Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I hate what video games have become

ivanca.tumblr.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

471–480 of 690 posts

Re: I hate what video games have become

#471

Post by gigaflop »

ridgered4 wrote: post #311
tyrfing wrote: post #53

It's a great business model for multiplayer games. They live and die on the basis of network effects, and gating access behind a $25-60 upfront payment means most games die from gradual attrition - which is just sad to watch happen when it's an enjoyable but niche game. Subscriptions are dead, with even Blizzard struggling to make it work, and most DLC models just don't work for multiplayer. Looking at my Steam libra…

I'm always the wrong guy to ask as a customer what business model to use to make money, but I remember reading some Call of Duty required people to buy maps or else you couldn't join multiplayer servers with them. There was a lot of predictable complaining that there weren't many players on the servers using the new maps. It honestly sounded exhausting to keep track of as a player to me and like it would server to re…

I'm not a console user, but ran into this when Modern Warfare 2 brought it to the PC (I think. If not MW2, then one of the early Black Ops titles). I was too young to have my own way to purchase them, but never felt the motivation to pay up, so I'd just get auto-kicked by the system if a lobby started with a map I didn't have access to.

I haven't played Call of Duty in a long time, but when I heard that Modern Warfare Remastered would have some maps locked behind a DLC[0] (along with the rest of the shitshow surrounding its release), I knew that I'd probably never buy another one of those titles again. I think the last I bought was MW2 or BO2.

On PC, in Modern Warfare 1, the maps were made available for free, while they cost extra for consoles. Modern Warfare Remastered 'conveniently' left them out of the base game, but charged a higher-than-original price for the pack, for all platforms. Consider that a remaster is generally supposed to contain all content (i.e. game + DLC), and this was a slap in the face to my younger self.

[0]https://callofduty.fandom.com/wiki/Variety_Map_Pack

Re: I hate what video games have become

#472

Post by jerf »

failrate wrote: post #428

There are so many new and dufferent games being created at all times, I defy you to even point in a general direction and say "this is what video games are". Coupled with that is the horrible viewpoint that the money for your game is now "wasted", which assumes that most everything we buy is kept, when in reality, most of what we buy is transient: food, energy, garments.

Most people who say this mean "this is what AAA video games are". Rocket League is arguably not AAA but is clearly taking its more recent changes from it.

As you say, many new things are being created, and the solution for the most part is simple: Don't buy AAA. It has almost no appeal to me anymore, and even when I hear about some franchise I like or used to like, I just assume the worst if it's making the leap to AAA, and to be honest, that metric hasn't failed me in a while.

I'm late to the bandwagon and just bought Slay the Spire for $10. No microtransactions, no unlocks, no AAA garbage at all. Just money for fun. That's the solution. Don't play games that are just platforms to deliver psychological manipulation to extract money from you when there are games that will deliver the same basic dopamine hits for defined amounts of money, and for goodness' sake, don't pay money for things that are just platforms to psychologically manipulate you into giving them money. And often, frankly, aren't as good at the dopamine hits anyhow since they have to wrap them around manipulation.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#473

Post by rstupek »

shusaku wrote: post #33
pengaru wrote: post #15

There's a lot to dislike, but my gripes as a developer who occasionally dabbles in games are more along the lines of "this puzzle game prototype is interesting and may be worth polishing up and tossing on steam, but oh right, it won't even pay for itself unless I turn it into yet another gambling machine." Then I go back to writing system software.

The other option is to apparently blanket your game with advertisements. I spent some time yesterday looking for word games in the iOS store, and it seems like everything was “free”, but had non stop, unskippable ads. One offered to remove ads for a fee, but even after paying they remained in various parts of the game.

what type of word game were you looking for?

Re: I hate what video games have become

#474

Post by Loughla »

kgwxd wrote: post #396
bambax wrote: post #160

> once you stop playing a game 100% of the money you spend on it disappears, you can’t recover any of it, not 50%, not 20%, just nothing (...) Can you imagine if other art mediums were this ridiculous? Well, we're getting there. Streaming services, and all subscription offerings, are systems where you don't own anything, and you lose everything the moment you stop paying.

When I go to the movies, 100% of the money I spend disappears. It's ridiculous.

It's the same with concerts and theaters and other live venues as well.

I think you might be on to something with this. "Big Art" is out to make sure I can't own anything. At all.

That's why netflix made sure that you can't go to the store and buy movies anymore.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#475

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

rovek wrote: post #383
OtomotO wrote: post #151

As a (non game) developer, I can say, thay free to play is instantly dead on arrival for me. The moment something is known to become or becomes free to play is the moment I lose all interest. The dishonesty in the system itself is what makes this unbearable for me. Developers need to eat, Managers need to eat, Marketeers need to eat... And sometimes psychologists doing evil mindtricks and supporting gambling addictio…

For me the biggest negative to F2P is in competitive games, so especially Rocket League in this case, because being F2P means that the competitive element and matchmaking system is 100% worthless.

Why is it worthless? Aren't for example a lot of chess servers also free to play, and thousands of chess players play there all the time?

Re: I hate what video games have become

#476

Post by gigaflop »

paulmd wrote: post #463
gigaflop wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're at the pro-level, then why does cosmetic choice matter? If it's actually a competitive environment, with people of similar skill levels, then you should be able to have some amount of trust in the skills of other players. If I were on an actual team of people, I'd expect cosmetics to only matter for at-a-glance identification of a specific player.

because tf2 largely isn't centered around the "pro experience" even if the players are at the top of the playerbase. Comp is its own thing with its own rules, and "casual" gameplay is what the game is designed and balanced around. Comp usually bans about half or 2/3rds of the weapons in the game and imposes additional rules (class limits, no weapons pickups, etc). It's a completely different thing that happens to run…

In something like TF2, I'd probably rely more on the player's name than what they were wearing. If I recognize the name (even if only in the context of the one match), and know roughly how good they are, I can have my mental preference of who I prioritize.

I usually play Deep Rock Galactic, which has some non-cosmetic ways to judge people's experience. Promotion(like prestige) of a class is indicated by a border color and number of stars, and indicates someone has played a character for promotion25 levels. Bronze stars are okay, silver stars should be decent.

'Blue Levels' are also present. They serve as an indicator of how many times that player has leveled up any* character. So, someone with blue level 100 and only one promotion star should still be considered experienced in terms of game sense, but not necessarily an expert on their character.

Someone with low 'blue levels' and no stars is just a greenbeard, and should not be expected to be great.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#477

Post by dfxm12 »

brailsafe wrote: post #272
flohofwoe wrote: post #186

This is just a self-inflicted bubble problem. There are now so many interesting games without any dark patterns on Steam alone that one can spend an entire lifetime playing awesome games without ever encountering a single loot box, just step a bit outside the AAA and mobile bubbles.

You're right, but only for you. This only works if all you want to do is play arbitrary interesting games, but that's almost never what anyone wants to do. The author liked Rocket League, and paid money for it, then disagreed with its direction. I like WoW. I disagree with a lot of its direction. Would I play anything else? Maybe, but probably not. Everyone is playing Elden Ring. If I wanted to play it, but disagreed…

The author liked Rocket League, and paid money for it, then disagreed with its direction.

If you gets years of enjoyment out of a game you spent $20 on, I think you've come out ahead in all measures. I think that's the most important thing to not lose sight of. Now, I totally get expressing disagreement over the direction of a game, but at the end of the day it's probably unreasonable to expect to enjoy the experience of a particular game (or any single thing, really) forever. Games change, gamers change.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#478

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

dkersten wrote: post #361
sofixa wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. There are ways to do it in which it's obvious where the business model is, and it isn't too forceful or gambling. The World of Tanks/Battleships/Warplanes series, are free to play, with progression through experience ( you unlock higher level machines based on xp points you accumulate through playing and success at it), or through paying to go up the ladder faster or unlock special machines. You can play…

The problem I have with these games is they are almost universally tuned to make them very time consuming and grindy if you don't pay. That is, instead of the game being balanced for what feels good to play, they are balanced so that they feel good when you pay more and otherwise are not so annoying that you quit, but annoying enough to push you to pay. Its not: here's a good game, but you can buy these things with r…

That is just certain games that rightfully have a bad reputation, not all F2P games. As others said, in rocket League or Fortnite you don't get advantages from buying things. You can buy levels in Fortnite, but they only unlock cosmetics.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#479

Post by stuu99 »

DaveSapien wrote: post #308

At great expense to my carrier I have out and out refused to take part in creating these predatory practices. If you could hear the contempt that "some" game devs have for their customers, you might never buy a game ever again. It really is quite shocking...and the contempt exists from top to bottom, its everywhere. That isn't to say there's not a vast number of of honourable people in the industry, not at all. It's…

No post body was provided.

Re: I hate what video games have become

#480

Post by rolph »

chiming in late here, but it looks like a substantial portion of the thread is about monetization of skins, and items.

that seems to be what video games have become.

I remember the days of tombraider and all the skins, and modding kits available. this was grassroots stuff to begin with.

eventually the industry realized that server subscriptions were not enough, and commercialized the elements of the gameplay.

ive never purchased a console, and i think Torchlight [0] is the most recent game i have in the MAME machine.

the last 20 years of gaming is mostly gone in this direction and has little appeal, other than hacking around in a graciously received console from the closet, that was designated as {bookend} .

i think GOG is about as good as it gets now.

[0] https://gog-games.com/search/torchlight

Post reply on HN