Voting with your wallet is exactly the right move to make. It's how the system is supposed to work.

1 hour ago, Darth Sanguis said:

They removed microtransactions. No more P2W.

Too little too late. Micro transactions should have never even been an idea in their tiny little Neanderthal brains. It’s obvious to me that Ben is running EA.

1 hour ago, Darth Sanguis said:

They removed microtransactions. No more P2W.

25 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

You don't have to weep for them, just don't be a mindless drone whinging on about micropays while expecting AAA standards.

I'm going too far? The **** did I do? Explain to you how the gaming market works? Rude.

They're a business that dishes out cash for development costs to make money. Someone's gotta pay, this system has proven most effective. Doesn't mean I like it, but I also don't like the idea of $120 games.

If you hate microtransactions so much you have 2 choices:

1.) come up with a better way for publishers to get paid for multi-million dollar investments

2.) Stop gaming.

Also, I apologize if I came off snippy.

I have a lot of love for Battlefront. I spent so many hours on the first 2 games. I want to relive those battles... I just want to do so without paying $60 + however many loot boxes I need to unlock everything. I think it was around $2100.

4 minutes ago, Warlord Zepnick said:

There is no doubt in my mind that the intent behind the EA statement is to mislead the public as to the state of the progression system. It is highly disingenuous to say that "all progression will be earned through gameplay". Clearly, it's only temporary as crystals will be introduced at a later time. People online are already making the quantum leap to say that EA is only going to allow us to buy cosmetics in the future with said in game currency. Hopefully the internet stays vigilant because we really need to send EA a message by refraining from purchasing until we see concrete changes.

3 minutes ago, ninclouse2000 said:

I cancelled my preorder and won’t be buying this. EA is a terrible company and I hope the game bombs. Disney needs to give the license to another game company.

Just now, ninclouse2000 said:

Too little too late. Micro transactions should have never even been an idea in their tiny little Neanderthal brains. It’s obvious to me that Ben is running EA.

I mean, I wish you well in your endeavors to stop a change that's been coming for a long time, but unless you have a better way for them to make money, I very seriously doubt you'll stop EA or Ubisoft from continuing to do this..



The real irony here, the part that makes me chuckle, is that table top gamers, and trading card gamers are fighting this so hard....


If Armada was a video game, there would be murders.... "the core game is $90 and only includes 3 ships?!" "OH I HAVE TO BUY THE OTHER SHIPS TO PLAY?!"

Destiny players "DUDE THESE MICRO PAYS ARE BS!"



Sorry if I'm just rolling my eyes at this colossal wave of nerd rage that makes 0 sense.

If they just released the starfighter gameplay as a $30 game I would have bought it instantly. I don’t care for the style of most modern 1st and third person shooters.

50 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

Here's the issue.

Microtransactions are the result of corporate greed as much as they are an evolving gaming market.

First and foremost is the cost of development. The cost to make a game has skyrocketed since the 2000s. Graphics, programming, marketing, connectivity, everything is much more complicated. Yet the price point of a video game hasn't changed since the games looked like this:


Now games are being released at the same cost but have mush higher standards and require a ton more work to produce:



So as hurt as everyone is about micropays, here's some bad freaking news. They're the way of the future. Companies like EA have thrived because it's a system the WORKS. They can dish out high dev costs, dev costs that couldn't be paid off by a standard "59.99" pricepoint because of this system.

I hate to say this, because it's definitely aggro, but if you're someone who's been complacent with the $59 pricepoint, you're part of the problem. As much as EA is a "monster" they are a result of the environment they're striving to profit from.

I don't have a dog in this race as I don't have a system that could play BF2. I've just been watching from the sidelines with my popcorn.

That in mind: my responses would be that microtransactions seem to have been carried over from the mobile gaming model where games are free up front but you pay for shortcuts. That's fine, but don't apply it to a full price AAA game. Other developers manage not to.

They were disingenuous about how they modified the progression, in response to the bad publicity. Having seen calculations tat it takes two full days of play (no sleep or eating) to unlock Darth Vader (for example), EA then reduced the cost of character unlocks by 75%. Good. Except that they also reduced the rewards earnt from campaign mode by 75% at the same time! Net result is the same.

This slow unlocking, coupled with the very stark difference between having a few star cards equipped or not (there are videos comparing this) mean that they were effectively promoting pay-to-win. They may have paused this for now, but that's temporary.

Like I said, I'm not buying in anyway, but I've been appalled by EA's behaviour. It actually makes me feel much better about not being able to play if I wanted to.

Just now, Church14 said:

If they just released the starfighter gameplay as a $30 game I would have bought it instantly. I don’t care for the style of most modern 1st and third person shooters.

They need to do a modernization of X-wing vs tie fighter. Just reskin, update the engine, set up better online services and boom, sold.

FFG removed microtransactions.

We now have to play 3000000000000 armada games to unlock wave 7.

Just now, ovinomanc3r said:

FFG removed microtransactions.

We now have to play 3000000000000 armada games to unlock wave 7.

THAT'S why it's been delayed so goddamn long! lol

4 minutes ago, ManInTheBox said:

oupled with the very stark difference between having a few star cards equipped or not (there are videos comparing this) mean that they were effectively promoting pay-to-win.

been actively playing for 3 days straight.... they really don't make that big a difference. really really...

9 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

I mean, I wish you well in your endeavors to stop a change that's been coming for a long time, but unless you have a better way for them to make money, I very seriously doubt you'll stop EA or Ubisoft from continuing to do this..



The real irony here, the part that makes me chuckle, is that table top gamers, and trading card gamers are fighting this so hard....


If Armada was a video game, there would be murders.... "the core game is $90 and only includes 3 ships?!" "OH I HAVE TO BUY THE OTHER SHIPS TO PLAY?!"

Destiny players "DUDE THESE MICRO PAYS ARE BS!"



Sorry if I'm just rolling my eyes at this colossal wave of nerd rage that makes 0 sense.

Eh... with tabletop we know what we’re getting into with Expansions. The precedent has been there for decades. No one went into Warhammer thinking they were getting everything in one box.

With video Games, micro transactions are new. Gamers are used to all in one transactions. Maybe one or two big expansions for popular games.

If the first 2 Battlefront Games had had micro transactions, you wouldn’t be hearing anything. If this was a new property, You wouldn’t be hearing anything. It’s all about the precedents.

I wonder how many units they sold.

I mean, its very hard to get actual development costs off of producers. One of the few marks we have is Bungie's budget for Destiny , which was $140mil for development.

It seems to be that most "AAA" developers aim for 1.2-1.5mil units sold to "pay" for their development costs of games...

I mean, I dare say that something like BF2 would have mostly sold that in Pre-orders...

Microtransactions have to be just profit gravy at that point.

Just now, Drasnighta said:

I wonder how many units they sold.

I mean, its very hard to get actual development costs off of producers. One of the few marks we have is Bungie's budget for Destiny , which was $140mil for development.

It seems to be that most "AAA" developers aim for 1.2-1.5mil units sold to "pay" for their development costs of games...

I mean, I dare say that something like BF2 would have mostly sold that in Pre-orders...

Microtransactions have to be just profit gravy at that point.

profit and paying for the "free" dlc. Halo 5 did the same thing, worked out great.

Just now, Darth Sanguis said:

been actively playing for 3 days straight.... they really don't make that big a difference. really really...

Your hands on experience trumps my observed anecdote. I don't know enough about the game or mechanics to anything further than what I've picked up second hand.

Oh, the other sh1tty thing they did: removed the "refund" button for digital pre-orders when people started to cancel en masse.

You could still get your refund, but you now had to call up a telephone number and wait in a queue to speak to someone.

1 minute ago, ManInTheBox said:

Your hands on experience trumps my observed anecdote. I don't know enough about the game or mechanics to anything further than what I've picked up second hand.

if every match was 1v1 with no objectives you'd notice, but the size of the arena and the way objectives work, and how the point system allows even less good players to unlock more powerful stuff... it really levels out.

Just now, ManInTheBox said:

Oh, the other sh1tty thing they did: removed the "refund" button for digital pre-orders when people started to cancel en masse.

You could still get your refund, but you now had to call up a telephone number and wait in a queue to speak to someone.

damage control lol

Let's be real here. The real reason people are pissed is because it's Star Wars. It's also why the game is getting so much publicity. EA is putting up massive pay walls to unlock more content. They can get away with it in other games because it's not Star Wars. But when you put Vader behind 60k, now 15k, credits and you can only earn 200-300 credits per game, you're going to get called on it because Vader is a symbol of Star Wars. Someone posted a screenshot of the "Hero" game play where everyone plays a hero. They weren't able to play because the characters he unlocked were taken and the others were locked behind the credit wall.

EA dropped the ball on BF1, even though I do think it was fun. Now they are trying to milk BF2. People grew up playing the OG BF and BF2 so they have a emotional investment in the BF series already.

Bottom line. You don't **** with Star Wars content like this.

4 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

But when you put Vader behind 60k, now 15k, credits and you can only earn 200-300 credits per game, you're going to get called on it because Vader is a symbol of Star Wars.

Beat the campaign cashed in my rewards and had 16,000 credits to unlock whatever I wanted....

I didn't try vader cause I hate hero battles, and never use the heroes with glowsticks in a game centered around guns.... but he's 15,000 to unlock and I had enough after roughly 6 hours in the Single Player....

This is why I have such an issue with this whole "I SUGGEST YOU DON'T BUY THEIR BLAH BLAH BLAH" crap. How much of it is in perspective? The people shouting this haven't played them game. They don't have 1st hand experience. If the campaign alone let's me unlock vader, and I haven't even begun to touch all the arcade rewards.... how is this an issue... yeah the PvP matches may take you a while to grind out 15,000 on, but there's rewards for that too....

Half truths can work both ways...

39 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

They need to do a modernization of X-wing vs tie fighter. Just reskin, update the engine, set up better online services and boom, sold.

They could and should do this with soooooo many games.

10 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

Beat the campaign cashed in my rewards and had 16,000 credits to unlock whatever I wanted....

I didn't try vader cause I hate hero battles, and never use the heroes with glowsticks in a game centered around guns.... but he's 15,000 to unlock and I had enough after roughly 6 hours in the Single Player....

This is why I have such an issue with this whole "I SUGGEST YOU DON'T BUY THEIR BLAH BLAH BLAH" crap. How much of it is in perspective? The people shouting this haven't played them game. They don't have 1st hand experience. If the campaign alone let's me unlock vader, and I haven't even begun to touch all the arcade rewards.... how is this an issue... yeah the PvP matches may take you a while to grind out 15,000 on, but there's rewards for that too....

Half truths can work both ways...

Are you able to earn 16k credits every time you play the campaign? From my understanding, there is a credit cap on non-pvp games so you can't actually grind your way to 15k credits. Without the cap, this wouldn't be an issue.

But my point is, EA is ******* with Star Wars which has touched a lot of peoples lives. This is why they are catching heat. Micro transactions were the trigger.

1 minute ago, Megatronrex said:

They could and should do this with soooooo many games.

The Homeworld remaster was amazing.

I'd love to see the same with Tie Fighter.

Just now, Undeadguy said:

Are you able to earn 16k credits every time you play the campaign? From my understanding, there is a credit cap on non-pvp games so you can't actually grind your way to 15k credits. Without the cap, this wouldn't be an issue.

They have a "challenge/locate hidden items" system under the career tab. There are tons of little challenges that have 250-500-1000 credit rewards that you unlock along side playing them. Don't get me wrong, unlocking all the heroes may take some time, but I do not think these reports are entirely accurate, especially after EA dropped the costs. That's where the bulk of my credits came from. Since I started playing I must have spent at least 3 times the price to unlock vader on starship card packs alone.

(I'm not sure if you get 16 k each time, haven't tried playing it through twice yet)

I've had the game for 3 days....

I think a lot of this is overblown or not fully understood because the people reporting are so pissed that "it's start wars" they haven't played it to find out.

If EA were smart, they'd just unlock all the highest tiers for all Star Cards for everyone in addition to heroes and villains. If they continue down this path, then their image will be irreparably damaged as this is the Star Wars brand we are dealing with. Hopefully they lose the right to make additional Star Wars games in the future if they do not clean their act up.