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Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

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Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#42
post #17

I'm amazed that people are still buying into his games. If you were to go by Peter's history, it's quite likely that the "life-changingly amazing" thing in the middle of the cube is a message like "Sorry Mario, but the princess is in another cube". I personally got burned somewhere around Fable and I'm never[0] going to get one of his games again.. [0] except for maybe Godus.. maybe.

I don't care what people say, Black and White was an excellent game which was much too far ahead of its time.

[Disclaimer: I don't know B&W 2, I'm basing myself only on the first B&W]

Black and White was a good game which unfortunately was far behind what its originating concept promised to deliver.

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#43
Holy motherfucking shit. This is not a game, this is something else. This is sick. This is abusive... This feels akin to exploiting a mental vulnerability that exists in a portion of the population to earn money. Its a strange situation where it is legal to do something to a human that is illegal to do to a computer.

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#44

Holy motherfucking shit. This is not a game, this is something else. This is sick. This is abusive... This feels akin to exploiting a mental vulnerability that exists in a portion of the population to earn money. Its a strange situation where it is legal to do something to a human that is illegal to do to a computer.

> "Its a strange situation where it is legal to do something to a human that is illegal to do to a computer"

What is illegal to do to a computer, in this case...?

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#45

Did he? I'm fairly sure I saw that on the PetetMolydeux parody Twitter account.

According to Eurogamer [1] it is announced in the app itself, but yes it was also tweeted by @PeterMolydeux [2] - I guess it's never been easier to parody someone...

[1] http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-04-19-molyneux-adds-o...

[2] https://twitter.com/PeterMolydeux/status/325281598444556288

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Adding 500,000 cubelets costs $10.99, which implies that people have paid ~$103 to add cubelets over the course of 166 days, or around 62 cents per day. Gross revenue from all cubelet sales in either direction is ~$308 or ~$1.85/day. Your numbers are way off, as is the timescale. The ability to add or remove cubelets is a new feature, released on April 17th. At ~$405.75 to change the cubelet levels using the most e…

Actually, they are not. The article indicated that the experiment had been going for 166 days (164 days, but it was written two days ago). $10.99/500K=$0.00002198 per cubelet. 0.00002198 X 18.46M total cubelets sold = $405. $405/166 = $2.43/day.

Originally you could only remove cubelets. Adding them back is a new thing.

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#49
It's hilarious when someone finds two actions that are opposites of each other and collect on both sides from people who want to take part in each.

I had a similar thought. I worked for a truly evil (management-wise; the engineers and PMs are fine) startup in the winter of 2011-12 and I've been debating whether to name-and-shame. The ethical problem I have with it is that, while I could easily kill the company (publicity-wise, but that would be enough) it would be low-level engineers who get fucked and the shitbag managers would probably bounce along fine. That's why I haven't done it. (After embarrassing a less-deserving company whose name starts with G, I'm more hesitant about public whistleblowing.)

However, if I ever end up in financial hardship I can't get out of, I'm going to start a Yes and a No project (maybe on Kickstarter, if they don't mind?) If "Yes" raises more money, then I name the evil startup that inspired my hatred of VC-istan, and out its scumbag executives in excruciating detail (including stuff about their families that I found later on). If "No" wins, then I keep it a secret. (Obviously, the losing side gets back their money.) I'd probably have to preclude the company itself, and its managers, from funding the "No", lest I get an extortion rap.

This could be a brilliant or fucked-up-evil startup idea. People who are cash-strapped and need to raise money take issues in their lives from the mundane ("should I sell my furniture?") to the important ("should I go back to school?") to the extreme ("should I out my scumbag ex-manager?") into the public and set up Yes/No races. On one hand, it would help a lot of people. On the other hand, it'd be hard to set it up so it doesn't become a vehicle for extortion.

Re: Peter Molyneux may have just monetized trolling

#50
post #4

After decades of trying to mke better and better videogames, always more realistic, Molyneux shows that the average human is, in fact satisfied by a Skinner box and will gladly pay for it.

Cow Clicker is a somewhat similar example: http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/12/ff_cowclicker/all/ It was created as a critique of FarmVille-style Facebook games. You could click a cow every 6 hours for free, or pay money to click more often. And people did!

The Cow Clicker creator also implemented a Cube Clicker to beat Molyneux's game to market: http://www.bogost.com/blog/cube_clicker.shtml

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