Where did Expansion Packs go?

[Craig234]

nm

 

[TheFlyingSquirrel]

I hate DLC and miss expansions immensely

 

[exar333]

I hate DLC and miss expansions immensely

This.

 

[SMOGZINN]

On the flip side, DLC has a bad habit of reducing first day sales. I know people who will not buy a game at release with the knowledge that at some point in the future a "complete" edition that includes all DLC will come out at the same or lower price point. Fallout 3 and Dragon Age are examples. Even i'm getting to the point where its not in my best interest to buy a game immediately. Since many games are developed with first day sales in mind, this could impact which projects get green lighted in the future. Developers know that under most circumstances they are going to move the most units in the first month of release with diminishing returns through the life of the product.

I do this, I almost never buy a game when it is initially released anymore. I wait a few months and get the 'gold' or GOTY edition, unless the DLC doesn't seem all that great, then I just get the game for 1/5 the price on a Steam sell if at all.

 

[Maximilian]

So, years ago we had expansion packs for PC games. These packs used the same game engine and merely added assets, e.g. extra levels/missions, weapons and characters. I'm thinking of things like the Half-Life 2 episodes, Doom 3 expansion, HL1 expansions, WC3 expansion, etc. They were fairly commonplace and usually took 12-18 months of development to pump out.

Today, expansion packs have been split into DLC and entirely new games. Looking at Modern Warfare 1 and Modern Warfare 2, what is so vastly different that could not have been released in an expansion pack? These games are taking 18-24 months to pump out, so basically a big expansion pack. Except with a $59.99 price instead of $29.99.

Can anyone come up with an answer better than merely money-grabbing?

Well old expansion packs used to limit the potential sales by requiring people to already own the original game, with the whole new game approach that isnt a problem. Fallout new vegas, crysis warhead and even the older GTA vice city/san andreas all couldve been expansion packs but that would have limited their sales and success.

 

[imaheadcase]

Another reason not mentioned is Retail space. They know distribution for a expansion pack costs a lot, with the influx of so many games (good or bad) retailers are more picky than ever to sell only certain games. I remember when wal-mart actually had a huge selection of PC games. Now the only games you see are pretty much new releases only, and popular sellers only.

 

[Dumac]

DLC provides a much higher profit:effort ratio.

Fuck, I hate DLC so much.