A hot potato: The highly anticipated Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced launched yesterday. Despite the hype, its Steam user rating debuted as Mostly Negative before moving to Mixed. But apart from several complaints about performance, the biggest issue was the $85 worth of DLC Ubisoft released alongside the game. Now, the company has responded to the outcry.
Black Flag Resynced currently has a Mostly Positive rating on Steam, but the huge amount of launch-day DLC resulted in the game being review-bombed into a Mostly Negative rating, with many noting that buying all the day-one extra content cost more than the game itself.
Also upsetting many players was the fact that the $70 Deluxe version of the game came with only a fraction of the DLC on sale. There were additional complaints about those paid-for items that offered a "paid gameplay advantage," such as a resource pack filled with gold and crafting materials, and a map pack that adds exploration markers to the in-game world.
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Ubisoft has long argued that these items merely save time rather than provide gameplay advantages. It once said that the microtransactions offered in Assassin's Creed Odyssey, which let players level up faster or acquire more gold and resources, were designed for those who "value their time." Other companies do the same, too.
Now, Ubisoft has responded to the Black Flag Resynced complaints. It first emphasized that the standard edition of Black Flag Resynced offers the full complete experience, with every mission, island, and part of the story included. It then added that all the additional packs are optional extras for players who want them and are never required.
Few companies stir up controversy over DLC, microtransactions, and season passes quite like Ubisoft. This is, after all, the company that once said microtransactions make the "player experience more fun."
This is far from the first Assassin's Creed game to include microtransactions, of course; the practice dates back to 2017's Origins. And Ubisoft is making a true, if obvious, point that they're optional.
But the flip side is that $85 worth of DLC, more expensive than the game itself, arriving at launch does seem excessive – and it's not like Ubisoft has a good reputation to start with. Maybe if there had been fewer items at launch and the rest had been added over time, people wouldn't have been as angry.
Ubisoft is hardly alone in pushing the limits of what players will pay for. Back in 2018, Activision charged Black Ops 4 players $1 for an "Open Dot" reticle that was, quite literally, a single red dot. The company temporarily discounted it to 50 cents as part of a sale.