http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-06-22-destiny-the-taken-king-director-defends-40-expansion-price-tag

You're not you when you're hungry.

:p

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Still need to know two things before I buy anything.

In the physical editions, is all content on disc or is the disc content vanilla Destiny with codes for the rest?

Are last-gen licenses to the content transferable to next-gen?

Uh, wow. This really is starting to make me doubt wether I should get it at all, in any form. I mean, I was on the fence earlier, but... jeez.

This is not the Bungie I used to know, I think.

It's what I've always thought. People are "upset" because for $40 more, you get the original game and both expansions, and a bunch of cool stuff.

People want that extra stuff like the emotes, but they don't want to "pay for" things they already have. Well, there is another way to look at it, which is that for $40 more you get the following:

Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
Collection of Relics and Artifacts
Strange Coin Replica
Three Class Specific Emotes
Three Armor Shaders
Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

If that list is not worth $40 to you, than don't buy it. I understand that people may wish that Bungie offered the emotes all by themselves for a fraction of the entire bundle, but that gets dangerously close to Bungie selling things to us for a couple dollars.

He's coming off a bit douchey and dismissive throughout the whole interview. That's going to rub most folks the wrong way...

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

Except that most hardcore players already have that stuff. Further, many here forked out good money already for Collector's editions or whatever.

This doesn't pass the smell test. It's business, and if they can get people to pay again, that's fine. But it's sketchy.

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

Except that most hardcore players already have that stuff. Further, many here forked out good money already for Collector's editions or whatever.

They already have stuff given away for free? Well good thing it's free and they can just throw it in the trash.

This doesn't pass the smell test. It's business, and if they can get people to pay again, that's fine. But it's sketchy.

Out of curiosity, what would you be willing to pay for that list of collectors edition things? Less than $40 I take it, so maybe $30? $20? Here is that list again to remind you

• Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
  
• Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
  
• Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
  
• Collection of Relics and Artifacts
  
• Strange Coin Replica
  
• Three Class Specific Emotes
  
• Three Armor Shaders
  
• Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

Certain he had a hard time articulating a good response to very pointed questions, but the interviewer was also phrasing it in a negative way.

As I pointed out, one could just as easily say that the emotes, shaders, and exotic class items each cost $4.50 a piece, and you get a bunch of other collector junk for free, along with a second copy of the game. $4.50 is well within the realm of a lot of other games that actually break out and charge for cosmetic additions to their games.

But I get what you mean about him not coming across the best. He had sort of a "take it or leave it" attitude which some may not like. It's the way it is though, and it's unlikely he had much to do with the decision anyway.

Just curious if we actually know. Also curious if Luke would not be allowed to comment if Activision are determining the prices/content for the expansion purchase options.

He's coming off a bit douchey and dismissive throughout the whole interview. That's going to rub most folks the wrong way...

I thought the interviewer came off irritable and douchey, too. That's not going to lead to good discussion.

IMO, that stuff isn't worth $40. I mean it is all cool stuff and in the overall package probably worth it, but you also have to remember that the other physical copy is going for $60 and that doesn't include any of the extras.

That being said, I do already have the collector's edition preordered (didn't want to miss out like I did with the collector's edition of the base game) and my plan is to trade in my current copy of destiny about a week before it comes out towards the price of it.

It's what I've always thought. People are "upset" because for $40 more, you get the original game and both expansions, and a bunch of cool stuff.

People want that extra stuff like the emotes, but they don't want to "pay for" things they already have. Well, there is another way to look at it, which is that for $40 more you get the following:

Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
Collection of Relics and Artifacts
Strange Coin Replica
Three Class Specific Emotes
Three Armor Shaders
Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

If that list is not worth $40 to you, than don't buy it. I understand that people may wish that Bungie offered the emotes all by themselves for a fraction of the entire bundle, but that gets dangerously close to Bungie selling things to us for a couple dollars.

Yeah, that's how I've seen it. The core game and the expansions are no longer worth their original price. You can get Destiny new for around $20 online and cheaper used. The relevance of Dark Below and House of Wolves will have greatly diminished by the time Taken King rolls out and won't provide the same kind of experience for those who got it fresh. So they're just bonus to the content you listed.

I don't know what edition I'm getting, but I don't see this as any different then the different overlapping editions Bungie has been putting out for a decade or more.

It's what I've always thought. People are "upset" because for $40 more, you get the original game and both expansions, and a bunch of cool stuff.

People want that extra stuff like the emotes, but they don't want to "pay for" things they already have. Well, there is another way to look at it, which is that for $40 more you get the following:

Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
Collection of Relics and Artifacts
Strange Coin Replica
Three Class Specific Emotes
Three Armor Shaders
Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

If that list is not worth $40 to you, than don't buy it. I understand that people may wish that Bungie offered the emotes all by themselves for a fraction of the entire bundle, but that gets dangerously close to Bungie selling things to us for a couple dollars.

The thing is they're not valuing that stuff at $40, they're valuing it at $20. There's a package with just the new expansion that's $40, there's a package with the base game and all three expansions for $60, and there's a package with the base game, all three expansions, and digital and physical swag for $80. They're putting the value of the swag at about $20. What's more interesting is that going by this they're putting of the base game and the first two expansions at about $20 too. Obviously these are package deals so the price is going to be lower, but presumably it's still in the ballpark.
For me, the lesson is don't be an early adopter. In games, in software in general, in tech in general, in products in general, early adopters nearly tend to get screwed. I don't have any of the expansions, and I won't have any of them until I buy the package with all three for the Xbone when it comes out, and I'm glad I waited to see what they were going to say at E3 instead of buying a season pass like I was planning to. The only reason I'm not waiting for the next big package deal after this-- because there will be one-- is that I'm about done waiting.

He's coming off a bit douchey and dismissive throughout the whole interview. That's going to rub most folks the wrong way...

I thought the interviewer came off irritable and douchey, too. That's not going to lead to good discussion.

They both sounded kind of unprofessional, but I commend whoever Eurogamer sent to do the interview and whoever approved sending them for capturing both the content and the tone of the negative reaction very well while still being much more civil than a lot of what's been said. I think a lot of journalism, especially games journalism, could do with less rolling over and taking what you're given and more pressing your source for actual answers instead of the platitudes and talking points they're usually focused on repeating. In this case, the interviewer was looking for why they priced it this way and what they thought and felt about the negative side of the fan reaction. In the end, they didn't get much, but I commend them for trying.

Certain he had a hard time articulating a good response to very pointed questions, but the interviewer was also phrasing it in a negative way.

As I pointed out, one could just as easily say that the emotes, shaders, and exotic class items each cost $4.50 a piece, and you get a bunch of other collector junk for free, along with a second copy of the game. $4.50 is well within the realm of a lot of other games that actually break out and charge for cosmetic additions to their games.

But I get what you mean about him not coming across the best. He had sort of a "take it or leave it" attitude which some may not like. It's the way it is though, and it's unlikely he had much to do with the decision anyway.

I wish they would talk to the decision-makers for these things. We finally hear from someone that's a bit more on the engineering side, and it's not about anything relating to gameplay or UI or responsiveness or bugs or any of that, it's about pricing, which is a whole different department.

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

Except that most hardcore players already have that stuff. Further, many here forked out good money already for Collector's editions or whatever.

They already have stuff given away for free? Well good thing it's free and they can just throw it in the trash.

My point here is that you can't give value to any that was purchased previously. Because their precedent is to make previous DLC free to anyone (i.e. Dark Below became free with release of HoW), then we can assume those would be free anyway. One can't make the claim 'but they're getting the full game too'.

This doesn't pass the smell test. It's business, and if they can get people to pay again, that's fine. But it's sketchy.

Out of curiosity, what would you be willing to pay for that list of collectors edition things? Less than $40 I take it, so maybe $30? $20? Here is that list again to remind you

• Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
  
• Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
  
• Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
  
• Collection of Relics and Artifacts
  
• Strange Coin Replica
  
• Three Class Specific Emotes
  
• Three Armor Shaders
  
• Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

So here we are. The only thing above I care about...and I mean the only thing, are the dance emotes. The only way to get them is to pay $40. Even better (worse?) I only roll 1 character, so it's $40 for 1 dance emote. Now you say, if it's not worth it to you, don't buy it! Which is fine, but I am of the opinion that the dance emotes are what will matter to most people - which is specifically why they were placed behind the $40 paywall. And now we slide into sketchy territory. So, to be clear: to me, specifically, it stinks.

EDIT: missed this the first go-round. I'd like to pay $5 for the dance emote.

Is there an issue here? I don't know; it will largely depend on how each person feels about the game.

...

Holy shit, did I just spend 10 minutes of my life writing a post about dance emotes?

Luke's always been willing to smile about the stuff that makes some people uncomfortable. ;)

I saw that interview this morning, and I squirmed a little. I read Earendil's rationalization below, and I guess my only real problem is a point made by the interviewer (one of his few defensible positions):

The Collector's Edition is aimed squarely at the only group of fans who ABSOLUTELY have the initial game and the first two expansions.

Folks who don't care about schwag will buy the $40 Digital TTK version, and be happy.

Folks who were on the fence about Destiny before now, or had never heard of it, or even had bought the original game but held off on the expansion packs, will buy the $60 no-frills-but-all-real-content edition, and be happy. ($60 for just the three expansions seems okay to me - you're also getting the original game, but it doesn't feel like you're really paying for it.)

Folks who love the game, and love schwag, will buy the collector's edition... and be unhappy, because they're getting a bunch of stuff they already have (and have already paid for) along with the stuff they want.

It's as though Bungie (or more likely Activision) is saying "hey, let's ream the hardcore fans, because they're the least likely to dump us when it happens."

Well, that's what it feels like, anyway. I hope there was another rationale to the given price structure, and I hope someone, at some point, can tell us what it is. :)

Because they can make $80 offering TTK/Exotic Emotes with Vanilla.

The players who would pay that $60 without the vanilla, but who won't pay the $80 with vanilla, will be more than made up for by new players who will buy all of it. The hardcore collectors will pay the $80 anyway.

And by 'They' I mostly mean Activision. I don't think Bungie makes distribution decisions.

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

Except that most hardcore players already have that stuff. Further, many here forked out good money already for Collector's editions or whatever.

They already have stuff given away for free? Well good thing it's free and they can just throw it in the trash.

My point here is that you can't give value to any that was purchased previously. Because their precedent is to make previous DLC free to anyone (i.e. Dark Below became free with release of HoW), then we can assume those would be free anyway. One can't make the claim 'but they're getting the full game too'.

This doesn't pass the smell test. It's business, and if they can get people to pay again, that's fine. But it's sketchy.

Out of curiosity, what would you be willing to pay for that list of collectors edition things? Less than $40 I take it, so maybe $30? $20? Here is that list again to remind you

• Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
  
• Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
  
• Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
  
• Collection of Relics and Artifacts
  
• Strange Coin Replica
  
• Three Class Specific Emotes
  
• Three Armor Shaders
  
• Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

So here we are. The only thing above I care about...and I mean the only thing, are the dance emotes. The only way to get them is to pay $40. Even better (worse?) I only roll 1 character, so it's $40 for 1 dance emote. Now you say, if it's not worth it to you, don't buy it! Which is fine, but I am of the opinion that the dance emotes are what will matter to most people - which is specifically why they were placed behind the $40 paywall. And now we slide into sketchy territory. So, to be clear: to me, specifically, it stinks.

Is there an issue here? I don't know; it will largely depend on how each person feels about the game.

...

Holy shit, did I just spend 10 minutes of my life writing a post about dance emotes?

If that's all I cared about (for one character no less), I certainly wouldn't pay $40, but I guess it depends on how much I cared about that one thing. I loved Arkham Asylum, but I certainly didn't love it enough to buy it again so I could play it again in 3-D, which is the only new thing that buying the game of the year edition would've gotten me. That's part of the calculation, though, figuring out how many people want something and what they're willing to pay. Capitalism is about charging what the market will bear and suffering if you charge more. Other people have outlined how the pricing structure makes sense, and it's a given that there's a cost and benefit to being an early adopter. I'm heavily invested, so it's a fair price for me, but I'm also hoping that Luke is right and it will seem more valuable as we learn more. I'm so glad they're not going the MMO subscription route because that would mean that I would feel the need to justify my play time every month (and I don't need any more justifications).

The only thing that doesn't make sense to me, pricing wise, is that the digital collector's edition. Per the original digital guardian edition, I'd expect it to be less than the physical edition.

I think a lot of journalism, especially games journalism, could do with less rolling over and taking what you're given and more pressing your source for actual answers instead of the platitudes and talking points they're usually focused on repeating. In this case, the interviewer was looking for why they priced it this way and what they thought and felt about the negative side of the fan reaction. In the end, they didn't get much, but I commend them for trying.

They pressed the "creative director" for information on pricing. Woohoo. How about they press him on something he actually knows. That's called knowing your sources, not taking the source you happen to get and push for something they don't know...repeatedly. Last I checked Bungie had 500+ people working there, you can't expect all of them to know everything there is to know about the company. While pricing is interesting, it's also understood to be pretty set.

I have a healthy respect for journalism, having worked in it briefly in college. But I'd rather game journalists focus on the actual mechanics of the game when they talk to game developers, instead of asking questions of them that should be aimed at advertising, marketing, or VPs.

It's as though Bungie (or more likely Activision) is saying "hey, let's ream the hardcore fans, because they're the least likely to dump us when it happens."

Yes. Exactly. EXACTLY.

This is why I flipped out about it.

I remember when everybody believed bungie when they said their partnership with activision on would not result in shitty things happening. Of course I personally never beloved that for a second!

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The thing is they're not valuing that stuff at $40, they're valuing it at $20. There's a package with just the new expansion that's $40, there's a package with the base game and all three expansions for $60, and there's a package with the base game, all three expansions, and digital and physical swag for $80. They're putting the value of the swag at about $20. What's more interesting is that going by this they're putting of the base game and the first two expansions at about $20 too. Obviously these are package deals so the price is going to be lower, but presumably it's still in the ballpark.

I don't think you can ever look at packaged deals in such a simple light. It works in middle school math, but not in economics and marketing. For example, you can't subtract the cost of software from a computer you buy and arrive at the "real" value of the computer.

For example, Let's assume the following for a moment:

• That Destiny and the expansions have paid for themselves already, which means that the "$20" extra for them is pure profit.
  
• That the new swag costs $21 just to make, meaning if sold by its self they would actually lose money at that pricing.

Now for the economic trick, if Bungie packages the swag with something that is pure profit, and that causes additional sales they wouldn't have otherwise made, than they net $19 for each collectors addition. Even if the collectors edition cannibalizes some sales, the difference is only $1, meaning they only need to sell one new copy to make up for 19 cannibalized sales.

Note: I don't think the above is realistic, but it's an example of the way things are packaged, and why many companies don't break things out into individual parts. Economics are not basic subtraction math.

For the record, I'd love to have some of the collectors stuff too but don't want to pay $40 for it. That's too much for what I consider items of value in that package.

I think a lot of journalism, especially games journalism, could do with less rolling over and taking what you're given and more pressing your source for actual answers instead of the platitudes and talking points they're usually focused on repeating. In this case, the interviewer was looking for why they priced it this way and what they thought and felt about the negative side of the fan reaction. In the end, they didn't get much, but I commend them for trying.

They pressed the "creative director" for information on pricing. Woohoo. How about they press him on something he actually knows. That's called knowing your sources, not taking the source you happen to get and push for something they don't know...repeatedly. Last I checked Bungie had 500+ people working there, you can't expect all of them to know everything there is to know about the company. While pricing is interesting, it's also understood to be pretty set.

I have a healthy respect for journalism, having worked in it briefly in college. But I'd rather game journalists focus on the actual mechanics of the game when they talk to game developers, instead of asking questions of them that should be aimed at advertising, marketing, or VPs.

...but I also think that the question should have been addressed at SOME point (it still hasn't). Luke's probably not the right person - but SOMEONE is.

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...but I also think that the question should have been addressed at SOME point (it still hasn't). Luke's probably not the right person - but SOMEONE is.

It would be nice if Bungie (or activision) laid out what they were thinking. Perhaps someone unfamiliar with game culture just grouped it as "big, bigger, biggest" and they screwed it up.

I don't think it can possible change though, since if it did it could be perceived as screwing over those that already pre-ordered. Damned if you do, damned if you don't sort of thing now.

And honestly that sounds exactly like the position Luke would have taken if he were still on the Bungie Podcast. He understands were players are coming from but knows what the company has decided. Moaning about not getting emotes isn't something he is interested in.

We've set some stuff aside for that edition specifically to really make it appeal to fans who have engaged with the game already

That quote really bugs me. "We made stuff we knew existing fans would want specifically for the bundle we designed for new players"

Those things plus Destiny, TDB and HoW? Probably worth $40... Except this package was specifically designed to most appeal to those who already have them.

- No text -

If I had to guess, I'd say Activision probably has final word. But I'd imagine there's 2-way discussion early on.

That being said, even if it was 100% in Bungie's court, I wouldn't expect Luke to say anything about it. As others have said, that's really not his department.

The thing I don't get is, if you don't want to spend the money for the neat stuff, just don't spend the money for the neat stuff! If it's only worth $60 to you, then don't pay $80.

I don't like that the special edition has all the neat stuff that only WE (read: big deal Destiny fans) will enjoy, but the fact is we don't have to buy it, or we could sell the non neat stuff on eBay at a loss.

If you want a Lincoln and you don't want to pay $50k, tough shit cause that's how much it costs. If you want something close just without the extra nice stuff, buy a Ford. Want the collector thing and don't want to pay $80, tough shit. That's how much it costs. Want something close without the extra nice stuff, buy the expansion.

To me, while I don't like that all that nice stuff hardcore fans will like is being packaged with junk we already have, it doesn't make sense that people are getting so upset about it. I'm not going to buy the strange coin. It's not worth it to me. If it's not worth it to you, don't buy it. If it is, buy it.

*shrug*

Every single person knows how video game valuation works. We all rationalize it. Should I pay $60 now or just buy it on sale later for $20? Should I buy my Moto 360 now for $250 or wait a year and get it for $100 on sale? Should I buy this new cell phone now or wait a year and get it for half price?

We all do it, and most of the time we can successfully rationalize the purchase.

If Destiny cost $200, knowing what I know now, I would absolutely go back in time and make sure my past self bought it cause it would still be a bargain to me. If I waited until now, I'd have missed out on 9 months of fun and screwing around with my friends.

I think a lot of journalism, especially games journalism, could do with less rolling over and taking what you're given and more pressing your source for actual answers instead of the platitudes and talking points they're usually focused on repeating. In this case, the interviewer was looking for why they priced it this way and what they thought and felt about the negative side of the fan reaction. In the end, they didn't get much, but I commend them for trying.

They pressed the "creative director" for information on pricing. Woohoo. How about they press him on something he actually knows. That's called knowing your sources, not taking the source you happen to get and push for something they don't know...repeatedly. Last I checked Bungie had 500+ people working there, you can't expect all of them to know everything there is to know about the company. While pricing is interesting, it's also understood to be pretty set.

I have a healthy respect for journalism, having worked in it briefly in college. But I'd rather game journalists focus on the actual mechanics of the game when they talk to game developers, instead of asking questions of them that should be aimed at advertising, marketing, or VPs.

That's a good point, I realized that later trying to explain to some people why this is kind of lacking in professionalism. If someone asked you about some aspect of the company you work at that you don't actually deal with, you'd probably have sucky answers too.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-06-22-destiny-the-taken-king-director-defends-40-expansion-price-tag

You're not you when you're hungry.

Actually from what I've seen that's pretty much him.

Deej I'm sure would have handled it better, but then again, if Bungie has to choose somebody to throw under the bus...

As for examples of handling it better:

"Bungie absolutely appreciates the loyalty of our day one fans. However, we also want to bring our game to even more people, and to do that, we're enticing them with something special just for those new fans. Of course, if you're a diehard collector who just has to have everything, you can just buy these new editions to get them. You're right that it seems you'll be buying the same things twice, but we believe this is the best way to balance offering an incentive to new players while making sure that content is available to as many players as possible should they choose to collect everything."

Those things plus Destiny, TDB and HoW? Probably worth $40... Except this package was specifically designed to most appeal to those who already have them.

I think the real problem here is that what I believe Bungie and Activision truly want is more players. The real thing here is offering the game and all the expansions plus some goodies to entice people who have been on the sidelines, either because they weren't sure they were interested in Destiny, or because some of the bad press and internet criticism has kept them away.

A package deal that means new players are getting all the current content for less than day one players means the risk is lower-- they get a lot of stuff, and if it turns out they don't like the game, hey, at least they didn't pay as much as they would have if they'd started on day one.

Veteran players are assuming this package is aimed at them. It is not. It quite obviously is not. People are acting as if Bungie is putting a massive price tag on a dance emote and taking advantage of longtime fans. I honestly do not believe this is so. They want more players so they can sell the next expansion and the following titles.

Of course, the later you get in, the more you'll get for the same price. I'm reminded of the parable of the talents-- day one fans are the workers who showed up first, did a full day's work for a full day's wages, and are complaining that people who came later got more for less work.

If you're honestly considering paying to purchase a bunch of stuff you already own to get some digital swag... the problem is you, not them. Consider stepping away from the game for awhile for your own good.

...and I don't think I am alone... I have ALREADY purchased the core game twice.

I bought the white ps4 destiny edition, that came with the console. I was annoyed for some time that I need a disc to play the game. So finally a few months ago I picked up the digital download edition so I wouldn't have to use my disc anymore. Which is silly, because it's not like there's a difference... it's a software switch. But hey, it's destiny, and I really like it and play a lot, so it's worth it right? (This has been great, I really like the digital download disc-less convenience. Even if it did make me re-download the whole game, also silly)

At that time I couldn't justify the collector's edition because I had previously bought the ps4 bundle and the season pass as well. I missed out on the red ghost and a few other niceties, but eh, I'll be okay. It's not like they will do that again.

Heh.

So, I am now in the same boat, but worse. Because the digital download special edition is the same price as the physical special edition -- you just don't get all the physical goodies. And if I -do-want to get the physical goodies then tough luck -- I am disc locked again. Not gonna do that, it would mean my double purchase was wasted.

So I'd be paying $40 for some emotes, no disc, and what I really want -- the XP bonus class items. My time is at a premium. I wasn't terribly interested in the extras until i heard about those.

So it feels like a double stick-it-to-ya. I pay a ton for a few digital items and miss out on the physical goodies, just so I can get a couple of class items that save me a little grinding.

Kinda sad about that, but I just can't justify the cost. It's a bit much. I'll be picking up the $40 version.

Luke's always been willing to smile about the stuff that makes some people uncomfortable. ;)

That's a pretty... mild way of putting it.

And on top of that, Bungie is tossing in the original game and first two expansions for FREE!
There, now you aren't paying for something you already have.

Except that most hardcore players already have that stuff. Further, many here forked out good money already for Collector's editions or whatever.

They already have stuff given away for free? Well good thing it's free and they can just throw it in the trash.

My point here is that you can't give value to any that was purchased previously. Because their precedent is to make previous DLC free to anyone (i.e. Dark Below became free with release of HoW), then we can assume those would be free anyway. One can't make the claim 'but they're getting the full game too'.

They didn't give everyone The Dark Below. I didn't buy any DLC and I'm still locked out of all of the content except Eris's bounties, the public things like the Eyes of Crota, and the multiplayer maps. The only thing they made free recently was the multiplayer maps.

This doesn't pass the smell test. It's business, and if they can get people to pay again, that's fine. But it's sketchy.

Out of curiosity, what would you be willing to pay for that list of collectors edition things? Less than $40 I take it, so maybe $30? $20? Here is that list again to remind you

• Collector's Edition SteelBook™ Case
  
• Modified Treasure Island Book with intro Letter from Cayde-6
  
• Cayde-6's Personal Notes and Illustrations
  
• Collection of Relics and Artifacts
  
• Strange Coin Replica
  
• Three Class Specific Emotes
  
• Three Armor Shaders
  
• Three Exotic Class Items with XP Bonuses

So here we are. The only thing above I care about...and I mean the only thing, are the dance emotes. The only way to get them is to pay $40. Even better (worse?) I only roll 1 character, so it's $40 for 1 dance emote. Now you say, if it's not worth it to you, don't buy it! Which is fine, but I am of the opinion that the dance emotes are what will matter to most people - which is specifically why they were placed behind the $40 paywall. And now we slide into sketchy territory. So, to be clear: to me, specifically, it stinks.

EDIT: missed this the first go-round. I'd like to pay $5 for the dance emote.

Is there an issue here? I don't know; it will largely depend on how each person feels about the game.

...

Holy shit, did I just spend 10 minutes of my life writing a post about dance emotes?

You should see the chat I'm in, I've been arguing for like 40 minutes how Bungie and Activision are not greedy assholes who are doing something clearly wrong by not offering a version with swag and without the other expansions and the base game.

The Bungie I used to know was all kinds of smug and snide with people that came at them with a combative and Pissy tone. I mean, did you ever read the webmaster?

It seems clear to me that the other rationale is that the market/channel partners would not want another SKU let alone the danger in getting the ratio wrong if they made a new guy collector edition and also a just the update collector edition which both had toys but varing amounts of games.

So, you have to cut one idea, and it won't be the one that has a prerequisite purchase as that excludes potential buyers. You lose some buyers as they evaluate the value of it to them, but unlike a collectors edition without vanilla, there is nobody who can look at this and say "I can't use this if I buy it"

I have not seen this said, but I assume the base game is going away as a purchase option.

- No text -

He's coming off a bit douchey and dismissive throughout the whole interview. That's going to rub most folks the wrong way...

If you're honestly considering paying to purchase a bunch of stuff you already own to get some digital swag... the problem is you, not them. Consider stepping away from the game for awhile for your own good.

p.s. Many of you have written +1 posts in this thread, but there's no 'like' button implemented so sorry.

Holy shit, did I just spend 10 minutes of my life writing a post about dance emotes?

Please please, process what you've just come to realize! THIS IS IMPORTANT! FOR YOUR SOUL!

Break the shackles!!! BREAK THEM!

- M

Am I reading this correctly, that The Taken King is going to cost $40?

Well, Bungie did choose to get into bed with Activision. A decision which a certain portion of the community was up in arms about from the beginning, because like, patterns.

Am I reading this correctly, that The Taken King is going to cost $40?

If you already have the base game and the first two expansions, yes, you can buy the Taken King for $40. Otherwise, it'll cost more.

Either a big part of the lead up to the part we see is cut out (which to me tends to point to the interviewer annoyed Luke into replying the way he did), or they STARTED an interview with Luke Smith, Creative Director at Bungie, with questions about pricing.

How big exactly is The Taken King.

I wouldn't take this as 100% real because I can't find a forum link, but...

this has pushed me pretty significantly more towards the "they don't care" camp, if it's real, but to be honest I don't care because the reaction is so damn funny

Big enough. New raid is all I needed to hear.

Either a big part of the lead up to the part we see is cut out (which to me tends to point to the interviewer annoyed Luke into replying the way he did), or they STARTED an interview with Luke Smith, Creative Director at Bungie, with questions about pricing.

This is why I stay away from journalism. Especially on the internet. Constant distortion of context.

How big exactly is The Taken King.

What I've gathered so far:

-A set of story missions, possibly longer and more cinematic than the previous expansion campaigns.

-A new explorable hub world like the four we got in the core game, this one being a hive captial ship orbiting the rings of Saturn. And it will have its own Patrol mode.

-New enemy faction, The Taken: possessed ghost versions of all four previous factions with new AI behaviors, weapons, etc.

-New Strike(s). I've heard plural in some of the interviews.

-New Raid.

-New multiplayer maps (I thought I heard 4).

-New multiplayer gametypes.

-A new subclass and super for each Guardian class.

-And new gear of course.

As an aspiring journalist I gotta jump in here. It's part of your job as an interviewer to ask people questions that are uncomfortable, even adversarial at times, and if the questions he was asking were "pissing him off" so to speak, then odds are good that the interviewer was striking a chord. As long as Luke was going to keep talking about it, the interviewer was going to keep asking questions, as is his job.

Luke would have been better off just saying that decisions about value and cost weren't his department, unless of course he was specifically given instruction to go into the interview trying to persuade people of The taken Kings value, which I think is a pretty good bet considering how much effort is put into getting employees to respond "on message" so to speak.

The most bizarre portion of the interview:

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 -

Is just a really strange moment. The fact that he felt he needed to go on the offensive at that point and dictate to the interviewer what they were feeling is a really strange way of trying to establish dominance over the interviewer.

Luke's gambit ultimately backfired as this followed:

Eurogamer: What I'm saying is that fan frustration is not because they don't understand the proposition. It comes regardless of how cool the exclusive content is. The frustration - and mine as a fan - is that the method of acquiring it requires me to re-buy content I bought a year ago.

Luke Smith: [Long pause] It's about value. The player's assessment of the value of the content.

Which is essentially saying we think you're going to want the content bad enough that you will end up paying for things you already own anyhow, and that doesn't really bother us, because it's about what the players valuation, not ours. Which I doubt is the message that the PR team wanted him to convey, considering how exploitative that might appear to people.

Yeah no... Luke was more than willing to engage the interviewer on the subject. If he truly didn't know anything about it he simply could have said that's not my department, or I don't know.

Instead he provided some very specific answers about why it was going to be priced the way it is.

This was probably a misstep for Luke and Bungie's PR, but for the interviewer it was a victory because he got some insight into Bungie's thought process regarding pricing that they might not have gotten by talking to a different source.

Bungie of course could backtrack and say something like our employee misspoke or something like that, but I seriously doubt he said anything that is incorrect about their pricing philosophy.

https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/132505215/0/0/1

As an aspiring journalist I gotta jump in here. It's part of your job as an interviewer to ask people questions that are uncomfortable, even adversarial at times, and if the questions he was asking were "pissing him off" so to speak, then odds are good that the interviewer was striking a chord. As long as Luke was going to keep talking about it, the interviewer was going to keep asking questions, as is his job.

Luke would have been better off just saying that decisions about value and cost weren't his department, unless of course he was specifically given instruction to go into the interview trying to persuade people of The taken Kings value, which I think is a pretty good bet considering how much effort is put into getting employees to respond "on message" so to speak.

The most bizarre portion of the interview:

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 -

Is just a really strange moment. The fact that he felt he needed to go on the offensive at that point and dictate to the interviewer what they were feeling is a really strange way of trying to establish dominance over the interviewer.

Luke's gambit ultimately backfired as this followed:

Eurogamer: What I'm saying is that fan frustration is not because they don't understand the proposition. It comes regardless of how cool the exclusive content is. The frustration - and mine as a fan - is that the method of acquiring it requires me to re-buy content I bought a year ago.

Luke Smith: [Long pause] It's about value. The player's assessment of the value of the content.

Which is essentially saying we think you're going to want the content bad enough that you will end up paying for things you already own anyhow, and that doesn't really bother us, because it's about what the players valuation, not ours. Which I doubt is the message that the PR team wanted him to convey, considering how exploitative that might appear to people.

Gambit? Please.

The 'journalist' reveals his bias when he says he's a fan. My take on this is that Luke could tell this kid was upset and agitated. That's no way to conduct yourself professionally. So he decided 'fuck this, this interview's already going to be biased from the get-go' And he just let the honesty fly. How much more honest can you be when you say "It's about value" - and the pause is probably because he saw this kid about to start crying.

Go Luke go!

What really makes me crack up is how now the PS4 folks are getting all up in arms - like they completely forgot that for a YEAR they've had exclusive access to content that XBone folks were denied.

Like others have (rightly) said - and I'll rephrase the words to how it *should* be stated: All this about some dance moves? ABSURD! If some stupid dance moves is how we now see as 'exploitative' for the core audience - I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

- M

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

Someone told me about this part of your reply a minute ago, and I had a eureka moment hearing him say it.

DBO is great because we're generally more moderate and more adult than, say, Reddit, or other sites, and I loved that there wasn't a bunch of entitled bitching about prices or collector's edition content, and have said so plenty of times since Reddit started doing it.

I couldn't put my finger on what I felt when I saw this stuff here at first. It wasn't like "Oh, another shit on Destiny (despite the fact that I play it constantly) thread that takes up the entire page" it was like "Oh, DBO. You've turned into Reddit with longer words and somehow even more entitlement."

What I felt was embarrassment. Thanks for putting that feeling into a word.

Gambit? Please.

The 'journalist' reveals his bias when he says he's a fan. My take on this is that Luke could tell this kid was upset and agitated. That's no way to conduct yourself professionally. So he decided 'fuck this, this interview's already going to be biased from the get-go' And he just let the honesty fly. How much more honest can you be when you say "It's about value" - and the pause is probably because he saw this kid about to start crying.

Go Luke go!

I agree. I think Luke saw the writing on the wall about how the interview was going to go, and decided not to play nice.

What really makes me crack up is how now the PS4 folks are getting all up in arms - like they completely forgot that for a YEAR they've had exclusive access to content that XBone folks were denied.

I don't think the frustration is totally without merit, but I'll get back to that in a moment.

Like others have (rightly) said - and I'll rephrase the words to how it *should* be stated: All this about some dance moves? ABSURD! If some stupid dance moves is how we now see as 'exploitative' for the core audience -

The specific items that people are getting worked up about are trivial. No doubt about it. But as I'm sure you already know, it's not really about the specific items. People don't like feeling excluded, and they don't like feeling manipulated. I personally don't feel either of those things, but some clearly do and I can understand why.

As others have pointed out, the bonus in-game items included with the new legendary edition are not the kinds of exclusive content that will get newcomers excited. People who don't already play Destiny are not likely to care about new dance moves, exotic class items, or the physical goodies in the box. The people who will care are the ones who already own the game.

I'm about as dispassionate about this as I could be, but something about this still feels off.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

- M

For what it's worth, I do think the discussion here is generally a lot more level headed than most other places, even if you feel the specific complaints are trivial. Every now and then I get flashbacks to my Waypoint moderator days (shudders)... we have it GOOD here :)

You used to be cool.

"Get it now or pay even more on eBay, then we'll see who's laughing".

WHAT?!

Veteran players are assuming this package is aimed at them. It is not. It quite obviously is not.

Luke: We've set some stuff aside for that edition specifically to really make it appeal to fans who have engaged with the game already.

It's not aimed at us entirely, but they sure as hell knew some of us would consider it, and threw a few things in there to intentionally make the decision harder for existing fans.

Bungie has always been pros at " We can't discuss that at this time" or "Someone else could explain this better". No one would think it unusual, and considering his role it would make sense for him not to answer those questions.

If you don't have the answers, don't give them.

That's all.

Veteran players are assuming this package is aimed at them. It is not. It quite obviously is not. People are acting as if Bungie is putting a massive price tag on a dance emote and taking advantage of longtime fans. I honestly do not believe this is so. They want more players so they can sell the next expansion and the following titles.

I completely agree that this is primarily aimed at new players. Most of the value in the package is Destiny itself, not the stuff. While it may not be Bungie's intention to (seem to) gouge veteran players, they may have underestimated or miscalculated the perception.

But I can't give them a free pass. For example, they might have simply added the new shaders and class items and emotes to people that already own DB and HoW. Although some might scoff at that stuff, I'd like to point out that people will grind forever to rank enough times just for the opportunity to get a faction shader.

The stuff (shaders, emotes, class items) are easy-cheesy - cheap to make. Throwaways. Except to veteran players that are looking for any scrap of newness they can find. What will that stuff matter to new players?

The Collector's package is aimed at new players, except for the stuff that veterans crave. That was most certainly put there to lure the veterans.

I don't entirely disagree. If you boil it down to "We want our dances" it IS pretty silly. But your attitude stinks. The guy is a "kid" and not a journalist why? Because he's asking questions a lot of people want to know?

Or is it his "bias" as a fan that makes his questions somehow less acceptable? (Beaides which it's not like he didn't disclose it). You're right in that he came at the interview from a specific angle, but the questions were no less valid, and at no point was he especially "unprofessional" - He did his job, asked some questions and got some answers.

What he did do is not sit and mindlessly ask the Press Release questions then come back to us with "Here is a Press Release I reworded a bit", which I appreciate. If I want a press release I'll read it from the source. Journalism is about asking questions and he did a great job doing that. Both sides said their piece with all biases disclosed and the reader can decide. Journalism.

My disclosure: Im buying the thing because I like Collector's Editions. Bungie have made their position clear so I've made a decision. But I feel that it's a position they've taken solely because they know they can get away with it. They've even mentioned that the CE stuff is there to bait existing players into rebuying content. Sadly that's the way the industry works - I'll live. But I understand the "outrage" - the industry shouldn't work like that. This thing isn't that bad, but it's an easy example people can get behind.

Almost forgot: I can't stand people who belittle others for their beliefs. Disagree all you want. Explain how wrong they are or why their beliefs are unrealistic/inappropriate/whatever. Don't just reduce them to "kids", "entitled" or "whiners". It does nothing to further discussion, all it does is make people feel shitty, small and/or angry. That's not how intelligent discourse works and it's not good for anyone.

Veteran players are assuming this package is aimed at them. It is not. It quite obviously is not.

Luke: We've set some stuff aside for that edition specifically to really make it appeal to fans who have engaged with the game already.

It's not aimed at us entirely, but they sure as hell knew some of us would consider it, and threw a few things in there to intentionally make the decision harder for existing fans.

Sure, because not doing that is leaving money on the table.

On the other hand, Luke is really not deft enough to talk about this stuff.

Time for Deej to do damage control, I expect-- which I think he's already doing.

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Here's my financial breakdown of all of my Destiny related purchases in order to get everything you can purchase on the xbox echosphere

xbone ghost edition (Originally was only going to play on the One): $149.99
CoD Advanced Warfare PreOrder (For Blacksmith Shader): $5
360 regular edition (bought to play with friends on the 360): $59.99
360 season pass (Because apparently you could only upgrade and not downgrade): $34.99
Nepal Relief (Shader, Emblem, Shirt, Poster): $100 (Only $24.99 for in game items)
xbone TTK Collector's Edition: $79.99

I'm sitting at $429.96 spent on this game so far ($354.95 for in game items)

I have played a total of 1271 hours on the 3 characters I have plus around another 200 on the 2nd warlock I ran for most of Vanilla and TDB. For simplification I'm going to round up to 1500 hours total spent in game.

$355 Spent on the game
1500 Hours in game
$0.24 price per hour played w/ all available content.

While I'm not excited to have to rebuy the entire game again for my new dance moves I'm sitting at a good price per hour of entertainment and still have a brand new expansion to play in a few months.

Where to begin.

First of all, the 'kid' you're referring to here is named Tom Phillips, a deputy editor for Eurogamer, not some wide eyed college graduate.

Secondly, not being present for the interview it is impossible for you to determine that he was upset and agitated, and I don't think "the kid was about to cry" even merits a response.

Third, saying "fuck this" and doing saying whatever you want would be pretty much the opposite of being professional, so you're working against yourself there if Luke did indeed do that (though I doubt that's what he did since you don't have a direct line into his thoughts).

Lastly, whether the interviewer is a fan of the game or not has nothing to do with his line of questioning. He simply asked the questions, and Luke gave the answers. If they elicited an unusual response, then all the better yes?

I know it's a burden to bear, but do your best to allow yourself to be associated with all the needy whiners out there. I know, I know, god it's just so embarrassing to be seen with those people, but you can do it, I believe in you.

So says they internet.

(here's the relevant part, no need to read the whole forbes thing)

[Update: From Bungie Community Manager Deej: “Year One players won’t get the same perks as people who buy a collector’s edition. They’ll get something better. Tune into the Weekly Update for more.”

Four dance emotes?]

I don't really care one way or the other what they do and do not include, as I don't have the same level of investment into this game that many of you do, however I can empathize that as a whole, this stuff is bonkers.

Surely they should have anticipated this kind of reaction. It could be a golden warlock turd as an exclusive item, and people would still get upset about it. It's not so much as what the content IS that sets people off, it's the fact there is clearly double dipping here.

I dunno.

Seems pretty standard for anyone under Activision's umbrella.

It's also about class items that give exp buffs. That could potentially alter your experience significantly. As for the ps4 exclusivity, I never defended that either and think it's just as shitty.

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- No text -

The Bungie I used to know was all kinds of smug and snide with people that came at them with a combative and Pissy tone. I mean, did you ever read the webmaster?

not to the press.

I don't entirely disagree.

This fills me with hope actually. I'm not being facetious.

If you boil it down to "We want our dances" it IS pretty silly. But your attitude stinks. The guy is a "kid" and not a journalist why? Because he's asking questions a lot of people want to know?

Because Luke gave him his chance to reconsider his line of questioning but said journalist was going to stick to his faulty-guns and continue to come off like a whiner.

Or is it his "bias" as a fan that makes his questions somehow less acceptable?

If you come off like some random person posting in a Q&A with the devs, his whole article looks like an attempt to just stir the pot and champion the disgruntled.

(Beaides which it's not like he didn't disclose it).

So? That doesn't excuse him. It actually put into focus that all we saw there was a dev that likes to shoot his mouth off and talk honestly against an agitated journalist that was coming at Luke w/ an agenda. That's punditry, *not* journalism.

You're right in that he came at the interview from a specific angle, but the questions were no less valid, and at no point was he especially "unprofessional" - He did his job, asked some questions and got some answers.

The 'job' here is basically a transcript of a rough exchange w/ a dev. Wouldn't a *real* good job be that he then researched the other side of it? "Eurogamer: Fair and Balanced."

What he did do is not sit and mindlessly ask the Press Release questions then come back to us with "Here is a Press Release I reworded a bit", which I appreciate. If I want a press release I'll read it from the source. Journalism is about asking questions and he did a great job doing that. Both sides said their piece with all biases disclosed and the reader can decide. Journalism.

It is great the he went off script, kudos to that, but that doesn't excuse the end result. And you're admitting now this wasn't journalism, but a debate between a fan and a dev? ("Both sides said their piece") So, no, not journalism.

My disclosure: Im buying the thing because I like Collector's Editions. Bungie have made their position clear so I've made a decision.

But I feel that it's a position they've taken solely because they know they can get away with it.

Ah, NOW we're getting to that glorious of honeypots: the "they're screwing us ON PURPOSE" canard. So firmly based on truisms and facts. Evidence abounds that Bungie sat in a room and planned this whole 'How can we give a middle finger to our fans that have played for the past year?"

They've even mentioned that the CE stuff is there to bait existing players into rebuying content.

Really? They phrased it exactly that way? Really?

Sadly that's the way the industry works - I'll live. But I understand the "outrage" - the industry shouldn't work like that. This thing isn't that bad, but it's an easy example people can get behind.

Now here's MY DISCLOSURE. As of TODAY, RIGHT NOW, I'm only buying the $40 digital download. Because that's all I care about, choose to value as appropriate for my needs. I'm not sweating having any of the extra content, because I was never much of a sucker for those kind of things… I'll be there on the sidelines waiting for all the discussion and youtube videos of folks taking apart the goodies in the CE. And I'll enjoy it all. Thanks very much Bungie.

Almost forgot: I can't stand people who belittle others for their beliefs. Disagree all you want. Explain how wrong they are or why their beliefs are unrealistic/inappropriate/whatever. Don't just reduce them to "kids", "entitled" or "whiners". It does nothing to further discussion, all it does is make people feel shitty, small and/or angry. That's not how intelligent discourse works and it's not good for anyone.

You are doing a good job of getting it. Thanks. I'm not here to just have rational discourse, though my posts are full of just that if you're willing to get beyond where I'm slapping you in the face. But the slapping in the face (or pouring cold water on you) IS my intent here. I'm not pussyfooting around. This forum needs a wakeup call, and I'm feeling like the momentum is building. I hate that this forum is VERY much like all the other forums, b.net included. Maybe it's full of more words, more 'elite college' chin-scratching, etc. but whittled down, the tone is *exactly* the same: Bungie, fix your shit, or I hate you and all you stand for. No matter how many hours of enjoyment I've gotten out of it, you stlll suck balls and I'm done with you. THAT, my friends, is a shitty attitude. Not worthy of my siding up next to you and kissing you on the cheek and saying there, there, I got your back on this. Because I don't.

Every post I read here and elsewhere that says "Bungie is shitting on their hardcore fans." "I'm a first day player, and Bungie is saying Fuck you to me for my dedication." "Bungie should be rewarding me for being so faithful." "It's not the content, it's the principle."

TO ALL OF THOSE, I SAY: No, no, no and double-NO. I'm a first day player, I'm a hardcore fan, I've faithfully played the game. But I reject being lumped into this bitter group. The principle is easy to grasp: Bungie has to make things that are exclusive, as they are selling along several tiers and they different thing to entice those tiers. AND THEY HAVE NOT FINISHED STATING WHAT'S COMING. So what I call "Zero-Day-Outrage" will be mocked by me. Sorry. That's just how it's going to go.

Can you imagine the teams at Bungie that have been working on all this new stuff for the past months (or year) and they wake up to see these posts of folks basically saying how they couldn't care less about all the new content they've created… that no, THEY'RE PISSED because they choose to focus on SOME DANCE MOVES plus other minor things???

Come on, REALLY?

I'll say it again, it's embarrassing. But I also implore you: Do a good job of parsing my words. I'm *not* saying disagreeing with a move a company makes is forbidden! All I'm saying is the level of outrage does *not* match reality. In any other reasonable world, (for instance, MINE) I would say "Oh, that's cool, all that collectors stuff, awesome… aww, look at those dance moves, those new shaders, etc. What? I can't get it but only through the CE? Oh, well that sucks. Anyway, can't wait to play the new stuff!" This folks is considered a reasonable reaction. But if instead we get "WHAT? YOU MEAN I CAN'T GET THAT? WHAT HAS THIS WORLD COME TO? I HAVE BEEN ABUSED AND MY MONEY IS BEING TAKEN AGAINST MY WILL!" Sorry, I firmly reject that worldview.

- No text -

http://www.usingenglish.com/forum/threads/12654-quot-I-said-my-peace-piece-quot-which-is-it

Except the avatar.

*shudder*

- No text -

Where to begin.

I'm sure you'll put in your best effort.

First of all, the 'kid' you're referring to here is named Tom Phillips, a deputy editor for Eurogamer, not some wide eyed college graduate.

Secondly, not being present for the interview it is impossible for you to determine that he was upset and agitated, and I don't think "the kid was about to cry" even merits a response.

Thanks, every now and then I like to put on the hyperbole coat, since it seems so well worn around here on the forum. Trust that I don't do it often. It smells of rancid gamer tears.

Third, saying "fuck this" and doing saying whatever you want would be pretty much the opposite of being professional, so you're working against yourself there if Luke did indeed do that (though I doubt that's what he did since you don't have a direct line into his thoughts).

See, you're reacting against what everyone else decided to do to Luke - to posit his attitude and his thinking and absolutely peg his motivations. But I'm not allowed to do that with the revered Mr. Tom Phillips?

Lastly, whether the interviewer is a fan of the game or not has nothing to do with his line of questioning.

This is too disingenuous to even try to argue with. You're legitimately saying that if this was a *neutral* person the results might not have been different?

You people are just defending him because he is pushing your *own* agenda. He is your agent against the big bad Bungie for their crimes against all faithful Destiny players. The fact that it all turned into one train-wreck with Luke flying his freak flag just belittles the whole exchange. If I was Phillips, I would've stepped back and said to myself - why was I asking this dev/game-designer NON-PR person at Bungie these questions? You know, I'll see what Deej or Urk or heck even Parsons have to say. You don't think if he showed them his exchange w/ Luke that they would've jumped at the chance to present their side of things? Now we're talking journalism, where the whole thing (Luke/DeeJ/Urk/etc) is examined, dissected, and presented to the reader.

He simply asked the questions, and Luke gave the answers. If they elicited an unusual response, then all the better yes?

I guess rubbernecking and staring at car accidents instead of just driving along the highway is all the better, yes?

I know it's a burden to bear, but do your best to allow yourself to be associated with all the needy whiners out there. I know, I know, god it's just so embarrassing to be seen with those people, but you can do it, I believe in you.

Jeeze, I've been dealing w/ the whiners for a good 30 years now. One day they'll learn to leave me alone. But I'll keep at it, no worries bud.

- M

Keep on Keepin on then friend. Don't let those rancid gamer tears and entitled kids keep you down.

Here's my financial breakdown of all of my Destiny related purchases in order to get everything you can purchase on the xbox echosphere

xbone ghost edition (Originally was only going to play on the One): $149.99
CoD Advanced Warfare PreOrder (For Blacksmith Shader): $5
360 regular edition (bought to play with friends on the 360): $59.99
360 season pass (Because apparently you could only upgrade and not downgrade): $34.99
Nepal Relief (Shader, Emblem, Shirt, Poster): $100 (Only $24.99 for in game items)
xbone TTK Collector's Edition: $79.99

I'm sitting at $429.96 spent on this game so far ($354.95 for in game items)

I have played a total of 1271 hours on the 3 characters I have plus around another 200 on the 2nd warlock I ran for most of Vanilla and TDB. For simplification I'm going to round up to 1500 hours total spent in game.

$355 Spent on the game
1500 Hours in game
$0.24 price per hour played w/ all available content.

While I'm not excited to have to rebuy the entire game again for my new dance moves I'm sitting at a good price per hour of entertainment and still have a brand new expansion to play in a few months.

See folks, he and I are on completely seperate sides of the schoolyard. His need to spend his hard earning drachmas on such things is completely abbhorrent to me. I'll never do it. Yet we can happily coexist. I applaud that he's having a ball enjoying all his loot!

Play on brother, play on.

- M

The 'job' here is basically a transcript of a rough exchange w/ a dev. Wouldn't a *real* good job be that he then researched the other side of it? "Eurogamer: Fair and Balanced."

No. Good Journalism is NOT about being balanced. In fact it's quite the opposite. Good journalism has a purpose and focus. Would you call out Rachel Carson because she didn't write about all the benefits of DDT? Would you call out CNN for not spinning the War in Vietnam in a positive light? Would you call out Glen Greenwald for not talking about how awesome spying can be? No! Good journalism is biased as hell.

"Balanced" journalism just means you aren't taking a side, and basically saying and changing nothing. It's what you fall back on when you don't want to admit you have no courage to speak out.

I would've stepped back and said to myself - why was I asking this dev/game-designer NON-PR person at Bungie these questions? You know, I'll see what Deej or Urk or heck even Parsons have to say. You don't think if he showed them his exchange w/ Luke that they would've jumped at the chance to present their side of things? Now we're talking journalism, where the whole thing (Luke/DeeJ/Urk/etc) is examined, dissected, and presented to the reader.

You firstly assume he has access to those other people, and second, this piece did more than the hypothetical piece which you wanted him to write could ever do. FORBES just wrote an article about how it was a disaster, and Bungie needs to consider changing things moving forward. Bungie's terrible decision is starting to spiral into negative PR.

Mission accomplished man. Let's be honest: there's really no defending what Bungie is doing on any sort of creative or ethical level. Most people just want to play awesome games and not have to deal with this shit.

I don't entirely disagree.

This fills me with hope actually. I'm not being facetious.

If you boil it down to "We want our dances" it IS pretty silly. But your attitude stinks. The guy is a "kid" and not a journalist why? Because he's asking questions a lot of people want to know?

Because Luke gave him his chance to reconsider his line of questioning but said journalist was going to stick to his faulty-guns and continue to come off like a whiner.

Again with the belittling. "Whiner" means nothing. It means "I don't agree so his opinion is invalid". It means "Pfft, grow up and accept it". He stuck to his guns because he felt he hadn't had a satisfying answer. Maybe a poor choice, but certainly not uncommon in an interview. I fail to see how it makes him a child, or a whiner.

Or is it his "bias" as a fan that makes his questions somehow less acceptable?

If you come off like some random person posting in a Q&A with the devs, his whole article looks like an attempt to just stir the pot and champion the disgruntled.

As you mention later, that's punditry rather than journalism I guess. You're right. I've always considered that to be a form of journalism but I understand the distinction you were making now.

(Beaides which it's not like he didn't disclose it).

So? That doesn't excuse him. It actually put into focus that all we saw there was a dev that likes to shoot his mouth off and talk honestly against an agitated journalist that was coming at Luke w/ an agenda. That's punditry, *not* journalism.

It doesn't excuse him? Who's looking for an excuse? It's context is all, and yes, it shows that he (openly and honestly) had an agenda. I would wager we just have different viewpoints on punditry, considering that's seemingly damning to you and good practice to me. Agree to disagree on that I guess.

You're right in that he came at the interview from a specific angle, but the questions were no less valid, and at no point was he especially "unprofessional" - He did his job, asked some questions and got some answers.

The 'job' here is basically a transcript of a rough exchange w/ a dev.

Press Release: The Interview. Yuck.

Wouldn't a *real* good job be that he then researched the other side of it? "Eurogamer: Fair and Balanced."

I don't know that I agree this is always necessary (again, see my views on punditry), but I get it. I expect this is what rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.

What he did do is not sit and mindlessly ask the Press Release questions then come back to us with "Here is a Press Release I reworded a bit", which I appreciate. If I want a press release I'll read it from the source. Journalism is about asking questions and he did a great job doing that. Both sides said their piece with all biases disclosed and the reader can decide. Journalism.

It is great the he went off script, kudos to that, but that doesn't excuse the end result. And you're admitting now this wasn't journalism, but a debate between a fan and a dev? ("Both sides said their piece") So, no, not journalism.

Like I've mentioned, I consider punditry a branch of journalism, but it's not Journalism with a capital J. I hadn't realised the distinction you were making previously.

My disclosure: Im buying the thing because I like Collector's Editions. Bungie have made their position clear so I've made a decision.

But I feel that it's a position they've taken solely because they know they can get away with it.

Ah, NOW we're getting to that glorious of honeypots: the "they're screwing us ON PURPOSE" canard. So firmly based on truisms and facts. Evidence abounds that Bungie sat in a room and planned this whole 'How can we give a middle finger to our fans that have played for the past year?"

They've even mentioned that the CE stuff is there to bait existing players into rebuying content.

Really? They phrased it exactly that way? Really?

Luke: We've set some stuff aside for that edition specifically to really make it appeal to fans who have engaged with the game already.

Less "malicious" intent, but definitely intent. As some have said, thry'd be silly not to, but I think the point still stands. Do I think there's an evil cabal (heh) of Bungie/Activision employees out to get me? No. But they'd be stupid not to take advantage of the situation, right?

Sadly that's the way the industry works - I'll live. But I understand the "outrage" - the industry shouldn't work like that. This thing isn't that bad, but it's an easy example people can get behind.

Now here's MY DISCLOSURE. As of TODAY, RIGHT NOW, I'm only buying the $40 digital download. Because that's all I care about, choose to value as appropriate for my needs. I'm not sweating having any of the extra content, because I was never much of a sucker for those kind of things… I'll be there on the sidelines waiting for all the discussion and youtube videos of folks taking apart the goodies in the CE. And I'll enjoy it all. Thanks very much Bungie.

Almost forgot: I can't stand people who belittle others for their beliefs. Disagree all you want. Explain how wrong they are or why their beliefs are unrealistic/inappropriate/whatever. Don't just reduce them to "kids", "entitled" or "whiners". It does nothing to further discussion, all it does is make people feel shitty, small and/or angry. That's not how intelligent discourse works and it's not good for anyone.

You are doing a good job of getting it. Thanks. I'm not here to just have rational discourse, though my posts are full of just that if you're willing to get beyond where I'm slapping you in the face. But the slapping in the face (or pouring cold water on you) IS my intent here. I'm not pussyfooting around. This forum needs a wakeup call, and I'm feeling like the momentum is building. I hate that this forum is VERY much like all the other forums, b.net included. Maybe it's full of more words, more 'elite college' chin-scratching, etc. but whittled down, the tone is *exactly* the same: Bungie, fix your shit, or I hate you and all you stand for. No matter how many hours of enjoyment I've gotten out of it, you stlll suck balls and I'm done with you. THAT, my friends, is a shitty attitude. Not worthy of my siding up next to you and kissing you on the cheek and saying there, there, I got your back on this. BCecause I don't.

Every post I read here and elsewhere that says "Bungie is shitting on their hardcore fans." "I'm a first day player, and Bungie is saying Fuck you to me for my dedication." "Bungie should be rewarding me for being so faithful." "It's not the content, it's the principle."

TO ALL OF THOSE, I SAY: No, no, no and double-NO. I'm a first day player, I'm a hardcore fan, I've faithfully played the game. But I reject being lumped into this bitter group. The principle is easy to grasp: Bungie has to make things that are exclusive, as they are selling along several tiers and they different thing to entice those tiers. AND THEY HAVE NOT FINISHED STATING WHAT'S COMING. So what I call "Zero-Day-Outrage" will be mocked by me. Sorry. That's just how it's going to go.

Can you imagine the teams at Bungie that have been working on all this new stuff for the past months (or year) and they wake up to see these posts of folks basically saying how they couldn't care less about all the new content they've created… that no, THEY'RE PISSED because they choose to focus on SOME DANCE MOVES plus other minor things???

Come on, REALLY?

I'll say it again, it's embarrassing. But I also implore you: Do a good job of parsing my words. I'm *not* saying disagreeing with a move a company makes is forbidden! All I'm saying is the level of outrage does *not* match reality. In any other reasonable world, (for instance, MINE) I would say "Oh, that's cool, all that collectors stuff, awesome… aww, look at those dance moves, those new shaders, etc. What? I can't get it but only through the CE? Oh, well that sucks. Anyway, can't wait to play the new stuff!" This folks is considered a reasonable reaction. But if instead we get "WHAT? YOU MEAN I CAN'T GET THAT? WHAT HAS THIS WORLD COME TO? I HAVE BEEN ABUSED AND MY MONEY IS BEING TAKEN AGAINST MY WILL!" Sorry, I firmly reject that worldview.

I agree almost completely. The only part I take issue with (and the reason for my previous post) is the rudeness. You call it a slap in the face, I call it churlish namecalling. You're clearly a smart guy, everything you've said makes sense, and everyone tells me how nice you are. So why the attitude? Surely you could achieve the same with a well-worded argument rather than rudeness? You could probably achieve more - I know I got so annoyed by it that I forgot how much I agreed with you.

Like I said - argue. Discuss. Disagree. Call people out. Don't belittle them. It's not a wakeup call, all it does is piss people off, and angry people don't make for good discussion.

I've said so much on other posts, which I'm sure you'll read. So I won't address everything you write below. I'm sure you understand.

Gambit? Please.

The 'journalist' reveals his bias when he says he's a fan. My take on this is that Luke could tell this kid was upset and agitated. That's no way to conduct yourself professionally. So he decided 'fuck this, this interview's already going to be biased from the get-go' And he just let the honesty fly. How much more honest can you be when you say "It's about value" - and the pause is probably because he saw this kid about to start crying.

Go Luke go!

I agree. I think Luke saw the writing on the wall about how the interview was going to go, and decided not to play nice.

What really makes me crack up is how now the PS4 folks are getting all up in arms - like they completely forgot that for a YEAR they've had exclusive access to content that XBone folks were denied.

I don't think the frustration is totally without merit, but I'll get back to that in a moment.

Like others have (rightly) said - and I'll rephrase the words to how it *should* be stated: All this about some dance moves? ABSURD! If some stupid dance moves is how we now see as 'exploitative' for the core audience -

The specific items that people are getting worked up about are trivial. No doubt about it. But as I'm sure you already know, it's not really about the specific items. People don't like feeling excluded, and they don't like feeling manipulated. I personally don't feel either of those things, but some clearly do and I can understand why.

I'm glad you don't! And like you, I completely understand why.

Here's where I'm taking it a step further. I'm using my smarts to *reject* the false feeling of being 'manipulated' or 'exploited' or 'deceived' - these are all pure constructs of my *own* creation. There is zero proof that Bungie is actually doing ANY of the above.

This is a new thing - this rejecting thing - I think for many folks here and elsewhere to embrace. For too long we have had an environment where *any* misstep is met with derision, and anger, and the pitchforks come out. ALL I'm asking for is a reasonable attempt to curb those initial impulses. To sit back and wonder - wait, why am I getting so upset? Does my anger, and jumping on the bandwagon with fellow upset gamers, actually help? What is actually going on here?

As others have pointed out, the bonus in-game items included with the new legendary edition are not the kinds of exclusive content that will get newcomers excited. People who don't already play Destiny are not likely to care about new dance moves, exotic class items, or the physical goodies in the box. The people who will care are the ones who already own the game.

I think this is supposition. I think they are following an established precedent of game-of-the-year collections. And I can easily envision folks that were on the fence, or thought Destiny was a crappy game due to the bad press it initially got, that they would love a package where they got lots of new goodies and loot to entice them to purchase the game.

I'm about as dispassionate about this as I could be, but something about this still feels off.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

I'm with you! What I would add though is that *now* I'm hearing folks say "Oh look, Bungie is doing damage control and they're going to announce stuff to placate us all that are upset!" And this again feels like a misstep in seeing cause-and-effect. When TTK was announced, it was said that there was MORE TO COME.

Again, I can understand thinking "oh, that sucks" what I can't understand is the "let's turn this up to 11" outrage.

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

- M

For what it's worth, I do think the discussion here is generally a lot more level headed than most other places, even if you feel the specific complaints are trivial. Every now and then I get flashbacks to my Waypoint moderator days (shudders)... we have it GOOD here :)

I get it, but I still feel there is a miasma here that needs addressing.

Let me also take this moment to speak directly to you CL, a few days past you started a discussion that got me rolling in comments with others, and things got all heated and there was back and forth, babies were made, babies were aborted, etc. etc. And Kermit near the end said something like "it's too bad all this had to happen on CL's OP, he's the nicest of guys and doesn't deserve that." I had meant to write, no Kermit, this is EXACTLY why CL's a perfect candidate for these discussions - because a) you're a bonafide Canadian, with your nice laid back attitude - I feel no matter how barbed the words are, they just slide right off of you, and so that means all that anger BS can be set aside and we can discuss the meat of the matter and b) you are a good representative of those people I rail against - but in the sense that you are *just* on the periphery - you are a true addict to the game, many of your posts just make me shake my head, but it's exactly because you are the anti-Cody with the surface-level self-generating loathing against the ills against 'gamer nirvana' and fake persona crap, that actually makes you accessible and my wanting to engage with you. You represent, to me, the insidiousness of how this game has sucked many of us fine people down the rabbit-hole. And with many paragraphs of discourse, excel spreadsheets, and talking over tea and biscuits, the addiction buried underneath is still there.. lurking and convincing some of us that it's perfectly reasonable to talk about moving 3 characters through nightfalls and weeklies, and weighing the minutiae of which gun perk gives us that .005% advantage (listen, Thorn is the answer - it will always be the answer) and therefore every other gun is a joke, worthy of sharding, etc.

In other words, you are my best chance of a breakthrough with the others. So for that I thank you, and hope to see you at PAX in a few months.

- M

And not journalism. Well, maybe both.

Three short things,

• 1) Luke isn't the guy to talk to about this. Sure Phillips was entitled to go ahead and ask him anyway, but it was childish to keep pestering him about it after it was covered. He knows decisions like that are not made by Luke and ragging on him about it is petty.
  
• 2) Why did Phillips not let the matter rest when it was done? What purpose could he have for needling a Creative Director over pricing? Seems to me like he just wanted to spice up the article with complaints. The idea that it's cool to pester content creators on the business aspects of pricing what they create is a bit abhorrent to me.
  
• 3) That Forbes article doesn't rely on much more than opinion. I'm sure the writer is mad and all that, but he is really just giving his opinions on how the interview went even though he is presenting it as cataclysmic fact. On the plus side, I bet that page will get a lot of views and generate lots of ad revenue for Forbes. An article titled "Bungie's 'Taken King' interview was a little testy, but will likely have no impact on Destiny" is much less exciting than the one they went with. I have nothing against news sites needing to make money, it's just a little too easy to let that need make you a disingenuous journalist.

See folks, he and I are on completely separate sides of the schoolyard.... Yet we can happily coexist.

^^^Exactly this^^^

I am the type of gamer who likes to play the crap out of a game and don't mind spending extra to have the little in game items. I figure I play the game a ton, so why not have the extras?

My last 5 years of gaming is essentially this. (With some Lego games sprinkled in)

2010-2011 Halo Reach
2011-2012 Skyrim + Halo Reach
2012-2014 Halo 4
2014-2015 Destiny
2015-2016 Halo 5 + Destiny

It doesn't bother me if people don't have the extras or are upset by having to rebuy something in order to get those little pieces. I personally hate having to rebuy the whole game for the collector's edition. But with that said, I am excited to have the strange coin replica and some of the other little pieces that come with the collector's edition. And I'll end up with an extra copy of the game that I can give to a friend.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

You are probably right about this, and I'm only mildly concerned (bonus XP means less grinding, making my time spent with the game much easier!). However, perhaps Bungie should consider the timing of their announcements. If we have to wait till a later announcement to smooth things over and realize it's no big deal, in the future perhaps they should just announce everything they need to announce at the same time, and prevent this from happening in the first place.

[[[ much snipped]]

I'll just sum up and say I am thankful that we found common ground. I mean that sincerely.

I agree almost completely. The only part I take issue with (and the reason for my previous post) is the rudeness. You call it a slap in the face, I call it churlish namecalling. You're clearly a smart guy, everything you've said makes sense, and everyone tells me how nice you are. So why the attitude? Surely you could achieve the same with a well-worded argument rather than rudeness? You could probably achieve more - I know I got so annoyed by it that I forgot how much I agreed with you.

Like I said - argue. Discuss. Disagree. Call people out. Don't belittle them. It's not a wakeup call, all it does is piss people off, and angry people don't make for good discussion.

I'm sorry but I will leave it to Claude and Levi to present the 'nice' side of the opposition. The thing is I have seen those poor souls try that approach for the longest time. It has not worked. Case in point, now folks are using that Forbes article which jumps on the anti-Bungie bandwagon as 'proof' that all the fixes are coming because a loud angry mob demanded restitution.

Since you are a reasonable person, not taken to sudden conclusions, please tell me how this is setting up any decent precedent? If anything it's furthering the cycle of announcement-outrage- dev reaction to calm down the fan base..

So Bungie now is beholden to this cycle for the next 9 years? That is sheer lunacy to me.

- M

since the special editions include the base game, they count towards total sales of "Destiny 1."

The fact that a lot of people on here have bought the game for multiple platforms and generations, and will likely buy it again, is just extra numbers for them to take to Activision and say "see, we sold this many units of the base game"

I would love to see the numbers of total units sold vs total number of gamertags.

I used to be caught up in the collectible craze (Halo 2, Halo 3, Reach, Destiny), i'm sticking with base games from here on out. If i really wanted my own strange coin, i could get them off of etsy; people have been 3d printing them for months now.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

You are probably right about this, and I'm only mildly concerned (bonus XP means less grinding, making my time spent with the game much easier!). However, perhaps Bungie should consider the timing of their announcements. If we have to wait till a later announcement to smooth things over and realize it's no big deal, in the future perhaps they should just announce everything they need to announce at the same time, and prevent this from happening in the first place.

what if the xp boost is only for year 1 content; i.e., lets new players level up faster to be able to jump into year 2 content?

Fair enough. At least I understand your position better now. I think I'll be signing up with the "Be nice and hope for the best" group though - too much unpleasantness going around already to bring it into my leisure time.

As for the new power dynamic - The jury's still out. So long as the dev response is measured and cautious, listening to the masses isn't the worst thing they can do. So long as they remember they can stop listening too.

I'm sorry but I will leave it to Claude and Levi to present the 'nice' side of the opposition. The thing is I have seen those poor souls try that approach for the longest time. It has not worked. Case in point, now folks are using that Forbes article which jumps on the anti-Bungie bandwagon as 'proof' that all the fixes are coming because a loud angry mob demanded restitution.

Miguel, there are times when such a public outcry has absolutely changed a video game company stance. Microsoft rolled back the DRM on the XB1. Blizzard scrapped the RealID system. Both of these I would attribute exclusively to the toxic reception of the news by the community.

I'm not saying that their bundles are going to change, but it's not out of the question.

I would've stepped back and said to myself - why was I asking this dev/game-designer NON-PR person at Bungie these questions? You know, I'll see what Deej or Urk or heck even Parsons have to say. You don't think if he showed them his exchange w/ Luke that they would've jumped at the chance to present their side of things? Now we're talking journalism, where the whole thing (Luke/DeeJ/Urk/etc) is examined, dissected, and presented to the reader.

You firstly assume he has access to those other people, and second, this piece did more than the hypothetical piece which you wanted him to write could ever do. FORBES just wrote an article about how it was a disaster, and Bungie needs to consider changing things moving forward. Bungie's terrible decision is starting to spiral into negative PR.

Mission accomplished man. Let's be honest: there's really no defending what Bungie is doing on any sort of creative or ethical level. Most people just want to play awesome games and not have to deal with this shit.

What I love about you is how consistent you are with your false assumptions. What's funny is how even your own words, if you bothered to read them, would prove your false premises.

- M

What I love about you is how consistent you are with your false assumptions. What's funny is how even your own words, if you bothered to read them, would prove your false premises.

- M

Maybe I'm not that smart a guy. Can you explain that for me like I'm 5?

Is this joke still funny? Love you Cody.

Maybe I'm not that smart a guy. Can you explain that for me like I'm 5?

I can't help it.

Title text: 'Am I taking care of you? I have a thesis to write!' 'My parents are at their house; you visited last--' 'No, no, explain like you're five.'

And he didn't, really. It was weird when he kept the interview focused on the shaders instead of moving forward, and his ominous rumblings about microtransactions don't make me particularly happy, but he wasn't an out and out a-hole like I expected him to be after reading these.

--

It's been clear to me for a LONG time that Destiny is following a hybrid business model of Call of Duty and World of Warcraft. The gameplay loops, strike/dungeons, and various cosmetic items all scream WoW. The every-few-monts expansions (and their price points and content) are more reminiscent of CoD to me. This new "major expansion" is like buying one of WoW's expansions. And, to be fair, Destiny is doing this without a monthly subscription fee.

I will not be at all surprised if Destiny adds in things like $10 for a special spaceship or $5 for a new dance emote. And those additions will not ruin the game. They won't even make me sad, except when I see people buy them. I'm sorry, but a dance emote is not 1/4 of the content of an expansion. It's not even close. I get that your one animator had to work for a day or maybe two to make it, but that ain't worth $5 to over 1 million players.

That is, of course, why it's likely to happen. The ROI is huge for micro-transactional stuff like that. And if the expansions were free, I'd buy those things to support the game. But tying them to the collector's edition *only* is pretty lame (and, again, very WoW-like).

This game is a cash cow. It's designed, in every way, to milk our wallets to the last drop. No one should be surprised by this interview.

The 'job' here is basically a transcript of a rough exchange w/ a dev. Wouldn't a *real* good job be that he then researched the other side of it? "Eurogamer: Fair and Balanced."

No. Good Journalism is NOT about being balanced. In fact it's quite the opposite. Good journalism has a purpose and focus. Would you call out Rachel Carson because she didn't write about all the benefits of DDT? Would you call out CNN for not spinning the War in Vietnam in a positive light? Would you call out Glen Greenwald for not talking about how awesome spying can be? No! Good journalism is biased as hell.

"Balanced" journalism just means you aren't taking a side, and basically saying and changing nothing. It's what you fall back on when you don't want to admit you have no courage to speak out.

Personally, I think it's braver to not take sides as a journalist, thus giving me, the reader, the ability to discern my own opinions on the facts that you provide. That doesn't mean "fair and balanced" to me, though, just "removed and observational" as opposed to "judgmental".

Opinions are easy to come by. It takes a lot more courage, wisdom, and tenacity for an individual to keep them as far away from the real reporting as you can.

He did, specifically, tell the interviewer that he wanted to poke him a little more on the subject. it was... weird. It's like Lindsay Lohan telling a reporter she wants him to keep asking her about why she left rehab.

I remember my first time posting on a forum.

Personally, I think it's braver to not take sides as a journalist, thus giving me, the reader, the ability to discern my own opinions on the facts that you provide. That doesn't mean "fair and balanced" to me, though, just "removed and observational" as opposed to "judgmental".

I do not get an opinion on global warming. I am not a climate scientist. It is up to the people who ARE to tell us it is happening and man made, and up to the journalists to deliver that message. It would be a disaster if every story about global warming had to have both sides weighed. Nobody needs the oil companys' side of the story. Not all sides are equal, and not all viewpoints are equal.

Opinions are easy to come by. It takes a lot more courage, wisdom, and tenacity for an individual to keep them as far away from the real reporting as you can.

You understand that merely by selection what story to report, you are already biased? What you choose to observe is itself already a bias.

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

Someone told me about this part of your reply a minute ago, and I had a eureka moment hearing him say it.

DBO is great because we're generally more moderate and more adult than, say, Reddit, or other sites, and I loved that there wasn't a bunch of entitled bitching about prices or collector's edition content, and have said so plenty of times since Reddit started doing it.

I couldn't put my finger on what I felt when I saw this stuff here at first. It wasn't like "Oh, another shit on Destiny (despite the fact that I play it constantly) thread that takes up the entire page" it was like "Oh, DBO. You've turned into Reddit with longer words and somehow even more entitlement."

What I felt was embarrassment. Thanks for putting that feeling into a word.

A person can take exception to this stuff on principle, not entitlement. Full disclosure: I no longer play Destiny and do not plan on getting The Taken King. The sticking point for me (based on the principle of the matter, not the specifics) comes down to the dance emote.

We all know people will pine for this - long time players especially. It does not matter that it is a stupid little throwaway thing. Agree or disagree?

As a stupid little throwaway thing, it should be no big deal (i.e. not cost-prohibitive) to simply give this away. Agree or disagree?

Since I agree strongly with both statements above, it is my opinion that putting this in with the new Collector's Edition is very specifically targeting long time players. Thus, I find it stinky.

You might say: "Ah yakaman, such a small, stupid thing to complain about...", and while I fully concede that point, I could say the same: "Ah Bungie, what a small, stupid thing to put behind a $40 paywall...".

Is this the greatest offense in the modern-day era? Of course not. Was the interviewer more dickish than he had to be? Maybe...a little bit. Can a person take offense to the stuff being stuck behind a paywall without being entitled/spoiled? I think so.

In the end, does any of this matter? Hell no. But it sure is fun to talk about.

Overall I liked what you had to say, but this part rankles:

I get that your one animator had to work for a day or maybe two to make it, but that ain't worth $5 to over 1 million players.

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

Personally, I think it's braver to not take sides as a journalist, thus giving me, the reader, the ability to discern my own opinions on the facts that you provide. That doesn't mean "fair and balanced" to me, though, just "removed and observational" as opposed to "judgmental".

I do not get an opinion on global warming. I am not a climate scientist. It is up to the people who ARE to tell us it is happening and man made, and up to the journalists to deliver that message. It would be a disaster if every story about global warming had to have both sides weighed. Nobody needs the oil companys' side of the story. Not all sides are equal, and not all viewpoints are equal.

I'm definitely not saying you can't tell me a scientist's opinion on their work and you certainly don't have to pair it with some opposing voice every single time. I'm not asking for all sides weighed - I even said that I don't need "fair and balanced" just a few lines right up there^^! I said "removed and observational".

I'm saying I don't want the journalist telling me their opinion and distorting their story and the context of people's words to fit their goals. I don't need the equivalent of some nutjob's Facebook post where he links some facts and then goes off on his opinion. That tells me nothing. That leads to shitty comments. And that's what so much of journalism is now. The editorial made war on the rest of the newspaper and won (or maybe it was always this bad).

Write an article about something that happened. Research. State facts, quotes from experts, etc. Leave the conclusions to me.

Opinions are easy to come by. It takes a lot more courage, wisdom, and tenacity for an individual to keep them as far away from the real reporting as you can.

You understand that merely by selection what story to report, you are already biased? What you choose to observe is itself already a bias.

Yes, that is a bias, and humans are likely incapable of true unbiased reporting - that's why, if you read my wording, I wish for journalists to try and keep their biases as best they can from their work.

I started college off as a journalism major and departed from it when I came to see how little 'reporting' was happening and how much more 'opinions' were being spilled forth from self-righteous journalists.

I welcome our future robot reporters that just state facts and actually quote people with due context.

- No text -

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

I haven't worked on video games. But I used to work doing architectural renderings. The sheer amount of time to make something realistic or then realistic + stylized was mind blowing. I can only imagine once you add mocap, animators, etc... how much time is put into something simple like a dance move.

- No text -

Write an article about something that happened. Research. State facts, quotes from experts, etc. Leave the conclusions to me.

That is a history report. Not journalism. I guess we just disagree here.

Overall I liked what you had to say, but this part rankles:

I get that your one animator had to work for a day or maybe two to make it, but that ain't worth $5 to over 1 million players.

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

And, if you don't raise the prices of your games, then the more and more work it takes to make games nowadays becomes less and less valuable in aggregate. This is why people balk at 10 bucks for 3 maps, since 60 dollars got them something that was way more than 6x the work. So either a 60 dollar price point undervalues the animator's work, or a 5 dollar dance emote overvalues it. You can't have it both ways.

This is again why I think it's best to treat everything in aggregate as 'the game' and not break down the value of each individual element by work, since they are all important in serving the game's overall quality.

Write an article about something that happened. Research. State facts, quotes from experts, etc. Leave the conclusions to me.

That is a history report. Not journalism. I guess we just disagree here.

Yep. It's probably not a good DBO discussion, either. :)

They won't even make me sad, except when I see people buy them. I'm sorry, but a dance emote is not 1/4 of the content of an expansion. It's not even close.

You forgot the "to my" qualifier at the end of that last sentence. If someone comes up to me tonight, shows me a dance emote that I think is kickass, and offers to trade it to me for my beer, I'd do it.

It happens in the mobile app space too. People see a $1 "that will do" app and compare it to a "quality, clean, and slick" app that costs $5. They determine they aren't getting 5x the value, and balk at the $5 price tag. They then turn around and spend $20 going out to dinner.

We all do comparative shopping, and the value each of us places in an items is unique. Maybe you haven't had a good beer in years, and wouldn't trade it for the world. Maybe you didn't know there was beer good enough that it would cost $5. I personally can think that an emote is not 1/12 the game in content, but I can also say that compared to other places I spend $5, an emote might actually provide more laughs and entertainment for a longer period of time.

Like I said - argue. Discuss. Disagree. Call people out. Don't belittle them. It's not a wakeup call, all it does is piss people off, and angry people don't make for good discussion.

I second this. You wear the hyperbole coat well, Mig, but following fashion trends is so last century. If you drive away people that are better off not coming here, cool, but I could see this driving away other people too.
I also contest the statement DBO, or at least this thread, has a bunch of entitled whiners. I've seen entitled whiners, I spent a lot of last night laughing at entitled whiners, and even most of the worst on DBO are a step above that.

Personally, I think it's braver to not take sides as a journalist, thus giving me, the reader, the ability to discern my own opinions on the facts that you provide. That doesn't mean "fair and balanced" to me, though, just "removed and observational" as opposed to "judgmental".

I do not get an opinion on global warming. I am not a climate scientist. It is up to the people who ARE to tell us it is happening and man made, and up to the journalists to deliver that message. It would be a disaster if every story about global warming had to have both sides weighed. Nobody needs the oil companys' side of the story. Not all sides are equal, and not all viewpoints are equal.

"Balanced" does not mean "Equal".

They won't even make me sad, except when I see people buy them. I'm sorry, but a dance emote is not 1/4 of the content of an expansion. It's not even close.

You forgot the "to my" qualifier at the end of that last sentence.

So your typo led to "It's not even close [to my]." confusing me for too long, Earendil, bearer of the Morning Star. :P

You used to be cool.

"Get it now or pay even more on eBay, then we'll see who's laughing".

WHAT?!

Really? That's how you interpret his statement?

I saw it as this:

"I believe that for a significant chunk of people, this product WAS priced correctly, as shown by the fact that they're almost sold out. In fact, once they're sold out, the only way anyone will get one is by paying much more on eBay - and they'll sell there, too, suggesting again that the demand at our price point exceeded the supply. And we won't even be making the money on that - someone else will."

It's all about your point of view, I guess.

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

I haven't worked on video games. But I used to work doing architectural renderings. The sheer amount of time to make something realistic or then realistic + stylized was mind blowing. I can only imagine once you add mocap, animators, etc... how much time is put into something simple like a dance move.

That's not even the end of it either, because there are three of them, and the shaders, and the class items, and the book, and the coin, and the little patch things.... Maybe it's not worth $40, maybe it's not even worth $20 like the price tiers imply, but people keep looking at one or two things just because this interview had it as a point of contention or because of what they're personally interested in, and then saying that thing is easy to make so the whole package should be cheap, and it blows my mind how reductionist it is.

Write an article about something that happened. Research. State facts, quotes from experts, etc. Leave the conclusions to me.

That is a history report. Not journalism. I guess we just disagree here.

Journalism is about recent history. The whole point is, "This thing just happened, here are the details".

Surely they should have anticipated this kind of reaction. It could be a golden warlock turd as an exclusive item, and people would still get upset about it. It's not so much as what the content IS that sets people off, it's the fact there is clearly double dipping here.

I guarantee they didn't anticipate it. Sitting together with other people trying to decide on price for a product is one of the most difficult things to do, and seeing how people will respond is even more difficult. Go back and look at the original iPhone, it was priced at $599 at launch and was slammed by critics for being so expensive, yet it still sold like crazy on its first day on the market. Obviously this isn't completely analogous, but this is how I imagine the conversation went (simplified of course):

"Okay so the expansion itself costs $40, and the legendary version with all the past content costs $60, how are we going to price the version with all of this exclusive content?"
"Well we don't want new Destiny players to buy it (not knowing well enough what's in it) and not have the original content, so we should probably pack it in with it too."
"If that's the case we probably want to price it above the Legendary at $80."

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The specific items that people are getting worked up about are trivial. No doubt about it. But as I'm sure you already know, it's not really about the specific items. People don't like feeling excluded, and they don't like feeling manipulated. I personally don't feel either of those things, but some clearly do and I can understand why.

I'm glad you don't! And like you, I completely understand why.

Here's where I'm taking it a step further. I'm using my smarts to *reject* the false feeling of being 'manipulated' or 'exploited' or 'deceived' - these are all pure constructs of my *own* creation. There is zero proof that Bungie is actually doing ANY of the above.

Just to clarify, it never occurred to me that Bungie would be looking for ways to manipulate or exclude their fans... when it comes to pricing, exclusivity deals, etc, Activision is the one with the final say (if I understand their relationship correctly). I believe Activision is 100% capable of attempting to manipulate the fan base. But please understand, I don't say that with any anger or resentment. These are the kind of "promotions" any major publisher would implement. It happens in business all the time. I switched banks a few years ago, and my new bank gave me an iPod as a "thank you". My wife, who had been banking with them for years, got nothing. It sucks. But businesses are constantly finding ways to "buy" new customers. At the end of the day, I don't think it's worth getting worked up about. We're the ones who choose to buy in to it or not.

TL;DR, We ARE being manipulated (not by Bungie, I don't think), but it's our fault if we fall for it.

This is a new thing - this rejecting thing - I think for many folks here and elsewhere to embrace. For too long we have had an environment where *any* misstep is met with derision, and anger, and the pitchforks come out. ALL I'm asking for is a reasonable attempt to curb those initial impulses. To sit back and wonder - wait, why am I getting so upset? Does my anger, and jumping on the bandwagon with fellow upset gamers, actually help? What is actually going on here?

Great point.

As others have pointed out, the bonus in-game items included with the new legendary edition are not the kinds of exclusive content that will get newcomers excited. People who don't already play Destiny are not likely to care about new dance moves, exotic class items, or the physical goodies in the box. The people who will care are the ones who already own the game.

I think this is supposition. I think they are following an established precedent of game-of-the-year collections. And I can easily envision folks that were on the fence, or thought Destiny was a crappy game due to the bad press it initially got, that they would love a package where they got lots of new goodies and loot to entice them to purchase the game.

Yes, I suppose it is complete supposition. But it makes sense logically, at least to me. If I've never played Destiny before, what is going to make me but this collection? All that content is a great bang for the buck. The ability to jump into Destiny as it is now, with all the refinements, is also a big motivator. Exclusive dance moves? A strange coin replica? Exotic class items? I don't even know what this stuff means. The only people who do are the hardcore fans who already bought the game (again, all supposition. This is just how it works out in my brain).

I'm about as dispassionate about this as I could be, but something about this still feels off.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

I'm with you! What I would add though is that *now* I'm hearing folks say "Oh look, Bungie is doing damage control and they're going to announce stuff to placate us all that are upset!" And this again feels like a misstep in seeing cause-and-effect. When TTK was announced, it was said that there was MORE TO COME.

Again, I can understand thinking "oh, that sucks" what I can't understand is the "let's turn this up to 11" outrage.

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

- M

For what it's worth, I do think the discussion here is generally a lot more level headed than most other places, even if you feel the specific complaints are trivial. Every now and then I get flashbacks to my Waypoint moderator days (shudders)... we have it GOOD here :)

I get it, but I still feel there is a miasma here that needs addressing.

Let me also take this moment to speak directly to you CL, a few days past you started a discussion that got me rolling in comments with others, and things got all heated and there was back and forth, babies were made, babies were aborted, etc. etc. And Kermit near the end said something like "it's too bad all this had to happen on CL's OP, he's the nicest of guys and doesn't deserve that." I had meant to write, no Kermit, this is EXACTLY why CL's a perfect candidate for these discussions - because a) you're a bonafide Canadian, with your nice laid back attitude - I feel no matter how barbed the words are, they just slide right off of you, and so that means all that anger BS can be set aside and we can discuss the meat of the matter and b) you are a good representative of those people I rail against - but in the sense that you are *just* on the periphery - you are a true addict to the game, many of your posts just make me shake my head, but it's exactly because you are the anti-Cody with the surface-level self-generating loathing against the ills against 'gamer nirvana' and fake persona crap, that actually makes you accessible and my wanting to engage with you.

Thanks for taking the time to write this. Just a few thoughts:

The reason I don't generally get worked up about stuff on the forums is that slowly over the years, I've formed relationships of some kind with many DBO regulars. Either through podcasting, twitter & Facebook, real life meet ups at PAX, or even just through playing Destiny and other games together. We all come here to talk about this game, share our ideas, likes & dislikes. Sometimes arguments happen, and that's cool! It's great! The world would be a very boring place if we all agreed all the time :) But I don't get worked up because I always tell myself that nobody here is going out of their way to piss people off or hurt anyone's feelings. I truly believe that. I can argue about Destiny with Cody or Cyber or Speedracer or a dozen other great people here on these forums, then a few hours hours later we're all playing Destiny together, having a laugh, and poking each other about the silly stuff we all said.

I think the reason things often go overboard is that there are so many regulars here at DBO, and we can't all have those kinds of relationships with each other. When you're only concept of another human being is based on their posts in a forum, it is difficult to give them the benefit of the doubt, to trust that they didn't mean for something to be hurtful even though it might possibly come across that way. It's ok for me to write a post that makes you think I'm crazy (as long as I'm not being a total jerk or hurting anyone)... We're still going to jump into the crucible together, chat on Facebook, see each other at PAX every few years, and have a great time. I don't need to agree with you on everything to like you and respect you.

You represent, to me, the insidiousness of how this game has sucked many of us fine people down the rabbit-hole. And with many paragraphs of discourse, excel spreadsheets, and talking over tea and biscuits, the addiction buried underneath is still there.. lurking and convincing some of us that it's perfectly reasonable to talk about moving 3 characters through nightfalls and weeklies, and weighing the minutiae of which gun perk gives us that .005% advantage (listen, Thorn is the answer - it will always be the answer) and therefore every other gun is a joke, worthy of sharding, etc.

In other words, you are my best chance of a breakthrough with the others. So for that I thank you, and hope to see you at PAX in a few months.

- M

This is where I don't think we quite see eye to eye. I LOVE to talk about the nitty-gritty stuff like specifics of weapon balance and other game design minutia. Partially because I love Destiny, but also because I find this stuff generally fascinating. I love learning about the process of making games, and a certain amount of reverse-engineering goes right along with that. We know designers at Bungie have to think about this stuff, so I like to try and figure it out as well.

I don't think these kinds of discussions are necessarily a sign of addiction (I haven't reached phase 1 yet ;p), nor do I see anything wrong with having them... as long as people just stay cool about stuff and don't get carried away against each other. I've gotten the impression from your posts in the past that you find this kind of stuff silly (please correct me if I'm wrong), and that's cool too. It IS silly. But some of us like it all the same, so I don't think it is something that needs to be curbed.

...and I don't think I am alone... I have ALREADY purchased the core game twice.

I bought the white ps4 destiny edition, that came with the console. I was annoyed for some time that I need a disc to play the game. So finally a few months ago I picked up the digital download edition so I wouldn't have to use my disc anymore. Which is silly, because it's not like there's a difference... it's a software switch. But hey, it's destiny, and I really like it and play a lot, so it's worth it right? (This has been great, I really like the digital download disc-less convenience. Even if it did make me re-download the whole game, also silly)

At that time I couldn't justify the collector's edition because I had previously bought the ps4 bundle and the season pass as well. I missed out on the red ghost and a few other niceties, but eh, I'll be okay. It's not like they will do that again.

Heh.

So, I am now in the same boat, but worse. Because the digital download special edition is the same price as the physical special edition -- you just don't get all the physical goodies. And if I -do-want to get the physical goodies then tough luck -- I am disc locked again. Not gonna do that, it would mean my double purchase was wasted.

I sincerely doubt that you'll be disc locked. I'm thinking it's a vanilla Destiny on the disc with codes to download everything else, but I've been trying to get that verified. I also want to know if the last-gen digital version will be transferable to next gen. I've brought up both questions several times here. Let us know, Bungie!

Yes. Thanks. I was having a really hard time dealing with my paternalistic lecture on "tone" from the guy who forces me to see a faux-sodomization each time I read one of his posts. The fact that nobody else even mentioned it was starting to make me feel like I was being gaslighted.

How big exactly is The Taken King.

What I've gathered so far:

-A set of story missions, possibly longer and more cinematic than the previous expansion campaigns.

-A new explorable hub world like the four we got in the core game, this one being a hive captial ship orbiting the rings of Saturn. And it will have its own Patrol mode.

-New enemy faction, The Taken: possessed ghost versions of all four previous factions with new AI behaviors, weapons, etc.

-New Strike(s). I've heard plural in some of the interviews.

Confirmed, they won't say how many, but definitely multiple strikes

-New Raid.

-New multiplayer maps (I thought I heard 4).

4 was what were shown at E3, but there are more.

-New multiplayer gametypes.

-A new subclass and super for each Guardian class.

-And new gear of course.

With 100% new models, even on legendary non-Raid weapons, not just slightly redesigned weapons.

-New multiplayer maps (I thought I heard 4).

4 was what were shown at E3, but there are more.

I believe DeeJ (?) said that those 4 were only a quarter of the total new maps during the IGN interview.

- No text -

It's also about class items that give exp buffs. That could potentially alter your experience significantly. As for the ps4 exclusivity, I never defended that either and think it's just as shitty.

I can totally understand where they were coming from with the class items. Someone is literally a year behind everyone else, the buff is to get them caught up. Experience buffs now would mean very little, maybe a little help leveling up new gear, but not nearly the advantage it will give specifically to new players.

Veteran players are assuming this package is aimed at them. It is not. It quite obviously is not. People are acting as if Bungie is putting a massive price tag on a dance emote and taking advantage of longtime fans. I honestly do not believe this is so. They want more players so they can sell the next expansion and the following titles.

Yes I think you're right - of course they want to grow their player base.

Of course, the later you get in, the more you'll get for the same price. I'm reminded of the parable of the talents-- day one fans are the workers who showed up first, did a full day's work for a full day's wages, and are complaining that people who came later got more for less work.

If you're honestly considering paying to purchase a bunch of stuff you already own to get some digital swag... the problem is you, not them. Consider stepping away from the game for awhile for your own good.

Ahh, yes. Serves you right for liking something so much you want more of it . . . This is some very backwards logic, Narc.

It's sad that this is Forbes, but this is what "journalism" has become. It's gotten so when I see Paul Tassi's face I see the face of THE ENTITLED GAMER in 2015. He trades in grand pronouncements of his opinions as if they are facts.

He feeds the fury machine with his megaphone and all can feel justified in their self-righteous outrage. Not to be ageist or anything, but I'm beginning to feel that self-righteous outrage is the default position of the millennials.

I can't relate.

- No text -

I should probably thank Mig for debating me out of my funk and into "calm, rational response mode".

Overall I liked what you had to say, but this part rankles:

I get that your one animator had to work for a day or maybe two to make it, but that ain't worth $5 to over 1 million players.

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

I am using hyperbole to make my point, but I also spent over a decade making video games, and my numbers are not total fiction. IF (and this is a huge if because lots and lots and lots of people who do this thing for a living don't understand anything about workflow design) they designed their animations and shaders in a plug-and-play kind of way (which seems plausible, because marathon was done this way and why not keep that same design philosophy), it should be relatively trivial to add new elements to the game. Shaders should be super, super easy - they're just color palette shifts and you've (hopefully) already designed thresholds and limits into each item's base structure. Dance moves, if not mo-capped, are pretty easy, too. You open up the toon in maya or poser or whatever it is they use these days and drag the guy's limbs around until they move the way you want. A professional animator should not find this sort thing difficult, though it is certainly real work. If they mo-cap everything (which big studios love to do because they have to justify the expense of keeping a mo-cap studio space year-round), it gets much more complicated because you need actors, wardrobe, lots of fancy sensors, etc., but even then the actual capture takes less than a single day. Then maybe 1 more day for your animator to clean everything up and make it fit the "look" of your game. So, worst case scenario, 1 day of work for like... 5 people and then 1 more day of work for the animator. I'll go completely crazy and say that somehow costs $30,000 between all of the paychecks and equipment rental fees and whatnot. At $5 a pop, you're asking 6,000 customers to buy it. Destiny has 9.5 million registered users. So you're hoping that 1 in every 1,584 (I'm rounding up) customers buys an animation. Those are insanely good odds. If 1 in every 9.5 people buy the animation, you're looking at nearly my $5,000,000 number on a $30,000 investment. This is why companies go to microtransactions in the first place. The ROI is insanely good.

Now, it's totally possible that every animation and shader in the game is hard-coded and can't be modularly altered. Then you're looking at potentially months of full-team labor in order to change the code to accept a single new animation. This is a horrible way to build your workflow, but it's possible, in which case wow, $5 is a steal. But it shouldn't be, because no one should design a game that way, ever. Especially a game with an initial design concept that included expansions.

--

using an IRL example: The animators on one of the last games I worked on were super bored because we couldn't feed them enough stuff to animate, so they just started building all kinds of idle animations and alternate animations into the game. Sometimes a punch would be overhead, sometimes sideways, sometimes an uppercut... They just did this all on their own because there was time. Even the complicated stuff like hitting a dude into another dude into a wall, they just built it. Not all of it ended up in the final game because of memory limits and whatnot, but if there had been an expansion, we had literally dozens of extra animations - complicated animations - to just summon out of the database without paying anyone anything extra. Occasionally we'd say "hey, we want this guy to fall out of a helicopter" and they'd whip something up in 2-4 hours. This was older-gen stuff, so it wasn't moving as many polygons as Destiny, but my point is that professional animators don't take days and days and days to animate a dance sequence. These guys do this for a living and they're good at it. I doubt it takes them very long. Heck, I bet they made 10 dance options and it took the producers longer to decide which they liked best than it took the animator to actually make them all. Knowing Activision, there may have even been a "what's the best dance move" focus test.

They won't even make me sad, except when I see people buy them. I'm sorry, but a dance emote is not 1/4 of the content of an expansion. It's not even close.

You forgot the "to my" qualifier at the end of that last sentence. If someone comes up to me tonight, shows me a dance emote that I think is kickass, and offers to trade it to me for my beer, I'd do it.

It happens in the mobile app space too. People see a $1 "that will do" app and compare it to a "quality, clean, and slick" app that costs $5. They determine they aren't getting 5x the value, and balk at the $5 price tag. They then turn around and spend $20 going out to dinner.

We all do comparative shopping, and the value each of us places in an items is unique. Maybe you haven't had a good beer in years, and wouldn't trade it for the world. Maybe you didn't know there was beer good enough that it would cost $5. I personally can think that an emote is not 1/12 the game in content, but I can also say that compared to other places I spend $5, an emote might actually provide more laughs and entertainment for a longer period of time.

Totally good points and my $14 Guldendraak won't argue with you!

Overall I liked what you had to say, but this part rankles:

I get that your one animator had to work for a day or maybe two to make it, but that ain't worth $5 to over 1 million players.

I get the use of slight hyperbole as a matter of trying to make a point, but minimizing the work of animators, mocap artists, and techs is kind of gross. I think most people not involved with game dev would be absolutely astonished at how much work goes into something as seemingly "trivial" as creating a dance cycle.

And, if you don't raise the prices of your games, then the more and more work it takes to make games nowadays becomes less and less valuable in aggregate. This is why people balk at 10 bucks for 3 maps, since 60 dollars got them something that was way more than 6x the work. So either a 60 dollar price point undervalues the animator's work, or a 5 dollar dance emote overvalues it. You can't have it both ways.

This is again why I think it's best to treat everything in aggregate as 'the game' and not break down the value of each individual element by work, since they are all important in serving the game's overall quality.

Firstly, not all of the work is done by the animator. Second, map packs are much better ROI on a per-unit basis than whole games. Third, I thought you hated microtransactions? Now you're defending them, even when they're overpriced? I'm confused.

As a not-yet adult (I've got a month left!) I can without exaggeration say that I've noticed this, too, and was talking about it just earlier today. However, I think it's more that, the internet enabled this kind of self-righteous echo chamber deal, and more young folks are on the internet, and the self-righteous angry young person is a loud one indeed.

Though I might be too young to be a millenial? Definitions I could find were kind of fuzzy about whether born in '97 or so counts. Either way, uh, actually that's not really consequential.

...which seems plausible, because marathon was done this way and why not keep that same design philosophy...

I don't doubt the rest of what you said, but Marathon was twenty one years ago. How much direct relevance can it really have to Destiny's structure and programming? If you'd said Halo then sure, but Marathon?

- No text -

I certainly haven't seen any mention of it being current gen only. Can't think of a reason it would be. It's Destiny is a PS3/360 game, so naturally the DLC would be as well, right?

It's a headline I read somewhere, but didn't get the chance to actually read the article before losing it. Something to the spirit of: "How TTK won't be hindered by last-gen"

From DestinyTheGame.com:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2015/05/26/this_chrome_extension_replaces_the_word_millennials_with_snake_peo...

In the same respect, you do have to bring a target up before you can knock it down.

Everything else (including Digital Collector's Edition) is for all 4 consoles.

This portion of the thread is where I find my position stands. I'm in no position to try for my math now, given that my numbers include playing both the PS4 and Xbone concurrently. And for the experiences I have had, and the amount of time, I have had my money's worth and I don't regret the decision.

When Luke says it is up to us to decide our value the answer is easy for me. I have purchased 6 copies of Halo 3, if you include the MCC. I still don't regret any of those purchases because of the experiences they allowed me to have.

I have lots of places I cut corners, but the two places I don't are my food and my fun.

Go back and look at the original iPhone, it was priced at $599 at launch and was slammed by critics for being so expensive, yet it still sold like crazy on its first day on the market.

This may be a bad example, as the original iPhone's price dropped by something like $200 after a few months.

I HAVE BEEN ABUSED AND MY MONEY IS BEING TAKEN AGAINST MY WILL!" Sorry, I firmly reject that worldview.

Is anyone here actually making that argument?

Just because people are unhappy with the pricing scheme and believe that it is unfair to loyal fans DOES NOT mean that they believe they are being taken against their will. I mean, are you even being serious right now?

Go back and look at the original iPhone, it was priced at $599 at launch and was slammed by critics for being so expensive, yet it still sold like crazy on its first day on the market.

This may be a bad example, as the original iPhone's price dropped by something like $200 after a few months.

That doesn't affect my comparison in the least, we don't know what's going to happen a few months from now, and even at $599 they were still selling amazingly (and kept selling out). My main comparison is about the fact that there is all this "negative" press about the collector's edition, and yet the physical one is sold out everywhere it's sold. If Bungie does anything for the long-term Destiny fans at this point it will because they do in fact care about their community (otherwise they'd just count the money that's rolling in).

I'm sorry but I will leave it to Claude and Levi to present the 'nice' side of the opposition. The thing is I have seen those poor souls try that approach for the longest time. It has not worked..

And you think your approach has a better chance of success?

It doesn't. Trust me. I should know.

Look. All of us are here because we love Bungie's games. After all, this is a Bungie fan site. Maybe you should try to keep that in mind when you respond to people here.

It's true that some of us believe that Bungie has been doing some really questionable stuff lately, but that doesn't automatically mean that we hate Bungie and everything they stand for. That's a ridiculous argument. Just because people have been taking Bungie to task doesn't mean that they hate the company, or that they feel they are being "abused against their will." You're oversimplifying what's happening here, and frankly you're just seeing what you want to see.

I don't know you from anybody. I gather that you've been a part of the Bungie community for a while and that you're well-known and well-liked by many here, but that's not what I see from your posts here. All I see is an asshole... and I should know because I've had my own problems with how people perceive me.

In fact, I think we could ALL do well to remember that everyone here found this place because they LOVE BUNGIE'S GAMES, and that no matter how negative we can be and how upset some of us are with Bungie at the moment, that doesn't mean that we HATE them or that our view of the situation can (or should) be belittled and reduced to binary "with them or against them" camps. Only a Sith deals in absolutes. The debate is more nuanced than that and you're smart enough to know it, but you choose to continue being a dick to people who have the nerve to disagree with you. That's childish and small, and you're better than that.

Digital Collectors edition is available for all systems. The physical is available for current gen only according to the website.

The interviewer has every right to ask Luke questions about the pricing structure, and at no point did Luke say "I don't know" "That's not really my area" or "I'd rather not talk about that". On the contrary, Luke continued to supply answers, sometimes with a considerable amount of confidence, answering as "we" (we being Bungie, who he was speaking for).

As for sensationalism, what exactly was sensationalist about this? This is clearly a topic that is of great interest to people who do and don't play Destiny, is extremely timely and doesn't involve any outlandish claims by the interviewer.

If you think it's sensationalist for the interviewer to ask questions based on factual information regarding Bungie's future pricing plans, then perhaps you need to examine how you yourself actually feel about this issue, because I sense you're clinging to some pretty flimsy defenses.

As for the Forbes article, no doubt that it is opinion, and little surprise, considering the author is listed as an opinion contributor! My word, an opinion columnist writing an opinion column. Queue the sighed lamentation of "journalism these days".

...which seems plausible, because marathon was done this way and why not keep that same design philosophy...

I don't doubt the rest of what you said, but Marathon was twenty one years ago. How much direct relevance can it really have to Destiny's structure and programming? If you'd said Halo then sure, but Marathon?

Well, I know nothing about modding Halo. I know some people did it on PC, but I have no idea what the structure was. Marathon, on the other hand, I modded like crazy. I changed the animations, changed the physics, changed the AI... it was all really brilliantly structured so that these changes were easily accomplished and it was easy to save different "packages" of changes to share with friends etc..

Combined with my experience at a couple of different gaming houses and I've observed that, in general, once a dev team lands on a design structure and workflow that is nimble and responsive, they are fairly unlikely to switch to something cumbersome and difficult to change. Since Marathon, way back 20 years ago, was really well organized and easy to modify in almost every way, I find it very unlikely that Bungie would have made any games since then that weren't just as well structured (at least in the developer tools side of things).

I have lots of places I cut corners, but the two places I don't are my food and my fun.

+1

Except that I would add toilet paper to your list. The quilted stuff is work the extra few bucks ;-)

- No text -

He was needling the guy for forcing him to talk about it so much. The interviewer was pestering him about something completely outside Luke's purview. Luke wanted to call him out for it. I'm not saying that Luke is a super polite guy. He sounded annoyed at the interviewers dickishness.

Fuertisimo:
The interviewer has every right to ask Luke questions about the pricing structure

Monochron:
Sure Phillips was entitled to go ahead and ask him anyway

There's no need to explain that. We agree.

Fuertisimo:
As for sensationalism, what exactly was sensationalist about this?

Monochron:
An article titled "Bungie's 'Taken King' interview was a little testy, but will likely have no impact on Destiny" is much less exciting than the one they went with.

^^^^^^ Right there. I explained in my post. To clarify though, I was saying that the Forbes article was sensationalism. Blowing up the drama of a previous interview.

If you think it's sensationalist for the interviewer to ask questions based on factual information regarding Bungie's future pricing plans, then perhaps you need to examine how you yourself actually feel about this issue

I think if you reread my post you'll see that I wasn't talking about that at all.

My word, an opinion columnist writing an opinion column. Queue the sighed lamentation of "journalism these days".

Meh, I'm not a fan of presenting opinions as facts. If that is standard practice in "opinion columns" then I guess I don't like that aspect of opinion columns. In particular, I definitely don't like this guy's writings for the reasons that I gave in my post above.

I think you throw around words like sensationalism because you just don't like what's going on.

Forbes didn't claim that Luke Smith impregnated Jason Jones' wife and now they're beefing. They published a fairly standard opinion piece. As for opinion masquerading as fact, that kind of trips at the first hurdle as it is an opinion piece not a news piece, thereby we can conclude that anything written therein is in fact, opinion.

I think you throw around words like sensationalism because you just don't like what's going on.

That statement is true. It's also pretty much irrelevant because I explained the reasons why I called it sensationalism. You are free to disagree, but I wouldn't recommend you try to divine my intentions over the internet.

As for opinion masquerading as fact, that kind of trips at the first hurdle as it is an opinion piece not a news piece, thereby we can conclude that anything written therein is in fact, opinion.

Sorry, you may have missed what I was getting at. We know it is the authors opinion, but the author is acting like he is making unassailable factual claims:
"The entire interview is absolutely worth a read, and Bungie has to be scrambling for damage control after this"
Like, Bungie employees posted to some forums/outlets? Is that scrambling?

Anyway, like I said, I don't like opinion pieces written like this but that isn't a big deal. It was only 2 sentences under my point #3 in my original post. A passing comment really.

If you're honestly considering paying to purchase a bunch of stuff you already own to get some digital swag... the problem is you, not them. Consider stepping away from the game for awhile for your own good.

Ahh, yes. Serves you right for liking something so much you want more of it . . . This is some very backwards logic, Narc.

Swag isn't more of it, though. It's just stuff that communicates to other people, and to yourself when you're not playing the game, that you play and like the game.

But at any rate, the update is up, and now you can shell out the difference in price to just add this stuff, so... yay?

There are also other things that people like so much they want more of it... like alcohol, tobacco and heroin. Some are legal and some aren't, some you just have to exercise restraint with, or avoid altogether. YMMV.

I think you throw around words like sensationalism because you just don't like what's going on.

That statement is true. It's also pretty much irrelevant because I explained the reasons why I called it sensationalism. You are free to disagree, but I wouldn't recommend you try to divine my intentions over the internet.

As for opinion masquerading as fact, that kind of trips at the first hurdle as it is an opinion piece not a news piece, thereby we can conclude that anything written therein is in fact, opinion.

Sorry, you may have missed what I was getting at. We know it is the authors opinion, but the author is acting like he is making unassailable factual claims:

Like, Bungie employees posted to some forums/outlets? Is that scrambling?

Anyway, like I said, I don't like opinion pieces written like this but that isn't a big deal. It was only 2 sentences under my point #3 in my original post. A passing comment really.

I dunno man, I gotta say I'm feeling pretty good about my thoughts on that guy's opinion, and that his opinion was pretty spot on considering that Bungie has now gone into damage control mode and Luke has issued an apology.

So.

I guess I'd add that "The entire interview is absolutely worth a read, and Bungie has to be scrambling for damage control after this" is actually an opinion. He in his estimation, the interview is worth a read, and in his estimation, Bungie is probably scrambling for damage control (which they were, and did).

So, yeah, the only thing sensational about this whole thing is how defensive people were of Bungie. Are you sure you weren't tossing out criticism because what the guy was saying made you uncomfortable?

I dunno man, I gotta say I'm feeling pretty good about my thoughts on that guy's opinion, and that his opinion was pretty spot on considering that Bungie has now gone into damage control mode and Luke has issued an apology.

Bungie's response was triggered by the community backlash of which his article was a part. He helped trigger their response. It's cool if you agree with his opinions, I don't happen to, but my post was not about that. It was about what he wrote being sensationalist.

I guess I'd add that "The entire interview is absolutely worth a read, and Bungie has to be scrambling for damage control after this" is actually an opinion. He in his estimation, the interview is worth a read, and in his estimation, Bungie is probably scrambling for damage control (which they were, and did).

Yeah I don't disagree that that sentence consists of his opinions. We both agree that he wrote an opinion piece, not a news piece. I have already been over what I don't like in his presentation.

So, yeah, the only thing sensational about this whole thing is how defensive people were of Bungie. Are you sure you weren't tossing out criticism because what the guy was saying made you uncomfortable?

I guess you aren't going to reread my original post. I already explained what I think was so sensationalist. And I guess you are still trying to guess my motives rather than listen to my arguments. Just for the sake of repetition: one of those things that make this article sensationalist is the bombastic title.