Well it has 0 effect on the game and is just a additional option.
There is a difference between adding a option later on that has no effect and designing the game economy with mtx in mind from the start.
Also we get free updates for this game. You dont want more FREE updates?
Polyphony is a first party studio, surely it can afford to give away FREE updates for a flagship first party GaaS game without having to resorting to going back on a very public promise of
not adding microtransactions.
Of course, if you're okay with corporations lying to your face, have at it.
While it's obviously not a great look, the game has been out for not far off a year now and is only adding MTX's now. Most people should have got their money's worth out of the game already if they bought it full price at launch. You can find the game for at least half that price these days and the MTX's are nothing like what was in games such as Shadow of War or Battlefront 2 so I don't think it's that much of an issue.
For me the issue is simple- be honest about it. Like, if these microtransactions had been in the game at launch, and they hadn't made a very public proclamation about
not having them, I wouldn't have cared. They publicly promised their game wouldn't have these- as a reminder, they did this when Forza 7 was mired in its own mtx controversy, so they got some nice free brownie points too.
TL;DR: the next time they say "no microtransactions!" or whatever about this game, why will I believe them?