Blizzard is bad about this with WoW too. A lot of the content is only available as launch-day cinematics, and is vaulted once the expansion has launched. Getting the full plot for WoW as a new player is basically impossible, because so much of the game has been hidden from players.
It’s to create FOMO, and keep players active. If players know they can access content whenever they want, there’s no incentive for them to log in right now.
They’ve done away with some of this with the time walking features. You can actually go and level a character through those old expansions these days. I think the only one fully missing is vanilla because of the cataclysm, but then there’s vanilla wow for that
Indeed, Destiny 2 example, just points out what is terribly wrong with games as service. Vaulting content, is something I never understood why. Its anti consumer and just destroys the value your game has. It’s just wrong practice in my eyes.
This is a huge reason I never even considered getting into Destiny after the fact.
I literally can’t play it from the beginning.
It’s like if new players who wanted to get into Mass Effect, had to start with ME2, because the first game had been purged from the face of the earth, for no-one to ever play again.
I don’t think stopkillinggames is optimistic that they would be able to do much about this type of thuggery. It’s way in the gray area compared to the clear-cut examples they (rightly) use.
Not in Europe, so I can’t help you there.
But I’d like to add, it’s not JUST about disabling games.
Bungie released Destiny 2 in 2017, in 2020 they started “vaulting” content, locking it away from people who had paid for it.
This included ALL of the story missions, essentially rendering the game plot-less.
Half of the original planet locations in the base $60 game, and the entirety of the first two paid expansions.
It’s literally impossible to play the game as launched even though, technically, it was never disabled and is still online.
The content has never been restored and cannot be accessed, even for a court case, Bungie had to rely on YouTube recordings of the removed content:
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/bungies-lawyers-have-to-use-fan-videos-of-old-destiny-2-content-in-court-because-well-it-doesnt-exist-in-game-anymore/
Is there any explanation even a theory of why this was done?
There was a bullshit explanation, that as time went on proved to be a lie, yeah.
Sounds about right for game companies these days.
Blizzard is bad about this with WoW too. A lot of the content is only available as launch-day cinematics, and is vaulted once the expansion has launched. Getting the full plot for WoW as a new player is basically impossible, because so much of the game has been hidden from players.
It’s to create FOMO, and keep players active. If players know they can access content whenever they want, there’s no incentive for them to log in right now.
They’ve done away with some of this with the time walking features. You can actually go and level a character through those old expansions these days. I think the only one fully missing is vanilla because of the cataclysm, but then there’s vanilla wow for that
Indeed, Destiny 2 example, just points out what is terribly wrong with games as service. Vaulting content, is something I never understood why. Its anti consumer and just destroys the value your game has. It’s just wrong practice in my eyes.
This is a huge reason I never even considered getting into Destiny after the fact.
I literally can’t play it from the beginning.
It’s like if new players who wanted to get into Mass Effect, had to start with ME2, because the first game had been purged from the face of the earth, for no-one to ever play again.
Yup, I don’t want nostalgia for something that can be taken away.
I don’t think stopkillinggames is optimistic that they would be able to do much about this type of thuggery. It’s way in the gray area compared to the clear-cut examples they (rightly) use.