The price is off-putting because we can see the sticker in order to get sticker shock. But lootboxes and gambling have no upfront sticker, the true cost is obfuscated and extended over years. In that regard, Paradox is much more transparent than Valve.
That being said, my beef with them is their “subscription for DLC” model, at least the version I saw being rolled out for EU4. That and the free updates tend to be fairly unbalanced if you don’t also buy the corresponding DLC for that update. That seems skeevy… but still not as skeevy as lootboxes.
That’s like 10 development years worth of additional content. There’s not many games that get that much post release dev time without a valid monetization strategy.
You have a point but the cost of Paradox DLCs FAR exceeds the development time most of the time. You really have to do your research before buying anything
I feel like doing research shouldn’t be an issue for people playing Paradox games, where it takes hours of research in the tooltips just to understand the mechanics.
That said, my research for new Paradox DLC usually consists of hovering over it in the store, ignoring anything with reviews less than mixed, taking interest in those with positive, and reading the first dozen reviews of the mixed ones, and that works well enough.
Im sympathizing with both sides of the conversation. Grand strategy games are so complex and can be supported for 10+ years so it makes sense that they regularly make DLCs to support development.
But they’re not totally optional/unnecessary. The problem is that many games are balanced around the new DLCs that sometimes you’re at a disadvantage if you dont buy them. I remember some drama around crusader kings where some mechanics don’t make sense unless you buy some DLCs
I agree. Strategy game do occupy a weird space, EU4 was a go to game for me for like 10 years. I appreciated the support for the game and did buy the DLC that changed mechanics (skipping most flavour packs). I remember people complaining about janky mechanics without DLC, but I know others would rollback to previous versions.
Funny thing is that despite playing EU4 for years and really enjoying the game. I feel little urge to upgrade to EU5.
I think that’s a fair critism, but also it’s not like people get a dlc buying addiction. It’s not necessarily predatory (although it could be if the base game was incomplete and needed to be fixed by DLCs) like gambling is
Yeah, tho, looking up a Paradox game and seeing it has 800€ just on DLC is off putting
The price is off-putting because we can see the sticker in order to get sticker shock. But lootboxes and gambling have no upfront sticker, the true cost is obfuscated and extended over years. In that regard, Paradox is much more transparent than Valve.
That being said, my beef with them is their “subscription for DLC” model, at least the version I saw being rolled out for EU4. That and the free updates tend to be fairly unbalanced if you don’t also buy the corresponding DLC for that update. That seems skeevy… but still not as skeevy as lootboxes.
That’s like 10 development years worth of additional content. There’s not many games that get that much post release dev time without a valid monetization strategy.
You have a point but the cost of Paradox DLCs FAR exceeds the development time most of the time. You really have to do your research before buying anything
I feel like doing research shouldn’t be an issue for people playing Paradox games, where it takes hours of research in the tooltips just to understand the mechanics.
That said, my research for new Paradox DLC usually consists of hovering over it in the store, ignoring anything with reviews less than mixed, taking interest in those with positive, and reading the first dozen reviews of the mixed ones, and that works well enough.
But the base game isn’t that expensive and most expansions are unnecessary game play wise. Even when I played paradox games I didn’t buy all the DLC
Im sympathizing with both sides of the conversation. Grand strategy games are so complex and can be supported for 10+ years so it makes sense that they regularly make DLCs to support development.
But they’re not totally optional/unnecessary. The problem is that many games are balanced around the new DLCs that sometimes you’re at a disadvantage if you dont buy them. I remember some drama around crusader kings where some mechanics don’t make sense unless you buy some DLCs
I agree. Strategy game do occupy a weird space, EU4 was a go to game for me for like 10 years. I appreciated the support for the game and did buy the DLC that changed mechanics (skipping most flavour packs). I remember people complaining about janky mechanics without DLC, but I know others would rollback to previous versions.
Funny thing is that despite playing EU4 for years and really enjoying the game. I feel little urge to upgrade to EU5.
I think that’s a fair critism, but also it’s not like people get a dlc buying addiction. It’s not necessarily predatory (although it could be if the base game was incomplete and needed to be fixed by DLCs) like gambling is
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The subscription is €5 a month