Not sure if I'd call this "peril..." Call me a boomer, but if killing deliberately addicting feedback loops spells peril for the industry, then the industry has lost the plot.
Games
Video game news oriented community. No NanoUFO is not a bot :)
Posts.
- News oriented content (general reviews, previews or retrospectives allowed).
- Broad discussion posts (preferably not only about a specific game).
- No humor/memes etc..
- No affiliate links
- No advertising.
- No clickbait, editorialized, sensational titles. State the game in question in the title. No all caps.
- No self promotion.
- No duplicate posts, newer post will be deleted unless there is more discussion in one of the posts.
- No politics.
Comments.
- No personal attacks.
- Obey instance rules.
- No low effort comments(one or two words, emoji etc..)
- Please use spoiler tags for spoilers.
My goal is just to have a community where people can go and see what new game news is out for the day and comment on it.
Other communities:
Nothing inside a video game should cost real money.
The entire business model is an abuse. Only legislation will stop it. You were never going to shop your way out of it - it is the dominant strategy. If we allow it to continue, there will be nothing else.
I'm still not going to glibly endorse the actions of a dictatorship doing the right thing for all the wrong reasons. It is horrific that this human-rights black hole has such an influence on global industries, simply by dictating what its people are allowed to enjoy.
Nothing inside a video game should cost real money.
Counterpoint: Cosmetics. Developers get more money, whales and streamers get to show off, and the rest of us can still play normally.
Horseshit. You are guided to value whatever worthless crap the game sells. If that's the only way a game makes money - funneling you toward that is the only reason the game exists. That is what all systems exist for, and that is what the full might of developers' manipulative rhetoric steers you toward.
All video games make you value arbitrary nonsense. That is what makes them games.
Every form of 'it's only X, it's not as bad as Y' is just willful ignorance toward how Y served the purpose of separating you from as much actual money as possible, and X has the exact same goal but a sharper razor.
Games cost money to develop. Unless a game is open-source, you either pay a fixed price initially, or have microtransactions. The problem is when they get greedy and do both / make it pay to win. Selling cosmetics does not affect gameplay, so I don't mind them doing it.
Path of Exile is a good example. F2P, quality game, shit ton of content, and not once did I feel tempted to buy cosmetics. I did buy additional stashes once, but that was a conscious choice to support the devs after playing for tens of hours.
Again:
You are guided to value whatever worthless crap the game sells. If that’s even the primary way a game makes money - funneling you toward that is the only reason the game exists. That is what all systems exist for, and that is what the full might of developers’ manipulative rhetoric steers you toward.
And if it's that or buying games, gee, can you guess which one I endorse?
Most players I know do not pay for cosmetics. 'Whales' - rich people who want to show off, or who love the game and want to support it - buy them. Some streamers also buy, but they get compensated by their sponsers. There is the occassional case of a kid buying it with their parent's money, and such purchases should definitely be reversed, but otherwise I see nothing wrong.
There's also a good chance the so called 'whale' isn't actually that financially well off, and is being manipulated by the game into spending more than they can actually afford.
'It only rips off some people' is not a defense.
Don't bother, this guy is just absolutely out of touch and unhinged when it comes to games.
This won't affect anything I enjoy playing at all.
Microtransactions are just an even more inbred cousin of nft's where there was never even a theoretical possibility of real value. Dailies and such are cancer if you have to work or do literally anything in real life. This would be a welcome change.
Hope all Chinese "game" companys go bankrupt now :)
That might backfire, seeing as most major game publishers are China-owned to some extent or other.
The ones that let themselves be bought by the red plague dont deserve to exist! Greedy fucks.
I can't believe I'm calling China based for the second time in my life
I have not really seen any reports or studies that show the harm of loose gaming policies. Yes, some are addicted and it is an issue, but is this worthy of government intervention in the context of all other issues? I am unsure. Love to see the data which seems to be absent here.
A lot of these microtransactions are designed to prey on vulnerable individuals, at the expense of making the games worse for those who don't pay. It's an exploitative business model that should be outlawed.
It must be a real issue for them because it's a revenue stream via taxes as well, so they made this decision knowing it has a direct cost.
No. China sucks.