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Diablo IV Monetization Explained - No Pay-To-Win

Dr.Morris79

Gold Member
Another game that's going to bombard me with season pass bullshit

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Aye, just a load of shit.
 
and people still defend blizzard despite all the bullshit that is Diablo Immoral

stop inhaling that copium and face reality!


It's a full priced game with all the battle/season passes, plus premium currency. A reminder that they nerfed the drop rates in D3 significantly to make people use the auction house.

I don't think anyone is defending, or even agreeing with, the current AAA gaming industry monetization models. Rather, we accept these trends for what they are as a 'necessary evil' for industry giants to keep delivering their AAA games. We realize these industry giants are not changing course and we don't want to miss out on, what honestly looks like it has the potential to be the magnum opus of the series, because of monetization model that doesn't seem that bad, all things considered. In a way I believe we have Diablo Immortal to thank for that.
From this perspective, you could say we are in fact facing and accepting reality, and making sensible choices based on that.

Regarding the 70 price tag I see being thrown around here. What's the source for that? As far as I know they haven't decided on the retail price. My guess is that they will likely offer different bundles.
 
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STARSBarry

Gold Member
This is as bad is it can be. What did you expect for a $70 game?

A full fucking game without parts cut out to sell to people separately and design philosophy which will purposefully design armour and weapons to look purposely plain because they need to sell you the more intresting looking cosmetics...

This happened in WoW as soon as they started selling the layered armour sets.

yRKK3yV.jpg


Paid set.

YmkWtbZ.jpg



Endgame earned set released in same patch... they even made it glow less compared to the concept art to make it stand out less

7RbegoO.jpg



This is what "only cosmetics" does to game design, they will actively design the game to feel less rewarding and put most of the things they would normally design as a reward into the cash shop.
 
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Spoken like a true shareholder.
The primary purpose of a business is to earn money. How do you think a board meeting goes where you propose to make a lot less money than you could lol? Customers seem to react positively (as in: they do pay for it instead of opting for alternative games w/o MTX) to this business model, so that's what you get, especially because it's more profitable. The market has spoken. I typically avoid MTX infested games and thankfully, there are plenty of alternatives on the market. No idea why reddit and you all always focus on these games.
 

Shifty

Member
You don't need to be a shareholder to understand humans like to maximize their efforts.
Effort is more than a purely fiduciary concept.

Hackneyed example as it may be, consider Fromsoft - AAA million sellers, with a comparative minimum of intrusive monetization.

You don't have to put the nipple clamps on customers' wallets to get a good return if your art (as in product, not just visuals) is of high quality.

The primary purpose of a business is to earn money. How do you think a board meeting goes where you propose to make a lot less money than you could lol? Customers seem to react positively (as in: they do pay for it instead of opting for alternative games w/o MTX) to this business model, so that's what you get, especially because it's more profitable. The market has spoken. I typically avoid MTX infested games and thankfully, there are plenty of alternatives on the market. No idea why reddit and you all always focus on these games.
It is not the customer's remit to speak CEO.

And I certainly can't speak for Reddit, but I'd quite like to see the OG ARPG franchise put out a good modern entry that can be played without various psychological hooks badgering me into extending my baseline full-price stake in their product.
 
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JackSparr0w

Banned
A full fucking game without parts cut out to sell to people separately and design philosophy which will purposefully design armour and weapons to look purposely plain because they need to sell you the more intresting looking cosmetics...

This happened in WoW as soon as they started selling the layered armour sets.

I totally agree with you that's why I said this news is as bad as it gets for a $70 game.
 
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quest

Not Banned from OT
Effort is more than a purely fiduciary concept.

Hackneyed example as it may be, consider Fromsoft - AAA million sellers, with a comparative minimum of intrusive monetization.

You don't have to put the nipple clamps on customers' wallets to get a good return if your art (as in product, not just visuals) is of high quality.


It is not the customer's remit to speak CEO.

And I certainly can't speak for Reddit, but I'd quite like to see the OG ARPG franchise put out a good modern entry that can be played without various psychological hooks badgering me into extending my baseline full-price stake in their product.

Great if you don't want to ever play the game again. Elden Ring was fun but no reason to play it again no new content. If some people who can't control themselves over dress up barbie pay for content so be it. I just give a shit about damage and clearing content. I could give 2 shits less how my barbie looks.
 

Shifty

Member
Great if you don't want to ever play the game again. Elden Ring was fun but no reason to play it again no new content. If some people who can't control themselves over dress up barbie pay for content so be it. I just give a shit about damage and clearing content. I could give 2 shits less how my barbie looks.
There's a sizable gulf between short one-and-done experiences and service titles whose lifespan is as long as their profitability.

And, as an entry in a franchise known for its replay value, ER isn't even on the short end of that scale. Did you see every piece of content in it on your first run? Statistically unlikely.

Not to mention that service games tend to treat their content as transient, which negatively impacts its value. Was it really good content in the first place if it can be vaulted away without concern, Destiny-style?
 
Great if you don't want to ever play the game again. Elden Ring was fun but no reason to play it again no new content. If some people who can't control themselves over dress up barbie pay for content so be it. I just give a shit about damage and clearing content. I could give 2 shits less how my barbie looks.
Exactly. I'd love to play more Elden Ring but I simply can't. I've seen 98% of the game and there's nothing more to do. With Diablo 4, assuming it's a successful game, we'll be getting new content for years. And not just barebones seasonal content like in D3, but real content, hopefully. The only reason why D3 seasons were barebones was because Blizzard couldn't monetize it.
 
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Mephisto40

Member
You can almost guarantee that season pass will have an xp boost included with it, so to say it isnt pay to win, well we'll wait and see...
 
If you want to compare with Elden Ring, then take into consideration it's company size. From Software has 3,5% of the number of employees as ActiBlizz. Ofcourse we can only guess the teamsize on D IV (I could only find DIII had 400 employees, so a plausible guess for D IV is somewhere between 600 - 800), but it would make sense that total company overhead is calculated in every products monetization model.
 
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Paasei

Member
I can see it miles away. The coolest (cosmetic) pieces with a lot of detail will be locked behind the paywall. Fuck that, I’m out.
 

amigastar

Member
Honestly, at this point i don't care if its gonna be pay2win or not. If it's pay2win Blizzard can go f... themselves, if it's done properly then i will play it.
 

Golgo 13

The Man With The Golden Dong
Regardless of how the people who mindlessly defend this practice want to justify it - the question you should ask yourself is this: Would this game be better, more complete, and more satisfying without a Battle Pass? The answer is clearly “yes”, because all of the best cosmetic items would be found in-game without anything locked behind a pay-tier. You can rationalize “Profit, shareholders, capitalism” but this response just shows how GROOMED you have become to accept shit business practices in $70 video games.
 
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DeepEnigma

Gold Member
A full fucking game without parts cut out to sell to people separately and design philosophy which will purposefully design armour and weapons to look purposely plain because they need to sell you the more intresting looking cosmetics...

This happened in WoW as soon as they started selling the layered armour sets.

yRKK3yV.jpg


Paid set.

YmkWtbZ.jpg



Endgame earned set released in same patch... they even made it glow less compared to the concept art to make it stand out less

7RbegoO.jpg



This is what "only cosmetics" does to game design, they will actively design the game to feel less rewarding and put most of the things they would normally design as a reward into the cash shop.
Path of Exile does the same. In their defense however, it's F2P.
 

Men_in_Boxes

Snake Oil Salesman
Effort is more than a purely fiduciary concept.
This is the 4th sequel in an old franchise, in a genre littered with quality clones. Holding Blizzard to a moral artistic standard here feels off considering how formulaic these types of games have become. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind this is not.
Hackneyed example as it may be, consider Fromsoft - AAA million sellers, with a comparative minimum of intrusive monetization.
Xerox didn't go from making a bunch of money to 0 money overnight. Obviously the "no MTX" holdouts are going to continue to be fewer and fewer as time marches on. We really should be shifting the conversation to "What are good MTX" rather than this old way of thinking.
You don't have to put the nipple clamps on customers' wallets to get a good return if your art (as in product, not just visuals) is of high quality.
If you don't want nipple clamps on your wallet, all you have to do is realize Barbie was made for children so Mattel could capitalize on selling cheap accessories. It's a pretty obvious opt in strategy is it not?
 
Considering this is Blizzard.....

I Dont Believe You Will Ferrell GIF
Yes, it's kind of been already proven that no matter what game companies say it's not always definite, which means that these sort of claims are just temporary. Need I remind you that Ubisoft did the same thing with AC Valhalla, when they waited until the review period was over just so they can introduce gameplay affecting mechanics, which they knew won't end up in the reviews.
 
I mean Overwatch didn’t ever have any pay to win stuff did it? From the time I played I don’t remember that. No reason to believe there would be anything here either I guess.

Mobile Diablo is different I guess as it’s free.
 

hemo memo

Gold Member
I mean Overwatch didn’t ever have any pay to win stuff did it? From the time I played I don’t remember that. No reason to believe there would be anything here either I guess.

Mobile Diablo is different I guess as it’s free.
Why would it? It costs 60$ at launch.
 
“It’s only cosmetic” is such a pathetic cope by the weakest of people. Just admit you are fine with being fucked in the ass by corporations.

In-game shops and battle passes are designed around destroying your patience until you decide to give in. They design everything to be the most monotonous grind imaginable so that you are incentivized to give in and spend money. The cosmetics they sell are meant to be more extravagant, than anything you would get by playing the game regularly.
 

Boneless

Member
Cosmetics is already too much for a game I pay for, but as long as there is legendary that can only be earned by playing it might be ok enough.

In the past, you thought: "wow cool that guys has amazing gear, mustve played a ton/at the hardest difficulty". Now you think: "oh look amazing gear, must be a loser that spent £100 on the game".

In any case, fuck Blizzard, and I LOVED Elden Ring for not having any of this shit.
 
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poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
Good lord, how hard is it for them to just focus on the damn core game experience and leave this bullshit for later. Did anyone want this info now?
Pretty much everyone who has played Diablo Immortal wanted this info. So only about 9 million people plus those who didn't play diablo immortal because of the P2W.
 

DavidGzz

Member
Hate it all you want but Blizzard isn't going to have a huge team making DLC and giving us seasons with substance without a form of continued revenue. There are exceptions like From Software but this is the reality of huge devs making and continuing to support games. There are small Indy devs still making Diablo likes for the people who can't deal.


I'm fine with it since I don't want another D3 with shit support.
 
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