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Incline The Death of Freemium? Microtransactions Under Global Scrutiny

Cael

Arcane
Joined
Nov 1, 2017
Messages
20,523
It's not a question of ARTISTIC FREEDOM GET OFF MY BACK BIG BROTHER but whether you want microtrans in every game from here to fucking eternity because why wouldn't devs throw it in? It's incredibly profitable, gamers are compulsive people. Even if you're not compulsive, don't you find it horrifically annoying? An outright ban might not be the answer but at minimum they should tax the absolute living shit out of it.

This same argument could be used to ban pizza and hamburgers, or limit spending on gaming in general. "Gotta look out for people who can't make reasonable decisions." Fuck that, let people decide for themselves. If people want to be fucking retards and support microtransactions then that's their decision. I think it's ridiculous but I don't agree with banning other people's behaviors because I don't like them. Unless we have a surge in criminality for people to get money to buy loot boxes then it's none of my business, and none of yours either.

I'm fine with limiting access for minors though, but again who decides what is a "minor-oriented game"? That's some bullshit right there, cut that part out and stick with the 18 years old age limit.
They already want to ban sugar, soft drinks, fast food and any game that is not Carebears because the children. What is one more thing?
 

Mark Richard

Arcane
Joined
Mar 14, 2016
Messages
1,192
I don't understand how anyone could be okay with unregulated gambling in videogames. It's attached to games as low as 3+/E for Everyone, but if that line wears thin then forget the children for a moment. What about disclosure of the odds, taxing publishers, conducting independent reviews to assure compliance with the law, or any of the myriad of functions a gambling commission serves. It's the difference between walking into an established gambling house and visiting a shady street vendor. The Entertainment Software Association have raked in billions without anyone looking over their shoulder.
 

Lambach

Arcane
Joined
Feb 11, 2016
Messages
12,813
Location
Belgrade, Removekebabland
It's not a question of ARTISTIC FREEDOM GET OFF MY BACK BIG BROTHER but whether you want microtrans in every game from here to fucking eternity because why wouldn't devs throw it in? It's incredibly profitable, gamers are compulsive people. Even if you're not compulsive, don't you find it horrifically annoying? An outright ban might not be the answer but at minimum they should tax the absolute living shit out of it, just like other gambling.

"It's annoying, therefore let's bring Mommy Gubmint into this"

Kill yourself.
 

Ovg

Cipher
Joined
Apr 25, 2010
Messages
921
Location
Potato
Let's just accept cyberpunk! I'm sure games won't be chopped into little dlc pieces, so you pay $500 for the pleasure of actually getting an ending!

And who says kids can't gamble? If you are old enough to click yes, it's your radical freedom to do whatever you want!

What a wonderful free market future!
 

Julyan Morley

Novice
Joined
Apr 20, 2019
Messages
6
I'm all for being skeptical of government intervention, but the industry being attacked here is unambiguously bad. Look at the top charts sorted by revenue in a mobile app store and you won't see a single product offering anything except addiction.

The government does a lot of things. There are better battles to fight against their overreach.
 
Self-Ejected

c2007

Self-Ejected
Joined
May 24, 2017
Messages
1,091
Location
404
Operant conditioning is ok?

Allowing your children to be programmed is ok? Playing another skinner box mechanic yourself is ok? Even good maybe?

God damn are some of you remarkably retarded.
 

Lambach

Arcane
Joined
Feb 11, 2016
Messages
12,813
Location
Belgrade, Removekebabland
We have to get the latest AAA video-game! We can't stop buying them and paying for the DLCs and microtransactions because we're mental midgets with zero impulse control!

And who says kids shouldn't have unlimited access to their parents' credit card? If you're old enough to hold your head up straight yourself, you should be given the freedom to spend all of your parents money, because parenting is TEH HARDZ! >: (

What a wonderful future where we abdicate all common sense, personal responsibility and let Big Brother protect us from our own complete mental retardation!
 
Self-Ejected

c2007

Self-Ejected
Joined
May 24, 2017
Messages
1,091
Location
404
Allowing your children to be programmed is ok?
maybe parents should start acting like parents
Were you micromanaged by your parents?

I was a free-range kid. In the late 70s I was out until curfew. Mom knew where I was, and "what I was doing". Playing hide my finger in the neighbor's pussy, aka All-American Freeze Tag.

I agree with your post to an extent, but I also recognize that I don't give a fuck about children in this as much as I do myself. The lootbox shit is destroying the quality of games because the mechanic is so profitable. I won't fall victim to it... I'll abandon the fucking hobby I started the same day I watched War Games in the theater. That has already begun - I haven't bought a new release title since DAI.

Stop focusing on the "muh children" portion of this. It is the least important part.
 

Lambach

Arcane
Joined
Feb 11, 2016
Messages
12,813
Location
Belgrade, Removekebabland
Were you micromanaged by your parents?

Not letting your kids have unlimited access to your money isn't "micromanaging" them, genius.

The lootbox shit is destroying the quality of games because the mechanic is so profitable.

Mainstream AAA games have been shit long before lootboxes. That's by far the least of their problems. DAI was unbearably horrendous garbage with or without them. Your (and everyone else's) approval to use the government baton to marginally increase the quality of already worthless garbage is not just petty and pathetic beyond all belief, it will also prove completely ineffective to achieve that particular purpose.
 
Self-Ejected

c2007

Self-Ejected
Joined
May 24, 2017
Messages
1,091
Location
404
This isn't some monumental task.

This also isn't the last freedom you are desperately clinging to, this is not a slippery slope.

Improving the product quality is my hope; you are on to something when you say the AAA industry has taken a huge shit on everything, and increasingly there simply are not any fresh ideas under the sun, or if there are they do not get greenlit because "it isn't familiar, people won't buy it".

You are conflating different concerns. I mentioned quality because the most annoying thing recently (why I didn't by DE: MD for instance) is lootboxes everywhere and games actively pushing me to buy DLC. Yes, BioWart did this with DAO years ago - it just gets worse.

I don't expect legislation against predatory gambling practices in gaming to be a quality panacea. That is fabulously optimistic. I do hope it will get rid of the obviously annoying part - in my face salesmanship while I'm trying to drink a beer and relax and play this cool game I heard about on the Codex.
 

Zombra

An iron rock in the river of blood and evil
Patron
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Black Goat Woods !@#*%&^
Make the Codex Great Again! RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Mainstream AAA games have been shit long before lootboxes.
Then why are you so adamant in your defense of them, that they should be allowed to run totally unregulated gambling scams? Do you like shitty AAA developers more than you like cool real life casino owners? Or do you think that casinos should be completely unregulated too?
 
Self-Ejected

c2007

Self-Ejected
Joined
May 24, 2017
Messages
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404
Free market morons gotta cry about something.

The "free" market isn't free at all.

Do you grow/raise your own produce and meat? No? Well, good luck with that without some regulations regarding health and quality.

Do you drive your car? Yes? Well good luck driving that car without regulations that guaranteed some degree of safety of that vehicle. Also, good luck driving without roads.

Do you capture your own electricity?

Do you filter your own water?

Bro, do you even lift?
 

Wyatt_Derp

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2019
Messages
3,070
Location
Okie Land
Free market morons gotta cry about something.

The "free" market isn't free at all.

Do you grow/raise your own produce and meat? No? Well, good luck with that without some regulations regarding health and quality.

Do you drive your car? Yes? Well good luck driving that car without regulations that guaranteed some degree of safety of that vehicle. Also, good luck driving without roads.

Do you capture your own electricity?

Do you filter your own water?

Bro, do you even lift?

Difference being you don't need micro-transactions/DLCs/loot crates. You do need food, water, and the ability to travel. In absence of government, necessity forces equilibrium. If you went to a restaurant and saw rats and cockroaches all over the food, would you consider eating their knowing that there was or wasn't food regulations in place? Would the un-enforced regulations mean the difference, or would the big greasy rat swimming in the nacho dip? Nature sorts these things out. Government/bureaucracy offers itself as an alternative to nature... usually with the end result being pitchforks, war, and the wailing and lamentations of women.

And the 'who'da fix muh roadz' argument... I got an example. I pay over $1200 a year in property taxes, over half of which goes to pay for schools I don't use. I also have to drive on rural gravel roads, don't have a fire hydrant in my entire neighborhood, and the telephone polls were installed around the time we pulled out of fucking Saigon. So the 'no taxes no roads' in many cases means 'no taxes no new Cessna private plane for local boss hog politician.' And what are the guarantees that you won't end up with boss hoggery at any level of government? You don't. Government is nothing more than someone offering a service at the barrel of a gun.
 

Wyatt_Derp

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2019
Messages
3,070
Location
Okie Land
Wait ... you mean ... our government isn't perfect?? QUICK!! ABOLISH IT NOW!!

When I was young... maybe. Baseball, grandma, apple pie and all that jazz. But I spent several years in the 90s watching endless hours of government functionaries blow steam on C-SPAN, so I've been cultured since. There's nothing like a hot mic wired for hours to a perceptive audience.
 

Swigen

Arbiter
Joined
Dec 15, 2018
Messages
1,014
Wait ... you mean ... our government is outlawing annoying loot boxes in all the shitty gaems I don’t even play?? QUICK!! GIVE THE GOVERNMENT FREE REIGN TO FUCK WITH ASPECTS OF THE HOBBY I DO ENJOY!!
 

Wyatt_Derp

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2019
Messages
3,070
Location
Okie Land
Wait ... you mean ... our government is outlawing annoying loot boxes in all the shitty gaems I don’t even play?? QUICK!! GIVE THE GOVERNMENT FREE REIGN TO FUCK WITH ASPECTS OF THE HOBBY I DO ENJOY!!

So you watch C-SPAN too?
 

Wyatt_Derp

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2019
Messages
3,070
Location
Okie Land

Swigen

Arbiter
Joined
Dec 15, 2018
Messages
1,014

Cael

Arcane
Joined
Nov 1, 2017
Messages
20,523
Wait ... you mean ... our government is outlawing annoying loot boxes in all the shitty gaems I don’t even play?? QUICK!! GIVE THE GOVERNMENT FREE REIGN TO FUCK WITH ASPECTS OF THE HOBBY I DO ENJOY!!

So you watch C-SPAN too?


No! I’m a member of the NRA!!

That's cool (though GOA is way better). I just buy guns.

New gun day tomorrow. 9mm or 45?
.45. 9mm has a tendency to go through bodies, which just means they get to stand there and shoot back. .45 knocks them down. Usually.
 

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