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Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

nobsgames.stavros.io

201–210 of 269 posts

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#201
post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you! Could you add them via the form? That way I can keep the feedback in one place.

Ah, found the form... but it was on the landing page that serves no other purpose but to forward people to the iOS or Android sections. So there's no real reason to ever go back to it. Perhaps link the form from the actual listing pages?

Yes, I need to split it off to another page and add an "Add a game" button.

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that there is no offline play until you purchase - furthermore SEGA still advertises their own games if you're connected to the internet. Any app, IMHO, that requires to be connected to the internet to play so it can deliver you ads doesn't belong on this list. Sonic 1, 2 and CD at least behave like this atm.

Does it require you to be connected to the internet? Or does it show you an ad if you are? Also, it shows an ad even if you pay? That doesn't sound great...

I really respect your effort, but something tells me that the list is going to be very short indeed if you don't allow any toxicity at all

It looks like you have a "DLC" flag, maybe add "Online Only" to the list as well..

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#203
post #86

I built a site that’s adjacent to this idea (www.darkpattern.games). It catalogs the dark patterns found in mobile games. Premium currency and ads are two of them but there are many more. The idea is that you could educate yourself so the dark patterns have less power over you and also you can browse the site to find good games that don’t have dark patterns.

That's a pretty well done site, thanks for taking the time to make it. I don't think that all 'dark patterns' are necessarily always bad, especially after seeing everything that made your list, as you have "Complete the Collection" as an example. While I think that it can definitely be abused and does belong on the list, I do think collecting things can be part of the fun of games for people, and that's been in games…

I don't know how I feel about labeling achievements, grinding, and leveling up as dark patterns

I guess they do technically exploit people's psychological weaknesses to make games more addictive than they'd be otherwise.. if you take all of those out, though, the classic Final Fantasy SNES games are basically just pixel art comic books

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#204
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not just charge money for games? Seems like a reasonable way for them to make money...

Because the app economy doesn't reward that kind of behaviour. A free game will get more downloads than a paid game. Kids are the biggest consumers of mobile games and they can't download it if it's paid and they don't have a credit card set on their account. Obscure games with low sales will fall off the rankings pretty quickly. And that's before you consider that there are only a few successful game types (Clash of…

Eh, as a kid in the 80s and 90s, we were by far the biggest consumers of console games which cost up to $50-$60, in 1980s dollars, and Nintendo had no problem making money.

Maybe it would be a good thing if children couldn't wantonly download adware without their parents inspecting it?

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#205
post #56

Here is my contribution (a webapp, a.k.a. a website) http://lalo.li/lsd/ coded it years ago mostly drunk on an island in Thailand, I now like to play it again on my iPad with iPencil. Github: https://github.com/franzenzenhofer/lsd (Warning: a single, dependency less CoffeeScript source file)

Any instructions on how to play this? All I can do is draw a line that then disappears when the dot hits the bottom of the screen.

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#206
post #109

I would like to build an app that's a series of games, that are all related. I want to use the freemium model, with a one-time payment. No ads, no subscriptions; once you pay, you own the entire game. What's a better model for this? A single app with a one-time IAP; or two apps, where one is free with no ads or IAPs, but there's a link to a separate paid app with no IAPs? It seems there's no way to distinguish easily…

> I would like to build an app that's a series of games, that are all related

This reminds me of the Cloverfield series. It would be interesting if you didn't know the games are related at the start or if you know they're related but they're not necessarily the same format or storyline. They just happen to exist in the same world.

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#207
post #205
post #56

Here is my contribution (a webapp, a.k.a. a website) http://lalo.li/lsd/ coded it years ago mostly drunk on an island in Thailand, I now like to play it again on my iPad with iPencil. Github: https://github.com/franzenzenhofer/lsd (Warning: a single, dependency less CoffeeScript source file)

Any instructions on how to play this? All I can do is draw a line that then disappears when the dot hits the bottom of the screen.

The dot bounces off lines :)

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#208
post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re in the Apple ecosystem, Apple Arcade is pretty great for this. Every game on it is an actual game, no IAP or ads.

Sorry to be snarky, but if they were on the "Apple ecosystem" they wouldn't call a tablet "a tablet"...

OP here, you are right. We bought some cheap Fire tablets and have regretted it. Amazon app store is a terrible experience. Almost 0 reviews for even popular apps. The only nice thing is you can push apps to devices through the Amazon website.

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#209
post #123
post #50

I echo the others here, Thanks! I have young kids and we let them use tablets on long trips, vacations, airplane rides. Finding games for them is impossible. They are too young to understand when characters, levels, items are locked. It seems like every 2 minutes they get stuck on some ad screen with a hidden X. I just want a game that when I pay $4, I get the full game. It doesn't even have to be a big, intensive ga…

Maybe not that advanced for your needs, but I made this drawing app for my son when he was little. https://babydraw.byteflip.de

My work flags your site as Pornographic for some reason.

Re: Show HN: Tired of mobile games with IAP and ads, I made No-Bullshit Games

#210
post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the BBC podcasts are ad-free, but I get them from within the UK. I am not sure if they have ads if served in other countries.

Hmm, at what point do all the trailers for other shows tip in to the advert category? I wouldn't want to try counting how many times I heard a trailer about 13 Minutes to the Moon last year, which I'm picking on specifically because I actually enjoyed it to make the point that the bucket choice can be very subjective.

The Brexitcast doesn't have ads. The Infinite Monkey Cage has a 10-15seconds clip in the end where they promote other science-y podcasts (which I always fast-forward anyway).

I also listen to the weekly "SecurityNow", in which out of the 2h there should be at least 10-15mins where Leo reads out his ads. Leo also tries to push SpinRite, but since SR has saved many disks in my lifetime, I gladly listen to that bit (finally we'll have a faster performing version soon-ish).

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