Microtransactions - Are They Worth it?

Microtransactions are being heralded as the worst thing to happen to modern video games. Publishers are being painted as thieves for offering paid content for their games. But are microtransactions all bad?

I spent almost £20 on a single microtransaction. This in-game outfit has cost me around four hours of work. What did I get for my money? This skin in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds:

PUBG has captured perhaps the only redeeming factor of 2016's Suicide Squad. Credit: PUBG Corporation

Was it worth it? For me, yes.

Players demonise microtransactions, but I don’t think that’s fair. When microtransactions are purely aesthetic and don’t give the player any advantage then, I think there is one good reason for buying them. Supporting the development team.

Since buying the game for £25 back in October 2017, I hadn’t invested any more money in the game or the developers. What I had invested was over 400 hours in the game, making it my most played game of all time.

Of course, I don’t believe that I owe the developers anything. But I do believe that in order to keep the game alive and being updated, Bluehole need to continue to make money.

When sales of a game slow down, what incentive is there for a development team to continue to update their game? If it’s not making money, then would they not move onto new projects and leave the game behind? But that’s not what I want as a player.

I want the game to keep developing and for the team to keep adding new content. So that’s where the microtransactions come in. I believe that the occasional microtransaction is essential to keep the games we love alive.

I know that not everyone will agree with me on this. I don’t think they’re wrong for wanting their games to reach their final form without putting in an extra penny. But I also don’t think it’s wrong to support the developers we love and the games we spend so many hours playing either.

Of course, a game should be fully playable and enjoyable to its fullest with only the price of admission. Pay-walls should never make a game less enjoyable, I’m looking at you EA. Cough, Star Wars Battlefront 2, cough.

So now I play the game in a costume that easily cost more than real clothes, all in the hope of keeping one of my favourite games alive. And that’s fine by me.