The gaming industry as a whole has been slapped in the face with the battle royale genre, not that that’s necessarily a bad thing. With Fortnite feeding into PUBG’s success, and both titles spurring fellow developers to be more creative in their online game approach, it’s definitely an interesting time for fans of this FPS format. There are some negative side effects, however, and YouTuber ‘Jimquisition’ breaks it down.
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Though Fortnite’s Battle Royale mode is free to play, Epic Games does offer a paid service through their Battle Pass. This allows players to unlock certain rewards, tiers, and earn additional XP through boosts and weekly challenges. Since this game is now a multi-billion dollar franchise and hasn’t even had this mode live for a year yet, it’s completely understandable that other studios would look to replicate even a portion of that success.
Unfortunately, like the generalized microtransaction feature, it’s easily exploitable in a way that could hurt gamers. As is, it’s fine – a voluntary service. But so were microtransactions until publishers like EA started adapting a pay-to-win model that actually impacted their games in extremely negative ways. According to the YouTuber, the same mistake is being made once more with this Battle Pass model.
Jimqusition, Jim Sterling, also goes on a bit of a crusade against AAA publishers and how this is the perfect stomping ground for them to get their “dirty” hands on this particular feature in online gaming. Though at the end of the day these companies are businesses – with the sole purpose of making money – there are ways to do just that in a less manipulative light.
In recent years, the trend of loot boxes and in-game purchases has been on the rise. While many companies do this the ‘right’ way in the sense that it’s purely optional and doesn’t affect the game in any negative way, others abused the system a bit too much. After the pay-to-win model was exposed shortly after Star Wars Battlefront II’s launch, the industry was turned on its head both with those working in it, and those enjoying the fruits of their label. Because of that controversy, developers are having to be very careful when it comes to including this feature in their games on top of utter transparency with their fans.
You can check out his full thoughts in the video above, including how he believes Fortnite achieves this model in a fair way and one that should be kept as-is versus molding it into something uglier.
