Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Dead Space 3′s Microtransactions Exploited Away Already

By John Walker on February 6th, 2013 at 11:00 am.

EA employees attack yet another customer.

Here’s what’s great about reality: people are great at breaking stupid stuff. So as Dead Space 3 launched yesterday in the Americas, people smarter than I had already figured out a glitch in the game to acquire all the items EA had hoped you’d pay for. Game Front have posted a video explaining how, which I’ve diligently included below.

It’s not until chapter 8 of the game, but once you’re there, with a little bit of farming you can gather all the “resources” you need to make whatever weapons you like. Also, why is this even a thing in a shooter?

It’s a shame that this’ll likely be patched out by the time the game reaches the rest of the world, but hopefully another cunning sort will discover something else by then. EA, the lesson here is: STOP IT.

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127 Comments »

  1. 06/02/2013 at 11:03 Mario Figueiredo says:

    There’s no stopping EA.

  2. 06/02/2013 at 11:04 gibb3h says:

    whats to stop you using a good old HEX manipulator?

  3. 06/02/2013 at 11:07 DrAmateurScience says:

    I imagine there’s something of a scramble at EA towers to get this fixed.

  4. 06/02/2013 at 11:07 Jackablade says:

    While I’m no fan of micro-transactions, particularly in this instance, isn’t posting a way to circumvent them and advocating its use rather dubious at best and potentially drifting into some murky legal grey areas?

    • 06/02/2013 at 11:11 NathanH says:

      It’s not a sneaky way of unlocking the microtransaction abilities, just a bug exploit that achieves similar results. So it’s just exploiting bugs in a single-player game.

    • 06/02/2013 at 11:14 Souldark says:

      There’s no circumvention involved, it’s the exact same bug as was present in a few of the Node rooms in Deadspace 2 – an item spawn replenishes on area transition. There’s nothing legally grey about it.

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:27 Strabo says:

      He’s just reporting bugs so he won’t get banned for not reporting them.

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:33 smb says:

      If cheating in a single-player game is murky grey legal area, I would have been in jail by age 10. How could they expect me to “catch ‘em all” when they conveniently left out 12 of them?

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:37 sirdavies says:

      Taking into account that the most obvious way to circumvent them is playing the actual game, no, not gray at all. I’d say the existence of microtransactions in a 60 dollar title is much grayer.

      • 06/02/2013 at 15:36 Corb says:

        There’s nothing gray about it, it’s bad design and an attempt to squeeze all the money they can out of you. I bet the design even adjusts drop/collection rates in order to push you into buying things (just like D3 did with the AH). Frankly, EA was stupid and didn’t do a proper bug fix between versions, their loss. FARM ALL THE RESOURCES!!!(for free!)

    • 06/02/2013 at 23:13 PopeBob says:

      Why, aren’t you just the most precious thing? Coochie coochie coo. Couldn’t read the article or view the video, who’s a big boy? Who’s a big boy?

  5. 06/02/2013 at 11:10 Moni says:

    Tomorrow’s announcement: Dead Space 4 out next year, will require constant internet connection.

    • 06/02/2013 at 11:12 Mario Figueiredo says:

      Made me laugh out loud and have people raise their eyebrows at me.

    • 06/02/2013 at 11:14 dee says:

      Dead Space 5 to require reverse Onlive stream to live EA customer care enforcement agent.

      • 06/02/2013 at 11:36 Lord Custard Smingleigh says:

        Nah, in Dead Space 5 they match you with a professional EA Game Facilitator to play it for you and stream it to your browser. You can give the EA Game Facilitator requests by SMS to a premium rate number.

        • 06/02/2013 at 12:40 Guvornator says:

          ” Hi, I’m [processing] TODD and I’ve been your EA Games Facilitator today. Have you enjoyed your Upay-WiPlay experience today?”

          “You selected ‘No’”. This answer is [processing] “INCORRECT!”. It will be discarded and the DNA sample we collected as part of your Origin download (please see terms and conditions) will be used to hunt you down and kill you.

          Please note: EA respects the rights of all its customers. Therefore your body will be dissolved in acid, preserving your right to privacy and sparing your loved ones from seeing your mutilated corpse. Thank you and have a nice day.”

          • 07/02/2013 at 03:26 Thermal Ions says:

            Hollywood wants to talk to you about writing the script for Gamer 2.0

      • 06/02/2013 at 12:07 mike2R says:

        Dead Space 6: Cancelled due to reviewers and customers failing to understand the genius of Dead Space 5.

        • 06/02/2013 at 13:16 Vorphalack says:

          Corpse Void: A Death in Space, released approximately a year after the tragic new that Dead Space 6 was canned due to all the critics going full retard simultaneously, and totally not a stealth reboot in any way.

        • 06/02/2013 at 13:42 tobecooper says:

          It was mainly canceled because of being too realistic. The consumers couldn’t handle all the MP5s and AK47s.

      • 06/02/2013 at 12:19 InternetBatman says:

        Dead Space 5, only available on Divx.

        • 06/02/2013 at 13:54 ucfalumknight says:

          Official Press Release: With EA’s recent acquisition of BetaMax, Dead Space 6 will only be available on Beta. No need for controls as your input will be extremely limited.

          • 06/02/2013 at 16:15 Dr_Barnowl says:

            Stasis effect is controlled with “Pause” key. Highly realistic temporal flickering will occur.

    • 06/02/2013 at 14:29 Raiyan 1.0 says:

      Dead Space: Origin – The FPS reboot.

  6. 06/02/2013 at 11:16 SanguineAngel says:

    John Walker! Are you not risking access to all your games on your origin account?!

  7. 06/02/2013 at 11:16 mikmanner says:

    Wouldn’t put it past EA to start banning / killing people for doing this.

  8. 06/02/2013 at 11:16 WoundedBum says:

    As long as I can play it without having to buy anything extra to be able to effectively craft stuff I’m happy enough.

    The crafting system is actually really good, I wish it was in DS1 + 2

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:03 JKjoker says:

      i disagree, the old system promoted conserving health ammo and stasis packs as much as possible to afford extra power nodes, thats pretty much gone now, none of those will give you tungsten which is what you always need

      • 06/02/2013 at 12:14 WoundedBum says:

        Oh yeah, true, I guess what I meant was not necessarily the whole crafting system, but just how detailed you can go when creating weapons. Not sure it would fit in DS1/2 after all.

      • 06/02/2013 at 12:54 Morlock says:

        Now you have to conserve real world money…. looking forward to the crafting system in Dragon Age 3.

      • 06/02/2013 at 15:43 Corb says:

        Honestly, can you even consider this survival/horror anymore? It truly just looks like “Zombies!!! The Pew Pew Game (now with co-op to make it even less scary and serious!)”

  9. 06/02/2013 at 11:17 Ansob says:

    So expect this to be treated as a critical issue and be patched out within the next 48 hours, then?

    Unlike actual bugs in games that don’t have microtransactions, that is.

  10. 06/02/2013 at 11:18 caddyB says:

    Incoming origin account bans

  11. 06/02/2013 at 11:20 Chizu says:

    Still waiting for the UK release :v
    Still I never had any intention of using the microtransactions, and from what I’ve heard in the standard playthrough you should have no issue gaining enough resources to have 2 powerful weapons come the end game.
    And I’ve never really used more than 2 weapons per play-through of the previous dead space games.
    And with no incentive to change guns because everything uses universal ammo in 3 (A most ridiculous idea in my opinion), I see little reason to bother.

  12. 06/02/2013 at 11:21 abandonhope says:

    Cool. There’s another exploit I’ve heard about that gives you $60 in out-of-game currency.

  13. 06/02/2013 at 11:33 Lord Custard Smingleigh says:

    Hello gamer! I’m a horror game.

    Those necromorphs, they eat your bullets like candy, but what they really want is your sweet, sweet corpse, to make necromorphic love to as your eyeballs explode in the pitiless howling vacuum of outer space. Even the architecture has a disturbing rib-cage aesthetic, making sure you never escape the oppressive atmosphere of dread. All you have is a half-charged plasma cutter and a small medpack that might help if you cut yourself shaving.

    Just take a second. Feel that?

    That’s tension. That’s fear. That’s horror. Savour the feeling that you’re in over your head, your weapons are pitiful, and that surviving this is going to take a miracle.

    Got that?

    Now grab your credit card, imma sell you a machine gun with infinite ammo.

  14. 06/02/2013 at 11:48 Bhazor says:

    “Scavenger bots” seriously? Seriously?

    Seriously?

    When you need to automate a part of your game to avoid tedium then you should probably just give up right there.

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:05 RobinOttens says:

      No, because you can charge consumers more money to take away the tedium, see. Smart, right?

    • 06/02/2013 at 12:06 JKjoker says:

      they got pretty close to a facebook ftp social game system

      you get resources in slightly above one digit chunks, you require 3 to 4 digits to make anything with a few exceptions and you can get more by letting bots go and waiting ooooor you can pay real money for a “speed enhancer”

      • 06/02/2013 at 12:21 Kitsuninc says:

        I got an email the other day trying to sell me discount “Speed enhancers”, maybe I should dig that out of my spam box after all.

  15. 06/02/2013 at 12:24 JKjoker says:

    i can propose a different exploit, at least during the first side mission if you quit the game half way because of the crappy autosave based save system you get to do it ALL OVER again (keeping inventory), just collect the lockers in the initial areas, rinse and repeat

  16. 06/02/2013 at 12:26 Lekker says:

    No biggie. Trainers which can give you any amount of resources you want are floating on the internet from 2nd of February (yes game could be unlocked early by simply changing your OS date to 5th). EA only threw away more money for implementing their pitiful microtransactions feature.

  17. 06/02/2013 at 12:36 Mathute87 says:

    I’m playing on Hard and I’m having no trouble at all with the ammo or the medkits… And I hate that.

    Thing is, I haven’t pirated a game since San Andreas (I was in a different country, where getting new games was pretty much impossible), but I’m sick of EA and I did download this game. I’m not proud of it, but I’m not that much demagogue to say it’s the worst thing ever. For a moment I thought “Visceral doesn’t deserve this”, but that moment fade away when I started thinking in how much I loathed DS2 and how much a generic third person shooter this has became. Plus all the fucking DLC/Microtransaction bullshit EA makes these developers to apply to their games. And that’s EA’s and Visceral’s and DICE’s and Bioware’s fault.

    So, yeah, I pirated this game to try it out. And now, with this exploit that can’t be forcedly patched on me, I will find out the exact spot where EA and Visceral decided that people with money to waste could get way earlier than those who don’t, and will see how much different the experience will be.

    • 06/02/2013 at 13:08 JKjoker says:

      im playing on impossible, i get about as much ammo and health as i use since im popping hpacks like crazy because monsters get in your face as soon as they appear and my current weapons have as much stopping power as a gentle breeze (although my short experiences in normal and hard say this happens there too)

    • 06/02/2013 at 13:17 Thunderbeak says:

      Why don’t you buy a game from a company that does right by its consumers, a game that you would actually enjoy and play that? Metro 2033 maybe?

      • 06/02/2013 at 13:24 Mathute87 says:

        I do buy those games. I have Metro on PC and Xbox (bought it on launch) and already preordered Last Light. The fact that I pirated THIS particular game doesn’t mean I pirate any other. In fact, I already stated that I haven’t pirated a game since the release of San Andreas for PC. Every other game I own (300+ on Steam, and like 10 on Origin) are all legit. So are my console games.

        • 06/02/2013 at 14:45 Thunderbeak says:

          I didn’t imply you were big into pirating games, not at all. I was surprised you felt the need to do so, hence I suggested an alternative.

    • 06/02/2013 at 13:59 MOKKA says:

      When you hated Deadspace 2 so much and are generally angry at EA for what they’re doing with Deadspace 3, why not simply ignore the game completely? This is what I do with EA Games since Dragon Age 1.

      • 06/02/2013 at 14:08 Mathute87 says:

        Because I was naive enough to think that there was a really small chance that this time they would get it right and release a better product… I really liked the first game. Now I’m going to ignore EA for the time being.

  18. 06/02/2013 at 12:57 DickSocrates says:

    The shareholders won’t be happy about this. And that is the ONLY thing that matters to EA.

  19. 06/02/2013 at 13:43 wodin says:

    And if you do expect to be banned and stopped from playing all your games..

  20. 06/02/2013 at 13:58 ucfalumknight says:

    Microtransactions: The ability to create a crappy game, and then charge even more money to make it better.

  21. 06/02/2013 at 14:16 whatisvalis says:

    I don’t understand why people come on here and moan about how EA are evil, micro transactions destroy enverything the game is about etc. and then boast about pirating the game. Here’s a novel idea, if something goes against your principles don’t play it.

    • 06/02/2013 at 14:42 Banana_Republic says:

      Truth. I’ve been doing that with EA for years. I think some people might consider pirating from EA instead of spurning them completely, to be hurting them in some way. It doesn’t. It can only help them. Just saying ‘no’ is always the best approach to companies like EA. And it’s surprisingly easy once you get started.

  22. 06/02/2013 at 15:01 ocelot113 says:

    Someone bought Dead Space 3? Let’s be honest. Most of the people that bought this game aren’t looking up gaming news on RPS. GT and IGN, I could see.

  23. 06/02/2013 at 15:14 D3xter says:

    By the way, Sim City is also supposed to have Microtransactions, at least according to people who found this in their leaked manual: http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/12506/article/simcity-to-have-in-game-store/

    “Click the banner on the main menu to enter the SimCity Store. Here, you’ll find special add- ons for sale. Select STORE to view the full list of additional game content (both free and paid) that can provide you with new gameplay possibilities.”

    So it’ll be a Triple-Whopper of Awesome: Always-Online DRM/Origin Only, Day-1DLC (additional to the Retail price) and Microtransactions.

    • 06/02/2013 at 18:53 mseifullah says:

      I’ll give the entire “Sim” franchise a pass because of the ridiculous amount of post-release content packages that have been released into retail for The Sims alone over the years. The Sims should have been one of the first franchises to adopt microtransactions.

      When you get down to it, it’s not even a game so much as just a modern approach to playing with dolls. And there has always been an accessories market for dolls.

      Expanding that point out to SimCity, when you look at any simulation-type games, there’s just no way to include all the possible content in the base-release. Nor would anyone necessarily want all the possible content. And it makes so much more sense to have an in-game DLC store than to constantly make these expensive themed retail bundles when only a few items from the theme catch your eye.

      Edit: Found a list of all The Sims expansions.

      http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Expansion_pack

      It’s also worth noting that a lot of the expansion content would get rolled into the sequel game as to expand the volume of base content for that release.

  24. 06/02/2013 at 19:20 Raquel says:

    You know whats funny ? Most people complaining about this prolly paid for battlefield 3 premium, what did you expect ?

    • 06/02/2013 at 23:27 Hmm-Hmm. says:

      Want to do a poll?

    • 07/02/2013 at 01:56 Dominic White says:

      I paid for BF3 Premium. A bit over £10 during the christmas sales, thanks to Green Man Gaming. It’s probably about the scale of all the BF2 expansions put together. Pretty damn good value, IMHO.

      I’m not touching Dead Space 3 until the price is somewhere around £10, or I might just rent the 360 version. Either way, I’m not paying top dollar to get gouged afterwards.

  25. 06/02/2013 at 20:18 Dowr says:

    No doubt they’ll ban anyone for taking advantage of a an exploit that is part of the games original code because fuck logic and reasoning.

  26. 07/02/2013 at 01:40 rsanchez1 says:

    That’s what they get for half-assing it.

  27. 08/02/2013 at 00:29 Josh Wanamaker says:

    If you’re playing this on PC, just grab the the +10 trainer that’s available on Softpedia. You can drop 5000 of X resource into your inventory whenever you want. It makes the game significantly more fun when you don’t have to spend half the time rummaging around looking for tiny amounts of rubbish.

  28. 06/02/2013 at 11:41 Mario Figueiredo says:

    Please do review how you feel about these things, alright? And let’s stop these type of arguments.

    There’s something really disturbing I cannot put my finger on (yet) about not advocating piracy by the act of pirating. But even more about people who feel it’s ok to publicly announce to the world they are filthy thieves.

    You do what you want to do. But spare everyone else your hypocrisy.

  29. 06/02/2013 at 11:58 suibhne says:

    “I am not in any way an advocate of pirating games but in this case I did. I’m glad I did”

    The goggles, they do nothing.

  30. 06/02/2013 at 12:03 RobinOttens says:

    Wait, underpowered weapons sound like a good thing for a game that’s calling itself a horror game. And what’s wrong with a straight up port? The past two games were pretty straightforward ports and they were just fine.

    Anyway, I’m fine with using pirated copies as a demo of sorts before going out to buy the full game. But you are pretty much advocating piracy here, despite what you said.

  31. 06/02/2013 at 14:16 Hmm-Hmm. says:

    I suppose it was too much to ask of poor old you to abstain? Surely you deserve to play this game which you worked so hard to.. download? Instead of the game’s developer who are obviously owned by The Man and thus should be shunned and you knew in your heart of hearts that a gifting of argentum would only be in vain.

    Alternatively, you’re being cheap. Either you should buy the game or not buy it and play something else. First world problems. Also, piracy doesn’t exactly tell EA that their game is BAD, it tells them people are scummy and will do anything to put their mitts on their (obviously oh-so-desirable) products.

  32. 06/02/2013 at 14:41 Koozer says:

    Surely the best way to show EA you disapprove would be to buy the game, but never buy any DLC?

  33. 06/02/2013 at 12:24 D3xter says:

    Except apparently EA expects people to insert money to “overpower” their weapons, at least that is what I take from all this:
    http://www.destructoid.com/dead-space-3-microtransaction-prices-revealed-243522.phtml

    Bot Capacity Upgrade $4.99
    Bot Personality Pack $4.99
    First Contact Pack Free
    Marauder Pack $4.99
    Sharpshooter Pack $4.99
    Tundra Recon Pack $4.99
    Witness the Truth Pack $4.99
    Bot Accelerator $4.99
    Epic Weapon & Resource Pack $2.99
    Online Pass $9.99
    Ultra Weapon & Resource Pack $1.99
    Resource Pack $0.99

    Microtransactions in general seem very scammy, but this even moreso…

  34. 06/02/2013 at 12:26 Guvornator says:

    Just a thought – do the micro-transactions work in the pirated game?

  35. 06/02/2013 at 14:19 Hmm-Hmm. says:

    Of course, in this case there is actually a genuine demo (regardless of how good that is).

  36. 06/02/2013 at 12:29 D3xter says:

    Sometimes I’m kinda hoping that the state would jump in and regulate this sort of thing similar to gambling, like is starting to happen in some countries e.g.: http://www.edge-online.com/news/regulation-fears-hit-japan-social-stock/

    Otherwise publishers and developers will likely get inspirational ideas and overdo it: http://www.danwei.org/electronic_games/gambling_your_life_away_in_zt.php
    But till anything like that happens they will likely push and push to see what they can get away with and make the most of it as long as they can…

  37. 06/02/2013 at 12:47 Mario Figueiredo says:

    I would think not. EA isn’t that smart.

  38. 06/02/2013 at 16:19 Dr_Barnowl says:

    The best way to show EA you disapprove is to send them a letter explaining why you don’t want their game. Not email, an actual slice of processed dead tree with text on it. Email can be directed to /dev/null ; proper mail has to be received, processed, read, filed. It’s far more likely to end up on the desk of someone that has the ear of someone.

  39. 06/02/2013 at 19:15 Phantoon says:

    No, the best way is to refuse to buy or play the game. It’s called boycotting. When asked about the game, you should tell them that EA’s terrible business practices remove any desire for the game you have.

    Piracy is not a moral high ground. Boycotting is. I’d say it’s okay to pirate things if you’re broke, since the next iteration you’ll probably buy when you have money. If a game is good, you now have a potential customer. Uncle Gabe already made this point, anyways.

    But since the internet age is the age of bombastic remarks, the vocal minority of pirates that constantly babble about how it’s “their right” make the discussion into that of legality on the terms of big corporations, which isn’t a good discussion for anyone.

  40. 06/02/2013 at 19:14 kud13 says:

    Piracy=Copyright infringement

    Copyright infringement=/=theft

    therefore, piracy =/=theft

  41. 08/02/2013 at 04:02 virtualmatrix258 says:

    Because you’ve never downloaded anything without paying. Please, get off your high horse. Jackass.

  42. 06/02/2013 at 19:24 sinister agent says:

    No but theft makes me angry, and piracy makes me angry, therefore piracy must be theft.

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