How do you feel about pre-ordering games?

[remydat]

My complaint with Mass Effect 3 is the precedent it sets.... its ok to **** up the first time around cause you can just fill in the gaps later with some DLC.

And **** you, the ending they originally did was shit, it was the same thing in 3 different colors and it simplified 3 games worth of "choices" to Red, Blue, or Green.

They admitted they fucked up by releasing DLC to try to appease the fans that were pissed.

And I am not asking for bug-free games, but DLC is allowing developers to essentially sell you half a game in whatever condition it is in and then finish it later using you as their testers and they can make you pay for the DLC to get the game to 100%. This is more or less what was done for Rome II Total War and I don't like the trend.

EA rushes everything out the door now at stages where games are sometimes barely playable.

The flaw in this logic is that you assume Bioware knew they fucked up with the ending. Again, they had a creative vision. They believed in that vision. I personally had no problem with that vision. You and other fans did. If there was a precedent it's that in the future, you might as well just say **** the fans who complain because even when you try to appease them, they will not be satisfied.

This is like anything in life. Sometimes people don't see eye to eye on this. IMO, fans became really irrational about this because they acted like Bioware intentionally tried to **** them over with the ending when the reality is Bioware went with an ending they believed in. It simply didn't resonate with some fans. That's all it was.

And again, I already posted the link that shows that Mass Effect 3 was pushed back 6 or 7 months in advance. It was suppose to come out during the Christmas season. They pushed it back until after the Christmas season which likely cost them even more sales. So again, yes EA rushes things out the door but no Mass Effect 3 was really not one of those games. You don't push a game back 7 months before it's release date if you are rushing a game. Whatever problems you perceive about that game had nothing to do with EA rushing Bioware and everything to do with the choices and vision Bioware had for the game.

EA cares very little for the main stories in any of their games. Their big push with their game developers is including online play. Game developers are free to develop the single player story however they see fit.

 

[Ares]

Maybe this is the subconscious reason I very rarely buy DLC

DLC tends to be a very bad cost/benefit ratio.... pay 5-7$ for a unit pack with 5 new units in a game with 150 units.... so you pay roughly 10% of the original cost of the game for something that will make up maybe 3% of the units in the game and in the context of the entire game its probably less than 0.5% of the content of the game.

I think I am for sure bitter about the Total War DLC.... they milk the **** outta it... hell they had a 3$ blood pack mod DLC.... something that could be included in the game as an option you turn on and off.... and they sold it as extra content lol.

Soon it will be like "Game volume slider DLC 5$.... High/Ultra Graphics level DLC 5$.... Exit to Desktop Button for Main Menu DLC 10$"

 

[Ares]

The flaw in this logic is that you assume Bioware knew they fucked up with the ending. Again, they had a creative vision. They believed in that vision. I personally had no problem with that vision. You and other fans did. If there was a precedent it's that in the future, you might as well just say **** the fans who complain because even when you try to appease them, they will not be satisfied.

This is like anything in life. Sometimes people don't see eye to eye on this. IMO, fans became really irrational about this because they acted like Bioware intentionally tried to **** them over with the ending when the reality is Bioware went with an ending they believed in. It simply didn't resonate with some fans. That's all it was.

And again, I already posted the link that shows that Mass Effect 3 was pushed back 6 or 7 months in advance. It was suppose to come out during the Christmas season. They pushed it back until after the Christmas season which likely cost them even more sales. So again, yes EA rushes things out the door but no Mass Effect 3 was really not one of those games. You don't push a game back 7 months before it's release date if you are rushing a game. Whatever problems you perceive about that game had nothing to do with EA rushing Bioware and everything to do with the choices and vision Bioware had for the game.

EA cares very little for the main stories in any of their games. Their big push with their game developers is including online play. Game developers are free to develop the single player story however they see fit.

Yes, my beef with DLC is much about the precedent it is setting. I get it you heart Mass Effect and don't like me criticizing it.

In reality I liked the whole Mass Effect series, but yeah I hated the cookie cutter 3-color ending they went with and I think they rushed that piece of the game which should have been the most important, well developed part of the entire series.

The fact that they released DLC to shore up the ending means they conceded to some of the criticism that their ending was not the best they could have produced. If they truly believed in that ending like you said they would not have of tried to "fix" it later with additional content.

In the end I don't like DLC being used as a crutch so any game developer can kind of just get a do-over and ask me to pay for the additional content.

You and I can agree to disagree on whether that is true for the Mass Effect series, but I know damned well it is true for other games.

I feel DLC is starting to become 2 main things.... either a crutch for devs to get a do-over on stuff down the line or a milk farm where they withhold a certain amount of content from a game and then release it piecemeal as DLC trying to get an extra 50-100% of your money for making one game.

And that is on top of current practices where they release games that are unfinished and then ask the consumer's to pay 60$ to be their bug testers for 6 months so they can work all the kinks out.... then they go "Hey on top of that, you wanna pay us more money for this DLC that probably could have been included in the original?".

I think its shady and promotes bad future practices by game devs and/or producers.

 

[remydat]

Also you reference Red, Blue, Green as if that was the decision. The colors are irrelevant. I thought the end choices were largely consistent with the whole series.

Red - You kill the Reapers at the expense of the Geth and with the Mass Relay system destroyed, the galaxy goes back to being somewhat isolated. Considering organics advancement was solely due to the Mass Relay system controlled by the Reapers, this seemed like an appropriate cost to me to killing the Reapers. So really the only downside here depends on how you feel about the Geth. There is also no guarantee that organics will not create new synthetics and the cycle begin all over again which again is fairly consistent with real life where humanity has a propensity to make the same mistakes over and over again.

Blue - You control the Reapers and become a god essentially watching over organics and synthetics with no guarantee that you are in fact in control or whether the Reapers are. I suppose this boils down to whether your Shepard covets power as well as whether destroying the mass relay system ultimately serves the greater good.

Green - Synthesis where all life becomes techno-organic. You basically **** with the DNA of the entire galaxy in the hopes that everyone will feel a part of each other and thus forego the desire to create divisions that ultimately lead to conflict. Of course, there is still no guarantee that a Krogon-synthetic hybrid will not still view himself as different from a human-synthetic hybrid but in this scenario the Geth remain alive.

So to me, the choices were three choices all with their flaws which is precisely the point. You pick the choice that is consistent with your character and it's really the lesser of 3 evils. However, given you are fighting a virtually immortal race of techno-organic overlords that have existed and defeated organics for billions of years, I never expected a perfect answer to defeating them.

The whole cycle of advancement and then destruction at the hands of the Reapers was ultimately a test of sorts. One that Shepard passed hence why the fate of the galaxy was left for him to decide.

 

[Ares]

Also you reference Red, Blue, Green as if that was the decision. The colors are irrelevant. I thought the end choices were largely consistent with the whole series.

Red - You kill the Reapers at the expense of the Geth and with the Mass Relay system destroyed, the galaxy goes back to being somewhat isolated. Considering organics advancement was solely due to the Mass Relay system controlled by the Reapers, this seemed like an appropriate cost to me to killing the Reapers. So really the only downside here depends on how you feel about the Geth. There is also no guarantee that organics will not create new synthetics and the cycle begin all over again which again is fairly consistent with real life where humanity has a propensity to make the same mistakes over and over again.

Blue - You control the Reapers and become a god essentially watching over organics and synthetics with no guarantee that you are in fact in control or whether the Reapers are. I suppose this boils down to whether your Shepard covets power as well as whether destroying the mass relay system ultimately serves the greater good.

Green - Synthesis where all life becomes techno-organic. You basically **** with the DNA of the entire galaxy in the hopes that everyone will feel a part of each other and thus forego the desire to create divisions that ultimately lead to conflict. Of course, there is still no guarantee that a Krogon-synthetic hybrid will not still view himself as different from a human-synthetic hybrid but in this scenario the Geth remain alive.

So to me, the choices were three choices all with their flaws which is precisely the point. You pick the choice that is consistent with your character and it's really the lesser of 3 evils. However, given you are fighting a virtually immortal race of techno-organic overlords that have existed and defeated organics for billions of years, I never expected a perfect answer to defeating them.

The whole cycle of advancement and then destruction at the hands of the Reapers was ultimately a test of sorts. One that Shepard passed hence why the fate of the galaxy was left for him to decide.

If they had produced 3 unique ending sequences you would play through and have 3 unique sets of cut scenes ending the game according to the choice you made I think I would have been ok with how the game wrapped up.

But the 3 endings were a choice they explained and the same video in 3 different colors basically.

To me that is what felt rushed.... you get to this big important choice, the most important of all of your choices and really it just results in the same video in one of 3 colors and none of your other choices impact the final result of your final choice.

I had expected a kind of grandiose ending for such a big, well produced series, and it felt as if at the most pivotal point in a series that drew you in with deep content and engaging story.... they kind of went "Ok 3 choices, explain them, play end video with 1 of 3 colors, done".

And when myself and many fans got pissed they went "Ok you're kind of right, we will release a DLC to try to expand upon our ending".

I don't even mind that much that the ending boiled down to 3 choices.... but the lack of depth to the ending and how little your ME3 choices really affected the end battle was disappointing to say the least.

I don't hate the series, it was awesome, but I think they flopped on the ending quite badly.

 

[remydat]

Yes, my beef with DLC is much about the precedent it is setting. I get it you heart Mass Effect and don't like me criticizing it.

In reality I liked the whole Mass Effect series, but yeah I hated the cookie cutter 3-color ending they went with and I think they rushed that piece of the game which should have been the most important, well developed part of the entire series.

The fact that they released DLC to shore up the ending means they conceded to some of the criticism that their ending was not the best they could have produced. If they truly believed in that ending like you said they would not have of tried to "fix" it later with additional content.

In the end I don't like DLC being used as a crutch so any game developer can kind of just get a do-over and ask me to pay for the additional content.

You and I can agree to disagree on whether that is true for the Mass Effect series, but I know damned well it is true for other games.

I feel DLC is starting to become 2 main things.... either a crutch for devs to get a do-over on stuff down the line or a milk farm where they withhold a certain amount of content from a game and then release it piecemeal as DLC trying to get an extra 50-100% of your money for making one game.

And that is on top of current practices where they release games that are unfinished and then ask the consumer's to pay 60$ to be their bug testers for 6 months so they can work all the kinks out.... then they go "Hey on top of that, you wanna pay us more money for this DLC that probably could have been included in the original?".

I think its shady and promotes bad future practices by game devs and/or producers.

The "fix" as you call it for Mass Effect 3 was "free" so again my point is Mass Effect 3 is simply a bad example of this practice you despise. It has nothing to do with my love of the series but the actual facts.

Fact 1 - EA pushed the game back out of the holiday season. That doesn't support the idea they were rushing the game because getting a major game out in time for Christmas would be the No 1 priority for a company solely concerned with rushing a game. They made the decision 6 or 7 months before release which meant if they really wanted to rush the game, they could have easily added developers and others to help finish the development. This is especially true since the game ended up being released like a month or two after Christmas so it would not have been a huge ask to add staff 6 months prior to release to get the game out on time.

Fact 2 - the DLC for the ending was given to fans for free. The people complaining already bought the game and they gave them additional content for free. So they really had no incentive to develop that content for fans. The idea that they would still be criticized for it is amazing. It's like they are damned if they do or damned if they don't.

Again, there are people in the market like me that demand the game as soon as it is substantially complete. Why should we wait for you? I still see no logical answer to that question. If a bug free game is available 6 months from now then why shouldn't I get the game now for $60 play it for 6 months and then you can get it 6 months for now for $40 and it will be bug free? In that scenario, we both get what we want. But it's like you want everyone to wait 6 months instead of you waiting 6 months. That makes no sense to me.

 

[Ares]

The "fix" as you call it for Mass Effect 3 was "free" so again my point is Mass Effect 3 is simply a bad example of this practice you despise. It has nothing to do with my love of the series but the actual facts.

Fact 1 - EA pushed the game back out of the holiday season. That doesn't support the idea they were rushing the game because getting a major game out in time for Christmas would be the No 1 priority for a company solely concerned with rushing a game. They made the decision 6 or 7 months before release which meant if they really wanted to rush the game, they could have easily added developers and others to help finish the development. This is especially true since the game ended up being released like a month or two after Christmas so it would not have been a huge ask to add staff 6 months prior to release to get the game out on time.

Fact 2 - the DLC for the ending was given to fans for free. The people complaining already bought the game and they gave them additional content for free. So they really had no incentive to develop that content for fans. The idea that they would still be criticized for it is amazing. It's like they are damned if they do or damned if they don't.

Again, there are people in the market like me that demand the game as soon as it is substantially complete. Why should we wait for you? I still see no logical answer to that question. If a bug free game is available 6 months from now then why shouldn't I get the game now for $60 play it for 6 months and then you can get it 6 months for now for $40 and it will be bug free? In that scenario, we both get what we want. But it's like you want everyone to wait 6 months instead of you waiting 6 months. That makes no sense to me.

Well I moved on to debating about Mass Effect on its own.

You are missing that I have 2 different gripes with DLC.

1. Using it as a crutch to get a do-over and fix stuff later, content, not bugs.

2. Milking money out of consumers so they pay extra for all the content.

I feel Mass Effect used DLC as a crutch to fix their shitty ending, I support them doing it because I didn't like the ending but I worry about the precedent it sets.

Now, the following is not in regards to Mass Effect:

I do not expect a bug-free game, that would be impossible.

I expect a finished game released in a state where it does not have known major flaws that have yet to be fixed and which delivers all the promised content on day 1. I would have a problem with you paying 60$ for a bug-ridden piece of shit because then you promote the practice of developers releasing unfinished unplayable products for full price.

If you want to support shitty practices by game devs and pay them lots of money, that is your business but I do not like it, I don't support it, and you won't change my mind.

 

[MassHavoc]

Maybe this is the subconscious reason I very rarely buy DLC

Another reason why I don't pre-order, or even like to buy a game at launch and wait for it to get price reduced. usually about a year later you get that nice "ultimate" version with all the shit that should have been in the release game but now it's all included and in a lower price than at launch.

 

[ijustposthere]

Also not a fan of DLC.

 

[MassHavoc]

I think that the real crux of the DLC is that I feel it's largely due to the publishers who are unnecessary middleman in my opinion. They make these contracts to produce these titles on a certain timeline and then push the devs to adhere to it because they have already started sinking money into the PR cycle for the game. the longer that cycle goes on without a product coming out, the more money they waste so they are starting to push the devs to release it early (or on an original timeline) as opposed to when it's done and so you get these huge day one patches as well as all this DLC they couldn't flesh out by the release. Then this also gives the Publishers hardon's because they can stretch their profit margins from a game way past just the launch and eventual price drop. They can keep the launch price of a game at normal price for much longer because they DLC that comes out is going to refresh the cycle a bit. I wish we could get away with dev to consumer games more often, but unfortunately the industry has boomed as such that the devs need the publisher money to make sure projects get off the ground.

This is why I respect companies like CD Projekt who can still put out a triple AAA title with now DLC and promise that DLC that is coming will be free.

 

[Ares]

I think that the real crux of the DLC is that I feel it's largely due to the publishers who are unnecessary middleman in my opinion. They make these contracts to produce these titles on a certain timeline and then push the devs to adhere to it because they have already started sinking money into the PR cycle for the game. the longer that cycle goes on without a product coming out, the more money they waste so they are starting to push the devs to release it early (or on an original timeline) as opposed to when it's done and so you get these huge day one patches as well as all this DLC they couldn't flesh out by the release. Then this also gives the Publishers hardon's because they can stretch their profit margins from a game way past just the launch and eventual price drop. They can keep the launch price of a game at normal price for much longer because they DLC that comes out is going to refresh the cycle a bit. I wish we could get away with dev to consumer games more often, but unfortunately the industry has boomed as such that the devs need the publisher money to make sure projects get off the ground.

This is why I respect companies like CD Projekt who can still put out a triple AAA title with now DLC and promise that DLC that is coming will be free.

Dev to consumer games can be far superior.... TaleWorlds was a husband/wife team that produced their own game and then went on to hire staff and become their own dev studio producing and releasing their own titles. They stick to their own schedules and release what they want to produce when they are done producing it. They are also extremely open to modding and making their games easy to mod which IMO can expand the life and value of a game far more than any shitty DLC will.

There is a fine line with any software dev between sticking to a schedule and producing a product for profit and sticking to principles and producing a piece of art you are proud of.... I understand both sides of the coin, but I think some of the bigger game producers lean too far to one side.

 

[MassHavoc]

Dev to consumer games can be far superior.... TaleWorlds was a husband/wife team that produced their own game and then went on to hire staff and become their own dev studio producing and releasing their own titles. They stick to their own schedules and release what they want to produce when they are done producing it. They are also extremely open to modding and making their games easy to mod which IMO can expand the life and value of a game far more than any shitty DLC will.

There is a fine line with any software dev between sticking to a schedule and producing a product for profit and sticking to principles and producing a piece of art you are proud of.... I understand both sides of the coin, but I think some of the bigger game producers lean too far to one side.

Indeed. I believe that the gaming industry is now bigger than the movie industry? That's a lot of pressure that publishers who act like production studios can put on a dev team. And can turn a product to shit. They learned that quickly in the movie biz that you produce shit movies and you get a rep, but for some reason shit publishing companies (I'm looking at you EA, Activision, Ubisoft, ect....) seem to be bulletproof because unlike shit movies where you can't go back and patch them, people accept all the patches and DLC as a reasonable fix for shit product being released and purchased. It's not.

 

[Ares]

Indeed. I believe that the gaming industry is now bigger than the movie industry? That's a lot of pressure that publishers who act like production studios can put on a dev team. And can turn a product to shit. They learned that quickly in the movie biz that you produce shit movies and you get a rep, but for some reason shit publishing companies (I'm looking at you EA, Activision, Ubisoft, ect....) seem to be bulletproof because unlike shit movies where you can't go back and patch them, people accept all the patches and DLC as a reasonable fix for shit product being released and purchased. It's not.

It would be like releasing a fucking car without a couple of doors and maybe a few missing or broken components that make the car breakdown or become undriveable and the car manufacturer being like "Hey we will fix that later... we also might make you pay for some of the missing doors".

 

[remydat]

Well I moved on to debating about Mass Effect on its own.

You are missing that I have 2 different gripes with DLC.

1. Using it as a crutch to get a do-over and fix stuff later, content, not bugs.

2. Milking money out of consumers so they pay extra for all the content.

I feel Mass Effect used DLC as a crutch to fix their shitty ending, I support them doing it because I didn't like the ending but I worry about the precedent it sets.

Now, the following is not in regards to Mass Effect:

I do not expect a bug-free game, that would be impossible.

I expect a finished game released in a state where it does not have known major flaws that have yet to be fixed and which delivers all the promised content on day 1. I would have a problem with you paying 60$ for a bug-ridden piece of shit because then you promote the practice of developers releasing unfinished unplayable products for full price.

If you want to support shitty practices by game devs and pay them lots of money, that is your business but I do not like it, I don't support it, and you won't change my mind.

The DLC for the ending was not used as a crutch. That is my point. They did not make the ending with the expectation that they would need to add content to it. They made the ending expecting it to be well received. The criticism of the ending caught Bioware completely by surprise. You can't say something is a crutch when the original plan never contemplated having to use said crutch.

Bioware didn't milk anything out of consumers. The additional content for the ending was FREE. I repeat, it was FREE. I could see you make the argument that Javik's DLC was milking consumers but not the ending. You can't milk a consumer by giving them something for FREE. Furthermore, with or without Javik, you still got $60 worth of content. Javik was not in fact critical to the story. He certainly adds to the lore but the game works just fine and you get 40-50 hours of gameplay without him. Milking a consumer IMO would be giving them content that is necessary for the game as DLC.

And I am not saying you have to support anything. I am saying your complaint doesn't make sense to me for the following reason. If the version of the game you want is available to you on June 1st, 2015 then as long as you have the discipline to wait then you will be getting the game on the same day that you would have gotten it regardless. In fact, if I get it on January 1st, 2015, you actually benefit for 2 main reasons.

1. Because I got it early, by the time it is available June 1st, the price will be much cheaper to you because the game will be 6 months old.

2. Because I got it early, the fixes are likely to happen faster because gamers can find flaws faster than developers because there are more of us. This has has been proven if you ever played Destiny because gamers found flaws in that game that developers had no fucking clue about to the point Bungie marveled at the glitches and shit that they found.

So explain to me how you are harmed? Under either scenario you should buy the game June 1st. The only issue is you see me playing on January 1st and for some reason are upset that I get to play on January 1st instead of having to wait until June 1st like you.

 

[remydat]

It would be like releasing a fucking car without a couple of doors and maybe a few missing or broken components that make the car breakdown or become undriveable and the car manufacturer being like "Hey we will fix that later... we also might make you pay for some of the missing doors".

It's not like this at all. It would be like releasing a car and having navigation, automatic windows, etc. as optional. The car runs just fine without it. If you want to add a few perks then yes it will cost more but in the end that's your choice.

Most games don't charge you for patches that fix bugs and stuff. They charge for DLC shit that is not critical to the game. Like what example do you have of a game with a major flaw that you were charged to fix that flaw? They may exist but certainly not in the games we have been talking about.

Destiny is as buggy as they come and I have never paid for a single patch for that game. The only thing I have been charged for is the Crota expansion.

 

[remydat]

Indeed. I believe that the gaming industry is now bigger than the movie industry? That's a lot of pressure that publishers who act like production studios can put on a dev team. And can turn a product to shit. They learned that quickly in the movie biz that you produce shit movies and you get a rep, but for some reason shit publishing companies (I'm looking at you EA, Activision, Ubisoft, ect....) seem to be bulletproof because unlike shit movies where you can't go back and patch them, people accept all the patches and DLC as a reasonable fix for shit product being released and purchased. It's not.

Except it is provided the consumer thinks it is. We are talking about luxury products not staples. The market dictates what it will and will not accept and the market dictates it will accept the game earlier even if it is a bit buggy. There is a whole sub culture and industry on youtube or various other social media that has been created for this very purpose.

You guys are the equivalent of my grandparents telling my parents that rock music sucks and my parents telling me that hip hop music sucks. The needs and desires of this generation of gamers is to obtain the game as quickly as possible and for them to find out all the bugs and tricks and post them on social media for all to see including the game developers who then make whatever fixes are necessary. That is actually a more efficient model than have like 10 guys at the developer trying to figure out all the issues with a game. The millions of gamers that play the game early can beta test it a lot faster than developers can.

Nothing remains static, things evolve, you can either adapt to that evolution or sit on your porch with your cane in your hand telling the kids to, "Get off my lawn."

 

[Ares]

The DLC for the ending was not used as a crutch. That is my point. They did not make the ending with the expectation that they would need to add content to it. They made the ending expecting it to be well received. The criticism of the ending caught Bioware completely by surprise. You can't say something is a crutch when the original plan never contemplated having to use said crutch.

Bioware didn't milk anything out of consumers. The additional content for the ending was FREE. I repeat, it was FREE. I could see you make the argument that Javik's DLC was milking consumers but not the ending. You can't milk a consumer by giving them something for FREE. Furthermore, with or without Javik, you still got $60 worth of content. Javik was not in fact critical to the story. He certainly adds to the lore but the game works just fine and you get 40-50 hours of gameplay without him. Milking a consumer IMO would be giving them content that is necessary for the game as DLC.

And I am not saying you have to support anything. I am saying your complaint doesn't make sense to me for the following reason. If the version of the game you want is available to you on June 1st, 2015 then as long as you have the discipline to wait then you will be getting the game on the same day that you would have gotten it regardless. In fact, if I get it on January 1st, 2015, you actually benefit for 2 main reasons.

1. Because I got it early, by the time it is available June 1st, the price will be much cheaper to you because the game will be 6 months old.

2. Because I got it early, the fixes are likely to happen faster because gamers can find flaws faster than developers because there are more of us. This has has been proven if you ever played Destiny because gamers found flaws in that game that developers had no fucking clue about to the point Bungie marveled at the glitches and shit that they found.

So explain to me how you are harmed? Under either scenario you should buy the game June 1st. The only issue is you see me playing on January 1st and for some reason are upset that I get to play on January 1st instead of having to wait until June 1st like you.

To the bold part I disagree with you, idk why that is so hard to grasp, stop fucking repeating yourself, I disagree.

It was a crutch regardless of whether it was free or not and I already said with regards to Mass Effect I did not view them as milking the DLC like I do other games.

To the remainder of what you said.... completely aside from Mass Effect... THIS IS NOT IN RELATION TO MASS EFFECT I HOPE THAT IS CLEAR:

I don't want games coming out unfinished using consumers as beta testers.... there are real beta testers for a reason.

If they released the game with the intent to have you and others test it and they didn't ask you to pay full price for it and they announced a full release date where I could pay for the game knowing it was full and I knew what I was paying for, then fine, but that is not what they do.

They produce half of a game, you buy it for full price and do the bug testing and I have to sit around and guess when I should buy a game.... is it done yet? Is it working yet? Is it worth buying in its condition or should I wait because its still a partially done piece of crap.

When you produce something and ask consumers to pay full price for it, it ought to be finished and it ought to be reasonably bug free to where it is playable without major flaws on the date of release.

All gamers who are asked to pay full price to buy a game that is partially complete and be a bug tester for free are being harmed.

Again this is how I see it and I disagree entirely with your position.

Now go ahead and repeat yourself again so I can write the same shit over again.

 

[MassHavoc]

just to troll a bit.

 

[Ares]

Except it is provided the consumer thinks it is. We are talking about luxury products not staples. The market dictates what it will and will not accept and the market dictates it will accept the game earlier even if it is a bit buggy. There is a whole sub culture and industry on youtube or various other social media that has been created for this very purpose.

You guys are the equivalent of my grandparents telling my parents that rock music sucks and my parents telling me that hip hop music sucks. The needs and desires of this generation of gamers is to obtain the game as quickly as possible and for them to find out all the bugs and tricks and post them on social media for all to see including the game developers who then make whatever fixes are necessary. That is actually a more efficient model than have like 10 guys at the developer trying to figure out all the issues with a game. The millions of gamers that play the game early can beta test it a lot faster than developers can.

Nothing remains static, things evolve, you can either adapt to that evolution or sit on your porch with your cane in your hand telling the kids to, "Get off my lawn."

No... you don't understand software development and how it ought to be done properly, it is not proper to produce shit software and expect your end users to do all the bug testing of an unfinished product.

Producing shit and having the end users just deal with it and lean on them to help you finish your production is not an evolution it is laziness and profit grabbing taking priority over proper software development practices.

 

[remydat]

I kept repeating myself because I didn't see any argument for why it was a crutch beyond because you said so. You kept going on about charging people for DLC or milking people (that reference to milking was in fact prior to you statement that the rest of your paragraph was not about ME3) hence why I kept telling you the DLC for the ending was free. Either way we can agree to disagree.

Millions of gamers can beta test a game far more effectively than in-house beta testers for the simply reason that we outnumber them considerably. This has been proven in just about every next gen game I have ever played. The coding and programming for games now is far more complex than than it was in the Nintendo or Sega Genesis days. Relying on a handful of beta testers is pretty dumb business these days especially for games with multiplayer.

The onus on you as a consumer is to do your due diligence before you buy. You are basically asking me to wait on a game because you can't be bothered to figure out whether a game is worth a buy or not. I am not being harmed because my priorities are not yours. I prioritize getting the game early and will pay a premium for the right to play it early. I would be harmed if anyone tries to artificially restrict the market for me to get the game as early as possible. You are trying to tell me what I should value which is really not your right.

I am not telling you you shouldn't value getting a bug free game. I am telling you the solution for you is quite simple. When a game comes out, don't buy it right away. Within a matter of weeks of a game's release, all it's flaws if any are usually already on the internet because again gamers are far more efficient at finding issues than developers because we outnumber them. A simple rule of thumb is that by the time the first price drop in a game occurs, you can be fairly confident all the patches to it have been made.