Bungie defends Destiny: The Taken King's £/$40 price tag (Eurogamer)

Einchy

semen stains the mountaintops
33 years old... not most but a lot of game I played was worst or small than VoG and I can make a big list of < 1 hour retail games (not all are bad games btw).

Destiny's VoG was really a unique experience for me... love it.

Your mind would be blown away if you played any of WoW's raids.
 

border

Member
I find it hysterical that Luke Smith had to answer questions with answers like these. Back in the 1up days he would've been the one going on a rant of what bullshit this is. Money is money though, gotta do what you gotta do for a paycheck.

I can almost guarantee you that 1Up era Luke Smith paid $80 for every WoW Collector's Edition expansion, all of which contained exclusive cosmetic items and did not include the base game. I don't know why people remember him as this huge enemy of premium collector's editions.
 

Primus

Member
I know with Destiny 2 that I will just wait for the year one content to cut back on price.

And I think this is the biggest problem right now. I spent $90 on the Digital Guardian Edition 9 months ago, and have gotten just under 30 hours worth of gameplay from it. Now that I know that in 2016, I'll be able to get all of the 2015-2016 content cheaper and be able to play it in one chunk instead of via drip-feed, why should I even care about TTK?

Bungie is essentially telling people, "don't buy our game now, wait a year for the collection edition". That ain't a winning sales proposition.

EDIT: Especially considering how crowded for gaming the end of this year is. I'm already spending $120 on Fallout 4 and Just Cause 3 guaranteed.
 

Vire

Member
I don't understand why Luke wouldn't just say business decisions aren't made by him, he's a designer for the raids... you think actually he's involved in setting the price point of the expansion. Instead he's a snarky ass about it... I mean that's his style usually, but I don't think you joke around when it comes to the money and sales part of your game.
 

piratethingy

Self professed bad raider
You are right that Destiny has limited content (especialy story missions) compared with more established MMOs and that everyone starts on the same area. We can still speculate why this happened. I guess that Bungie wanted a simpler MMO design, easy to play by new people to the genre (console gamers), with light use of MMO and rpg mechanics with solid shooting (Cod and Halo gamers), a game basically to be appealing to console shooter fans.

We can say that Destiny is the Call of Duty of MMOs, easy to play and get hooked and that it’s designed for players that like to do the same things again and again, without caring for background story or lore or character progression (except damage upgrades)…

This post reminds me that the latest CoD has better and more loot than Destiny.
 
Eurogamer: Just not the emotes.

Luke Smith: It doesn't because they come with the Collector's Edition.

Eurogamer: Final question on prices -

Luke Smith: Is it also the final question on the emotes?

Eurogamer: I'm not going to mention them again. I can't get them.

Luke Smith: But you can if you buy the Collector's Edition.

Eurogamer: I'm not going to buy the game and the two DLCs all over again.

Luke Smith: Okay, but first I want to poke at you on this a little bit.

Eurogamer: Poke at me?

Luke Smith: You're feeling anxious because you want this exclusive content but you don't know yet how much you want it. The notion of spending this money is making you anxious, I can see it -

Eurogamer: I do want them. I would buy them -

Luke Smith: If I fired up a video right now and showed you the emotes you would throw money at the screen.

Thanks, Luke. Feeling great about being part of the Destiny community. Feeling great about chasing down a small loot table and taking an interest - for the first time in my gaming life - in cosmetic additions. Feeling great about sticking with the game through those really rough first three months.

They have the numbers and research. They know how many people left the game, and what they said when they did. They know that at least hundreds of thousands of people left the game with a sour taste in their mouth because of the poor game balance, high grind and pointless repetition right up until the release of really, the first DLC. But even more realistically, the second.

The game is *so much fun* these days. Taking down a Wolves event while a random public event a few meters away is happening with 5-6 players is hilarious madness. Then dropping into a Prison of Elders to finish off your play session - it all works now. But don't they know they're still on thin ice? Do they really not know?

Do they really - with all the data they get about who leaves and who stays - think we're going to be doing the proselytising to our friends, to help grow the player base, if they're not going to make it easy for us?

Why... why would I encourage my friends to come back to Destiny? Surely they want to make it easy for me.
 

Squire

Banned
I'm not a huge Jeff fan, but he is totally on point with this

"Think about how fucking profoundly disappointing Destiny is."

Yep. It sold and people play it, but when you consider the full context of Destiny, from the leak to the reveal to the hype to the faith people had in Bungie coming off Halo to the final release? Most dissappintijg launch of the generation so far, by far. Like, moreso than games launching broken. I actually think Vinny bringing up MCC at the end there is funny. 343 fucked up, but the stakes were on such a smaller scale. It really doesn't even compare.
 

Pop

Member
The lack of content was evident from Day 1. Everything is a rehash of everything else. Oh a different skin of the same gun over and over again, how original. Yeah I played for the first months then soon realized just how shallow the game was. Like it was gutted and resold as dlc later.
 

Genis94

Neo Member
This has to be one of the most disgusting business practices I have seen in the industry. I'm really curious to see how the fans try to defend this, assuming any of them do.
 

Yaari

Member
Destiny taught he a very valuable 90$ lesson that I should never again pre-order a Season Pass with a game.

I had my fun with Destiny but it was very underwhelming. I never even bothered with any of their expansions, and the Season Pass was wasted on me.

Screw their expansion. And this guy knows just how to defend every questionable decision they made, lol.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Yeah and a result they're going to get a bunch of bitter people buying the $40 edition instead of a $60 one - if that. Some people won't buy it at all, and some people will buy the $80 one regardless. It's needlessly irritating a lot of people, though. Bad press for poor management of freaking bundlings. Makes no sense.
The thing is, for all the complaining, I bet the retention rate on Reddit and DestinyGAF is going to be high. It's like any MMO, where you think about the prospect of abandoning your 500+ hour characters and you realize that you feel more comfortable continuing with the game than leaving it.

Johnny come lately buyers getting the game on the cheap should NEVER be given content that is locked away from existing players.

There getting the game on the cheap. That is their reward for waiting. Exclusive content should never be offered without letting existing players get it. Even if they charge a couple bucks to existing players. It's better than making them rebuy the game.
Maybe they're afraid people will buy a used copy of Destiny for 10 bucks and then just buy the CE DLC? I have no idea what they're thinking.
 
You're meant to just buy the TTK by itself. The CE is meant to convince people who, by virtue of not buying Destiny in year 1, have shown little interest in the game. They're assuming that everyone who is committed to Destiny is going to buy TTK anyway, whether or not they get some emotes.

Deej and Luke Smith also made it clear that they think that stuff is worth 40 dollars, and it's up to you to decide if you want to pay that.

While I agree in principle what you're saying, it doesn't match up with how they are marketing these "Extras". If I understand it correctly the CE with the Extras are offered in limited quantities and at an increased price. Those two things don't seem likely to entice new players who have already passed on the game. The Legendary Edition seems poised to do that by being available in large quantities, providing the past and new content in one package, and going for $60.

I'm honestly not sure who the CE is marketed towards, and I am even more surprised that it is selling. Although reports of it selling out would be less impressive if they didn't make many in the first place.
 

BigDug13

Member
This has to be one of the most disgusting business practices I have seen in the industry. I'm really curious to see how the fans try to defend this, assuming any of them do.

Based on 24 pages, I'm betting nearly all of them don't defend it. Mostly because they're the ones being denied content. Even the most staunch Destiny defenders will drop their sword and shield once they are the ones who are wronged.
 

angrygnat

Member
I am a huge defender of Bungie and Destiny, but this is getting harder and harder to defend. We don't want more dances. Especially when you have to rebuy content to get them. How crooked is that? I gave Wolves a chance. It was just more of the same aimless grind. Levels just for the sake of levels. Faceless enemies that are begging to be fleshed out but never are. Cardboard cutout stories with no depth. Never anything at stake. No connection to the world. All the dings on Destiny are true. At first I could look past it, believing that Bungie was holding back the good shit. All they needed to do was get their feet under them and this thing was really going to be special. What a disappointment.
 

lt519

Member
I would say that 150-200 hours of gameplay is good value for the asking price. The shooting in Destiny is solid and the game runs rock solid without any serious server issues since launch. In most popular MMOs the first two months of launch is a nightmare to play.

Bungie obviously removed the grinding with every expansion in order to help new players to achieve max level faster, so they can play together with their maxed friends. It’s a mechanic that is used on every MMO and it is used with Destiny.

But with 450 hours on the game I think that you got your money worth my friend! :D

Oh definitely got my money worth, we have fun over in the OT and my IRL friends play it so we have a blast. If you don't take it to seriously you can have a lot of fun with the game.

I haven't played to many other MMOs but I can't imagine their grind was as bad as Destiny's. You had to grind all the wrong things. Literally running in circles farming chests for materials instead of playing strikes and killing enemies. It was awful and they removed it as fast as they could. It wasn't the EXP grind, it was trying to level up all the cool gear you got but you needed materials for. Not too mention the grind to get gear to get to raid levels has been completely removed. The only way to get legendary gear to drop before was to grind out random drops, but now you can trade in the rep you earn naturally for entry raid level gear.

It was really bad and unfortunately it killed the game for millions of people before they even reached the raid. It was probably Destiny's biggest failure and is going to cost Bungie millions in the long run because they failed to see in their limited play testing that the drops rates and grind were so excessive. If you listened to that Jeff rant that somebody just posted this was his exact problem with the game, everything else he actually liked.
 

piratethingy

Self professed bad raider
"Think about how fucking profoundly disappointing Destiny is."

Yep. It sold and people play it, but when you consider the full context of Destiny, from the leak to the reveal to the hype to the faith people had in Bungie coming off Halo to the final release? Most dissappintijg launch of the generation so far, by far. Like, moreso than games launching broken. I actually think Vinny bringing up MCC at the end there is funny. 343 fucked up, but the stakes were on such a smaller scale. It really doesn't even compare.

Yes. Destiny is by far the biggest gaming related disappointment of my life. I promise that is no exaggeration. Bungie, coming in after the absolutely generationally defining Halo trilogy (which only looked better in hindsight after the relatively dissapointing Halo 4) with all the money and time in the world to make THE NEXT GEN MMO SHOOTER TO END ALL GAMES.

If I had to choose going into this console generation whether I could play Destiny or every other game to ever be released on the PS4 and XB1, it would have been a tough call.

Looking back at my hype level all I can do is laugh.
 
DeeJ's comment about "it'll probably sell for even more thank we're asking on eBay" is probably the dumbest response to this possible.

Deej is the worst community manager I've ever seen. Doesn't help Bungie is pilling terrible design decision in their game and the worst DLC value I've looked into. So yeah, he got a hard job but it doesn't excuse the fact that he's bad at it
 

Lnkn52

Member
Maybe they're afraid people will buy a used copy of Destiny for 10 bucks and then just buy the CE DLC? I have no idea what they're thinking.
That could have been the thought process. Exactly why they sold the exclusives rights for the CE to Gamestop (a store that makes money on tradeins).

Playing the Devil's advocate here, how is Bungie going to increase the number of new players without cheating it's 1st year players?
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
While I agree in principle what you're saying, it doesn't match up with how they are marketing these "Extras". If I understand it correctly the CE with the Extras are offered in limited quantities and at an increased price. Those two things don't seem likely to entice new players who have already passed on the game. The Legendary Edition seems poised to do that by being available in large quantities, providing the past and new content in one package, and going for $60.

I'm honestly not sure who the CE is marketed towards, and I am even more surprised that it is selling. Although reports of it selling out would be less impressive if they didn't make many in the first place.
To be clear, I'm sort of playing devil's advocate inasmuch as I think it's a bit silly to alienate your more ardent fans as well. But they need to try to create artificial scarcity to make it seem like 3 emotes and class items and whatever are worth the extra money - to people who might want to buy the TTK bundle and also to people who already own TTK.

If they sell the DLC separately, someone new might just buy the TTK bundle and think to themselves "I'll just buy the CE DLC later if I really want it" but never actually do it. I'm sure there's some economist/statistician who has run the numbers on the behaviour of gamers who buy this stuff.
 

Sanke__

Member
Thanks, Luke. Feeling great about being part of the Destiny community. Feeling great about chasing down a small loot table and taking an interest - for the first time in my gaming life - in cosmetic additions. Feeling great about sticking with the game through those really rough first three months.

They have the numbers and research. They know how many people left the game, and what they said when they did. They know that at least hundreds of thousands of people left the game with a sour taste in their mouth because of the poor game balance, high grind and pointless repetition right up until the release of really, the first DLC. But even more realistically, the second.

The game is *so much fun* these days. Taking down a Wolves event while a random public event a few meters away is happening with 5-6 players is hilarious madness. Then dropping into a Prison of Elders to finish off your play session - it all works now. But don't they know they're still on thin ice? Do they really not know?

Do they really - with all the data they get about who leaves and who stays - think we're going to be doing the proselytising to our friends, to help grow the player base, if they're not going to make it easy for us?

Why... why would I encourage my friends to come back to Destiny? Surely they want to make it easy for me.

OMG
HOLY FUCK
I almost just threw up
I have never.....
They made a game that is purely addictive over fun and now they are making fun of people for being addicted to it
 

Teriyaki

Member
I don't see why they would provoke veteran players by doing this. The hardcore players who sink the most time into the game are the ones who can attract other players and build community. Otherwise, a majority of gamers would move on to other games and there's missed opportunities to sell more content to ANYONE in the future.
 
"Think about how fucking profoundly disappointing Destiny is."

Yep. It sold and people play it, but when you consider the full context of Destiny, from the leak to the reveal to the hype to the faith people had in Bungie coming off Halo to the final release? Most dissappintijg launch of the generation so far, by far. Like, moreso than games launching broken. I actually think Vinny bringing up MCC at the end there is funny. 343 fucked up, but the stakes were on such a smaller scale. It really doesn't even compare.

I love playing destiny, but it is also the single biggest disappointment in gaming that I have ever experienced. It's the death of my dreamcast, except i never even got to play what I was supposed to get. It's impresaive considering my expectations were rather realistic. Shooting on par with previous bungie games, a campaign in the same tier as halo as far as engagement and fun go. I got the first, but somehow they totally failed the second. Abysmally.

And the more i read this topic, the more twisted my panties get. Thin ice is right. Part of me wants to never give bungie a fucking dime again after all this, from launch game to unforgivable interview.
 

Vire

Member
Deej is the worst community manager I've ever seen. Doesn't help Bungie is pilling terrible design decision in their game and the worst DLC value I've looked into. So yeah, he got a hard job but it doesn't excuse the fact that he's bad at it

It sucks that we no longer have a community manager from Bungie post on GAF. Urk and Frankie always did such a great job with the Bungie Weekly Updates.
 
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I think he is totally wrong, people are jumping to conclusions here...Phobos is a new moon I think that is 1 new area, plus there is the dreadnaught (Which is supposed to be large), that's 2, plus there is rumoured to be new areas on existing planets? Maybe people should see what content it has before bringing the pitchforks.
Actually he says in the interview that "there's a new place for players to go to, that new destination."

That really makes it sound like there is just one new destination to go to.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
DeeJ's comment about "it'll probably sell for even more thank we're asking on eBay" is probably the dumbest response to this possible.

Agreed. Their edgy attitude of being some against the grain type people are starting to wear thin. You are still indebted to Activision at the moment guys.

That attitude worked on the XBox platform because you had Halo which the majority of the consumers who purchased an XBox frothed over. You are now with a game that can easily be replaced this holiday by your ex-IP as well as a couple of others (Blops3/Battlefront).

While he is human, and that is a very human/fanish response (not going to attack his character since we are all guilty of this), but he should choose his words wisely when they reach millions of gamers. PR reasons.


I can agree with him on this. And I enjoyed (and will still enjoy probably when I start playing again), but he is right.
 
The thing is, for all the complaining, I bet the retention rate on Reddit and DestinyGAF is going to be high. It's like any MMO, where you think about the prospect of abandoning your 500+ hour characters and you realize that you feel more comfortable continuing with the game than leaving it.

I mean, in the end, people are really complaining about spending only $40. It's the missed opportunity of a Year One-ers bundle, and the messaging/"fuck you" to year one players with the $80 edition that people are understandably upset about. We'll see how they address it this weekly update. For now, it just seems like bad PR for no good reason. Reminds me of the whole Xur exotic debacle in TDB.
 

Kusagari

Member
It's remarkable how bad Luke Smith is at PR.

It was striking when the issue of trading came up on the Bombcast and he seemed as confused as Jeff and Brad why it isn't in the game.

lmao
 

border

Member
Based on 24 pages, I'm betting nearly all of them don't defend it. Mostly because they're the ones being denied content. Even the most staunch Destiny defenders will drop their sword and shield once they are the ones who are wronged.

I don't really feel "wronged" by the Collector's Edition, except for the fact that I apparently can't buy it anymore. I would have liked the extra emotes but I don't really feel like I'm missing out on anything important. The upside is that I imagine there will be more emotes to come anyway.

This tempest in a teapot is mostly over cosmetic items that will be of little-to-no value once the actual game launches. Gaming websites will play it up because every Destiny story they write drives traffic and generates clicks like a motherfucker, but most players probably won't care one way or the other.
 

lt519

Member
Agreed. Their edgy attitude of being some against the grain type people are starting to wear thin. You are still indebted to Activision at the moment guys.

That attitude worked on the XBox platform because you had Halo which the majority of the consumers who purchased an XBox frothed over. You are now with a game that can easily be replaced this holiday by your ex-IP as well as a couple of others (Blops3/Battlefront).

While he is human, and that is a very human/fanish response (not going to attack his character since we are all guilty of this), but he should choose his words wisely when they reach millions of gamers. PR reasons.

Yeah as much as I defend the game the PR responses are just horrible. I don't get easily offended, and I'll put up with some bullshit to play a game I enjoy, but they gotta tone it down. Either don't post anything or don't be a dick, it's pretty simple.

As far as other IPs replacing it, I don't really see that. I posted it earlier. What other game does what Destiny does better? People keep comparing it to WoW and GW2 (which both fans and haters are stupid for doing) but those are completely different genres. Destiny is a shooter not an action/hack n slash game. Fallout 4 and Borderlands are the closest IPs but Fallout 4 isn't co-op and Borderlands just isn't as good of a shooter and doesn't have a substantial PvP mode. COD/Battlefront don't have loot/raids etc. Just not comparable. The people that fell in love with Destiny, warts and all, will keep playing it over those games.
 

Gold_Loot

Member
We're still talking about useless dance emotes eh? I don't know what I'm gonna do with my life without those three emotes. Destiny will be doomed without them.
 
So Lukes Eurogamer interview is getting around. Jim Sterling, Danny O' Dwyer(Gamespot), Kevin Vanord are all piling on.

Which I mean......it's deserved. The arrogance is incredible, as O' Dwyer put it.

We're still talking about useless dance emotes eh? I don't know what I'm gonna do with my life without those three emotes. Destiny will be doomed without them.

Please. Unless you've played enough Destiny like me and many others have, where at this point we play for the 'cosmetics' and not the gear(Since weapons are re-rollable), it's the only thing worth playing for.
 

Bsigg12

Member
It's remarkable how bad Luke Smith is at PR.

It was striking when the issue of trading came up on the Bombcast and he seemed as confused as Jeff and Brad why it isn't in the game.

lmao

Him and Deej are hilariously bad at putting their game in the best light possible. They're condescending and have a "we're better than you" attitude. It's extremely off putting.
 

border

Member
That could have been the thought process. Exactly why they sold the exclusives rights for the CE to Gamestop (a store that makes money on tradeins).

Generally speaking, Gamestop exclusives tend to be things that would not sell well at toy stores or big box stores -- weird collector's editions, JRPGs, niche franchises, etc. It's possible they couldn't get places like Best Buy or Wal-Mart to give them shelf space for an $80 expansion pack that comes in a gigantic box.
 
It was trending on Twitter too.

Good.

Generally speaking, Gamestop exclusives tend to be things that would not sell well at toy stores or big box stores -- weird collector's editions, JRPGs, niche franchises, etc. It's possible they couldn't get places like Best Buy or Wal-Mart to give them shelf space for an $80 expansion pack that comes in a gigantic box.

I don't think this box will be that huge. It's just an extra artbook and a poster/some little trinkets and I'm pretty sure the coin fits inside of the book. It'd be about the size of a bluray tv set
 
Johnny come lately buyers getting the game on the cheap should NEVER be given content that is locked away from existing players.

There getting the game on the cheap. That is their reward for waiting. Exclusive content should never be offered without letting existing players get it. Even if they charge a couple bucks to existing players. It's better than making them rebuy the game.

Exactly. And they wonder why people are upset here.

They're valuing "3 emotes, shaders and exotics" at $20 for new players, and $40 for existing players. Makes no sense, and it's a completely understandable PR disaster based on how they've handled addressing the complaints so far. Bad form, Bungie.
 

UMGAWA

Member
Actually he says in the interview that "there's a new place for players to go to, that new destination."

That really makes it sound like there is just one new destination to go to.

There is a locked area on earth named Kings Watch, surely it will be a new area in a exsisting destination.
 
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