I don't play a lot of Paradox games, I am someone who likes a good city-builder though, but I swear I am not a Paradox fanboy. I know they exist, I'm not one of them. I'm just a guy that thinks the idea that not all the DLC from the previous game will be in the new game isn't always so damning.

First, I'll preface by saying, I won't buy it on Day 1 anyway. I'm always going to wait for reviews and general consensus some time after release and probably even wait for a sale. In other words, all of this implies the game actually winds up being good.

Secondly, I should also preface that I'm someone who thinks getting 8 years of continuous entertainment out of something (which is how long the first game was supported), is pretty great. So great, that I don't mind paying some amount of money occasionally for more content. So for me, that just leaves what the content is and whether the price is fair.

Third, I think it's also important to understand what the DLC even is. Cities Skylines is a little weird because there's shit like Content Creator packs and radio stations. Personally, I don't give a shit about these, nor are these things that will wind up in a sequel. I think people would be pissed if it literally had all the same music and same exact buildings as the last game. So I don't think these are fair to bring up in this specific discussion. It would be fair play in a discussion about someone who feels the need to own literally every piece of content possible, and whether that's fair or not, but since none of this will carry over then it doesn't seem in scope.

So what are we actually talking about here? The main expansions for Cities Skylines, the ones that have actual content that adds features, costs roughly $13-15. If you look at the release schedule, this comes out to like $30-40 a year. Now this is also assuming that for whatever reason, I can't wait for a sale, which in reality is exactly what I do. And because I do that, additional Cities Skylines content winds up costing me roughly 2 fast food meals per year. But if I didn't want to wait, then I suppose you could double that.

That just doesn't seem that insane to me for a game that I'm playing for 8 years of my life.

Would I rather that the company just hands me everything in a brand new engine with all new graphics and all I ever had to do was pay $60 one time and get 8 years of enjoyment out of it? Fuck yeah. But also, that's just not generally how any of this works and I'm not sure I'd even be getting a Cities Skylines 2 if that were the case. So again, this doesn't really create the sticking point for me that /r/games likes to think it should.

Everyone has different thresholds, but I don't think this is even close to being nefarious. Just don't be someone who feels the need to own every little thing and gaming ends up being one of the cheapest commercial hobbies imaginable.

And since this comment is wrong, another reminder, this is just about Cities Skylines. I can't talk about any other Paradox games.