a stand against this kind of capitalism.
Step 1: EA buys Take-Two
Step 2: .....
Step 3: Profit