Prior to the game’s release tomorrow for the Playstation 3, Polyphony Digital has revealed the microtransactions for Gran Turismo 6, at least for Europe.
Without beating around the bush, this is what each increment of in-game credits will cost in British pounds, as well as Euros. We are including US dollar equivalents in parenthesis as well, as sourced from Google today:
500,000 credits – £ 3.99 ($ 6.52), or € 4.99 ($ 6.79)
1 million credits – £ 7.99 ($ 13.07), or € 9.99 ($ 13.57)
2.5 million credits – £ 15.99 ($ 26.14), or € 19.99 ($ 27.18)
7 million credits – £ 39.99 ($ 65.39), or € 49.99 ($ 67.98)
To put it in context, the Jaguar XJ13, one of the priciest cars in the game, will cost a total £ 119.95, or $ 196, to get, since you’ll have to shell out for two 7 million credits packs, one 2.5 million credits pack, and one 1 million credits pack. We also need to clarify that US players will likely not have to shell as much as these converted prices I have quoted, but of course we will have to wait on that to be sure.
Interestingly, Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida has responded to the criticism you would expect him to get for this. In Yoshida’s words, this is just an alternative path for busy players. Shuhei also thinks microtransactions are not a problem, but game design skewered towards microtransactions are.
We can certainly debate these points with Yoshida. As I noted before, this creates a situation where players who can afford them will be in a more favorable position to players who cannot afford them, regardless of skill level. Even if Gran Turismo 6 was not designed around microtransactions in the same way something like Angry Birds was, does not mean that it does not affect the GT6 game experience.
Turn 10 has had to back down somewhat from this, but to be fair, they went overkill with it and should have known better. However, I would make a comparison between GT6 and GTA microtransactions, and think it is fairly easy to predict hardcore Gran Turismo fans will soon be complaining about how the microtransactions are affecting their online experience, irregardless if they bought into it or not.
Do you think Yoshida’s defense has merit, or do you agree with me and think Polyphony Digital made a mistake on this one? Let us know in the comments below.
