Valve Wants Free DLC – How Say You Microsoft and Sony?
You buy the product, you get the content. We make more money because more people buy it, not because we try and nickel-and-dime the same customers.
This was well before the game was released and was a forgotten quote up until today, where the issue of paying for additional content does not come up often with so many people just being okay with it. At least, people who aren’t PC gamers. Even I was against it at first, having waited for all the Halo 2 maps to be free before I was able to jump back into matchmaking, I was very stubborn. Now I have quickly bought up 4 Rock Band tracks in the past few weeks (and I still haven’t even beat the game and unlocked all the songs that I have on the disc). This doesn’t mean that I don’t see the value of free content from a consumer point of view, it makes me really want to do business again with whomever would offer such things to me.
This brings us back to Team Fortress 2 and Valve. With a new map pack finally coming soon, the talk of price has come up, and so that Eurogamer quote is now relavant. Kotaku contacted Valve, where the VP of marketing, Doug Lombardi, has not only kept the same mindset of having the content free, but left with this very bold statement, “The platform holder owns the final call.”
I think one can only say.. BAM! Eat that Microsoft and Sony! With this news coming on the weekend, I would expect no official response on the matter until Monday (if at all), but still it ensures that all us gamers, whether we are fans of Valve or not, are able to see who really is making us all pay for horse armor. I think we can all recall Epic stating that Gears of War DLC would be free, but when it showed up, it seems Microsoft tacked on a cost to get it. Now I am going to bet this is going to fall on what will Sony do first, then Microsoft will follow, as if it was up to Microsoft, you know we would be downloading this only after saving our lunch money for a few days.
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I don’t think I’m alone in saying that developers should say what the prices are — not console manufacturers.
Damn straight
I agree but I’m sure the publishers and distributors incur some expenses like bandwidth in transferring the files and they want to tack on additional fees to make them a profit and to maintain their server (which really has very little to do with the customer). I doubt they’ll give them this for free – DLC is the real bread and butter of the industry.
It’s not the game so much as the addons that really make them money.
Somehow I think that the daily bandwidth used to get DLC pales in comparison to that of a by a Halo3 hardcore gamer. I wouldn’t know, I TF2 on the true medium of Valve, the PC.
Being nickle and dimed to death is awful. Yes, it’s become the “Bread and butter” of the console industry, but I think it’s a terrible thing to do. Wasn’t there a game in which half the DLC available was actually stored on the game disc, but you had to pay for the “DLC” to be activated? It’s practices like that that make DLC a very slippery slope indeed.
I believe the game you are referring to is Beautiful Katamari
Beautiful Katamari DLC was not on the disk at release, all the objects that were used in the DLC were already on the disk having been in previous levels, what you were downloading was the code for the new levels to put the objects where they were supposed to be in the new levels, which is why the downloads were so small. doesnt take very much information to just send code.
If you can make people pay… Hum, think they have to pay for a service well it’ll be ok for as long as they stick along. This isn’t only about the gaming’s industry, it’s about the Services industry combined with capitalism: profit is better. No. Profit is better.
Developers developers developers!
I don’t believe I’ve heard Sony take any stance about “YOU MUST CHARGE FOR CONTENT!” yet, and since they have a number of free items you can snag, I don’t think we’ll see anything confrontational from them.
I know Epic and Microsoft butted heads before about their desire to release extra Gears of War maps for free, which turned into “pay for a bit, then later become free.” And since they still want to charge for even the likes of icons and themes and minor stuff, we may well see a bit of headbutting on this matter. Hopefully Valve being as influential as they are, they’ll be able to change Microsoft’s stance on the matter. It would certainly be assuring.
I agree somewhat James, BUT, the console manufactures also make/run gaming networks. Networks that require equipment to be maintained for it to run, so if they host content, I would expect they’d want something for that.
Do I agree with it, no. But it’s their network, they are free to charge if they want.
I waited for the GoW DL pack to be free, I will not buy content from M$ anymore, until they fix their DRM issues with the RRoD xboxes that come back from repair.
Am I in the minority? Probably.
The way this is going, I’m waiting for them to start charging for ammo! Coming soon to CoD9.
Yes, they do have to run gaming networks. But in the case of XBL, you pay for that as well. Microsoft really has no leg to stand on on this one. What the hell do you pay for XBL for if you have to pay for bandwidth to download a measly 20MB map pack?
God I love PC gaming…
you pay for xbl dude…
with the overwhelming profit margins of big games, I certainly think we should see more free content. I sometimes wonder if content is held back just so it can become extra income.
“Overwhelming profit margins”? Most games nowadays have to sell millions of copies just to break even. The cost of Metal Gear Solid 4 for example (as of mid 2007) required almost every ps3 user to buy the game so that kojima sees a dime… Things just keep getting more and more expensive so companies must put charges on downloadable content.
I have no issue with it as long as the dlc isn’t manditory to play the game online and as long as free content is still offered.
[...] “You buy the product, you get the content. We make more money because more people buy it, not because we try and nickel-and-dime the same customers.†…… “The platform holder owns the final call.â€http://www.bingegamer.net/index.php/valve-wants-free-dlc-how-say-you-microsoft-and-sony/ [...]
I think everyone is overreacting here. Valve is a developer; Microsoft and Sony are in the hardware business. When it really comes down to it, it is the DEVELOPERS that decide to release DLC for free. Look at GHIII. I have downloaded at least 5 tracks since getting it for free. Did Microsoft care when Activision decided to release the boss battles or mjolnir or three kings? No. This is a problem with your favorite developers. stop the Microsoft hate.
btw dont care about sony.
There’s no “hate” going on. The only mentioned point is that they’ve stood in the way of some free content before, and might again. People are really just commenting on that, and in Valve’s case they just seem to be taking a more confrontational stance before it can even become an issue, like it did somewhat with Epic.
Microsoft does have it’s hand in fixing prices for DLC… that is fairly well-known. I recall several instances where developers wanted content to be free, and MS forced a price.
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I think that microsoft should offer it free as part of their restitution for the live blackouts of december 07/ jan 08. Screw PS3 no one likes them anyway.
Nobody likes the PS3? What an ignorant fool. God I hope your post is sarcastic.
Let’s all remember: bandwidth isn’t free… but then again neither is Xbox Live. Quite a conundrum, isn’t it?
No bandwidth is not free, however, the costs are the same for pc users and console users, and, mmorpgs excepted, pc users do not have to pay to play online, or for dlc
On the ps3 it doesn’t matter what Sony says they could include maps in an update. Or make it so we download them through the game. Another solution would be to dl on the computer and then transfer to the ps3
Sony has allowed Unreal Tournament 3 content to come to the PS3 without going through their official channels. So far, its all player-built mods, but I’m sure there will be official content that comes this way as well. And Sony doesn’t have a viable veto on future free PS3 content (since the free PC content can just be converted via the tools EPIC has released).
I am sure if in the end, Sony wants to have a charge, they will ensure that the user made content will not be able to work with the game via a patch or something, saying they don’t have a viable veto seems like nonsense.
(Of course, I could be wrong on this if they keep allowing people to cheat in Call of Duty 4 via modding their files on computers)
[...] the same customers. †…… “The platform holder owns the final call.â€read more | digg [...]
Well if the developers want to send a clear message to the platform companies, They need to do some bold moves. Microsoft isn’t in the position they were 5 years ago with the PC market and are doing everything they can to try and get a grip with the current market. How would Microsoft feel if a game company such as ID Software were to release Doom 4 on for OSX, Linux and Wii because Nintendo agreed to distribute the new multiplayer levels free of charge on their service. It isn’t up to the Platforms to set the prices for extra content, if the Creator want to give away something then The platform people should comply or face being boycotted on future games. Remember their are 3 curent platforms and 3 pc markets. Last time I checked, Nearly everyone in my engineering division where I work (nearly 200+ people) have moved away from Microsoft products as much as the office can (Darn Exchange server…Outlook is the last piece of MS software i actually use & only because Work requires it for now!).
[...] wants to release add ons for free, Microsoft and Sony have yet to [...]
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I agree with what BillRoss says:
I also think we should boycott Microsoft products , see how they are acting now, trying to buy Yahoo to get rid of competitions. Sad.
Microsoft and Yahoo don’t seem to compete with each other, combined they still don’t have the power of Google. I think it would be in both of their best interests to merge.
[...] Valve wants free downloadable content for consoles, will Microsoft play nice? [...]
There’s Valve, and then there’s everyone else. This is a great company!
Well when it came out there were only 6 maps…(not many) tho they said something like:
“we think players rather learn a handful of maps well then having a dozen”
but they have changed their minds for the better -
and have since released 1 new one and remix another to be ctf -
BBBBut most people in Australia ONLY play 4 of the maps. IE 2 of the original and the 2 news are sadly failures and get no game play time – everyone quits the server when the map changes over :O . So i think it’s expect of them to release more maps and free of charge – well they are nice guys after all.
but i always come back to CSS as an example there are still 8 or so great maps that never got port from CS.
On most Australian servers there are only 3 played maps: Iceworld(3rd party map) office and dust2.
The Proof something not right:
TF2 needs work a lot of work/tweaking – well at lest in Australia at 2am on ANY given week night there are 20-50 servers playing CS:S with players actually playing – TF2 at 2am NONE ZIP NOTHING it’s dead! Even with CS:S servers keep going all night long till at lest 6am with no less then 10 servers with players playing. that Speaks for it’s self.
PS. TF2 has sold heaps so there are lots of people who own TF2 and CS:S, so it’s not a case of there more CS:S players then TF2 – it’s minimal difference.
(if valve by any chance read this plz feel free to contact me via my website)
I like Valve, but most the people who run that company are Microsoft ass-kissers. Gabe Newall, for example, used to work for Microsoft personally. I like Valve, but frankly I don’t respect them until they un-DRM their Steam and do a little more cross-platform work. Won’t happen, though, because, again, Gabe Newall and co. are still a bunch of MS ass-kissers despite this little incident here. I love HL2. But it feels horrible encumbered by the likes of Steam DRM and attempts to make it so dependant on DirectX it makes me wanna puke.
As much as I agree that Gabe kisses MS ass (which he does), I have to defend Valve and their DRM. Without it, they would be selling like shit, much like all other PC games (other than World of Warcraft). The fact that they got their shit together so well is the reason why so many other companies are putting out their games via Steam, it makes sense from a piracy standpoint.
Every game being sold nowadays is loaded with DRM up the wazoo. At least Steam’s DRM doesn’t interfere with your optical drives and actually has the Steam features as a consolation. DRM-free commercial games don’t exist anymore.
Citizens might want to read such super advise dealing with Wants Free DLC – How Say You Microsoft and Sony?. Thank you for the surprising wisdom!
[...] song being a free download either completely backs Valve wanting their content to be free for users or all the cats at Harmonix/EA are making sure Rock Band fans are treated like royalty. I am [...]
“Bandwidth isn’t free”
I thought that’s why you pay 50 dollars a year for xbox live. It’s like they actually use it to fix their awful matchmaking servers.
Sorry I meant to type “It’s not like they actually…”
[...] they are pulling a Valve in a way, trying to put this one on Microsoft. Which I can completely see, even recently Jonathan [...]