Embattled Star Wars: Battlefront II Microtransaction System Taken Offline - MMORPG.com News

SBFord

Embattled Star Wars: Battlefront II Microtransaction System Taken Offline - MMORPG.com News

It appears that big changes are coming to Star Wars: Battlefront II after a very rough week in the press and its community surrounding the loot box and microtransaction systems. In a move signalling potential change, it seems that microtransactions have been removed from the game. You can no longer purchase the premium currency called Crystals. Both PlayStation Network and the PC version have had the ability to buy Crystals removed completely & in game for XBox One they are out as well.

Read the full story here

Forgrimm

What a shitshow.

jitter77

at least they are making changes for the positive

MadFrenchie

The plot thickens.

BruceYee

It took a big company like EA to bring loot boxes into the spotlight which is good I guess.
Hopefully this leads to the end of them in every game and the ability the buy stuff without losing to RNG.

Albatroes

BruceYee said:

It took a big company like EA to bring loot boxes into the spotlight which is good I guess.

Hopefully this leads to the end of them in every game and the ability the buy stuff without losing to RNG.

This definitely wont be the end of loot boxes, but hopefully it'll make companies wanting money upfront to think twice before trying to pull your wallet out for you.

MadFrenchie

It's good on consumers for pressuring the entity into rethinking such a predatory system.

Ridrith

Can I just say... Good! Fuck your shady business practices, EA!

rodarin

they gambled and lost. NO harm no foul they will still sell a bazillion copies and there WILL be loot boxes they just wont have content or characters locked in them. But I suspect after this all dies down they will introduce 'special' characters in them. And there will be a few whimpers but not like we see now.

They have seen a lot of stupidity over the past year or so from gamers so they took a shot who can blame them? I mean you have people spending thousands and thousands for jpegs, and now not even jpegs but promises, then you have people ponying up more for a paid expansion to a game not even released than the game itself cost. And you have the most wanted MMOs of the future being out and out p2w schemes all getting supported (and then some) in kick starter campaigns.

I am shocked they caved, but I havent followed it all that closely. I guess some of the streamers they have in their pocket complained and it started an avalanche.

Dauzqul

Let's hope that this lesson will work for future games. So sick of this greedy BS. I don't mind playing 60 for the game (or even 80+ for a CE), but it's got to end there. I can see paying a monthly fee for a MMO with constant updates, but NOT FOR A SMALL FPS.

Lame.

TalulaRose

It will be repriced and back for Christmas.

Siveria

jitter77 said:

at least they are making changes for the positive

This is EA, so take it with a grain of salt, if anything they'd make it worse.

TheDarkrayne

Probably won't happen but... If they come back and say you have to pay for the upcoming DLC instead, how would everyone feel about that?

MadFrenchie

TheDarkrayne said:

Probably won't happen but... If they come back and say you have to pay for the upcoming DLC instead, how would everyone feel about that?

How I felt about map packs in BF4- I'd buy them if the maps looked fun, pass if they didn't.  That really only works when players can host dedicated servers, though.

Daranar

Gross. This is from the Developer, "This means that the option to purchase crystals in the game is now offline, and all progression will be earned through gameplay. The ability to purchase crystals in-game will become available at a later date, only after we’ve made changes to the game."

Translation, we can't weather this PR storm at launch, so once the hype and swirl around our games dies down a bit, we will re-implement the gamble to win mechanism and collect our margins and less people will care and we can sort of save face. He claims to have heard the players 'loud and clear' but obviously not. This just ensures that the game will be even and fun for the first month until everyone can buy their success.

MikeB

My hope is they go and overhaul the entire progression system to be sidegrade based. This whole thing would have been much more tolerable if the Star Cards weren't actually straight up upgrades. It's also better game design. Having to make tradeoffs is much more interesting. I don't think full cosmetic only loot boxes are in the cards, unless Disney gives DICE some creative leeway. We'll see.

LackingMMO

So I just saw on another site that ea loot boxes are being investigated in I think Belgium and if they are found to be gambling they have to pay a large fine. I'm wondering if this shutdown has anything to do with the investigation instead of "hey we hear you so we will change"

Talonsin

Hit them in the wallet and get the investors upset and stuff changes so fast you'd think there was magic involved.

TheDarkrayne

LackingMMO said:

So I just saw on another site that ea loot boxes are being investigated in I think Belgium and if they are found to be gambling they have to pay a large fine. I'm wondering if this shutdown has anything to do with the investigation instead of "hey we hear you so we will change"

It could escalate to something worse than that with Disney being involved. I'm sure Disney don't want gambling attached to their 'family friendly' image in a teen rated game.

MikeB

Torval said:

MikeB said:

My hope is they go and overhaul the entire progression system to be sidegrade based. This whole thing would have been much more tolerable if the Star Cards weren't actually straight up upgrades. It's also better game design. Having to make tradeoffs is much more interesting. I don't think full cosmetic only loot boxes are in the cards, unless Disney gives DICE some creative leeway. We'll see.

Do you think they may return to map packs? I mean return to the more standard method of selling DLC via map packs.

I sure hope not.

MadFrenchie

MikeB said:

My hope is they go and overhaul the entire progression system to be sidegrade based. This whole thing would have been much more tolerable if the Star Cards weren't actually straight up upgrades. It's also better game design. Having to make tradeoffs is much more interesting. I don't think full cosmetic only loot boxes are in the cards, unless Disney gives DICE some creative leeway. We'll see.

So much this.  Having tradeoffs would've made this whole thing a negligible microtransaction system that only opened up wider variety instead of upgrades through buying lootboxes.

Not sure why EA thought giving out straight upgrades as a progression system for competitive multiplayer experiences was ever a good idea anyways.

aliven

So after people spend shitton of money to have edge on the start now they will keep that edge because they fucked up progression in game.

Bravo.

BruceYee said:

It took a big company like EA to bring loot boxes into the spotlight which is good I guess.
Hopefully this leads to the end of them in every game and the ability the buy stuff without losing to RNG.

Actually, Overwatch brought the lootboxes into the big stage. 

TheDarkrayne

aliven said:

So after people spend shitton of money to have edge on the start now they will keep that edge because they fucked up progression in game.

Bravo.

BruceYee said:

It took a big company like EA to bring loot boxes into the spotlight which is good I guess.
Hopefully this leads to the end of them in every game and the ability the buy stuff without losing to RNG.

Actually, Overwatch brought the lootboxes into the big stage. 

Team Fortress 2 brought them to the west originally. Is it safe to say Overwatch is kind of a Team Fortress clone? I sort of think it is.

Definitely very very heavily influenced by TF2:

"blatant ripoff of the game modes; control, king of the hill, and especially payload maps, and the heroes; Tracer vs. Scout, Pharah vs. Soldier, Junkrat vs. Demoman, Zarya vs. Heavy, Torbjörn vs. Engineer, Mercy vs. Medic, Widowmaker vs. Sniper - only Pyro and Spy weren’t represented closely, although one could argue that Mei is Overwatch’s Pyro and Reaper its Spy."

- From some reddit post someone made

Octagon7711

And a great rejoicing was heard throughout the land when micro-transactions removed.
Mischief managed!

ciely

disabled temporarily, they will return to haunt us, never forget 677k downvotes! avoid EA at all times! https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsBattlefront/comments/7cff0b/seriously_i_paid_80_to_have_vader_locked/dppum98/

IceAge

TheDarkrayne said:

aliven said:

So after people spend shitton of money to have edge on the start now they will keep that edge because they fucked up progression in game.

Bravo.

BruceYee said:

It took a big company like EA to bring loot boxes into the spotlight which is good I guess.

Hopefully this leads to the end of them in every game and the ability the buy stuff without losing to RNG.

Actually, Overwatch brought the lootboxes into the big stage. 

Team Fortress 2 brought them to the west originally. Is it safe to say Overwatch is kind of a Team Fortress clone? I sort of think it is.

Definitely very very heavily influenced by TF2:

"blatant ripoff of the game modes; control, king of the hill, and especially payload maps, and the heroes; Tracer vs. Scout, Pharah vs. Soldier, Junkrat vs. Demoman, Zarya vs. Heavy, Torbjörn vs. Engineer, Mercy vs. Medic, Widowmaker vs. Sniper - only Pyro and Spy weren’t represented closely, although one could argue that Mei is Overwatch’s Pyro and Reaper its Spy."

- From some reddit post someone made

...and yet , Blizzard dev's has clearly said that Overwatch was influenced , along other games , by TF2. So they never denied that they didn't ...copy things from other games, including TF2.

Everyone should watch this :