Exploitative Gaming Practices

[Arch Dornan]

I have witnessed much of videogames changing that you now pay money for random chance to give you what you want or you keep spending.

Might as well make a thread for bitching. Lootboxes, gatchas, in game casinos yada yada ecetra ecetra.

Anyone want to voice their thoughts?

You can even say boobies are getting people to pay for a game.

 

[FriedCFour]

I find it a perfectly acceptable practice legally and don't think it should be made illegal. I think its your fault for playing those games in the first place and getting caught up in pay for lootbox bullshit in the first place. If you don't like it don't use it. My problem is mostly with the people who want it to be banned.

 

[Arch Dornan]

I find it a perfectly acceptable practice legally and don't think it should be made illegal. I think its your fault for playing those games in the first place and getting caught up in pay for lootbox bullshit in the first place. If you don't like it don't use it. My problem is mostly with the people who want it to be banned.

Fair enough with that philosophy. The choice to waste money on frivolous services or not including careless parents who let their kids get ahold of their bank account.

Thankfully I don't have a gambling habit so I stick to F2P generally.

Do you feel the same on gaming exclusives?

 

[FriedCFour]

Do you feel the same on gaming exclusives?

What do you mean by gaming exclusives?

 

[Arch Dornan]

What do you mean by gaming exclusives?

Epic games and their tendency to buy the right to sell PC games only on their client for a set period.

So someone who wants to buy the game must buy it on their client service or wait for the exclusive to end to buy it on a client they used frequently like steam which makes it inconvenient.

Do you then feel it is the right of the customer to decide whether to buy it now or buy it later?

Gaming console exclusives could be included but it's something I am accustomed to.

 

[FriedCFour]

Epic games and their tendency to buy the right to sell PC games only on their client for a set period.

So someone who wants to buy the game must buy it on their client service or wait for the exclusive to end to buy it on a client they used frequently like steam which makes it inconvenient.

Do you then feel it is the right of the customer to decide whether to buy it now or buy it later?

Gaming console exclusives could be included but it's something I am accustomed to.

If they wanted to sell their game exclusively through measured increments of gold dust on a scale only open on Tuesdays by a creek bed in Nebraska they can do that. The Epic Games Store is a piece of shit but I don't see why they shouldn't be allowed to do that with games they own.

 

[Arch Dornan]

If they wanted to sell their game exclusively through measured increments of gold dust on a scale only open on Tuesdays by a creek bed in Nebraska they can do that. The Epic Games Store is a piece of shit but I don't see why they shouldn't be allowed to do that with games they own.

It's quite an inconvenience when there's games I want that get bought by them but I shall wait it out.

I don't want a lot of gaming clients in the PC.

 

[FriedCFour]

It's quite an inconvenience when there's games I want that get bought by them but I shall wait it out.

I don't want a lot of gaming clients in the PC.

Yeah but that's the thing about ownership and property. You get to do what you want with them even if its inconvenient to you, because they are the ones who financed and brought it into creation. You want the game but you don't like the store they use? That's too bad. That's how console exclusives have always been and I don't really get why that is now suddenly a big deal when exclusives have been a thing since home consoles were a thing.

 

[Arch Dornan]

Yeah but that's the thing about ownership and property. You get to do what you want with them even if its inconvenient to you, because they are the ones who financed and brought it into creation. You want the game but you don't like the store they use? That's too bad. That's how console exclusives have always been and I don't really get why that is now suddenly a big deal when exclusives have been a thing since home consoles were a thing.

I blame social media which allows Tim to act like an asshole for people to see and get enraged at.

Then the evolution in what is defined as exclusive. PC's generally PC but then comes these small things so out comes the bitching. Steam used to be bitched at when digital was still new.

 

[prinCZess]

You can even say boobies are getting people to pay for a game.

Then I shall!
I would refer to the 'Seed of the Dead' game discussed elsewhere in this section as an example of one avenue of exploitative gaming practices...Or, I guess more generally, practices which use sex as a crutch to hold up an inferior product. Which happens all over, but seems popular in gaming. At the same time, I will note that boobies and dongles should not be anathema in games. Just done well instead of as cheap cash-grabs. Contrast with, for instance, 'Bayonetta', which uses sex, or at least sex-appeal, as an addition to things rather than a crutch like it is in 'Seed of the Dead'. That million+ dollar porn game kickstarter as another possible example--though since it's still in development, can't say for certain where it lands on quality.
Point being that people paying for porn games should recieve QUALITY porn games.

On a perhaps minor note I might be incorrect about--the incessent yearly releases of [x], most often happening with sports games but occasionally others (Assassin's Creed was doing it for a while I recall) seems a bit sketchy--very limited development time and definitely not enough for engine changes or the like...Which always threw things into 'this should just be an expansion pack' in my mind since I'm a child of the 90s on electronic stuff. Also related, though it hasn't happened in a little while (and now I think some places in the States at least are changing things) but the usage of College athletes names and likenesses in games (though I think that's more a problem with that larger industry than it was/is with gaming).

 

[Terthna]

I find it a perfectly acceptable practice legally and don't think it should be made illegal. I think its your fault for playing those games in the first place and getting caught up in pay for lootbox bullshit in the first place. If you don't like it don't use it. My problem is mostly with the people who want it to be banned.

Personally I'd love to see the practice banned; but I understand why doing so might be a bad idea in many ways. That said, I believe we could still find some common ground, in at least admitting that something could still be done about the information disparity between businesses and their customers. Falling for a con, when you had no clue you were being manipulated and/or lied to, is in no way the victim's fault.

In any event, the practices of including lootboxes, micro-transactions, and DLC are among the many, many reasons I've basically abandoned modern gaming. For many years now, I've only ever played indie or retro games, and I emphatically encourage everyone else to do the same; if they want to show the big corporations that they won't stand for the current state of the gaming industry.

 

[FriedCFour]

Personally I'd love to see the practice banned; but I understand why doing so might be a bad idea in many ways. That said, I believe we could still find some common ground, in at least admitting that something could still be done about the information disparity between businesses and their customers. Falling for a con, when you had no clue you were being manipulated and/or lied to, is in no way the victim's fault.

Which ones are cons?

 

[Terthna]

Which ones are cons?

Just one example are the ones that deliberately gimp the game, making it as tedious as possible, in order to encourage players to pay more to avoid the tedium; but then pretend that they're only offering players a "choice", and that the design of the game is in no way built to encourage them to make that "choice".

 

[FriedCFour]

Just one example are the ones that deliberately gimp the game, making it as tedious as possible, in order to encourage players to pay more to avoid the tedium; but then pretend that they're only offering players a "choice", and that the design of the game is in no way built to encourage them to make that "choice".

That's not a con though. You can find that out easily with a product review.

 

[Terthna]

That's not a con though. You can find that out easily with a product review.

con
: something (such as a ruse) used deceptively to gain another's confidence

Can you? How about someone else? A con doesn't stop being a con when it fails to catch you; anymore than bears stop being dangerous, just because a guy with an AK-47 killed one. Even with the information being out there, how are people who are not as keyed into this industry like you and I are supposed to find it? Not to mention the sources (usually with financial ties to large gaming corporations) insisting this sort of thing isn't happening, and if it is, you shouldn't think about it.

 

[FriedCFour]

Can you? How about someone else? A con doesn't stop being a con when it fails to catch you; anymore than bears stop being dangerous, just because a guy with an AK-47 killed one. Even with the information being out there, how are people who are not as keyed into this industry like you and I are supposed to find it? Not to mention the sources (usually with financial ties to large gaming corporations) insisting this sort of thing isn't happening, and if it is, you shouldn't think about it.

Youtube. It's not that hard. If you want to buy a game because of trailers you do that. If you don't actually know what the games like with easily and readily available reviews, well, that's on you.

 

[Terthna]

Youtube. It's not that hard. If you want to buy a game because of trailers you do that. If you don't actually know what the games like with easily and readily available reviews, well, that's on you.

That's where we disagree; so I suppose we cannot find common ground on this issue after all. Ah well; at least I tried.

 

[Battlegrinder]

I find it a perfectly acceptable practice legally and don't think it should be made illegal. I think its your fault for playing those games in the first place and getting caught up in pay for lootbox bullshit in the first place. If you don't like it don't use it. My problem is mostly with the people who want it to be banned.

While "don't like, don't buy" certainly has a place, I'm not totally sold on it being the only acceptable means of control, since at this point it's starting to freeze people out of whole genres. Plus, there's a reason gambling is heavily regulated in real life, I don't really buy the excuses for how those rules don't apply to games (though, and I'm guessing here, I imagine you don't find those gambling laws acceptable?).

If they wanted to sell their game exclusively through measured increments of gold dust on a scale only open on Tuesdays by a creek bed in Nebraska they can do that. The Epic Games Store is a piece of shit but I don't see why they shouldn't be allowed to do that with games they own.

This, however, I totally agree with. I'd prefer the convenience of steam and it's previous one stop shop status, but there's nothing wrong with the Epic Store.

 

[Sophrosyne]

That's not a con though. You can find that out easily with a product review.

That's not quite true though. For example Activision promised Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled wouldn't have microtransactions at E3 and waited until after it was critically reviewed and publicly released to add it in during an update one month after launch.

 

[FriedCFour]

That's not quite true though. For example Activision promised Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled wouldn't have microtransactions at E3 and waited until after it was critically reviewed and publicly released to add it in during an update one month after launch.

Yeah, to let you spend money to get coins for skins that zero impact on gameplay. That's not a big deal.