Diablo 4 is $69.99.

[Fencers]

The 20 lvl skip includes these. Blizzard have locked them behind player lvl as well though, so you still need to become lvl 20 to unlock these levels you accelerated. People argue that it's faster to lvl to 20 than to lvl the battle pass to 20, so thus you get some form of p2w for this specific currency.

Ah, thanks for the correction. I didn't recall it all from the live stream.

[Nzx]

This forum: developers are blessed angels who never make mistakes and should be paid more

Also this forum: reeeee why game with hundreds of hours of content cost $10 more

People want infinite content, constant patches and balancing, 24/7 human support, extremely high quality graphics, a storyline on par with or better than Breaking Bad, and a combat system as complex as Dark Souls. The fun part is that you want all that, but you want it for $20 with no additional monetization and with the developers making enough money to buy mansions and never have to work again. It's legitimately pretty strange that so many people don't see the problem with that.

[Jetstream]

I am sorry but I looked at the first 3 pages and no one is talking about this, how did blizzard get away with this?
I understand that some game companies want to be scummy and charge $70 for the ps5 versions of the game but how come the Digital version purchased from battle.net(I initially pre order it for ps5 cuz of friends) is $69.99. IS not a physical copy of the game!!!!

While everyone is talking about the lore, the hardcore statue thing and how similar it is to D3, I feel like this has gone over the head of many of you and this is so wrong. Its thievery of the highest level. And what sucks is that if you want to play with your friends you have to fork out $70 for something that you won't really own since its not a physical copy or anything like that and its already too late to purchase a wow token cuz I haven't paid my wow sub unless someone knows of a way to have the gold on your toon from an unsub account get use to buy a wow token. This sucks. /rant over.

/edit, found a way to purchase a wow token with my unsub account. still, it sucks.

“Get away” with what? Buy it or don’t. If you think it’s too expensive, don’t pay it. If you pay it, well, there you go. That’s how they “get away” with it.

[tikcol]

The 20 lvl skip includes these. Blizzard have locked them behind player lvl as well though, so you still need to become lvl 20 to unlock these levels you accelerated. People argue that it's faster to lvl to 20 than to lvl the battle pass to 20, so thus you get some form of p2w for this specific currency.

The question is how much faster it is and Blizzard have even commented on it saying that they put this in place to combat the p2w, but if it goes significantly faster to lvl to 20 than to lvl the battle pass they would look into adjusting it.

So technically there is a small form of p2w, but personally I think this is such a minor thing it won't bother me. The goal is to not have p2w though and by the looks of it is that they have accounted for it... question remains as if they accounted enough for it.
unless I've missed a recent statement on the matter where they have solved this.

There's no p2w anywhere, at least, so far. The season boosts are free and you can't accelerate those. It's on the free portion of the battle pass. Premium battle pass only has cosmetics.

[Kumorii]

There's no p2w anywhere, at least, so far. The season boosts are free and you can't accelerate those. It's on the free portion of the battle pass. Premium battle pass only has cosmetics.

It is on the free portion. But there aren't separat tiers per track. Buying 20 tiers means you get 20 tier on the battle pass. Not "20 premium" tiers.
You have 2 tracks... but getting tier 5 on your account, means you get rewards from both tracks in the tier. They aren't lvld separately.
Blizzard have even made statements on twitter about this. That's also when they explained that it's tied to your highest character lvl so you can't just buy 20 tiers at lvl 1. And they put this into place for that reason so it wouldn't be p2w.

The discussion is how quickly can you get to lvl 20 and how quickly can you get to tier 20 on the battle pass. If getting 20 lvls is faster, then you technically buy a little bit of power...We don't know if this is the case yet though. Yeah, this is on such a technicality lvl that I personally see no issue with it. And they have said if there are edge cases like this they will try and change it as per this tweet:
https://twitter.com/PezRadar/status/1656857901510836226

That his him responding to the p2w speculations.

Here's a video explaining the potential loophole and Blizzards plans if it happens to be p2w.



And let me be clear. I'm not saying the game IS p2w... I just clarified how the battle pass worked and the discussion surrounding the potential for a very minor edge case scenario where there might be one if the adjustments is not made properly.

[Zardas]

Yeah, if only there was ways to find this game for way cheaper or even for free...

[Aliven]

The Immortal battlepass and D4 battlepass are fairly different. All the necessary items are part of the free tract in D4. A percentage of the rewards can be used to purchase additional battle passes as well. They are, as shown by the devs, to be all cosmetic.

An "accelerated" battlepass essentially is paying $5 to get the skins sooner instead of waiting for each step. That only applies to the premium as far as I understand it too. The free tract, with the relevant currency, everyone would have to acquire normally.

Accelerated Battle Pass also has unique cosmetic tied to it. So, for somebody who is completionist, it is 25$ every season.
What devs are saying in promotional and PR materials are not to be trusted. There was blog post, tweets etc that in Immortal you can not buy power. We all know how that went.

[Alcsaar]

Because game prices are starting to increase this generation. Because Blizzard determines the price they sell their games for. Because people will pay that increased price. Because it's been discussed and there's just not that much to really say about it.

It's not thievery, if that's too expensive for you (a whopping $10 more than usual), don't buy it until it goes on sale. I continue to wonder why nobody else seems to remember the era of gaming where you would go to the store and games would range in price from as low as $30 to as high as $90 just for the game itself - no special editions or add-ons, just the game in a box.

$10 more this year. $20 more in 3 years. Pretty soon you're paying 2x the cost. $70 is way too much for a game that is also going to have an in game store and sells expansions for $40.

[Kumorii]

$10 more this year. $20 more in 3 years. Pretty soon you're paying 2x the cost. $70 is way too much for a game that is also going to have an in game store and sells expansions for $40.

going by the rate of price increase we have +$20 total in 20 years isch

[bloodwulf]

$10 more this year. $20 more in 3 years. Pretty soon you're paying 2x the cost. $70 is way too much for a game that is also going to have an in game store and sells expansions for $40.

Dont buy the game then? Speak with your wallet and if enough people do they might see a mistake. The problem is, your logic that it is going to increase every few years is not supported by the last three decades of game prices, they have largely remained constant or even lowered.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/...g-time-coming/

[rhorle]

There was blog post, tweets etc that in Immortal you can not buy power. We all know how that went.

The issue with Diablo Immortal was Blizzard said you couldn't buy gear. People took that to mean all power. Legendary gems are not considered gear by Blizzard. It was something easily misconstrued by not a lie. Could Blizzard do the same for Diablo 4? Sure but all indications look like they won't.

Someone that wants to 100% collect things in a game may already have to pay or go above and beyond. There is the KFC promotion that will already exclude many from getting 100% of every collectible. If they rationalize that it is fine not to get that then couldn't they do the same for the accelerated pass? Not to mention if they are that focused on collecting wouldn't the accelerated pass be ideal as it gives 20 skips each season so they can get those collectibles faster?

[Fencers]

Accelerated Battle Pass also has unique cosmetic tied to it. So, for somebody who is completionist, it is 25$ every season.
What devs are saying in promotional and PR materials are not to be trusted. There was blog post, tweets etc that in Immortal you can not buy power. We all know how that went.

That's a personal quirk though being a completionist. The same as someone that wants to hoard all loot. That's just how someone is choosing to behave. Not the actual function of the game systems.

[Jujudrood]

$10 more this year. $20 more in 3 years. Pretty soon you're paying 2x the cost. $70 is way too much for a game that is also going to have an in game store and sells expansions for $40.

30 years ago, I purchased the SNES game WWF Royal Rumble for $79.99 USD.
It was all of my birthday money and then some.

Given the volatility in basically every other market, video games have remained fairly constant over the years.
Maybe 70 becomes the new norm for AAA titles, but to try to predict that trend of doubling when the evidence we have is that they went from 60-100 each (SNES/genesis) to 40 (ps1 era) to 50-60 (ps2/3 era) to now, some 15 years later, where 60 has inflated to 70 for some games/studios.
This tells me that maybe in the next 10 years we could see another increase, but it all depends on how the market responds, if we're being honest.
Publishers will price the game at the price point they believe they can move units and maximize profits, and that won't change.

[Exkrementor]

I agree that the price is too high, but I tend to wait until games are on sale (if they’re not Nintendo games) and enjoy it then. I’m still waiting on an Elden Ring sale.

I mean especially Elden Ring is a game I have no regrets paying full price for. Its easily 300 hours of fun, From Software is a good developer, free patches and DLC come out every few months and the game mostly works fine. I would pay 100$ for Elden Ring, no questions asked.

EA, Ubisoft and Blizzard can go fuck themselves though and I save every penny I can. Also you are kinda forced to wait a few months if the game gets patches and stuff because most of their games launch broken. Ubisoft has a nasty habit of abandoning their broken stuff right after launch. You can say about Blizzard what you will but they usually support their products. Maybe not WC3 though lol.

[chrisisvacant]

I live in one of the top 3 American markets.

I bought tickets for Into the Spider-verse today. This doesn't include parking ($40) or snacks. Matinee.

All due respect, but I wouldn't base my economic choices on the decision you made to have multiple kids. Taking 4 people out to an event should obviously cost more.

[Ghost of Cow]

That's a personal quirk though being a completionist. The same as someone that wants to hoard all loot. That's just how someone is choosing to behave. Not the actual function of the game systems.

Yeah, I really wish people would stop throwing around the word "completionist" like it's some special status that makes every little issue and complaint carry more weight.

"Completionist" just means "I think I should have all the stuff" and there has never been any obligation on the part of a game to cater to that for anyone.

[EyelessCrow]

As time has gone on I realize more and more that the people who have a problem with the cost of games that has essentially stayed the same for the past 20+ years are people who cannot financially afford to waste time playing video games.


100 dollars is a movie and a nice lunch/cheap dinner at this point. I get so much more entertainment value from even a mediocre game.

[Dundebuns]

This. Remember in the 90s when SNES games sold for 80-120 bucks EACH? If anything, pricing has gone DOWN drastically.

False equivilancy. Cartridges were hella expensive to make and were the main bulk of what you were paying for. As soon as 3 1/4" disks and CD's become the norm the price plummeted because the medium was super cheap.

[chrisisvacant]

False equivilancy. Cartridges were hella expensive to make and were the main bulk of what you were paying for. As soon as 3 1/4" disks and CD's become the norm the price plummeted because the medium was super cheap.

And those games were also much shorter.

[Flaks]

Yeah, I really wish people would stop throwing around the word "completionist" like it's some special status that makes every little issue and complaint carry more weight.

"Completionist" just means "I think I should have all the stuff" and there has never been any obligation on the part of a game to cater to that for anyone.

It's been nice though when the game actually included all of that with the box price.

That said, expecting a live service game with regular content drops outside of expansions to not have have in game shop/battle passes does sound a bit ridiculous.

On the other hand, I fully expect Diablo 4 to go the way of Destiny 2 and start charging for each individual season's new content. Only time will tell...