Pre-order DLC, Not for Me

Prologue: I had a lot of fun writing this. Don’t read it as a rant, but read it as the opinion of one with quite the chip in his shoulder. Please to enjoy!

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Let’s get this out of the way up front. I am NOT a fan of pre-order DLC. As much as it is a cool bonus for gamers, I dislike the practice. My reasoning behind this is quite simple. Pre-order DLC is a not so clever disguise for developers/publishers to trick gamers into purchasing their titles. It’s a horrible way to incentive gamers to buy their games, and it reinforces my belief that video games are becoming more of a revenue driven business, and less of an entertainment medium.

It is my opinion that pre-ordered DLC has nothing to do with giving something cool to gamers. I’d even go as far as saying that behind each PO-DLC announcement is a marketing team tasked with the following campaign objective,  “Develop program designed to drive revenue, and increase first week sales for title x”.

Pre-ordered DLC is a slap in the face with a leather glove. When a game ships with that content on the disc, the leather glove is upgraded to a titanium gauntlet forged in the fires of Mt. Doom. In a world where games were still made for gamers, and NOT investors and the stock market, we wouldn’t see such atrocities. Some might argue that the content is technically available to everyone, and that the gamer makes the choice of pre-ordering or not. Or maybe developers and publishers are just giving us the opportunity to enhance our gaming experience. What happened to the days where beating a game on a certain difficulty or accomplishing tasks that reward us with unlockable content?

Digging a little deeper, I’ve heard the following response to my last point…

“Well not every gamer wants to invest the time to unlock these bonuses. In addition to this, the market has expanded, and not everyone is going to have the skills or ability to get to that point. There is a very large casual market that we’d like to tap into and provide this opportunity to “.

Well I say shame on you casual gamers.

This is what a MAN's gamerpic looks like

You see my pic? It’s Ryu Hayabusa. How’d I get that? I conquered Ninja Gaiden 2 on Master Ninja. After countless hours invested in that game, I unlocked that little piece of content. I worked for it, and I am NEVER changing my gamerpic, Avatar be damned. If that was available through a pre-order bonus, I might shed a tear or two.

The other argument I’ve heard is as follows…

“Well, we’d like to offer a bonus to gamers willing to support, have faith in, and invest in our titles prior to their release”.

My rebute? The gamers that are going to support your games are going to support them either way. If Mass Effect 2 shipped without pre-order DLC, I would have bought it on day one regardless. Granted, I want all of the content the game has to offer, but when you tell me I need to pre-order it in order to access that content, you then force my hand. Yes, I still have the choice to pre-order or not, but if that’s the best response you can come up with, your first console was probably the Xbox, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you though Halo Wars was a good RTS.

Long story short, people these days are more concerned with touting their first week NPD numbers and less interested in the consumer/gamer experience. Call me a whiney girly-man if you like, but I’ve been on the inside. I’ve seen the lies,  marketing spins and all the black hearted souls that are quickly taking over my favorite past time. On the head of Jenova, when I go to Hell, I’m doing everything in my power to make my experience as close to Dante’s Inferno as possible. And believe me, I’ll be maxing out my Unholy path, because I’m punishing every single one of the suits responsible when I get to the circle of Greed.

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