Exactly. The rise of the Western MMO has shown developers it's far more profitable to have a continual income source rather than the burst income that is paid from retail sales. This is why I no longer do business with EA in any way, shape or form. The problem with EA is that before this business model became their focus they tried to pump out sequel after sequel to cash in on a franchises success. Look at Need For Speed - they have two seperate companies producing two games at the same time to ensure a new release every year, with a limited development time of two years maximum for each game.

This is part of the reason why piracy is rampent in the games industry; people got tired of paying for games that were ultimately rushed out the door and completely untested and a just a mess of a game. As a counter-measure, most games now require some kind of online authentication to 'beat the pirates'. See the PC version of Mass Effect for the worst of this. Clearly, it has neither reduced piracy or help increase the quality of our games.

Now, because of the success of DLC, some companies - like EA - sell us part of a game at launch and later the better stuff becomes available only if you pay more for it. Please see SPORE's expansion pack 'Galactic Adventures' for evidence. This is quite possibly going to lead to even further piracy. However, this time it's not to avoid paying for a game - it's simply to get all of a game that you've already paid for.

Oh

It doesn't. I posted that as counter for "free updates never added anything worthwhile" (or something like that).

Or just a C:\_ "blinking" command iconized to call a menu straight off a key between CTRL & ALT, logo obvious but not Blackened to fail when typed!

I understand exactly what you mean.
It's actually cheaper for me to buy the full priced, retail, boxed set of Dawn of War II than it is to download it via Steam. I purchased Demigod digitally, rather than wait for the Australian release, because it was cheaper via Impulse than it was going to be at retail. The best thing about Impulse, with Demigod at least, was that I had the option to purchase the CD, Box and Manual at additional cost if I so chose. I didn't, however the fact that I got the game cheaper for forgoing these items was a big plus in my opinon.

@ZehDon

I don't mean to say that Steam or Impulse are useless, as you can get good deals from them or earlier access to games, but digital distribution has along way to go before I jump onboard. Currently I'll only buy games that are utterly unavailable at retail. Getting the game cheaper is not the norm, but an exception, sadly. The sales and bargain games might be good, but quite a few stores around where I live have games go on clearence too. I picked up the Witcher Enhanced for $20 a few weeks ago at a local Target. They put games on clearence at leat once a month to clear shelf space, and none of it is advertised. The games are also different for different targets. Curiously, they still had the Red Boxes (non-enhanced) on the self selling for $40.

@Annatar11

Personally, I will pay more for a product I can hold. I recognize that I am in the minority though. I'm not saying it's perfect, or that it's even good business, it's just what I believe is fair. But the willingness of the masses to pay more for less (in comparison) is bothersome to me. Currently, there is no incentive for me to buy games online, unless that is the only way to buy them. If online games were cheaper it would just speed the eventual evolution into direct downloads being the only way to buy games, with special collector edition items being mailed to you. Then I would be a 20-something old man remembering the good 'ol days. I understand the economic standpoint as well. It's the same reason a .pdf book costs as much as a regular book. If you could buy games for cheaper online, it "devalues" the product, and when no more games are available at retail, your product is worth less, or you have a massive price hike. I just consider it another way to rip off the customers though. We're paying more, or the same price, for considerably less spending on the other end. I'm happy they're getting rich and all that fun stuff, they deserve to be paid, but passing on some of the savings would be nice too.

Personally, I think a direct download game is worth much less than a retail copy. It bothered me to no end that when I ordered the GalCiv2 expansions, and paid more for the disks to be shipped, that I got exactly that. I wasn't expecting an awesome box, but a jewel case would have been nice.

I love DLC.  By the time a full expansion comes out for a game, I rarely care enough to play much of it anymore.  With DLC, they keep me interested in playing more.  I don't care if it's free or pay because either way they're spending money to give me something I enjoy.  Should we really be expecting companies to do stuff for little return on investment?  Look how long it took for the UT3 2.0 patch to come out.  I'm sure it was fascinating, but I was long done with the game at that point.  Same with The Witcher's Enhanced Edition.

I won't go into all the DLC I've bought and loved since that's not terribly relevant, but definately enough. 

Yep, and i paid for THE Counter Attack expansion for that Cavedog wonder.

I could probably count the number of expansions I've actually finished on one hand.

C&C Generals: Zero Hour...Red Alert 3: Uprising...umm...FEAR: Extraction Point...I've been gaming for roughly twenty four years now, and that's all I can remember.  (I have plenty more, I just never finish them.)

With DLC, if I wasn't going to play through it I wouldn't buy it in the first place.

But you're not too likely to see many normal expansions anymore.  They existed the way they did because retail was the only way to go...and now it isn't.  Not all DLC is going to be to excellent, but neither were all expansions so nothing new there.

As for 'new mentality' not really in my case.  I've always felt the same way about expansions, just never had any other options until recently.

I hope they are dead and I obviously loved those games, so indeed on the disagreement.

That said, though, I understand your feelings in general.  I haven't been terribly impressed with most DLC expansions as they're fun, but so incredibly easy and limited.  Fallout 3 I've been working my way towards more of the DLC...the first one wasn't that impressive, but it was pretty good...they got way more buyers than they expected so started shifting more resources to it past that point.  I'm working my way towards the second one now.  Everyone I've heard talk about them say Fallout 3 is the first time DLC has really been done right. 

The initial DLC efforts we got (especially Oblivion) were disappointing at best, either random crap or unlocks from the disc or not even worth mentioning, but companies were exploring new territory so no huge surprise there.  I don't even care about the Oblivion efforts though, as I didn't like Oblivion to begin with.  It was fun to tool around in but as soon as you tried going through the main plot, you got massacred...I hated that.

Either way, I believe the death of retail will be great for gaming in general.  It was a very limiting way of doing business.

Anyway, I'm done with this discussion as I'm pretty sure we've both said our piece at this point.  Enjoy.

I was done with this, as Savyg and I were done beating our dead horses, but I'll bite one last time. Plus I'm bored at work with no work flow and most everyone is on vacation. The death of retail isn't my problem with DLC.

That problem is true for paid DLC games as well. If the DLC's are planned and in a stage of public advertisement, then why weren't they just included in the game in the first place, other than to dig a few extra dollars from the community? Also, some DLC was promised (Left 4 Dead) but it's not being released seperately (as a sequel in that case).

As for brand loyalty, I'm less likely to buy a game that I know will release pointless DLC for above it's worth (Oblivion), and much more likely to buy a game that will receieve free DLC because the developers love the game (X3).

As far as who to look to, the list should go: 1. Developer (who made the game, and usually makes games of a similar caliber), 2. Publisher (who published the game, but can pull many strings, but usually produce a similar caliber of game), and then 3. IP owner, who is usually one of the former anyway. Just because it's a Star Wars game doesn't mean it's a good game if you took away the lore.

This sounds like a PR spin for DLC. DLC has huge advantages to the gaming companies, not to the players with what you've given as examples. The advantage to the players is that you get new content released faster than a large expansion could be completed. Those happy with the out of the box experience didn't save any money, they paid full price for the game, but only have part of what's available. Those that want the flashy DLC, have just spent $100 or so on a game. If it was originally released with all of the DLC in a pack for $100, no one would buy it. It's genious as far as our market system goes, but for the consumer, we're getting the short end of the stick.

For example, Fallout 3, which as Savyg said, has quality DLC released. The original game costs about $50. There are 4 DLC's released, and one more on the way I believe (Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Broken Steel, Point Lookout, and Mothership Zeta). Each DLC costs about $10. Now, take that $50 game and compare it to the $50 of DLC. You get much more for your money for the game. In a different comparison, take that $50 DLC, and compare it to the $30 expansion that you could have had, such as Shivering Isles for oblivion, the same developer as Fallout 3. You still get much more content and game time for your money's worth.

I'm not saying DLC is evil or bad, I'm saying that it's not worth the price it's currently being charged for. Obviously, everyone would love all free DLC. I'm not asking for that either. I'm saying that the problem is that too many people are willing to overpay for breadcrumbs. Why pay Ed Hardy prices for WalMart clothes?

This arguement is slightly flawed. The idea of it is right though. Online distribution is fine, and is where the market is going. It offers many advantages and saves a lot of money. My problem with it is that a direct download game (which costs much less) is the same price as a game I go buy at the store. We don't get the savings passed down to us. Also, even though competition should drive the prices down,  with very few exceptions, most PC games are $50, most expansions are $30, regardless of who developed, published, advertised, or whatever for them. DLC will have a basic understood set price for what is included and it will be just as standard as everything else is.

Quality will rise regardless, and there will always be bombs, just like released games and expansions.

I'm not a fan of unfinished games either, but something much worse than free updates adding in these things later is paid updates adding in these things later. With a paid DLC model, companies will now plan things that could be added in to the finished game (Spore), but are instead held to make paid DLC since they know people will buy anything.

Not all DLC is bad, or original content held over. I just believe it's not worth the current price. I bought all the DLC for Oblivion in one go for $10 (The Knights of the Nine retail disc), and the newest castle DLC was free for it's first week. That price is much more reasonable.

In conclusion, since I wrote a mini-novel, I want my money's worth of content out of DLC. I don't mind downloading it, I don't mind waiting awhile for a big quality expansion, and I don't mind getting small updates quicker as long as the prices are are reasonable and comparitively fair. I believe that many people are all over the bandwagon because it's easy to dismiss being ripped out of $50 dollars on a few quests because it's spread out over $10 payments and a few months. Who cares about $10 dollars? I spend more at McDonalds in one trip. If all of that shiny new DLC was put in a box for $50, you'd laugh at it, and keep walking. But, it's just $10 at a time, so it's no big deal.

This is why DLC, or even expansion packs, can be a bad thing. Companies will abuse it - and because they make damn sure those DLC packages are mighty appealing, people will buy them.