We all have those pet peeves that seem to affect us and only us in ways that seem indescribable to the outside world and for me that nagging sensation currently pertains to Battle Passes and their normalisation within the gaming world. I think it's because I see through the pretence to exactly what they are, weaponizations of 'Fomo' with the intent of seizing control of player's freetime in order to tell them exactly what they should be playing when. I despise having my spare time decided for me by my own media, and thus I hate Battle Passes. Really is that simple when you break it down to brass tack, isn't it? But, of course, they are far too prevalent across the world today for me to try and avoid them in everything I play, now aren't they?
And to be fair I understand what the promise of a Battle Pass is meant to be. Rewarding players for sticking with the game, giving them something to periodically work for in their favourite games- that can really work! I remember such a system in Ghost Recon Wildlands really bringing me back to the game time and time again- although that might have also been because you didn't have to sit down and pay for that content- simply engage with the game and following the small drops of content every few months. Really cool stuff. And I know that even some of the paid Battle Passes work out for some people- reinforcing the season, drawing the community together, giving online games that pumping life blood they need to survive. I 'get' it. So to speak.
They really can work, the old 'Battle pass', when the team actually take the effort to make them engaging- give them worthwhile content, not overload their progression with unnecessary roadblocks and maybe even just giving us a purpose to actually engage with it. (Although it truly is telling how few games out there actually try to tie in the world of their monetisation and their game. Almost as though they don't consider that a part of their art or something.) A truly lazy Battlepass can feel like a ball and chain on your leg keeping you captive of the game and it's seasons. Especially with the 'get your credits back' system which demands you play until the bitter end of the season in order to score enough credits to buy the next pass- literally putting your wallet on the line.
It all ties into the way that Live Services are feeding into standard game model. If a concept doesn't have a solid enough identity to fully define itself- some slimy executive will slide in with the trappings of the Live Service to try and score a promotion. Monetisation and constant development are exhausting the gaming world from both ends- developers and players- and we're really starting to see it's effects glare on the welts of the people. You've got Naughty Dog straight rejecting Sony, throwing up an ultimatum between high quality games or a single Live Service. You've got smaller devs straight up calling it a death sentence on games, with growing evidence supporting that perception, you've got the increasing drain on narrative enrichment present in those few examples of the genre that are actually long lasting with Overwatch and Call of Duty essentially losing all sense of identity with the way they support their current seasons! And you've got the increasing truth that even the best of the industry, the examples to the genre, eventually run out of steam and fall on their sword.
Apex Legends was a game I have up on a long time ago when I saw the way they wanted to support their season, the absolute dismissal of an 'apology' they offered, and saw the absolute writing on the wall. It seems those chickens are finally coming home to roost because with the sudden change to the way that their Battlepasses function- many players are starting to seriously reconsider their relationship to the franchise they gave their fandom too. It's a shame too, because fans had actually been grumbling about the problems with the Battle Pass for ages now, the unreasonable length, the depreciating value on offer- but it would seem that the page the community were on and the page that the development team were on came from two separate volumes entirely.
Firstly, Apex are pressing their boots on the necks of players with two battle passes per season- really ramping up the 'fear of missing out' so that you don't have time to play literally anything else if you want all the rewards. (Stuff that 'Player choice, go for what you want!' bull- we all know they're trying to feed on the 'desire to earn as many rewards as possible' desire intrinsic to us all) You'll also no longer be able to afford buying the special Battle Pass with in game funds, which at the very least means people won't feel incentivised to grind out currency in the current pass in order to cost effectively afford the next one. Now cost effectiveness doesn't exist at all, which is... better? Oh and because there are two Battle Passes a season- I guess that means you need double the money in order to get all 120 rewards? Yeah, I'm not sure why they didn't see this backlash coming...
Live Services have to subsist off recurrent monetisation models in order to justify continued investment- that makes sense- but the balance of that monetisation seems like an absolute arcane mystery to these companies that have been making nothing but Live Services for years now! You'd have thought that Apex would now the pressure points of their players well enough to handle and change with care, but they ended up bungling the revision nearly as badly as Ubisoft managed to do with Siege! (Although I'd argue that Ubi remain the kinds of bad practices in that regard.) Of course, it's on a superficial outcry. Apex fans are addicts with nowhere else to turn to- and perhaps that is what the team are counting on. Abusing those that aren't powerful enough to leave. Fair enough business model, I guess.
Still yet more evidence to why the Battle Pass model is like a leash around gamer's necks forcing them into never ceasing servitude. Oh it's better than some item store fronts for sure- Diablo 4 charges $20 per cosmetic outfit- but when the value proposition isn't there- and when the developer response is to make the same amount of content, albeit split into two tiers, with a higher price tag: you have to wonder if there's any point at which video game monetisation for these styles of games is ever going to reach a point that doesn't feel straight exploitative of your fandom. Maybe in a world like Helldivers 2 where the value feels appropriate, but even then could the Helldivers model work if that game and developer were as big as Respawn? I think that snake is eating it's own tail, and there's no way out of that cycle of torment.
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