Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep the industry took an arrow to the knee.
You were downvoted because you referenced the wrong game. ;P
Maybe it passed into Oblivion ;)
Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
31–40 of 47 posts
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
No one putting gun to their head to cough up $4500. They are paying because of their own weakness or maybe because of market forces as they can't get their fix elsewhere. I can easily justify it ethically as "it's what my offering is valued by market". All my engineering education skills have not gone waste, those sleepless nights, missed dates - all paid off finally! Revs up Lamborghini bought on installment paid wi…
They are paying because app stores are allowing "authorize one payment" to mean "unlimited transactions are authorized". This is fraud, which is why Apple had to settle a class action for the exact same problem. Relying on a password, pin or parental control to prevent unauthorized purchases is irrelevant since in their absence, fraud is still illegal. https://www.macworld.com/article/2029384/apple-to-settle-law...
I think there are basically four categories of big spenders:
(1) People who don't understand that they are spending actual money. Kids can fall into this category. Also people who are confused by an intentionally obfuscated user interface.
(2) People who are spending someone else's money, so they don't care. Kids can also fall into this category. (And when they do they may pretend they are in category 1.)
(3) People who can't afford it but have some kind of compulsive shopping disorder, addiction to the game or spending, etc. (People in this category might pretend they are category 1, i.e. request a refund and blame it on children who might even be fictional.)
(4) People rich enough that they will feel no ill effect from dropping $1,000+ on something of little value.
Whales are, at least theoretically, presumed to be category 4. There really isn't too much of an ethical problem IMHO with category 4.
The real ethical problem comes from the fact that you don't truly know which category the user is in.
Anyway, I think you are talking about category 1 and the person you replied to is talking about category 4.
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are paying because app stores are allowing "authorize one payment" to mean "unlimited transactions are authorized". This is fraud, which is why Apple had to settle a class action for the exact same problem. Relying on a password, pin or parental control to prevent unauthorized purchases is irrelevant since in their absence, fraud is still illegal. https://www.macworld.com/article/2029384/apple-to-settle-law...
I think there are basically four categories of big spenders: (1) People who don't understand that they are spending actual money. Kids can fall into this category. Also people who are confused by an intentionally obfuscated user interface. (2) People who are spending someone else's money, so they don't care. Kids can also fall into this category. (And when they do they may pretend they are in category 1.) (3) People…
If #4 actually existed platforms and developers would put real prices in the games instead of obfuscate the transactions and currencies. This would make them the same as every online and brick-and-mortar shop, where children and adults alike are not inadvertently spending thousands of dollars stemming from a single small purchase but may do so with explicit consent.
There are definitely millions of #1 though, we know this because Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Google have all been sued for the sheer volume of #1s they allowed/enabled to be defrauded.
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2014/09/googl...
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2014/01/apple...
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-classaction-idUS...
https://www.ftcadlaw.com/ftc-scores-big-win-against-amazon-i...
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#34> But he says he's amazed that in a game designed to be played by children it would even be possible to spend thousands of pounds across a thousand transactions over the course of just a few weeks. These games are designed around this. The dark patterns are intentional. > "We encourage parents to review their payment settings on third-party services, such as Google Play, as they typically have an option to require a…
A friend, who worked at a famous mobile/Fb gaming company, once told me his company would, sometimes, assign an engineer for an individual user or just few users. High spending users.
[deleted]
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#35How can a game developer ethically justify a $4500 price tag for a game? Yes, we can put in limits on spending, but let’s say we didn’t, does that mean a game could be worth that much money? Ever?
Devil's advocate: It's not 4500$, but a lot of microtransactions.
A lot of mobiles games make most of their money on "Whales" that represent less than 1% of their playerbase.
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#36> But he says he's amazed that in a game designed to be played by children it would even be possible to spend thousands of pounds across a thousand transactions over the course of just a few weeks. These games are designed around this. The dark patterns are intentional. > "We encourage parents to review their payment settings on third-party services, such as Google Play, as they typically have an option to require a…
A friend, who worked at a famous mobile/Fb gaming company, once told me his company would, sometimes, assign an engineer for an individual user or just few users. High spending users.
"whales" is the free-to-p(l)ay/ freemium games industry term for this sort of power user, who will spend vastly more than the average user and carries the lions share of the profit for the developer.
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#37Being a long time Elder Scrolls fan, I was disappointed yesterday upon trying out Elder Scrolls Online for the first time. The constant stream of reminders and up-front placement of things to spend money on is extremely immersion-breaking. I'm going to put more hours into it just to see if there really is a hidden kernel of fun in there, but so far it hasn't done anything to hide the fact that it's a brazen cash-grab wearing TES clothing. I really don't mind paying for quality games and DLCs, but in ESO, doing anything except for failing basically requires sending a stream of cash to Zenimax. :/
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#38How can a game developer ethically justify a $4500 price tag for a game? Yes, we can put in limits on spending, but let’s say we didn’t, does that mean a game could be worth that much money? Ever?
No one putting gun to their head to cough up $4500. They are paying because of their own weakness or maybe because of market forces as they can't get their fix elsewhere. I can easily justify it ethically as "it's what my offering is valued by market". All my engineering education skills have not gone waste, those sleepless nights, missed dates - all paid off finally! Revs up Lamborghini bought on installment paid wi…
Did you forget to end your comment with a "/s"?
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
A friend, who worked at a famous mobile/Fb gaming company, once told me his company would, sometimes, assign an engineer for an individual user or just few users. High spending users.
"whales" is the free-to-p(l)ay/ freemium games industry term for this sort of power user, who will spend vastly more than the average user and carries the lions share of the profit for the developer.
Usually lonely people who try to impress strangers online
Re: Dad horrified at £4,642 gaming app bill
#40How can a game developer ethically justify a $4500 price tag for a game? Yes, we can put in limits on spending, but let’s say we didn’t, does that mean a game could be worth that much money? Ever?
The industry actually has a term for people who spend compulsively like that. They literally call them "Whales"
Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.
Srsly, if you rip of loners for community status, that's Rock bottom as a game.. a slot machine dev