Microtransactions are an actual cancer of the modern video gaming industry, and they need to die soon. Remember back in the good old days, when you could just purchase a video game cartridge, cd, or DVD/Blu-Ray for only 50 to 60$? Well, those days are well and gone thanks to microtransactions that drain both consumer confidence and gamer happiness within seconds. Want this gun that is painted yellow? 2$to 4$, please! Want a patch that stops our shitty game from crashing every five seconds and shutting down your computer? Lick our corporate sweaty ballsacks while you pay us more of your hard-earned cash!
Halo 5 Guardians contained some of my favorite multiplayer the series has seen in years despite a truly lackluster campaign. Yet the microtransactions ruin an otherwise enjoyable experience, by forcing you to either shell out your money or pick random requisition packs to get armor you may not even care about or care for. More and more, game developers are taking the easy way out, patching games post release and leaving hundreds of bugs in their games at release. Mass Effect Andromeda, such a monumental disappointment and a riddled bug disaster (which I will be covering on the new Spilled Parchment 2.0) is a prime example of the issue with post-release patching. Microtransactions only rub salt deeper into this wound, by making players shell out cash for cosmetics or maps that could have been included in the game at release. All too often, players are paying exorbitant sums for simple unlocks or even more shamefully, paying for content already on the disc itself, locked away by a greedy game developer looking out for profits first and gamers second. This greedy corporate malpractice must end, and it must end now.