Rantology: Talking about Microtransactions

So one of the biggest things in the game industry right now is the trend for companies to want to rip ever last dime you have from your wallet and give you seemingly little in return.  Whether it be different amount for different editions of the game, a plethora of cosmetic items and virtual currency bought with real money for in game items and rewards, or the loot box system that started coming under fire last year when the game launched.  However, some of these are more insidious than others because they don't offer the player a guaranteed product that they can judge to be worth their money.  Now the debate of whether this is gambling or not I will try to avoid, as it has been covered, beaten, and then covered again over the years (full disclosure it is textbook gambling and if you don't think so please go fuck off).  No what I want to do is talk about the cost of games, the ethics of such a thing and why it's dangerous, even if you can afford it.

The Cost of Games

Full disclosure I have bought loot boxes in the past.  Do I regret my decision?  Not necessarily.  Am I adding to the problem?  Absolutely.  But that's the first part of the problem, admitting there is one and knowing when you are being part of it.  Loot boxes are a problem, micro-transactions are a problem.  I have added to that problem.  I fully admit that and I'm not going to beat around the bush with it.  What really needs to be addressed here is the value behind this as a service.  What does that mean?  Simply put at what point in time does a product stop being valuable to the consumer?  This is one of the most researched topics in human history as companies want to maximize their profits and their sales.  Lets use cereal as an example.  If I am a large cereal company like Kelloggs and I am selling boxes of oh so delicious Frosted Flakes to my customers, I need to make sure that I give enough product at the right price to both make money, and yet still have it affordable enough to make a profit from. Meaning if I were to charge $10 a box I would have a huge profit margin, but I probably wont sell a lot of boxes due to not many consumers seeing the value in my product.  Thus I'd need to sacrifice my profit margin for sales to earn more money overall.  This is pretty simple economics so far.

But how does all of this apply to the games industry?  Well simply put the industry has agreed upon a price of $60 retail for a game, and while this price will vary in countries because of exchange rates (except Australia because you cheeky fuckers are weird) this is generally the agreed upon price.  While that seems a fair price to pay, publishers will argue otherwise, claiming that they don't make all the money off of the sale and while they technically do make most of it and are recovering some losses from their earlier contracts (basically the cost they pay the developer, console and brand licensing, and the costs to advertise the game are all paid up at front while the profits and retailer portion is actually earned at the cash register).  So if we take a game with a $100 Million budget (and assuming a retailer rater of 15%) they would need to sell roughly 2 Million copies to make their money back on that project, over that to start making money.  However with the advent of digital distribution a player buying a digital copy of the game off their platforms distribution service will effectively cut out the 15% retail cut giving that to the publisher, thus making them more money (which is why we've seen a huge push for digital sales in recent years).

Publishers will say that every game should need to make its money back on its own, and while that is a statement I can understandably agree with, that is not the reality.  See far too many games exist for this kind of a market to effectively exist (saying that roughly 1 million copies need be sold for every $50 Million in costs) especially considering even your lightly played games still have the expectation of being of a certain quality (sorry I don't like clipping Janice!!)  When you break this down you must realize that there is a minimum amount  that is needed for that quality to be achieved.  These costs come in the form paying developers, artists, voice actors, musicians, and all the other staff at a development studio to make the game (who typically don't see a dime after the game is launched based on the games success unlike other forms of entertainment media), and staff at the publisher, and console companies too. So it's understandable why they cost so much, but the publisher obviously wants a return on their investment.

Now lets go back to our Kelloggs example above for this next part.  Say I have a not significant amount of customers wanting a new type of cereal, like Bran Flakes for example.  Obviously this isn't going to be a large seller, but the demand for this product is big enough that the costs wont be too absurd to make it, so it would make sense for us as a company to make this and sell this.  Now I may end up losing some money on it occasionally but it makes people happy and it gets the Kelloggs name out there driving more sales of my other brands so I'm okay with it especially considering I have my guaranteed Frosted Flakes to pick up the slack on an off month for it.  This same idea applies to the game industry.  For every game like Madden that makes EA a TON of money, ten games like Dead Space exist to fill a more niche roll in the market for a specific type of game and to ultimately make my consumers happy so I get a better rep.  Yea, Dead Space may not have been a super huge block buster hit, but it does have a cult following of die hard fans who will gladly buy more games in the series because it gives them what they want.  It may even lose money here and there, but the good rep with your consumer base pays off more than well enough.  This is a fact that is lost on these more digital entertainment companies because they're seen as a premium product and believe they're above the rules for other companies.  The no longer respect their Bran Flakes.

The ill advised ethics of micro-transactions in the digital age

As many of us know and will agree to micro-transactions and loot boxes are largely disliked, but they are still be driven by out ever increasing "want it now" mentality.  Why play the game and spend time earning things if you can just pay a little extra and get it right now?  That hat that looks nice, well either 3 hours of gameplay, or hey, toss me $5 and I'll just give it to you!  This is the problem, companies don't consider the alternative besides what they will gain from it.  As someone who has worked selling games some people decide to not buy a game simply because there are micro-transactions in the game.  The cost of entry is already $60, why should they be forced to suffer through a game hallmarking the extra money they can chose to spend simply because a publisher wants to make more money on top of that?

The problem with this is if I'm paying a cost of entry of $60 already, which is a lot, I should not be pressured into giving you more money.  If you want to make more money simply charge more money for the product at the register.  I'd personally be okay paying $5-$10 more per title if it meant I wouldn't get rimjobbed with micro-transactions all day while playing my games.  Because I'll fully admit, they are tempting, they're designed to be so.  The system is made such that it is supposed to be tempting, so the temptation is an additional price, and if I'm not paying anything to get in then I'll gladly deal with the temptation and will actually more than likely to slide a few dollars to the game if I genuinely enjoy it.

Recent events *cough* Battlefront 2 *cough* have really encouraged i'll used ethics by not only time-gating but also pay-gating characters and having an almost 0 skill barrier behind it but instead hey, give EA $100 and you can be almost the deadliest thing on the planet thanks to it.  Which is a shame because I was looking forward for this game.  While I do want to keep talking about Battlefront 2 and Star Wars as a whole that will probably be a separate post.

The long and short of the ethics here is that there are no ethics for them in a $60+ retail game, even if it is cosmetic in nature only.  The cost of entry has already been achieved, if you feel that this isn't enough, simply charge more.

Why micro-transactions are dangerous

Now as we have seen with preorders and season passes and I can cry wolf about slippery slopes all day the fact is that this isn't even the worst part.  No the worst part is in the future we're probably going to see parts of the game split up and served to us on a silver platter for premium prices, because lets face it, companies want to nickle and dime us for every last dollar we have.  See that really cool Halo game?  Well if you want to play certain pieces of it only you can, but surprise surprise buying it piece wise will be more expensive in the long run, and even if you bundle them you may be lucky to get it for the same price.  Imagine paying $30 each for campaign, competitive, and cooperative multiplayer, and then this being touted as a good thing because players can get and pay only $30* for the games, but the real cost could be up to $90.  For an example of this look at what is currently happening with games like Hitman where they're breaking the story up into pieces.  And while other franchises have been doing this thank god they don't have the audacity to charge over $60 and are reasonably priced experiences.

Honestly the real slippery slope is what will publishers think up next to try and shoehorn as much money out of people as they can because they can.  The issues are what comes next, what comes after, how do we protect ourselves as consumers from this bullshit, because it is bullshit.  I know I, for one, will be boycotting Battlefront 2 because of this weeks revelations, at least until it's only a $20 game or I can get a cheap copy preowned (because fuck EA and fuck money going into their pockets because they don't deserve that shit ever).  Join me in pledging to not buy lootboxes, not to give in to the pressure that they represent, and not to give into the micro-transaction shit anymore to show that we wont make them profitable.

Really if you give even a fraction of a shit about the games you play and the quality of your experience you need to not buy these horrible misguided mistakes that we have been forced to endure.  Vote with your wallets, don't make these profitable, show that they're a waste of money as they wont make money for the developer.  Till next time folks.