Man I've never been so frustrated watching the Co-Optional Podcast as I was with the Overwatch microtransaction part. A huge collection of "missing the point", strawmanning, hyperbole, and circle-jerking.

First of all, I hate the argument that "It's cosmetics so it doesn't matter." It's great that it doesn't matter to some people, but just because they either don't care how their character looks, or have more money than they know what to do with, that doesn't mean it doesn't matter for the rest of us.

So as far as Overwatch goes. Well personally, I admit I'm a little extreme on this, I hate paying money for a game and then, on day 1, having a shop menu that begs me to spend more money on it right away. You want to charge me for future content? Hey, that's fine (as a counter-point to the argument "Well I guess we can't charge the gamer for anything because they think they're entitled to everything!"). But I really hate seeing that on Day 1.

Now Overwatch is a bit tricky because they've promised all future maps/modes/characters for free. And obviously they need a revenue stream. Cosmetics are a good compromise for that, right? And especially so, since you can unlock everything in the game for free.

But my problem with Overwatch is just how long it takes to unlock what you want. Leveling in this game takes forever, and that's the only method of getting lockboxes. Lockboxes that are entirely random, mind you. And lockboxes are the only method for getting content; you can't "buy" costumes or whatever straight, there's no way to get credits outside of lockboxes right now.

There are so, so many better ways of doing this, more fair ways of doing this (so the argument in the podcast that this is the "most fair way" just boggles my mind). Why not give the player credits for wins? Or heck, just double/triple the lockbox acquisition rate? If we do need a progression system (as they liked to point out during the podcast, that players DEMANDED one), why not an actual progression system?

Why rely on a slow grind for random loot crates? Oh, right, because that makes a lot of money for the company. It's designed to leech as much money from players as possible. Slow progression + gambling = spending $$$ on lootcrates hoping for a cool new shiny.

And that they defended this in the podcast? It's just... really boggling to me, especially from people who claim to be consumer-friendly.

Bleh, this was a long post, a lot of rambling. Hope I got my point across. I just hate how vehemently people defend this system. It's not a good, not a fair system. Overwatch may be fun, polished, but this game that you pay $40/$60 for has the monetization model of a F2P game. And I hate it when people defend that.