The Modern Cost of Video Games

If you've paid even a little attention to video game news in the past few months, or even the past couple of years you will have no doubt heard about the cost of Micro-transactions and DLC's

But as it stands right now there are two companies being barraged with community hate the most.  One rightfully so and the other not so much, but before I get into defending evil corporations lets do a brief history of the cost of a video game and their prices adjusted for inflation.  Side note:  I'm focusing on Console Games because those are what is purchased and played by the majority of consumers.

The following prices are the at retail during the launch window of most first party games. 

Atari 2600 Cartridge

1980 - $25

2017 - $80

NES Cartridge

1990 - $50

2017 - $96.81

N64 Cartridge

1998 - $70

2017 - 106.85

Playstation 2 Disc

2005 - $50

2017 - $64.87

One important fact about all of these games is that they were made before the days of online gaming, dedicated game servers, and patches.   Once a game was completed and released that was it.   The publisher never touched it again unless they made a sequel or remaster. 

The next thing to look at is MMO's  World of Warcraft and Elder Scrolls Online two of the more successful and loved.    They have monthly subscriptions, content locked behind paywalls, and micro-transactions. But unlike previous generations of console games MMOs require constant (usually weekly) server maintenance and patching to maintain game balance and software stability.  Which requires staff and resources to do.  People who need to be paid for their work and hardware that has to be maintained.    

So, back to the console side of things. 

During the previous generation of consoles, the 360 and PS3 systems, online gaming started to emerge.   Most of the games, like their PC counterparts over a decade before them, had direct connections from system to system as their multiplayer functionality.  The stability of a Multiplayer game being based on the hosting systems processing power and internet connection.  Which, in some cases required a small post release patch to make sure the a particular game maintained stability over the internet.    At this point both players, and companies, started to realize that direct system connections could not support large scale stable game play. 

Which brings us to modern day: the end of the 360/PS3 era into the current generation of console games, where games are becoming increasingly online and less off.  And to maintain the staff, hardware, and servers to keep these games playable, console games are starting to see micro-transactions, subscriptions, and paid DLC for games. 

All of what I stated above brings me to the press surrounding two modern games and their respective companies. 
Destiny 2

and
Star Wars Battlefront 2.

If you look at gaming from a historic perspective $60 at retail for these games is relatively inexpensive.  If they were stand alone games that did not require servers, updates, and patching it would be more than enough money.  The $100 that Destiny asked for it's basic game plus it's 2 DLC's over the next few months, historically, is what the actual retail price of a full game should be if pricing trends had followed inflation. 

How Star Wars Battlefront is Doing it Wrong.

The rage directed towards EA in the case of Battlefront is justified.  They released an online game that is meant to be competitive. However, the balance and competitive edge has to be purchased.   Which even though pay-to-win micro-transactions pay the bills and keeps the servers up an running it makes the game much less fun for those who do not have the money or the time to sink into unlocking the items or characters to be able play fairly against those that do. 

How Destiny 2 is doing it right.  

For starters, the price.  $100 is historically fair for a full game.   $60 is the modern standard, but that is also the standard pricing for games who's primary play is offline, and does not require server maintenance. Someone has to pay to keep the servers up as well as pay the team who fixes all of the balance issues and things that keep the game playable and fair for both new and old players.  

When looking at the micro-transaction purchasable items in Destiney:  they are cosmetic. They do not effect game balance.  A fresh starting player can still compete with a weathered veteran if they have similar skill levels.  

  

I'll admit that it's kind of crappy for certain game modes to be locked behind DLC as it drops. But, on the flip side an extra $20 to $40 to keep the servers up and keep access to all of the game content is a small price to pay compared to the average of $15 a month most MMO players pay just to have access to their game vanilla or not.

TL:DR Welcome to the real world of continuous online gaming.  It's expensive.  

Bees in the Belfry (part 1)

The silhouette of a long forgotten tower juts up from  the flattened plain.  The ground so cracked only the hardiest of plants cling desperately to the fissures in the landscapes surface as the blazing sun inches it’s way to the horizon. The light of the dipping did show that that the tower was a solid silhouette at least and the crumbled walls at it’s base offered shelter from the cold winds that the promise of night held.  

     As the sun dipped below the horizon and the soft hues of dusk began dominating the skyline Evie in the driver's seat watches for Arenel and Rin's guidance  as she cautiously maneuvers the horses and cart into the sheltering walls of what appeared to be an old entryway that lay in the shadow of the tower.

 Being closer to the tower now and not having the blaze of the setting sun in his eyes Rock notes that the tower is not nearly so solid as it  appeared from the distance. Parts of the walls chunked out and missing make the gnome fear for it’s stability if the night winds decided to gust.  In one part cautiousness and three parts curiosity he decides to investigate the tower closer and with a prayer to Selune lifts silently from the ground and glides towards the rickety structure.  

As the small cleric approaches the winds of the plains carry to him a soft buzzing.  The hairs on the back of his neck stand of their own accord as he slows his approach and stops dead just beyond the towers walls.  
Then he sees it.

Just inside a man sized opening.  A mass of honeycomb being crawled on by black and yellow bodies.  One of the black and yellow creatures peels away from the rest and begins an angry buzz in Rocks direction.  The little fellow turns, to late to avoid detection, and shoots like an arrow back towards the rest of the group...

LFG

Trying to find the motivation to write more stories.  Something new, something original.
Ha.
Most of the story ideas that have been banging around in my head have all been based on old Dungeons and Dragons games.  Which...that just doesn't work for me.  I didn't take enough notes back then.  And if I'm going to be writing any stories the way that I was I need someone else running the game so that I can focus on note taking.

As a DM, note taking of the events doesn't work very well because I'm too busy running the game.  Trying to keep events and actions flowing and keeping the players interested and engaged.  Also, as a DM, trying to write out to many details in advance pigeonholes the players and leaves them little to no choice in their actions.  So I need to find a DM that will let me sit with my computer out and up so that I can tap tap away as events take place.  I might even have to forgo playing.

But then again it brings me back to the concept of new and original.  Or telling my story.   

What ever the hell that is.

Na, just playing in a game isn't going to work if I'm going to tell a story that interests me.  I'll need to co-dm a game.  Let the other DM either run the bulk of the game while I take notes or the other way around.
(wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more) 

But then again I'll need to find someone that is willing to put that sort of time and effort into creating a story. Players that are willing to let me take their characters and give them voice beyond the table.

That's the hard part.

I've brought such an idea, writing out the adventures of the game using notes from, in the past.  More often than not the players are keen on the idea but throw in the caveat "I want to write my own character."  Which is great in theory, but no one ever picks up the ball and runs with it. And  me being me, I respect that.  The the story falls fallow and the ideas grow stale because the other players don't hold up their end of the story.  In that, no story comes from their side of the table. So the finished thing ends up lopsided with only one or two of the NPC's dominating the action

Except this one time, with this one player...
Have you met my wife?

And that's what I'm trying to find again.  Not a wife.
I have one of those, and after a few years of writing out stories from our various role playing adventures we ran into the same problem.  Lopsided, mostly, romance stories that either left the other players or the GM butthurt that we were writing as much and the story would get altered or the other characters left out.    
And we do write the romance angle quite a bit, I mean...well we're both hopeless in that regard.  Or I am and I steer the writing that way.  

I'm not really sure which but there are mountains of fluffy, directionless romance, in both of our respective writing piles because of it.  

Point is, I either need to find a group of people that want to write with me, or a group of people that will let me take the characters and story and craft it in my own words without the butt hurtness of having a character fall to the wayside in the narrative. Because...

Also, side note: finding a place to live where my neighbors don't have dogs that bark insistently just outside the window.  Nothing blows your train of thought like a  little yipper going to town just a few feet from where you're writing.  

Where was I?...something about butt hurt players and yippie dogs....no...that's not right

Oh yeah,
Letting characters fall out of a narrative isn't done because a character is more or less interesting than any other. It comes from trying to keep the narrative moving at a good clip and sometimes you have to focus on a smaller group.
In film it's easier to do ensemble stories because you can have everyone on screen doing their own thing in the same shot. Where as from a writing stand point, for reading word format you have to tell the story from one or another characters perspective or get bogged down in the details of each characters motivation etc. is.  Why do you think that group stories always turn into sweeping epics?  Look at any series of books.  You get so much mileage out of the same story because the author is telling it from several different perspectives simultaneously.  

Ack, but I digress.

Long and short of it is that if ti is going to be an ensemble writing piece everyone has to  contribute in the writing department or their character gets left out of the story or side lined.  And if my wife and I  are left to our own devices and only have our characters to work with it devolves, very quickly, into mushy romantic stuff. 

Write what you know I guess.

Now, I'm going to go back to editing notes from some recent games I played in...and probably piss a few players off for not treating their characters the way that they would.

But maybe, just maybe, one day I'll be able to publish something without fear of retribution from old players thinking they didn't get a fair shake, or that they own the character even if they never wrote the character. *sigh* or I'll just have to come up with a whole new story.

But for now, editing. 

Prep Work

It's zero hour before this weeks D&D game and wouldn't you know it;  I'm pacing back and forth again.

I can't help but be excited.  This is the fourth run I've taken at playing through this campaign I'm running this evening.  And this time the players are half way through and seem as though they're going to work their way through the whole of it.

The first time I ran this adventure the players decided to go a completely different rout and gave up on it half way through to explore character hooks. At the time this didn't really bother me all that much since I used to abhor canned adventures. Preferring the fluid nature of character driven story lines and random encounters to rule the day.  And now, since I no longer spend nearly twenty hours of prep time on my adventures the way that I did when I was a little younger, having a steady through line of adventure and pre-made dungeons to explore along with my players has become a little more my speed.


The second time I ran this adventure path was for a Library group that I was DMing as part of a summer reading program.  This is rewarding in a way that other games are not, but also somewhat frustrating.  When doing the whole "paid GM" thing you only have a small window of opportunity to get adventuring done. Since most of the time these players have either never played outside of that instance or have little motivation to explore the books and game info on their own game sessions can be slowed down considerably with rules explanations and getting the idea across that; No this is not quite like an MMO and that the actions that their characters can take are much more robust than most digital offerings have.  Mostly because they're not limited by digital storage space and pre-planned responses.  The other reason that this adventure was never completed during a library run is because the goal of the Library games is more an educational one.  To teach the players how to play and run their own games while teaching the basic research skills necessary to play the game. This is doubly important since these games are meant to be  geared towards middle to highschoolers in an effort to help them apply these same skills to non game projects.  Which, so far, has worked.  For the adventure it means barely scratching the surface in the handful of weeks the program takes place and constantly reintroducing a rotating crop of players.

The third time...well...technically this is a continuation of the third time.
I started it with a group of new players, taught them the basics of the game and then dove in head first into the adventure.  They were making great headway and really enjoying the game.  But as often happens with role playing groups; life happened.  People moved, changed availability and the like.

So, now here I am with the remnants of two groups come together to pick up where the third group left off.

Last week we started by giving a brief introduction of "Last time on Dungeons and Dragons..." that detailed each of the characters journeys that led them to this point coupled with expositioning in the parts of the first half of the adventure some of them weren't there for.  And after taking a small detour to chase down a monster bounty that almost killed some of their number, they jumped onto the investigation train "In Character" to set themselves on the path of adventure.

So here I am, waiting for the players to show up, going over my notes from the previous sessions, the notes for the coming session, and generally being a Nervous Nelly about and doing the "Did I  do enough prep work" dance that always has me teed up before a game starts.

Which I think I did..hopefully.  But, as always with these table top games.  The pace is dictated a lot by where the players want to go and what they want to do and I'm simply here to provide the backdrop and the adventure paths for them to follow.

Looking for the Fairy Court

 





  Getting Closer
 


 Found a seat at court.

 

How does it go again?

Once upon a time. 
That's a good start.
Except that it's never once, and time keeps on moving forward even if you're not ready for it to do so. 

If you're still keeping  up with these musings of mine I commend you.  For starters I've been a bit off my rocker of late.  Stress, depression, and all of the other things that go along with eating disorders and self esteem issues have a way of doing that to a person. 
So I'll make a deal with you oh intrepid and somewhat masochistic reader. 
From here on out it's going to be story time. 
Either fictional stories or real stories.  It doesn't much matter. But stories none the less.
I've been running around the same mulberry bush trying way to hard to fix myself when in reality the only problem I have is being comfortable in my own headspace.  And I'm not really certain when, where, or how that started but it did.  The stress of it made me Mark Watney Skinny and drove me more than a little batty.

But here we are now.  Almost back to a healthy weight and doing it right this time.  Given up on all of my vices save for video games for now.
Truth be told Video Games aren't so much a vice as they are a rock that I've held onto through out these crazy storms.  Video Games are where my friends are, where I connect with people and share adventures with even if those people aren't right next to me. 
So that's why I'm starting my Youtube channel up with a little bit more fervor.  To share my adventures with the people that maybe aren't quite as inclined to play or don't have the skills to keep up.   Maybe introduce you to some of my friends that I go on those digital adventures with. 

Also, to share in my cosplay adventures.  Because much like Video Games; Role Playing and Cosplay are two things that make me truly happy.  Dressing up and pretending to be a grand hero or what have you is fun.  It makes me smile, and sometimes it makes other people smile. 

Like the late night that the Sheriff met Robin Hood and Friar Tuck. 

It was a cool autumn evening and myself and some friends were at Oberon's Tavern. 
Yeah you read that right I was at Oberon's Three Penny Tavern.
The real one.
We had enjoyed food and drink and us merry revelers were strolling through the park when we saw a bear.  A real bear.
 It was just ambling across the path and disappearing into the trees.   
Keep in mind that this was in the wee hours of the morning when night isn't sure it's ready to give up it's hold on the world and the day is still a few hours from starting. 
We were a touch pickled, but not so much so that seeing a real bear didn't sober us up to the point of deciding to head over to the Local P.D.s office and let them know that there was a real and present danger lurking in the underbrush.
 We  knocked on the door and after a few moments a bleary eyed officer opened the door on our small troop of Merry Men.
I, the obvious leader, started to tell the officer what we had saw, but he held up his hand and said. "Give me a moment here. I need a second to appreciate that Robin Hood and Friar Tuck are standing in front of me."  He smiled and then said "Go Ahead."    I then proceeded to tell him about the bear.
The officer smiled again and informed us that the bear was indeed a resident of the park and was mostly harmless and avoided people.  That the park authorities were aware of it's presence and were already working on a way of getting it safely out of the human park and back into it's natural habitat that was in the hills behind said park. 
After that he laughed, told us to have a good night and so then we exited.
Not perused by the bear.