You don't infuriate the internet. Well, at least you don't infuriate them and get away scot-free. Gabe Newell, CEO of Valve can justify that. But really, has the stance taken by the Payday community deserve to be noticed? To be honest... yes. Back in 2013, David Goldfarb had confirmed that there will not be any micro-transactions in Payday 2. "No. No. God, I hope not. Never. No." Obviously 2 years down the line and Goldfarb has since left the company. Next in-line to take over was Almir Listo. Things took a heavy hit when the voice-actor for Chains and also a co-founder of the company, Ulf Andersson, left. Right before this week's Crimefest update, Simon Viklund, sound director, co-owner and composer, left as well. What does this mean for Overkill and Payday 2? Before we get into what Overkill should do, let's talk about what they did wrong. Well, for starters they added crates and keys (drills), to be bought which will include cosmetics. Next? These cosmetics give stat bonuses. And that is precisely what they did wrong. Day 2 of Crimefest also showed that there were 5 Vlad masks available. Seems like Overkill really wants to direct their player base to greater heights by paying them out from their hard-earned cash. For those new to the whole Payday shenanigans, they will definitely be thrown off by the insane amounts of DLC that Overkill has already put out for the game. Not to mention, the GOTY edition didn't even have close to all of it, excluding the recently released ones. Right out of the gate it's a little possible to see what Overkill wanted rather than giving the over 20,000 player count per month what they wanted. So what's really the big problem people are complaining about? The complete lack of integrity, respect for the players as well as turning a blind-side to all of the complaints thrown their way (Jimquisition, Gamerant, etc.). Was the writing on the wall kind of there already? Others will say DLC isn't technically micro-transactions and rhey are true, but for guns like snipers, which should "technically" be in the game? While I have opposed Overkill since the beginning of their DLC insanity, it's really easy to see through the thin line now that they've punctured the trust of the community. I think Valve and Square Enix recently are good examples (but started out as horrible) for their own little shenanigans and what they did to resolve it. Firstly, they listened to the community. Back in April - May, Valve and Bethesda introduced paid mods to Skyrim which caused major uproar in the gaming community. At first dismissing these complaints, they decided to review their own judgement and removed paid mods after it blew up in their faces. On the other hand, Japan-based game publishers Square Enix released a pre-ordering tiered system for their upcoming game Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, telling players to choose between two choices which should undoubtedly be in their system from the start. The worse part? If players pre-ordered enough copies to reach the last tier, Square Enix will release the game 4 days early(!) from their release date next February. Wow. As of last week, they have taken the system down and instead gave the players who pre-ordered and gave both of the choices instead of only the one that they chose. Obviously, there is the integrity part. I mean, surely with that many amount of DLCs already made, Overkill would've been laughed off the park? Or should've, rather. It's no excuse when a company who has blatantly opposed to not having micro-transactions and simply "adding" it in after 2 years is astonishing. Not that astonishing when some of your regarded staff (albeit hated) leaves the company only to be replaced by others with different ideologies of how the game should run.
What does this mean for the Payday player-base? There really isn't much to do, honestly. There are many protests within the Steam review section of Payday 2, now at 85% positive, and when the worst hit Skyrim back then, it dropped to less than 75% positive. There's also the protest of the wallets, simply not adhering to Overkill's idiotic micro-transactions as it is. Personally, I do feel that Overkill has put a foot wrong in this debacle. There really wasn't any need for micro-transactions in the first place. Especially when the Crimefest update was free. That is mind-blowing. Obviously I do hope that Overkill right the wrong in terms of their fate and put out an announcement - or an apology - so gamers and players can simply move on like nothing happened. So much has been put onto the emphasis of how Overkill does it the way it is, rather than suiting the players of what they wanted. I guess Overkill will skim over comment sections and Reddit before they decide to pull the trigger: of which to release another DLC. But if this madness has to end, it has to start with the company who has triggered these events. Do I think they will apologize? No. Do I think they should. Hell yes. Good luck Overkill, it's only a matter of time before people leave the sinking ship that is Payday 2. Another 2 more years of Payday? I don't think so.
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AuthorBenny Ong: Just your regular guy who likes soccer more than most people, and also a little downtime is pretty nice. Archives
November 2015
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