The DLC Scam

The first paid DLC ("downloadable content") I heard of was the infamous Horse Armor for Bethesda's The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. It cost $2.50 and all it did was, as the name says, put armor on your horse. It was purely cosmetic. My reaction was the same as most of the other gamers: Who would pay for that crap?

Plenty of people, as it turns out. And thus the DLC revolution began. Now you nearly never see a game released that doesn't have some paid add-on content released along with it. Why are people buying this stuff?

First of all, the term "DLC" is all wrong. I've been able to download content for PC games for ages, in the forms of patches and mods. But that's not DLC, you see, because DLC you have to pay for. They should call it pay-to-unlock content, because it's not even "downloadable" most of the time. They just put the DLC on the disc and you have to pay to unlock it. Which of course means that the extra content is actually a part of the finished game! They just decided to lock it and charge extra for it before they shipped the game out.

Naming conventions aside, I'm not a fan of DLC because of the way most of it integrates into games. A recent game, Mass Effect 2, has DLC that adds a new character to the game. The DLC integrates itself into the middle of the storyline; it's not a continuation of the story. Since I had already finished the game, I had no use for such DLC. If instead I was a new player, I wouldn't want to immediately pay extra to add on to the game I just bought. I would be more concerned with the game being worth what I paid in the first place. I guess it's aimed at people who are halfway through the game? I don't know. Fallout 3 DLC was the same way, I had already finished the game and was disappointed by the ending before any of it even came out.

DLC also needs to be worth the cost. Modern Warfare 2's DLC is a huge disappointment in this area. $15 for 5 maps, only 3 of which are new; the other 2 are recycled from the first Modern Warfare game. Luckily there are some great developers out there who still release stuff like new maps for free.

The only DLC that makes sense to me is stuff like the music store in the Rock Band series. It doesn't matter if you're a beginner, an expert, or even if you have Rock Band 1, 2, or both. If you like a song, you can pay 2 bucks to be able to play it. When Rock Band 3 comes out, I'll be able to play it still. And it's the only DLC I have ever purchased so far.

You know what I like? Expansion packs. I buy the crap out of expansion packs. They have a clear purpose and a clear audience: they are for people who have finished the base game, because they take place after the base game. None of this "pay $5 to add a brand new level 10 mission to the game! Oh, you're level 50 already? Time to restart to see this new stuff! After you pay, of course!"