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How a mediocre online multiplayer can spoil a good game


SonicMTD

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20 minutes ago, Darling Baphomet said:

 

Is there any actual data supporting the idea that triple A games need microtransactions in order to do well? Sure, games are cheap, but the gaming market has also expanded exponentially. It's not like games are a product with solely physical value where there's a set cost for every item sold - once the actual games are made, disk costs are practically irrelevant. Publishers like 2K and EA aren't hurting for lack of money - they're rolling in profits; it's less a matter of survival so much as ever expanding profit margins.

 


That’s true - and from a publisher side, I think you are right, it is profit maximisation primarily, but on the dev side I think there is an argument for a genuine need nowadays.


it’s my understanding that the benefit of micro transactions for developers is less about overall profit margins, as it is about continuity of employment and alleviation of a ‘boom and bust’ economy within the developers that has arisen as the development pipeline has become so long for big games now.

 

Back in the day, games typically took less time to develop, and had smaller teams working on them, so there were less long droughts between big releases. Now, bigger games have dev teams in the hundreds, and a specific dev will typically have only 2 or 3 prestige products launch in a year, maximum. For most, it’s less than 1.

 

That means that  there will be significant periods of time where less money is coming in, and the dev has to either pay hundreds of salaries, or scale down in the lean times, and unless the ‘boom’ sales are enormous, the ‘bust’ times are tough - and micro transactional stuff, as well as dlcs, help to smooth over those troughs, allowing a more steady continuity of personnel.

Edited by DrBloodmoney
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7 hours ago, SonicMTD said:


Huh didn’t know the UK was that overpriced back then. I’m looking at this through my ignorant Canadian sunglasses but I suppose I should have looked up game prices outside of North America.

 

I made an entire video about why we still need physical media as opposed to digital:

 

 

in the event you want to skip that. I highlighted how physical gives you more options as in: I can go to the local library and pick up a game, I can trade with my friends. Back during the years of just physical sales I could spend a fraction of the price to rent a game from a Blockbuster Video. Having online storefronts works if the games can depreciate in price and make them accessible to those who can’t normally afford it.

 

If we eliminated those options and went to digital storefronts there is no way I would have been able to afford gaming since I relied so heavily on second hand games and rentals in order to get them.

 

Hell going back to game ownership, your game essentially can become unplayable in the event something like a DRM license expires, which is what happened with Tron Legacy.

 

Microtransactions work in free to play games but including them in a $70 game is lunacy. You can’t have your cake and f**k it too. I will not budge on that stance.

 

I was thinking the other day that it would be really awesome to have Blockbuster around right now but mainly for games. Streaming films/tv shows is way more convenient than going to Blockbuster and renting a VHS/DVD and bringing it home. But I don't think there's any real way to rent games. I know stuff like PS Now exists but it has a very limited library. Like I'm working my way through my PS3 backlog and certain games like the Lego games can be completed in less than a week for me. I wouldn't mind paying £5 to rent it and give it back at the end of the week. I'd prefer that to buying it on ebay and having to resell it after or trading it in at a game store when they reopen

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36 minutes ago, Darling Baphomet said:

Ultimately these corporations will do whatever you let them get away with - see disasters such as Battlefront 2 locking Vader behind dozens of hours of grinding, or loot boxes in every other multiplayer game. I'd wager people who complain about microtransactions do just as much, if not more, to ensure the quality of games, by making it less profitable to stuff every game full of microtransactions. If they could get away with it, EA and 2K would be making every game like the NBA games in terms of predatory microtransactions.

 

Battlefront 2 at launch is one of the finest and few exceptions where the monetization actually had an impact because it was an online pvp game with pay to win mechanics. 

 

They aren't getting away with anything really, a system was implemented to make more money long term and it has only worked because gamers are willingly buying it up. As I said before the blame can't solely fall on publishers when the consumers are participating. 

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4 minutes ago, HMS_Victor said:

 

I was thinking the other day that it would be really awesome to have Blockbuster around right now but mainly for games. Streaming films/tv shows is way more convenient than going to Blockbuster and renting a VHS/DVD and bringing it home. But I don't think there's any real way to rent games. I know stuff like PS Now exists but it has a very limited library. Like I'm working my way through my PS3 backlog and certain games like the Lego games can be completed in less than a week for me. I wouldn't mind paying £5 to rent it and give it back at the end of the week. I'd prefer that to buying it on ebay and having to resell it after or trading it in at a game store when they reopen

You can rent with Gamefly or Redbox here in the states at least. Don't know if you have an equivalent over in europe

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1 hour ago, BrandedBerserk said:

Wether someone wants to earn in game rewards by playing the game normally or willingly spending money to do so what effect does it have on you exactly?

 

I've played a ton games with micro transactions yet I've never spent a single dollar on anything other than dlcs or season pass. You don't need em, you can fully enjoy whatever game it is you're playing without spending anything extra. Pay to win monetization ill agree is shitty but battle passes, skins or time savers won't have any impact on you whatsoever. 

I couldn't care less how a person plays their games. However let me tell you about the effect I have experienced ever since that approach to gaming became profitable.

 

Instead of receiving a well thought out GTA after a certain amount of time after the last installment's release, we get......more online "content". Instead of having well thought out single player DLC like "The Lost and Damned"/"The Ballad of Gay Tony" for GTA IV or "Hearts of Stone/Blood and Wine" for Witcher III, we either get lootboxes, ripped out content being sold back to us under the guise ot it being DLC or nothing at all.

 

Why was the planned SP expansion for GTA V scrapped? Why doesn't RDR2 receive one? Because it is way more profitable to create content for GTA Online or Read Dead Online, both of which simply don't have the same production quality like single player experiences.

 

Back in the Black Ops II days it started with purchasable camos for your guns. It looked like your entire gun was wrapped in bacon or dollar bills. Looked silly but kinda funny, yet I never purchased one of those for 2€. As a matter of fact I have never purchased anything microtransaction related. Back in the day I never even purchased DLC. That's just my way of approaching this situation. Then there came a time where COD was so lootbox ridden that it wasn't funny anymore.

 

Black Ops III at the beginning: Only cosmetics in lootboxes.

Not too long down the line: Special weapons with very good stats in lootboxes.

 

I don't have to buy ingame currency for NBA 2K, never have, never will. I just can't play this series anymore that I once held so dear simply because it's a rip-off machine at this point.

 

Games also tend to make the grind more heavy to incentivise people to purchase a shortcut or ingame currency.

 

I agree with you in the sense that everybody has the right to play their games how they see fit (imho that exludes hacking and the like), even if I don't like their approach to gaming.

But nobody can deny the fact that gamers who don't like those rip-off strategies are affected by this in some way and therefore I don't think it's as easy as to say: If you don't like it, you don't have to buy it. Nobodies forcing you.

 

Imagine going to the cinema and getting a seat facing the back wall. You can purchase a seat facing the screen for an additional 30 bucks. Nobody's forcing you to do so.

While that example sounds completely ridiculous it shows something that another poster in this thread already mentioned: First, create a problem. Second, provide the solution. Third, profit.

 

Edited by JohnlMatrix
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2 minutes ago, BrandedBerserk said:

They aren't getting away with anything really, a system was implemented to make more money long term and it has only worked because gamers are willingly buying it up. As I said before the blame can't solely fall on publishers when the consumers are participating. 

 

You realize gambling is an actual, psychological addiction, right? One that game developers make a very concerted effort to exploit. If someone deliberately got kids addicted to drugs, would you blame the children for continuing to buy them once addicted?

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I don't think the online spoiled the game.  The online portion was definitely a let down as far as playing with friends goes.  My friends and I didn't have that much fun after we completed the few short story missions in the beginning.  However, I did like the PvP matches.  Specifically, make it count.  

 

The single player portion of the game is a 10/10 for me and the overall game with online considered is still a 8 or 9 in my opinion.  

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35 minutes ago, Darling Baphomet said:

 

You realize gambling is an actual, psychological addiction, right? One that game developers make a very concerted effort to exploit. If someone deliberately got kids addicted to drugs, would you blame the children for continuing to buy them once addicted?

 

As someone who enjoys gambling at the casino from time to time, I'm well aware how addictive it can get but that's on me for making the decision to spend my money there. To answer your question, no I wouldn't blame the children but I'd question the parents for not educating them on the matter. Until games start making it mandatory for you to partake, I wouldn't say they're deliberately trying to get you addicted but rather giving an alternative for those who do wish to spend. Oh and it's almost always publishers that push for monetization not the developers

 

59 minutes ago, JohnlMatrix said:

Why was the planned SP expansion for GTA V scrapped? Why doesn't RDR2 receive one? Because it is way more profitable to create content for GTA Online or Read Dead Online, both of which simply don't have the same production quality like single player experiences.

 

Games also tend to make the grind more heavy to incentivise people to purchase a shortcut or ingame currency.

 

While that example sounds completely ridiculous it shows something that another poster in this thread already mentioned: First, create a problem. Second, provide the solution. Third, profit.

 

 

I'll agree with you on the first part. Take Two seems to have found a huge money maker and that's the way they'll be going forward in the future with their online content it seems which is fine by me as long as they keep putting out excellent single player experiences. I know some people really enjoy the online aspect but I didn't so just decided to skip out on it. 

 

As for time savers, I'll use the recent assassins creed games as an example. People claimed that the game was too much of a grind and that it was obvious they did that in order to persuade people to buy time savers. After only 50 hours or so of just playing through the games content, I was maxed out with some of the best gear possible. Is 40 to 50 hours in order to reach that point really much of a grind to where you can't just play through it normally? Seems like you're essentially paying more to not play the game. Games such as NBA 2k or fifa are a different story though.

 

In most cases it's not a problem but rather an alternative. That's how I see it. 

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35 minutes ago, BrandedBerserk said:

I'll agree with you on the first part. Take Two seems to have found a huge money maker and that's the way they'll be going forward in the future with their online content it seems which is fine by me as long as they keep putting out excellent single player experiences. I know some people really enjoy the online aspect but I didn't so just decided to skip out on it. 

 

As for time savers, I'll use the recent assassins creed games as an example. People claimed that the game was too much of a grind and that it was obvious they did that in order to persuade people to buy time savers. After only 50 hours or so of just playing through the games content, I was maxed out with some of the best gear possible. Is 40 to 50 hours in order to reach that point really much of a grind to where you can't just play through it normally? Seems like you're essentially paying more to not play the game. Games such as NBA 2k or fifa are a different story though.

 

In most cases it's not a problem but rather an alternative. That's how I see it. 

Given I was using pretty extreme examples, but that was my point. I don't care who speeds things up in Assassin's Creed. But at which point does the alternativ become a problem where the solution is also delivered right away in form of the option to pay for progress so to speak. I don't care who buys what camo. But somewhere down the road I'll maybe not be able to obtain a cool camo or costume through effort, but rather through payment. Look at Dead or alive with its 150 season passes for costumes.

Edited by JohnlMatrix
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4 hours ago, NxtDoc said:

 

I can't believe this bullshit stance.  It totally rings as tone deaf.  You miss the whole point.

 

These Publisher's and Developer's are creating a problem.  And selling the solution.  For younger generations of gamers that there 1st console was a PS3 or 360, they won't notice how this is bullshit.  Because it's their norm.  

 

And as a fortunate gamer who grew up playing the NES, and on.  Owning a console from every generation I have seen just how far the greed has reached.  

 

They truly are creating a problem, to sell the solution.  And the whole bullshit "they aren't being forced" nonsense misses the point.  A lot of games now are built around the micro/macro-transactions instead of being built around a robust, fun experience with the addition of purchasable DLC.  I have no issues with purchasable DLC.  Examples being Dragon Age: Origins, or Dragon Age 2, or Witcher III.   

 

Tired of the nonsense no one is forcing you.  It's such an ignorant stance.  And you are just as much part of them problem as the idiots, and children taking part in buying the bullshit

 

 


I love this comment. Just hit the nail completely on the head and I agree.

 

3 hours ago, DrBloodmoney said:


it’s my understanding that the benefit of micro transactions for developers is less about overall profit margins, as it is about continuity of employment and alleviation of a ‘boom and bust’ economy within the developers that has arisen as the development pipeline has become so long for big games now.

 

Back in the day, games typically took less time to develop, and had smaller teams working on them, so there were less long droughts between big releases. Now, bigger games have dev teams in the hundreds, and a specific dev will typically have only 2 or 3 prestige products launch in a year, maximum. For most, it’s less than 1.

 

That means that  there will be significant periods of time where less money is coming in, and the dev has to either pay hundreds of salaries, or scale down in the lean times, and unless the ‘boom’ sales are enormous, the ‘bust’ times are tough - and micro transactional stuff, as well as dlcs, help to smooth over those troughs, allowing a more steady continuity of personnel.


The problem with that stance for example, are companies like EA who despite record breaking profits still decided to lay off hundreds of employees without warning. The problem is the money stays with the executive branch and the developers are really treated like shit. (Something I mention in the video I posted).

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46 minutes ago, BrandedBerserk said:

As someone who enjoys gambling at the casino from time to time, I'm well aware how addictive it can get but that's on me for making the decision to spend my money there. To answer your question, no I wouldn't blame the children but I'd question the parents for not educating them on the matter. Until games start making it mandatory for you to partake, I wouldn't say they're deliberately trying to get you addicted but rather giving an alternative for those who do wish to spend. Oh and it's almost always publishers that push for monetization not the developers

 

You do know what an addiction is, right?

 

There are deliberate marketing strategies at work here. If you think publishers are just accidentally sneaking predatory microtransactions into games played by kids... well, I'll refrain from finishing that sentence. There's a reason why they give you a lootbox here or there, just enough that you're introduced to the mechanic without actually giving you what you want; and there's a reason why there's always a shiny 'buy more lootboxes!' button there for when you're done with your freebies. You can use as much doublespeak as you want; 'they're simply offering surprise mechanics for those willing to spend money on them', but the fact of the matter is these games constantly dangle their gambling mechanics in front of their players' faces; their lootboxes are not some hidden feature in some little sub-menu that you have to work to find. They are aggressively showing you an addictive mechanic with the intention of getting you to spend money on it.

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17 hours ago, SonicMTD said:


The fact that they didn’t release RDO at launch but still had the balls to release it as broken makes my opinion of them way worse. Cause at that point they could have made RDO not have the bugs and glitches it came with.

 

An incredible amount of micro transactions are from kids who have access to their parents credit cards and have no idea what they’re doing. Many parents might leave their payment information saved on their console only to find their children blew through hundreds of dollars because they were only thinking of short term rewards. The fact that the first thing to show up in a lot of these games is usually the in game storefront, and a culture where kids bully others because they walk around in generic cosmetic items makes me think there needs to be more safeguards in place and that the industry cannot effectively police itself.

If kids are seriously robbing their parents highway style that's

1) The fault of the parents. Parents need to teach their kids about money.

2) The fault of the parents. If you don't put in the most basic parental features than your kids are literally unable to waste money on absolutely useless shit.

12 hours ago, SonicMTD said:


You and I are probably not going to see eye to eye on this, if you want to see issues with charging for cosmetics then I recommend you play Fortnite where kids are bullied for their lack of skins/emotes to the most recent Dead or Alive game where you have to pay to change your characters hair colour back after paying for it the first time.

 

If you want to play a game where they made it a slog by design so you use time savers try out 2017’s LotR shadow of war.

 

The only time I’ve seen DLC monetizing as a bonus was when The Witcher 3 offered new campaigns like Blood and Wine.

 

Then there’s Star Wars Battlefront 2 which was essentially a pay to win scam with loot boxes.

 

At this point the game industry is in dire need of regulation because they obviously can’t do it themselves.


While the cost of the games themselves are cheaper compared to the 80’s-90’s they also didn’t have paid subscriptions to play games such as PS+/Xbox Online and various other things like game pass/PS Now.

 

The cost of goods are increasing while wages are staying the same in places like the US. (Where some places pay $8 an hour and have to work multiple jobs to pay rent). 
 

So yeah I am pretty much against monetizing.

 

If you didn’t experience any issues with RDO then I consider you incredibly lucky. Either way, I’m done with the game.

 

Ah yes, the government intervering with games is just what we need. That'll solve all our issues. 'Do it for the kids! C'mon guys, don't be the bad guys!'

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5 hours ago, OmegaRejectz said:

If kids are seriously robbing their parents highway style that's

1) The fault of the parents. Parents need to teach their kids about money.

2) The fault of the parents. If you don't put in the most basic parental features than your kids are literally unable to waste money on absolutely useless shit.

Ah yes, the government intervering with games is just what we need. That'll solve all our issues. 'Do it for the kids! C'mon guys, don't be the bad guys!'


1) The problem is that stance is that a lot of parents have no f**king clue  about what the possible risk is. So basically by doing your point we’d have to educate the parents about the problems with the current game industry so they can then educate the kids. I would much rather create better safeguards in place.

 

2) While I understand the problems with government intervention (I was around for the violent video games cause violence IRL argument) right now, as we speak governments are currently weighing in on games like FIFA’s egregious monetization and loot boxes. You can be as passive aggressive as you want but it still doesn’t change the fact that the industry has messed up so badly that governments are now fighting in court to regulate the addictive gambling mechanics and problematic monetization found in these titles. Titles that are intended to be rated E for everyone because the industry absolutely sucks at regulating itself.

Edited by SonicMTD
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22 hours ago, B1rvine said:

The multiplayer experience really isn't really that bad.

 

I wouldn't say it's groundbreaking either, but it was at least enjoyable. It's a lot better than RDR1's online mode, since there's actually a multiplayer campaign to complete. My only issue is that lower ranked levels seem extremely underpowered in PvP modes, but it's easy enough to level up and earn money, without spending real money. It's really not that hard to spend about an hour doing daily objectives to earn about 2 gold bars a day.

 

Micro-transactions are everywhere, at least this game's options are mostly cosmetic, or non-essential. If you're an adult, then simply don't buy stuff, or don't save your credit card on the system so your kids can't buy things.

RDR 1 had the best online mode what are talking about. There was no grind and was fun and lot of people who I know agreed with me. There were no micro transactions and there was a friendly free roam. Other than playing poker and liars dice there were no currency involved. I spent over 1000 hours RDR1 online and it was the best experience in gaming I've had. I spend roughly 40,000 hours playing video games throughout me life. How dare you disrespect RDR 1 online, it's way more fun than God of war or any COD game.

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3 hours ago, patrickogorman19 said:

RDR 1 had the best online mode what are talking about. There was no grind and was fun and lot of people who I know agreed with me. There were no micro transactions and there was a friendly free roam. Other than playing poker and liars dice there were no currency involved. I spent over 1000 hours RDR1 online and it was the best experience in gaming I've had. I spend roughly 40,000 hours playing video games throughout me life. How dare you disrespect RDR 1 online, it's way more fun than God of war or any COD game.

 

Well, I feel like this topic is about at the point of beating a dead RDR horse, but anyway... I never said RDR1 was bad, or compared it to CoD or GoW. Simply that RDR2 Online is better than RDR1 Online. 

 

But you're incorrect. RDR1 absolutely had a grind, worse than RDR2. Both have you ranking up to level 50, but in RDR2 at least there are "roles" which made it fairly painless.

 

Otherwise, I see both online modes as basically being a bunch of mini-games, shoot-outs, and races that you can play. RDR2 has a campaign though, whereas RDR1 doesn't. Otherwise, they're largely similar. Sure, there's micro-transactions that are absolutely optional, and if you played RDR2 for 1000 hours as well, you'd certainly have enough cash to own everything, and not need to spend a dime of real money.

 

Edited by B1rvine
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On 10/04/2021 at 8:00 PM, DrBloodmoney said:


I’m not quite sure where I personally stand on ‘time saver’ type MT’s - I have yet to find a game to definitely push me towards one point of view or the other - but, I think there is a natural counterpoint to your argument here - shortcuts.

 

Do you think that the existence of Star Road in Super Mario World, or the Warps in Super Mario Bros 3 means that all the levels that you bypass using those are just ‘artificial padding’?

I mean, those are essentially the NES / SNES era version of ‘time savers’ - they just didn’t cost money. 

 

Back then, a lot of games had level skip cheat codes, often times written right into the game manual, or at the very least, freely available in magazines etc.

 

 

I’m not arguing that what you are suggesting here never happens - Lord knows, free phone games are rife with it - all I’m saying is that I think there are almost certainly perfectly good games out there, where the ‘grind’ or the loop is fun and engaging, that also happen to offer a ‘time-saver’ pack for a few bucks for people to do if they want to experience end game stuff without putting in the hours to get it - and while I might once have baulked at that notion, getting older and having more responsibilities and demands on my time, and less gaming time to whittle away, I can understand the impetus behind those. 

Your comparison to older games such as mario is not exactly the same thing. I know old games used to have cheat codes to skip levels or shortcuts to bypass levels, thats one thing.

 

im specifically talking about modern games with a time saver pack that you can pay real money for. Sure its still a shortcut to skip content that might still be fun but no one believes that time saver packs that you can pay for is in favor of the player buying them. It might look that way but if you buy a game at a premium price to enjoy a piece of entertainment for hours on end, then why in the world would you skip content that and i quote “I think there are almost certainly perfectly good games out there, where the ‘grind’ or the loop is fun and engaging, that also happen to offer a ‘time-saver’ pack” are supposed to be fun and engaging? That makes no sense at all.

 

I dont care what others use their money on but how can anyone defend time saver packs to skip content that is supposed to be fun that you just paid alot of money for? If the content isnt fun and time saver packs would skip that part of the game, then why is said content in the game to begin with?

 

Are executives saying, “this content isnt fun and is just extreme boring padding/filler, lets put some time saver packs in there!”

 

Fact is, its not okay. If you see a time saver pack in a video game that you can pay real money for you can bet that there are no good intentions behind it whatsoever.

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24 minutes ago, UlvenFenrir said:

Your comparison to older games such as mario is not exactly the same thing. I know old games used to have cheat codes to skip levels or shortcuts to bypass levels, thats one thing.

 

im specifically talking about modern games with a time saver pack that you can pay real money for. Sure its still a shortcut to skip content that might still be fun but no one believes that time saver packs that you can pay for is in favor of the player buying them. It might look that way but if you buy a game at a premium price to enjoy a piece of entertainment for hours on end, then why in the world would you skip content that and i quote “I think there are almost certainly perfectly good games out there, where the ‘grind’ or the loop is fun and engaging, that also happen to offer a ‘time-saver’ pack” are supposed to be fun and engaging? That makes no sense at all.

 

I dont care what others use their money on but how can anyone defend time saver packs to skip content that is supposed to be fun that you just paid alot of money for? If the content isnt fun and time saver packs would skip that part of the game, then why is said content in the game to begin with?

 

Are executives saying, “this content isnt fun and is just extreme boring padding/filler, lets put some time saver packs in there!”

 

Fact is, its not okay. If you see a time saver pack in a video game that you can pay real money for you can bet that there are no good intentions behind it whatsoever.


Sure - you make some decent points (and I chose to ignore the bolded part, and just take that as being a figure of speech, and not you stating that your opinion is fact.)

 

There’s nothing objectionable about what you say, but while I do find the argument about ‘skipping content that is meant to be fun’ to be one I agree with generally, I find it a little rich on this site specifically, where autopops, dev console access, exploits, clip-skipping etc are all fair game, and threads about them are generally met with appreciative thanks and immediate use.

 

I guess I just don’t see a huge difference if the ‘skip’ costs a couple bucks or if it’s free - use is still at the players discretion, and if it doesn’t affect competitive MP, and is within the rules of the site, trophy wise, then it’s none of my business how someone chooses to spend their gaming time. ?‍♂️
 

They paid for the game, after all, and their free time was earned by them. 

Edited by DrBloodmoney
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A fool and his money are soon parted.

 

I don’t love microtransactions but it is largely cosmetic focused which is perfectly fine with me.  Let others invest in this (they see a value to it or would not buy it).  The revenue generated from it gets re-invested into those same games (season release content) and into future games.

 

Without micro-transactions, the price of games would be higher than they are currently.  I am certain of it.  In real-time $$ , gaming is cheaper than ever.

 

Yes, consumers need money management skills.  This has always been the case.  Let’s not pretend these same consumers who buy microtransactions would not just spend that same money on additional games they just add to the backlog and never get around to playing.  Or lottery tickets.  Or cigarettes.  Or soda.  Or whatever consumable that is not really needed.

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11 hours ago, SonicMTD said:

So basically by doing your point we’d have to educate the parents about the problems with the current game industry so they can then educate the kids. I would much rather create better safeguards in place.

How is educating a worse solution than your proposed "safeguards"? Because it doesn't sound you want safeguards at all. You're vouching for the complete removal of them. Parents have so many options, easily implementable ones at that that makes it so their kids can't just spend a bunch of money. Parental settings have only gotten better over time, parents just need to spend fifteen minutes once to completely curb that spending.

45 minutes ago, djb5f said:

A fool and his money are soon parted.

 

I don’t love microtransactions but it is largely cosmetic focused which is perfectly fine with me.  Let others invest in this (they see a value to it or would not buy it).  The revenue generated from it gets re-invested into those same games (season release content) and into future games.

 

Without micro-transactions, the price of games would be higher than they are currently.  I am certain of it.  In real-time $$ , gaming is cheaper than ever.

 

Yes, consumers need money management skills.  This has always been the case.  Let’s not pretend these same consumers who buy microtransactions would not just spend that same money on additional games they just add to the backlog and never get around to playing.  Or lottery tickets.  Or cigarettes.  Or soda.  Or whatever consumable that is not really needed.

"nope, gAmEs baD! mIcRoTraNsActiOns hAve No PosiTivEs. iTs the ComPanIes fAuLt nOt tHe cOnsUmerS!!!'

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2 hours ago, OmegaRejectz said:

How is educating a worse solution than your proposed "safeguards"? Because it doesn't sound you want safeguards at all. You're vouching for the complete removal of them. Parents have so many options, easily implementable ones at that that makes it so their kids can't just spend a bunch of money. Parental settings have only gotten better over time, parents just need to spend fifteen minutes once to completely curb that spending.

"nope, gAmEs baD! mIcRoTraNsActiOns hAve No PosiTivEs. iTs the ComPanIes fAuLt nOt tHe cOnsUmerS!!!'

 

Alright let’s break this down. There is nothing wrong with making an ad campaign about educating parents about the inherent problems with monetization in modern gaming but you can do so much more. For example even something as basic as two factor authentication in order to make purchases is leaps and bounds better. The PS4 has a parental control mode but a lot of parents aren’t aware of that. Maybe if parents have to watch a tutorial or are given some kind of instruction before even booting up the storefront I’d be swayed but I consider this a failure on the side of the gaming industry. This has been a known issue for years and they have done practically f**k all.

 

Shrugging off your incredibly rude demeanor, I will agree with you on the stance that I do not support monetization. Primarily because a lot of the monetized features were free back before the online storefront gave companies the ability to sell a less complete game. I have been watching the industry try to monetize stuff that shouldn’t and to make games more geared towards monetization. If games are not properly regulated to deal with the monetization of loot boxes and online storefronts then the government needs to step in, which is currently happening in various courts throughout the world as we speak.

 

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16 hours ago, B1rvine said:

 

Well, I feel like this topic is about at the point of beating a dead RDR horse, but anyway... I never said RDR1 was bad, or compared it to CoD or GoW. Simply that RDR2 Online is better than RDR1 Online. 

 

But you're incorrect. RDR1 absolutely had a grind, worse than RDR2. Both have you ranking up to level 50, but in RDR2 at least there are "roles" which made it fairly painless.

 

Otherwise, I see both online modes as basically being a bunch of mini-games, shoot-outs, and races that you can play. RDR2 has a campaign though, whereas RDR1 doesn't. Otherwise, they're largely similar. Sure, there's micro-transactions that are absolutely optional, and if you played RDR2 for 1000 hours as well, you'd certainly have enough cash to own everything, and not need to spend a dime of real money.

 

RDR 1 had co-op missions which is similar to the missions in RDR 2 well at launch, haven't play the game in 2 years. I never talk about levelling system in RDR 1 you do the pikes basin gang hideout which gave you a lot of XP, especially when there was the 3 times XP bonus, I reached max prestige for that game so I know the fastest  to level as well as the hardcore RDR 1 community. Play RDR 2 at launch so XP system is probably different now. In RDR 1 online you never had to buy weapons and upgrades, as well as buying horse or ammo. There was no competitive advantage when playing RDR 1 online when playing competitive events.

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9 hours ago, DrBloodmoney said:


Sure - you make some decent points (and I chose to ignore the bolded part, and just take that as being a figure of speech, and not you stating that your opinion is fact.)

 

There’s nothing objectionable about what you say, but while I do find the argument about ‘skipping content that is meant to be fun’ to be one I agree with generally, I find it a little rich on this site specifically, where autopops, dev console access, exploits, clip-skipping etc are all fair game, and threads about them are generally met with appreciative thanks and immediate use.

 

I guess I just don’t see a huge difference if the ‘skip’ costs a couple bucks or if it’s free - use is still at the players discretion, and if it doesn’t affect competitive MP, and is within the rules of the site, trophy wise, then it’s none of my business how someone chooses to spend their gaming time. ?‍♂️
 

They paid for the game, after all, and their free time was earned by them. 

But if it affects the way the single player experience is designed then there is a problem no? Its been showed time and time again how the experience is throttled because of a game that implements those packs or other mtx. I agree that if it doesnt affect other people in competitive MP then all is good. But youre also forgetting that even though it doesnt affect anyone directly, sometimes the way its implemented will affect everyone indirectly.

 

Whenever a developer tries to take away the fun factor from you, anywhere from slowing progression at the rate of which items are earned or if theye trying to artificially make the game longer for no reason its because they see potential for a gold mine. Then players moan, then developers come out with a piss poor PR statement as they normally do and come up with one excuse after another and the cycle continues.

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14 minutes ago, UlvenFenrir said:

But if it affects the way the single player experience is designed then there is a problem no? Its been showed time and time again how the experience is throttled because of a game that implements those packs or other mtx. I agree that if it doesnt affect other people in competitive MP then all is good. But youre also forgetting that even though it doesnt affect anyone directly, sometimes the way its implemented will affect everyone indirectly.

 

Whenever a developer tries to take away the fun factor from you, anywhere from slowing progression at the rate of which items are earned or if theye trying to artificially make the game longer for no reason its because they see potential for a gold mine. Then players moan, then developers come out with a piss poor PR statement as they normally do and come up with one excuse after another and the cycle continues.

 

I agree in those cases - actually, I don't think we are particularly opposed in terms of general outlook on MT's as a whole -  I just don't think that examples like the ones you cite are quite as common as you imply. 

When they do happen, the Dev's / Publishers usually get a right-royal spanking for it in the reviews, and it hits their financial bottom line in the end.

 

I mean, there have certainly been egregious examples - Battlefront 2 is a good one, as is Middle Earth: Shadow of War - and in both cases it affected the game critically and financially, and the games had to be patched to correct the issues. The companies lost face, lost sales, and lost future credibility, all of which will lose them far more money than they would have made from the MT sales, so I think - purely from a self-interest point of view - these will be less the norm, and more the exception.

 

Lots of Devs and publishers would like a steady stream of MT money coming in, but none of them want to risk losing more money on base game sales and/or future sales because they pushed it too far, and the critical community and the user bases is pretty astute in sniffing out where these things have gone too far, and delivering a swift, backhand-slap in return. 

 

All the more reason to keep arguing against them if that's how you feel, of course - personally I'm just being pragmatic.

I don't think MT as a concept is going anywhere, so I'm more interested in calling it out when it is overly sleazy or goes too far.

I have little stomach for a Quixotic quest to rid the whole world of all types of MT.

Sometimes, a windmill is just a windmill. Tilting at every one isn't going to make them all go away.

 

 

It might just be the particular games I've played, but I've personally experienced far fewer examples of obvious padding and unenjoyable grinds with MT-purchasable skips than I have perfectly enjoyable, fun games that happen to also offer them.

Edited by DrBloodmoney
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