Articles of Interest

• EA posted a surprise quarterly net profit, sending its shares up 8%. Revenue rose 16 percent to $784M, beating the average estimate of $676M.
• Via Joystiq, a microtransaction chart that shows how much various next-gen games would cost if you were to purchase all premium content available for them. (Top title: Need for Speed Carbon at $94.97.)

And the debate continues. It’s unfortunate that so many people continue to make the assumption that all of this downloadable content would have been created and distributed for free in the “good old days,” when it’s entirely possible that much of it would have never been created at all (or would have simply been aggregated into more costly expansion packs). Our industry needs to do a much better job of communicating with the public about this.

Of course, I’m not offering a blanket defense of microtransactions, some of which may very well step over “the line.” I’m just repeating an old (but sound) argument: that microtransactions, when applied correctly, can make the market more efficient — to the benefit of both consumers and developers.