2/23/08

Nintendo's Pay-to-Play Online, Bad News for Gamers

As mentioned during this years Game Developers Conference (GDC) Nintendo could very well start charging its customers to play games online. Not only that, but it will allow companies to start releasing downloadable content for games.

I personally think this news is awful. I can't stand the fact that companies hold onto content for a game, charge full price for it, and then release said content and charge you again. I would rather wait a year for the full-blown sequel while playing the original than pay $30-$40 to "upgrade" the same game and then pay for the sequel a year and a half later anyway. Make this downloadable content free (yeah right), and we'll talk.


A game like Animal Crossing on the Wii, which I am (was) quite excited for, now holds some serious potential to be a total wallet killer by forcing us to pay for every single piece of furniture. Disaster in the making? I sure hope so. This may be the first time I have ever hoped for something that Nintendo does to fail. So much for appealing to everyone huh Reggie.

As for paying to play online games, until Nintendo's online services prove not to suck compared to the competition, one of which is also free (see PS3), then they should hold off on this move. The announcement stated this change is for the Wii and the DS system, but DS users are already paying an extra $5 charge for every WiFi compatible title ($35 for a DS game rather than $30). Now Nintendo is going to charge an addition fee after the already increased $5 price? If Mario Kart Wii is the first game to demonstrate this move for Nintendo, then it could very well be the first Mario Kart game that I do not buy.

Am I alone on this one? Are there others out there that feel the same way I do or am I standing on top of a very small soap box?

2 comments:

Metaldave said...

Hey man I wanted to tell you that the Friend code stuff for Smash is all good now. It no longer says anything about "waiting for registration" thank goodness! Looks like I'll be playing you soon...

Travis Hendricks said...

Good to hear. It took long enough. The weirdest part was that it said I could mail you replays and custom levels but it still said "waiting to register." It makes me wonder if that same thing is going on with a bunch of other people too on my list.