#2) To Be Honest, I’d Rather Look At Ads
Yeah, it’s a minute I’m not gaming, but I can do what humanity has always done when faced with an unskippable ad: get a snack, urinate, send a text message. Is it annoying? Absolutely. But it does take this mechanic of selling stuff out of the equation.
#1) If You Have To Sell Ads, You Have To Make Games People Want To Play, Not Skinner Boxes
Most F2P games stink because they either relentlessly push you towards buying stuff, and do so via blatant attempts to play off your psyche. For those unfamiliar, a Skinner box is what you use to train an animal via operant conditioning. For example, if you show a rat that if he presses a button, he may get a pellet of food, the rat will hammer that button constantly.
It’s true that early arcade games were pretty much like this, but we’re well beyond this as a gaming experience at this point. And frankly, the attempts to do this are so blatant in F2P games most of the time it’s insulting. This is what Blizzard tried to do with Diablo III, only to discover it didn’t work.
But, if developers instead are inspired to create rich, open worlds that, if we want to, we can buy, and if we don’t, we’ll still sit through the ads to play the game… well, it’s hard to see a loser in any part of that scenario.
Seriously, Square Enix didn’t pick Hitman: Blood Money by throwing a dart into their library. They picked a beloved entry in a popular series for a reason; it’s an episodic game that people want to play more of. It’s a really good TV series.
So, really, what do you want? Crap games that try to get you hooked and squeeze your credit card one nickel at a time? Or developers trying to make the most compelling game possible?
Of the options the game industry will give us? I’ll take door number two.
![[avatar]](http://p.uproxxcdn.com/photo/569/thumb)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/gammasquadpikmin3-150x150.jpg)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/capcoms-new-challenger-tobias-funke-uproxx-150x150.jpg)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/gammasquadlegobatmanmovie-150x150.jpg)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/batman-arkham-origins-gets-a-trailer-for-its-trailer-uproxx1-150x150.jpg)
I totally agree, F2P scares me because it just makes me want to stop playing the game if I have to either pay or farm for ridiculous hours to move forward.
Horrible. Ad supported, then when ads stop being effective it’ll be down to 1 Ad for 10 minutes.
Also the game software can’t and will not be downloaded to your local computer. I figure with all your railing against Blizzard for the always online factor of Diablo 3 you wouldn’t support a system that requires you to always be online to play your game.
To quote a previous post by you “If a game is not an MMO, it does not need to be constantly online.”
You might want to check out section 2.6 of the Core Online ToS.
Would I prefer to download a game? Absolutely. Do I think that option will always be there for gamers?
No.
That option will always be there. Will it always be legal? Probably not.
Man, remember when you used to own a game and actually own it? Those were the days. Almost every game now has a limited license agreement in the EULA, which basically says ‘yo we’re letting you play our game until we decide arbitrarily that you cant.’ Now sure there are some reasons to have that in there. MMOs are a good example, but tons of other games are including that.
The move from physical media, to digital games brings with it a whole new question of ownership. There should be no question about it, but most companies will happily fuck you over. I play one or two F2P games, I haven’t bought a physical copy of a game in a while (Starcraft 2), but the move from digital downloads to not even having the game on your own system does not appeal to me in the slightest.
This is a terribly jumbled post. But there you have it. Sorry I’ll go back to being a quiet nerd now.
No, no. Be a loud nerd! We like loud nerds!
To be honest, I don’t like the shift away from actual ownership, either. But since it seems inevitable, I’d rather have a system that drives quality.
I’m getting tired of Game publishers squeezing their costumer base. All these new pay structures they are coming up with have NOTHING to do with improving game quality. It is ALL designed to bilk more money out of customers and control their experience.
Anything to stop every company from becoming Capcom.
Hey, Capcom put out Dragon’s Dogma, which is probably the best open world game I’ve played so far this year.
I think Capcom make some great games, but I also am one of the guys that they have nickle and dimed for over 20 years straight when it comes to Street Fighter. 2 decades of that leaves you a little sore, especially after figuring out what they were doing.