They literally just waited. It's the same strategy with everything else - horse armor was a punchline when it was introduced, but within a couple years tiny DLC packs were being done by everybody and nobody thought it was weird anymore. Introduce loot boxes and everybody complained, but eventually they lost patience and it became the new normal. Deus Ex sectioned off a sidequest for ten bucks and people lost their minds, but now that's completely standard practice among major releases.