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The casino in your pocket

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Re: The casino in your pocket

#151

Post by edanm »

kyteland wrote: post #122
vintermann wrote: post #85

> In a casino, any rational adult expects this. Whoa, no way we don't. I do expect that while the game has a house edge in a casino, if something seems random (roll of dice, draw of cards) then it's random in the way it seems, e.g. that there's a 1 in 6 chance of rolling a 6. I'm pretty sure that's regulated in most places. That online casinos and casino-like games rampantly cheat is another matter, I do expect that…

It is regulated. If it looks like a die in a game of chance then it is a fair die. If it looks like a deck of cards, it is a fair deck of cards. This is written into the gambling laws of each regulated gaming jurisdiction. And like most regulations, these rules exist precisely because someone tried exactly this scheme at some point. And the regulators saw it and said "Oh hell no" and made a rule. As the saying goes,…

> Casino game developer and mathematician

That sounds like a kind of incredible job description to me, what does it mean exactly to be a casino game developer?

Re: The casino in your pocket

#152

Post by a13o »

Having worked in the f2p games industry for a decade, nothing is as you perceive. Your entire reward stream is scheduled down to the coin, in spreadsheets written by people like me. I know how much you have today and how much you will have tomorrow.

Any reward presentation, assume there is a loot table behind it. You see 4 cards on the screen, but there may as well be 1 big slot lever; cuz no matter where you tap you're doing a single prng rand and getting what the loot table says.

The loot tables aren't at all what you expect, they skew heavily towards 'booby' prizes cuz that makes it easy to predict your progression. The screen might show you 4 cool things you can get alongside 1 lame prize, implying 20% odds; but the sum odds of those 4 cool things will be The one thing working in your favor is a 'pity' counter. Every time you get a booby prize the pity counter goes up and leads to another rand call. If you succeed at beating the pity counter, it'll give you a good prize and reset the pity counter. The net effect is that I can program the reward stream such that you're guaranteed a good item every 50 pulls or whatever. Some games are just straight with you about this, others aren't.

During the onboarding flow, which could be designed to last months depending on the game's age, your entire reward schedule will be painstakingly controlled down to the coin. Not a single rand call in sight.

My advice is to play these games if you understand all this and have friends to play it with. They've got good hobby value, on a per dollar basis. I mean, have you seen the cost of golf? If you don't get how the monetization works, and you're alone, there's healthier hobbies to spend your money on.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#153

Post by rcarr »

WA wrote: post #58
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

gamification? No, this is illegal use of casino algorithms and payoff psychology / slot machine psychology, outside of regulation, restriction from exposure to children, without disclaimers for gambling problems and hotlines. The middle-tier issues I have: the same issues that used to exist with gambling and introducing it officially: moral concerns over degeneracy, the family impacts of gambling addictions, the regr…

> Why Europe has not woken up to this, which is the only real hope in the short run for substantial fines, is beyond me. Thing is, regulations do exist but as long as Apple and Google are not forced to comply at least partially in these regulations, nothing will ever change. Take the GDPR as an example: - Europe says: "Your app must comply with the GDPR if you want to be in the European market." - Apple says to app d…

What would the counterpart be if a product was found not to be complying with hardware regulations, such as an electronics device that was found to be a fire risk? Who gets penalised/fined, the seller, the importer, the company who made it or all three? I don't know, but if it's the importer or seller then Apple/Google should absolutely be made to regulate this in some way seeing as though they are taking on that role in the pipeline.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#154

Post by artursapek »

a13o wrote: post #152

Having worked in the f2p games industry for a decade, nothing is as you perceive. Your entire reward stream is scheduled down to the coin, in spreadsheets written by people like me. I know how much you have today and how much you will have tomorrow. Any reward presentation, assume there is a loot table behind it. You see 4 cards on the screen, but there may as well be 1 big slot lever; cuz no matter where you tap you…

Do you ever regret working on this kind of software?

Re: The casino in your pocket

#156

Post by gambiting »

JopV wrote: post #132
gambiting wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I tried Bloons TD6 on apple arcade, a game which has very heavy monetization strategies, thinking ok, maybe the apple arcade version is finally playable without spending money - and no, they literally just removed the in-game store but haven't adjusted the curves it takes you to earn anything so if you want to unlock anything prepare for a VERY long grind.

The Apple Arcade and Netflix versions give you double the Monkey Money as the microtransaction version. I agree they should have changed more, but it's not true they didn't adjust it.

Wait, really? It's been a while since I tried it, maybe they've changed it(or maybe I'm just being stupid) - either way, I guess I'm wrong then!

Re: The casino in your pocket

#157

Post by kikokikokiko »

doctorhandshake wrote: post #136

This article employs a common tautological use of ‘algorithm’ I see more often than I’d like. It explains that there is an underlying method to something, explains how the method works, then further clarifies by explaining that it’s an algorithm, with a link to the Wikipedia entry for the word. It’s framed almost as a reveal, as though the rest of the article hadn’t already explained the same thing in other words. Th…

"Another comment, more on-topic: it may surprise some to learn that the ‘crane’ or ‘claw’ games in arcades and rest stops are also games of chance, not games of skill. They are programmed with the value of their prizes, the cost to play, and the operating margin the operator would like to have. The machine handles the decision of who wins, when."

It wouldn't surprise me a little bit if it was true, since it's almost impossible to get any prize using those cranes, but if it is in fact true, it should definitely be illegal. When I see a game in the style of these crane games, I and pretty much everyone believes it is a "game of skill", and if you just get the crane in the right position, it would be able to get your prize. Down here in Brazil those machines are everywhere.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#158

Post by freeone3000 »

ehnto wrote: post #26
freeone3000 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking over the best games for Apple Arcade and it’s… Temple Run, Cut the Rope, Fruit Ninja. Really! That was the peak?

Unlike PC and console gaming, mobile gaming's market is practically "Everyone". So there probably are some great mobile games out there, just buried in the charts under what the masses preferred. What's most popular on mobile is going to be a reflection of a very different demographic's interests. Kind of like trying to find the "best" movie from box office charts, you will get a list of the most popular movied, not…

The most popular movie today is not ten years old. They have made movies since The Avengers. (Notably, Avengers: Endgame, but less facetiously, a Super Mario movie and James Cameron's Avatar sequel were pretty popular.) I'm not asking for something inventive and genre-defying, just a game that is not literally ten years old.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#159

Post by lacrimacida »

MandieD wrote: post #147
dspillett wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It has been fascinating and demoralizing to watch monetization roll out. To younger generations like my brother, they don't know any different, it's just part if gaming for them. A step worse too: they are being trained that being bombarded with adverts is acceptable. Genuinely heard (couldn't avoid hearing, the voices were fairly loud) on a train the other week a dad explaining to his charge how he should “watch t…

No, you're right to be horrified, and I'm the mom of a three year old who will look for things to take apart if left to his own devices. Current screen policy: only "his" laptop, only videos I've picked out for him (currently, he's into Alphablocks and Numberblocks), laptop gets closed and put up for the rest of the day the instant he whines about having to stop watching for whatever reason.

Wait, your 3 year old has a laptop already?

Re: The casino in your pocket

#160

Post by IntrepidWorm »

xcdzvyn wrote: post #142
kawhah wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think that it should be legal, or illegal, for people to sell drugs to teenagers? Genuine question.

Genuine answer! You've made me reconsider quite a lot, actually. Intuitively I'd say yes, it should be legal to do that. But then, I would consider that a violation of property, because really, a child is unlikely to understand the consequences of a herion addiction. But then I suppose nobody addicted to herion really understands the consequences of addiction, or they wouldn't buy herion. Which almost makes me recons…

To be perfectly clear, most addicts understand that their addiction is killing then, but caring about that pales in comparison to the addictive urge to continue using. It's not some cerebral choice- once addicted, you are no longer in control of your body, or it's urges.

With that said, we as a society do have a responsibility to protect children - free access to heroin (for instance) would be incredibly harmful to children, who have not formed the ability to properly assess risk. Allowing for unfettered access to heroin for adults is much more complicated. Given how easy it is for most adults in America to access the drug, I would argue we are already contending with many of the complicated factors of unrestricted access already. How to deal with those problems is something I don't have many good answers for.

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