So the key for the first game is Steam redeemable and the one for the sequel isn't?Weird :l

It's the wickedly awesome trailers....isn't it? ;)

Bah, it's not 100% my fault if people mistake the tone behind my posts. 0.o

I usually(when replying/rating posts) try to think what the poster's original intentions were/are when posting something before assuming ill will or rating them down. I wish more did the same, but what can ya do? *takes sip of fine cognac*
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This...also nice avatar you have there, if I may say so. :)

You know you can buy it and just not use it until you feel it is ok while playing, right? ;)

So I need to keep track of how much of my experience/money I can/can not use at any given time? That is a pain.

Sales, man.....sales.

(They get day 1 buyers and then when enough sales have been had at full price they have massive sales to get all the customers who wait for sales.)

Why is it such a pain? Heck, people do it with other games already(Pokemon games & the Nuzlocke challenges, limiting one's skills/inventory artificially in various RPGs/etc.).

(Also I was mainly talking about not using overpowering DLC weapons/items/skills while playing, not not using in-game money & the like.)

Well the one for the first game redeems Valley 2 also.

Im not a sales person, but even i can see something wrong with that concept if thats what they are doing. Every game will have an initial rush then level off. Seems to be very silly to spend oodles on product X. Sell at RRP for very short time then discount it left right and centre. Not a good way to do things IMHO especially considering the cost of development and the development cycles.. but then what do i know....
BUT then i guess thats the legacy of Steams silly cutprice sales eh?

Because while it is simple to not use a certain weapon, keeping in mind that I always need to be 10 000 exp behind (and thus not leveling up when the game tells me that I've leveled up) or keeping track of how many credits I can not use requires me to be more conscious of what I do at all time. it distracts the player from actually playing the game.

Umm, couldn't you just buy something super expensive and toss it (or you know, drink 1000 health potions in 30 seconds)?

I think you're making a bit of an overstatement here.

This would work as well. Heck, he could even just toss some creds/money on the ground and leave it there(If the game allows it.).

The game does not let you drop money and that would not work (unless you want to buy three thousand energy drinks and watch Wei do the drinking animation every time, which sounds like a horrid way to spend an hour). And I don't think it's an overstatement at all. It would be extremely intrusive to try to play around the cheats (coming from someone who's played and beaten the game).

The best you could do is buy a bunch of cars and just never drive them, but it would be infinitely easier to just not buy or uninstall the DLC. Plus that still doesn't solve the XP problem.

It seems to work fine for most devs/sellers, at any rate.
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Isn't that the case, though, for many games? (In that they get a good number of sales day 1 and then that number drops afterwards until either a sales pops up or some new expansion is released.)
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There will always be those who feel like spending massive amounts of cash on day 1 buys(To support the devs/makers, to get something before others get it, etc.).
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They make money off of it in most cases so there must be some merit to the method.
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Imo it's more a legacy of sound business strategies. ;)

Except Square-Enix posted a pretty big loss, none of their games hit their sales targets and the CEO is stepping down. Doesn't sound particularly sound to me.

Well that sucks....can't you buy a weapon/etc and drop that, then? (Or as I said just ignore you have all that money and simply hold back on spending.....you could even build it into the immersion by calling the main character a frugal spender or some such.)
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Opinions, man......we all have em'.
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They're not cheats(imo)....they're gameplay advantages. Cheats(imo) are using codes/cracks/etc to gain an advantage the game/dev doesn't normally allow you to have, not using DLC which adds items/exp/cash/etc.
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Then why do some buy the DLC without looking into reviews/etc and then complain that it ruins the game for them?
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What XP problem?


Just because it didn't work for them that doesn't mean the strategy isn't sound or that that's the only reason SQ-Enix is losing money.

And this is where we can all stop speculating. FWIW, I'm not either, but I have learned over the years that what actually works is counter intuitive more often than not, so just give up trying to understand it at all, it's really not worth it.

To be clear, this is not a rant or a put down, just pointing out that normal people (myself included) seem to be perpetually horribly wrong on this stuff, because it just doesn't work like people expect. Salemanship and advertising frequently work off our "glitches". Human beings are just really fucking bad at making some choices or avoiding manipulation at particular times.