Buying games before they're made

I don't know what it is about gamers but for whatever reason we've gotta be the biggest bunch of suckers in the entertainment biz. We are a customer base that loves to be ripped off.

First the DLC and microtransactions thing happened and people were warned that it could easily become abusive if consumers rewarded that kind of behavior and what did we do? Rewarded that kind of behavior, of course. Then came freemium, a rip-off scheme of monumental proportions that has the disgusting characteristic of making much of its money from the most vulnerable of people. Now it's possible to spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars playing a single game. That's also been successful.

So I guess that selling content before it actually even exists is just a natural evolution of things and so far it's looking like that is going to be a smashing success for gaming execs as well. This latest development is very concerning because it enables companies to be less concerned about quality than they've ever been. After all, you've already payed for it regardless of what the final product turns out to be.

Look at Activision, once they realized that millions of copies of Destiny had been sold before the game was even complete they ordered Bungie to cut out much of its content to be sold later as DLC. If it happened in that case rewarding those sorts of practices will cause it to happen over and over again with other games in the future. But history has a way of repeating itself and it's looking to me like gamers are poised to get behind this latest brand of anti-consumer behavior.

Simply complaining changes nothing, what you do with your dollars is what matters and this one is so damned easy: Do not purchase gaming content in advance.

I agree with you 100%, I have never bought DLC or a microtransaction in my entire life, and I never will. The problem is people are suckers and these business models have proven successful so developers will continue to abuse them until people smarten up, the problem of course is that people will never smarten up so I don't expect this garbage to stop anytime soon.

I agree. Our money does talk, but when we just throw it around prematurely we aren't using it to say anything about the types of products + services we value

Last game i ever pre-ordered was Ultima IX in 1999 i think. The game turned out to be a stinking buggy pile of shit. I haven't pre-ordered a game since and never will again.

I'm surprised people haven't learned yet, i learned ages ago. I guess eventually people will get enough bad games and stop pre-ordering.

"We"? I do not identify with these people. I have never pre-ordered and I will never pre-order. I think I understand why people do it and frankly, I think most people are actually satisfied with their pre-order, which means there's no reason for companies to stop offering them. If it was really so abusive and a bad deal, people would have stopped pre-ordering by now. I think people continue to pre-order, because they're satisfied with their purchase, not because they are continuously stepping into the same trap without realising it. Granted, those two things can happen simultaneously, but the fact remains that as long as people are satisfied with their purchase, there's no reason for this to end.

Great another post about how companies are ripping people off. "We demand better games that cost more to make but we will scream if you try to get more money from us to pay that different."

I have no problem with DLC, microtransactions, or preorders. For those that talk about about voting with you wallet, you been out voted.