I want to do some math rq.
Helldivers 2 released in February 2024.
In that time, they’ve released multiple ‘warbonds’ that can be either paid for or free with some grinding. Collectively, these warbonds have a giant pile of skins and cosmetics, as well as ten new weapons - twelve if you count the one dropping next week - and several grenades and utility items. They’ve added 2 mechs, multiple new mission types and enemies, and temporary events and modifiers as well.
They’ve done this while managing a full-scale war narrative adapting to the actions of the players, running bugfixing, and consistently communicating with the community. None of the content they’ve released has to cost players money. All of it is earnable.
Darktide?
Darktide has gotten no new weapons, 1 new enemy type who’s a reskin of an existing enemy, 1 new mission modifier, admittedly some bugfixes (on the 21st of February) that often fail to fix things completely and which never include long-running issues like the close range bug, some slight balance adjustments, an underwhelming penance-grind update that failed to retroactively grant completed penances as promised, including map completions that were ALREADY TRACKED, and a single, solitary event that granted no special rewards or incentives.
The most consistent updates the game gets are the biweekly ‘hotfixes’ that add stuff to the store rotation that can only be earned with cash. And the cosmetics it adds are outsourced.
The vast majority of Darktide’s updates consist of clipping fixes to cosmetics you already have to pay for, with blatant ‘cut these apart to sell them later’ methods for the rare free things like with the Moebian 6th loyalist set (look at vet’s headpiece cosmetics), or just having the free cosmetics be slightly adjusted reskins of previously existing ones. The biggest thing they’ve done is add stuff that’s been in the game files since launch and featured on the box art.
Helldivers 2 is generating interest and keeping people invested by not demanding they pay out the nose.
Darktide crashed and burned on release and unless it learns to copy its more successful and more generous cousin, it will never attain the heights it could have.
To illustrate, since HD2’s release date, here’s the rough approximation of how much you’d have to pay to get all the content released, minus the base game cost naturally:
HD2: 1000 SC per Warbond, about $10 per set unless you just play a bunch and accumulate SC. There will be six Warbonds in a week, five of them paid.
FINAL CONTENT COST: $0-$50
Fatshark: 9 cosmetics rotations, roughly 2300 Aquilas for an individual skin, call it about 3.5k for everything since there’s constant ‘lesser’ rotations for the non-setpiece bits and prices aren’t consistent. 4 skins every release, so about 12000 every release, give or take the repeats and previously acquired cosmetics. Aquilas cost $30 for 7000 at the largest bundle. You’ll need to buy about 15 Aquila bundles to pay things off. I’m gonna heavily undercut that under the assumption that the individual bits are common repeats you’d already have.
FINAL CONTENT COST: AT LEAST $400
Might I remind you that while HD2 is charging for actual weapons and content, Darktide is charging you for outfits.