Devil May Cry 5, the newest entry in the action-packed Capcom video game series, got a pretty good showing at the Tokyo Game Show this year, but a feature in the game may not leave players pleased. In a story first reported by GameSpot, Devil May Cry 5 will give players the opportunity to spend real money on orbs to make their characters stronger.
In the Devil May Cry games, a big part of fighting is performing combos on enemies to earn orbs and higher battle ranks. Doing better in combat and perfecting combos cause the enemies to drop more orbs. The orbs can be spent to improve your character in various ways, including unlocking newer, deadlier combos. It’s a progression cycle that encourages players to hone their skills to make their characters stronger.
GameSpot writer Peter Brown spoke to Hideaki Itsuno, the director of Devil May Cry 5, about why they decided to put a microtransaction system into the game, which is one with no sort of competitive multiplayer. He answered that it’s about giving players the option to play as they wish:
With giving people the ability to purchase Red Orbs, it’s something we want to give people as an option. If they want to save time and just want to get all the stuff at once, those people can do that. But on the other hand I don’t feel you have to get all the moves. You should be able to play it the way you want to play it.
Microtransactions for increased character strength also existed in Devil May Cry 4 Special Edition.
Peter Brown also asked how the microtransactions would impact the learning/progression cycle of playing Devil May Cry 5. Itsuno said:
It’s interesting because from a game design point of view there’s two different things we think about when we set the prices of the moves, skills, and abilities [which can be purchased with Red Orbs]. The first thing is the stuff that we feel people should want to get first is made cheaper. So people will think, ‘Oh this is cheap so I’m just going to buy this.’ But then for the stuff that’s going to be harder to use and master, we make that more expensive. Partly because of you save up for that you’re not going to be able to buy as many skills, so you’re going to have the time to learn it. So you have to make the decision between going for the cheaper stuff or saving up, getting the thing that has a lot of application but you’ll have to spend time learning and perfecting.
Devil May Cry is set to release sometime in Spring 2019.