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[Saty]

It's not locked away though, you can listen to them from the menu.

If you want to use them ingame though, you need to unlocked them.

They add literally nothing to the game though, I'd suggest keeping your currency for cool looking skins.

Of course i'd like to use the lines in-game. Who the heck cares you can preview them in the menu? You SHOULD be able to since you can only quip one so instead of going back from the game into menus to change lines they ought to let you preview them. And they ought to let you preview them if you can buy them using in-game currency. Stop saying this like it changes something.

They don't impact gameplay but they do add to the game and to my enjoyment. It's crap they are treated like something to lock away or sell.

You can listen to the lines on the character profile. Also, with probably 4-5 hours of play you can unlock all your favorite lines with in-game currency.

I get you are taking some sort of principled stance here but you are totally making a mountain out of molehill. And you would know that if you actually bothered to play the game.

Blizzard are making this a mountain because they chose to treat speech lines as unlockable.
Do you have any argument to offer other than 'as long you can unlock it by playing there can be no downside to locking it'?

You know what? They could've. They also could've arbitrarily spared any number of systems away from the unlock treadmill. They ALSO could've abritrarily added yet more systems into the unlock treadmill.

I do not think it's a radical idea that they would lock certain taunting voice quips behind the treadmill because at the end of the day they need everything they can to subsidize the future development of this game.

It's radical enough of an idea that i'm not aware of any other full-priced game that does it. Look, we both know Blizzard will make enough money selling all the cosmetic stuff besides voice lines. If they think speech is also fair game, then that's when i call it out. To me speech is valuable enough and different from skins that i don't want to see it locked away.

Dota 2 already has taunts as unlockables. You didn't make a thread for that though.

I'm not entirely sure what Dota 2 does and how because. Regardless, Dota is F2P.

 

[MMaRsu]

Why would they all be unlocked from the start though. Do you have any good arguments for that besides " ZOMG they want to sell microtransactions thats why everything is locked"

??

 

[HappyPuppy]

I do wish they gave you a freebie in something you would like, like a token where you can unlock 3 things when you reach a milestone or something, It feels bad when you get completely shafted with the rng.
After 16 hours, no legendaries, no epic skins and 475 currency :/. I'm level 23. Don't like the system but at least it's just cosmetic. A lot of skins feel underwhelming but others are really cool. The Mei skins are meh.

 

[Ramenman]

There is absolutely nothing wrong about that and if you've actually played Overwatch you know it's true.

It's 100% cosmetic and bonus stuff.

The characters have plenty of chatter and banter and lines and stuff from the get go, there just happen to be a few more you can unlock randomly through loot.

Nothing's missing from the experience that you buy for fourty bucks, you'd really have to be reaching to say that.


There is also nothing new in having the option to pay real money for "blind packs" of things.
Be it real life trading card games (pokemon, magic, whatever), any scratch ticket or lottery ticket you can think of, or if you want videogames counterparts, buying keys to open boxes to get a new paint for your knife in Counter Strike and whatnot.

I enjoy having a free loot box every now and then, but I also don't give a crap if I have to play 200 hours more before getting a new voice line or spray paint that I find cool when I browse the gallery.
It's a business model that is fair and unobtrusive to what the game is and if they feel that can get them a few Saudi Princes buying hundreds of loot boxes until they get the green skin for D.VA then good on them, it doesn't detract from my experience at all.

If your beef is with the unlock system itself (sans the fact that loot boxes can be bought), then I suggest you watch this vid that explains what they tried before settling on the current one :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41DLNBzp68Q

Basically, we're already having trouble sometimes getting people to play for the objective and select heroes according to purpose/team composition, now imagine if people had ulterior motives due to the progression system. "Nah, I'm playing only Genji until I get the next unlock, sorry".
Or even if it was tied to achievements "I'm trying to get the purple Reinhardt skin for '100 kills with the Hammer', so sorry team but I don't give a crap about shielding you ! let me just suicide-dive into ennemies until I fill this damn bar".

I think they managed to make a system that is unobtrusive to the game itself, AND fill it with unlocks that are nice but not so important that you'd resent the randomness of the unlock system. Kudos to them.

 

[SpiceMelange]

I do wish they gave you a freebie in something you would like, like a token where you can unlock 3 things when you reach a milestone or something, It feels bad when you get completely shafted with the rng.
After 16 hours, no legendaries, no epic skins and 475 currency :/. I'm level 23. Don't like the system but at least it's just cosmetic.

The token is called gold, or coins or w/e.

 

[Jito]

Can't believe OP is still freaking out over voice lines in a game they don't own. Where was the indignation over buying guns in UC4?

 

[Pendas]

OP Complains about Blizzard hiding characterization behind a paywall.

Blizzard releases free 5 minute animated shorts with tons of characterization.


????

 

[XANDER CAGE]

I think the only thing that has stuck out to me about the loot boxes that is frustrating is how truly random they seem to be. I have no idea if that's just a legal requirement for this kind of thing or a way to prevent people gaming the system somehow, but just from an anecdotal sample of me and my friends there seems to be a real lack of weighting on unlocks.

Personally, my luck has been incredible. I have purple and orange skins for nearly every character I play. I've pulled an orange drop in like, every other crate. I've gotten crates with two oranges and two purples, or all purples, etc etc. I've gotten several money drops in a row that have enabled me to just go buy the stuff I want. I'm a pretty happy camper; for the record, this is after 23 levels' worth of free crates and $20 of purchasing crates because I'm a sucker and was curious.

I have friends who have not been so lucky, to the point where they're fed up with the whole system. Constant crates of just dumb sprays and voice lines, dupes, etc. I'm surprised that there doesn't seem to be much in the way of preventing dumb stuff like that happening, or any sort of "okay, well your last one was three whites and a blue, so your next one will be better!"

Like at this point personally I'm pretty done with caring about the crates until they add new stuff since I have everything I want. Meanwhile, I know people who are beyond wanting specific things and have moved to just general frustration with the whole loot experience. That seems a bit unbalanced, and I'm curious why it is the way it is - like on the one hand sure, not giving people everything they want immediately keeps people playing and increases the chances they'll buy packs, but... clearly it's truly random enough that people can have an experience like mine where it just throws the rarest stuff at you so fast you're out of reasons to care about crates by level 25.

As for how insidious the crate microtransactions themselves are, well, I hate to say shit like "that's video games in 2016" but it's kind of true. I completely understand not liking this gacha-esque system layered on top of a buy-to-play game, but in a world where practically no one is letting big games out the door without some kind of microtransaction hook, 99 cents (or two bucks minimum for two crates in truth) for faster access to free cosmetic level up rewards isn't so bad. That's not meant to be an excuse, just, it seems pretty relatively benign, especially if they uphold their promise that all actual content (maps and heroes) are free. I can deal with that.

 

[azyless]

.

Dude they're just a tiny way of customizing your character, other games have idk hats or face tattoos or whatever, this has one liners.
The fact that you're whining about this while not even owning the game is ridiculous, get over it.

 

[SocksAndShoes]

OP Complains about Blizzard hiding characterization behind a paywall.

Blizzard releases free 5 minute animated shorts with tons of characterization.


????

Yeah but OP would have to unlock those by searching on Youtube for untold seconds.

Blizzard should really stop hiding important lore behind youtube search-walls.

 

[Confused Cheeseburger]

This thread seems to have backfired on OP.

 

[MMaRsu]

Yeah but OP would have to unlock those by searching on Youtube for untold seconds.

Blizzard should really stop hiding important lore behind youtube videos.

Plus you also need a damn internet connection to even watch these shorts! Damn this always online culture!!! Now I have to pay money for internet too.

Spoiler

/s

 

[Freeman]

I'm too old for this shit... on a full priced game? Shameful.

 

[SocksAndShoes]

I'm too old for this shit... on a full priced game? Shameful.

I'm curious: Did you read any of the thread or just the title?

 

[MMaRsu]

I'm too old for this shit... on a full priced game? Shameful.

Yeah like every other game in the past 10 years.

Or did you just read the OP and call it a day

 

[Poison_Idea]

When does Y2Kev or Bishoptl wake up so this thread can get an appropriate title?

 

[Scirrocco]

honestly from activist on, this is far better then I expected. Hopefully it stays this way and more paid ad dons aren't added later

 

[Kintaro]

This game has some members of this forum so legit shook. I have no idea why. What is going on lately?

 

[Nosgotham]

wait.. this is a full priced game with microtransactions? are the expansions going to be free like Halo5? if so thats cool, if not yuck

 

[Wowfunhappy]

If only there were some way to not buy games with this kind of microtransaction if you find them objectionable.

I agree that the OP is being a bit rediculous, but your suggestion is becoming increasingly difficult for someone who likes to play AAA multiplayer.

There's still Splatoon and a couple other games that are completely free of microtransactions, but not that many.

 

[SomeOneInaHat]

wait.. this is a full priced game with microtransactions? are the expansions going to be free like Halo5? if so thats cool, if not yuck

Characters and maps will be free.

 

[old]

The system is fine. It allows for continued monetization after purchase without being pay to win. Which is a great thing. Normally devs abandon these games after launch to work on the next game. We want Blizz to continue working on this game for years and years. There needs to be a monetary incentive for them to do so. They've decided randomly dolling out meaningless skins, sprays, and taunts will suffice.

 

[doctorblurg]

This game has some members of this forum so legit shook. I have no idea why. What is going on lately?

People are mad that the cool pretty game isn't made for them and is still crazy successful

 

[Sushigod7]

LOL man the fun never ends with complaining about MT and DLC costs. Perfectly playable and enjoyable without any of it. Remember that time you bought a car? And it had a shit load of options in the lot? Then you went in and talked to the sales and finance people and they offered you a shit ton of other accessories and service plans?? OMG you should totally go back and rip them a new one all that should have been in the price. In fact write about it on social media and leave a negative yelp review. smh

 

[DrEvil]

End of match voting should net you in-game currency, likewise if you get gold medals.

 

[super-famicom]

Lol at this thread backfire. Can't believe OP is serious.

 

[Kor of Memory]

A new low in 'carrot & stick' progression design; in closing-off any kind of content to give the illusion there's more of it by unlocking. A new low in nickle and diming microtransactions.

Blizzard are already monetizing skins and sprays but now they are fucking monetizing speech lines?! Obnoxious. And before you say that it doesn't affect gameplay so it's good - it does effect the writing, the characterization and basically the heart of the game. In Multiplayer games, any piece of writing is crucial to set-up the characters, to give them personality and to give them voice, figuratively and literally.

Imagine TF2 releasing with only one line per class. Imagine if you had to unlock the rest line by line, trying to glue back together a character who was shredded in sake of 'progression' and microtransactions. Imagine any other game or any other medium with lines of dialogs stripped out of it and locked away until some asinine demand is met.

And how do you unlock speech back to the game? As i understand it, you either get lucky with the loot box and it has a speech line or you get lucky and the loot box and it has in-game credits that you can spend on buying the lines. (not sure if there's any other way to get credits). No one would be shocked if they add the option to buy it also using real money.

There you have it. At best this is a new low in bullshit game design where more and more basic properties of a game are put on an unlock treadmill to give fake and artificial sense of progress (fucking lines!), to act as a cheap tactic to retain players' engagement instead of having confidence in the actual game and to mask what might be perceived as too-little content in the game.

At worst, you have all that + malevolent intent to hollow-out the game in order to drive microtransactions.

I'm sorry, but I heavily disagree with this.

The main flaw in your argument is the assumption that character dialogue is limited to the purchased items, when it's not.

Characters have tons of lines of dialogue in the game naturally. They have full conversations during the pre-game. They do their own call-outs (Get on the point, Watch out behind you, etc...). Not to mention you have a full 8 point emote wheel that gives every character several lines:

On this wheel, the top item is simply a gesture, and the bottom left is your choice of the purchased (or randomly awarded) line. Everything else is free and pre-set.

Your comparison to TF2 is way off.

I literally heard a conversation yesterday in the pre-game between Mei and D.Va. With D.Va telling Mei she is super jealous that she gets to travel so much.

 

[Ithil]

Yeah it sucks that we have to pay for the voices and skins on top of the maps AND characters.

A full priced game with no content. Heh. I bet people will support this idea just fine.

But you don't have to pay for it. You can unlock all that stuff by just playing the game.

 

[MyNameIsRye]

GTFO OP, a new low? This thread should be locked.

 

[partyphone]

I think the only thing that has stuck out to me about the loot boxes that is frustrating is how truly random they seem to be. I have no idea if that's just a legal requirement for this kind of thing or a way to prevent people gaming the system somehow, but just from an anecdotal sample of me and my friends there seems to be a real lack of weighting on unlocks.

Personally, my luck has been incredible. I have purple and orange skins for nearly every character I play. I've pulled an orange drop in like, every other crate. I've gotten crates with two oranges and two purples, or all purples, etc etc. I've gotten several money drops in a row that have enabled me to just go buy the stuff I want. I'm a pretty happy camper; for the record, this is after 23 levels' worth of free crates and $20 of purchasing crates because I'm a sucker and was curious.

I have friends who have not been so lucky, to the point where they're fed up with the whole system. Constant crates of just dumb sprays and voice lines, dupes, etc. I'm surprised that there doesn't seem to be much in the way of preventing dumb stuff like that happening, or any sort of "okay, well your last one was three whites and a blue, so your next one will be better!"

Like at this point personally I'm pretty done with caring about the crates until they add new stuff since I have everything I want. Meanwhile, I know people who are beyond wanting specific things and have moved to just general frustration with the whole loot experience. That seems a bit unbalanced, and I'm curious why it is the way it is - like on the one hand sure, not giving people everything they want immediately keeps people playing and increases the chances they'll buy packs, but... clearly it's truly random enough that people can have an experience like mine where it just throws the rarest stuff at you so fast you're out of reasons to care about crates by level 25.

As for how insidious the crate microtransactions themselves are, well, I hate to say shit like "that's video games in 2016" but it's kind of true. I completely understand not liking this gacha-esque system layered on top of a buy-to-play game, but in a world where practically no one is letting big games out the door without some kind of microtransaction hook, 99 cents (or two bucks minimum for two crates in truth) for faster access to free cosmetic level up rewards isn't so bad. That's not meant to be an excuse, just, it seems pretty relatively benign, especially if they uphold their promise that all actual content (maps and heroes) are free. I can deal with that.

hearthstone and diablo 3(and maybe WoW???) have pity timers. so if you don't get something good after awhile the system cheats and gives you something good. like in hearthstone it's impossible to open more than 40 packs and not get a legendary. so I really gotta assume they're doing the same thing with overwatch. they realize that pure randomness isn't fun.

 

[Son Of D]

This game has some members of this forum so legit shook. I have no idea why. What is going on lately?

It's the big new game release. Got to show everyone the light!

wait.. this is a full priced game with microtransactions? are the expansions going to be free like Halo5? if so thats cool, if not yuck

Gameplay updates are free, cosmetics are paid.

 

[LapinAgile]

Wait, are these speech lines for the base character?

Yeah, I can definitely see that as a problem, especially when you paid up front for the game already.

Edit: Holy crap the apologists.



Oh yeah you like having tons of stuff to unlock? Then how about they make tons of stuff to unlock that isn't something that should be free.

Played Uncharted 4 multiplayer? They didn't lock away Nathan Drake's lines, and there's a ton of stuff to unlock to keep you happy.

These are not conversation lines. Those still happen between characters to give context to the match and banter. These are catch phrase style emotes not "dialogue they owe us " they are cosmetic audio at best.

 

[ZangBa]

Title had me thinking Blizzard patched the game to introduce some bullshit, but this is just a minor non-issue. It's 25 for a voice line, dude. I have over 500 coins playing casually, I could probably buy all of those if I was so inclined. All these things you can buy are cosmetic and fluff that doesn't matter. If we're getting free post launch support, I'm totally OK with this form of microtransactions, it's the best kind.

 

[MMaRsu]

honestly from activist on, this is far better then I expected. Hopefully it stays this way and more paid ad dons aren't added later

Activision has nothing to do with this game.

The Activision logo isnt even anywhere to be found ingame or on the box/disc

 

[Scirrocco]

End of match voting should net you in-game currency, likewise if you get gold medals.

Nah, then you'd have vote rigging, and so the entire vote system becomes pointless.

But maybe the act of voting could. Like you get 1 gold for voting for anybody and maybe another for ranking the game.

I like the medals idea though. It would be a nice encouragement to play support since you always get the healing gold.

 

[Permanently A]

overwatch's system sells absolutely nothing that can affect gameplay, and you consider this a new low? compared to games that will straight up sell you power for money?

 

[Kurdel]

GTFO OP, a new low? This thread should be locked.

After 15 pages, OP is still sticking to his guns, I don't know what it would take to make him understand this isn't a big deal.

 

[Gravy Boat]

They're basically emotes. Calm down.

 

[gatti-man]

I understand your point but it's like a fighting game. Unlocking stuff through player progression is one of the joys. I like unlocking some stuff and using it in-game later. But remember that all maps and modes in the future will be completely free.

No it's not. 8 hours of game time (that's optimistic) for 1 skin is not like fighting games at all. They average 30 minutes to 2 hours at most.

Once again future content better be free when we got 1/3rd a game at launch. I mean honestly let's look at games that get punished for low content and I can't think of one game that released with less content than Overwatch.

 

[borghe]

hearthstone and diablo 3(and maybe WoW???) have pity timers. so if you don't get something good after awhile the system cheats and gives you something good. like in hearthstone it's impossible to open more than 40 packs and not get a legendary. so I really gotta assume they're doing the same thing with overwatch. they realize that pure randomness isn't fun.

yes, WoW has a pity timer as well. Literally every RNGesus game Blizz has has a pity timer on it. I have seen people here talk about droughts, but without blizz speaking up I'm not sure what there timer is.

belief is the HS pity timer is 40 packs (as in no leg in 39 packs, the 40th will contain one)

WoW I believe was pretty low.. like 5-6 LFG raids (from the auto drop)

No it's not. 8 hours of game time (that's optimistic) for 1 skin is not like fighting games at all. They average 30 minutes to 2 hours at most.

lol... not even close to optimistic. unless you are talking about for a SPECIFIC legendary skin.

 

[Scirrocco]

Activision has nothing to do with this game.

The Activision logo isnt even anywhere to be found ingame or on the box/disc

Except they kind of own blizzard, so I'm sure they had some input.

 

[PrivateRyan]

These are not conversation lines. Those still happen between characters to give context to the match and banter. These are catch phrase style emotes not "dialogue they owe us " they are cosmetic audio at best.

The amount of times this has had to be pointed out in this thread is tragic.

OP swings and misses on a game he hasn't played and now other people who haven't played it are drifting into this topic and assuming he's correct and those that are defending it are "apologists".

Embarrassing.

I still can't fathom why someone would get worked up into such a froth over such a minor thing in a game they haven't even played.

 

[Degen]

saying this as a fighting game player...

you don't wanna know how low it really goes.

 

[SocksAndShoes]

No it's not. 8 hours of game time (that's optimistic) for 1 skin is not like fighting games at all. They average 30 minutes to 2 hours at most.

I think you're going to find that the vast majority of players have earned at least 1 skin for 8 hours of play.

lol... not even close to optimistic. unless you are talking about for a SPECIFIC legendary skin.

This.

 

[Neverwas]

it's pretty much the same system that Mass Effect 3 used for its multiplayer unlocks. This "new low" is old hat... and it affords us free content down the road. I don't see a problem.

 

[MMaRsu]

Except they kind of own blizzard, so I'm sure they had some input.

But they dont "own" blizzard tho. Shows how much you know.

They also had no input on this game.

 

[SuperStiltzkin]

lol if you're gonna complain about characterization, it should be the 'ol "Why no campaign mode!?" argument and not this petty voice line shit.

 

[Anton Sugar]

I think you're going to find that the vast majority of players have earned at least 1 skin for 8 hours of play.

Unless it changed in the beta, I think I got about 4-5 skins in as many hours of play. Maybe I lucked out.

 

[ZangBa]

I think you're going to find that the vast majority of players have earned at least 1 skin for 8 hours of play.

Shit, I must have half the roster at this point at least, probably more, and I'm a bit over 8 hours.

 

[borghe]

Except they kind of own blizzard, so I'm sure they had some input.

no. blizzard has said (and been shown to over and over) run as its own independent entity. It's why Blizzard games are still released "when they are done"

The sole point behind these microtransactions are to keep the server lights on and keep development of future content free of additional charges.