Why does dlc cost money

It has tanks. July 13, March 1, August 20, All rights reserved. Login Form. We also got our gaming news from magazines, talked to our friends on the phone about what we read, and walked 15 miles to school through the snow, uphill both ways. Wild times. Later, there came to be expansion packs. For a charge that is typically less than the price of a full game, expansions can inject new storylines, quests, playable characters, accessories, maps, sometimes even entire worlds to explore.

These are meaningful enhancements to the original game, whether adding hours of gameplay or increasing replayability with more variety. Expansions update the game at a modest cost, which has always been and continues to be a great way to extend its life until a sequel arrives.

Being a person who grew up in an era where a game purchase meant getting an actual game, or at least the equivalent of one, almost any other form of paid DLC just looks like unnecessary or downright useless to me.

For now I'll ignore the fact that everybody who bought L4D was ripped off by paying for content that they assumed would come free. I think Microsoft's excuse of bandwidth isn't really viable. Microsoft wants money, plain and simple. Heck, not a lot of recent PC games have extra downloadable content. Aside from Valve, who else makes new content as free downloads for the PC, if at all? Stop kidding yourselves into thinking that PC games give content for free.

They usually don't get any new content at all. Most publishers, especially on consoles but not limited to, see DLC as a way to make extra money more than to keep the player base up. When it comes to something bigger like a full expansion pack think Shivering Isles for ESIV: Oblivion versus say Knights of the Nine for ESIV: Oblivion then usually PC gamers get charged as well and in accordance with the normal price of a PC game its usually slightly cheaper than the console version but even then a lot of companys include it for free with there game for the same reasons as valve put out the Surival Pack for free.

Its not just valve that does it there is an "indie" game called Iron Grip: Warlord which is essentially a co-op horde-style FPS set in here own universe and they added a new expansion pack Winter Assault I beleive or something similer for free as a way of keeping the players coming back so they are more likely to buy and know about there next project and as a way to make sure new players know about there game.

Valve has tried to continue this same attitude on consoles but as a far as I know Microsoft made them charge for the new content to pay for bandwith and to keep the status quo though it is cheaper than similer DLC it seems. PC gamers are spoonfed whiney babies which will bitch if something isn't free or low cost.

Developers are willing to pay for the bandwidth and distribution of DLC something they have a choice on on the they can pay out their own cash host every thing do every thing and users get the DLC for free on xbox live, or the users can foot that bill thus ensuring they pay money for that DLC.

Valve wants it to be free. Microsoft doesn't.