Overwatch's Nyan Cafe bundle should be a slam dunk for the game as far as cosmetic packages go. Pink cat-themed maid outfits on five fan-favorite heroes? What's not to love? Blizzard Entertainment has all but assured its otherwise fun new outfits are steeped in backlash, however, thanks to a hard to swallow price and a new rarity of skins.

For those who aren't deep in the Overwatch trenches, bundles that package a bunch of themed Legendary outfits and cosmetics normally cost around 6,900 OW Coins or about $60 in real-world cash. The Nyan Cafe bundle instead costs 9,900 OW Coins, meaning most players will need to fork out an extra $100 since, like most live-service games, Overwatch doesn't let you buy an exact amount of coins.

Blizzard's reasoning for the bundle's higher price is that it's introducing two Ultra Skins for Sierra and Kiriko, a new rarity of skin, alongside three regular Legendary outfits for Reaper, Orisa, and Ashe. Buying the Ultra Skins in their individual character bundles costs 4,500 OW Coins ($40).

What sets Ultra Skins apart are the extra sound and visual effects added to reloads or eliminations, in this case a puff of pink cat-shaped smoke lands wherever an enemy dies, though Blizzard says it's "leaving things open for future innovation."

Fans were almost immediately dismayed at the new prices. "The quality of this game's cosmetic content keeps getting lower and lower while the prices get higher and higher," one player writes on the game's subreddit. "To quote one of this game's own characters, 'you shame yourself.'"

"As someone who's totally comfortable with blowing money on things I enjoy, no expense spared, this is just insulting. I don't enjoy the microtransaction culture in businesses and I'm disliking it even more seeing its evolution to macrotransactions," another response reads.

Similar sentiments are echoed up and down Overwatch's various online communities. The main worry is that Ultra Skins are just Blizzard's Trojan Horse dressed up in bright colors – a way to charge even more money for what would've been labelled a Legendary otherwise.

Pretty much the only person not irked by the price bump is noted Conker enjoyer and freshly-minted Overwatcher Doja Cat, who tweets: "On another note there is a new Nyan Café bundle on overwatch and it is one of the best things that has ever happened to me on this planet. I can't believe this is fucking real. Sierra’s skin is so good like I can't breathe."

Overwatch has always had pretty steep cosmetic prices, even compared to its direct competition, and so I can definitely understand the player frustration after seeing costs inflate without that much value being added on top.

Uncharted 3 co-director and The Dragon Prince co-creator joins the Overwatch team, once again reigniting hopes for an animated show.

Sure, Grand Theft Auto has always been about the shooting. The car chases. The seedy criminal activity. But it's also about looking fly as fuck while you do it. Driving around the city in expensive, tricked-out cars. Nipping to the barbershop for a nicer haircut as you climb the criminal ranks. Spending your eventual riches on parodied designer clothing and jewellery. Hitting that level of wealth where you go from looking expensive and put-together to expensive and downright ugly.

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I never expect to have to cough up too much of my own real-life finances to do that, but if GTA 6's Ultimate Edition is anything to go by, that's exactly what I'll be doing. Rockstar's calling it the game's ultimate edition, sure, but I can't help but feel like this is what the developer actually wants the standard version to be, while its $80 version is feeling distinctly Lite Edition.

Now Deluxe/Ultimate/Premium/Insert Fancy Upgrade Term Here cosmetic exclusives are not new to videogames, and preorder bonuses have become a plague on the industry. But usually it's the odd outfit here or cosmetic pack there. Rockstar, however, is going one step further by putting entire stores on the map of Leonida that won't be accessible unless you cough up the $20 upgrade, and quite frankly that's where I have to draw the line.

As far as we know, there are currently five stores that are paywalled: Two mod shops, a clothing store, a salon, and a tattoo parlour. All offering customisation options that, at this point, I deem an integral part of this series' identity. It feels criminal that a game touting itself as the "most immersive GTA experience yet" has the very real potential to constantly pull me out of that immersion by reminding me that I've yet to spend an extra 20 bones any time I get within the vicinity of these 'premium' stores.

Who knows if we'll even be able to enter any of these stores with our paltry, peasant $80 purchase? Will the doors be locked entirely, prompting me to open the store page and fork out for the upgrade? Will I be able to enter, but told that I'm not quite elite enough to get a new paint job—of either the vehicular or manicure variety? There's no winning strategy here besides paying the full, big hundo. And even then, I still feel like I'm losing.

To me, it's a bad sign of what's to come. Not just for GTA, but for videogames. Locking off little pockets of the map for only the biggest spenders does not feel good, especially when it's for a singleplayer game. It doesn't even seem to be ending at cosmetics, either—the pre-order page also lists "action" as something reserved for the Ultimate Edition buyers.

What that looks like isn't totally clear right now—at the very least, it seems to be referring to a series of side missions called PTT Youngin$ Compound and Scores, where you'll raid this gang's store for contraband and special items. This stuff used to be in the game for no additional cost, guys! Come on, now.

The worst part is, this is going to work. The FOMO of shuttered stores and exclusive cars will entice a whole bunch of people to settle on the more expensive version. And quite frankly, I can't blame them. But I also wish Rockstar had simply folded all of this in and offered a flat $100 videogame. That probably would've pissed people off too, but I'd prefer this over paywalling stuff that's been a part of the series for years and acting like it's some kind of cool bonus. Instead, the whole thing comes off as mighty greedy.