Tu Shoes to Walk In

DLC and Expansion Rant

projectanima:

So, as the main Founder, and currently the only Owner of the Project Anima Tumblr (Which I’ll be giving access to other Team Members in due time) I’d like to rant about DLCs and Expansion Packs,
more specifically, the edgy, gritty fine line between Gamers supporting you MORE due to your DLC and Expansion Packs, or LESS because of these extensions.

These are reasons why Gamers might hate you, your game, and your DLC:
-When the DLC/Expansion Packs add TINY INSIGNIFICANT amounts to the game

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs COST almost as much as the game itself.

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs Cost drastically outweighs its actual value. 

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs SHOULD have been a part of the full game

These are reasons why Gamers might further appreciate you, your game, and your DLC:
-When the DLC/Expansion Packs are so large, they actually feel like meaningful chunks of data that the game NEEDED.

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs Cost significantly less than what the normal market asks for

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs cost is even, or even less than the actual value of the game

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs COULD have been a part of the full game, if it had been thought of before the game’s release.

-When the DLC/Expansion Packs are so close to the Vanilla game, you really feel like its adding to the game, and not just a random chunk of data to extract more money from your pocket.

I personally dislike DLC and whatnot. When they charge you 5 or 6 dollars for what’s essentially a small content pack, it feeds my rage towards Mainstream Game Corporations. When they charge you 15 Dollars for MAP PACKS. It makes me want to commit genocide. (I’m looking at you, COD and MW),  those aren’t cost effective. They’re ignorant, profit obsessed ploys to force you to pay excessive amounts to producers whom over value their products expansions and minor DLC.

For Project Anima, the plan is to make DLC and Expansions a very small aspect of the game. There WILL be a lot of them. Project Anima is essentially Pokemon in one game. There won’t be 17 versions each with a handful of random creatures, a few new moves, and a new battle system. There will be one. There will be one, with certain updates and expansions being free. Others costing small amounts of money. I hope for the very largest of expansions to cost less than 5 dollars, and if it cost you 5 dollars, you should expect the expansion to add a good 15-20% gameplay to the game. 

DLC and Expansions should not be about the money. They should be about expanding the game where it was lacking. Keeping the game fresh, and ultimately, keeping your fanbase happy. There’s a very fine line between Profit and Satisfaction, and a balance is absolutely necessary to ensure Brand survival.

Like, take the Fallout Series for example. Their DLC added GOOD story. A good amount of extra gameplay. New Content. New Places. New NPCs. New Creatures. And entire Quest Lines. And they were what, 15 at release? A little bit pricey, but it was for GOOD DLC. 
That being said, Skyrim’s two expansions, (Costing 1/3 of the game’s full price) are things that SHOULD have been in the game. Houses without any sort of house customization? Werewolf forms without a Vampire form?  20 Bucks for these? I mean, they added content, places, NPCs, and Creatures. But you’re paying 1/3 of Skyrim to get these. And they don’t even amount to maybe 5% of the gameplay.

Also, both Fallout and Skyrim were incredibly buggy upon release (And still are actually.) and yet, they’re charging nearly 60 Dollars for Skyrim and have continued to charge that much.
Don’t get me wrong, without bugs, Skyrim is worth 60, probably even more than 60. But it’s NOT without bugs. It was barely even tested. (And if it was, I could’ve tested better than they did, and I have no experience in testing Alpha or Beta games.) I own Skyrim, I paid about 30 for it, having played it around its initial release using a friend’s computer, and being absolutely disgusted by the bugs, I refused to pay full price for the game. But 30 was quite worth it.

Now, Project Anima, I’ll give a rundown of my own perceived set of how we plan to market this. The Full PA will probably be less than 30 Bucks upon release. And I intend to make sure it won’t be a buggy mess (I’d sooner scrap the project then release a buggy hunk of crap, I have more pride than that.) The Expansions will hopefully not be over 5 dollars. The only time it might be over 5 Dollars would be a DLC bundle or something of the sort.

The Main DLC, like, Anima we design and think of AFTER the launch, we will release in series. Each set will contain probably 6 Anima families (So anywhere between 6 and 24 Anima), all Perks, all Abilities, and all Modifications to said Anima would be programmed in as well, and the cost will most likely be something like 99 cents. For Aesthetic Items, and Furniture, it’ll most likely be sets of 50-150 Items, for about 99 Cents. Misc Quests will be added, probably about 99 Cents for 5-10 Quests, depending on their lengths. 
All Interface Updates and Graphics Updates will be free.
Region Expansions will be at max, 3 Dollars, these will include new NPCs, new Anima areas to encounter Anima, it’ll probably include a few new Anima not released in the Sets to be encountered, and it’ll include new quests and whatnot as well.

That’s my personal projected marketing plan. Having designed multiple Anima and Quests already. I don’t see why I’d charge more than that.

This is my first game design, this is my first major project, and I don’t intend to stab my potential fanbase in the back. The Audience makes the game. If nobody wants to buy your game, you fail. Getting on the Audience’s bad side is the last thing any Indie or even more Mainstream game creator would ever want to do. It’s just not a smart thing to try.

Anyhow, I’m done with my rant on Money and DLC and whatnot. Project Anima is still being worked on, I just haven’t been on Tumblr in a long while. 
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