Sitrep: Paying to Win?

[News Portal]

The unthinkable has happened: EA have figured out yet another way to make money from a game you already paid for months ago. Now any FNG fresh off the couch can log onto [app=5812]Battlefield 3[/app] and fork out for The Ultimate Shortcut Bundle. But is this paying to win, or paying to play?

Read full article by Toby McCasker

[Denzil]

It's so expensive, doesn't come with the extensions on the guns themselves, and is far enough in the games life not to bother me.

It's like, if you look at the weapons stats for the assault class, they look bloody identical other than the G3 (dmg, not recoil, same for most classes I think). It's not a huge worry for me.

[skitzor]

pretty much. the people who are spending the money to unlock everything will probably find part of the appeal of the game gone. it's their choice, and it only effects them.

for people who are too busy working to spend hundreds of hours to unlock all the cooler stuff, and just want to arse around on weekends for a few hours it's perfect. they probably have enough money, and the extra enjoyment is worth it.

it doesn't give them any significant advantage because by now regulars have unlocked the majority of the stuff they would use. if they released this on day 1, I would probably have something to complain about. getting enough points in the jet/helicopter to get flares was hard enough right at the beginning where everyone had nothing. it would be so much harder if some people had all the unlocks.

[thefinn]

Yeah if you are dumb enough to fall for this, you're missing out on at least 50% of the fun of unlocking something, working towards a particular gun/unlock.

Still trying to unlock my L96...

[Yurtles]

It's like I was saying back when we were first discussing BF3 unlocks. Multiplayer unlocks are a joke. Everything needs to be balanced with everything else, you can never get absurdly more powerful through unlocks because that'd ruin the whole thing. All they're there for is to artificially extend the games life, they're a crutch holding up mediocre game design.

So in that trend, offering the unlocks for purchase now when most have already done it in game makes perfect sense. The game is played out for a lot of people, they've not nothing to lose by messing with their life extension gimmick anymore.

[Bluefire]

Next DLC will be the addons for the weapons.. similar price.
You know it will happen
Me.. Im STILL waiting for them to patch out that origin ****.. money is still sitting here waiting for you to not require the installation of spyware ea ... when oh when will you collect it?

[Mearehear]

Personally I really dislike the current generation of games obsession with leveling up and unlocks, to me it's artificial game play, so bypassing this I would see as a valid option (not that I play BF3), but with the prices they are charging for the shortcuts, it really makes it look just like a cash in by DICE, something that is also becoming another trend all round with this generation of gaming.

[The_Pharoah]

like I always say...its the guitarist not the guitar...thats my analogy. Joe Satriani can make a $100 guitar from Aldi sound better than me with a $10k Ibanez JS1000.

its all about skill.

[skitzor]

Me.. Im STILL waiting for them to patch out that origin ****.. money is still sitting here waiting for you to not require the installation of spyware ea ... when oh when will you collect it?

probably when they start caring about earning .5% of what they already earn.

(never).

why lose platform control over your game when it won't earn you much money?

[Alexdotau]

Who cares about this dead game tbh.

[jerichosainte]

Now EA are mixing free to play gaming model with regular games lol its pretty obvious they want to make more money.

[akira675]

A friend brought this game for his 360 before he was blessed with a PC from this decade. He had unlocked the lot, however he got his new PC and now plays with us. He brought the shortcuts to not have to go through the unlocks all over again.. Worked for him.

Unlocking everything off the bat doesn't grant you any extra skill, it just gives you the grenade launcher faster so you can be a twat in metro all day. Nobody loses except metro 24/7 players imo.

[Snootle]

The problem are unlocks in general. I think they're completely out of place in a competitive FPS.

[RSOblivion]

I find this whole gotta play 500hrs to unlock things completely damn pointless. You aren't actually getting much of a reward for your time and in MP it's usually unbalanced as it affects whether you survive or die a lot. To say that the starting loadouts are balanced is laughable, with most of the higher tier weapons being unreservedly better than the lower tier ones. Which just means you die a lot more to get the better guns then cause pain to other lower level players. Vicious cycle that gets very boring in BF3 very fast.

Not really saying the current CoD's are any better though at the moment. Similar issues there for unlocks.

Still neither game balances guns correctly, though I do like BF3's bullet drop, which CoD lacks.

[me109]

I paid for the Ultimate Unlock Bundle as I work away most of the time and don't get too much time to grind through the kits.

Unfortunately, the Ultimate Unlock Bundle doesn't work as advertised as the aircraft and vehicles don't unlock.

This is the email that I got from them when I queried them as why I didn't get the unlocks:

After having reviewed your email, I understand that you are not able to view the weapons in the game for which you have purchased the Ultimate Short Cut Unlock Bundle. I know this must have been frustrating for you.

To be honest with you, these issues have already been reported by several of our “Battlefield 3" players that they are having this issue and we have already forwarded these issues to our game development team to have a look and resolving the issue. Our game developers are working on it