1y ago

Diablo 4's latest microtransaction controversy is a $30 portal recolor: "You can get Palworld for this price"

www.gamesradar.com Diablo 4's latest microtransaction controversy is a $30 portal recolor: "You can get Palworld for this price"

Fans despair as Blizzard charges "almost half the price of the game" for class-specific portal colors

Gaming @beehaw.org

Diablo 4's latest microtransaction controversy is a $30 portal recolor.

www.gamesradar.com /diablo-4s-latest-microtransaction-controversy-is-a-dollar30-portal-recolor-you-can-get-palworld-for-this-price/

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Games @sh.itjust.works

Diablo 4's latest microtransaction controversy is a $30 portal recolor: "You can get Palworld for this price"

www.gamesradar.com /diablo-4s-latest-microtransaction-controversy-is-a-dollar30-portal-recolor-you-can-get-palworld-for-this-price/

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67 comments

Just saw some clown on Mastodon argue that capitalism isn't to blame for this.
- This is what people really mean when they say Capitalism incentivizes innovation, lol
  
  It does a stellar job of creating innovations that maximize profits, just look at enshitification! A masterpiece in shareholder value.
- I assume, based on the format of Twitter/Mastodon, as well as using Twitter for many years, that Mastodon is full of Libertarian cutting edge tech bros that see capitalism as a natural order of things.
- Capitalism isn't to blame for this. The Individuals who buy it are.
  I bought DIV, I got value out of it. I won't be buying micro transactions, and unless D4 sees one hell of an overhaul to it's end game and encounter design - I won't be going back ever. Comparing it to other games I have purchased in the last couple of years, I would say DIV is the game I have gotten the LEAST value out of, which is surprising considering historically Blizzard games tended to be the top tier in terms of dollar per hour of enjoyable play time I got out of said games.
  Onto Capitalism. Capitalism needs two things to function:
  A Basic Standard of Living Provided by some entity - historically the Church served this purpose. But currently there is nothing that actually serves this purpose - Welfare is a poverty trap, minimum wages require multiple full time jobs in many places, and where housing is affordable - jobs are lacking in many cases.
  Supply + Demand Market Considerations - if you make a product people don't buy: You will fail. If you over charge, a cometitor can move in and steal your lunch money. The reason we have IP laws (Patent, and Copyright) is duplicating hard work done, is far easier than doing your own work - so, we protect the human labour component (which is why I do think AI generated art should NOT be copyrightable, but the AI models and the work that goes into selecting assets to train the model with, fine tuning the weighting, and creating filters to attain desirable outcomes - that is reasonable to copyright).
  The failure of NeoLiberalism, and the Industrial age in general is we took the responsibility the Church and the Tithe that was paid to it away from the church, replaced it with work houses with piss poor conditions, and allowed a blaming of unforutnate individuals who couldn't find work - and blamed them for being lazy, instead of treating them with respect and dignity as every human should be treated.
  By the way: This is why, I support the idea of a Universal Basic Income. Scrap Welfare, Scrap old age, Scrap food stamps. Universal basic income - and give people the power to find meaningful work. Give people the foundation to take a risk in starting up a small business to improve their lot in life where work is slim pickings, or all the employers are asshole middle managers that are instructed to pay piss poor wages. Capitalism actually would be liable to work FAR BETTER. And besides - you would likely see crime rates in plenty of places basically drop off a cliff as people would not need to turn to crime to ensure they can make rent, keep a roof over their head, or just pay for food.
  Capitalism is not the problem. NeoLiberal Ideology is. A Failure to put in working policies to help actual people is a problem - and the "left wing" and "socialist" parties of the last several decades have all failed to bring meaningful positive change to the working class. But that should surprise no one given the track record of left wing authoritarian regimes.
  
  It's 1000% capitalism bro. The thing you're describing is commerce. Commerce is the act of doing business. Goods/Services for Consideration.
  Drop the history lesson. You don't know what you're talking about.
  
  What?

If people stopped paying ridiculous prices for cosmetic shit like this maybe we could see reasonable prices like $1 recolours of things. There's absolutely no reason changing the colour of something should cost $30 other than the fact that people fucking pay for it, and it means other more sensible dollar-conscious players get priced out of the fun little things like that.
- Uh... I don't think recoloring something in a game I already paid for should cost anything.
  
  Oh well, the market clearly accepts paid cosmetics. It sucks for people who don't spend money on it like me but at the end of the day people will blow cash on it and that's why it keeps getting up charged.
  
  If it didn't cost anything they wouldn't do it at all. You already paid for it, they have your money. They do the extra stuff to try and squeeze out more money.
- Addicted people with poor self-control are abused in these kind of microtransactions. This should be illegal.

Or you could get Last Epoch. And maybe start enjoy playing an ARPG again in the process.

I've been boycotting Blizzard since the bNetD lawsuit & haven't regretted my decision yet.
The level of contempt they have for their players is amazing.
- For me it was when they banned Blitzchung from a Hearthstone tournament and took away his prize money for supporting Hong Kong freedom. I haven't regretted it since they don't make good games anymore like they did when I was growing up.

Who cares, the game is boring as fuck. Told myself I was never gonna get this garbage after they butchered Diablo 3 so bad. Saw it on sale for 50$ during the holidays, gave in and bought it. Fuck do I regret it. It's just slow, repetitive and uninteresting. Quit after I got to level 50, shit was mind numbing.
- I skipped D4 and I made the right choice, absolutely.
  D2R was incredible, though.
- What's the difference between d3, poe, grim dawn, etc?
  
  D3: Very little build diversity and endgame activity selection. Pretty much built around sets and the builds reflect that. Kinda fast but very repetitive
  Grim Dawn: I didn't play this a ton but it has a lot of depth in the campaign and lots of builds. I don't know of much end game, though. It's playing through the campaign at different difficulty levels as far as I can tell.
  Last Epoch: Lots of build diversity and a lot of endgame activities for a pre-release game. Great loot filter and crafting. Not the fastest game but not the slowest.
  PoE: The most complex, rich, and flexible of them all. I've got 1500+ hours in it and I still consider myself a noob. So many things to learn, so many things to do, so many builds. I still don't play without a build guide because maximizing your potential is so deep. The blaster's dream RPG. "Free" but you'll want to buy some stash tabs if you play at all seriously.
  D4: Better than at launch but still with some incredibly boneheaded design decisions.
  I could be wrong about these but those are my impressions from the ones I played. Here is a hilariously sarcastic video about the differences between D4 and Last Epoch that explains some of the bad decisions in D4 and How LE fixed them.
  
  It's slow as fuck. You have to walk around a huge map spamming your resource generators just to hit once with your mediocre resource spending skills. There's no feeling of progression because you don't actually get stronger. Monsters just level up with you so it's always the same. The leveling in an ARPG is usually my favorite part. Trying out new skills, getting stronger, upgrading gear constantly. This game just fucking killed that. Skills are underpowered and uninteresting, did not feel like I was getting stronger at all and I rarely found gear upgrades.
  It's just fucking boring. I've played most ARPG's out there and have never been so bored of the gameplay like I was with D4. I'll stick to PoE and vanilla/modded D2.

You never know how other people value their money. Some people buy a $3500 AR headset. Some people buy a truck that costs more than they make in a year. Some people pay 30USD to make the portals a different color.
I have NEVER bough a cosmetic item in a game, I truly do not understand people who do. But, people love that shit so who am I to say it shouldn’t be available to them?
- I'm someone who can't find a game without dollar signs in it anymore because these idiots are reinforcing shitty practices. Fuck them all.
  
  Modern games cost WAY too much to make and the industry has come up with the worst possible way to solve that problem. If you want to make a single player game with modern graphics that sells for 70$ and has a few 30$ dlcs, it HAS to be a huge hit or your going out of business. There are very few studios left with the guts and confidence to make that sort of wild “all-in” bet.
  The worst part is that games production costs are almost all labor cost so making games cheaper means making games with less people. There is no worker friendly future for games but free to play cash grab skinner boxes.
  Making art with 100s of millions in budget requires a hell of a patron. There is no market way to get the Sistine Chapel.

Simple solution, ditch diablo 4 and play last epoch instead. D4 is a fucking disgrace of a game.
- Isn't that game in early access?
  
  It releases on 2/21 this month.

People increasingly love getting fucked in the ass by corps and paying for the privilege. Trying to fight this trend is a lost cause.

It still cracks me up when I see quotes of reddit users in a random thread (taken as a newsworthy story, lol). It makes me wonder how far it can go with obscene usernames. Imagine having a good breakdown of a problem posted by someone called AnalNosferatu69 that you just can't quote.
- Then you get “a reddit user”
  
  Then you lose a fun of citing @ilikeboobies as an expert.
- Always makes me laugh on here when I see SatansMaggotyCumFart or whaterever the name is lmao
- There was a subreddit dedicated to that exact phenomenon. I forget what it was called.
  
  I think you’re thinking about r/rimjobsteve
- Have your own reddit account with an inoffensive name, copy the comment, paste it as a reply to another instance of the same question, quote your own reddit account in the article. Foolproof!

I think the bigger problem is their game is not fun in its current state.

Wish I could say I was shocked...

It's only controversial if you were misled. If it's just $30 for a different colored TP, then it's just bad business and if anyone bought it, foolish consumers.