EA Explains the Unlockable Weapons in Battlefield: Bad Company
We heard rumors last week that Electronic Arts would be making some weapons in the upcoming Battlefield: Bad Company available only though microtransactions. Now, thanks to the fine people over at MTV's multiplayer blog, we learn that EA is going to be doing this, but maybe not exactly how some thought it would happen.
Quote:
At launch, there will be ten weapons available through XBL or PlayStation Network that aren’t in the box.
Before you panic: five will be free. Five retailers offer an “exclusive” pre-order weapon in the months to come. Each of those weapons will become available at launch for free.
Another five, however, will not.
These five will be exclusively bundled with a to-be-announced “Gold Edition” of “Battlefield Bad Company.” Think of “Gold Edition” as another term for the many “Limited Edition” versions of games we’ve seen recently. These weapons are readily unlocked for gamers who purchase the Gold Edition, but everyone else will need to pay.
Furthermore, Electronic Arts tells MTV that all of the weapons in the game are balanced, and the weapons you get via the Gold Edition or DLC will not unbalance the gameplay, only provide more options.
On a compulsion level: It drives me nuts not to be able to access every part of a game I buy. Paying $10 more for a special edition just to get 5 more guns is really annoying. I'm more worried where this will lead in the future.
Furthermore, Electronic Arts tells MTV that all of the weapons in the game are balanced, and the weapons you get via the Gold Edition or DLC will not unbalance the gameplay, only provide more options.
It's an odd balancing act Electronic Arts has going on. On one hand, they have to mollify the greater consumer base that they are not, in fact, getting only part of a game for $60. On the other they have to try and sell these $10 (or whatever they hell they'll eventually sell for) weapon packs as something other than just new skins on old guns.
My view still stands.. I'm not buying games that do this. We already got a price increase with "next gen" at $60 a few years ago.. what's next $70? oh wait..
So someone offers a decent incentive to preorder and limited edition buyers instead of the usual shoddy art books and "making of" DVDs and people complain. Typical.
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Why would you think the gold-plated heat seeking, wall penatrating, multi-barreled rocket launcher will imbalance the game? Hmmm??
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So someone offers a decent incentive to preorder and limited edition buyers instead of the usual shoddy art books and "making of" DVDs and people complain. Typical.
But that's not what they're doing at all. The guns are for a game where you'll be playing against players who may NOT have the new guns. And we don't even know what it means, but we don't like it. And they're also available outside of buying the limited edition...which I think is them trying to legitimize their micro-cashing in.
It's incentive to get the limited edition, sure. But it's also five guns in the game you have to pay for to get, one way or another.
If there are 30 guns in the box and you can get an extra one by perordering with a reseller, then i guess not getting the extra 9 until you pay an extra 10 bux is about what I would expect (from EA)
If on the other hand you get 10 guns in the box, and you have to preorder the limited to get an extra 6, then buy the remaining 4 as well then that is kinda lame.
Any of you guys played Warrock before? It's a free online FPS. Sole people can choose to fork over real money to be able to HOST more maps, LEASE non-default weapons, and gain exp faster. The non-default weapons are a little bit better than default ones, so there is a slight imbalance between people that pay and people that don't pay. You could just play the game a lot to slowly accumalate virtual money instead of paying with real money. I believe that the purchasable weapons in Battlefield will be different than the default weapons but not necessarily better.
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Hopefully the weaons will have better balance than BF2142.
Really?
I know 2142 wasn't generally well received by the BF community, but I personally thought they did a great job on the gameplay and balance specifically. No über jets for the 'leet' kids, artillery strikes that one can actually survive, shields to survive the first salvo, spawn beacons, and the list goes on...
I think every online FPS will always have its G36E or Krylov or what have you.
