8th Ed. Total Warhammer: Launch April 28th, Chaos as pre-order DLC

[airjamy]

A thing people forget about SOME DLC, is that it wasn't meant to be included in the first place.

Game developers often plan for ONE release, but because the different departments might get ahead of schedule or even finish
up way to early. Instead of those departments being idle, and in some cases not paid, they are assigned the task of creating extra content.

As the company has to put in extra hours to make that content a part of the game, it also increases the production cost,
as the hours spend more often than not exceed those paid for by the original budget.
Meaning = they have to charge something extra.

My take is that WoC wasn't meant to be playable this time around, but rather an in-game enemy with fewer and more centralized units than the other armies.(we were told 4 armies would be playable)
CA probably realized that they were able to get them ready for gameplay, and decided to go for it and use it as an advantage and pre-purchase carrot.

Regarding the extra cost: nobody has been shafted. in fact CA has chosen the user-friendly approach
If you pre-purchase, you get more than you originally bargained for. FREE. You pay the same for more.
If you dont, well you still have the option to purchase it later, so you are not forced to do anything because of a time constraint.

"But Phat, if you dont pay more when pre-ordering, how do they cover their costs with no price increase?"
Like this:
1. A bunch of WoC players (and fans) are gonna chip in now = Increased sales

2 Pre-ordering gives the advantage of getting money earlier than expected, which means they can be re-invested faster
and used to improve the business and even marketing for the original product (also increased sales)

(Example: A man tells you:" I will either give you 1 million dollars today, or 2 million dollars in a year."
If you chose the 1 million dollars you are also saying: "I think I can make 1 million dollars into more than 2 million dollars in a year"
If you chose the 2 million dollars you are saying "I CANT make 1 million into more than 2 million dollars in a year"
Most businesses will go for the early investment, because money RIGHT now is golden for a busy company with plans.

3. They know their market. A lot of players dont pre-order even with content, as they are waiting for the initial reviews before investing.
They rather pay more later, than pay less now and take the risk of a spending money on a poor game.
Total war has its sceptics for various reasons, so this is a very viable consideration.


Regarding the trailer, it is probably an in-game cinematic which got used for this instead.

CA is the kind of company who pay a LOT of attention to what their customers is expecting, so blaming them
for being DLC milkers like other companies might be a little of mark.

I wholly disagree with this, as i feel that it makes for very bad customer behaviour. Pre ordering should never be something you should do, do not give your money to someone if you do not know what you are buying. This is expecially true of a company with such a mired reputation as CA, who does not remember the terrible condition RTW 2 shipped in (broken models, the AI not being able to land in their ships, broken textures, more AI problems). As long as we as consumers keep rewarding developers by giving them money hand over fist before we have seen the goods, they have no incentive at all to improve their behaviour! I want a game, especially the game i have been dreaming of for years and years and years, to be good when i first play it. I dont want the stuff to be broken, and it will be if you keep buying before any reviews are out!

Having day one DLC is an even worse idea, i am paying for the time invested in the game by the developers, and if they invest time in DLC that they could have also invested in the main game, i feel screwed over as my experience is possibly worse due to their investment in the DLC! This is even worse in this case, as they already have confirmed day one DLC 5 months in advance, you are not going to tell me that the team building the game would have done nothing for the main game 5 months in advance, so i feel completely justified in the statement that the main game will very likely be worse due to time invested in the DLC! I think people should hold off on pre ordering, especially with companies with bad reputations such as CA. Do not reward them for trying to trick you into pre ordering, do not sign contracts you do not know the contents of, do not think that day one DLC is a good idea because it directly detracts from the main game.

I so hope this will be good, but i also so hope they get their business model straight.