9 Crippling Problems With The Gaming Industry’s Future

1. Micro-Transactions In Full Price Games

Micro-transactions can be good when they are used correctly, for instance, in free-to-play games. You download the game for free and the developer makes their money back by offering you access to items or upgrades in return for a few pence. Over the last few years the gaming audience has embraced micro-transactions when they are done right, and people don't mind dropping a grand total of a few pounds/dollars over the amount of time they'll play the game. What gamers do mind is when they have paid £45/$60 for a big-budget game and it then that title keeps demanding money from them. Look at Forza 5 on the Xbox One, it was one of the biggest name launch games for the new console and pushes the boundaries in terms of hyper-realistic graphics and racing simulation, but it is swimming with screens that are asking you to pump further funds into the game. For instance, you earn currency in the game which you use to unlock cars just like every other racing game in the last ten years, but below the value of each car there is a 'Token value' which is how much it would cost you in purchasable tokens. It's as if the game is reminding you that you don't have to grind for that Audi RS8 you're lusting over, you can just pay something out of your real bank account and it'll be yours in seconds. Or look at the first major console game to embrace micro-transactions, the much-derided Dead Space 3. EA forced upon developer Visceral the ability to pay for parts to upgrade your weapons. Sure, in the game you could send a little scout bot off to scuttle away and look for upgrade components for you, but it would frequently come up short on certain supplies the game would require to unlock the most powerful upgrades. So unless you wanted to restrict your playthrough to a couple of weapons, there was an inevitability that at some point you might have to pay for something with real money. It didn't stop you finishing the game if you didn't buy any upgrades, but it certainly made some of the latter stages much harder. No one would have batted an eyelid if either of these games were released as free to play and were supported by micro-transactions, or if they were released for reduced prices owing to that expected element, but by attempting to squeeze further money out of peoples' affiliation to a particular franchise, it comes across as far too greedy and off-putting for both fans and newcomers to the games, and the medium itself. What do you guys think? Does something just feel a bit off with gaming at the minute, or are their good sides to some of these points? Let us know in the comments!