‘Member when the game let you unlock characters for free by playing it. Those were the days.

This is fucking obscene.

You already bought the game. These prices aren't "micro" anything, they're the price of whole other games. Games that aren't expecting to sell ten million copies and "season passes" and whatever other bullshit product-as-a-service fees a publisher can dream up.

'But they spent so much money!' Budgets follow revenue. They spent what they expect to gouge back, through this exploitation. It does not cost one hundred million dollars to make a 1v1 fighting game. All these Johnny Longtorso schemes, selling a complete game piecemeal for $900 total, exist only to justify themselves and suck unlimited real currency from your wallet.

'But it's just cosmetic!' It's whole characters. No, I don't care that re-releasing Street Fighter II seventeen times was also bad; two things can both be awful.

'Well then don't buy it!' This shit is in everything. It started in mobile "free" garbage, and now it's here in full-price major-franchise games, with preorder crap and seasonal crap besides. For a 1v1 fighter! It's not a fuckin' MMO. Warner doesn't need intense server coverage, to enable internet slapfights. Their necessary infrastructure is 90% sending this shit to people's hard drives, so they can charge eight actual dollars for the privilege of saying they have it. They definitely have it - they can watch someone else slap their teeth out, using these characters.

... Jesus fuck, is that middle one temporary? They have people paying five dollars for some shit in a video game they don't even get to keep?

This entire business model is a scam. Just get rid of it. Nothing else will solve the problem, and if we don't stop it, there won't be anything else.

Wait, Shang Tsung is DLC? Isn't he a major story character?

I actually think this is a great way to do it. Announcer packs and fatalities dont have a gameplay impact but a whole character does. This just means its easier for players to get the character. It would be best if the character was free but this is not a perfect world.