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u/Mountain_Candle7626 17h ago
Also games were made to be enjoyed, not to become money printing machines.
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u/HubrisOfApollo 17h ago
back when making good games was the way to make money
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u/hiimbackagain 10h ago
Know what you mean but there are still countless very well made games out there. Take a look at those, not the mostly shitty AAA slop
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u/ToffeeCurious 17h ago
Kids today will never know the joy of grinding 40 hours for one character
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u/higorga09 17h ago
Did y'all not have arcades or smth? They were overturned as hell and you had to pay for continues.
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u/HubrisOfApollo 17h ago
arcades died off when home consoles were similar in processing power. and yeah i agree that arcade games were money grabbing traps, the same way the 16bit era games were either really long (like RPGs) or insanely hard (like the Disney platformers) so people couldn't just rent them from blockbuster and beat them in a weekend
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u/Expert-Basil6015 8h ago
There was something magical about being 10 years old with a pocket full of quarters and a whole afternoon to spend at an arcade though. Area 51 got so much of my money
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u/Adjective-Noun-nnnn 5h ago
I learned recently that pretty much all pinball machines have adjustment pegs that tune how likely it is for your ball to slip out the side above the paddles in a way that's more or less uncontrollable. If I walk into an arcade and the pegs are in the "take their money" position, I don't even bother.
Oh and it's not like selling content for money is new. There are like five different versions of every Street Fighter prior to SFV when they switch to the modern DLC model. They added two or three characters and a balance patch in each version and sold it as a full-priced game.
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u/DanikanSkywalkr 18h ago
We also had 3 lives and if you fucked it up you're back to the start
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u/DeoInvicto 17h ago
I dont miss that aspect one bit.
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u/Available_Cap_5328 12h ago
It was frustrating as hell, but it did contribute to actually having to master the game and the satisfaction at the end of completing it
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u/Great_Scott7 17h ago
unless you had the secret:
up up down down left right left right b a start
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u/HubrisOfApollo 17h ago
this is why they made the game genie
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u/ZAlternates 14h ago
Just about every game back then had dev codes as developers needed ways to test their games. The Game Genie unlocked them for us.
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u/intellectual_punk 11h ago
That's why I liked Warioland 2... you never died, you just got thrown off a tower.
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u/dedarou96 59m ago
While that gave me patience to replay games till I could do it. I honestly prefer save states or faster retry points than make me do a long ass quest all over again
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u/Kitto-Cakes 17h ago
When games were released with ALL of the content. No paid DLCs. No micro transactions. Just.. video games made with passion. Not greed.
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u/AccountantWorth452 14h ago
And they worked on day 1.
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u/sithmaster0 14h ago
Or they didn't and they were a waste of money and you were seething when you got home after renting the game with the cool looking cover at Blockbuster because now you're stuck with a shitty broken-ass game and nothing else and you'd have to wait until your family next decided to go there to rent a movie.
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u/Turgid_Donkey 6h ago
There was also no internet for you to look up reviews. There was a game I wanted to get last week, and gamestop was running their buy 2 used games, get 1 free campaign. So I spent a couple hours looking at reviews for the games they had listed. All that for like $15 in used games. Back then you'd him and haw for half an hour then spend $40 on a game because the description sounded cooler only to find out it was nothing like that and looked like hot dog shit.
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u/EligibleUsername 13h ago
And if they had DLCs or expansions, those were basically half of a sequel being sold at one third the price. Oh you finished the 12 chapters campaign? Here's another 5, $4.99, enjoy.
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u/Adjective-Noun-nnnn 5h ago
Eh not always. You're enjoying Street Fighter III? What if we added a couple characters and sold it to you two more times at full price?
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u/EligibleUsername 4h ago
I'm more talking about single player games, but yeah, competitive is probably the only game genre that benefits greatly from the modern online age. I certainly don't wanna go back to the days when an entire fighting game's tier list revolves around how well each character does against one incredibly overtuned character. (Iykyk)
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u/Rasputin_IRL 14h ago
You guys are acting like every game is made by EA, Ubisoft or Rockstar.
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u/JehnSnow 3h ago
To be fair this is expected in mobile games too. Kingdom rush is a good example. If no one's played it on PC the characters are all unlocked by playing, opposite for mobile
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u/MrParticular79 17h ago
I guess. I bought a lot of expansion packs back in the 90s and early 2000s.
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u/RacoonWithBenefits 13h ago
expansion packs back in the 90s and early 2000s.
but those were typically larger amounts of content
i mean the Warcraft 2 expansion 'beyond the dark portal' was amazing
almost double the amount of campaign content + new units, ,buildings, maps
i mean, its "almost" like buying a smaller game, that just happen to require owning the previous game
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u/aldandur 12h ago
Someone didn't play Horizon: Burning Shores DLC
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u/CandidoJ13 hates reaction memes 6h ago
Or Elden ring shadow of the erdtree, and cyberpunk Phantom Liberty
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u/MrParticular79 5h ago
That depends on the game but I know what you are saying. I’m not comparing expansion packs to modern DLC. But this idea that’s been so pervasive about games coming out and being “complete” and you never pay for anything again is just so wrong. There were many many games that put out a wide variety of additional content.
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u/72kdieuwjwbfuei626 4h ago
Games being “complete” is just a nonsense word that dumb people say to express whether they like or dislike a game because they’re literally too stupid to express themselves in words.
Exhibit A: Baldurs Gate 3 being widely lauded for “releasing as a complete game” when the developer arbitrarily increased the version number to 1.0 years after they started selling the game.
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u/Fragrant_Major_9553 10h ago
The Diablo II expansion pack cost the same as Horse armor.
And it transformed the entire game. Huge difference
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u/72kdieuwjwbfuei626 4h ago edited 4h ago
Oh honey, do you think the discounted price you bought it for twenty years later was the original sale price? That’s adorable.
That expansion was $40 twenty five years ago. That’s $75 adjusted for inflation.
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u/Fragrant_Major_9553 4h ago
Listen, sweaty 💅
The Diablo II battle chest was indeed $40, which came with the original game, Lord Of Destruction, and a Prima game guide.
So, yeah, the LoD expansion pack was $20 imo, it just came with the original game(which you probably needed because the play disc was scratched) and a game guide.
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u/Dontbeajerkdude 17h ago edited 17h ago
Recently bought Dragon Ball Fighter Z. Good game. I was super stoked to see all the unlockable character silhouette and play the game to get them, only to find out you can't unless you pay. So fucking lame. It's not even really about the money, it's just not satisfying if you pay.
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u/bryan_from_heck 14h ago
Me when I bought Street Fighter 5 and there were like 3 characters to choose from. Of course you can buy them with in game currency, but Capcom made it so it's basically impossible to unlock all the characters unless you either pay or spend the next 50 years playing the game to earn enough in game currency
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u/Dontbeajerkdude 14h ago edited 12h ago
At least it's possible! If it's not, they need to release a complete version or advertise it as incomplete without DLC so you know what you're getting into and how much you're paying up front.
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u/Penakoto 11h ago edited 11h ago
Yeah, but Dragon Ball Fighter Z gives you way more characters at the start, that you'd ever see in any fighting game pre-2015 that wasn't a Blank vs Capcom game.
And if you want any of those DLC characters, you only need to pay like $5 for the one you want. When "back in the day" if a fighting game got new characters, and you wanted to play them, you had to buy a brand new, full priced copy of the game you already sort of owned.
Depending on the era, and game, you might have to do this 2 or 3 times, like Street Fighter 2, 3 and 4 all have at least 3 distinct versions with different rosters.
These "Back in my days" threads never give the full story of what gaming in "the good old days" was actually like, and this is just me talking about what you had to put up with for fighting games, specifically.
For all the bad shit we have to deal with today, nothing tops how ripped off I felt having bought Marvel Vs Capcom 3, and then 8 months later a new version of the game was announced that basically replaced it.
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u/Dontbeajerkdude 11h ago
You're not wrong that it has quite a few characters anyway. But those empty silhouettes taunt me. And I was looking forward to the unlocking process. As is, there's little reason to play the frankly milquetoast story mode at all.
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u/DanteTFL 11h ago
Yeah i think sometimes is not as much because the money thing but because the audacity to show you in the face like "hey look theres 235 whole new characters that YOU cant play unless you pay and im gone remind it to you constantly in the character select screen"
Smash also has a lot of dlc characters but at least they have the decency to hide it if you dont have them
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u/Dontbeajerkdude 10h ago
And those characters are entirely unique. Every DBZ character somewhat runs on the same basic principals.
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u/Adjective-Noun-nnnn 5h ago
Most modern fighting games have leaned into the idea that the only content people care about is the online versus mode, and while that's definitely the most important feature, neglecting single player content leaves a lot of casual players with nothing to do after they
get ownedplay matches for a couple hours.I'd call SF6 a notable exception here. The single player mode is really janky, but it's funny and nostalgic, introduces all the mechanics and characters, gives you some practice, and let's you unlock a costume for every character.
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u/hitpigs 16h ago
This is you
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u/Stormfly 12h ago
"Things were so much better before!"
"What about all those problems?"
"Haha I choose to ignore those..."
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u/Florac 11h ago
The games weren't better but the monetization certainly was
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u/Stormfly 8h ago
I mean there's a game or two I play that catch a lot of criticism for the monetisation but I feel that it's great to have a game with constant updates, both free and paid.
Some DLC sucks. Some are well worth the money (for me at least).
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u/RubiiJee 12h ago
It's just such lazy karma farming and every gamer froths at the mouth about it. Every single time.
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u/ScrumbledTumblo 11h ago
Genuinely think most people who overly wax nostalgic about video games don't actually give a shit about video games and like the aesthetic of being an "old school" gamer over actually enjoying the myriad of amazing games coming out all of the time.
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u/FreshClit 18h ago
Games by EA was the most annoying
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u/Lucas_Steinwalker 14h ago
Bard’s Tale was great.
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u/RacoonWithBenefits 13h ago
sure but thats from 1985
not exactly the typical modern EA games we have today that fucking lied about how their game worked and then released some shitty mediocre garbage (sim city in 2013)
ive not bought a single ea game since, and i never will
also its one of the worst places to work, in the US.
no reason to support that hellhole, any more
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u/Expert-Basil6015 8h ago
The thing about gaming is it's not owned and operated by gamers anymore. Since nerd culture went mainstream, gaming is just a legitimate business venture and the ultimate goal is money, not a good experience for the customer.
Don't support AAA studios, don't buy into hype, play indie games.
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u/ford4prefect2 57m ago
I haven't played EA since Fifa 2003 on PS2. I had questions and then I searched for the answers on the Internet. Have a good day.
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u/Careca_RS 13h ago
I only play Path of Exile (1 & 2), so I have no idea what you're talking about.
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u/Material_Ad9848 8h ago
So you didnt unlock the scion? (before 3.29 she was unlocked partway through campaign)
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u/Careca_RS 7h ago
I have it... but I have no idea how it happened to show up. I thought all the classes came already unlocked with the game itself.
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u/72kdieuwjwbfuei626 4h ago
Ah, yes, the game where everyone looks like a hobo by default and armor skins are 30 bucks.
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u/Artegall365 17h ago
1080 Snowboarding on N64 - had to unlock the Gold Boarder.
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u/Stunning-Fox1409 9h ago
The Panda on the penguin board... memories. Unsure if it was a cheat only tho haha. So many rage fits when i was 12, from that game.
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u/Felinomancy 15h ago
Well back in my day, game patches are a "maybe", and if the devs did bother to make one, you have to pay for them to mail the diskettes (or later on, CDs) to you.
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u/AnimeAddict1123 18h ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/FoH28ucxZFJZu
but I can remember it like it was yesterday... Ahh the good ole days.
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16h ago
[deleted]
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u/Special-Town-901 16h ago
Exactly. Every era had its share of greed and half-assed games—people just tend to remember the good stuff and forget the rest 😂
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u/RacoonWithBenefits 13h ago
i still remember unlocking a ton of characters in tekken 3
they just kept coming
it was awesome
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u/OffByOneErrorz 8h ago
We did not know how special disconnected games were at the time but capitalism taking anything good and twisting it into some max profit pos should have been foreseen.
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u/semaj_2026 6h ago
I remember having to put in the hours to unlock Mewto on smash bros. I think you had to out 10 hours in before you can play to unlock him.
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u/_OnuHeino_ 15h ago
I remember spending a month with a friend unlocking Tofu in Resident Evil 2. We had printed a english walkthrough but none of us spoke english...
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u/star_cannon7k I saw what the dog was doin 14h ago
Gaming companies took the L and made every playable game a payable game.
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u/Hans_the_Frisian 13h ago
I preferred the days where you didn't have to unlock anything, take the early CoDs or Battlefields for example. You bought the game and there were no weapons or skins to unlock. You played the games because they were fun not because you wanted to unlock stuff.
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u/CapnTholaf 13h ago
This is why the 'It's just cosmetic' argument never holds water for me, it used to be exciting to unlock things like that, and being able to style your character, etc was part of the fun you paid for. Not quite the same for games supported long after release of course.
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u/MeanWafer904 13h ago
I remember a game I played in the PS3 era brought out a fast track DLC. I think you got all the unlockables except for the one for Platniuming it.
I also remember the fandom was mostly not happy with it. The only really outliers being people like well now my 8yo kid doesn't have yo grind.
Weird looking back seeing the response to that and now seeing it become the norm
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u/Asholootleigh 13h ago
Plenty of these games still exist. There are far fewer games that charge for characters than there are games that give them for free as far as I'm aware.. but then again I don't browse the mobile game market so with that in consideration maybe that's not true. But back in grandpa's day, games on phones didn't exist... but arcades did, and you needed to pay a quarter every time you died. Which was frequently, because they were designed like that.
EA remarked they could/should charge players to reload their ammo in first person shooters. They weren't that far off from Arcades with that idea.
Now this is one of the things I do hate in modern game design. The desire to unlock things via purchasing, vs. playing. Buying skins is just as bad. That used to be a reward. Do something challenging, and show it off. Now you can just pay $20 and get a recolored clone of that reward that everyone else is using because it came bundled with a pass. Cooooooooooooool.... I question how or why anyone wants to pay for these things? Like buying dress clothes for your digital barbie. They transformed something that felt rewarding into something gay. And people trample each other to hand the money over for their barbie's clothes. It made me hate games and gaymers.
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u/PrezyDante 12h ago
They simply do not make games with the same style of content and completeness as Halo 3, MW2, etc. Its abysmal. And people act like the DLC for those games were somehow just as bad as the shit companies pull today. Hilarious.
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u/CheeeseBurgerAu 11h ago
We continued to play multiplayer games for year without the need for prestige and unlocking camos. You had a fun race to unlock everything once and then everyone played for the love of the game.
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u/NewlyMadeMann 11h ago
Hey! This was posted here last week with an AI recreation of the simpsons image!
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u/415thebayarea 11h ago
I remember the pure joy when my brother and I unlocked all the characters on Super Smash Bros 64, then SSB Melee on GameCube.. oh, the days.
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u/ennuiinmotion 11h ago
It's really unfair to kids. I held off letting my kids buy in game things for a long time but recently came to the realization that I can't force them to live in a world that doesn't exist anymore. Pay to play is what they're unfortunately saddled with. I still try to talk them out of buying things whenever I can, though.
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u/Night25th 10h ago
Back in my days people used to say that League of Legends was pay to win because if you spend money you can get characters faster.
(there is no advantage to having more characters except you have more options to pick from)
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u/misteryk 10h ago
Medieval 2 total war faction unlocking: Destroy this faction in campaign or edit a txt.file
Warhammer 3 total war faction unlocking: pay like $500 (or get some app from github that fools steam into thinking you own DLCs and unlocks it since you already have all the files in base game)
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u/Omegasedated 10h ago
Yea but Street fighter 2, then a whole be game for just four characters.
You couldn't unlock them
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u/FukkingDeathMental 10h ago
Back in my day, arcade machines were rigged to extract more money from you.
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u/LizzieAftynsonna 8h ago
Played Plant Vs. Zombies in 2010... it's like a life achievement when I unlocked every plant by playing all levels twice
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u/Corswaine 8h ago
In smash brothers when a new challenger approached was peak after winning against ur friends it was up to u to beat the new character to unlock him. I was link and and had to be Gannon in melee those were the days
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u/Beautiful_Ninja 8h ago
I do not miss having to grind unlocks in fighting games. Looking back at "The Day", Tekken 2 had 10 playable characters baseline. Tekken 8 has 32, before any DLC. They were also huge issues with a lot of unlockable characters effectively being palette swaps of other characters.
Honestly think people are having nostalgia about being a kid and having time to waste unlocking characters than the actual mechanics themselves.
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u/ImmortalDemon89 8h ago
Back in my day we had time to play the game wnough to unlock stuff...not really anymore
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u/just_someone27000 8h ago
You also sometimes had to do crazy stuff like new game plussing it 3 times to unlock the true ultimate god tier thing that then made the game the easiest thing ever conceived. At least most games back then didn't take 80 hours to replay
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u/lil_poppapump 7h ago
Downloaded the new Mortal Kombat and was blown away that you couldn’t even unlock them if you wanted to, it was all money. Like $5 a character. Fuck that.
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u/MetallGecko 7h ago
I miss when unlocking armour pieces and customisation were unlockable and required skill and effort, now the only requirement and skill i need is my credit card.
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u/Lord-Nagafen 7h ago
Remember when Star Wars Battefront 2 came out and you had to play for a couple hours to unlock Darth Vader and everyone lost their minds
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u/Elephantus_Maximus 5h ago
Sometimes you had to go into the game files and unlock them. Looking at you, Rome: Total War...
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u/BobaHutt__ 4h ago
"Okay grandpa, now let's get you back into grinding that $15 battle pass with the $10 battle pass 2%XP boost."
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u/Ghost-hat 1h ago
Do you guys remember getting to play as Vader at the end of the first Lego Star Wars game? How sick was that
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u/MaveriKat 1h ago
*Smiles, remembering all the genuine surprises of fighters being automatically unlocked as I played Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast.*
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u/Wolfsrabe 51m ago
We have that today, too. But now it's called getting a "sense of pride and accomplishment" xD
I know where thr door is, thank you very much xD
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u/GunRu808 26m ago
I'm of the first group, but the real question is would you have paid for those characters right off the bat if we had that option back in the 80s-90s?
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u/repwin1 17h ago
Or entering cheat codes that unlocks characters