Why are people complaining about DLC

[monsterparty]

I mean, come on guys they gave a lot good free stuff from release of planet coaster. They can not give everything away for free that's not how a business work they needs money to keep supporting this title like 0ther do. It's not like they said there never going give anything way for free again in the future and $10 dollars is a fair price for want the spooky set going have in it so far we seen.
So stop with complain and have faith in frontier for planet coaster future.

 

[LN]

If you don;t want people to complain don't come here and tell that to everyone.

Now you will get responds with complaints.

It's more the, "here, take my money" and " I would pay 50 for an DLC like...." that is so irritating.

If you don;t mind spending money like it's nothing special, please buy the DLC for me then so I can save mine.

 

[danijami23]

I mean, come on guys they gave a lot good free stuff from release of planet coaster. They can not give everything away for free that's not how a business work they needs money to keep supporting this title like 0ther do. It's not like they said there never going give anything way for free again in the future and $10 dollars is a fair price for want the spooky set going have in it so far we seen.
So stop with complain and have faith in frontier for planet coaster future.

I don't have any faith left in Frontier at all. The sheer avarice of releasing a stuff pack that should have been in the original game, alongside completely ignoring the massively unfinished features this game contains is pretty disgusting to me. I'm sure all the apologists will come along and tell me that I'm being entitled, and to be honest I don't care. I used to sit and fight FD's corner when people were mean or rude about them because I thought it was unfair to criticise such an incredibly talented and passionate team of people. While the people working for them are no less talented or passionate, whoever is heading this project needs sacking.

I honestly only came to these forums this time around because I'd gotten pretty excited about this expo thing, naive as I am for thinking it might actually be the start of some improvement to the gameplay, but now it's crystal clear that all they want to do is sell cosmetic nonsense for the game we've already paid for. Blergh.

 

[DisneylandFreak]

If you don;t want people to complain don't come here and tell that to everyone.

Now you will get responds with complaints.

It's more the, "here, take my money" and " I would pay 50 for an DLC like...." that is so irritating.

If you don;t mind spending money like it's nothing special, please buy the DLC for me then so I can save mine.

I want to support the devs of this great game so i spent my money for dlc[wink].They can't bring free updates for this game forever[rolleyes].There have been already 3 free updates and there's still one very big in store for november.Devs have to earn their money too somehow[yesnod].So please don't be mad about something that is totally normal,because if they get no money they can't eat and drink and they will die[redface].Would you want that?[uhh]

 

[ojonas]

The sheer avarice of releasing a stuff pack that should have been in the original game

Where does it say what Frontier promised to have in the game? I have not seen a list of items that they promised to be in that we can check off on. Especially I have not seen anywhere where Frontier promised that this particular game would come with a Spoke theme in the base game. As far as I can remember Frontier has not decided to charge for anything that they have previously shown or teased but that was not in the game at release. There are exampled of items that they shown but that was not in at release with the explanation that they wanted to make sure they were working perfect, in their minds, before releasing it publicly. Security guards, go carts and shuttle coasters comes to mind. I cant think of a single item they have shown or talked about just to charge for later.

The sheer avarice of releasing a stuff pack that should have been in the original game

While the people working for them are no less talented or passionate, whoever is heading this project needs sacking.[/QUOTE]

Frontier is a publicly traded company that is in this to make as much money as possible. Like it or not, that is the who idea of a business. They are not a charity or non-profit and their employees need to get paid so they can feed their family etc. The management at Frontier is just doing what they are supposed to. Obviously they are doing something right as people do buy their stuff and Planet Coaster so far is a big success.

but now it's crystal clear that all they want to do is sell cosmetic nonsense for the game we've already paid for. Blergh.

Would you be fine with the alternative, that they would not work on and release anything else at this point? They need to bring in money to be able to keep working on the game. If not, they will have to take the team and have them work on something else that will bring in money to Frontier. If it is nonsense to you, you are free to decided not to buy it. No-one is forcing you to buy something you don't want or need. Again, Frontier is a business and they are, like every other business out there, in it to make as much money as possible.

 

[LN]

I want to support the devs of this great game so i spent my money for dlc[wink].They can't bring free updates for this game forever[rolleyes].There have been already 3 free updates and there's still one very big in store for november.Devs have to earn their money too somehow[yesnod].So please don't be mad about something that is totally normal,because if they get no money they can't eat and drink and they will die[redface].Would you want that?[uhh]

Can you read?

I'm not complaining about the DLC cositng money.

I'm complaining about people like you offering money just to get a certain DLC.
But don't take it personal.

Money should roll I know, but if your so keen in giving it away, please, give it to me then instead and I will use it to invest in Frontier Developments

 

[danijami23]

Do you know what alternative I would like? I would like the crazy alternate reality where they fixed what was supposed to be in the game, like management, stability and a career mode, based on the reams of feedback they received. If they did that then I would be the happiest man alive and would part with hundreds of dollars of my money to keep their poor little business going so they could feed their starving children.


I know how a capitalist society works. People offer services, and for those services they should be compensated. I know this; I'm not stupid enough to believe otherwise. With that said, it's a two-way street. If I'm paying away money THAT I HAD TO WORK REALLY HARD TO EARN, I expect not to feel cheated.

This game is quite simply not what was advertised. The simulation is not "evolved" the management is shallow, the career mode is a lacklustre scenario menu. I don't know about you, but I paid I to this game a long time ago, and the way that they hid how they were implementing the management right up until two weeks before they released it was bordering on outright deceitful.

If you think that making games is just about business and about the company making as much money as possible, then that is very much your prerogative, but at the end of the day I'm in this life to enjoy the things I spend my money on. I have to make money too and when I part with it for what is essentially a very pretty lie you're darn right I'm going to be ticked off about it.

 

[SoapyIllusion]

Ok lets talk dollars and cents lets talk a two way street?

Thus far you paid what 30-100 US dollars for the game right? Depending upon what version you went for or if you got the game on sale... ok

You paid that "fee" one-time.

Games are made by software engineers. Software engineers are paid a salary wage in most cases. A Salary that goes from 50,000 USD to 150,000 USD. Depending upon the company, your title, experience ect ect... If we could break that down to an hourly salary that equates to more then 25 dollars an hour. To keep the example simple lets keep it to 25.00. So say you paid the standard 44 dollars for the game. You paid for a little more then an hour of that devs time. You can only do so much with that hour. Lets say you paid a 100. You'd given frontier enough money for 4 hours worth of ONE devs time. You paid this to Frontier once.

If this were really a two way street and 44 dollars had a of weight Planet coaster would be a much less complete game.

Again what makes the game "complete" and what you find "value" is complete subjective. From an actual economic standpoint any of these arguments really make 0 sense.

 

[danijami23]

Ok lets talk dollars and cents lets talk a two way street?

Thus far you paid what 30-100 US dollars for the game right? Depending upon what version you went for or if you got the game on sale... ok

You paid that "fee" one-time.

Games are made by software engineers. Software engineers are paid a salary wage in most cases. A Salary that goes from 50,000 USD to 150,000 USD. Depending upon the company, your title, experience ect ect... If we could break that down to an hourly salary that equates to more then 25 dollars an hour. To keep the example simple lets keep it to 25.00. So say you paid the standard 44 dollars for the game. You paid for a little more then an hour of that devs time. You can only do so much with that hour. Lets say you paid a 100. You'd given frontier enough money for 4 hours worth of ONE devs time. You paid this to Frontier once.

If this were really a two way street and 44 dollars had a of weight Planet coaster would be a much less complete game.

Again what makes the game "complete" and what you find "value" is complete subjective. From an actual economic standpoint any of these arguments really make 0 sense.

What I would find a complete product would be one with features that matched the advertising. I have never complained on Introversion's forums about the state of Prison Architect, I have never complained about any game which I purchased and didn't like (subjective as you say). What I'm complaining about here is that I was not delivered the advertised product, which I paid for and cannot refund.

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

How people have interpreted the advertising is subjective as well.

"Simulation evolved " does NOT mean the same thing to everyone who reads that feature.
You bring in all YOUR wants and desires to that vague statement.

"Management" does not mean the same thing to everyone who will interpret it, again, with their own biased thoughts of what the word means or implies.

 

[Ramm]

I think most people are upset with the priorities. Sure new visual stuff is always nice but there is still alot to be done about the original game. Many things have been mentioned since alpha which was 1.5 years ago and since then there isn't much response. So that is probably why you see people losing hope a bit which results in negativity. For some people the current game is not much of a game and it's more of a visual designer/tool to put scenery around your placed stuff and when they then announce more visual stuff but nothing else about the general experience well then things heat up a bit.

I highly doubt it's a price issue for anyone. Since it all goes into the same wallet: to help Frontier give us the best theme park/coaster sim there is. But right now, the sim and coaster builder aspect is a bit lacking.

A great idea would be for Frontier to give more insight on what's on their agenda. They are a bit secretive about stuff which on one side is a logical choice, they dont wanna make you happy about something that might not happen, but complete silence about what they are doing behind the scenes will result in some frustration when alot of things get ignored for a long time.

Let's hope the November update brings more than just visual stuff. [yesnod]

 

[ojonas]

What I would find a complete product would be one with features that matched the advertising. I have never complained on Introversion's forums about the state of Prison Architect, I have never complained about any game which I purchased and didn't like (subjective as you say). What I'm complaining about here is that I was not delivered the advertised product, which I paid for and cannot refund.

What part of what they advertised do you feel they did not deliver upon? We are talking hard facts here, not YOUR interpretation of something someone else said. If what you says would be true, they Frontier would be swimming in lawsuits today for falsely advertising.

Steam also do have a refund policy. If you don't like the game within Steam's refund time frame you are free to return the game, no questions asked. Frontier themselves has also more than once honored a refund for other reasons in their discretion. That being said, if you decided to purchase the game as a pre-order, early-bird etc. then you forfeit that right upon release. You became an investor in the game rather than a consumer. As an investor there are always risks. If you are not OK with the risks, well, maybe you should have waited to buy the game until it was released and reviews were in?

As SoapyIllusion wrote, it all boils down to the financials. His example is a very good one but also leaves out all the other costs a company have for an employee like taxes, medical and retirement payments, office space etc. One copy of the game barley makes a dent in the recovery of the cost they had to develop it.

 

[LN]

I think it is fair to say the company is doing very well, and Planet Coaster obviously is their big money maker.
So no need to worry about staff wages and accomodation costs I think.

31 May 2017
Turnover £(M) 37
Profit £(M) 8

31 May 2016
Turnover £(M) 21
Profit £(M) 1

31 May 2015
Turnover £(M) 23
Profit £(M) 2

31 May 2014
Turnover £(M) 10
Profit £(M) -2


Now, a lot of this money will be re-invested in either PC or JWE.

But if you want people buying stuff it's also a matter of keeping it interesting, otherwise people don't buy.
And I wonder how long it can still be interesting enough. I hope for a long time, though it all still depends on ongoing sales and wether they keep selling.

Looking at this makes me think, I should have bought stock shares early 2016.....

 

[ojonas]

I think most people are upset with the priorities. Sure new visual stuff is always nice but there is still alot to be done about the original game.

The simple answer to this is that there are more than likely different teams and people working on scenery and management for example. It would make no sense for Frontier to pause all scenery development until one of the other teams have something ready to release. Then everyone would complain that no new items were added. They way people argue and whine about this make Frontier lose no matter what they do. You can''t please everyone at the same time. I also imagine, I am not a software developer by trade but knows what goes into coding and debugging, that is by far easier to design a new wall piece or a new flower than fixing something in the back end code that handles, lets say, people path finding (just as an example, path finding is not an issue today). That change may involve thousands of lines of code that could potentially be affected. Just to put it to scale.

A great idea would be for Frontier to give more insight on what's on their agenda. They are a bit secretive about stuff which on one side is a logical choice, they dont wanna make you happy about something that might now happen, but complete silence about what they are doing behind the scenes will result in some frustration when alot of things get ignored for a long time.

This is how Frontier always done business. They have always kept everything close to themselves, not just for Planet Coaster. You may not like that tactic but no one can argue that Frontier is not a successful company today so they must have done something right.

Let's hope the November update brings more than just visual stuff.

If history is any indication I don't think we have to worry here. So far every major free update, I think there has been three so far, has come with more improvements than visuals or new attractions. There has always been one or more game play improvements, additions with all of them. At this point there are no reasons why that would not happen this time as well.

 

[Ramm]

The simple answer to this is that there are more than likely different teams and people working on scenery and management for example. It would make no sense for Frontier to pause all scenery development until one of the other teams have something ready to release. Then everyone would complain that no new items were added. They way people argue and whine about this make Frontier lose no matter what they do. You can''t please everyone at the same time. I also imagine, I am not a software developer by trade but knows what goes into coding and debugging, that is by far easier to design a new wall piece or a new flower than fixing something in the back end code that handles, lets say, people path finding (just as an example, path finding is not an issue today). That change may involve thousands of lines of code that could potentially be affected. Just to put it to scale.

This is how Frontier always done business. They have always kept everything close to themselves, not just for Planet Coaster. You may not like that tactic but no one can argue that Frontier is not a successful company today so they must have done something right.

If history is any indication I don't think we have to worry here. So far every major free update, I think there has been three so far, has come with more improvements than visuals or new attractions. There has always been one or more game play improvements, additions with all of them. At this point there are no reasons why that would not happen this time as well.

Yes creating a new wall texture and adding it to the game is alot easier than fixing the gameplay. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't have both.

If it's their business model that's their choice and more than fair but I do hope both frontier and the community will understand the frustration when people don't see improvements in the gameplay but instead just visual additions. We simply don't know. And then they release a cosmetic pack and some people will go: "Well what the.... How about X and how about Y? We've been talking about that since Z!" And then you still don't have any answers to those exact gameplay suggestions. So I do understand the frustration that causes for some.

I hope you're right, but I still think it's better if they give us insight about what is on the menu gameplay-wise. That way the community can still share their insights about those exact things they are working on.

If you only hear about what's going on 2 days before it releases, well then good luck trying to get them to improve those exact systems in time with suggestions of the community. [wink]

 

[ojonas]

I think it is fair to say the company is doing very well, and Planet Coaster obviously is their big money maker.
So no need to worry about staff wages and accomodation costs I think.

Date Turnover £(M) Profit £(M) Basic EPS Currency
31 May 2017 37 8 22.70 GBP
31 May 2016 21 1 4.20 GBP
31 May 2015 23 2 4.90 GBP
31 May 2014 10 -2 -5.80 GBP
31 May 2013 12 1 4.20 GBP

Now, a lot of this money will be re-invested in either PC or JWE.

But if you want people buying stuff it's also a matter of keeping it interesting, otherwise people don't buy.
And I wonder how long it can still be interesting enough. I hope for a long time, though it all still depends on ongoing sales and wether they keep selling.

Looking at this makes me think, I should have bought stock shares early 2016.....

II don't think anyone doesn't think Frontier is making a lot of money or that their employees can't get paid. That doesn't mean that they don't want to keep making a ton of money. The more money they can make from it's customers, the more they can reinvest in future development, being for Planet Coaster or some other game (right now the Jurassic Park game).

Compared to most games out there, and I include the consoles here as well, Planet Coaster is an old game today, by gaming standards, but it still feels like a new game. That is a good testament. Most other development companies would already moved on to either a sequel or a completely different game by now with no or minimal support for the current game. DLCs will keep Frontier work on Planet Coaster to make it an even better game than what it already is. If people stop buying the additional content the game development will eventually halt and then we are locked in with what we have at the moment (or at the moment this may happen). I don't think any of us would like that.

 

[mr.sugar]

If people could read, maybe there wouldn´t be a need for this thread...

Most people who complain also explain why, so why even starting a thread?
Thank you for clearing things up for us. Most of us probably realize they need more money to keep the development going. I´m also not against giving them money. I just don´t like the form of the DLC and also basically broken promises (I remember it was said paid DLCs will not include exclusive rides and will be more about eye candy and scenery).

There are other ways of monetization that works VERY well, support the development and do not fragment the community. Thanks god, a lot of good MP games learned the lesson and there are really good examples of those, who do not charge for extra maps (as that fragments the community), but they charge for other optional things (and people are willing to pay for that if they like the game). Yes, PC is not multiplayer game, but I bet I´m not alone here who use Workshop a lot and segmentation is killing it for me, therefore ruining the game experience.

Also very often, most those who don´t understand the critics seem to make the critics related to THIS DLC, while we target to ALL DLC, the past and the future DLCs too. I´m still standing strong with my opinion that Frontire plans a lot more of these DLCs. I don´t mind that much that it will probably cost like if you bought 5x PC Early access in the end. I do mind that community will split. And also that I think this game is not ready to have much more content added as it needs major fixes, optimization and UI redesign in order to handle all these DLCs too..

UPDATE:

I would like to remind also one interesting fact. Frontire made A LOT of money on the free updates....

 

[ojonas]

There are other ways of monetization that works VERY well, support the development and do not fragment the community. Thanks god, a lot of good MP games learned the lesson and there are really good examples of those, who do not charge for extra maps (as that fragments the community), but they charge for other optional things (and people are willing to pay for that if they like the game). Yes, PC is not multiplayer game, but I bet I´m not alone here who use Workshop a lot and segmentation is killing it for me, therefore ruining the game experience.

I see you mention other good ways of monetizing the game but give no concrete examples. You just refer to "good MP games". Most likely the audience that plays Planet Coaster heavily is not so much into those MP games as they are totally different genres (not including everyone here as I am sure there are a lot of people enjoying both types, just not the majority). So can you please list some of the very good ways you mention for Frontier to monetize Planet Coaster that does not involve what they have been doing successfully so far? I ask because I see this comment all over this forum but no one does seem to give any examples of what those other ways might be.

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

"I would like to remind also one interesting fact. Frontire made A LOT of money on the free updates.... "

Please elaborate...

 

[mr.sugar]

"I see you mention other good ways of monetizing the game but give no concrete examples. "

I did, in other thread. Without even thinking, you could probably come up with scenery being free, but charge for extra maps, ride skins/train skins, mascots.... And if you think even more, you definitely can come up with more ideas how this could work. And none of these things would fragment the community. And I would be more than wiling pay for that.

"I would like to remind also one interesting fact. Frontire made A LOT of money on the free updates.... "

Please elaborate...

Simple (and it´s proven) that when free update is released, sales get boosted. There are cases when update/ sale or combination of both boosted sales for like 106% and Valve themselves managed to boost sales several times for like 3000%. Free update (if well marketed) can generate more sales = more money. Saying that Frontire did the free extra content and get nothing out of it is only lying to yourself. And if they didn´t earn money on this, it´s only the marketing fail...