Diablo 4's new mount costs more than the actual game

It's crazy how far micro-transactions and monetizing games have come since Bethesda charged $2.50 for cosmetic armor to put on your horse. If you'd told someone back then that one day an in-game mount would cost more than the game itself they would have laughed you out of the room.
- I'm so sick of this revisionist bs. Plenty of us were outraged then and warned of EXACTLY this. Y'all reaped what you sowed. Now micro transactions and paid early access are the norm. We screamed and yelled to "vote with your wallets", and by god, you did. "It's just a few bucks" is the most common one I hear. Well, now EVERYTHING is "just a few bucks".
  You won.
  
  This. That’s why I gave up on arguing with people a long time ago. There is a shimmer of hope in me that this industry still comes crashing down at some point. I would celebrate it. But by the looks of it, it won’t happen anytime soon.
  The best I could do is not buying anything on release, early access or riddled with microtransactions, mostly indie games and maybe one AAA title a year, also avoid certain studios. Oh, and also don’t really care at all when these kind of news come up. I cared back then, I voted with my wallet and still do, but the other side won. Shit happens. There is nothing I can do other than get angry, but that’s not worth the hassle.
  
  The market has spoken, and it said some real stupid shit. I've given up on gaming as a hobby, and good riddance.
  
  Also let's not forget the horse armor was the free patch, Microsoft allowed 1 free cosmetic patch on the x-box, then everything else they required Bethesda to put a price on. It just so happened to be win -win for both Bethesda and Microsoft
- Unless you were in MBA school, at which point they'd hail you as their king.
- Yeah I remember saying that that Bethesda's horse armor bs would lead to gamers being nickeled and dimed to death and was soundly called a overreacting whinger.
  And like you said here we are now and gamers are being outright exploited and you still have people saying it's all still blown out of proportion like these companies aren't hiring psychologists to manipulate us to buy this bullshit.
  
  But they're not being nickled and dimed. They're being Lincolned and Hamiltoned.
  
  "But it's only cosmetic!!"
- Some people would have laughed you out of the room. A lot of people, myself included, warned that this was the kind of shit we'd spiral into with these microtransactions. It was basically confirmed within a year or two with the absolutely insane amount of money mobile gaming was seeing where the base product was just addictive crap with as many microtransactions shoveled in as possible. These games just completely blew the revenue of actual AAA titles would out of the water. It was basically inevitable and we're now in a situation where we've got a generation of consumers raised on this trash.
- It's a slippery slope. Money talks. They are accountable to their shareholders. So when they saw that people were paying for them, they started to monetise more and more.
- Horse Armor? How about a jewel-encrusted horse!?
  Am I alone in thinking this is a joke that has gone over everyone’s heads? Isn’t it just a sparkly topping on a pile of currency anyway?

Every time this comes up (which is too often) I'm like "Who is buying this?" How can we make them stop? Do they need help?
- People with poor fiscal responsibility skills, such as children, people with ADHD, and people with mental health issues like depression.
  They literally hire psychologists to make this stuff as enticing as possible by pushing the right buttons in your brain.
  
  Don't forget the people with more money than sense. Whales are what keep the microtransaction mechanic alive and well.
- Yes.
  People who spend 10s of thousands of dollars on micro transactions do need help.
  Said help probably needs to come at a government level banning things that were designed in a computer lab to be digital Crack.
  
  It's such a shame that the OW1 discussion about loot boxes went nowhere in regards to giving ingame gambling the same legal framework as IRL gambling.
- Might be the people that play only one game. I used to play WoW and then Diablo III exclusively like it was a full time job, and wound up in social bubbles with people who were equally invested. I never spent money on cosmetics or in-game items or anything but at that point it'd be pretty easy to rationalize since it's something someone is spending 20-80 hours a week playing.
  Back in WoW we used to sell one slot on our Algalon raid (hardmode only raid boss) and pay for our Ventrilo and website with that lol
  
  Grubby is a good example of someone who was recently reformed. In one of his early Dota 2 videos (some time last year), he admitted that he didn't know that games outside of Blizzard had gotten so good - he actually only played Blizzard games and nothing else. It's been pretty wholesome watching someone learn the wider gaming world.
- Whales, idk if we can make them stop, often times yes they need help

- The fact that this meme misattributes horse armor to Skyrim instead of Oblivion is bothering me way more than it should
  
  Kids these days don't know shit man. Skyrim had been out long enough to concieve a kid and watch him graduate. Oblivion might as well have been a DOS title to them.
  
  After so many re-releases of Skyrim, I kind of forgot there were TES games before it...
- I seriously doubt it, but I really hope they keep their word about no more ship sales after the official 1.0 release...
  I can get behind the idea of "you want to support the game at high dollar amounts since you have that kind of cash, go for it." But I can't get behind "well people keep buying ships so let's just keep selling super fucking expensive ships after we're already "done" with the game."
  
  As if they'll keep their word about anything, the game's only 8 years past their initial launch debut.
  "But but but S42 is done and now they're making the PU more quickly!"
  Yep, and I'm sure they'll reach their 100 star system goal (lol) in about 40 years. Orrrr they'll just release 5-10 solar systems and then shrug when people ask why they stopped.

I love the "blame the consumer" mindset so much! It always leads to change and reform
- I mean I do blame the consumer. Specifically for not voting in harsh consumer- and worker-protection laws curbing corporate abilities.
  
  I think the issue is only blaming the consumer and especially when pointing to the cause of the issue.
  Is it naive to vote for someone who obviously tells you all you want to hear but has a record of taking advantage every time they get your vote? Absolutely.
  But so is walking in a city at night. All kinds of bad things can happen there but someone who hasnt seen evil firsthand will not recognize it easily.
  I grew up in a very rough part of a big city. I knew you cant go outside unarmed at night and especially not linger there. But I cant expect friends from other places who havent seen this to act „wisely“ without telling them. This why we advocate without looking down on people.
  Have a good one.
- If consumers as a whole keep buying overpriced skins then yes, I will blame the consumers for enabling this behavior.
  
  These companies are using dark design patterns to manipulate kids and young people into a pattern of behaviour. You can blame consumers, but it’s not exactly a fair fight. These big companies have behaviour specialists employed and tons of data, used specifically to get people to act dumb in a way that benefits these companies. Heroin pushers are more honest.
- This whole attitude of "its not their fault they can't help but hand over their money and buy overpriced shit" has got to stop
  Economics is very simple here: there is supply, there is demand. If demand outstrips supply, the price will rise. This includes when is artificially restricted (or the market is flooded with alternatives by the same vendor to give the feeling of scarcity).
  The demand for streaming services is the same. People will take the hit, so the price goes up until they can't anymore.
  The generation is contributing to inflation because of inability to restrain themselves from buying frivolous shit for extortionate amounts of money, because they can't psychologically cope with doing without something, then complaining that no jobs pay enough while they try to launch an onlyfans career. Every generation has it's flaws.
  This then makes prices rise for everyone. The infantilzation to suggest they cant help themselves is astonishing. Companies are not going to stop making profit without intervention.
  
  Did you seriously just write that zoomers buying horse armor caused my groceries and rent to get more expensive
  
  There's no vote with your wallet when the supply is infinite and intangible, me not buying the microtransaction is one person, but a single whale will buy several, getting multiple votes in "yes please continue to shove shit down my throat" this isn't voting at all.
  
  You really think boycotts work? Is that for real? Do you have evidence? Like any example, at all, of boycotts working in gaming?

If youre still playing D4, I dont know what to tell you. Most people who pay attention to industry news and the game design philosophy of Blizzard knew well enough to pass it over.
- I saw someone mentioned the other day in that thread about buyer's remorse that they didn't even feel like they were playing a game, that it played itself basically and that just made me think about watching my son-in-law playing Diablo 3 and all he really did was walk around while shit died around him due to his character's abilities and items, and I asked how that was even fun anymore and he turned to me with a straight face and said "it's not fun. I just want to 100% it."
- i only played it because it came free with my xbox. then starfield came out and i completely forgot about d4
- I was hoping in vain that Blizzard might pivot even a little when they saw the backlash but nah people continue to throw money away on bullshit so of course Blizzard wouldn't
- Now I feel all the more right for skipping over it. To be honest, I didn't mind Diablo 3 once it had all its content and was no longer a dual-wield credit card simulator. It was a pretty fun game by the end IMO. Diablo 4 didn't feel right to me so I just skipped it.
  
  D4 really isn't that different from current D3. In some areas it's actually better. But of course both of those suck compared to D2 or PoE.

Stop 👏 playing 👏 games 👏 that 👏 rip 👏 you 👏 off 👏
- Or just stop playing games that exist as shitty GACHA vending machines.
  It isn't even the cost per-say. Its the fact that mounts were implemented in D4 as a practical afterthought. They barely affect gameplay, you can't take them into dungeons, they don't have any kind of skill progression or character synergy on their own right. Barely more than a TF2 fancy hat.
  I got D4 at base price on release, played the main act, and shelved it months ago. I can't imagine still playing a game that's been nothing but bloody runs since that initial release. Nevermind paying $60 for a fucking cosmetics improvement while I grind mobs for incremental stat increases at the level cap.
  
  TF2 fancy hats are relevant to the game. They provide an entire economy and allow for style, when finding ever new or enjoying old ways of hilarious frags.
  They are not an after thought, but a solid part of the games progressed development. However they are not providing an advantage in the core play, so everyone can still enjoy the game.
- At least Diablo is easier to quit than games that literally condition players into a gambling addiction. But all this is easier said than done.
  
  I mean Diablo is pretty addicting too lol, one of my friends dropped out of school for Diablo. Then again, one of my friends almost dropped out of school for Modern Warfare 2 - not that it wasn't fun of course (most fun CoD imo).
- Also stop pre-ordering games that aren't complete.

Meanwhile, Helldivers 2's armor is like 2 bucks, and you can find the currency in-game.
- Its nice to see a low cost microtransaction, and nice to see that you can get the currency in game but really thats just the same as it was a few years back before it went full 100 dollar for a reskin mode.
  You are defending a game by pointing out that its money grabbing methods are less greedy than another company.
  Games wont make the billions and billions they make now if they move away from the in game purchases models but they also evidently dont need billions and billions to operate.
  Some of the best games on the market were made on small budgets by indie developers and sell well because the are fun and people actually want to play them.
  
  I would argue that on online game kinda needs a stream of revenue that's doesn't only come from the first purchase, since that will stagnate.
- For Democracy!

Do you guys not have phones?

What happened to the micro part of microtransactions? This is why I only bought one skin in Genshin Impact since they give you extra funny money for your first time to get it, but a second skin will double than the first so I'm never buying one ever again.
- Macrotransactions.
  
  I will only pay if I get Robin Williams. This is the hill I will die on.
- Dumb fucks kept giving shitty publishers like Activision and Ubisoft money for microtransactions, so those companies did what any good capitalist would do: see how much you can fleece the idiots.
  
  I saw a post a couple years back in the Red Dead subreddit where someone posted a screenshot of their character. They had something like thousands of gold bars, and when someone asked how he had so many, the OP actually said that they spend $100 a month on the gold packs. Each month.
  
  see how much you can fleece the idiots.
  AKA "charge what the market will bear".
- I've got good news for you, the bonuses reset every anniversary (around September).
  
  I think they stopped that after fontaine. HSR didn't reset theirs iirc.
- I buy the monthly cards in advance and use the gems they give you from that, best value way of getting them
- At least Genshin Impact had a fucking plot, too. I can stomach dropping an extra $30 on a game after the first 100 hours. But D4 just stopped being a story after release. I was having fun exploring the world and plot in Genshin for the better part of two years (thanks, COVID!) I cleared D4 in a month. Cleared it again with another class. Got bored and shelved it.
  
  Genshin is good in some aspects, but it shows how desensitized we are that we accept the egregious gambling and the endless grind that only exists for the sake of retention. Can Genshin players really talk shit about this when in average it takes around $200 to get one single 5* character? Even if you are not paying that yourself, the game is built that way to exploit those who do.

I need to make a game for rich suckers.
- Step 1: make some genuinely top shelf, genre-defining games in the 90s and early 2000s
  Step 2: Sell out
  Step 3: Become shittier than anyone could ever imagine
  Step 4: Charge 1 kidney for a shitty in app purchase
  
  Step 3.5: Use psychology to "convince" children and those with certain mental health issues that they need the in app purchase.
  
  What, dont you all have kidneys?

Correct me if I’m wrong, but weren’t people warned about this before the game even came out?
This should fall under the purview of “fools and their money.”
- Such that laws are created to protect people from scammers? Because that is what really should be done. With the rise of this "buying is not owning' bulshit, it has been a long time coming.

i got plenty of hate when i said years ago this is where the mtx slippery slope would get us

This sort of thing is exactly why I mostly just play retro games.
- Indie games ftw!
- I did that for a while, but I discovered my local library has a great selection of games. I went from spending a few hundo on games a year to buying two a year - Christmas and birthday, and doing the rest of my gaming exploring their catalogue. It's been great on my wallet. Hooray libraries.
- There are a lot of solid indie titles you can get for $10

And it looks like the result of a transporter malfunction involving Baron Rivendare's Deathcharger and Butt Stallion.
- Holy information density batman! That's a fucking mess to look at there's so much going on it stopped being cool looking
- Hahahaha! I hadn't seen it before! And people are expected to (and some do) spend money on that?

This year‘s CK3 DLC package is also very close in price to the „base game.“ Naturally, it provides nowhere near as much content and I refuse to believe it requires nearly as much work to make either.
- Paradox DLC policy is why I don't play Paradox games anymore.
  If I were to only play 1 game ever, then the DLC system might be ok, it's basically a subscription system. But since I'd only play a campaign every other year or so, I'm not going to fork out that much money for 1 campaign. And it's way too annoying to play some game with obvious parts missing + in game ads, so now Paradox gets no more money from me.
  
  I feel Paradox DLCs are the better way of DLCs. They add good content but you absolutely can enjoy the game without them
  
  Yeah I loved EUIV early on, but have left it alone for a while. Now, whenever I get the urge to play again (and I do), I have a look at everything that popped up in the meantime and it's just overwhelming. Sure, I could play the snapshot I have but then the game keeps getting patched so you get stunted new mechanics that need the DLCs to function properly. I could revert to a previous patch, but what was the patch in march 2021? Do I still find it in the steam options?
  And if you want to bite the bullet and just buy the whole DLC collection it's around 100 euro for a couple of years. or something like 300 for the whole package? I do appreciate the quality that paradox churns out though.
  This is why I've been holding off on getting victoria 3.
  
  Can you expand on this in-game ad thing? I love paradox but it’s been loooong time since I played one of theirs.
- Kind of like Monster Hunter Rise's DLC being almost the same price as the game, while having no campaign at all, unlike Iceborne.
- I buy base Paradox games just so i can mod the cracked version with all dlc through steam.
  
  Care to elaborate?

Somehow that's not surprising, which is sad.

And I'm sure several whales have already bought it

If they still play honestly ...

No it doesn't. Social media sites that have moderators really need to take a stand about clickbait garbage headlines like this. It's like getting a free t-shirt with a car purchase and claiming that T-shirt costs $40,000. You're buying coins which already cost that much, the coins with or without the mount cost that much. Currently you can buy those coins and get a free mount. Lots to be upset with Diablo and Blizzard, but this is just garbage.

Game journalism these days...
Listen, I don't play nor like Diablo 4 but is this headline not a little bit misleading since you get the mount skin as a bonus for buying 70€ worth of their stupid premium currency? So you actually pay for the currency and not the mount...
Again the disclaimer that I do not play Diablo 4, nor do I defend Blizzard or microtransactions and I'm a true supporter that the coolest looking stuff should be exclusively achievable by actually playing the freaking game and not fucking pay for it!
If you excuse me now, got to continue playing Last Epoch which is even in its early access fucking amazing.
- The issue is that the mount is only available in this way. So if you want it you have to buy the "bundle", making it a $65 purchase either way.
  
  But are all the other shop skins available by actually playing the game? Because if not I would find the headline still to be quite misleading.
- If you excuse me now, got to continue playing Last Epoch which is even in its early access fucking amazing.
  What's the deal with the Epoch points? I keep wanting to check it out, but the Epoch point packs makes me think it's going to be the same deal where you can't earn cool looking stuff in game and have to buy it.
  
  don't know, never heard of them, but I also play exclusively offline and never saw a shop or something

Question from someone who plays warframe.
They do their prime bundles for a decent chunk of money. But it's also a really good deal just for the paid currency.
And you can get the same things in game for free.
So how much is the actual item vs the currency?
- Reading the article, yeah it's basically a "hey, buy 65$ worth of our virtual money and we'll throw in this horse armor!" bundle.
  There isn't a way to get it ingame though. I think the only way to actually earn platinum is if you buy and complete the battlepasses.
- Whatever the in game markets sells it for
- There is no ingame market, and Warframe is a free game so it gets more of a pass compared to a paid game charging MORE than a f2p one.