During its investors conference call last week, Take Two revealed that all of its future games will have microtransactions. Yeap, as we’ve already said, microtransactions – and loot boxes – are here to stay. According to Take Two’s CEO Strauss Zelnick, the gaming industry is now all about recurrent consumer spending and not about game sales.
As such, Take Two will invest in this new approach, and will add microtransactions to all of its future games.
“We’ve said that we aim to have recurrent consumer spending opportunities for every title that we put out at this company. It may not always be an online model, it probably won’t always be a virtual currency model, but there will be some ability to engage in an ongoing basis with our titles after release across the board.”
So yeah, like some other triple-A games, expect microtransactions even in single-player games. We don’t know how this will affect the gameplay of an SP game, however it’s pretty obvious that most developers will build their games around microtransactions.
Zelnick concluded:
“One of the things we’ve learned is if we create a robust opportunity, and a robust world, in which people can play delightfully in a bigger and bigger way, that they will keep coming back. They will engage. And there is an opportunity to monetize that engagement. There’s a lot of room for growth. This is just the beginning.”
Thanks Gamasutra
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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This programs cant be called games. Gayming software maybe….but not games
GTA V is the most successful game, even if that still not enough then
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if xcom somehow comes out of this unscathed i guess i’ll only buy that otherwise no more games from take two i guess.
Looks like T2 made it easier for me to avoid their games for good.
As always, the casuals will bring ruin to the industry. Why you might ask?, simply because they don’t care about MT’s, they thrive on mobile games, they don’t mind MT’s on that platform either and so far they don’t mind them on consoles. They are the primary force that is feeding those AAA companies the MT money and it is that same crowd that will bring ruin to the industry, simply because they don’t care about what their spending habits can lead to.
‘As always, the casuals will bring ruin to the industry’
What a horrible elistist atitude to have, gaming is hobby we share with millions of other people, I’m curious, what is casual, and what isn’t?
“What a horrible elistist atitude to have”
It’a a sham,e you don’t seem to realise that the casual audience doesn’t actually care about what business practices a company can employ in their service.
I’m talking about the casual audience, the type that don’t care about a company and what they do. There is a huge difference in gamers that study a company and what they release vs those that come home from work and pop a disc into their machine, not caring about MT’s or anything else attached to the game that otherwise seeks more money from you.
I’m far more curious to see your world eye view on everyone apparently being exactly the same, having the same knowledge, the same cares, wants and want nots.
I have a friend who spend 2k usd on Clash Royale.
I think you’ve been around long enough to see that a lot of gamers tend to act impulsively and have little patience to wait. How many times have you seen a gamer buying a game on release and complaining about it being riddled with bugs and then turn around and pre-order the next game from that Publisher?
There’s just too much money in microtransactions. That’s why we are seeing more and more of it. Even single player games will have them.
No, I was well aware of what was going on, but this is the straw that broke the camel’s back.
It took 2 years for that to come to light, not like this stuff was happening at launch when most people bought GTA V.
Yeah it should be pretty clear that almost all developers have no respect for all of their customer base, thats not just something exclusive to the PC as a platform or R* as a developer.
I have no issue with loot boxes or micro transactions, as long as they are not mandatory and don’t impact the game play. If the items are purely cosmetic than that’s perfectly fine with me.
I don’t buy them, I have however made a little money of them in Battlegrounds and Rust.
It’s a fair point, but what about in games like Rust, the skins are created by the community themselves, they offer absolutely nothing to the gameplay and are purely cosmetic
Again, fair point, I can’t argue with you. What I would say is the makers of the Rust skins do get a cut of each sale. But that is dangerously close Valves and Bethesda’s paid modding fiasco early this year.
Again: The scam “Micro transactions” are here to stay no matter as the casual consumer will support it no matter what. The only way to really “fight it” is to not buy any of their products AND ignore them completely while supporting those who do not try to rip you off.
Thanks pc gamers for popularizing the practice
Red Dead Redemption 2 not coming to PC. Now it doesn’t sound too bad.
Is that for certain or will it just be delayed for months before coming out on PC? I would have bet money that Rockstar would release the game on PC. With the shortage of Westerns in gaming and the reputation of the first game they could easily sell millions to PC gamers. I understand Rockstar catering to it’s console gamers but to skip hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue is just bad business.
first pc gamers moved developers away from single player now this sad
You are such a blessing to have around Kim. You’re like a ray of sunshine.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/13c4dacf93ad161f67cb63b08a1d2c86618fd6d4a2a660ede63700f423412ddb.jpg
That will be funny to see.
I never liked their games, so i will have no problem on skipping, but it’s a major one whose many people will have to think twice.
I may be being to pessimistic about this microtransactions stuff but it may become so popular to gain a few extra dollars on each game that the amount of single player games without them could be few in the near future. The cat is out of the bag now so to speak.
Nah, I think your right 🙁 well at least for the AAA games. Red Dead Redemption 2 will have them for sure as an example.
Well just be thankful in the indie scene/crowdfunding no one has followed the Star Citizen model, just imagine if that would of taken off and others followed.
Can you imagine concept art micro transaction for every Kickstarter game going forward it be insane! Heck I might quit gaming all together if everyone funded their games like Star Citizen. Oh look a new Rare one handed sword concept art for $250(real money). Note you can also buy insurance on it’s durability or else you loose the item all together after X uses. Btw the item cost 20 hours worth of grinding to buy with in game currency.
We’ve gone from expansion packs to DLCs, to cosmetics to pay to win to lot boxes. Now we have games like GTA Online and Star Wars Battlefarce 2 that are designed to be a tedious, frustrating grind that exist solely to get you to pay up. Just think about that, these games are no longer games that are designed to be fun, but solidly as a platform to siphon money out of you like a gambling addict. When will gamers say enough is enough?
But that’s the thing, I mean, think about it; they don’t need to sell well, as the publishers don’t actually care if they sell 10 million copies or 1 million copies any more, so long as the 1 million people who bought the game make up for the other 9 million by buying sh*tloads of microtransactions.
And that’s the crux of the issue; they can’t pander to whales without alienating the masses, but good luck getting them to care. I mean, sh*t, there’s a reason why pay-to-win never became standard & it won’t, no matter how hard EA tries to force it.
It’s funny, actually, if you stop to think about it for a second; the industry has spent the last 10 years abusing the mindset of “f*ck the fanbase, so long as we sell more by f*cking them over, that’s great!” But now, with this, that doesn’t work any more.
For example, when you bought Battlefield 1 & Battlefield 1 Premium to go with it, EA couldn’t have given less of a sh*t if you spent 100 hours or 100 seconds playing it (actually, the less the better, as it means less server bandwidth costs on them), but now, with this approach, they actually need you to spend 1,000 hours playing Battlefront 2, else you’re not being tempted to buy the microtransactions! Except, who wants to play a sh*tty P2W game for 1,000 hours without investing into the legalised cheat system?
And that is exactly why Diablo 3 failed back in the day (Real Money Auction House) & it’s exactly why such systems will continue to fail outside of arcade-type games like GTAO.
It really is an insane scheme 🙁 , it really does make a sh|t load of money. Your totally right.
Yes, but it’s also completely unsustainable. Hell, even if your board is fine with you selling 1 million copies of a so-called “AAA” product because of the massive profit margins, the industry will eventually inevitably collapse under the burden of attempting to sustain this mindset because it’s just not how this works.
You can make targeted games all you want, but at the end of the day, as long as they’re specifically targeted at the 1-in-10 actually willing to put up with these tactics, they’ll never be sustainable, no matter how much money each individual product may-or-may-not actually bring in, as they’ll leave behind a massive gaping void in the industry which will remain completely unfilled save for independent projects.
Especially as they’re not just doing microtransactions with paid-access, but they’re also trying to do microtransaction pay-to-win + paid-access.
Rather ironic really, as just a couple of years ago they were still screaming about how mainstreaming = more sales = more money……
No your right, it will collapse and that is what is so crazy, it is only short term thinking with limited easy gains(at a high long term risk to your companies reputation). The key thing is what you said it can not sustain this model it will collapse and fail(I 100% agree).
Not to mention the long term reputation damage EA doing to it’s self, I am shocked some one is not like “WTF guys people really hate us and don’t trust us now.”. I still think respect and credibility has a huge value in society so to loose that can actually make a whole company fold and EA is on their way.
Also what is crazy you have so many indie games now so you would think it make the AAA companies more worried and have to try harder. I don’t get it how EA seems to be like “eh what ever, lets think of a way to squeeze more money out of the customers we have left.”.
The whole thing is really WTF????
The sad part is how many cool IPs and shops/teams will die as a direct result of these executives that think they are rock stars for their new so called brilliant schemes 🙁
Well, they’ve been doing short-term easy gains in exchange for long-term risk to the company’s reputation for a decade now & they’ve been getting away with it just fine as far as they’re concerned (the battlefield’s worth of dead IP corpses they’ve left behind is of no concern to them, after all), so I can see why they’d jump onto another such bandwagon when seemingly provided with an opportunity to do so.
Credibility is absolutely a very important factor, especially in this day & age of the consumer becoming more aware of what they’re actually buying in to compared to the older days, but hey, the modern corporation’s top brass has always been far more concerned with how big their bonus checks are than about leaving behind a sustainable, thriving legacy, which is exactly why the modern age as a whole is unsustainable, but good luck explaining that to them – assuming anyone even cares, in the first place.
“Also what is crazy you have so many indie games now so you would think it make the AAA companies more worried and have to try harder.”
“We pander to the mainstream moron who buys into our bullsh*t advert campaigns, whereas they pander to….. those other people who pay less money & thus make them less money, so f*ck them.”
Remember CAPCOM’s behaviour towards the fanbase with the DMC reboot? Well, that’s basically the entire entertainment industry, right now; “f*ck the fanbase, we can always make more fans & thus more money! They’re just a bunch of stupid idiots, anyway.” Hell, look at how openly & blatantly they lie to us, continuously – even as recently as a few days ago.
And yeah, the massive side-effects these decisions result in are tragic, but eh, at least we’ll (hopefully) learn from their deaths, instead of repeating the same mistakes once this age is over & done with.
Dude you are like the freaking Oracle 🙂 . The stuff you talk about makes me depressed and sad but… it’s all true, all of it.
I 100% agree with you 🙁 , this is why I hope gamers will appreciate indie games more than ever.
I can say for my self my game’s focus is: that it owns, is fun, looks rad, takes advantage of your PC gear and the gameplay is awesome. Making money is a after thought, for I feel if you make a proper game(focused on the game alone) and it is truly good money/respect will follow with out any gimmicks. When the time comes I will see if the jokes on me or if gamers will prove me right and quality will always be appreciated.
The way mother base works in Metal Gear Solid V is ruining the game for me at mid level+ gear. You can’t get all weapons and gear without having to either replay all high paid missions over and over again, or upgrade more than 2 mother bases without having to pay real money so then you can have the highest level to get the top gear level crap.
They actually managed to put a free to play grind like progression system into a 60€ game with micro-transactions on top of it.
After playing The Witcher 3, how cool it is to have it all (armor sets and swords) by simply playing the game following its progression and by exploring the game’s map (all that enjoying it all the time), makes you wonder if this stupidity of extending the game’s progression artificially is going to make the games better. In my opinion it will do the opposite.
Imagine a future with games like The Witcher without being able to make your inventory bigger so you can put more stuff unless you pay for it (like in most free to play games), imagine finding new gear but locked behind a pay wall with a message “for use this sword you can buy Master Sword DLC”, and silly stuff like that.
I will stop play those games if this ever happen.
I play games to enjoy them, I pay for those games because “AAA” means (or should mean) quality content, story, mechanics, and an enjoyable full experience…If developers are trying to take all of that joy from the games…they all won’t see any of my money ever again.
Another Cancer Dev … so sad that greed gets the best of them, leave microtranzactions out of single player games.
,,consumer spending opportunities” New BS word for microtransactions from your beloved marketing team.
Year by year the gaming industry gets worse and worse. I wonder what year will gaming be so toxic that it will be like mobile gaming where games are just plain “milking the gamers” to their last penny
What happened to gaming why it came to this??
I miss the 90’s and mid 2000’s
It happened gradually over the years. If it had happened all at once overnight then it would have been a shock but it’s just crept in on us. Publishers excused DLC as being necessary due to the costs of making games going up and still only charging $60 and now they will use that as an excuse for microtransactions in single player games. There are literally billions of dollars to be made with microtransactions so imo it’s a done deal now and a lot of Publishers will be jumping on board with it.
The worst thing that could happen is Developers intentionally making the game a grind-fest unless you pay extra for microtransactions in the future.
Indie games are keeping the 90’s and mid 2000’s 100% alive.
Sucks the big games are turning into this scheme but in the worst case the indie scene will just take over and be the new era as the old one destroys it self.
Hey waddya know, another company I won’t be buying games from.
then make all games 30$
cause 60$ + micro= no buy #pirate it
people will complain and still buy it the cycle continues
Looks like is a Triade or a Union,when Ubifail,EA,Activi$ion and now Take dICKKs,have or will have transactions,loot boxes or gambling boxes.
They cooking something and the gamers dont know,yet,whats coming.
Bad and Greedy industry of gaming we have today.
Just putting more pressure on themselves, Because if the game is a turd AND it requires paying more than the base game, It is eventually going to fail as a business model.
All it will take is that young and talented up and comer indie programmer, Make a decent game with NO paywall to absolutely destroy the big AAA studios, You will be rich overnight and we gamer’s will also be happy just buying a normal game with no micro transactions.
So get to it, What are you waiting for? Now is a perfect opportunity to get in and take some of that pie.
The way modern gaming is going, I wouldn’t be surprised if laws are changed one day.
May be R18+ only for anything with gambling in it, Games that require spending real money on top of the base game.
If it does happen and it’s adults only, Then they(AAA studios) have just shot themselves in the foot and lost half their customer base.
P.S. Wouldn’t surprise me if it happens first in my country(Australia) the nanny state, Would be the first time I could actually agree with what they do in regards to restrictions for a change!
I am basically praying for video game crash by now.
Do you want piracy? because this is how you get piracy…
I don’t want piracy. I want good games. And those are really rare nowadays. Also piracy is publishers fault, if they priced the games accordingly, they would get crapton of sales.
exactly, if the game is typical AAA garbage and barred by both offside DRM (I.E “social club”) AND microtransaction
that game has lost all of it merits to the average gamer
i would’n’t personally pirate this cause they probably went cheap on the story, if there even a PC port (which will likely appear after the console version sold it’s fare share) it still will be heavily restricted
I will not say the game industry, but industry as a whole and this system needs to collapse, seems that humans no matter what can’t stay on the top for long, the regular change is needed to keep corruption under control.
This world is going backwards…
ALIENS, COME TO SAVE US! LOL!
The most fritghtening part is “This is just the beginning”.
The will to enrich, to make easy money and also bigger salaries for their employees, more expensive equipment, all these reflect in today’s sales decisions.