EA — A bunch of no good, scruffy looking, nerf herders #studyingstarwars
Battlefront II, the newest video-game of the Star Wars franchise, has been in under a media spotlight since its release on November 17th. The highly anticipated sequel to 2014’s Star Wars Battlefront hit a huge roadblock with players when the games progression system was revealed prior to the official release.
Almost all online games have a progression system
A progression system encourages the player to continue playing the game via unlocking better gear, characters, or cosmetics. Most games maintain a healthy balance of playtime leading to unlocks, so with a bit of time and effort you can enjoy the majority of what that game has to offer, but those who are extra committed to the game, are rewarded accordingly. In Call of Duty Black Ops II, with an exorbitant amount of time and effort you can unlock a diamond skin for your weapons. Not only does your weapon sparkle for you as you run around the map, but other players see it as well. Other games offer skins for your characters that alter their entire appearance, or different abilities/skills that you can utilize while playing the game. The common theme for these unlocks, however, are that while some might give you a slight edge over your competition, they are mostly cosmetic, and obtainable with a reasonable amount of time played
The issue with Battlefront II is two-fold, the progression system, and with loot-boxes. The progression system locked away iconic playable characters (such as Darth Vader) behind ~100 hours of playtime. A calculated decision by EA to encourage the purchase of loot boxes, enflamed the gaming community. Based on the average credits earned at the end of matches, and the price of unlocking various heroes and cards, it was speculated that it would take around ~2,000 hours to unlock everything the game had to offer. or 83 days of playtime. If you averaged 2 hours of playtime every day, you might unlock everything within 3 years.
An interesting conundrum, one that I hope to write about over this week, is one of the limitations put on the game via Disney’s brand. Disney refused to allow anything non-canonical in the game. If it wasn’t on the screen, it couldn’t be implemented as an unlock. No flashy diamond lightsabers to show how much time you’ve put into the game, which forced EA Dice to place entire characters behind the progression wall. It remains to be seen how EA will react to the pushback, especially considering lower-than-expected sales of the game.
For now, they have promised changes to the progression system, and have disabled in-game purchases.
