I agree with him that whatever the model is, it shouldn't be called "games as a service" which implies (to me) that it's like SaaS, which apparently it's not. This is not subscription-based, but they monetize it by....? It's also downloaded and played locally, correct? I mean, it very loosely if at all fits the typical "as a service" moniker if you ask me.
Not even a mention of payment, or that it's different than your typical game on their website:
"Marvel’s Avengers is an epic, third-person, action-adventure game that combines an original, cinematic story with single-player and co-operative gameplay*. Assemble into a team of up to four players online, master extraordinary abilities, customize a growing roster of Heroes, and defend the Earth from escalating threats."
Note the asterisk, which has no footnote anywhere on the page to explain (and that's the biggest thing I am interested in!)
In any case, from what I can gather since it's not really straightforward, you pay for a full price game (around $60 I guess), and then on top of that if you want to do things like customize your character, you have to pay? That's kind of....crazy. Remember the good ol days when you paid full price for an RPG and you could customize your character without paying? Yeah, me too, it's called today!
Obviously they can choose whatever model they want to, their game, I don't have to play it...but I just am worried if this is a success, games like Wasteland 4, or XCom whatever number is next. (X-Com much more likely than Wasteland, but still...)
Why not just go the Fortnite model here? Greed? Hey, let's make a F2P game, BUT CHARGE FOR IT LIKE IT'S NOT!!