Free-to-play Overwatch 2 is a bigger rip-off than loot boxes – Reader’s Feature

metro.co.uk:

A reader thinks that Overwatch 2 is worse value for money than the original, despite being free, and calls on Blizzard to make changes.

There has never been a truer adage uttered than the suggestion that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. If something is free that means someone wants something other than money from you, and that’s never a good sign. With video games it’s different though. With video games something being free is a sign that the publisher hopes to extract more money from you than they normally would.

In the old days, you bought a game for full price and you owned it. You stuck the cartridge or disc in the console, you played the game as much as you wanted and probably beat it in a week or two and then either sold it on or let it retire in a cupboard somewhere. None of those things happen anymore, or at least not without a great effort on your part, to get a physical copy and find somewhere to sell the game after.

As much as I told myself I’d always buy physical it’s pointless nowadays, as most of the game isn’t even on the disc anymore, not just in terms of patches to make it work but DLC and microtransactions that have become the most important part of gaming to most publishers.

EA makes more money selling loot boxes on FIFA than the actual game. They could easily make it free and it’d barely dent their profits, but why bother when everyone seems happy to buy it anyway? Blizzard found themselves in a slightly different position. They also make more money from loot boxes than from sales of Overwatch, but with their game interest was declining and they’d upset their fanbase so much they needed to draw a line under things and release a sequel.

That’s actually pretty rare with live service games. Call Of