The Splatoon Standard
DLC being included in games has become
the norm instead of the exception. When buying any new game, there’s always a
good chance that the developers are spending launch day working on more content
set to be released later. I’ve always said that there’s nothing wrong with new
content, so long as it’s stuff worth paying for in a game that’s worth going
back to.
But with recent game announcements and
releases, a question’s been sticking in my mind: when should developers charge
for DLC?
A recent and much welcomed trend
changed gaming forever, arriving in the form of 2015’s surprise hit shooter Splatoon. Splatoon launched without much content to its name, but it also
came equipped with a promise: Nintendo swore it would continue to update and
upgrade the game over the course of the entire year with new gear, weapons,
maps, and even entirely new game modes. They delivered on that promise, leaving
the game as one that many consider to be the pinnacle of the Wii U’s library.
Nintendo employed a similar strategy a
few months later with the launch of Super
Mario Maker, and at that point developers around the world were turning
their heads. Nintendo’s aquatic-themed paintball game went on to win several
awards for Best Shooter that year, defeating industry giants like as Halo and Call of Duty, and the recent launch of Splatoon 2 on Nintendo Switch was met with critical and commercial
acclaim, with new weapons already starting to roll out as Nintendo prepared for
apparently up to two years of new content and support for the game.
Other developers were quick to take
note: Splatoon was able to, in the
words of the game’s Squid Sisters, stay fresh in the minds of gamers everywhere
because new content was being released frequently. Games like Overwatch and Titanfall 2 began to release with promises of new characters,
stages and special events to be given to players free of charge later on down
the line. EA made gamers everywhere breathe a sigh of relief when they
announced Star Wars Battlefront II would
also be going down the path of the squid kids, doing a complete 180 on what its
predecessor was so lambasted for. Aside
from optional microtransactions here and there, the current consensus seems to
be that the price you pay to buy the game should also include everything that
is released later.
This doesn’t sound too bad, except
that not every game has adopted this principle. Two of this year’s most
successful releases, Horizon: Zero Dawn and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild are
employing paid DLC models, with Zelda’s
having already begun with the release of a new dungeon in June. Both are
expected to release more in the Holiday season, with Zelda giving a new questline and Horzion adding a tundra-themed area to the map, complete with new
quests, settlements and the like.
So the big question here is primarily
why did Nintendo slap a price on Zelda’s
extra goodies whereas games like ARMS and
the Splatoon franchise give out their
additional content for free?
One explanation is that the size of
the update and the amount of work put into it requires the extra cost. By the
sound of it Horizon’s new update will
be adding a significant amount of new content to the game, making it feel more
reasonable why we’ll need to pay a bit more. A whole new area of an already
enormous map would be significantly harder to make than, say, a new character
for Overwatch. The fact that it’s all
being released in one huge update instead of a bunch of mini updates over time
like Splatoon does is also a major
factor.
I still say that Splatoon is in the right when it comes to DLC: games are already
pretty darn expensive as is, especially if you live in Canada like I do. Having
a game you already paid for give you more stuff for free is always nice, and it
keeps you coming back for more months and months after buying the game. I’m
really looking forward to spending a lot more time with games like Overwatch and Splatoon 2 for years to come thanks to the continued support of the
developers.
Song of the Week
Color Pulse – Splatoon 2
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