Durning all history of gamers generation of 20th century we console players enjoyed all games at fullest . That was golden ages . Nobody said that there isn't anything valuable than gold . So it happend , in end of 20th century internet service started to invade console users with optional, additional content alongside expanding our possibilyties. In short time it grown in additional industry of money milking from gamers monster. Ofcource sometimes we gladly had blind eye and purchasing everything we wanted , but lately monster become more ugly and unreasonable too expensive to keep him .
We all familliar with this beast , DLC (downloadable content) for console players like me it was a new and surprisingly pleasant add, sure why not to download if have full pocket of money and don't worry about shit called life?
Yet for commoners like me beast show's it's teeth called price , and mostly for unresonable content.
Let's have a sample, gamer has game and find's out a new dlc in his home service, of cource after excitment he notice ugly side - price , sure in many case we do pay our bloody money for long waited/wanted content , but do you want pay for dlc wich costs 10% of game value? Alrigh , let's see this situation from different position , i have a game it's not bad title and offcource it has a dlc , wich includes additional content (new character pack) i am fan of franchice and giving my hard made money about 7GBP , and here we go i have new awesome 4 characters wich gives me additional happiness even if for not long, you see in this case customer pays for happiness end in the end money is on second place , happy end. (Sure price is too big, i hope there will be no more dlc. At least not for the same price) . But no!! After few months developers releases special edition of game i had , and you know what ? No, price the same , they put 5th new additional character!! IN this case they can screw themself, im not gonna buy this game no way even for halfed price. !! So comments?
I'd like to end, but there more interesting samples .
The so called Pre-order bonuses, sure it's cool to got something in bonus, but wait! Is this final product? I fear not !
Another marketing sample of DLC. Ok we got pre-order case , nice downloadable content including, sweet! At first look. So we have a game + some dlc, later additional dlc released for additional price and more later another with character pack for example, hurray i bankrupted again...after few months smart company releases full set dlc for game , it contains all released before and surprise - price is not so big! Do we buy ? In many case we have no choise . It's marketing.
Yet another cruel case , game released as usual , dlc also comes in normal , after you collected all you could , they releasing downloadable mega-dlc !! Game with all dlc in one pack for same price in dlc form!! WTF?!!
Allright , it's not so bad as you feel now , coz criminal continues , there are developers wich seems to understand what loyal customer/fan means, and no matter what releases dlc , a very high quality ones - for free. It's real you can have it , just download and enjoy . (BAA is a sample) Sure there only few not in money milking interested developers , but still it makes to think about game developers completely in different light , the money making is top priority mostly (about 95%)
and all what left ..i dunno think , at least for a while. There is not much we can do. We do want it , but do we ready blindly obey? I don't think we have other options here it's monopoly .
Advice? Sure , never rush in first months of released dlc , things may happen. I do believe will return to this theme, just need more evidience.

I always like more content to keep me occupied with games that I like, so in that regard, I do not view DLC as a foe, I do view it as such, though, concerning the way it's handled. The extra missions, equipment and all could be just part of a collector's edition retail version. If not so, in case the content wasn't 100% completed by shipping time, it could be released as a premium module pack, like NeverWinter Nights had, or wait till the expansion and include them there. It doesn't necessarily have to be day 1 DLC or have it released gradually withing the extent of a few months and definitely not for the price tag a lot of these carry.

tl;dr Friend, but only if handled properly. Which it usually isn't.

Well , it's two different situation when talk is about PC an console owners. In all matters, content , price , please be more specific.

Can be either, friend (Borderlands, Fallout 3) when executed properly, and bad (Modern Warfare 2, Assassin's Creed II) when executed with the concept of generating money overcomes any concept of genuinely GOOD content.

I think the two that irritate the shit out of me the most are early-release DLC and pre-order bonuses. If a DLC is released anywhere from the first month to the first DAY of a game's release, you know it's a rip-off tactic by the publishers that decided to just sell different parts of the full game separately.

As for pre-order bonuses, the ones I especially hate are multiple bonuses for different stores. Case in point, Transformers: War For Cybertron. If you pre-order at Gamestop, you get to play as the Decepticon Shockwave, but if you pre-order at Best Buy, you get Autobot Jazz. So no matter what you do, you will not have all the available characters in your game. Not to mention that Transformers: War For Cybertron is a real gamble, I'm not utterly convinced the game won't suck, so pre-ordering it would be stupid in my opinion. Besides, I'd just as soon buy the game used at Gamestop just to ensure Activision gets none of my money. But if I don't pre-order it, I won't be able to play as Jazz! Jazz is one of my all-time favorite Transformers, and ever since this game was announced, I always wished "oh please let Jazz be in this game!" Well, now that I hear he IS available, I hear he's only available through pre-order, so that's a right kick in the balls!

Not to mention that if Jazz is in fact an optional DLC character, that means he's not going to be in the main storyline, at least not as a main character, which is just fucked up. I'd just as soon toss out Bumblebee altogether if it meant Jazz would be an actual part of the game's storyline. Fucking yellow bitch, the only reason he's a main character in this game is because of those terrible fucking live-action movies, stupid fucking yellow Camaro bitch...

My sentiments are in line with these guys. If it's handled correctly, not held back from the game to screw us over, is worthwhile (enough good content and priced right) and enhances the gameplay experience, then it's great. If it's shit that they held back, or shit that should have been in the game in the first place (roll cancelling in Dante's Inferno....wtf) etc etc then FUCK IT.

I have only purchased 2-3 pieces of DLC, so you can see what I think of most of it.

Yes! I fucking hate the pre-order bonuses. I mean, sure that gives incentive to pre-order something and pre-orders as well as day 1 buys considerably influence the chances of getting sequels for a game, but companies would issue these bonus as standard content, they'd get more sales from people that simply don't pre-order and/or didn't have much incentive to buy the game if it wasn't released with some extras.

I hate them even more when there are differnet ones for different stores. They're fragmenting the games now, with all of these bonuses and dlc releases.

And i tought Alan will never awake again