According to Billy, people find it hard to find the DLC and download it, fragmenting the playerbase

Your face.

I never understood why ME3 didn't do a compatibility patch to resolve this issue. Every other multiplayer game on the 360 that I played required the user to patch before accessing the online content. Maybe there was some weird technical limitation specific to ME3.

Anyway, the point stands that there was a solution to that issue that didn't involve drip-feeding content, which I agree is way less hype than big batches of content, and really aggravates the 'unlock the needle in the haystack' problem this revenue model presents.

I used to have trouble finding games in ME3 back in the day too.......then I realized the game disc was still unopened wrapped in plastic.

Wh- wh wha WHAT? Like, how stupid people actually is?

Okay, let's say that the DLC thing has to be downloaded manually, so there're people who genuinely miss it. BUT BRAH, put a frigging reminder or some shit in the MP menu! as big as their heads: "There's a new Multiplayer DLC, would you like to download it now?" How hard is that?

First they say that the reason was because people will find it more interesting getting new content every so often (and that new content is basically one kit every 2 months, go figure) instead of DLC sized every 3 months or something, and now they say that it's because the players are so dumb, they'll just miss it? I'm sorry, this is kind of too much.

Though a great idea, it will still fragment the player base somewhat, because that's people for you.

Dark Souls 2 did the patch route even for paid DLC, this way you could still play with players who had DLC equipment and even trade DLC equipment with those who haven't paid for DLC. Heck, you can even still play DLC areas and not having paid for them, though in a more limited manner (you can only get summed to DLC owner worlds). So yeah, online game DLCs included in patches is the future.

Irrelevant.

Billy knows this model works, that is the point.

Real devs make real DLCs.

And I'm saying zero chance for fragmentation and ease of installation is the point. Would you rather the game tell you "Hey, dummy, there's free DLC to install. Get to work!" Or just turn the power on to your platform of choice and it automatically does it by itself while you scratch your butt and burp Homer Simpson. Because that's the average player base, bunch of Homer Simpsons.

Halle-fucking-lujah. Ding ding ding.

The region I play in is practically dead. I'm forced to leech off people's host outside of my region regardless of the lag just so I could get a game or two.

I think people also forget that Billy also worked with Dragon Age Multiplayer, and that game didn't properly communicate when new MP DLC was available either. Something else that I haven't seen brought up yet in the discussion is download speeds, which was also another reason Billy stated. They use a patching system so that you don't have to struggle with waiting for several minutes (maybe even an hour) downloading new content, when you simply have it done while you're away from home via automatic patching.

That doesn't necessarily mean that they shouldn't have improved the means at which they communicated new content to their playerbase either. I don't particular have an issue with way they're doing things now. I get it doesn't build up much hype, but if they had released all the new characters, weapons, maps, and gear we've received (prior to 1.09) as one big update, would things have been all that different?

I feel like saying "netcode" isn't a thing in terms of game code is just an argument in semantics on his part, when it should be obvious that we use it as a general term for how good a job the game does (or doesn't do) in compensating for P2P connections, lag, packet poss, varying UL/DL speeds, etc., especially compared to other games.