This shovelware spam is making trophy hunting less fun

[VigilantCrow]

4 minutes ago, Pots3k said:

The reason these "games" exist is far worse than that. The only reason they exist is that someone has realized they can make money off people who want to hear the "ding" noise and the dopamine injection.

It was a slow burn, these games didn't just come up out of nowhere. It had to become acceptable to make games smaller and the community are the ones who allowed this to happen. 

[SnowxSakura]

One of the easier fixes would be to just make it so only one stack of a game counts towards the leaderboard

[Pots3k]

Just now, SnowxSakura said:

One of the easier fixes would be to just make it so only one stack of a game counts towards the leaderboard

Yeah absolutely, that would be a great start.

[RedDevil757]

I would try and just have fun hunting trophies for yourself. Leaderboards here are flawed. It's not about skill anymore. It's about who can play and stack as much crap as possible. Unless you play said crap and stack the crap out of it. You'll never be competitive on leaderboards.

[Maxie_M0us3]

22 minutes ago, RedDevil757 said:

I would try and just have fun hunting trophies for yourself. Leaderboards here are flawed. It's not about skill anymore. It's about who can play and stack as much crap as possible. Unless you play said crap and stack the crap out of it. You'll never be competitive on leaderboards.

It’s also about who can spend the most cash as possible.

[BENJAM1N_LINUS]

I don't personally care about the leaderboard aspect, or how my trophies compare to others, but I can see how if you are into that meta that this situation is a nightmare.

 

As it is, it's just annoying to see the store absolutely littered with true scammy shit.

 

Say what you will about the easy plat games that, at least in part, have a business model intending to sell you on an easy plat such as the Ratalaika or EastAsiaSoft games... but those are real games. I know a lot of people here hate them, and many buy them just for the plat, but there is merit to them and game to be played beyond just getting the plat. Take a lot of the small VN games for example, you can certainly plat them in 2 minutes- or you can actually play/read it for the few hours it takes (such as myself). How you play it is on you.

 

But the relatively new epidemic of these jump/animal letter/etc "games" are pure trash. There is no merit or game. The problem is, you can't outlaw them either because I don't want Sony or anyone else deciding for everyone what they deem to be a "real" game.

 

Getting rid of region stacks is a good measure for sure though. It's clearly possible to have different regional versions without multiple stacks so quite frankly it should have never been a thing for any game in the first place. I'm not sure what else you could do. Put limits on the number of games a publisher can release in a certain time frame? Seems unfair though. Perhaps they could honestly just take a scalpel approach and instead of putting out blanket policies that would effect all publishers/devs- take action on these specific games/publishers? There's really just a handful of them. I dunno.

Edited August 30, 2022 by BENJAM1N_LINUS

[willmill97]

10 minutes ago, BENJAM1N_LINUS said:

But the relatively new epidemic of these jump/animal letter/etc "games" are pure trash. There is no merit or game. The problem is, you can't outlaw them either because I don't want Sony or anyone else deciding for everyone what they deem to be a "real" game.

 

It's literally called quality control. They absolutely should be able to deem whether they're real games, because they absolutely aren't 

[EDGES]

I see how it can upset you if you're going for leaderboard stats, sucks for those people

for me, some guy can pay $1000 for 1000 $1 1 minute Plats, his profile is worthless to me, it's not about the quantity with trophies anymore, it's only about quality, that's how I feel about it

[You]

14 minutes ago, BENJAM1N_LINUS said:

I don't personally care about the leaderboard aspect, or how my trophies compare to others, but I can see how if you are into that meta that this situation is a nightmare.

 

As it is, it's just annoying to see the store absolutely littered with true scammy shit.

 

Say what you will about the easy plat games that, at least in part, have a business model intending to sell you on an easy plat such as the Ratalaika or EastAsiaSoft games... but those are real games. I know a lot of people here hate them, and many buy them just for the plat, but there is merit to them and game to be played beyond just getting the plat. Take a lot of the small VN games for example, you can certainly plat them in 2 minutes- or you can actually play/read it for the few hours it takes (such as myself). How you play it is on you.

 

But the relatively new epidemic of these jump/animal letter/etc "games" are pure trash. There is no merit or game. The problem is, you can't outlaw them either because I don't want Sony or anyone else deciding for everyone what they deem to be a "real" game.

 

Getting rid of region stacks is a good measure for sure though. It's clearly possible to have different regional versions without multiple stacks so quite frankly it should have never been a thing for any game in the first place. I'm not sure what else you could do. Put limits on the number of games a publisher can release in a certain time frame? Seems unfair though. Perhaps they could honestly just take a scalpel approach and instead of putting out blanket policies that would effect all publishers/devs- take action on these specific games/publishers? There's really just a handful of them. I dunno.

 

Great post, agree with everything.

 

I honestly don't think there's anything that can be done, genie is out of the bottle, the flood gates are opened. The only thing left to do is to try and not let it get any worse, like how on Steam 1 game can have 5000-10000 achievements in a single game. As much as these new "games" are dumb, Introducing new policy measures seems a bit unfair to other devs who want to start.

If Sony allow literal advertisement menu screens for other games as platinum, then well the gloves are off and almost any type of "game" is possible.

 

There will I think be a cut off point though, which is starting to happen already, that a lot of casual users buying these games occassionally will see the light and then stop buying them. Then it's going to be kinda like the "whales" of the mobile phone ecosystem, with only a few people with wads of cash buying everything.

Ikemenzi due to no fault of his own has been removed off the leaderboards twice, it will be an interesting time if his PS5 bugs out a third time. I mean the guy's life is pretty much keeping his lead, I wonder what's gonna happen if he gets banned for good. Because you know, if you're not in some leaderboard somewhere, those trophies are gonna be worthless right?

Edited August 30, 2022 by enaysoft

[darkrequiem7]

Surely the main reason shovelware games exist is because sites like this have leaderboards. Those who want cheap, quick plats to boost their numbers have to be the prime consumer of these "games." 

 

I never tried to be competitive. While it's fun to go up the ranks, there's been plenty of times over the years where I would play less Playstation and more PC or binged tv shows for a month or two and my rank went down. Instead I just try to go for a better completion rating of my own profile. I don't worry about what others are doing. Y'all are strangers to me anyway.

[Pots3k]

9 minutes ago, BENJAM1N_LINUS said:

I don't personally care about the leaderboard aspect, or how my trophies compare to others, but I can see how if you are into that meta that this situation is a nightmare.

 

As it is, it's just annoying to see the store absolutely littered with true scammy shit.

 

Say what you will about the easy plat games that, at least in part, have a business model intending to sell you on an easy plat such as the Ratalaika or EastAsiaSoft games... but those are real games. I know a lot of people here hate them, and many buy them just for the plat, but there is merit to them and game to be played beyond just getting the plat. Take a lot of the small VN games for example, you can certainly plat them in 2 minutes- or you can actually play/read it for the few hours it takes (such as myself). How you play it is on you.

 

But the relatively new epidemic of these jump/animal letter/etc "games" are pure trash. There is no merit or game. The problem is, you can't outlaw them either because I don't want Sony or anyone else deciding for everyone what they deem to be a "real" game.

 

Getting rid of region stacks is a good measure for sure though. It's clearly possible to have different regional versions without multiple stacks so quite frankly it should have never been a thing for any game in the first place. I'm not sure what else you could do. Put limits on the number of games a publisher can release in a certain time frame? Seems unfair though. Perhaps they could honestly just take a scalpel approach and instead of putting out blanket policies that would effect all publishers/devs- take action on these specific games/publishers? There's really just a handful of them. I dunno.

I haven't played or really taken much stock in the Ratalaika games but I searched a couple you platted on google and yeah, they're games with ratings and reviews. Unlike Nump Jump or Mayo. I mean, I just think it wouldn't be that hard for the basest level of curation, from that perspective.

[The Alchemist]

8 hours ago, Pots3k said:

Oh and to anyone lined up with a "none of it matters" or "who cares" or equally unimaginative post, I'll cut you off right now because, you see, the point of a leaderboard is to create an environment of competition between people which is inherently important to the people involved. If you're not interested in that competition, good for you, other people are.

 

Okay, I get your point, but... if you care about leaderboards then you'll just have to accept that you need to play ezpz to keep up or you're going to fall behind. The reason so many of us don't care about leaderboards and think they don't matter anymore is for that exact reason. We don't want to nor are we willing to play ezpz trash 24/7 in a futile attempt to keep pace with the top guys on leaderboards. It's a complete waste of time, money and effort. 

 

It seems to me that you want leaderboards to matter, which is fair enough, but there isn't a solution to what you're asking and I don't know if there ever will be. Unless there's a total reset and new leaderboards using different metrics get introduced then it'll remain the same as it is now, with ezpz spammers coming out on top.

 

99% of us here are used to seeing our country and worldwide ranks in the red these days and there's no point getting hung up over it, because it's a no-win situation. You can either join the spammers in a pathetic attempt to climb leaderboards or you can accept that it's not worth it and quit worrying about leaderboards altogether and go at your own pace, enjoying the games you actually want to play. 

[coldish-pride5]

the point of a leaderboard is to create an environment of competition between people which is inherently important to the people involved. If you're not interested in that competition, good for you, other people are.? You don’t get to choose or judge based on your own standards, I get my platinum badge today in 14 months, I live within my means and I’ve worked my way up to 3rd place, buying cross buys and any cheap affordable plats as possible, if you don’t like that, “then tough luck” you don’t get to judge me!!, 

[TJ_Solo]

27 minutes ago, willmill97 said:

 

It's literally called quality control. They absolutely should be able to deem whether they're real games, because they absolutely aren't 

 

That isn't what quality control is. All software QC is making sure the app runs, it does not brick the device that it is running, and isn't a backdoor to other security issues.

QC is not the Criterion Collection. 

[djb5f]

56 minutes ago, RedDevil757 said:

I would try and just have fun hunting trophies for yourself. Leaderboards here are flawed. It's not about skill anymore. It's about who can play and stack as much crap as possible. Unless you play said crap and stack the crap out of it. You'll never be competitive on leaderboards.

Leaderboards were never about skill.  Leaderboard chasing was always a fool’s endeavor IMO.  It was about who had the most time (and fewest interests outside of gaming, be it family, friends/social, career, other hobbies, etc.).  Secondarily, money always came into play in regards to who was willing to spend their disposable income to have a huge quantity of games.  And let’s not pretend that every game was the same length, difficulty, etc. There were shortcuts before.

 

Don’t get me wrong, the issue with leaderboards is MUCH more pronounced now, it is a mockery of the system but there are some benefits to it, in that many will see the pure lunacy of it in the first place and finally stop chasing.  Moderation is the key to life.

The horse is already out of the barn.  It would’ve been nice to keep these PSN shovelware games as smaller point totals with no platinum but that didn’t happen.

 

I’m also in favor of a rarity leaderboard as another metric (like PSNTL has) but I’d caution against chasing that too, lol.  It is a losing battle.

 

[Silver-I-Chariot]

4 minutes ago, coldish-pride5 said:

I’ve bought my way up to 3rd place

 

Fixed it for you. 

[Pots3k]

Well, this has been fun and really constructive for the most part, I appreciate everyone's input. There's probably not much more that can be said about the matter, I'll just go back to playing games and maybe hanging around Truetrophies more instead. Thanks for the chat everyone! @DaivRules feel free to lock, I can see where this is starting to go

[YTPerfectParadox]

Happened to me a few years ago, I use to really enjoy trying to rise up the Australian leaderboard and got quite high but now i just don't see the point.

[VigilantCrow]

9 minutes ago, coldish-pride5 said:

the point of a leaderboard is to create an environment of competition between people which is inherently important to the people involved. If you're not interested in that competition, good for you, other people are.? You don’t get to choose or judge based on your own standards, I get my platinum badge today in 14 months, I live within my means and I’ve worked my way up to 3rd place, buying cross buys and any cheap affordable plats as possible, if you don’t like that, “then tough luck” you don’t get to judge me!!, 

We can judge anyone we want and for any reason. Welcome to the real world kiddo. 

 

[sepheroithisgod]

7 hours ago, MidnightDragon said:

Worry about what you do and not worry about others so much.

Doesn't really work when what other people do affects your leaderboard position.

[Bumperklever]

It would still be nice if this site introduces a rarity leaderboard and a completionist one.

 

Also truetrophies custom leaderboard were you can just invite your friends would be pretty dope too.

 

All things that can benefit this site.

[Speling_Expirt]

Agree with OP. 

 

So, so sad to see the PS Store, PSNP Trophy lists and PSNP new game lists get absolutely washed with this crap

 

[SnowxSakura]

The amount of shovelware reminds me of the market crash in the early 80s

[HusKy]

2 hours ago, SnowxSakura said:

One of the easier fixes would be to just make it so only one stack of a game counts towards the leaderboard

 

This doesn't sound like a good solution at all? There's a ton of games that have stacks where you need to play the stack from scratch.

[Mellenthin]

I think it's disheartening that Sly doesn't involve himself with the site as he did in the past. I you can butcher how DLC is calculated in order to please the masses, surely you can do something similar in this situation as well, no?

 

Unfortunately, I see PSNP going towards the same fate as PST - all that's left is milking the site until there's nothing left.?