Posts tagged “microtransactions”

High-octane ballsport Rocket League yesterday reduced cosmetic item prices, having started selling them at high prices with new systems replacing DLC and loot boxes in last week's Blueprint Update. Our Matt said only yesterday that "Rocket League's new Blueprints are too expensive, but still better than loot boxes" then a mere six hours later, Psyonix announced the price cuts. This is response to a solid…

Tagged with microtransactions, Psyonix, Rocket League.

Let's get this out of the way: CD Projekt Red really haven't confirmed much regarding Cyberpunk 2077's multiplayer. They know it's happening (eventually) but what that looks like, or when it'll happen? Not even Keanu knows. Last week it was reported that CDPR may know one thing for certain - CP2077 multiplayer would be monetised, and include "well thought-out" microtransactions. However, it looks like the…

Tagged with CD Projekt, CD Projekt Red, microtransactions, Cyberpunk 2077.

The latest patch for Fallout 76 released today includes some shiny new additions Bethesda revealed earlier this month: cameras and item repair kits. The latter can only be purchased with meta-currency, a departure from the in-game storefront's focus on solely offering cosmetic items.

Tagged with Bethesda Game Studios, Bethesda Softworks, microtransactions, Fallout 76.

Electronic Arts have thrown in the towel in their battle with Belgium over whether or not paid loot boxes in FIFA's Ultimate Team mode constitute illegal gambling. Without admitting to anything, EA today announced that they will soon stop selling Belgian players the 'FIFA Points' microtransaction currency used to buy Ultimate Team 'packs', effectively stopping selling them. Technically if someone is sitting on €657965468476 of…

Tagged with Belgium, Electronic Arts, FIFA Ultimate Team, loot boxes, microtransactions, FIFA 18, FIFA 19.

The Australian Senate are launching an enquiry into microtransaction loot boxes, investigating whether they constitute gambling and to what extent they "may be harmful". While the enquiry won't change any policy itself, it could inform future laws.A number of politicians and bodies around the world have cocked an eyebrow at microtransaction virtuacrates of random digicrud in recent years, most notably after the loud backlash against…

Tagged with Australia, legal, loot boxes, microtransactions.

The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), the North American industry body which assigns games age ratings, will expand its labelling on physical boxed games to include warnings of "In-Game Purchases". This will cover everything that can be bought digitally for real money, from season passes and skins to microtransaction currencies and random loot boxes. They're only a decade late to noticing all this, then.Some industry…

Tagged with DLC, Entertainment Software Association, ESRB, loot boxes, microtransactions.

When Electronic Arts turned off microtransactions in Star Wars Battlefront 2 over that whole stinking loot crate progression system mess, they said they would bring 'em back after a rethink. Well, EA's chief financial officer said on Tuesday that is still very much the plan. While he isn't sure how and when microtransactions will return, he seems fairly certain they wouldn't include cosmetic items which…

Tagged with Dice, Electronic Arts, loot boxes, loot crates, microtransactions, Star Wars: Battlefront 2.

Activision have created a matchmaking system which would attempt to put players in situations where they're more likely to spend money on microtransaction items. Perhaps it would match you against a great player with a fancy gun so you'd want to buy that gun and emulate that success. Or if you've already bought a fancy gun, it might put you in matches where that weapon…

Tagged with Activision, matchmaking, microtransactions, patents, the internet is some sort of punishment we probably deserve.

Megahit MOBA League of Legends [official site] will raise the price of its premium microtransaction currency, Riot Points (RP), for UK players by 20% later this month.Seeing as the pound has tanked since the UK voted last year to leave the European Union, developers Riot Games say players elsewhere in the world have been paying more per point than Kingdomeers. Raising UK prices will "restore…

Tagged with Brexit, microtransactions, Riot Games, League of Legends.

Last year, Overkill Games upset a pretty vocal corner of their Payday 2 [official site] community by introducing microtransactions to the co-op heist 'em up - something they'd previously promised to avoid. In an announcement made yesterday, Starbreeze - Overkill's parent company - revealed they've now acquired full rights to the Payday franchise and as such will scrap paid-for in-game items via the next update.…

Tagged with 505 Games, microtransactions, Overkill Software, Payday 2, Payday 3.

When Overkill Software first added TF2-like weapon crates to Payday 2 [official site], putting special gun skins with better stats in 'safes' unlocked by paying real money for 'drills', it went poorly. The vocal portion of the co-op heist FPS's playerbase were riled, to say the least. Overkill backpedalled a little, making it so folks might randomly earn free drills while playing, but it was…

Tagged with microtransactions, Overkill Software, Payday 2.

We can be fairly certain that affordable time travel won't exist within our lifetimes because Payday 2 [official site] developers Overkill Software evidently haven't travelled back to last week and erase their mistake of adding microtransactions to unlock more-powerful versions of guns. If they had, memories of CS:GO-style weapon crates and keys concealing a random selection of garish weapon skins with better stats would fade…

Tagged with Back to the Future Day, microtransactions, Overkill Software, Payday 2.

An update due Wednesday (19 August) will bring six (6) new flavours of pet to Path of Exile [official site]. They include the fastest tortoise I've ever seen and a well-behaved lemur. Also a pukeko which I didn't know was a real bird until now. I'm mostly posting about this because it let me assess a bunch of digital pets.

Tagged with Grinding Gear Games, microtransactions, Path of Exile.

The UK's Office of Fair Trading (OFT) is to issue new guidelines (pdf) about in-app charges for gaming loosely aimed at children. "Is to", which is news-speak for over-simplifying a story to make it sound like a proposal is a thing that's definitely happening. ("Government is to chop the heads off all left-handed people" will read the headline, while the story reveals this was actually…

Tagged with in-game purchases, microtransactions, office of fair trading.

So it was discovered by dogged data miners, so shall it be. After dabbling in microtransaction-based cosmetic items but largely buttering its bread with sweet, sweet subscription money, World of Warcraft is finally rolling out an in-game cash shop. Do you have excess moneydollars lining your pockets/sofa/cat? Are these "tough economic times" secretly treating you better than everyone else? Do you (for now) play exclusively…

Tagged with Blizzard Entertainment, microtransactions, World of Warcraft.

(I know we call 'em microtransactions not in-app purchases on PC, but John will almost definitely shout at me if I let the headline run onto two lines).This doesn't come as much suprise in light of what EA did to Dead Space 3, but there's still a certain amount of gastric churn to be felt in response to an EA bossman's public declaration that microtransactions…

Tagged with Electronic Arts, microtransactions.