After the end of the open beta for Star Wars: Battlefront II, player feedback has been mostly focused on one issue — microtransactions. Following EA’s official response, more devs have stepped in to address the “pay-to-win” issues.
In-game purchases are not always a bad thing, but when some of it gives competitive advantages to players that choose to spend the money, the pay-to-win complaints come out and something has to give. The controversial microtransactions in Battlefront II are Star Cards, which provide powerful upgrades to playable characters. These can be purchased with in-game currency earned by playing but also with real money.
EA Motive, the team behind Star Wars: Battlefront II‘s campaign, recently interviewed with GameSpot about the system in question. Art director Chris Matthews spoke about the Star Cards and player feedback to them.
“DICE [developer of Battlefront II’s multiplayer] has taken great care to make sure that Star Cards and the way they work give you more options in battle,” said Matthews. “Terms like pay-to-win and stuff like that are hard to dodge, but the guys are doing a really incredible job of trying to balance that system.”
While saying the pay-to-win claims are “hard to dodge” isn’t exactly comforting, it is good to hear the effort to balance the system is there. Matthews’ comments echo part of EA’s official response, which assured players the loot box / Star Card system from the beta was not the final version and will be continually adjusted based on public responses.
Mitch Dyer, one of the campaign’s writers, went on to say the open beta existed to determine what is and isn’t working based on feedback from players. However, none of the devs indicated what changes would be coming to Star Wars: Battlefront II to provide more balance to the system that definitely needs it.
