General Games News - The Bear and Badger

mistercrayon

Man those crack and meth dealers are so misunderstood. They just have a product that people want, it’s not their fault that people buy it!

mistercrayon

Man those bookies are so misunderstood! It’s not their fault that people are bankrupting themselves! People want to play one hundred pounds a spin the profits tell you so!! Stop complaining!!!!! They’re only providing a SERVICE.

YOU CAN TAKE A HORSE TO WATER BUT YOU CANT MAKE IT DRINK!

EvilRedEye

I think it will be interesting to see what happens next gen given that Xbox has already pivoted to GaaS this gen while Sony seems content to continue to offer traditional experiences as a kind of loss-leader/draw kind of thing. The next Xbox is going to be the first dedicated console where the proposition is 'super-fancy GaaS box' right out of the gate.

afgavinstan

Rather pertinent, just now.

Acti patents matchmaking system designed to encourage microtransaction sales:

https://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/news/how-activision-uses-matchmaking-tricks-to-sell-in-game-items-w509288

g.man

That's fucking rancid ^

pantyfire

Watch as sales of the Blue-on-Blue Grenade Team Shield sales skyrocket after being matched in the same game as G.

g.man

hahaha

g.man

What's this umbrella in my inventory for?

monkey

Part of me thinks this is emblematic of an industry with razor thin margins and too much competition, where the window for selling your product at full price is too small and innovation is often unrewarded. But now they’ve worked out they can do it they wouldn’t stop even if they were already making huge pots of cash.

monkey

afgavinstan wrote:

Rather pertinent, just now.

Acti patents matchmaking system designed to encourage microtransaction sales:

https://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/news/how-activision-uses-matchmaking-tricks-to-sell-in-game-items-w509288

There’s probably games that do this stuff already but the devs weren’t stupid enough to announce it.

bad_hair_day

Not counting season passes, Star Wars: Battlefront sold over 15 million units.
If it’s the only way to progress without a soul destroying grind, loot crates are encouraging gambling with real money and Publishers should be called out at every opportunity.

monkey

EA are doing pretty well but increasingly their money is being made from DLC and other shenanigans. Sticking a game on a shelf in a shop and selling it is a diminishing part of their business.

It’s going the way of razors. Sell the first thing cheap then milk the consumer later down the line.

Diluted Dante

EA make a ton of money from mobile, where disgusting predatory micro transaction practices are rife.

EvilRedEye

I don't really understand how shitty microtransactions even took off in a world where great value entertainment is everywhere. People are just shit.

monkey

Same with pre-orders. I’d be interested in how age affects these figures as it’s probably driven by kids. Kids are stupid but they have a right to be without companies predating on that stupidity.

When I were a lad, I contributed to the detriment of gaming by lapping up plenty of crappy, rushed-out, half-broken licensed games if I was into the licenced thing (Batman, Spider-man, Turtles etc). To some extent, it has to be accepted that the industry is driven by the demands of stupid pubescents that don’t know any better.

But that’s really why the companies have to be held accountable. Putting real gambling into kids toys is completely unacceptable. But that will need a law change to do anything about it.

JonB

monkey wrote:

Putting real gambling into kids toys is completely unacceptable.

Man, got fucked over by Pannini stickers too many times.

Yossarian

Yep, this predates videogames by quite some time.

monkey

You could actually buy the stickers you needed directly couldn't you? No one ever did but wasn't there a thing at the back where you could send off for them.

mistercrayon

I did for the last World Cup.

monkey

Those claws that grab the cuddly toys are the worst. Those things are properly rigged.

JonB

monkey wrote:

You could actually buy the stickers you needed directly couldn't you? No one ever did but wasn't there a thing at the back where you could send off for them.

Up to about 30 I think. I completed my Mexico 86 album that way, but had bought far too many packets already.

They'd always give the albums away free in magazines as well.

mistercrayon

They are. They only allow wins on a certain percentage of goes which is determined by the operator and proportional to the prize in the machine.

Diluted Dante

monkey wrote:

You could actually buy the stickers you needed directly couldn't you? No one ever did but wasn't there a thing at the back where you could send off for them.

You could also trade them with your friends, something lacking in most of these games.

afgavinstan

It's a minefield for me at the moment. I'm getting balls-deep into Ultimate Team and in my head I can morally justify it as it's completely separate to the main body of Fifa 18. Almost loads up like a separate game. I see the packs just as packets of stickers, and there's a transfer market if I need a specific one. And I have a goal of using these packs to build a team of my own making and design. I've never taken to the mode before until this year as it's clear there's been an effort from EA to include more ways of earning rewards without paying for it with extra dosh. Squad Battles is fantastic. The main problem I have though is that it has clearly taken dev time and money away from other aspects of Fifa that I feel haven't improved in years (presentation, mostly) and that grates.

My point is that it's completely optional, but in games like Forza, Mordor, Halo 5 and Battlefront 2 it seems, it's woven directly into the fabric of the main experience, and there's no escape. And that is what annoys the fuck out of me.

I understand that this is me and my head weasling it's way out of an opinion that FUT Is Bad, and it is in parts. The youtube scene behind it is fucking disgusting in places. I'm a big hypocrite, I know. I just don't see the point of it in games that don't necessarily need it.

I could probably word this better.

EvilRedEye

Even though I don't like football, I can understand how football stickers as a cultural thing could make a kind of throwaway digital equivalent more comprehensible. But then there's no equivalent for other things and it's probably pretty gross to boot up a full-price game and be presented with a weird infinite money-hole.

monkey

It's just completely against what I want from a game. Give me the stuff at a pace that you've designed to level up with my skill, competence, familiarity with the game world etc. That applies to grind as well really. There's grind in eg Skyrim but that's totally a player's choice to level up more quickly. You can play without it. Not played destiny for more than 5 minutes, but even without loot boxes, the grind there seems more mandatory and designed to keep players hooked in for further money-milking.

Paul the sparky

You should try Destiny 2.

Yossarian

EvilRedEye wrote:

But then there's no equivalent for other things

Magic or other deck-building card games.

Diluted Dante

No, that's not how they've implemented it in Destiny. The grind is there to keep players logging in and sustain a userbase.

The way they try to milk players in Destiny is Eververse. When you level up, you get a Bright Engram, which to get it's contents you have to go to the place where you buy things with real money. One of the possible drops is the shaders to colour your gear, which are now single use items unlike in D1.

You of course don't get enough to colour your full set of gear. You can buy some more Bright Engrams though, which doesn't guarantee which ones you'll get, you just have a chance of getting the one you want.

Want to colour in an exotic weapon? You'll need an ornament for that, which you guessed it, only come in Bright Engrams. Those cool emotes? Bright Engrams. This is stuff that could be bought in D1, however you could purchase it directly, rather than this gambling bollocks.

mistercrayon

Yossarian wrote:

EvilRedEye wrote:

But then there's no equivalent for other things

Magic or other deck-building card games.

Magic is also bad.

So much so that people create variants that circumvent the necessity to buy boxes at a time just to get 24 decent cards.

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