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When DLC Goes Wrong
kube00 writes "Poorly done downloadable content is one of a gamer's worst nightmares right now. Where a publisher stands to make some money, gamers get screwed. Whether it's the overpriced extra maps/costumes DLC, on-the-disc-at-launch DLC, or DLC that is nothing more than a remake of other content, no game is safe from bad DLC. That includes Modern Warfare 2, Bioshock 2, Uncharted 2 and a host of many other popular games. Is there a chance to fix this system?"
I disagree with that broad statement. If I'm interested in the DLC, I probably felt like the game itself had good value. If I didn't thoroughly enjoy a game, I'm not going to be paying them any more money. What's a "complete" game anyway? I'd rather play a good short game than a tedious long one.
Furthermore, if DLC comes out months after a game is released, it indicates the devs didn't just decide to withhold content for a premium. And I can understand being in a situation like "We have this interesting side story to develop, but that would push back the release date a few months." I'd rather have that option to extend the game if I'm enjoying it.
DLC can be good for experimental game ideas. Most of the fallout 3 DLC took place in different settings than the main game, there were some interesting ideas in there. Some were utter failures, mothership zeta was terrible. On the other hand, point lookout was great, and most of my favorite fallout 3 experiences were from that.
Obsidian loses points though for making the end of the game contained in a DLC. I don't know if they had the original ending and decided they could do better (which would be more legitimate) or if they decided they'd be losing money to put all that content in one game (less respectable) or if they decided they could squeeze more out of us by breaking it up (woudn't put it past them).
However it happened, it was a good game and I didn't think twice about buying New Vegas.
It's interesting to see how DLC is detested in computer games. In boardgames, expansions are popular and sell like wildfire, even if they tend to hurt the game experience (the basic game is often sleek and elegant, and expansions add lots of extra crap). But when people love a game, they love to pay to get even more of it. In RPGs it's even worse: a game is considered unsupported if there's not a regular schedule of source books and other stuff prying money out of our wallets. But here, more stuff usually gives the game more viability. The basic rules are nice to get you going, but we want more setting, more adventures, more careers/classes/abilities/spells, etc.
There's no real reason for it. There are lots of excellent games that have a complete and very enjoyable game in a single package, but the big sellers are the ones that keep releasing more and more stuff.
Why wouldn't this work for computer games? A big part of it is of course the way in which the game is released. If the basic game is broken and no fun at all, you'd be crazy to spend money to get more. Releasing an incomplete game and finishing it in DLC is a terrible idea. But releasing a small but fun complete game for a reasonable price, and then selling expansions and more content to those who love it so much they want to get more out of the game, that sounds like a very sensible approach. A company might make the last game you'll ever need, and live from continued support, expansions and new ideas for that game, and of course the new customers that are attracted to such a well-supported game. But yes, it needs to be about honest support, and not merely teasing some extra money out of your customers' wallet.
I think there's also a collector's itch at work with boardgames and RPGs, though. That's probably less the case with computer games, simply because they're not physical products.
As an ex senior game developer, you and I know very well that the problem is that we write two (or three or four) games for every one that's published. And we do this because most of the industry is institutionally incompetent.
Writers who can't make themselves understood; designers who say "give me an engine then I'll tell you what I really needed it to do"; engine devs who think they're writing the game; game devs who think they're writing the engine; artists who view resource limits as only applying to lesser talents; testers who are just frustrated designers; project managers who want to be producers; producers who want to be distributors; distributors who want to be writers, it's a massive dysfunctional clusterfuck from beginning to end. What amazes me is that anything actually gets released.
If we had the discipline (as an industry) to write just one game for every game released, they'd all be AAA, and turn at healthy profit at $30 retail.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Look at what Rockstar has done with Red Dead. First DLC pack is free and adds totally new capabilities to the game.
Now, one might argue this pack has content that should have came with he game in the first place and all it means is the game was rushed...
Well, that explanation does not hold water with the Red Dead Undead pack, because it really is a totally new storyline and side-plot of the game, where you kill freaking zombies. It is also VERY well done and well worth the $10.
I'll clarify my point: each AAA game that gets released tends to have been (re)written at least twice. There's no need for that to happen, other than poor management of the process. Egos run rampant, mavericks are brought in and allowed to throw away man-years of work because they think they can re-write it all in less time than it takes to fix it, code is written before requirements, requirements are delayed until code is available, content is produced before it's clear whether it's needed, or suitable, and all the while layers of writers, managers and producers fight turf wars over what game they're actually trying to create.
Games are expensive because the process of developing them is horrendously wasteful. Take a look at the credits on any AAA title and ask yourself how many of the people there actually contributed to the game that's on your screen - the version that actually got released, rather than all the abandoned attempts. It's surprisingly few.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.