I have such mixed feelings about this style of monetisation. On one hand, (as that talk that Blow gave a while back) it usually affects game design badly. If y

I have such mixed feelings about this style of monetisation. On one hand, (as that talk that Blow gave a while back) it usually affects game design badly. If you remove the money element, of course you wouldn't have to sit around for days while things upgrade. But on the other hand, the micropurchase model has helped to sustain games much beyond their original "Fresh by" date. The one that comes to mind for me the most is Team Fortress 2. A huge amount of content has been added, and is at this point subsidised by item purchases. Of course League of Legends and other DOTA-likes do this too. And then there's Hearthstone, which keeps content fresh through constantly selling new expansions a la MTG. Some might make the distinction between the good games and the bad ones, but I have a hard time imagining one without the other. ---- I think a bit of a weird aspect of this is that games are now incentivised to keep you entertained longer. If you buy a $50 game, it's fine for it to take 5 hours and for you to be done. There's no financial advantage for the game maker to keep you around longer. I guess a lot of this is a distinction between kinds of games though. Some games are like books, others are like sports. Nobody complains about the addictive nature of soccer....