Today we are going to be talking about a critical situation about gaming, the constant “Downgrades” and on disc DLC that can’t be played unless you buy the “Season pass” or Pre-order or buy the DLC by itself and what we think is the biggest problem of the two.
So let´s talk about downgrades first.
“Downgrade” is when a game has been presented with a gameplay trailer but when it has been released, the graphics have been lowered. So obviously everybody is upset about it and the sales go down Etc.
The thing is, downgrades have been almost a common thing recently, and people are worried that this will go on like a normal thing since at E3 2015 The Division has gone under a big downgrade here is the video where you can clearly see it:
And let’s also remember the scandal that Ubisoft went through with Watch Dogs, no reflexes on the mirrors and the windows reflected another street, the original graphics were hidden in the code and someone made a mod to use them. Plus the overpriced DLC for things like skins, weapons, game modes and more that were included in the disc but needed the paid DLC to play was intolerable.
Let’s talk about on disc DLC, for example say you are EA and you make the new Battlefield game, it is an almost yearly franchise and you need money to maintain the company alive, and prepare the next entry on the franchise so you lock some of the content of the game and make it paid DLC so you offer the main game, premium, class and weapon shortcuts, rent your server and more, so for the player that buys all these instead of spending 60$ they spend 120$ more or less.
Then weeks later of the release, a PC modder finds out that all those things were included in the disc and people become upset about it your sales go down so you start losing money so you make some of this content free for all the players so they stop complaining, people do stop complaining but the sales don´t really come back and your company is stained forever.
Now let´s talk about Toys-To-Life a genre that has recently attracting more attention lately, games like Disney Infinity, Skylanders and Nintendo´s Amiibos are all good examples of on-disc DLC except that this time is physical DLC since the content they unlock it´s on the disc from the start and the NFC cards the figurines contain unlock this content and the figurines are actually pretty expensive and in the case of the Amiibos they have an availability problem and you can´t get them anywhere except for eBay and sites like that but with major price than their retail counterparts and this is something we should all be worried about since Lego is also entering this genre and probably more companies will so we are going to get more and more of this overpriced and difficult to find physical DLC.
So which one of these gaming sins is more devastating? In my opinion both are pretty terrible since in both cases you are paying for incomplete content and less that you were promised but we need to decide wich is more awful, I will say that both should be dealt with pretty much instantly.
So the worst sin (In my opinion) is… DLC.
The fact that you are paying for a game that is not complete and then having to spend more to use the entire game is just sad and I think we all agree that our pocket are starting to get emptied and it hurts… a lot.
Yes downgrades are also pretty bad but since the console gamers are becoming more exigent and asking for 1080p 60FPS the companies have to downgrade the graphic quality needs to go down in order to achieve this requirements, yes it shouldn’t have to happen but also keep in mind that consoles aren’t as powerful as a PC and only the day they are we can rest assured we won´t see any more downgrades.
Do you think the same? Tell us in the comments section below.
