Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing

[Badnik Mechanic]

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?t=323818

Although had it been put Srg. Fist in a game... hmmm tempting.

[Ashley Marsh]

If there was gonna be a Puyo Pop character, surely it should be Arle with Carbuncle with her. Arle is cool and more of the main character of the series.

Oh now people are talking about Puyo Pop with Arle and Carbuncle! I've been saying that for ages!!!

Arle and Carbuncle for DLC would so have my vote. YEAH!

[Aquaslash]

Mighty and Ray would be cool, but you'd pressure Sega to find official VAs for them.

Unlike Metal knuckles, who could probably just use the same sounds as Metal Sonic give or take a pitch modification.

In fact, I'd just reverse them and call it a day!

[T-Bird]

Maybe we could get more than, what, One character and one track for 560G? Or at least some bloody achievements!

I've done one race and that's it really - all the new content experienced. I could have bought Geometry Wars II and some Eggman glasses with credit to spare!

Come on Sumo, a bit more content for our coinage please!

T

[The-Master-Board]

Mighty and Ray would be cool, but you'd pressure Sega to find official VAs for them.

Unlike Metal knuckles, who could probably just use the same sounds as Metal Sonic give or take a pitch modification.

In fact, I'd just reverse them and call it a day!

I asked SOL a while back before the game came out if they'd be allowed by SEGA to do Nack/Fang or other "forgotten" Sonic characters as DLC, he said something along the lines of they hadn't planned it...but if it was popular enough it may be possible.

Personally I think Nack would be great for this. If we're talking obscure characters getting a little modern spotlight ASR already has been appealing to that demographic with SEGA characters, why not some Sonic ones. Plus Nack/Fang already has a vehicle for racing, that's less work for the concept and design people!

[BanjoConkers]

Although had it been put Srg. Fist in a game... hmmm tempting.

So, are you signing?

[Cortez]

So, are you signing?

I don't think anybodies signing, not only is it waaay too late to start new campaigns for DLC characters but adding Mighty and Ray as DLC is a stupid move, nobody outside of a few diehard fans and active members of the online community would even recoqnise them, they wouldn't sell well at all.

[Djawed]

I'd love to play with either vyse or shinobi would be another nice addition.

I would have really loved to see ristar as a playable but his cameo might have confirmed that he's not going to be in, or maybe it confirmed he will... or not. We'll see

Edited April 10, 2010 by Jaouad

[AAUK]

Mighty and Ray - not happening guys, certainly not ASR and if they did people'd end up complaining it was another Sonic character anyway

Maybe we could get more than, what, One character and one track for 560G? Or at least some bloody achievements!

I've done one race and that's it really - all the new content experienced. I could have bought Geometry Wars II and some Eggman glasses with credit to spare!

Come on Sumo, a bit more content for our coinage please!

But you couldn't have played Geometry Wars 2 in ASR, which is the point of this add-on, you seem to forget T you are not OBLIGED to purchase it. A bit like the unlock code where everyone complained about how they don't want it like SEGA were somehow forcing them at gunpoint.

So... if you'd got an achievement for USING the new track or Metal Sonic that would've...been...okay?? I'm intrerested in what you think would comprise this "more content" to justify the price. Explain please.

[JezMM]

If a track and a character is worth £4.80, let's for the sake of arguement split it to £2.40 for a track OR a character.

The default characters/tracks (not including console exclusives) would come to a total of £105.60 ($162.34). When you consider it like that the DLC is pretty expensive.

I'm sure it's fun and of high quality (I'll be reluctantly parting with my cash for it when it arrives on PS3), but still, it IS expensive for what you get. Especially if you're only interested in the track (considering no missions are included, and I don't care for the character on an emotional level, I probably won't even try him out).

Edited April 10, 2010 by JezMM

[sjmaster92]

I would personally prefer alt vehicles for characters like Ryo-F.

[PsychoJosh]

All we can do is hope that the DLC won't be as overpriced in the future. We're paying customers, they should respect our opinions more.

[Amorbis]

I would have liked to have seen more content in the Death Egg pack, but I'll probably still buy it. Pricing for DLC varies a lot from game to game, with a few games getting free DLC, some getting micro transaction DLC or small items and others getting packs of DLC. All Stars Racing doesn't stand out in price very much, Ryo-F is undeniably expensive, but there are things like the LittleBigPlanet costumes which are also quite dear for what you get.

I think that DLC is expensive as it is separate from the game and not a requirement, so not everyone that has the game will buy it. Plus ASR has a bigger risk factor with DLC in comparison to games like Call of Duty, which has a bazillion DLC downloads a day where ASR might only have a few.

[Blue Blood]

I would personally prefer alt vehicles for characters like Ryo-F.

The prospect of playing the entire race with a Kapu Kapu or flying on the Master Emerald is certainly intriguing.

[Gamerguy21]

The prospect of playing the entire race with a Kapu Kapu or flying on the Master Emerald is certainly intriguing.

Ha ha, yes. There should be some sort of DLC that let's you play as a neutered version of everyone's all-star move (like Ryo-F). That'd be awesome.

Just hope it wouldn't be over-priced like Ryo-F is...

[T-Bird]

But you couldn't have played Geometry Wars 2 in ASR, which is the point of this add-on, you seem to forget T you are not OBLIGED to purchase it. A bit like the unlock code where everyone complained about how they don't want it like SEGA were somehow forcing them at gunpoint.

So... if you'd got an achievement for USING the new track or Metal Sonic that would've...been...okay?? I'm intrerested in what you think would comprise this "more content" to justify the price. Explain please.

I didn't forget I was not obliged to purchase it - I purchased it because on the whole I've enjoyed the ASR experience, and I wanted more of it. I'm not really interested in the whole "it costs this to do that" arguement in this case as I'm a consumer, as are many people on this board, and if something's too expensive, people won't buy it. Granted I think I should have really read in to what I was getting with this pack - I had assumed that "new track" meant in the context the Sonic packs like the Final Fortress Zones - i.e. three tracks within the theme.

My arguement is this: With the Resident Evil expansion pack which was, granted, a little more at 800G, you got a whole new story mode to play - i.e. an hour's new gaming experience if you ignore replay value. You also unlocked various new characters for the multiplayer modes, different collectables, new achievements. You got a whole bag of goodies. In other words, it was a helluva lot of small things, that added to the game.

Gears of War: Same goes - new characters, new maps, new stories etc...a little more expensive, yes, but a hell of a lot of content.

Now for 560G, which is an awkward price in my opinion, you get a new character and a new map. I'd experienced all the new content in under 5 minutes. I'd honestly thought there might have been at least some extra challenges added. To me this is far from a fair price. When the price came in a 800G, I thought something was seriously wrong, and I feel sorry for those who paid that for it. I'd honestly thought it was twice the price it was supposed to be - 400G would have at least made it a standard cost.

I think what also has slightly narked me is the other "DLC" for 400G to enable the unlock for characters, maps and tracks that you would unlock anyway, for free, if you played it. I honestly can't justify in my mind why anyone understanding this would pay money for this.

Now before we go into schpiel about how the company has to make it's money from the game, that's fair enough - I know there have been long, hard hours of work endured by the team to put this stuff together. Nor am I arguing the point that this is not a fantastic little extra that is no doubt exciting for many fans. But that's what it is in my mind; an extra.

Maybe if this was something like, I dunno, Fang/Nack, I'd be chirping a different tune, but that's only because I'm bat-shit crazy about that specific character; in that sense maybe Metal Sonic fans feel that this is worth the cost, or perhaps a glimpse of "Star-face" on the track is. But considering you get such a huge range of characters, tracks and tunes to play with anyway for the price of the title - this adds very little for the cost. I think the fans on the whole are sensible with their money and this will put off a lot of people buying further content.

Now I'm going to assume there are a couple more of these packs lined up? If there are two more character/map packs to come out, that means if a fan wants to have everything at his disposal its going to cost them 1680G about (£14.40) for it. That's nearly half the cost of the game itself.

Again, this is my point of view. But unless the next pack out offers a bit more for my buck, then I will definitely be taking into account that I'm not obliged to buy it.

T

EDIT: I'd love to know your opinions as well guys - while we've got AAUK here we may as well voice our opinions, good or bad, while someone who can give feedback to SEGA present.

[Sonic Yoda]

I have to agree with T. DLC like this is a quick way for SEGA to recoup some losses from publishing and promoting the game. They are not the only publisher that utilises this strategy (I'm looking at you Activision) but you cannot ask the buying public who have already shelled out £40 for the game to pay an extra £5 for something so little. If you had to pay £5 for every character, track and set of 5 songs in the game it would total a ridiculous amount.

Also, you cannot say a character, a track and some extra songs increases the playtime of this game beyond 5 minutes. For a little extra, you can get DLC episodes for other games which add at least 2 hours more playtime and actually increase the shelf-life of the game. Resident Evil, Grand Theft Auto 4 and Borderlands are all great examples. They may be a little more expensive but look at what you're getting!

This sort of DLC should be free. Extra characters in Dragon Ball Burst Limit and side-characters in Naruto Ultimate Storm are all free and so they should be. Using them does not add hours of extra playtime to the game. They are merely gifts for the fans, the people that actually bought the game and supported its release.

SEGA's DLC strategy essentially rips off the hardcore fan by making them pay silly prices for little add-ons that should really be free. And of course, the real fans will buy them because they don't want to miss out. It's quite a shady practice if you think about it.

[HunterTSF]

Bah, price certainly isn't an issue for me. I've happily purchased all of the DLC released for this game (All Avatar items, characters, videos, as well as the theme and track) just to show my support for this game and to give SEGA some moneys.

Oh, and while AAUK's here I demand some Sonicman and Wentos Avatar outfits for their respective games.

Edited April 10, 2010 by HunterTSF

[Cortez]

ASR obviously isn't going to sell as well as Resi 5 or GoW, they've got to make their money some way.

Resi and GoW can charge less for DLC because more people will buy it.

[SykoTech]

I don't think I'd go as far as to say that it should have been free. Okay, maybe Ryo on a forklift, but I can understand charging for characters and especially tracks.

Also, I don't know much about Burst Limit, but the extra characters in Ultimate Ninja Storm were already on the disc and in the story mode. The DLC didn't allow people to play as them either. I think that's a bit of a different ball park.

I've already expressed my opinion that the DLC is a bit pricy, though. I think it should have been $6 at most, preferrably $5. $8 (on PSN) will add up pretty fast...

Edited April 10, 2010 by SykoTech

[KillingRaptor]

As far as extra content goes as DLC for this game, I'll buy all of it.

It's just that I'm having to much fun to play this game, even after I have done everything (all unlockables, missions, achievements,...) I play the game frequently online and even some single player races.

[Ashley Marsh]

With the price, I can't help think about Sonic 4. That's gonna be 400g I think, so seeing the price of this just makes Sonic 4 seem even more of a steal!

[Badnik Mechanic]

I have no issues at all with the price for the Metal Sonic + Death Egg DLC.

But... if the current prices are anything to go by, I may not be saying that for future. Ryo-f is a prime example of this. It was always going to be the case that at some point this character would have been some form of DLC,

Yet when it comes to who and what the character is, it's current price doesn't make any sense, obviously the forklift was made for ryo's ASM, so would the majority of Ryo-f's design and creation not have already been made to tie in with the original budget, both in terms of time and money? It's creation for it being a single player stand alone character couldn't have been along the same effort and time as some totally new character since it is an evolutionary step from the normal ryo's ASM. Capcom have said that DLC budgets are different to that for the original game, do sega have the same system? If so, was Ryo-s ASM made using the DLC budget or the games main budget? Either way, it doesn't make any sense to then justify it with such a high price as a large part of it was made for a day 1 use even if you did not have the unlock code.

It's such a high price for what is already there on the disk. For me, I don't feel like I'm paying for extra effort or time, it was made to be there for day 1. It was always planned to be in the game one way or another. there was even merch made for that character. So I can't understand why the price reflects what is in effect a cheat code to unlock it, no matter what else you have to download onto your machine, it was made for day 1, it was ready for day 1 and theres very little indication or word to even suggest that theres a reason for it to even have an extra price at all. Lets not forget too, it's RRP was universal, the pre-order bonus guys didn't have to pay an obvious increase for some kind of special/bonus edition code.

Then theres something else I wish to put forward.

Do you recall how for the first two weeks of release, the prices between the Xbox 360 and the PS3 version where different by quite often a range of £1-£2. Due to the fact that Banjo had been made and put into the 360 version? Both versions cost the same now.

So why then does Banjo only cost £2 to put into a retail copy of a game.... but ryo-f costs £3.99 just to unlock?

When people talk about the prices for things, quite often the die hard fans and often the devs will quote and say "Nobody is forcing you to buy it." Thats very true. Nobody is forcing me to buy it.... typically I look at it and try to see if it's justifyable, if not I'll ask why. So now I and several other people are asking. "What is the justification for the prices of the DLC?" This isn't a question thats just tied to SSMB either, you google anything along the lines of ASR DLC price, ryo-f price or any kind ot variation, theres a lot of complaints out there about this.

Edited April 10, 2010 by Casanova

[Chooch]

I think it should have been $6 at most, preferrably $5. $8 (on PSN) will add up pretty fast...

I don't think it should be more than $4.

It's even more ridiculous that people who patched the game (for the sake of the content) can't play with people who bought it if they didn't buy it to. That's not how LittleBigPlanet works with downloadable content and this game certainly shouldn't work that way either.

[Aquaslash]

It's even more ridiculous that people who patched the game (for the sake of the content) can't play with people who bought it if they didn't buy it to.

It's not ridiculous at all. Metal Sonic and DEZ weren't unlock keys. They're 150MB worth of all new content. If you play against someone who doesn't have Metal Sonic, and you choose him, what will they load? It would be extremely impractical to sit there and wait for you to download all the content.

Now if they had a patch for everyone to get the DLC and then pay for the unlock key, well I can't help but think that'd be retarded.