The Dark Downward Descent of DLC

I have a confession to make.

I hate DLC. 

Once upon a time, when you bought a game, you had hours of enjoyment. If the game was good, and sold well, the developer might make a sequel. All was good with the world.

Then came PC expansion packs, adding more story, content, and fun. These were sold for a fraction of the price of the original game and were (usually) worth the money. 

With the prevalence of the internet and the launch of the next generation of consoles, (PS3 and Xbox 360 and Wii) we started to see consoles get their own content delivery systems so that they too could get additional content.

One day, the evil publishers decided that they could start putting content on the disc but not let anyone play it unless they paid. There was an outrage, but not big enough to prevent the next twisted, dark step… 

Somewhere along the line someone decided to come up with the idea to sell extra aesthetic content like weapon skins and costumes for small, micro-transactions. Such was the beginning of the end.  

It feels like we pay for only half a game these days. Take Battlefield 3, for example, it has over $100 of DLC. Sure, you can save money if you buy premium and the mega bundle, but it still costs more in DLC than the game itself. Don’t forget the bundles and premium edition weren’t available right away so early adopters of the game got royally screwed. 

Yeah, I get it. It takes time and money to develop games, and give us extra content. Personally I would rather wait an extra week or two for a game to be released if it meant I got more content. Which brings me to…

DAY ONE DLC!

Day one DLC is the worst kind of DLC. It tells me that the publishers don’t care about the gamers, if you can manage to have “extra” content ready for release day, include it in the game. Quit gouging us. If you want lots of money, make a good game, we’ll buy it. I’m sick of having to buy the game and countless DLC packs to be able to enjoy it. 

Take us back to the good old days.