It's always felt like something of an inevitability to me that Bungie would add microtransactions to Destiny. Well, Bungie has announced that they're finally arriving. Starting on October 13, Destiny players will be able to buy "Silver" via PSN and Xbox Live and then use it at Destiny's new Eververse Trading Company, where they'll be able to buy new emotes. Players will be given a small free batch of silver so that they can try the system out and pick up "an emote or two" for free.

There really isn't much more information than that at the moment. Bungie hasn't indicated how much Silver will cost, nor how expensive the 18 new emotes will be. While the studio does note that these emotes "won't impact the action game in any way," it isn't clear whether the Eververse Trading Company's catalog will stick to aesthetic goods or if it will ever expand to include things like armor, weapons, or gameplay boosts.

In the announcement, Bungie emphasizes that this program will serve to expand on the "surprising" new content that the Destiny fanbase has enjoyed in The Taken King. The studio specifically notes the plan is to use these microtransactions to pay for "more robust and engaging" updates from Destiny's live team, including an increased focus on world events.

For better or worse, microtransactions have become part and parcel to the modern MMO experience, and I'm pretty ambivalent about them. When done well, microtransactions can provide value to interested players (and a new income stream to the studio) without ever dragging down those players who'd prefer not to pay.

Of course, what a "good" microtransaction system looks like depends on the game in question. What seems pretty scummy in a full-priced game is much more reasonable in something that is free-to-play. In a highly competitive game, "boosts" and similar microtransactions can severely unbalance the game in a way that makes it unplayable for players who can't (or won't) pay, but I'm cautious about totally dismissing the argument for "convenience" micotransactions (especially as my own free time becomes increasingly limited). There really are a ton of variables in play.

Bungie seems to be hedging their bets with this announcement, and I'm not quite sure how to take that. This opening salvo of emotes seems unobjectionable, but the studio also hasn't made any promises about future microtransaction content. Given how Destiny has recently gotten its claws into me, I'm interested to see how they execute on this strategy... And if I'm being honest, I'm pretty curious to see these new dances, too.

Maybe Destiny will go free to play at some point? Compete with Warframe.

Destiny 3.0 vs Warframe Update 18?

Both games now have a similar pedigree of re-inventing their mechanics, progression and presentation. Well Destiny has done it once with Taken King, Warframe has re-worked itself about 4 times. Mod 2.0, UI 2.0, Melee 2.0 and recently Parkour / Movement 2.0. Next rework for warframe announced to be progression and starchart 3.0

wow...

I'll copy what I posted on the other thread before this became Austin approved news (AAN for the cool kids)

My biggest issues with this isn't the micro transactions for emotes, that stuff is fine, people who want them can buy them.

I'm worried about how they say they aren't going to do a "second big expansion" and instead make free story missions to give away. Now for most games and developers, I'd be fine with that, but for Destiny and it's history of dry content, even if TTK is much better, I fear our new story content every few months is going to non-substantial and really not have an impact on the story of the game, instead of what a new expansion would be.

I hope I am wrong, and it'll just be a wait and see, but from the angel of someone who wants more, forward driven narrative, this sets of some slightly yellow flags to me.

As long as they're cosmetic, I don't mind. Dances are the new hats.

it begins.

As long as it's only for emotes.

@rapid: doing too well as a full retail product. I guess if they can have the best of both worlds, why not?

Let's see if it stays with cosmetic items or not. Destiny has cost a lot of people $/€100+ already so they had better not get too cheeky with this stuff.

This is a slippery slope....

If this makes them a profit, I don't trust Activision to not take advantage of it.

How much to Dougie?

yeaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh

This has to include things other than emotes eventually, right? Otherwise why make a new currency when you could just release the dances as DLC?

Hey you already paid $140 to play this game... Hurry and give us more so you can.... Dance.

It's only a matter of time before they fuck this up.

I'd probably drop a few bucks down to just change my dumbass mohawk for my hunter.

A twerk emote can't be too far off, right?

As long as I don't have to pay $15 a month to just play destiny, I'm fine with a cosmetics shop. Paying $15 a month just for one other MMO really keeps me from getting back into some of them.

Austin following in patrick's footsteps of see a thread on giant bomb, make a news article shortly after. :D

I know it's most likely coincidental, just looks funny.

@jericu: my thoughts exactly. The new currency is the part that makes this seem fishy.

Here we go.

A lot of people play Destiny. People will go in on this shit hard.

Our plan is to use these new items to bolster the service provided by our live team for another full year, as they grow and create more robust and engaging events that we’ll announce later this year.

That being said, events like they are describing should be included already in a "living, breathing world". Maybe I'm reading in to a little bit too hard, but maybe this is saying we need to hire some additional content creators because everyone else is working on Destiny 2.0? At a certain point, it almost sounds like a Kickstarter pitch.

EDIT: Can we get the stats of the number of users who jumped directly to the comment block without reading the article?

If they lay out the direct correlation that this microtransactions store is to pay for people to make actual gameplay content that would otherwise not exist them im pretty cool with it but ive paid about £80 towards Destiny so I dont need them waving another payment method around in game. I dont care if its optional since I paid for the whole game and on the 13th I will not own the whole game anymore.

Man I hope Bungle takes that extra step everyone is dreading. That way I can see Jeff once again go Kratos on this game. Till that time its whatever as I have no real interest in this.

Activision would never do that when they can still charge for the base game and then also charge for microtransactions.

Also, people already couldn't handle having to grind marks or rep or having a weekly limit on marks earned; there is absolutely no way those same people would be okay with Warframe's F2P crafting mechanics.

Both games are two of my favorites of the last five years, for the record.

ah hahahahahahahaha, of course. ooooooof course this is happening.

Fingers crossed for Snoop Dogg announcer pack.

Paying for cosmetic stuff has allowed Dota 2 to become a huge awesome game, and now that I'm really starting to appreciate Destiny I can see this becoming great for the game as well. As long as they're being honest about using this cash to improve the game further, I have no qualms.

Whatever. Destiny's got its goddamn vile claws in me again, but I'll be goddamned if I buy emotes for real money. Perhaps other people will enjoy this addition to their fine product. I'm happy with my popping/locking robot.

Dammit Steve

@rapid:Does Destiny let you move your ship around during the loading screen? Didn't think so. Winner is Warframe ;)

This isn't the place for it but the whole "cosmetics don't affect the game" attitude is a bold-faced lie marketers have somehow gotten away with for too long. Grrrr! Hear me seek justice!

Yes, it does change your experience with the game.

Sure, cosmetics do not change at all how much damage you do, but there is a metric fuck of a difference between paying 2 bucks to unlock a dance/sparrow/shader and unlocking a new one IN GAME. One of those is a fun experience (an exciting reward or loot drop perhaps?) that makes you want to keep playing the game and finding new stuff, and the other is not.

Anyways feel free to tell me I'm wrong and cosmetics and how you unlock them has 0 effect on your experience playing a game.

Yes, this is the lesser evil. I'm not blind to the other options, just dumb and worried. There is already a lack of loot in this game and problems with everyone having/going for the same gear. I don't see this DLC making that better, only worse. Except now when everyone tells the same story about this gun they got from a raid, they can all tell the same story about going to the online store to buy a shader.

That said. As maniacal as it sounds, I think the idea of using your whales to fund free content for everyone else instead of expensive "leave everyone behind" expansion packs is a smarter decision long term for the community.

edit: ohhh that hurts to say but it is what it is.

Is this the next step to make it Free To Play when the next one comes out? I kid! A little bit.

Guess it really is too much to ask these days that games you drop $60 US for aren't filled with F2P micro-transaction garbage. Got to get that cash son!

here comes the overreactions and slipperly slope talk....

as long as it cosmetic and silly stuff go crazy bungie I guess. games aint cheap

I've never been a fan of micro-transactions in non f2p games (only exception would be Rock Band/GH) and it's no different than anything before it. This just further pushes me away from investing any time in what I consider a soulless experience. Activision and Bungie will never get a cent from me.

They added another animation to the ship movement, you can raise the flaps!!

also a new type of ship! You can call for supply drops in mission (like DE trying to copy metal gear or something)

As long as they don't go overboard and try to sell you Strange Coins or More of Light, we're good.

@geraltitude: Yeah, I avoided using this terminology here because I'm sympathetic to your argument. It's also why I'm happy that Bungie used the phrasing "won't impact the action game in any way," which I guess out of context might read like "won't impact the game, which is in the action genre, in any way," but to me reads like "which will not impact the action/shooting part of the game in any way." They know well enough that dancing matters.

I don't understand video games anymore.

In their secret labs, activision works on the next great game-changer, the Macro Transaction(TM)

Didn't buy The Taken King, definitely not buying emotes/silver. Deleting Destiny off my PS4. Damn, it had so much potential.

This will be interesting to see what the implications will be, this can be easily abused, or it can actually assist in making Destiny realize its true potential and have the next set of DLC and "Destiny 2" actually have a lot more significance than taken king.

Smart move. I could see people being outraged because of the cosmetics, but come on. Game making is not cheap. As long as Destiny doesn't become play to win (which it won't) I'm fine with it

@ripelivejam: Is that going to be their new name for DLC?

If it's for cosmetic crap that doesn't impact the game, then go nuts.

If it's for "boosts", impacting drop rates, or otherwise finagling with the core gameplay loop itself? Go eat shit.

The former never bothers me, and I don't get why people lose their minds. The latter would be a betrayal of the people who have paid you about $150 so far, to keep playing your content-thin product as you slowly turn it into something more feature-complete.

@pistolpackinpoet: if I recall, Evolve was massively shit on by the media and gamers for cosmetic dlc.

That's unbelievable you replied, I was just miming myself sending you an email for the beastcast when I saw this. Definitely I read it like you. There's an acknowledgement here. Specificity is rule number 1 in expectation management. And when it comes consumers Austin, well... expectation management? That's everything! *a jingle plays in hell*

Just a reminder, Activision owns World of Warcraft, which is chock full of microtransactions that don't affect the gameplay at all. I don't think this transition is going to hamper the gameplay of Destiny either.

Also, boosts already exist in the game, remember? Red Bull codes give you double XP.

Emotes? I don't care.

Everything under the Destiny umbrella up to this point has probably generated well over a billion dollars in revenue. Bungie trying to make it sound like they need this money in order to keep "free" updates coming is kind of a lot for me to swallow, especially as they continue churning out relatively high-priced expansions at the current rate.

I'm not necessarily against developers charging for content and I don't think cosmetic microtransactions are inherently evil, but I feel like they are feeding Destiny players a load of bullshit with the wording of this press release.

Oh great, I can't wait for them to talk about Destiny for another hour on the Bombcast.

Yeaaaa... no thank you.