EA: Yes, You’ll Have to Buy Some Weapons in Battlefield: Bad Company, But It’s Not THAT Big a Deal
By Jonathan on Monday, March 24th, 2008 at 3:55 PM PST In Electronic Arts, Game Companies, Game Consoles, Games, Games Industry, Microsoft, Sony
You may recall a few days ago when it was discovered through the Battlefield: Bad Company beta test that some weapons in the game were ominously locked and labeled “Available for purchase on Xbox Live Marketplace.” Naturally the internet erupted in an uproar, because, seriously, who wants to have to pay extra for something that should just be available right out of the package? Well, EA decided to respond to this and give their own take on it.
“In addition to the core set of weapons, Battlefield: Bad Company will release five unique weapons free of charge through five different promotional programs prior to launch. EA will again make these weapons available to players free of charge after launch, in case anyone missed the pre-launch promotions.
At launch, EA will release a Gold Edition of Battlefield: Bad Company which will feature an additional five new weapons. For players who do not purchase the Gold Edition of the game, they can still buy the five weapons at a small individualized price per item. All weapons are balanced for gameplay. More weapons offer players more choices but do not create an advantage/disadvantage for players who do not opt to buy new items.”
So you can get five of these weapons by buying the Gold Edition (for a higher price probably) and get the other five through special promotions following the game’s release. You know, this wouldn’t be a big deal if they offered the weapons for pay download a couple weeks after the game had launched. At least then, gamers could feel like they’re actually getting something extra rather than a disc with a lot of locked content on it. This sort of move just makes it seem like EA is some money-grubbing corporation who thinks their customers will complacently buy anything that’s shoved down their thoats, because they really don’t have much choice…oh, right.
Via Kotaku
As long as the weapons are balanced (I’ve look at the stats in the Beta and they seem to be) then I’m not fussed, I may try and get hold of a pre-order deal if I enjoy the beta, we shall see though.
Before anyone goes “OmFg dis si bulshit mang!1!1″, shut up and grow up, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BUY THE GUNS, so stop moaning as if you do have to buy them, christ half of them will be free after a while anyway.
EA can suck my thigh.
EA is always thinking up new ways to get money out of you. i’m all for new games but charging for weapons in an effin mmog? kiss my left nut, EA.
If you don’t want to give EA your hard earned coins then don’t, simple as that, no-one is forcing to to pay for the content, I dislike what EA is doing here but the fact is that the guns are optional and offer no real advantage and thus I won’t complain about it, complaining is useless, if you have an actual problem them go straight to EA about it.
this whole micro-transaction thing is getting out of hand. I’m so sick of it it’s not funny.
Abusive language is bad, mmmk?
@dragon
And if you don’t like people complaining about something you think is pointless then ignore it instead of telling them how they need to ‘go somewhere’
See, it works both ways.
Justify it any way you want Dragon, bottom line is that this crap is the short end of the stick and it isn’t the first time EA has tried to pull this crap.
Why can’t we just boycott EA? They have done too much..I think they deserve it.
well it doesnt bother me that u have to buy the guns unless they are like 50 euros/$ each