this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2024
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Interesting:
A Season Pass must include at least one released DLC when it is made available for purchase*
.*with the exception of Season Passes included in a Pre-Purchase of a deluxe edition.
[...]
You may include a Season Pass as part of a game's pre-purchase. [...]
When a Season Pass DLC is in pre-purchase mode, you are not required to release at least one DLC in the Season Pass at the time it goes on sale (as you are usually required to do when you launch a Season Pass). However, when the game launches, you will need to release the Season Pass out of pre-purchase--this will entail releasing at least one of the DLCs included in the Season Pass.
My reading of this is that deluxe/gold/ultimate editions will need to include some "day one" DLC content. Many of them already do but publishers are now further incentivised to include something small like a bonus skin if they want to sell the season pass before its major content is ready.
I think that is already a requirement? As a dev I hated that we had to make what is essentially a day one DLC, which isn’t a good look. ”Look, they lock content behind DLC, which they already have, it cost them nothing”. Players extrapolate from that to other content we release later, content we actually haven’t even designed yet. Ugh.
Well, making a season pass is crap too, but there was no way to talk the publishing department out of that.
Guilty Gear Strive sells its season passes way before the first character actually releases.
This seems reasonable, if you are selling something the expectation should be that something is actually available when it's not labeled as a preorder.
Do devs need dlc when releasing a season pass or when the game drops.?If a company is releasing day 1 dlc with a season pass because “we have to” it’s a dev choice as day 1 dlc is. I think it’s more or less so devs can’t put up a season pass at launch and wait 8 months to drop 1 thing people paid for almost a year ago
I fully expect companies would switch to releasing some bullshit and call the DLC released.
That already happens. They often have a legal requirement to release what was promised, so they just get it out the door so the requirement is fulfilled. That's the problem with pre-ordering.
Preordering digital shit remains king of stupidty.
I reject the presupposition that season passes can ever be "proper." What's "proper" is buying a game once, receiving a game that's finished and complete, and owning the whole thing forever.
A game can both be complete and have expansions later. While it is true that many games strip what seems like core content off the main purchase to sell it separately as DLC, there are many examples of DLCs expanding upon an already finished game.
Exactly. There were a ton of these in the 90s, like StarCraft Brood War, Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal, and my personal favorite Lords of the Realm II: Seige Pack.
Even today, there are plenty of great examples, like the new DLC for Factorio, Space Age. Good DLC isn't a problem, MTX and DLC acting like MTX are the real problems.
A recent example is Owlcat's Rouge Trader. Full game on release, season pass is just a bundle of their two big expansion DLCs which offer full story additions and party members. Season passes work when they are lower cost bundles of high quality DLC, they are awful when they are incoherent slapped together offerings of cosmetics, random content, and stuff which should be base game.
What a silly take. Game expansions have existed nearly as long as games themselves. The expansions for Anno 1800 have given it hundreds of hours of new play for me.
I don't preorder games and I'm not subscribing to DLC. I would be willing to buy DLC after it's released(and reviewed), but I'm not whatever the fuck Live Service shit is.
Season passes predate the proliferation of live services. Live services tend to have "battle passes". In my world, fighting games, "subscribing to DLC" has its advantages.
I'm just combining all this shit together and putting into pile called, Shit I Don't Fuck With.
What exactly is a "battle pass" for fighting games and why should I trust major game studios?
A battle pass for fighting games, if you're a competitive player like me, is easily ignored because it's a carrot at the end of a stick to keep you playing to earn cosmetic items. In fighting games, this currently only exists in Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8, and kinda sorta in Mortal Kombat 1, to my knowledge.
A season pass is where you get new characters, just like you can get expansion content in any other game. These are what I do buy as a competitive player. They usually come with 4-6 characters that are released over the course of the year. There's no world where I wouldn't want to have every character, since even if I don't intend to play as that character, I'd still want to bring them into training mode to figure out how to beat them. So the package is slightly discounted compared to buying each character as they release, and I know that I'll have each character unlocked the second that they're available.
Are you paying for content before it comes out?
Yes. There's no reason to buy the season pass before there's even a single character ready, so I usually buy it the day that character comes out, but like I said, it hardly matters to me what the other content is in this case, because I'll need it one way or the other.
You're talking about an entirely different thing. The convo wasn't about live service games.
How is a subscription for getting dlc content isn't within the umbrella of Live Service? I buy a game and I own a game. Anything else is Live Service.
Season pass aren't a subscription
...
Ok, so what are they? I think I bought a season pass for something ages ago and couldn't figure out what it was for. I'm paying for something without knowing what it will be, right?
Paying for something without knowing what it will be for is also not really a hallmark feature of a subscription.
Season pass are bundled dlcs usually at a discount. While it's true most people buying it don't know what they're paying for, it's totally possible to buy it once every dlc included has been released.
The way I read it the "proper" in the title refers to "proper support", not "proper season passes"
What about paying for online functionality?
Yea I don't understand what a "season pass" is in reference to video games. And I dont really care either. Can I just buy the game normally and play it whenever I want, please?
Season pass means you get all the dlc / expansions for a discounted price since you are buying "in bulk". So it is about as "buying it normally" as it gets. The difference Steam introduces now is that they need to state what will be in the pass and when it can be expected.
The discount is mostly for giving them your money early, not for buying in bulk. Money is worth more the earlier you get it, because it can be invested. You're giving them money for the promise of something in the future, with very little knowledge on what that is.
Except you can buy season passes after they are released and no more dlc are planned.
Not usually, no. You can sometimes buy packs of DLCs, but that's not a season pass —though it may use that name. A season pass is, as the name implies, a pass to get whatever content comes that season (or whatever period).
I can't wait for companies to not use the system that way they can get around the requirement of having a partial refund if they don't go through with their commitment
I imagine Valve would give them a pretty strong slap on the back of the head if they didn't.
Gotta get it ready for the deadlock full release.
FR. If there's one thing I actually hate about Valve, it's that they were the ones to popularize some of the most predatory practices seen in gaming today.
Maybe, but I'd still rather buy from steam than any of the other stores right now. Steam at least makes an effort to look like they have your back.
That's why it's the only thing I can say I hate. Because it's the only shitty thing. They are, and have been, otherwise pretty pro-consumer.
It’s insane to me that people support companies that do these predatory practices. Even worse that steam allows companies that steal from their customers to be listed.