It's all being discussed in the news that doesn't deserve its own thread thread, fairly extensively.

 

Was previously planning on buying due to it actually looking gorgeous. Now I definitely won't buy it and will seriously think twice before buying anything EA in the future.

 

EA has been a shit company for decades at this point. I'm still bitter over their handling of command and conquer and that franchise has been dead for 5 years now and should have been killed off 15 years ago. There's no end in sight for that kind of shit.

FWIW, they reduced the cost of all the heroes, but they also reduced how many points you actually get, so there's actually no difference at all. They're holding an AMA tomorrow, but I don't see a situation where the only questions they answer are ones by their own plants.

I fucking hate this company with a passion and have for over half of my life.

 

If you care about the direction the games industry is taking, don't buy this game. Don't even pirate it, because if there's a playerbase, the whales will buy lootboxes. The only way anything changes is if EA is starved of the playerbase.

But oh well, it's a SW game and the gameplay/graphics are amazing, right? I'll only buy the base game, no harm in that.

No. There is no compromise. Take a stand. Be a Sith. Don't buy, don't play. If you do, you're enabling EA to keep doing what it's doing.
--- Post automerged ---
Reddit AMA with 3 DICE devs. As expected, all anwers read like pre-written scripts that confirm that the microtransaction business model is the only one EA will accept and are vague otherwise.

The top post in the thread. To absolutely no one's surprise, the devs haven't answered and most likely won't. EDIT: One of the devs actually answered. Make what you will of that. For me the message is clear. The AMA was always going to be a PR move to combat the backlash, nothing more.

 

EA's already said they're 'turning it off while they evaluate things'

Which means they're gonna wait for the suckers to calm down, buy things and THEN turn it on.

 

1. turn of gambleboxes
2. wait for sheeples to buy game
3. turn on gambleboxes
4. profit

 

Delicious how Jim Sterling trashes the game and his main point isn't even the micro transactions but the quality of the game itself

 

To be fair considering the "longevity" of games like these nowadays (as far as I know the large majority of them experience massive player drop-offs within a few weeks/months) even a month or two, which admittedly might be a bit optimistic, without the system in place is likely resulting in quite a bit of "lost" revenue.

Though I have to admit that my hope is more on national regulators/politics getting "attracted" by all this publicity and introducing some actual regulation.

 

You mean the EU. Because the US needs a lot of politicians to die or retire for them to start thinking video games are a kind of actual big industry.

 

It seems most likely that the EU would go first but even in the US I think that the relevant agencies (if not the politicians themselves) will not let the situation continue as as is forever. And for a lot of this you don't necessarily need large political reforms.

 

I fully expect even the US to get on board with extending gambling regulations to cover digital gambling lootboxes as well in the relatively near future. Problem is, that's still most of a decade out IMO, barring EA or Activision doing something so ludicrously egregious that it causes major mass media shitstorms (think "Trump's running for President" level coverage), and until then, it's only going to get worse.

 

If the business is going to be forced to change, I really doubt that the lootbox=gambling argument is going to be the thing that does it. It just seems like the first possible hiccup that got presented and everyone latched onto it. It's just a very small part of a much larger problem.

 

Nah. The lootboxes/random packs/etc is just the most obvious equivalent of a physical equivalent, and as a result, the most likely to be regulated first.

There's a bunch of money-grubbing bullshit in the game industry that's likely to eventually get regulated and brought under some degree of control, but I don't expect that to happen for a while, being perfectly honest. We'd need an entire new generation of statesmen to see anything being done on that front.

 

You know, a lot of people on that reddit forum talk about returning their game because of the micro transactions and talking about never buying another EA game. Yet, once the next battlefield or star wars battlefront comes out, see those same people buying the game and go bitching on reddit.

I highly doubt EA will change anything, they eat up all the small game companies and try to push out as much as they can for as much as they can without giving a shit about the brand or longetivity of the ip or gaming company itself, because in the end retards will keep buying.

 

Fun thing: EA's now viral "The intent is to provide players with a" response, with 680,000+ downvotes, has become the most downvoted comment in reddit history.

 

So EA scams aside, game looks like legit fun gameplay, beautiful scenery and great sound design.

What I've seen of the way has far surpassed my expectations.

Ignoring EA cash-grab money-gating content.

 

Well, DICE always delivers on the graphics and sound design.

Also, from what I've seen, it has terrible balance. Vader is absolutely busted.

 

Being totally honest, Battlefront 2 looks like a really good game; everything I've seen of it save Jim Sterling's video looks and seems to play consistently great.

It's just a shame EA had to get their stink all over it and I'm never going to play it.

 

It's possible they'll step a bit more carefully due to all the backlash. Not because EA gives a damn about bad PR or being an evil exploitative company, but because Disney was reportedly pissed off enough about all the bad press to threaten EA with taking away the Star Wars IP over the whole mess. Given EA's singular talent for screwing up any IP they own, they really need that Star Wars license to make games that are somewhat EA-proof.