5. BATTLEFIELD 3 – ULTIMATE SHORTCUT BUNDLE
PRICE: £23.99
This is one of those in-game purchases that really annoys not only me, but also other gamers. It’s basically a way to cheat the game by unlocking all 119 weapons you earn through progression and also helps to boost your EXP so you level up at an insane rate. Not only is this just pure laziness, it will take away the replayability from and will also piss off anyone on the map that wants to unlock things the normal way and improve their level by using their skill within the game.
This really does take the fun out of gaming because if you have unlocked everything that is available to you then there is really no need to play the game you have just spent £50 on because aside from the achievements, you won’t have anything to aim for. I know that when you look at the price and you see just what you’re getting, it is pretty good value for money (I can’t believe I just wrote that), but the point still stands – everyone hates a cheater.
4. EVOLVE – ALL OF IT
PRICE: AROUND £100
Evolve was one of those games showed so much promise when they first showed trailers of it, but it has since gone down in infamy as the game that requires you to purchase not one season pass, but two.
For those who don’t know, Evolve is an online game where you must play with friends to capture certain monsters. In order to do this, you must work as a team, with each of you playing as a certain cog in the team. The problem with Evolve became apparent quickly because you must do certain actions to level up the characters, which meant everyone was doing that and not working as a team. It’s so bad, that this game now goes for just short of £10 in any store. But at least the game servers worked!
When the DLC for Evolve was revealed, it promised us alternate costumes, new maps, monsters and gear. But to get all this you needed to buy two season passes. For a game with a core that is just as broken as my career prospects, this was a bad move. It is safe to say that Evolve bombed and now there are very few people playing.
3. WWE 2K17 – MOST OF THE DLC
PRICE: SEASON PASS £24.99. VARIOUS PRICES FOR EACH INDIVIDUAL PACK
WWE 2K17 had a pretty rough start when it was released due to the changeover of developers and coming off the back of a game that wasn’t really that good. Although I enjoy playing this game, the DLC that is available for it is both stupid and reasonably expensive.
The first thing is the Goldberg pack and the New Superstar pack, which includes introducing Anderson and Gallows as playable characters. It has had such an impact on the game that WWE actually gave Goldberg a push in the company, much to the annoyance of the fans. Then there is the new moves pack, the accelerator pack, the Legends pack and the Superstars pack, which add either new playable wrestlers to the roster or give your own created wrestler a boost in Career Mode. The issue here is that all the characters and all the moves are actually available in the game already, you just need to pay for the code to unlock them or pay to allow your created wrestler to use someone else’s finisher.
For a game that was always going to struggle on release, this is a pretty poor move by both the WWE to endorse it and also for the developer to go ahead with it. I mean, Anderson and Gallows were signed to WWE just before this game was released so there is no reason why they can’t be included without having to pay for them.
2. ALTERNATIVE COSTUMES/AESTHETICS FOR YOUR CHARACTERS
PRICES: VARIES DEPENDING ON THE GAME
I have never seen the attraction or the need to buy new clothing or new designs for my characters to use in the game. 90% of the time, they offer no other bonuses except for an aesthetic look and when you think you can jump online and your character will be different, you are sorely mistaken as some other schmuck has done the same thing.
For example, Watch Dogs 2 threw four new sets of clothing down our face as soon as we loaded the game up. But if you have played the game like I have, then you may agree with me that they really weren’t anything special. They were just alternatives of outfits that were already available in the game itself. The Division did exactly the same thing, offering you DLC to allow you to dress your character like a policeman or a fireman or a stripper (okay, maybe not a stripper), yet as you progress through the game you are given more than enough clothing to customise your agent to suit the climate they are in.
For most of these games, the choice of clothing that is already available is insane and there really is no need to go for these packs, unless you have spare cash in your account or you really, really want something.
1. IN-GAME CURRENCY
PRICE: VARIES ON THE AMOUNT PURCHASED AND THE GAME YOU’RE PLAYING
This is the worst type of DLC that developers can offer gamers. In most games, in-game currency used to purchase new items can be earned either by completing missions or by winning matches online. It was recently discovered that for you to be able to unlock every single feature in For Honor
Prices tend to vary from £2.99 to £69.99 and they offer a varied amount of currency for you to unlock different gear or weapons packs or EXP boots that will help you progress through the game. The best way to describe how this annoys me is to throw in a couple of examples.
When Assassin’s Creed Unity was released, I was working in a game shop and had to deal with a lot of the brunt that came my way from unhappy customers. One customer came in to trade the game, whilst telling me he had spent nearly £100 to unlock everything he needed to play it properly. The problem with Unity was you needed to jump online with friends to unlock certain items of clothing or weapons, but the matchmaking was pants and the servers were broken, so people couldn’t do this. They turned to purchasing the currency with real money.
Although many developers are using this system at the moment, one of them in particular is appalling for it (naming no names) and I genuinely feel disgusted by the tactics that they use when the game you have already bought is substandard.
So there we have it, rant over. Is there anything that bugs you about DLC?
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