In the MMO shooter Destiny , the introduction of a cash shop has been announced. Moreover, there are credible rumors that the paid 20-Euro DLCs will soon be outdated.
Last night, a few puzzle pieces fell into place. In June, Bungie had
a name protected “Eververse” and later removed the vendor Tess Everis from the Tower. This was not connected. The press speculated that the name implied an in-game trade between vendors. Tess’s departure was a mystery.
However, both are closely related, answering many questions while raising a few new ones.
Silver becomes the new real-money currency in Destiny
Tess Everis will come into the game as a vendor. She will sell 18 new emotes. However, they will not be available for Glimmer, but for “Silver.” Silver is a real-money currency that players will buy through their console store – for hard Euros, they will receive virtual silver.
It will start on October 13. Bungie promises that they will provide players with enough free silver to purchase one or two emotes immediately.
Items that Tess Everis sells are intended to have no impact on the game itself and are purely cosmetic in nature. With the revenue generated from this, they intend to continue supporting the “Live Team” , the people who work on Destiny day in and day out.
Rumors of Free DLCs
A few hours before the news broke, the US site Kotaku reported that Bungie was planning “microtransactions” (which is what was announced).
Kotaku has further information. According to two sources familiar with the development of Destiny, there is a new plan for distributing DLCs in Year 2. Instead of offering DLCs for 20€ each in Year 1 (Darkness Awaits and House of Wolves), they plan to provide these expansions and missions for free in Year 2. The revenue for the live operation will come from microtransactions such as emotes or sparrow skins.
The next paid expansion for Destiny would then be “Destiny 2” in 2016.
Important: This is not confirmed!
A good solution if everything really happens
Mein MMO thinks: If everything turns out like this, and the cash shop really only offers cosmetic items, it is a very good solution for Destiny. A solution that many have expected before.
If someone wants to spend more money on embellishments, they can do so and thereby finance the development of the game. Those who do not need that can basically play for a year without any expenses and will not be forced to make the “mandatory purchases” of mini-DLCs like in the first year. The mandatory purchase would then be a major expansion (or Destiny 2) in the fall, just like the King of the Taken is now.
The question is whether the DLC will really be free or if additional charges will apply.
Currently, there is a lot of talk favoring “free,” the overpriced Year 1 DLC was perhaps the biggest point of criticism for Destiny. Which also fits the theory: There has not yet been any mention of a second annual pass or a season pass. If they had wanted to bring two 20-Euro DLCs again, they would have probably sold such a pass with “King of the Taken” already.
Hopefully, in Year 2, the gameplay content in Destiny will be extensive and rapid. However, in hindsight, it can hardly be weaker than the paid DLCs in the first year.
