None, and like some, never will. And if we're talking Mass Effect 3 especially, it's all about the campaign (for me at least).

@Potts:

Ask yourself what the difference between a Free2Play-style unlock scheme is, and how a 'real' game handles unlocks.

Mass Effect 3's MP unlock scheme is totally askew - absurdly timeconsuming - just like Free2Play games are designed (because the MP portion is designed to work like a F2P game, including the most insidious microtransactions scheme known to man). A 'real' MP game, like let's say any CoD or Battlefield game, has a finely tuned and highly motivating unlock scheme, that constantly rewards you with new weapons and gadgets to play with - unlocking the entire suite of gameplay options in a reasonable timeframe. That's the difference.

I've payed 80$ to play Mass Effect 3, and I find it quite disgusting how EA/Bioware monetizes its multiplayer component. There's a lengthy thread on the topic, if you care to dig it up. There you'll find my testament of 1001 reasons why I hate it so much.

The upside is 'free content', it just comes with the caviat of mostly being unlocked via a totally broken progression - insidiously pushing sad sods like you to paying cash for a 'free attempt at unlocking shit with a draw of pure RNG luck'. With my luck, I'd be down 25k $ to unlock everything. Think about it.

Just writing this down makes my blood boil again. Thanks for that. Not even playing that POS anymore. GRRRR. Could punch a baby cow in the face with a sledgehammer and fry up some veal right now.

0 USD

Too much.

The amount of cash spent would equal zero, it only takes a few silver matches to get enough for a premium pack so no point.

@Seppli said:

@Potts:

Ask yourself what the difference between a Free2Play-style unlock scheme is, and how a 'real' game handles unlocks.

Mass Effect 3's MP unlock scheme is totally askew - absurdly timeconsuming - just like Free2Play games are designed (because the MP portion is designed to work like a F2P game, including the most insidious microtransactions scheme known to man). A 'real' MP game, like let's say any CoD or Battlefield game, has a finely tuned and highly motivating unlock scheme, that constantly rewards you with new weapons and gadgets to play with - unlocking the entire suite of gameplay options in a reasonable timeframe. That's the difference.

I've payed 80$ to play Mass Effect 3, and I find it quite disgusting how EA/Bioware monetizes its multiplayer component. There's a lengthy thread on the topic, if you care to dig it up. There you'll find my testament of 1001 reasons why I hate it so much.

The upside is 'free content', it just comes with the caviat of mostly being unlocked via a totally broken progression - insidiously pushing sad sods like you to paying cash for a 'free attempt at unlocking shit with a draw of pure RNG luck'. With my luck, I'd be down 25k $ to unlock everything. Think about it.

Just writing this down makes my blood boil again. Thanks for that. Not even playing that POS anymore. GRRRR. Could punch a baby cow in the face with a sledgehammer and fry up some veal right now.

How is it "the most insidious microtransactions scheme known to man?" Battlefield 3 has microtransactions, very similar to ME3's. Plenty of other "real" multiplayer games have had microtransactions, how does having them make ME3's multiplayer less of a "real" game? Also, I'm not a big fan of COD's unlock scheme. Everyone gets the same thing as they level up, there's no variety in it. If you play ME3 regularly, without paying a dime, you get constant unlocks of new weapons & classes. It may not be in a specific order like with COD, but you're unlocking everything the game has to offer, for free, and all you have to do is keep playing. The real insidious microtransaction scheme is called Farmville and other Facebook games, where you have to pay to keep playing the game, or to access the best features of the game. I think those are the ones you have the real problem with. Games that keep the best stuff behind a paywall are the real offenders here, not games that offer a shortcut to unlocking things you would get through normal play, like ME3 or BF3.

Also, the point of ME3's unlocks is not to unlock everything and then play, it's to unlock them as you go along, making you more powerful as you continue to play, as well as giving you a variety of options - new classes & weapons make for different playstyles. If you pumped hundreds of dollars into unlocking ME3 stuff, you're doing it wrong. The game offers a shortcut for people who want to pay for it, but again, it's optional, it does not require you to spend anything on it, and therefore it is not effecting you. At all.

Some might make this argument and say that they are not defending BioWare or EA in their decision to monetize the game. I'm not going to say that - I support their option to try to make a few more bucks off of it, as long as they don't make it mandatory. Yes, EA is a big soulless money-grubbing corporation. No, I'm not surprised they did this. No, I don't give a shit that they did. And honestly, I can't understand why you do.

Like $2 because I had left over Bioware points for some reason and didn't know what else to do with them.

@Deathmachine117 said:

The amount of cash spent would equal zero, it only takes one gold match to get enough for a premium pack so no point.

I agree with you here, but I fixed your post. :D Gold matches are not much harder than Silver - if you have a team that works together and you are familiar with the map and spawn points, you should be able to knock out Gold matches fairly easily. And the payoff is significantly higher - a Bronze nets you about $15k, a silver about 25-30k, and a gold will routinely get you 70k+.

I only paid money for those packs a few times, and that was before I started playing Gold matches.

@Potts:

@Deathmachine117 said:

The amount of cash spent would equal zero, it only takes one gold match to get enough for a premium pack so no point.

I agree with you here, but I fixed your post. :D Gold matches are not much harder than Silver - if you have a team that works together and you are familiar with the map and spawn points, you should be able to knock out Gold matches fairly easily. And the payoff is significantly higher - a Bronze nets you about $15k, a silver about 25-30k, and a gold will routinely get you 70k+.

I only paid money for those packs a few times, and that was before I started playing Gold matches.

Yeah I really should attempt Gold matches now that I have a few decent guns and some high level characters, the one time I did though the whole team were annihilated in the opening waves.

@Potts:

Basically the trend is a bad thing because the system is designed as a huge time sink in the first place. You only feel the need to save your personal time if you feel like your time would be wasted otherwise. It's a simple setup. Make a system that would otherwise would be hard/tedious/long for a player to slog through to get to the good stuff and then offer paid shortcut option, to "help" then out. Here is the thing if the (unlock) system in place was not overly tedious/long in the first place there would be no need for such shortcuts at all. It's an artificially created barrier.

It affects people who don't pay. How? Because the system is designed in mind with attracting the payments rather then only offering a better/smoother experience in the first place. That's how "pay to unlock ingame reward" works at it's core. And now people who don't pay either have to use inferior gear or have to grind more and spend more time to get gear then they could have if the system was better (ie not designed with goosing sales in mind) So yes it's negatively affecting everyone else.

The shadiness is not simply in putting something behind a paywall. They created a passable pay wall that sure you can climb over with enough time, but they made it take so much effort in order to make the option of paying more appealing. It's similar to a scandal that was in Battlefield Heroes some years back when the effort to grind without paying for better weapons was so extreme it was impossible to achieve anyone not playing 20 hour a day. Sure it was possible to unlock those items through effort, but you would have to bust your ass and a nut to do so in the first place. (Iit being a competitive game made it more of an issue too). The excuse "well it's possible to unlock through play" is not a dividing line anymore. The industry has moved onward, become smarter. Making it possible to unlock through play play but making it just a tad too tedious (or if gameplay content is not up to par like in ME3) to incentivise real money sales is a far more clever model that also outwardly looks nicer to the user, if you are only looking at the surface layer.

It's such very basic design principle that people like @Seppli are against. With which I agree.

It comes down to where you draw the line personally of course, your line may be at a blanket cutoff of gear behind a pay wall you can't acquire otherwise. Our line is drawn when a progressions system is crippled and designed in mind with incentivising and accommodating paying for your progress hence compromising a design that provides the best experience by just playing it.

I'm not looking to change your mind on it, or to criticize your spending, that's your own money and i got no business telling you how to spend it. But the above I feel is a good description of why it's a bad trend overall.

Zero money

$0. Do your part to not ruin video games.

None. I didn't get that into the ME3 multiplayer, but even if I had, the whole idea of "Pay EA your real-world money for video game guns" is really unappealing to me.

@Gamer_152 said:

None. I didn't get that into the ME3 multiplayer, but even if I had, the whole idea of "Pay EA your real-world money for video game guns" is really unappealing to me.

Actually, it's "Pay EA your real-world money for a CHANCE to get video game guns." That's even less appealing.

$0

I have been tempted many times as I have extremely limited time to play so I haven't unlocked many of the classes I want to play with.

However, I feel disappointed every time I buy a Spectre Pack with in-game currency and I'd be pissed if I'd spent real money on it.

$0.

@Tennmuerti said:

*snip*

It comes down to where you draw the line personally of course, your line may be at a blanket cutoff of gear behind a pay wall you can't acquire otherwise. Our line is drawn when a progressions system is crippled and designed in mind with incentivising and accommodating paying for your progress hence compromising a design that provides the best experience by just playing it.

Now there's a decent argument against it.

I see where you're coming from, but what would you suggest as an alternative? Companies like EA & Activision are going to try to monetize the hell out of multiplayer games any way they can. As long as it doesn't effect the ability to play the game to it's full extent without paying for it, I really don't care how they do it. I may even throw them a few bucks if I enjoy playing the game, and want an extra gun or something.

My main issue with your argument is how you categorize the progression system in ME3 as broken. While I agree that it's shady to make the people who don't have time to play pay to keep up with those who do, I would argue that the gear progression in ME3's multiplayer is designed after the single player version, which was derived from ME1's gear progression, and they just tacked a pay model onto it - one that is a bit unfair.

I would suggest keeping the unlocks the same in ME3 MP, but instead of charging $2/$3/$4 for the packs, they should have done something like $2 for 50,000 credits, $3 for 150,000 or $4 for 500,000. It would make it more affordable for the amount of gear you get, and I think that it would attract more players to buy it since it's a better value.

I brought 800 BW points the time they first have premium packs in store, and I still regret it now:(

I could use that money on something else more fun/meaningful...