作者：Martin Robinson

回想8年前，你会发现那时候的DLC还是一个贬义词——它代表着为《上古卷轴：淹没》的马所佩戴的华丽铠甲设定价格是一种自大与贪婪的表现。这是敲定DLC理念的一大组成部分，并逐渐推动着它成为延伸游戏寿命的一种方式。

最近还出现了另一个被当成贬义词的词语，也就是免费游戏。很长一段时间以来，这是形容剥削玩家的一个代名词，并且是乔装成游戏设计的一种可疑的商业道德——但随着像《英雄联盟》，《星球边缘2》，《坦克世界》以及《军团要塞2》的成功，这便成为了一种适合玩家和开发者的系统。

所以如果你想要加入其中的话，便可以以微软为理由，尽管现在可能有点晚了。尽管一直以来Xbox 360都将免费游戏拒绝在外，但是在今年初的E3上，它却宣称《坦克世界》将出现在其主机上，并在公开了全新免费游戏《Killer Instinct》后，这便成为了Xbox One将要张开双臂拥抱的一种模式。

Ryse（from eurogamer）

（《Ryse》处在微软对于免费游戏大胆定义的最前列。）

最终证明这有点太开放了。在许多Xbox One发行的游戏中还有一些免费游戏设计元素：《Ryse》带有微交易能够帮助玩家在多人游戏模式中前进，而在《飞龙骑士》中，玩家也可以通过消费现实世界中的金钱去帮助自己在单人玩家路径中前进。《极限竞速5》允许你通过支付额外的费用去提高速度从而获得XP，或者你可以花钱加快前进的速度从而获得更高端的摩托车。它们都是在免费游戏世界经过考验的系统，但却仍存在一个问题：所有的这些游戏都不是免费的。

这是一个显著的区别，但也是非常重要的一点——这似乎完全与微软撇清关系了。还有另外一个值得指出的区别：这并不是基于较高的价格而提供的额外内容，而是一个伴随着游戏现有的系统的消费品。没有人真正喜欢离开钱的免费游戏机制，或至少没人会将其误认为优秀的游戏设计。你之所以能够忍受这种附加物是因为：你所玩的游戏（利用了这些战术）是免费的，这些系统在游戏中并没有真正的地位，45英镑就已经是非常巨额的投资了。

《FIFA Ultimate Team》是过去几年里最大的商业成功之一，同时还带有吸引着热情且忠诚的用户基础的功能。尽管艺电已经巧妙地划分了功能，将其从主要游戏中分离出来，但是当你投入钱时，你便能够得到一些有形的内容。如果与我一样，你只是想要选择新的《FIFA》与朋友一起游戏，你也可以带领着自己的团队经历几个季节，这也是绝对有可能的。

微软认为这些微交易是可选择的，并且是对于玩家选择的延伸。所有的这些听起来有点空洞：对于更传统且更理智的人来说，进入为了让玩家花钱而故意分解的游戏中是不可行的。在《飞龙骑士》中，微交易并不突出，甚至为了发行而更加收敛——但是它们的存在是在15.99英镑的中心。当然，选择是在另一端：这是取决于开发者是否想要创造一款更优秀且更具有易用性的游戏，还是想要不顾一切地赚更多钱。

在《极限竞速5》中，问题的根源更深入——这一系列游戏的经济支柱发生了改变，我们很容易发现这种改变是为了推动微交易的执行。与之前的《极限竞速》游戏不同的是，新游戏中的汽车不再作为成功的奖励：相反地，玩家只能选择使用现实世界的金钱去购买它们。

《极限竞速5》将汽车渗透法作为50美元优惠套装的一部分更是加剧了这一问题的恶化。甚至当你将其作为DLC而购买，为了在游戏中完全拥有它们，你就需要使用现实世界中的货币—-或者投入你所拥有的额外的钱。游戏的创意总监Dan Greenawalt（一个聪明且充满热情的人，我想他并不是这些决策的幕后操纵者）承认优惠套装并不受欢迎，但人们确实喜欢它并愿意补救它，这也是推动他们继续玩6个月游戏的主要动力。它通过一些较小的方面将其与健身会员的关系进行了比较——但《极限竞速5》的会员问题在于他们已经支付了会员费，但是你在之后又要求他们为每个单独的设备支付费用。

在这种糟糕的愿景中，所有的一切都是待售的。这会让人想起Philip K. Dick的《Ubik》（游戏邦注：以1992年的北美联盟国为背景的科幻小说）中过度商品化的社会，人们每一天的行动变成了货币交易：你租了一间公寓，但却必须再额外支付一些费用才能使用冰箱，或者你发现自己必须投入便士才能打开前门。

bravely default（from eurogamer）

（《勇气契约》很华丽，但是微交易的引进也预示着它的分裂。）

我们很遗憾地发现人们面对《极限竞速》会先想到其技术而不是黑暗经济——毕竟，Turn 10的系列游戏是最擅长链接赛车游戏和RPG的游戏之一。在一款优秀的RPG中总是会存在升级的乐趣，让玩家能够沉浸在获取XP和前进的喜悦中。设计一个平衡且稳定的升级系统是一门艺术，一旦你引进了微交易，它们便会腐败掉。在《最终幻想7》的游戏世界中，如果存在一个选择让你花钱穿过复杂的升级系统，你是否还会认为这是一种奖励？

遗憾的是这并不是一个假设性问题：《最终幻想7》的PC版本发行之前的谣言预示它将引进微交易，从而让玩家的XP提升变得异常简单，尽管最终这种情况并未发生。Square的3DS RPG《勇气契约》为了年末的发行进行了本土化，而这让你可以通过花钱去推动角色在游戏中的进展。不过说实话这真的是一次叠加的悲惨。

它并未在此止步。《Gran Turismo》的刷任务已经被一些包含物所破坏了，《GT6》是这系列游戏中最早出现微交易机制，而这一趋势也将继续延伸到下一代的游戏中，直到该公司最终意识到这是一种无理且不诚实的实践，直到玩家投入无数钱于它创造的地狱中后醒悟过来并决定不再这么做。免费游戏并不是问题所在，它是一个能够丰富游戏未来的理念，它将能够有效扩展游戏用户群体。反倒是那些愤世嫉俗的发行商们应该停止对于这种模式的滥用，否则他们便会因为自己无耻的贪婪而赶走所有用户。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

What happens when free-to-play games aren’t free?

By Martin Robinson

Rewind some eight years and you’ll remember a time when DLC was a dirty word – when it symbolised a certain arrogance and greed typified in the shining armour that could sit on The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion’s horses, for a price. It took the best part of a generation for the concept of DLC to settle in, and for it to become a respected, at times respectable way to extend the lifespan of a game.

More recently there’s been another dirty phrase often recounted with curled lips: free-to-play. For a long while it’s been a byword for fleecing players and questionable business ethics masquerading as game design – but as the success of the likes of League of Legends, Planetside 2, World of Tanks and the retooling of Team Fortress 2 suggest, it’s a system that can work for player and developer alike.

So you can excuse Microsoft for wanting to get in on the action, even if it was a little late to the party. The Xbox 360 historically shut out free-to-play games, only for an about turn at E3 earlier this year when it was announced that World of Tanks would be coming to the console, and with the announcement of a new free-to-play Killer Instinct, it was a model that the Xbox One would embrace with open arms.

Ryse is at the forefront of Microsoft’s bold redefinition of free-to-play.

A little too open, it turns out. There are aspects of free-to-play design in the bulk of the Xbox One’s launch titles: Ryse has microtransactions that aid progress in its multiplayer mode, while Crimson Dragon’s single-player path can also be given a little helping hand by buying in-game currency with real-world money. Elsewhere, Forza Motorsport 5 allows you to boost the rate at which you gain XP for a little extra cost, or to spend money to fast-track your way to a higher end motor. They’re all systems proven in the world of free-to-play, but there’s a problem: none of these games are free.

It’s an obvious distinction, but an important one – and something that seems to have completely escaped Microsoft. There’s another distinction worth making: this isn’t extra content that’s being offered at a price, but rather a consumable that tinkers with a game’s pre-existing systems. No-one actively enjoys the base free-to-play mechanic of parting with money to progress, or at least no-one’s going to mistake it for good game design. It’s an appendage you put up with for a simple reason: the games you’re playing that employ these tactics are free, and they’re systems that certainly have no place in games that, at ￡45, already represent a sizeable investment.

Inspiration has been taken from FIFA Ultimate Team, which is fair enough: it’s one of the big business successes of the last few years, as well as a feature with a passionate, dedicated fanbase (you don’t want to know how much time and money Tom Bramwell’s dedicated to it in recent years). EA, though, has been smart to compartmentalise the feature, separating it out from the main game – and when you put money in, you get something tangible out. And if, like me, you just want to pick up the new FIFA to play with friends and take your team through a couple of seasons, that’s still perfectly possible.

Microsoft’s own argument goes that these microtransactions are optional, and an extension of player choice. All of which rings a little hollow: purchasing them certainly is, but for more traditional, sensible people, partaking in a game that’s wilfully broken in order to allow for their inclusion shouldn’t have to be. In Crimson Dragon, the microtransactions are unobtrusive, and are even being dialled back a little for launch – but their very existence at the heart of a ￡15.99 rankles. Surely the choice should be on the other side: it’s up to publishers to decide whether to make a better, more accessible game, or whether to just make a desperate lunge for more money.

In Forza Motorsport 5, the problem runs deeper – the economy that’s the backbone of the series has been altered, and it’s too easy to come to the conclusion the changes have been made to make way for microtransactions. Unlike in older Forza games, cars aren’t offered as rewards for success: instead, the only option is to buy them in a grind that can be augmented by pumping in real-world money.

It’s a problem exacerbated by Forza Motorsport 5′s drip-feed of cars as part of a $50 season pass, a number of which are being reintroduced from earlier games. And even when you’ve bought them as DLC, in order to own them fully in the game they have to be purchased using in-game currency – or, of course, by pumping in a little extra money of your own. The game’s creative director, Dan Greenawalt – a smart and passionate man who I suspect isn’t behind these decisions – admitted the season pass hasn’t been wholly popular, but that people are enjoying it and redeeming it, and that it’s keeping them playing the game for another 6 months. He compared it in some small way to a gym membership – but the problem with Forza 5′s membership is that having already bought the gym and paid a subscription, you’re then asked to pay individually for each piece of equipment within.

In this grim vision, everything’s for sale. It’s blandly reminiscent of the excessively commodified dystopia of Philip K. Dick’s Ubik, where everyday actions become a monetary transaction: where you rent your apartment but have to pay a little more to access your fridge, or find yourself scraping pennies together just to open your front door.

Bravely Default’s beautiful, but the introduction of microtransactions also suggest it’s broken.

It’s sad to see Forza’s considered craft replaced with dark economics – after all, Turn 10′s series was one of the best at penning a link between driving games and RPGs. In a good RPG, there’s always pleasure in power levelling and submerging yourself in the stream of XP and progression. Designing a well-balanced, well-paced levelling system is a fine art, and as soon you introduce microtransactions, that’s corrupted. Would working through Final Fantasy 7′s world be as rewarding if there was the option to spend your way through its intricately designed leveling system?

Sadly that’s not so much a hypothetical question: rumours preceding the PC re-release of Final Fantasy 7 suggesting it’d introduce microtransactions that could boost your XP were all too easy to believe, even if they didn’t eventually come to pass. The follow-up to Square’s 3DS RPG Bravely Default that’s being localised for release later this year goes there, though, allowing you to spend to speed up your progression. It’s a miserable addition.

And it doesn’t stop there. The grind of Gran Turismo already looks to be broken by the inclusion, for the first time in the series, of microtransactions in GT6, and it’s a trend that’s set to continue well into the next generation of games. It’s one that will carry on, as well, until companies realise it’s a disrespectful, dishonest practice, and until players stop supporting it by pouring money into the bottomless pit it creates. Free-to-play’s not the problem, and it’s a concept that will, in time, enrich the future of gaming just as it broadens its audience. Its misappropriation by cynical publishers must be stopped, though, before it turns those same people away with their shameless greed.(source:eurogamer)