31–40 of 141 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, can't take this site seriously when it lists some of my favorite mechanics as dark patterns.
'Competition' is listed as a dark pattern. Ya know, the core thing common to basically all games going back millenia, this site is ridiculous.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, can't take this site seriously when it lists some of my favorite mechanics as dark patterns.
'Competition' is listed as a dark pattern. Ya know, the core thing common to basically all games going back millenia, this site is ridiculous.
It does not look like all patterns described here are meant to be taken as a rule. If your game don't have any of the patterns this website suggests, it won't automatically become a good game. Grind or collecting items is suggested as a dark pattern. Dead cells is an amazing game and it has both of these. Most rogue lites use these both patterns heavily. I don't see grinding as a hard no. I don't mind repeating if ga…
This site feels like this it's made by people that misunderstand games and genres and can't stand the concept of live service games which surprise takes money to run. Saw one where powercreep is considered unhealthy ...if you played a competitive card game without power creep you'd quit because the first meta would be the only meta. Controlled power creep is healthy for game longevity.
I think what they would want to see is the cards all be free. That way powercreep does not make a purchase less valuable, does not make people gamble for cards they want, and not give an advantage to people who want to spend more money to get good cards.
Chris Wilson released a video on this topic yesterday - "Dark Patterns: Are Your Games Playing You?". He has an interesting perspective having been the lead of Path of Exile. A free to play, decade long, popular, action role playing game. While opinions vary on the correct use of these patterns, the video is a helpful and easy to digest, reminder of them. The video description contains additional links. --- "Dark Pat…
The premise of this site seems to be that anything designed to make the game "addictive" is a dark pattern — this is contradictory to the concept of "dark pattern" in products in general, which I would define as "when an interface biases users towards action that is more in the interest of the business controlling the interface than the user's goals for using the software ." When someone plays a game, the user's goal…
Yes, not everything here is a dark pattern. The one that stood out to me was "Wait To Play"[0]. In the before times, there was a browser-only MMO called Urban Dead[1] which had a cap on the number of actions any player could take in a single 24-hour period. This was to avoid giving undue influence/advantage to players who could play more during the day and disadvantaging people who e.g. had to work during the day and…
Yeah I used to enjoy those games. But I dont think thats necessarily what they are referring to here.
>Another common in-game timer is related to "harvesting" or "research". You may send your character off to harvest some resources, but you have to wait an arbitrary amount of time before this task is completed. This forces you to stop playing and wait for the timer to expire. Often there is a way to pay money or watch an advertisement to accelerate or skip the timer.
>Games that prevent you from playing them whenever you want are trying to get you to space out your playing throughout the day. This is a much better way for you to develop a habit of playing the game, and also a way to prevent players from reaching the end of a short game or getting burnt out on a repetitive game in a relatively short amount of time.
In a modern wait to play, you can bypass the restriction by spending money, or you are simply bounced back into ads multiple times during the day as you log in at every increment to press the next button.
war thunder doesn't count? it's pay to win hmm people say it's pay to progress not win
Its not "Pay to Win" until you reach max level. Because the matchmaking always ensures theres some people of lower level, and some people of higher level (if they exist) in every match. This means that you want upgrades to overcome obstacles, but even if you buy progress, you still hit obstacles requiring upgrades. Its an infinite grind treadmill.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
'Competition' is listed as a dark pattern. Ya know, the core thing common to basically all games going back millenia, this site is ridiculous.
Competition is not core to all games by any means. You could argue that challenge is core to games, for a particular definition of ‘challenge.’
Sure there are some solitaire card games, and toys like yo-yos, kendama and the like that could be classified as games. But competition defines most of what we consider "games" up until computers were able to simulate the other players in the form of hostile/friendly npcs, computer controlled 'players' etc.
I like the idea, but their ratings seem.. dubious at best. For example: Hyperrogue, which hit the frontpage a few times and which I can confidently say does not feature any dark patterns, is rated just 1.19 [0] on a 5 (best) to -5 (worst) scale. [0] https://www.darkpattern.games/game/18554/0/hyperrogue.html
Yeah I think this clarifies the core issue with this kind of thinking (imo). The venn diagram between 'mechanics that make games fun' and 'dark patterns' (as described by this site) is basically a circle. The important thing isn't the patterns themselves, it's that they're used to make you spend money on microtransactions. Looking at just the mechanics divorced of any context of the surrounding business/marketing/mon…
I don't really think Daily Rewards are a fun mechanic. Nor is Friend Spam, and Social Pyramid Scheme is rarely fun either.
Chris Wilson released a video on this topic yesterday - "Dark Patterns: Are Your Games Playing You?". He has an interesting perspective having been the lead of Path of Exile. A free to play, decade long, popular, action role playing game. While opinions vary on the correct use of these patterns, the video is a helpful and easy to digest, reminder of them. The video description contains additional links. --- "Dark Pat…
PoE seems to be an outlier, having probably the softest freemium model in existence. I dont recall having been even slightly tempted to spend money in that game.
As far as I can tell the main difference is a younger demographic and being more pop culture adjacent. I don't think that should affect whether you consider it "bad" monetization, but I will concede that context is important with these sort of things.