Cash of Clans
I’m not one to play annually released
sports games. I pass on the Maddens,
the FIFAs, and the like every year,
simply because they just don’t appeal to me. But this year 2K Games has turned
plenty of heads for all the wrong reasons with NBA 2K18, so I guess it’s time to take a look at that.
Apparently competing with Shadow of War to become the shadiest
game of the Fall 2017 season, NBA 2K17 released
filled to the brim with microtransactions, premium currency, and the like. Despite
the game costing at least $60 at retail, the game employs a financial system
not unlike one you’d find in one of those terrible free-to-play mobile town
builder games and Farmville knockoffs.
Upgrading your virtual player costs
in-game cash. You start off with around 6,000 currency, but it quickly turns
out that that’s barely worth scratching your nose at as everything costs a ton.
According to Kotaku, the 6,000 is enough to level up your player twice. You can
get from the starting level of 60 to a monumental level 62 thanks to 2K’s
generosity.
Customization also costs virtual
currency, the exact same one used to power up your guy. And since any gamer who
knows what they’re doing will pour all their money into making their guy better
at actually playing the game, you’ll be stuck with the pre-made boring looking
character for the entire game. You’re not even allowed to see a preview of what
a new hairstyle will look like on your character until you buy it, so shameless
is their greed.
Unless, you know, you give 2K Games
some more cash.
Let’s go back to those town-builder
games you can find everywhere on iOS for a second. We’ve all played one of
those, whether it’s Smurf Village, The Simpsons: Tapped Out, or any of the
other hundreds available on that poor marketplace. Whenever you want to make a
new building or whatever in that game, it can take up to 24 hours or more to be
built. Alternatively, you can use the magic paid-for currency that costs real
world cash to speed up the process and give it to you for free.
2K Games is trying the same tactic
here. Why should you spend hours and hours playing the game to build your
character when you can just pay some extra money to make it happen early?
Ultimately it doesn’t work here for exactly the same reason the lootbox orcs
don’t work in Shadow of War. If your
game is so not worth playing that you have an alternative where you pay money
so you don’t have to play the game, why should I pay $60 for it in the first
place?
When I pay that much money for a game,
I want to feel I got my money’s worth. Having microtransactions that are
basically saying “Yeah, you could play the game, or you could pay money to get
the stuff that you could’ve gotten by playing the game right now”. This
ultimately neuters a game’s lifespan, at least for me. Part of the fun of a
game is messing around and doing bonus unnecessary sidequests before arriving
at the next major story point. Destiny 2’s
storyline was peppered full of fun little side adventures to do in order to
collect loot and make your character stronger, and it didn’t detract from the
experience one bit.
Publishers need to get their heads out
of the gaming gutters and take a look around. Right now NBA is getting thrashed on both Metacritic and Steam reviews, and a
Shadow of War YouTube video on the
PlayStation channel where WB announced it was backing out of its controversial
decision of charging for DLC based on a developer who passed away while working
on the game was slammed with dislikes despite being obsensibely a good decision
on their part. Gamers don’t like it when you mess with stuff in the game
themselves. If you yourself will insert paid-for microtransactions in your game
that essentially tell people the thing they just blew $60 isn’t worth investing
hours upon hours into, I get the feeling that Steam’s refund policy might be
seeing several new darlings.
Song of the Week
Wario City – Mario Super Sluggers
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