1y ago

Diablo 4’s Hellish Microtransactions Go From Bad to Worse With $65 Horse Bundle That Costs More Than the Game Itself

www.ign.com Diablo 4’s Hellish Microtransactions Go From Bad to Worse With $65 Horse Bundle That Costs More Than the Game Itself - IGN

Hot on the heels of a backlash against Diablo 4 portal reskins that cost the same as Palworld comes a new microtransaction horror: a horse bundle that costs more than Diablo 4 itself.

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Inflation has even hit horse armor apparently

Wow, thats Macro-transaction

Of course, a mount like this would have been part of an achievement or an in-game event. Now its just "open your wallets"
- I would like to see a law that simply states anything purchasable in a game, must be able to be earned in the game with a reasonable level of effort compared to the sale value of the item. Whales would still whale, but fish could hunt down the stuff they want.
  The simplest formula would be the dollar value divided by the fed min wage. So a $35 item would be about 5 hours. So it must take the average player 5 hours to obtain it, or less.
  
  Or maybe we just need to stop buying shit that’s just thinly veiled skinner boxes, and play games because they are fun again, not to get the best/coolest/most brag-worthy stuff in-game.
  
  It would never happen. Because then they'll lawyer up to fight "what does reasonable mean".
  And I predict that they'd say well if a whale is going to pay for it, they would imply that the assumption is that that person works 40 hours a week thus does not have time to play. Does a reasonable amount of time to play the game to earn something is then a full-time job.
  Which is absolutely absurd. But the name of shareholder profits that's exactly where they'll go.

They're winding the game down and trying to milk the whales as much as possible before they stop supporting it
- There's like at least one xpac coming down that will somewhat revitalize the game, support won't end tomorrow.
  This is just blizz squeezing for more money, like every other game with an MTX shop.
- Wait. D4 is already winding down? Didn't it launch last year?
  
  It'll get an influx of players next month with the GamePass release. How long that lasts is ¯(ツ)/¯
  
  Well, it's hard to say. Player count still exists, but appears to be trending down. This is likely due to the season model they're going for. Blizzard isn't very forthcoming with numbers, so everyone's looking towards this 3rd party for numbers https://activeplayer.io/diablo-4/

There IS a way to get this out of games, but it won’t happen. People would actually need to NOT purchase things from companies that display this behaviour, the games included.
- You'd like to think that, but the entire industry is currently collapsing in upon itself because they've spent so long doubling and tripling down on things that nobody was buying already. They won't even think twice about driving beloved studios off a cliff in the pursuit of their corporate wet dreams.
- I wish I could not buy something twice.
- Systemic problems need systemic solutions.
- They didn't get me this time

I remember when $2 for the color blue was bad…

Whats that, whippersnapper?
Horse Armor....?
WHAT YEAR IS IT?!
- at least horse armor wasnt more expensive than oblivion, it was only $2.50
- It's almost nostalgic. But shitty.

Phew, I’m so glad I switched to 3d-printing/war-gaming. That is absurd.
What sucks is this will likely sell “well” too. I have a buddy of mine that is a “whale” and he eats this shit up
- What's the craziest they bought that you know of?
  
  I can’t put my finger on a number, but for example every time a new Magic the Gathering Arena Set comes out he buys packs until he has a play set of nearly every rare. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was more than five figures annually.
  
  Spending entire monthly savings on Eve online
  
  I have a friend that drops hundreds on Apex Legends every time there is a "Collection Event" which means "Obtain all 20 of these items and get a special item that you can't get again very easily."

It would be outrageous if the game were performing well, and yet people keep dropping it as they insist on fracking up each “season”.

I've seen guns in Mech Arena cost over $100. I shit you not.

I, admittedly, don't play Diablo 4. But I know they have "seasons." Is there new content released with each season that you don't have to pay for? If so, I would thank microtransactions for that and the people who pay so you get new content without paying.
- The season is a battle pass. The paid tier is all cosmetic, but the prices on the shop are so ridiculous. This game should have been free to play. But Blizzard is so greedy now, even with WoW Classic fueling their traditional subscription cash cow more than it has been for a while. It's sad to see the decline of this once-awesome company.
  I bought D4 recently when it went on sale, and it is pretty fun, but I would not recommend paying full price.
  
  The season is a battle pass.
  I'm not sure what this means, as I suspect it means different things for each game. However, a quick look at the way Diablo 4, it does look like they add content with the pass, and I don't see anything about having to purchase it, but I could be wrong. But if I was getting a constant stream of content for free and the only penalty is that I couldn't get some meaningless cosmetic item, I would be happy not furious.
  Also, I don't recommend paying full price for any* game because they all go on sale eventually. I just drop any game I want into my wish list and then when it eventually drops under 20 bucks on steam, I buy it.
  I will happily pay full price for indy games. And I also don't always follow this rule, like I did just buy BG3 for full price.

Ok, but this is a stupid example. This is something you buy for the 7000 platinum and get the horse for free.
The horse looks like shit though and you shouldn't buy that much platinum.
- And 7000 platinum is worth how much in irl currency? It's not mental gymnastics, you know?
  
  Not sure what you mean?

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