Comments on Above 49: It Began With Horse Armour ...

After reading Michael's post and before readin...

2009-06-19T05:47:10.268-07:00

After reading Michael's post and before reading this one, my initial thought was, "Why not make it work like Rock Band?" No surprise, then, that I agree with Nels's position on the issue and the suggested alternative. I do think it's worth it to acknowledge that this is a sort of discrimination against certain play styles. I'd also like to suggest, though, that even if the players who see it as the more galling issue are those who'd prefer to work for that content anyway, that doesn't mean it's not our problem too.

When I play Rock Band with my girlfriend, we play the tour mode. We're unlocking our songs the old-fashioned way. We don't have a lot of time to play games together, though, so it's slow going. When we have friends over for gaming, we unlock all the tracks on the disc (with the well-publicized cheat code) to give our friends more options, to make the game more enjoyable and accessible for them. I would feel cheated if that option was behind a pay wall.

Paying for new content (like new tracks) is fine by me. Paying for access to content I already paid for seems kind of crass.

I think one observation that I have regarding this...

2009-06-16T18:35:19.372-07:00

I think one observation that I have regarding this kind of "progression bypass", is that it breaks the fourth wall of gaming. As Nels said in the last comment, everything in a videogame is artificial. One of the main requirements to enjoying a videogame is that suspension of disbelief; to believe that in this world the character can only run left and right, that pressing A three times does a power hit, that reaching the end of this level awards the new ability.

Progression mechanics form the mechanical tapestry of a game world just as much as movement, attack, or story mechanics. So by letting players optionally unlock everything, you are kind of pointing at that lock system and saying, "Hey, look! It's just an arbitrary mechanic in this video game! You're not actually achieving anything!" This breaks the player's suspension of disbelief. And I think this is why skill players get so riled up about it -- they don't want anyone pointing out that they are beating their head against artificial limitations.

I compare it to the special features on DVDs. I hate watching the 'making of' stuff -- it makes otherwise fantastic effects boring and obvious. The first time I watched The Lord of the Rings, it didn't even occur to me that Gandalf was 2x taller than Frodo; it was just part of that fantasy. Now I can't watch those movies without looking for all the camera tricks and CG.

I can only imagine that when someone comes up against a barrier in a game that provides this kind of barrier bypassing, instead of thinking, "OK, I have to beat this bad guy!" instead they will now be thinking, "I just want to progress in this game!"

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All that said, many people have no objections to watching the bonus features and having their experiences ruined. Most people just don't care that much. So why should we object to providing those people with a way to unlock everything? And @Jorge, why should we object to designers including unlocks as part of their mechanical palette?

@Jorge I think having some content locked is actua...

2009-06-16T14:40:05.999-07:00

@Jorge I think having some content locked is actually a valid design decision. Making the entirety of a game's content available from the first second of play can easily overwhelm some players.

Unlockable content also serves as a feedback system, letting players know they're doing well on a metagame level. Many people are hardwired to find achieving goals very satisfying (I know I do) and I'm not sure achievements alone are sufficient goals for many kinds of games.

Is that artificial? Maybe. But at the end of the day, so is everything else in a video game.

I'm still a firm believer that unlockables sho...

2009-06-16T11:34:00.609-07:00

I'm still a firm believer that unlockables shouldn't exist. Understandably, as Michael put it, unlockables make something valuable for a select few, but it is a false value. Like hoarding all the worlds supply of chocolate to artificially raise the value, it does not actually change content. Content which, in my opinion, should be satisfying and compelling enough for tourists and completionists alike. There are still achievements to satisfy those who want a sense of accomplishment. Locked content, to me, seems like the cowardice of developers who do not stand behind their gameplay.

@Lucas That's the most common objection and it...

2009-06-15T21:56:36.287-07:00

@Lucas That's the most common objection and it makes sense. But I think it's still important to make the skill player vs. tourist distinction because skill players usually aren't going to pay for unlock DLC.

The objection you raise isn't shared by most tourist players, which makes me wonder a little about how offensive unlock DLC is. It still feels exploitative, but less so than if the objection was universal.

I'm willing to pay for downloadable conten...

2009-06-15T20:25:16.575-07:00
I'm willing to pay for downloadable content, but not for access to content that is included in the game as it is sold. This seems like a straight forward and reasonable opinion, neh?

Discussions of "casual" "tourists" or what players get from overcoming challenges are interesting, but beside the point. EA may be draining players' sense of achievement or opening their games to less dedicated consumers, yes, but they're also charging for something for which players have already paid.

@Graham It's an interest experiment to conside...

2009-06-15T08:55:13.670-07:00
@Graham It's an interest experiment to consider, though. Of course, if that model proves to be successful, will some of the big publishers start including "demo play" as $5 DLC? Could they resist that temptation? I worry they could not.

@WorldMaker I deliberately tried to restrict this conversation to (primarily) single player or co-op games because this issue becomes vastly more complicated in the space of MMOs.

The perception of fairness figures a lot into how many players engage with MMOs. Purchasing advantages can alter that pretty dramatically, and I honestly don't think it could work in a game like WoW. Now, an MMO that's more instanced like DDO (which will become free-to-play quite soon, actually) might host something like this better. Alternatively, experimenting with "RMT" and "non-RMT" shards could be interesting as well.

@Psychochild Except the difference is The Sims 2 expansions offered new content, they didn't simply unlock content already in the game. An accurate analogy would be if The Sims 3 had DLC that gave the player 50,000 simoleans for $5.

I have no fundamental problem with DLC that is actually something new, it's selling people access to something they've already purchased that's problematic for me. That's a subtle distinction, but an important one, I think.

"How easy it is to make just a little more co...

2009-06-15T01:45:39.136-07:00
"How easy it is to make just a little more content locked, facilitating multiple unlock DLC offerings."

We already live in that world. The most successful game of all time, The Sims is successful primarily because people could acquire new content for the game at a price. We just call those "expansion packs" and people don't seem to be all that bothered.

The difference is that downloadable content is, well, downloadable instead of the player being required to go buy a box at the store. Because the developer doesn't have to bundle changes into one large package for reasons of retail efficiency, DLC can be provided a la carte. Honestly, if Oblivion's horse armor had been one of 10 major features in a $25 expansion pack, there would be a lot less complaining than what happened when they dared to offer it directly to the players through download. In an expansion pack, people could have selectively decided that "feature X" was worth the money, even if they hated the horse armor.

Eventually DLC will be seen the same way we see expansions. I expect some game developers will get smart and start offering bundles of features for people who want to feel like they're saving a bit of money, or those who have to have every feature for their favorite game. New things are scary, so we're seeing a lot of people getting frightened, but in reality this is just a variation of what we've seen before.

I've helped debate the merits of unlock charge...

2009-06-14T22:22:47.579-07:00
I've helped debate the merits of unlock charges in the realm of MMOs. MMOs make the topic even more complex because there are several valid economic arguments for charging the customers willing to pay to have their characters more quickly leveled, max leveled, provided with spoils, or what have you. The battle against the concept leads to the "criminalization" of (potentially many) legitimate players and the dark, shadow economies where the unscrupulous ("Chinese gold farmers") benefit for as long as their EULA-breaking isn't discovered and the developers see the in-game economic effects without benefit of out-of-game economic advantages.

I can see good reasons for developer provided unlock charges, and although rarely am I a libertarian I think that this is one of those areas where presumably the market can very well help determine what such things are worth. (I think that we can eventually answer: How much is an average player's "grind time" worth?)

On the other hand, I wish we could collectively get over the "purity" of achievements and bring back some of the old school powerful cheat codes, without "compromising" achievements. Why shouldn't I get narrative achievements when I play an FPS in "god mode"? That's how I used to play an FPS for its narrative "back in the day". I'm still physically working my way through the narrative, even in god mode... I might as well get the game-external plot coupon for it all the while.

Not exactly related, but almost perfectly parallel...

2009-06-14T22:22:14.467-07:00
Not exactly related, but almost perfectly parallel is this recent news.

Both your post and that quote from Miyamoto point out problem to me: It's hard to remove the challenge from a challenge-based activity without ruining it, for obvious reasons. I think 'tourist' is a great way to describe the kind of players who want that; they are getting an experience, it's just not the experience, much like a tourist who travels to some exotic location and then spends the whole time at the resort. It's safe and clean and easy.

Of course in games that aren't primarily challenge-based (The Sims?) this need not apply. In that case, in fact, skill gamers are the tourists, power-leveling their character through a career and missing the point of the game.

So none of that has anything to do with DLC. I'm tired. I'll try and bring that full circle later on. :)