system
A chat on subreddit /r/pcmasterrace
human
It really was crazy at the time because at that point, PC games had gotten like Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction, give or take an extra 1/4 of the original game added in.

Ultima Online, Everquest had multiple expansions that in some cases doubled the game's size or at a minimum added a whole new Biome with unique monsters, cities, bosses, etc.

Warcraft had full blown expansions

Now, most of this stuff at the time was 19.99 - 29.99.  We are talking like 1999-2004 era.  We were getting "Expansions" that were adding significant amounts to the gameplay, through new areas, new enemies, new classes, new missions, etc etc.

Then Horse Armor shows up and they wanted money... for that?  It was literally just unheard of.  Patches had just kind of started to become a thing that were happening regularly to games, particularly on consoles with Xbox Live and PSN.  

Then they dropped Horse Armor and it was mindblowing theyd even have the audacity to do it.  And here we are, 20 years later - and people are paying for Costumes in First Person Games for 30 bucks.   

They cant even see the goddamn thing theyre buying and theyre spending 30 bucks on it.  In 1999-2004 era, that would have gotten you another half of a game with an expansion. 

Really just nuts how this all played out.
gpt
Micro transactions ruined video games, so in a sense capitalism ruined video games.