BioWare - Explaining Day One DLC

BioWare's Fernando Melo has explained the business proposition for Day 1 DLC and other paid DLC in a speech for GDC. In essence? Players buy them. From IGN:

Yet that still didn’t address the question of why the DLC wasn’t just part of the base game. As the production timeline Melo presented during the talk showed, multiple packs of downloadable content must go into production before the base game is complete. Melo couldn’t provide specific sales figures, but showed a high percentage of players, particularly with Dragon Age: Origins, purchased the content made available day one. Even significant percentages of those who purchased titles used from game stores went on to activate online passes and purchased additional DLC.

The piece also discusses the completion rates for several of their games (Joystiq lists a couple more) - don't expect new games to be as long as Dragon Age: Origins, with only a 36% completion rate; Mass Effect 2 was highest of the games provided at 56%.

Thanks, Avantenor!