[HN Gopher] App store payments will have increased competition
___________________________________________________________________
App store payments will have increased competition
Author : laurieg
Score : 261 points
Date : 2021-08-27 15:45 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.kalzumeus.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.kalzumeus.com)
| AlexandrB wrote:
| As an avid Genshin Impact player, I think this style of game
| needs to be heavily regulated. Besides endless grinding for
| slightly better random stats on a few items, there is little
| endgame progression possible outside of rolling for new
| characters in the "gatcha", and the prices are insanely high!
|
| I find that this setup generates a compulsion in me to spend
| money for "one more roll". And while I've never been to a real
| casino, this resembles accounts of gambling addiction. At a
| minimum, these games should be rated 18+. There's no way it's
| healthy for kids to be exposed to mechanics that amount to
| unregulated gambling before they've even developed some modicum
| of self control.
| patio11 wrote:
| Experiences can be compelling without being addictive, which is
| a distinction I think sometimes lost here. Civilization is
| compelling and I for one have lost some sleep to Just One More
| Turn, but one rarely loses one's job or family over
| Civilization, which is not true of gambling addiction.
| Inability to stop despite sincere desire to stop, negative
| impact across multiple outside-the-activity areas of life, etc,
| are diagnostic criteria for addictions of all sort for
| basically this reason.
|
| As a parent, I probably wouldn't encourage my children to play
| either WoW or Genshin Impact or similar until I had a strong
| bead on their level of self-regulation capacity.
| mattnewton wrote:
| I think the difference here is that Genshin only has variable
| rewards and allows you to pull levers for them with real
| money. Civilization (for the right player) has bottomless
| gameplay time, A game like WoW has a fixed subscription cost
| (with cosmetics) and a bottomless gameplay time; what Genshin
| Impact adds to the danger list is the "gacha" style gameplay
| progression where you gamble with as much money as you are
| willing to spend for game items, stat boosts and characters,
| many available for only a limited time.
|
| I have no doubt this model is much more lucrative but it
| feels like there is a slot machine standing in the way of
| what is otherwise a very impressive fusion of different ARPG
| ideas.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| > I think the difference here is that Genshin only has
| variable rewards and allows you to pull levers for them
| with real money.
|
| It's even worse than that. You can only earn a relatively
| small amount of gatcha currency in-game. Once you've
| exhausted that pool for a given patch, no amount of
| grinding will get you more and the _only_ way to "pull the
| lever" is with real money.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >but one rarely loses one's job or family over Civilization,
| which is not true of gambling addiction.
|
| debatable. Maybe not with Civ specifically, but I remember
| huge scares in the MMO days over some people literally
| playing themselves to death from malnourishment. In
| particular this was targeted towards dedicated gaming cafes
| in Korea from what I remember. Addiction can be just as
| deadly even if it "only costs $10/month"
|
| I imagine it's more common than expected, mmo's have just
| become "more accepted" over time as it acclimated into
| society.
| ggregoire wrote:
| > There's no way it's healthy for kids to be exposed to
| mechanics that amount to unregulated gambling before they've
| even developed some modicum of self control.
|
| I don't disagree but TCGs are basically unregulated gambling
| for kids and it has been the case for several decades.
| kevingadd wrote:
| Incidentally, it's heavily regulated in China, where the
| developers are based. It's only a free-for-all overseas. There
| are regulatory limits on how many loot boxes a player can open,
| etc.
| NHQ wrote:
| Would it not be more profitable to process all payments for all
| internet transactions, rather than one app store?
|
| Ditch app stores, fully integrate the web as a platform, then
| bake Apple/Google pay into the browser/OS, and just be the
| payment processor for all transactions.
|
| This would also make it much easier for web developers to fetch
| payments from their apps, no third party API needed. The boost in
| volume from this factor alone should be considerable.
| Hamuko wrote:
| Apple already has baked in Apple Pay to Safari for a cut of all
| transactions.
| rollcat wrote:
| Apple Pay doesn't take a cut.
| _jal wrote:
| I'm not sure what exactly you're including/excluding under
| the 'Apple Pay' umbrella here, but what do you call the
| merchant discount rate?
| Hamuko wrote:
| It absolutely does.
|
| https://www.theregister.com/2014/09/13/apple_to_get_15_cent
| s...
| astlouis44 wrote:
| We're building this at our startup - a universal app store in
| WebGL. Primary use case is for game developers (Unreal Engine,
| and later Unity). No 30% fees, applications work everywhere.
|
| For users, clicking a link is much easier than installing an
| app.
| sedev wrote:
| One of the better things Apple does with their position as a
| middleman is give customers more control over their relationship
| with app creators of all kinds. If the customer is unhappy about
| their experience, iOS gives them what amounts to a one-click "get
| off my phone and get out of my wallet" button. Compare this to
| the notorious New York Times cancellation rigamarole where
| cancelling a subscription required a phone call to a person whose
| job was to talk you out of cancelling. This level of autonomy is
| clearly valuable to customers: behold the widespread
| dissatisfaction about subscriptions vs. one-time purchases.
| People don't like the experience of being strongarmed into a
| business relationship any more than they like it with
| interpersonal relationships, and rightly so. However, because
| Apple exerted the degree of control that it did over what shape a
| customer relationship mediated by their app store could look
| like, it hasn't been clear exactly _how_ valuable that control is
| to consumers.
|
| Once app creators have options for customer relationships other
| than Apple's app store, I expect that we'll find out exactly how
| valuable that autonomy is to customers, and I'm personally
| fascinated about what the answer might be.
| mattnewton wrote:
| I would pay more per app to a third party App Store that promised
| platform independence- that is, I can take my App Library with me
| to android from iOS or from iOS to android, where supported, like
| I do with steam windows/Mac/Linux.
| boplicity wrote:
| Exactly. I own a lot of game licenses via Steam and Epic. I
| expect to be able to use those licenses no matter the device
| I'm using. This alone is why app stores should be de-coupled
| from hardware vendors.
| nikodunk wrote:
| Another, less rosy take: https://world.hey.com/dhh/apple-s-new-
| settlement-is-a-corrup...
| senojsitruc wrote:
| > But it gets worse, because the trophy of this settlement, as
| presented in the press, is supposedly that developers can now
| tell their customers where to buy services outside the app.
| Except no, that's not actually what's happening! Apple is
| simply "clarifying" that companies can send an email to their
| customers, if they've gotten permission to do so, on an opt-in
| basis. That email may include information about how to buy
| outside the app.
|
| This is exactly the problem. Without the ability to _at least_
| link to (if not fully integrate) a payment system, this
| settlement is a total sham.
|
| Hopefully South Korea will make the first real crack in this
| dam.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| Was listening to Ben Evan's podcast earlier today and he had a
| stat from the Apple / Epic trial that shook me a bit - in a given
| month in 2016 something like 0.05% of Apple users were spending
| in excess of 450 USD on in-app purchases. And that was 54% of App
| store revenue.
|
| This is basically addicts gambling. Its the sort of numbers you
| see at Casinos and online casinos, and ... i dunno. It saddens
| me. Yes the vast vast majority of players have a "bit of fun",
| most never pay for anything, but all the profit comes from the
| addicts.
|
| Even in IOS App Store. Which really did look like it was trying
| to avoid that.
| sholladay wrote:
| I spent a bit more than $100 on in-app purchases this week,
| simply because the apps I wanted to use were pretty limited out
| of the box. They are "free" unless you want the full
| experience. I don't like that it is SaaS'd and gamified. Heck,
| I almost uninstalled Tetris when I found out they wanted a
| subscription to permanently remove ads, which I'll never do for
| such a simple game. But my point is that it's normal these days
| to spend $15-$30 per app, which isn't necessarily unreasonable,
| it's just done after download. The industry has essentially
| shifted to an unlimited free trial model. Though, the devil is
| in the details and it's more devious than that.
| patorjk wrote:
| A couple of years ago, when I was playing Pokemon Go daily, I
| showed up to a raid with my son. I started chatting with some
| of the other people there and one guy mentioned that his
| monthly budget for the game was $100. Another guy chimed in to
| concur. It was kind of eye opening. I had been wondering how
| the game could be free, and it was at that moment that I
| realized that the game was mostly paid for by hard core players
| who were spending to level up faster and get rarer Pokemon
| (through buying incubators for eggs and such).
|
| Pokemon Go doesn't really have a gambling aspect to it though,
| so I can't fault it in that area, nor am I really sure their
| model is a problem - since the people spending the money are
| choosing to do so for their own entertainment. It does feel a
| bit odd though, and ultimately it did hurt the experience of
| the game (since you do better if you pay more).
| thehappypm wrote:
| $100/month is a very reasonable amount of money to spend on a
| hobby!
| shadilay wrote:
| Depends on income.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Pokemon go is a top 10 grossing mobile game
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-
| grossing_mobil...
|
| I don't know WHAT people are spending on since the core loop
| of the game isn't monetized, nor is there any stamina system
| that locks people out of the core loop like many other
| japanese mobile games. But they have a lotta people spending
| a lot of something.
|
| Honestly a bit surprised that I haven't heard of some non-
| Niantic titles trying to compete. I know part of it is purely
| on the pokemon brand, but there clearly must be some slice of
| the market to cater to outside of that.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| Incubators to hatch eggs, Passes to do more than 2 raids a
| day, extra storage for pokemon and items, different clothes
| for your character. All of those can be purchased with in-
| game money, but they also have special cash only events.
|
| I paid $100 4 years ago, that I still haven't used up.
| Though I can see how someone could go overboard with it.
| matwood wrote:
| $100/month for entertainment is actually pretty reasonable.
| Going to the movies every Friday night probably costs more.
|
| I spend ~$200/month on just fitness related subscriptions,
| but would balk at spending any money on Pokemon. Different
| people, different hobbies.
| ddlutz wrote:
| I argue it has a hidden gambling aspect with raids. Most of
| the desirable pokemon comes from raids, and of course you
| want desirable stats. There are about 3 levels of gambling
| here that get people hooked in:
|
| 1. Catching the pokemon at all. There is only a probability
| with each throw that the ball catches the pokemon 2. Getting
| good stats. It's easy to get mediocre stats from the raid
| pokemon, which are randomly generated and not known unitl
| catch time. 3. Getting a shiny. It's something like a 5%
| chance from a raid that the pokemon will be shiny. And of
| course you don't know until after you spend your raid pass.
|
| Niantic gives you only 1 free raid pass a day, so in order to
| get more chances at shinies and good stat pokemon you need to
| spend money.
| patorjk wrote:
| These are really good points, I'd forgotten about the
| shinnies and the stats. I was always less concerned with
| stats because I would usually get one that was good enough.
| However, I knew people that had to get the latest shiny
| when it came out. Some of the shinnies would only appear in
| eggs too, so you would need to hatch a lot to have a good
| chance of getting one. Thinking about it more, the game
| definitely does seem to have some hidden gambling aspects
| in it.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| Addiction is a real problem, but I don't think the absolute
| dollar amount is a good way to tell. There are some people that
| don't even notice $450 a month. While there are also quite a
| few people that spending $20 a month would be detrimental to
| their life.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| I was also thinking: what if those people are perhaps kids of
| super rich parents, for whom spending $450 on mobile games is
| nothing compared with their other expenses?
|
| How do we distinguish addicts who cannot resist spending
| money they can't afford to spend, from genuinely super rich
| people for whom any number smaller than thousand is
| effectively zero?
| duped wrote:
| It reminds me more of alcohol purchases where the top 10% of
| drinkers (aka alcoholics) account for more than half of all
| alcohol sales in the United States.
| bentlegen wrote:
| My father died recently in his early 80s, and I took possession
| of his iPhone and audited its contents. He had several active
| subscriptions to official-sounding apps like "Find my iPhone
| Pro+", some of which charged $200+ a year. I think this is
| where some of those numbers come from.
|
| There is a whole industry of knockoff apps designed to deceive
| the tech-illiterate, and Apple seems like they don't give a
| shit - even when these apps seem to be violating Apple's
| trademarks - perhaps because at the end of the day they take
| home 30% of that.
|
| Aside, as long as these apps continue to operate on the app
| store and grift seniors, I will never buy Apple's "this walled
| garden is to protect users" argument.
| finfinfin wrote:
| It's especially infuriating because it seems like that's an
| easy problem to solve. It's unreasonable to allow
| subscriptions above $50 a year. And if developers do insist
| on a higher price, then Apple could audit them.
| mdoms wrote:
| My Netflix subscription is upwards of $200/year and that's
| one of the cheaper ones. MotoGP Videopass is something
| north of $300, Microsoft Gamepass is somewhere in the
| triple figures.
|
| I don't own an iPhone so none of mine go through Apple but
| my point is there are any number of legitimate
| subscriptions well above your arbitrary figure.
| finfinfin wrote:
| Valid point. I think higher price subscriptions could be
| manually reviewed by Apple to prevent abuse.
| douglaswlance wrote:
| All subscriptions are reviewed by Apple.
| tartoran wrote:
| Then somerhing's broken in their review process.
| Nefarious pp clones continue to scam people with
| subscriptions and crazy fees
| Alupis wrote:
| Seriously, from a company that famously wouldn't allow
| flashlight apps because they provided the "official" one,
| this is just silly.
| tartoran wrote:
| Yes. Not a hard to solve problem. Thing is apple profits
| more from higher subscription and even abuse so their
| incentive to fix is not there or they drag their feet to
| gobble up as much as possible. Apple used to be safe, now
| it's rampant with scams and fake apps. I removed my
| credit card from my apple account so I no longer have any
| surprises.
| SCdF wrote:
| These stats are similar to but much more extreme than alcohol,
| where the vast majority (~90%) of sales go to a tiny minority
| (~10%) of "consumers", aka alcoholics.
|
| I wonder how many industries have the facade of normality but
| are propped up by this kind of ugly secret.
| kevingadd wrote:
| I don't think the App Store looked like it was trying to
| prevent this. It favored low-priced titles from a very early
| point which led to the race to the bottom where eventually
| everything was 0.99, and then eventually everything was "Free"
| and loaded with microtransactions. They only later on added an
| indicator so you could tell it was "Free*" and not Free.
|
| And why would they prevent it? When a gambler spends $450,
| Apple gets $135.
| somehnacct3757 wrote:
| As someone who used to build f2p games, it's not addicts
| gambling. It's very rich people who don't even think about the
| sums of money a f2p game is designed around. At $BigF2PCo we
| even set up a wire payment system for these players and direct
| chat with customer support and the development team. They
| expect a white glove level of service.
|
| Game addicts can exist at any monetization level. Governments
| have been passing laws to further regulate f2p and protect
| those players. Total money spent is not a reliable way to
| identify them.
| jungturk wrote:
| While not to that extent - I play Hearthstone (poorly) via
| the app store but have enough disposable income to buy packs
| to get the good cards when they're released so that I can
| play the game and enjoy it.
|
| Now this only adds up to dozens of dollars per release, but I
| suppose that puts me above $150/year, which feels to me like
| a reasonable level of support for the company to continue to
| offer a product I want.
| ec109685 wrote:
| It's those addicts that would be willing to use an alternative
| payment mechanism if that was made easy and there was some
| benefit to them. That might be why Apple is so strident here
| given that 54% of App Store revenue could easily vanish.
|
| Also, the number was .5%: https://www.ben-
| evans.com/benedictevans/2021/7/8/app-store
|
| I'm also not sure if "addict" is the right term. If someone
| likes to go to a high end restaurant once a week, they'd likely
| be spending far more than $450 a quarter on food. Do we call
| them addicts even though they probably only represent .5% of
| the population as well? We only live once, so who are we to
| question how people spend their money?
| treeman79 wrote:
| If people make there own money. Then fine whatever. If the
| set of gamblers has a large crossover with the set of people
| on welfare. Then people paying taxes have a right to be
| grouchy.
|
| Like watching a who Person is always out of money and gets a
| lot of hand outs; blow all the money on scratchers.
|
| I have a family member whom I only buy food for because every
| dollar I give them goes straight to scratchers. She once won
| big. 150 out of the 100 dollars I gave her. she then proceed
| to buy our kids expensive crap.
|
| Umm that was so you had food for week.
| grogenaut wrote:
| .5% is half of the 1% who can easily afford an expenditure
| like this for fun. Or if you don't go to bars 2 days a week
| the same for top 10% earners.
|
| I think your fitting your own narritive to these numbers
| with no data.
| diebeforei485 wrote:
| High end restaurants don't use casino-style tricks (random
| rewards or non-rewards) to get you hooked.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| No, but low-end ones do. cf Domino's Surprise Frees
| (https://surprisefrees.dominos.com/) program.
| suprfsat wrote:
| Furthermore, sweepstakes are regulated and always require
| "no purchase necessary". Mobile games are the wild west.
|
| You can enter simply by mailing a self-addressed stamped
| envelope to Kalamazoo and waiting two weeks, it's just as
| easy as ordering a pizza online.
| _fat_santa wrote:
| Personally I don't see that as getting people hooked,
| more so incentivizing online ordering.
|
| My theory is Dominos has figured out that online orders
| are much more efficient to take than phone orders. As
| such they are doing everything they can to nudge people
| to order online. So no I don't think it's to get people
| hooked on Domino's pizza because of a roulette you can
| play when you order, I think it's a "nudge" to get you to
| order online.
|
| Regular Joe wants to order a pizza and goes to call
| Dominos, when he looks up the number he sees the
| promotion but only if he orders online. Even though
| Regular Joe usually orders over the phone, he orders
| online this time, even winning some breadsticks for his
| trouble. Regular Joe now orders online whenever he gets
| Dominos.
| judge2020 wrote:
| > Personally I don't see that as getting people hooked,
| more so incentivizing online ordering.
|
| Not much different than the Phone then. I can assure you
| there are at least a few dozen people who buy Domino's
| once a day thanks to this promotion.
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| At that point they're winning regularly and it acts more
| like a 50 cent discount on each order, with no way to win
| big either. If you want to get hooked on that you can
| just pick your own random day of the week. So whatever,
| not predatory in the way that going for whales usually
| is.
| secabeen wrote:
| Online orders save staff time, and are much less error-
| prone.
| shadilay wrote:
| Food is different. At the end of the day you can only eat
| so much, even if you're paid to eat. There's a physical
| consumption cap. This is why 'sharing a meal' has
| historical significance. Food is inherently anti-greed.
| gowld wrote:
| High end restaurants use social status tricks. What's the
| difference?
| gwern wrote:
| High end restaurants absolutely do those! They track
| customers looking for whales, and track various random
| gifts and upgrades. "Monsieur? The maitre d' says he put
| the corner table aside for you. Please enjoy a small bisque
| while you wait, our compliments. And I believe it is your
| wife's birthday, perhaps the pianist can play her favorite
| song?"
| mortenjorck wrote:
| Yes to whale-seeking, but this is otherwise not a valid
| comparison. Fine-dining patrons are not basing their
| visits around the hope that "this time they'll get the
| free appetizers."
|
| Put another way, I'm reasonably sure that gambling
| addiction support groups outnumber fine dining addiction
| support groups by a few orders of magnitude.
| void_mint wrote:
| Are all businesses to be compared to high end restaurants?
| gravypod wrote:
| I may be ignorant but I don't know many businesses who
| operate mainly on dopamine hooks other than tech and
| gambling.
| [deleted]
| prepend wrote:
| Most restaurants are garbage, convenience places relying
| on massive ads and such to succeed. Pretty much all fast
| food falls into this category. Sugar and cheap oils
| making up tons of calories to get people coming back.
| void_mint wrote:
| Is it coincidence that high end restaurants usually
| involve lots of alcohol?
| gyc wrote:
| If anything given the cost of high quality ingredients,
| high end restaurants might even be losing money on food
| alone, and may depend on alcohol sales to make up the
| difference.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Um...
|
| * pharmaceuticals
|
| * alcohol
|
| * soft drinks
|
| * tobacco
|
| * fashion
|
| * media (film, tv, publishers like Buzzfeed, People,
| etc.)
|
| * half the useless shit I buy on Amazon
| ethbr0 wrote:
| High performance automobiles
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Games as an entire concept use these tricks. mobile games
| aren't fundamentally different. The difference is that
| there was always a spending ceiling until mobile came
| along. Even if that spending celing was still something
| absurd in a few cases, like $2000 of train simulator DLC.
|
| Regardless, people spending this much money are likely old
| enough to choose to gamble (or stealing their money, which
| is a different issue altogether). So I'm as concerned for
| them as any other gambler/alcoholic. Wish them the best but
| I don't care to bring the government in and regulate
| everyone's behaviors (My country historically tried and
| failed with alcohol. And is slowly losing similar efforts
| with drugs).
| wyre wrote:
| Most (US) cities already have regulations against
| gambling and I don't see people having underground
| casinos where they are losing their life savings. AFAIK
| there is even regulation against e-gambling like online
| poker.
|
| Microtransactions give the brain the same chemicals but
| without the possibility of a cash payout and are
| engineered to take as much money from the user using
| techniques casinos don't have access to because they
| exist in a physical space and not digitally inside a
| mobile phone without having to offer cash payouts for
| winners.
| thegrimmest wrote:
| > _regulation against e-gambling like online poker._
|
| nit - playing poker against other people isn't gambling,
| it's a game of skill. Much like chess, if you're better,
| you win and can earn a living. No one earns a living
| playing roulette.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >and I don't see people having underground casinos where
| they are losing their life savings.
|
| well, it wouldn't be very undergrounds if you saw it, no?
| I have little doubt that they exist, even if I cannot
| prove it. Underground betting rings is almost a cliche in
| modern media.
|
| >Microtransactions give the brain the same chemicals but
| without the possibility of a cash payout
|
| no, games do that (outside of like, Steam Marketplace
| where you can apparently sell digital items yourself. So
| the money traded IS the rush). MTX are a monetization
| taking advantadge of that dopamine rush. And nowhere
| close to the first one.
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| > Wish them the best but I don't care to bring the
| government in and regulate everyone's behaviors
|
| "We live in a society"
|
| And people's behaviour is a function of their
| environment: blaming "personal responsibility" and
| leaving it-at-that is a position taken out of either
| ignorance of how society and complex-systems operate, or
| out of callous disregard and suggests you lack empathy.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >blaming "personal responsibility" and leaving it-at-that
| is a position taken out of either ignorance of how
| society and complex-systems operate, or out of callous
| disregard and suggests you lack empathy.
|
| It is indeed lack of empathy. 2 years ago I didn't even
| HAVE $450. Let alone $450 to spend on any gaming
| whatsoever, regardless of ethical pricing. These are
| premium entertainment, not some base good nor even a (IMO
| unethical) attempt to promise riches like a lottery/high
| APR credit card/high interest loan/gambling. There is no
| premise that you'll be making your money back unless
| you're trying to flip a free mobile game account (which
| is against pretty much every services' TOS, if you want
| to get legal about it).
|
| So again, best of luck improving themselves. Addiction is
| rough and it's not easy at all getting out of it. But
| people spend hundreds recklessly on so many items, legal
| and not. Or on items that are long term detrimental to
| our health (e.g. fast food, cigarettes, alcohol).
|
| I don't think they should all be left to the governemt to
| decide. Because historically that hasn't stopped the
| actual addicts (given that I know/knew several friends on
| already illegal drugs). At some point you need
| intervention of self and close loved ones. Making all
| mobile game MTX illegal won't solve these people's
| problems
| thegrimmest wrote:
| There is a third option: believing that I have no moral
| standing to intervene in other people's decision-making
| process, no matter how much I think they might benefit
| from it.
|
| We all live in a society, but that doesn't mean we all
| have to agree about everything, or even that we're all on
| the same team. To me it just means we're willing to co-
| exist peacefully, and resolve disputes via due process.
| From there I really don't think I have the right to tell
| others how to spend their money, or whether or to whom to
| sell their kidneys.
| watwut wrote:
| > The difference is that there was always a spending
| ceiling until mobile came along.
|
| Gamers spent huge amount of money on Steam and were even
| proud of it. There was whole.vulture of "Inpaid more for
| games I am better then you" as dumb as it sound.
|
| And there are the people who hate mobile games the most.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| True, I have run into internet commenters like that.
|
| It's an interesting quandary. one person paying thousands
| for games for "clout" despite never playing 90+% of them
| (almost exclusively digital, so of no resale value
| compared to collecting physical copies), vs. one person
| paying thousands for a few single games they likely play
| way too much.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| Thanks for the number check - too late to edit now. (Ben
| arrived at a number of a milion people so I think it was all
| a little fuzzy)
|
| Addict is a difficult term. As patio11 points out elsewhere
| most definitions of addiction include desire but inability to
| give up, plus some degree of harm. Helping addicts is a
| individual task, but I think social policy has a role to play
| in harm reduction.
|
| I like Richard Thaler's idea of Libertarian Paternalism. Yes
| we support each persons individual right to fuck up their
| lives. But we should set the _defaults_ in life to be ... in
| the best interests of the patient as it were.
|
| So, each month we take taxes out of our pay packet, oh and
| yes, by default you pay 8% into a pension. New job? You are
| automatically enrolled in a union. Want to get out. Fine,
| fill in the form. (P.S. that one changed the course of
| British Politics for a century)
|
| We can question how people are persuaded by others to spend
| their money. We can question the polluters who muck up the
| rivers, so we can also question the polluters who pollute our
| minds.
|
| I am sure is an unpopular position, but, at the bottom level,
| I find it annoying that supermarkets put kids toys and
| chocolates right next to the checkout.
|
| (Perhaps better advice is - you are human - you _will_ get
| addicted to something. booze that something carefully)
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| >I'm also not sure if "addict" is the right term.
|
| The difference between these games and a high end restaurant
| is that, at the restaurant you get what you order.
|
| In the games, you roll a die and have small change to receive
| a big payout.
|
| I would have no problems with the games if you could just
| choose the high end loot and pay for it.
| Thorentis wrote:
| > In the games, you roll a die and have small change to
| receive a big payout.
|
| This is untrue of most games with IAP. You are usually
| buying in-game items to speed up your progression through
| the game, or to give you some advantage.
|
| In practice, I imagine the brain mechanics are much the
| same as a slot machine though. I once saw a senior couple
| sitting at McDonald's next to each other, both on an iPad,
| slowly tapping away at the screen of what looked like a
| Clash of Clans/other town builder game. The dead look on
| their faces as they tapped away reminded me of addicts at
| slot machines. While the gambling aspect isn't the same,
| the dopamine hits I'd say are largely identical.
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| Have a look at the Top Grossing free iOS games. They all
| rely on random drops from loot boxes (perhaps in addition
| to timers)
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| In a given _quarter_ , 0.5% had spent 450 USD or more (i.e. an
| average of 150+ per month).
|
| (Note - this is isn't necessarily the same 0.5% each quarter,
| so it doesn't mean that 0.5% of app store users are spending at
| least 1800 per year.)
| easygenes wrote:
| With the design of the search and the choice of titles that
| they push on the App Store editorially, I don't think it looks
| like they're trying to avoid gambling-type behavior at all.
|
| If they were responsible about it they would allow you to set
| preferences to filter out titles which have IAP. Also it would
| be granular; you could configure so you can see or not:
| 1) Titles which have one-time IAP for permanent feature
| unlocks. 2) Titles which have set-price recurring
| subscription IAP. 3) These are the evil ones, and should
| even have some sort of account lock-out that's harder to
| override available: Titles which have some sort of endless in-
| app currency.
|
| For those last ones, it would also be responsible of them to
| have it so you can setup with an account-level monthly budget
| which has, say, a 24-hour minimum cooldown to override.
|
| Otherwise, yes, they are basically encouraging addiction just
| like casinos and probably ought to be regulated as such since
| they're not self-policing at all.
| easygenes wrote:
| Also, I think there's something to be said for scale and
| context when it comes to regulation of this sort of
| marketing. Another poster here put it quite succinctly
| saying, I'm paraphrasing, "You don't expect them selling guns
| at the candy store."
|
| So the App Store is something which a large subset of the
| global population has shoved in it's face, just for having a
| phone; which society expects of them. It's not people seeking
| out a "gambling-type" experience.
|
| There's a greater onus of care to be a responsible player. I
| guess then they'd sell less of the self-help and counseling
| apps on the store too though.
| easygenes wrote:
| Another thing which would be a responsible play by Apple: For
| those unlimited-in-app-currency purchases, have a no-
| questions-asked automatic refund process which is available
| for 30 days after purchase and causes the app to be either
| permanently removed from your library or made unavailable for
| reinstall for a minimum of 90 days (and perhaps all other
| apps with unlimited in-app currency).
|
| This would show Apple's commitment to avoiding encouraging
| regrettable addictive behavior on their platform.
| void_mint wrote:
| > Even in IOS App Store.
|
| Chuckled. "Even in". The app store is derived around squeezing
| whales. Apple is the best at facilitating gambling addicts
| dumping cash into IAP in the world. "Even in" I guess speaks to
| their public image.
| ohples wrote:
| Its worse then gambling. When you gamble at a Casino, atleast
| there a chance you can win money (albit rare). With the mobile
| gaming pay to play inapp purchases, you never win that money
| back.
| Macha wrote:
| And even if you do win the "prize", if the casino shuts down,
| say goodbye to your hard won PNGs.
| mattknox wrote:
| I felt that way too, but I have mostly changed my mind. My
| wife, who has a FT job, a purse company, and 2 kids, plays a
| SHOCKING amount of Maple Story. She never pays money, but at a
| reasonable-for-her time value of money, I'm sure she'd be well
| into 10s of $K/year of cost. Is that malfeasance on the
| developer's part? I dunno. I'd generally prefer she play less,
| but she is an extremely functional adult, and she gets to make
| her own choices.
|
| Thought experiment: if she spent 10X less time but $2K/year on
| the game, would that be more or less troubling? If she took
| that trade, she'd be an addict by your lights, but she'd be
| spending 10-30 min rather than 3-5h/day, and I'd be THRILLED.
| It's interesting to me that we are generally totally fine with
| something that sucks up (or alternatively, makes enjoyable) all
| or more-than-all of someone's free time, but we get upset when
| it takes even trivial amounts of their money.
| gowld wrote:
| > if she spent 10X less time but $2K/year on the game,
|
| Does that matter? Is it a meaningful option?
|
| If she made that trade, she'd have free time, and there are a
| milion more addicting options (plenty of which are free!), so
| the steady state would likely be the same time spent on
| similar whatever, plus the $2K/year. Or, if she finds a
| better hobby (yay), no need to pay $2K/yr!
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >Does that matter? Is it a meaningful option?
|
| depends on how you value time. Which seems to change based
| on age. At 14 it wouldn't matter, I'm happy spending hours
| grinding. Now at 27, it's much more ambivalent.
|
| >she'd have free time, and there are a milion more
| addicting options (plenty of which are free!), so the
| steady state would likely be the same time spent on similar
| whateve
|
| maybe, maybe not. I've had friends who quit big mmo's just
| play other MMO's. Some just moved to a new MMO, some moved
| to new hobbies. Sometimes even more expensive (oh boy, I'm
| SO glad I'm not a car junkie. Geez, the money and time
| spent on parts... not to mention the danger. ), some
| "productive" and even profitable (e.g. I helped give some
| tips to a friend learning to program and said he quit Lol,
| which I remember him playing pretty heavily even before
| college).
|
| Too broad to assume.
| Quinner wrote:
| That's actually part of the problem I have with this model.
| These companies are charging you to reduce the amount of time
| you have to play the game to achieve the goals set in the
| game. They could make a game where you get the same
| satisfaction in 30 minutes as you do in 3 hours now, but then
| they wouldn't be able to charge you for the shortcuts.
|
| I have my own gaming addiction (with games that have complex
| systems), but I find the mobile gaming model perverse and
| manipulative.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Ultimately, entertainment is just "A time waster". Games
| from their core commercial history involve ways to get more
| money or time (often both) from a player. including:
|
| 1. Arcade machines meant to be overly difficult to extend
| playtime and each quarters
|
| 2. early console game made to be extremely difficult with
| punishing systems (limited lives, lack of save states, etc)
| that artificially extend the playtime of what's not ~3-5
| hours on an emulator with these features
|
| 3. early online computer games inflating engagement with
| horrendously low drop rates, and requiring groups to be
| formed to very slightly accelerate the rate at which
| content can be cleared so they can keep a monthly
| subscription up. Bonus points for the group forming an in-
| pressure to stay engaged, possibly after you've tired of
| the grind.
|
| 4. splitting of the game into 2 or more "versions", which
| have minimal differences but require both versions to truly
| gain completion or some specific rare item. Again, bonus
| for forcing social interaction amongst peers to give
| pressure to buy the game (or a different version so you can
| interact).
|
| 5. in the realm of 4), sometimes rereleasing a "director's
| cut" a year later at full price with cut content (that you
| can argue was cut purposefully) in order to get more money
| out of 90% the same content
|
| 6. DLC that includes anywhere from cosmetics that used to
| be available in game to the direct "time saver" item packs
| that is now often contributed to mobile games.
|
| We're just at the newest iteration. And much of the west is
| already moving from #7 being taled about today (stamina
| systems and random chance at drops) towards 8) Battle pass
| structures to encourage playtime and give extra rewards on
| a pseudo-subscption system. An interesting combination of
| 3) and 6).
| [deleted]
| unilynx wrote:
| Do you have examples of #4?
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Pokemon is the biggest example and it's been ingrained in
| fans for 25 years to
|
| 1. choose 1 or buy 2 versions of a game that is 90% the
| same (example, Gold or Silver, whose differences are in
| some dozen pokemon exclusive to one version) 2. a year or
| two out, receive a 3rd version with extra content charged
| at full price (Crystal). Often acting as the "definitive
| version" for that generation.
|
| It's not the most common model, but a few other
| franchises outside of pokemon have definitely applied
| their own take on it (often Nintendo related ones).
| ethbr0 wrote:
| I played the 1 and 5(?) generations of MMOs (if we call it
| text MUD, UO, EQ, WoW, post-WoW subscription, freemium).
|
| It was already night and day seeing where game design re:
| funding was going.
|
| I decided I'd never play another MMO without a good answer to
| one question: "Am I enjoying every minute of this?"
|
| Not "Am I enjoying the rewards?" or "Am I enjoying the thing
| that happens after 4 hours of doing something?" Every minute.
|
| Because a game should be fun. Always. Otherwise, it's a waste
| of my time.
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| I've been getting into SplitGate the last few weeks, I've
| been using my one hour a night of free time on it. Every
| minute has been a blast, but it has put a real dent in my
| progress on my side projects . :)
| ethbr0 wrote:
| IMHO, non -inventory / -peristent shooters have a pretty
| high efficiency by this metric. You drop in, enjoy
| yourself, then drop out.
|
| (said as a UT / TFC / Tribes fan)
| novok wrote:
| Does your wife sleep?
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| So pay-to-win gets a _lot_ of bad rap, and it 's not entirely
| unearned... but I've really come to appreciate the value of
| microtransactions if you're a busy working individual.
|
| In the traditional multiplayer space, the players with the best
| stuff and most progression are lifers. Those _real_ addicts:
| The people who are online all day every day, whenever you sign
| in. A lot of them are kids, and I used to be one back in the
| day. But as a full-time employee with a wife and a kid, I can
| 't ever compete with that.
|
| Pay-to-win games give people who work good jobs a way to
| compete: If I know that an item it'll take me three weeks to
| grind out will cost me $20 to buy outright... I make more money
| working in real life, so why not buy it in-game instead of
| wasting my time grinding.
| Macha wrote:
| How traditionally are we talking? Traditionally, many genres
| of games haven't had progression for someone to have the most
| of. That guy who played a billion hours of Quake, or Halo 3,
| or Starcraft 2 doesn't have anything you don't have. Hell
| even the likes of League of Legends, it doesn't take that
| much IP to buy any one champion the free way, and you can't
| buy power for that champion. I guess you could say you're
| paying to win by buying the strongest champion in that patch
| with cash each time, but honestly if you really have that
| little play time you're probably hurting your performance
| more than helping it by champion hopping that much.
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| I probably speak mostly in the scope of MMOs: Games that
| are fairly grindy by default, and always have been, and
| have social/competitive aspects. Generally they've always
| had items and tiers that take weeks or months to grind out,
| and the idea of paying your way through that is often
| looked pretty far down upon.
|
| But if you're making more out of game than in-game, it's
| just good time management.
| orangecat wrote:
| _Pay-to-win games give people who work good jobs a way to
| compete: If I know that an item it 'll take me three weeks to
| grind out will cost me $20 to buy outright... I make more
| money working in real life, so why not buy it in-game instead
| of wasting my time grinding._
|
| That's exactly why I hate most IAPs: developers intentionally
| make parts of the game annoying so you'll be tempted to pay
| to skip them.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| TBF. all online games are annoying regardless in terms of
| respect to time. At least you have a choice here between
| saving money or time, instead of neither with an MMO.
|
| Guess that's just the literal cost of wanting a game that
| constantly updates. People can argue that single player
| games are the best bang for their buck, but it really
| depends on if you're the kind of people who will play a
| snigle game dozens of times or if you're one who want to
| mostly experience the main content once.
| gowld wrote:
| Why not play games that don't suck?
|
| You pay $20 to win? For $15 I'll call you a winner. Visit my
| OnlyFans.
| socialist_coder wrote:
| It's the red queen effect though, as soon as you make the
| IAP, you quickly advance, but then you will soon hit the next
| plateau. So you're stuck again unless you keep making IAPs.
| If a game is pay-to-win, you have to keep paying and paying
| and paying. It's not like you can pay once and then you're
| good.
| eropple wrote:
| I mean--it used to be that you bought the game and you got
| the stuff and you had to ladder up _within the context of a
| single game_ in order to get to the good stuff. Why should
| grinding be rewarding at all, except to put players on an
| _external_ addiction loop rather than one based on the
| moment-to-moment fun of the game?
|
| Counter-Strike was never my game, but during the course of a
| match you could ladder your way up to an AK (absolutely
| reasonable for most gameplay) within the first couple rounds
| and it was pretty difficult _not_ to be able to get an AWP at
| least for a while if you wanted to. I played FireArms Half-
| Life and The Opera instead, where you built your loadout and
| everybody had access to everything, save for in FAHL specific
| skills that laddered up throughout a match themselves.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| > If I know that an item it'll take me three weeks to grind
| out will cost me $20 to buy outright...
|
| Why do you think that desirable item takes 3 weeks of
| grinding to acquire? Pay2win is bad because it incentivizes
| developers to make their game an annoying slog, then turn
| around and sell the player a solution to the problem they
| just created. They're not helping you by giving you the
| option to pay to skip part of their game; they're the ones
| responsible for the grind you're trying to avoid.
| adamc wrote:
| Came to say exactly that. It is abusive, particularly of
| younger players.
| dvt wrote:
| > This is basically addicts gambling.
|
| A bit tangential, but there is some serious cognitive
| dissonance here on HN (and more broadly in the tech world in
| general). When Apple/Google does this -- facilitates some kind
| of arguably degenerate behavior -- it's "evil." But when
| OnlyFans does it -- sex addicts, lonely guys, social weirdos
| that need friends collectively spend _millions_ of dollars on
| parasocial fake OnlyFans relationships -- this "empowers sex
| workers."
| makeva wrote:
| I think you are making a connection that I can't find. Care
| to elaborate?
| hengri wrote:
| Could be that HN is more inclined to use OF than play
| mobile games heh
| watwut wrote:
| > sex addicts, lonely guys, social weirdos
|
| AFAIK, all kind of guys use and pay for porn. Not just social
| weirdos.
| jjulius wrote:
| FWIW, I've seen many discussions about how OF's biggest
| spenders are people like that in many OF-related threads on
| HN.
| paulddraper wrote:
| I've seen equal criticism of both.
| mattnewton wrote:
| Lots of different people on HN, I don't know that the same
| people have both those beliefs, it could just be the people
| with the strongest beliefs express those on each topic
| patmcc wrote:
| It's both, of course - the app stores empower developers,
| OnlyFans empowers sex workers, both take advantage of a small
| subset of consumers. Just like there are whales playing
| Genshin Impact, with a whole lot of people paying nothing/a
| tiny amount, there are lots of people ogling Amouranth for
| free on Twitch/youtube/whatever, with a tiny percentage
| spending way too much on OnlyFans.
| fragmede wrote:
| It's almost as if one of those is a relatively small platform
| whos creators are almost exclusively young women, and the
| others are two of the largest, richest conglomerates in the
| world, who's creators are software development houses,
| (software development is a well-paying career) and that
| there's some sort of difference between the two groups.
|
| Hm.
| EvilEy3 wrote:
| Except two of the largest, richest conglomerates also
| provide value outside of the said degenerate activities.
| stouset wrote:
| What exactly makes consumption of porn--or,
| alternatively, compensating women for the production of
| porn--a "degenerate activity"?
| thegrimmest wrote:
| Id's say "degenerate" is a catch-all for any activity
| which produces a supernormal stimulus, far in excess of
| what our Neolithic biology would be prepared for. Excess
| food, drugs, sexual novelty, and gambling all fall into
| this category.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| TBF, I've heard opinions all over the spectrum for OF. Many
| supportive, many not so much. Sex work is pretty much as
| controversial as usual.
|
| Also, the idea of OF isn't that one dude spends thouands to a
| million dollar coporation, it's that thousands, maybe
| millions, spend like $10 to see curated boobs, which mostly
| goes to a single creator (at most. a dozen people managing
| their social media).
|
| I'm not a vehemently against mobile games as many parts of
| the internet, but it is a different dynamic altogether.
| rootsudo wrote:
| Agree 100%
|
| --
|
| So, how do you control optics? Large marketing dept? Positive
| PR? Buy positivity?
|
| or has the world really changed?
| SCdF wrote:
| Supporting people using OF is about supporting a safe place
| for sex workers, your tangent seems as you say, tangential.
|
| Para-social relationships are potentially troubling, but have
| nothing specifically to do with OF: they exist on YT, Twitch,
| insta etc.
| pixelatedindex wrote:
| The difference is who this money goes to. In the gambling/iOS
| whales scenario many people are paying one big mega Corp. At
| least the social weirdos are paying the content creator
| directly.
| deelowe wrote:
| OF isn't manipulating their customer base. It's pretty clear
| what you're getting into when you go to their site.
| spoonjim wrote:
| Right but they depend on their degenerate "whales" just
| like anyone. There's a big difference between going to the
| strip club a couple times a year with your buddies and
| being the guy who shows up at 11am on Tuesday with his
| paycheck but the strip club is happy to take all of the
| addict's money.
| deelowe wrote:
| I guess I need more data before fully forming an opinion
| then. I don't care about whales who intentionally seek
| out certain things to blow all their money. My concern is
| folks getting tricked into those situations via
| manipulative techniques.
| spoonjim wrote:
| What's a manipulative technique? Is getting a guy more
| and more sexually aroused to separate him from his money
| a manipulative technique?
| deelowe wrote:
| I don't know precisely, but maybe we can start with
| building entire research teams who specialize in brain
| chemistry to have them create complicated engagement
| strategies which are inserted into "free" apps targeted
| at kids.
| watwut wrote:
| I never seen degenerate to be used for mobile gaming
| whales. Why so much hate toward customers of OF?
|
| But like, going to strip bar with guy friends is no
| better in anything.
| misnome wrote:
| I mean, this applies to literally anything people do for
| leisure
| tolmasky wrote:
| Although it may seem counter-intuitive, the fact that the
| behavior on OnlyFans is so transparently "degenerate" makes
| it somewhat immune to that sort of criticism. Everyone knows
| what people go there for. The problem with Apple is that it
| holds up the AppStore as a pinnacle of morality (many of
| their AppStore rules are specifically around creating the
| perception of a moral store, such as no porn), and Apple the
| company itself portrays itself as a moral company, but then
| at the end of the day they are making the majority of the
| AppStore's money on a vice like any other (often times on
| children, as many of these games are geared towards that
| audience). A candy store that secretly sells cigarettes will
| always receive more criticism than a bar.
| infogulch wrote:
| Apple wants to have their cake and eat it too.
| dvt wrote:
| > A candy store that secretly sells cigarettes will always
| receive more criticism than a bar
|
| You make a great point that I didn't really think of! Apple
| definitely tries to massage their optics. Could also be why
| Apple's store is also more criticized than Google's, even
| though there's a lot more garbage on the Play Store.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| The HN umbrage also seems to stem from the fact that
| Apple _uses_ those optics to justify their monopoly over
| the App Store.
|
| We need absolute control over our platform -> so that we
| can control the user experience -> so that we can make
| the iPhone ecosystem a more private, secure, safe, high
| quality place
|
| If it turns out the reason they need absolute control is
| so that Apple can milk whales in the same way Zynga
| did... well, IMHO people are entitled to call hypocrite
| angrily.
| thegrimmest wrote:
| I personally think the fact that Apple built their
| platform _literally_ from the ground up is more than
| sufficient justification for them to maintain as much
| control over it as they please. Shouldn 't we all just
| say "Hey, thanks Apple for advancing the state of the art
| so tremendously far" and leave it there?
| prepend wrote:
| > Everyone knows what people go there for.
|
| I don't think so. I've talked to people who use onlyfans
| and most are truly delusional. In that they think the site
| runner cares about them and responds just to them. It's
| almost harder than physics sex work because few people
| think the prostitute cares about them.
|
| I had people swear that when someone wished them happy
| birthday, they cared because "they didn't have to do that."
| Cipater wrote:
| You're saying that you know multiple people who think of
| OF creators in this way?
|
| Curious. Would you describe them as lonely people?
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| >>> It's almost harder than physics sex work because
|
| I know its a typo, but I now have this image of Carl
| Sagan dressing like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, that I
| cannot get out of my head :-)
| spoonjim wrote:
| I think you might be under the influence of a biased set of
| observations. Most average Americans do not hold women who
| show their boobs on the Internet in high regard, and use
| words significantly more coarse than "sex workers" to
| describe them.
|
| But it's just a subset of course of the bigger problem of the
| "Twitter take" often being light years away from the "average
| take."
| gowld wrote:
| Most average Americans are hypocritical mysogynists who
| enjoy porn but disrespect the creators.
| spoonjim wrote:
| Agree.
| vineyardmike wrote:
| > sex addicts, lonely guys, social weirdos that need friends
| collectively spend millions of dollars on parasocial fake
| OnlyFans relationships
|
| Wow this an extremely hostile take on OF. What a vapid,
| overly opinionated and negative view of sexuality. Do you
| really think that P0rn is used for lonely social weirdos that
| need friends? Is that a genuine take on the purpose?
| aaaaaaaaaaab wrote:
| Yes. Mostly yes.
| dvt wrote:
| > Wow this an extremely hostile take on OF.
|
| There's dozens of studies on parasocial relationships and
| how unhealthy they can be[1]; dozens of studies on how
| heavy porn consumption lowers libido and is overall not
| great for you[2]; and dozens of surveys on how my
| generation (millenials) and younger (zoomers) are more
| lonely, having less sex, having less friends, and less
| happy than previous generations.
|
| [1] https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?arti
| cle=3...
|
| [2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5039517/#:
| ~:tex...).
| staticman2 wrote:
| You'd have to eliminate all media to eliminate parasocial
| relationships, not sure what that has to so with porn.
| The most intense parasocial relationships are probably
| with politicians and celebrities, not porn stars.
|
| That second link discusses correlations and calls for
| further study which you've translated to "porn causes
| Millennial's problems" in your summary, which is not a
| reasonable takeaway.
|
| People with healthy relationships and healthy bodies are
| almost certainly going to have less time for porn, for
| one thing. It's hard to put in porn viewing hours if you
| are hanging out with platonic friends or going for a walk
| with your crush.
| dvt wrote:
| > you've somehow translated to "porn causes all life's
| problems" in your summary.
|
| This seems a bit uncharitable, I don't think I've done
| this at all.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Well you said people are "lonely guys, social weirdos"
| for engaging in this activity, and then there are studies
| saying society as a whole has less physical intimacy this
| generation than any other.
|
| It may not be intentional, but it is indirectly saying
| that these activities are major contributors
| stouset wrote:
| > and dozens of surveys on how my generation (millenials)
| and younger (zoomers) are more lonely, having less sex,
| having less friends, and less happy than previous
| generations
|
| There is no causation link here.
|
| There are plenty of other massive social upheavals going
| on that are likely tied into this. The pandemic.
| Political acrimony. Impending impact of climate change.
| Helicopter parenting. Economic difficulties and
| uncertainty for younger generations. Facebook and other
| social media. Celebrity obsession. Abuse of addictive
| patterns in gaming apps.
|
| We've created a world where people's real life prospects
| are dwindling and yet there's cheap, easy, and unlimited
| access to virtual dopamine generators. While porn is
| certainly a contributor, I don't see any evidence that
| it's an outsized one or that it deserves to be singled
| out from the myriad ways we've ruined things for future
| generations.
|
| Also and more directly to the point, GP was addressing
| GGP categorizing porn consumers as "sex addicts, lonely
| guys, social weirdos". The vast majority of the western
| world--including women--consume some amount of
| pornography. They just do it overwhelmingly in private,
| which is why such a stigma exists. Paying for it is not
| necessarily indicative of it being a problem for these
| people, in the same way that paying for music or other
| media isn't. It's just a changing of the norm to one that
| is frankly an extreme improvement for the women who do
| this as a profession.
| Dma54rhs wrote:
| The power balance is way off, it's taking advantage of
| miserable people. Mostly men in this case.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| Wouldn't that count things like ordering coffee in an app? I
| spend perhaps far too much money on coffee ordered through my
| iPhone. That's an in-app purchase, right?
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| Are Apple taking 30% of your coffee purchase? Wow.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| I would guess in this case it's just normal merchant fees
| (no larger than 5%). But I don't know how this all breaks
| down. It's not like they take 30% when you use Apple Pay at
| a store. Ordering coffee in an app seems more like an
| extension of that.
| bullfightonmars wrote:
| This isn't just from gaming apps and gambling though. I
| purchase all of my media via the itunes, pay for streaming
| subscriptions, icloud, and sometimes subscribe to premium
| productivity apps.
|
| In my household this has approached $300/mo at the highest, but
| is typically around $80-100/mo.
|
| That is all without a single in app purchase in a game.
| Mindwipe wrote:
| > Which really did look like it was trying to avoid that.
|
| How? Apple literally did everything it could to incentivise
| this behaviour. It blocked upgrade pricing to incentivise in-
| app micropayments. It relentlessly promoted lootbox filled
| games ahead of discrete experiences with sensible pricing. The
| layout of the store was totally biased against titles without
| this structure.
|
| Apple 100% steered towards a whale economy in the app store,
| and didn't give the slightest toss about the human misery that
| resulted in because it made their monthly results look a bit
| better.
| nvrspyx wrote:
| I don't know why you're downvoted. It really does seem like
| Apple not only facilitated this, but continues to implicitly
| encourage it.
| rapind wrote:
| In gaming they are called "whales" and they are actively
| targeted. https://youtu.be/xNjI03CGkb4
| amelius wrote:
| So we can't mention other payment methods inside our own apps.
|
| Isn't that a violation of Freedom Of Speech?
| ChrisKingWebDev wrote:
| Freedom of speech only refers to your ability to criticize the
| government. A private company can do whatever they want with
| their platform.
| jjcon wrote:
| It does violate the concept of freedom of speech (though it
| does not violate the law as enshrined in USA 1st amendment to
| the constitution)
| OldHand2018 wrote:
| The Genshin Impact behavior, as described, sounds like a true
| nightmare. It's like when you skimmed through the Epic lawsuit
| against Apple and they described all the "features" that Apple is
| "preventing", I just wanted to throw up.
|
| On the customer side, who the hell wants this stuff?
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| well, it's a monetization model and not a gameplay feature for
| a reason. Financial incentives will always be at war with the
| consumer ideal of "free and constantly updating, no strings
| attached".
|
| I don't think anyone "wants" to pay for this kinda stuff. But
| many have.
| wonnage wrote:
| The customer probably just wants a button they can click in-app
| to pay for stuff.
| ArchOversight wrote:
| I know I am probably not your average consumer, but I am not
| looking forward to this at all.
|
| I like having a single place that my payment info is stored and
| processed, and I trust Apple with it. With this new world order
| everyone and their dog is going to be asking for my credit card
| details and who knows how well or safely it is going to be
| handled/stored.
|
| For small purchases I really don't want to have to enter my
| credit card details.
| throwaway473825 wrote:
| If Revolut is available in your country, you can use it to
| create disposable virtual cards for one-time transactions.
| toiletfuneral wrote:
| yeah, i understand how badly developers want to increase their
| margins but i'm still unsure how much this ultimately benefits
| customers other than having an ever increasing number of
| accounts to manage just to pay $1 a month instead of $2 a
| month...? What am I missing?
| dangus wrote:
| Worrying about credit card safety is silly. Your bank shoulders
| that burden. In the US you are legally not responsible for
| significant credit card fraud.
|
| I'm much more concerned about monopolistic behavior. The
| solution to payment security isn't to choose one company and
| make them the gatekeeper.
| ArchOversight wrote:
| The real issue is that I am lazy, and my credit card number
| is also used for recurring payments on things that are
| important to me.
|
| So if there is credit card fraud, and I have to get a new
| card number, I end up having to remember the 10+ places it is
| used and update them before I find out because my water is
| turned off (for example).
|
| I have ADHD, I already have enough on my mind, I don't need
| to add additional complexity or burden to it.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| I don't think it'll shift as quickly or as hard as you expect.
| I imagine this will just be where some companies strongly urge
| users to use their native payments, but there will be some
| small "use apple pay" button (possibly mandated by Apple,
| possibly not).
|
| On top of that, many may not bother at all. setting up a
| payment vendor isn't trivial. Some may be happy to let apple
| keep 30% of the gravy for that convienence.
| huhtenberg wrote:
| It'd be a choice of paying a bit more with less hassle (via
| Apple) and paying a bit less with more hassle (via a 3rd
| party). But at least there will _be_ a choice.
| hanniabu wrote:
| Sounds like a good opportunity for "Log in with Ethereum" and
| stablecoins
| tommymachine wrote:
| seems like by using Apple Pay / google pay your fears would be
| assuaged?
| ArchOversight wrote:
| Apple Pay still sends a credit card number to a website.
| Where it may be used like any other credit card number. Same
| with Google Pay.
| tommymachine wrote:
| pretty sure at least apple pay uses a dynamic security
| code, and not just a raw card number that can be saved?
| judge2020 wrote:
| Yes
|
| > After you authenticate your transaction, the Secure
| Element provides your Device Account Number and a
| transaction-specific dynamic security code to the store's
| point of sale terminal along with additional information
| needed to complete the transaction. Again, neither Apple
| nor your device sends your actual payment card number.
| Before they approve the payment, your bank, card issuer,
| or payment network can verify your payment information by
| checking the dynamic security code to make sure that it's
| unique and tied to your device.
|
| > Like with in-store payments, Apple sends your Device
| Account Number to the app or website along with the
| transaction-specific dynamic security code. Neither Apple
| nor your device sends your actual payment card number to
| the app.
|
| Note that this can be prefaced by 'usually' - some banks,
| instead of generating a new unique ID for Apple Pay, will
| use the CC number itself, or will at least augment the
| device ID with the payment card (I noticed this as
| receipts showed the last 4 of the card, despite using
| Apple Pay).
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203027
| jscottmiller wrote:
| With respect to the author, I found the article a bit overwrought
| and folks may bounce before getting the gist.
|
| tl;dr Apple will be more generous in allowing developers to
| message their customers about payment options outside the app.
| This is a big deal for virtual game economies (and others!)
| because now Epic can email/message you about a fortnite vbuck
| bundle sold from their website, where epic can pay their payment
| provider, say, 3% plus $0.25 for a $10 transaction rather than
| the 30% App Store fee, saving $2.45!
|
| The revenant Apple text:
|
| > To give developers even more flexibility to reach their
| customers, Apple is also clarifying that developers can use
| communications, such as email, to share information about payment
| methods outside of their iOS app. As always, developers will not
| pay Apple a commission on any purchases taking place outside of
| their app or the App Store. Users must consent to the
| communication and have the right to opt out.
|
| Very exciting stuff, and Patrick is right that this messaging
| will be rolled out quickly by games and others.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| > folks may bounce before getting the gist
|
| Agreed. I had to read it more than twice to get what he was
| talking about. I'd say that the the only reason I bothered is
| that I usually like patio11's insights so I figured it was
| worth trying to understand it.
|
| Since I'm not a gamer, I got distracted trying to understand a
| lot of the game stuff and why it was so relevant to what he was
| getting at.
|
| ps, I like your tl;dr :-)
| somehnacct3757 wrote:
| Interesting wrinkle for Mihoyo (Genshin Impact dev), I've heard
| from a big spender friend that he purposely buys primos on iPad
| even though he plays on PC.
|
| This is because their PC payment flow routes through China and
| puts flags on his card. They may need to address that first,
| before they can route more US traffic through a non-apple flow.
| Still worth their time, but could refute the "single sprint" dev
| cost in the article.
| quadrifoliate wrote:
| > Gacha games are named after the onomatopoeia describing vending
| machines in Japanese malls and arcades which dispense toys and
| trinkets for, typically, 100 to 200 yen (about $1-$2). The pool
| of trinkets is displayed prominently on the machine; which
| trinket you get is effectively randomized. If you had your heart
| set on a particular one, you might spend much more than $1 on
| getting it, and some children (and adults!) very much do. Many
| very successful games have a monetization strategy which descends
| from a variant of this.
|
| I am sorry to say this as someone who usually agrees with
| 'patio11 on everything, but both gacha and the "monetization
| strategies" inspired by it (be they hawking in-game currency or
| trying to mine email addresses) sound like a _terrible_ idea.
|
| I don't want gacha, or any of these monetization strategies in my
| ideal consumption model. I want to look at a toy in the store and
| buy it while knowing what I am getting. This gacha model sounds
| like it's incentivizing gambling from a very young age.
|
| Am I too close-minded? Idealistic? Missing some crucial part of
| the article? I'd like to hear, because nothing seems _good_ about
| this at the moment.
| cblconfederate wrote:
| This is not a new situation, Facebook platform games went through
| all those gaming-the-gamers phases 10 years ago. If devs start
| baiting people to give their address, soon all the devs will do
| that and apple will ban it because reasons. Very few people will
| give their email anyway. Overall the impact will be minimal.
| Also, surprised that apple hasn't banned those gacha things yet.
| kposehn wrote:
| A few notes about Genshin Impact:
|
| - Genesis Crystals are the base currency that RMT get you in
| Genshin Impact, not Primogems. You have to choose to convert them
| in order to do wishes (Gacha rolls)
|
| - In 2.0, MiHoYo implemented cross-save functionality with
| PlayStation, PC and iOS. This allows PS players to now play on
| other devices, but importantly _Genesis Crystals do not carry
| over between platforms_
|
| - The end result is that your RMT purchase is locked into the
| platform you use until you convert it into Primogems
|
| - As a result, Genesis Crystal purchases have an additional
| hurdle that MiHoYo has to deal with to incentivize users
| (GC->Primogems conversion) but it is by no means insurmountable
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Correct, this is often common practice with any cross platform
| app (usually IOS/Android). I imagine for platform policy
| reasons they can't just let you move over premium currency that
| was bought on one platform.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| I don't think so. I'm sure I'm not the only one who really enjoys
| the convenience of managing all of my payments and subscriptions
| in one place in the Settings app.
|
| EDIT: You can downvote me all you like, but you need to deal with
| the fact that the end user's experience is more important than a
| bunch of devs who think they are entitled to be free riders on an
| App Store that is most certainly not free to develop or maintain.
| Mindwipe wrote:
| > but you need to deal with the fact that the end user's
| experience is more important
|
| The end user is completely toxic as a result of the App Store.
| I cannot buy books in Amazon's app, because Apple think they
| are entitled to rent seek on it. We've ended up in a word of
| crappy gambling simulators instead of sensibly priced paid
| software because Apple engineered the store that way.
|
| The App Store is horrible for me, as a user.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| I certainly don't want the App Store to become the more or
| less anything goes Google Play Store which is still riddled
| with malware and shovelware.
|
| One of the reasons why I enthusiastically continue to choose
| the Apple platform is that Apple has standards and gives an
| actual damn about the end user and having actual platform-
| wide standards and conventions instead of letting devs do
| whatever the hell they feel like a la Windows or Android.
| orangecat wrote:
| Just to be clear: is it a bad thing that you can write a
| Mac app and distribute it without getting Apple's
| permission?
| atishay811 wrote:
| They could also do this by exposing get subscriptions and
| cancel subscription APIs that other payment providers/apps can
| implement. Just like the share sheet, there can be a pay sheet.
| minhazm wrote:
| It comes down to how much you're spending. People are spending
| hundreds of dollars (some spend thousands) on Genshin and other
| gotcha games. If you're spending hundreds of dollars and you
| can get 30% more virtual currency for your money then you're
| much more likely to go out of your way to do it.
| auggierose wrote:
| Sounds like you are getting a bad deal either way.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| I really dislike the whole "freemium" or "free-to-play"
| category of games and I refuse to touch that garbage.
|
| Software should have a fair upfront price. It's not
| complicated.
| orangecat wrote:
| The IAP model became dominant on mobile largely because of
| Apple's store policies and their refusal to allow other
| forms of distribution. Meanwhile Steam and many other
| channels are largely pay-once, and they exist only because
| of the developer freedom that you decry.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| No, the IAP model became dominant because the unwashed
| masses can't be bothered to spend a few dollars or even
| just 99C/ for a copy of software that oftentimes took
| many months if not years to develop, to say nothing of
| on-going support and maintenance costs. Too many people
| (in general) are just flat out fucking cheap and too many
| devs/companies are willing to resort to stuffing every
| app with ads and tracking.
| ezekg wrote:
| It's even worse when you have kids... your toddler gets
| upset because the very fun looking princess puzzle she's
| trying to play "is broken." In reality, it's just pay-
| walled.
| svachalek wrote:
| It's so hard to find anymore. Digital board games are one
| exception, there are a lot of really excellent ones with
| great replay value for a fixed price. Scythe, Root, Spirit
| Island, Railroad Ink, Wingspan, Through the Ages, Galaxy
| Trucker...
| PStamatiou wrote:
| is that convenience worth paying 30% more? (assuming apps are
| allowed to have different pricing outside the app store). I
| think it might for apps you're unsure about at first and want
| the ability to easily cancel, but for things you're paying for
| for years? You probably wouldn't mind going thru a stripe web
| flow for some savings.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| Convenience a big part of it but not only thing. The platform
| owner needs every big club available to it to keep developers
| in line with the platform rules and conventions.
|
| Otherwise we would end up with something along the lines of
| the growing Electron cancer that macOS is affected by.
| WA wrote:
| Cordova predates Electron. Webapps in a WebView container
| were on iOS first and still have quite a market share. This
| has nothing to do with payments.
| josephd79 wrote:
| Honestly , I think developers are going to have a hard time
| changing peoples behavior. If its vastly cheaper to pay outside
| of the app store, sure I can see that impacting peoples decisions
| on how they pay. But, if you're only talking about a couple
| bucks, most people are just going to say f it, its easier to just
| use in-app purchases.
|
| Also, if you think about it. people would probably only do that
| for apps and games that you can play across several different
| devices.
| collaborative wrote:
| Most people have a paypal account they can use instead of
| Apple/Google. It's also a lazy payment method, a couple clicks
| and you're done
| [deleted]
| patio11 wrote:
| Happy to chat about it, HN, since otherwise I'd just be playing
| more Genshin Impact.
|
| My capsule review of the game nobody asked for: if you like
| Breath of the Wild, you'll likely enjoy it a lot. It is not as
| pure of an exploration game at BotW is, and the emergent game
| mechanics that made BotW such a joy, a toy which produced its own
| unique stories with every player, are mostly absent. The
| exploration doesn't tie in closely with the plot like it does in
| BotW.
|
| But, other than that, it's an extremely, extremely effective
| game. Excellent art and music design; the graphics compare
| favorably to anything I've ever seen in an AAA game if you like
| this anime-inspired visual style.
|
| I find the combat similar to single-player WoW with more
| interesting strategic choices (regarding party comp, etc) and
| less interesting tactical choices. Harder encounters are fun
| puzzles to solve.
|
| While the actual story in the game is nothing we haven't seen
| done better before, the character interactions are an extremely
| interesting Chinese take on Chinese/Japanese/Western fantasy
| tropes. Someone could get an East Asian Studies thesis out of it
| fairly easily. It's amusing to "read" with that cultural
| commentary lens on; the localization is also surprisingly well
| done (including both English and Japanese, to the extent you
| credit me with being able to perceive that).
|
| The metagame about how to progress as quickly as possible, and
| where to invest your resources / how to harvest them efficiently,
| also pushes my buttons very effectively.
| tomjen3 wrote:
| Do you think this will have any impact on aps that are not pay
| to win games?
| ezekg wrote:
| This blog post is published tomorrow, just a funny heads up :)
| mlpinit wrote:
| Different time zone: Time zone in Tokyo, Japan (GMT+9)
| ezekg wrote:
| Ah, good call. Forgot he's in Japan. My mistake.
| [deleted]
| sleibrock wrote:
| I think the distinct lack of enemy diversity is what kills it
| for me. Even the boss designs are overall lackluster. A bunch
| of cubes casting spells, or an ice/fire flower. I go to
| challenge this water goddess thing and instead I fight water
| squirrels and crabs. That and I can only kill about four bosses
| a day for rewards.
|
| First going in I thought I would be playing with friends and
| fighting bosses. Now I've been told not to do that because you
| don't want friends stealing your chests. Maybe I'm doing things
| wrong.
| cosmojg wrote:
| Just a heads up, you're the only one who can open your chests
| in Genshin Impact. The most that other players can do to your
| detriment is pick flowers.
| professorsnep wrote:
| Enemy diversity is just part of another big issue for me:
| General gameplay diversity. Most of the stuff the game has
| you do outside of story content is just fighting the same
| enemies or boss types. There's no unique dungeons or bosses,
| the "domains" you need to farm for gear are all just waves of
| enemies, daily quests are just killing enemies, etc. There's
| rarely any unique mechanics or novel ideas that actually
| change the way you play, which makes the game get stale fast.
| novok wrote:
| What is the interesting Chinese take on it?
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| At some point I hope this model evolves to engage content
| creators.
|
| Clearly the biggest "draw" for these sorts of games is new
| content, and that is a sort of sunk cost with developers who
| pay people to create new content so that they can monetize it.
|
| However, when it shifts into something like an MLM scheme where
| an "end user" can develop new content and then deliver it
| through the game engine, and then the game engine owner and
| person who developed the content "share" in the monetization
| (one by game sales etc, the other by in game currencies) then
| games like PoE and others can grow diversity without hiring.
|
| The incentive alignment is pretty clear, really avid players
| can both improve their own playing experience (enrich
| themselves in game) by doing this, and the game developer gets
| more people playing because there is such an interesting mix of
| things to do an see.
|
| At some point this evolves into market exchanges where people
| who can conceive compelling stories find others who are skilled
| at art or puzzle design and they can form a group for the
| purposes of delivering a bit of gameplay content that they
| share in the rewards from.
|
| If you are having a hard time visualizing this, consider WoW
| for a moment. Let's say Bliz had a way for an avid player to
| "design" an NPC, write their back story, their interaction
| dialogs, and the quests they would give in the execution of
| their "story". An artist teams up with this person to provide
| textures for either an existing character type, or potentially
| designing a completely new kind of creature for this. All WoW
| quests have a fairly fixed set of game mechanics choices to
| work from so putting those together in ways that are
| interesting might be the role of a third member of this ad-hoc
| group. Once completing the story line you have access to a
| vendor NPC who will sell you various items for WoW gold (pets,
| spells, recipes, etc). If the "team" that came up with this
| whole package got a cut of the WoW gold that the vendor
| received for their wares, that would provide an incentive to
| this team to make their content compelling. That may be all the
| incentive they need. And Bliz gets a quest chain + vendor +
| content that enhances game play for all players and keeps it
| fresh.
|
| Sort of like the virtual gig economy where players add content
| to the game in exchange for in game currency.
| nxrabl wrote:
| What you're describing sounds a lot like Second Life, which
| launched in 2003 and is still running. (Incidentally, to tie
| it back to Genshin, Second Life recently banned gacha-style
| transactions on its platform [0])
|
| [0] https://ryanschultz.com/2021/08/02/second-life-bans-
| gacha-ma...
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| I'm familiar with SL. And yes it has some of the elements
| of this, what it doesn't have (or didn't when I last looked
| at it) were constrained physics story lines and a questing
| model tied to in game currency. Mostly it was around
| converting "real" money to "Linden" Dollars[1] to
| facilitate in-game transactions.
|
| [1] And at the time (2008) there were sites that would
| convert your Linden dollars back into cash.
| CreepGin wrote:
| So Minecraft, Roblox, Rust, and other mod-friendly and
| sandboxed games are close to what you are describing.
| Centralized games like WoW is almost like the opposite.
|
| In order to support custom content creation and integration,
| the game needs to have a specific type of asset and tooling
| pipeline that can be community-driven, something that's more
| or less determined at the conception of the game.
|
| I agree with you in that we do need more big studios stepping
| in this direction. It takes guts for these CEOs and CFOs to
| say to their investors "Yes we will have first-class mod
| support, LAN support, and give the players the tools
| necessary to alter the game with their creativities."
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| > So Minecraft, Roblox, Rust, and other mod-friendly and
| sandboxed games are close to what you are describing.
|
| Yes they are. There are also 'total conversions' in the
| gaming community where a game had nearly all of its assets
| replaced to become a new game. The pieces are all out
| there, but they haven't yet combined into a single thing
| yet.
|
| We often think of ideas as being these amazing things that
| spontaneously spring into existence, however they are more
| often the amalgamation of a bunch of things that have
| emerged on their own and then contextualized in a way that
| unifies them into a cohesive whole. My thinking is that
| distributed game economies are going to be such things.
|
| One of the early things about WoW was the emergence of
| "gold farming" which exploited legitimate game tools
| (questing, mailing gold to other players, in game
| transactions) and demonstrated you could earn real money
| off players by selling them virtual goods. Personally, I
| think that was the point when game product managers said,
| "Hmmm, that is money we could be making" and the "freemium"
| model was accepted as a legit model.
|
| They still keep 'game flow' and 'game assets' in house
| however, but the curated app store model has shown business
| people how you can let third parties make stuff and then
| give them a platform to sell it and skim the profits. When
| you combine these two models in games you get this new
| thing.
| CreepGin wrote:
| That's a very interesting point about WoW. I was not a
| hardcore WoW player but I did play on and off in my high
| school years (Vanilla + Burning Crusade).
|
| I remember selling 1000g for $50 USD at some point. Then
| a month later the average price for 1000g dropped to $15.
| It seemed like the price would eventually match the
| absolute lowest of 3rd world labor cost (until WoW tokens
| were introduced). So that pretty much aligns with your
| point of management finally giving in to the new model.
|
| > the curated app store model has shown business people
| how you can let third parties make stuff and then give
| them a platform to sell it and skim the profits.
|
| After being involved in both kinds of work fields
| (content vs platform), I can say that it's really a
| grass-is-always-greener-on-the-other-side thing. When we
| were making in-house contents we would think how nice
| being a platform is (no creativity involved, just skim
| off other people's success). But when we made our own
| platform, we often felt the insecurity of not having our
| own contents and people jumping ships. Plus, licensing
| headaches and dealing with lawyers became a norm.
|
| The only kind of platform that doesn't have this issue is
| one that is a near monopoly ( _cough_ App Store).
| Netflix, after realizing the rise of their competitors,
| went to town with in-house productions and declared
| "Content is King".
| kbenson wrote:
| > If the "team" that came up with this whole package got a
| cut of the WoW gold that the vendor received for their wares,
| that would provide an incentive to this team to make their
| content compelling.
|
| There's have to be careful thought as to how this works, as
| the incentives might work out to a lopsided amount of content
| that maximized the thing that resulted in designer
| compensation.
|
| Since the resources used aren't really an internalized cost
| in most cases, the NPC needs to be balanced against an
| idealized cost/value system that is often judgement based,
| meaning that a lot of work is required assessing if the
| designed asset is good for the system or not.
|
| The simple example would be an NPC that if you walk up to
| grants you ten minutes of immunity for 1% of your wealth. Not
| only will something like that be extremely popular on it's
| own, if the designers get a percentage of the received gold,
| they are incentivized to make it _always_ used. Maybe that
| means making it easily available almost all the time, and
| only taking 0.1% of wealth, so people use it even more often.
| But the real question is, does that break the game? The
| designers can be entirely motivated by profit, and not care
| about overall game function and health. The only way to
| combat this is to either carefully align incentives such as
| game health to function which is tricky (everyone might love
| the immunity boon for the first week and always profess to
| like it but end up playing less because of less challenge and
| engagement) or to have the game runners carefully assess and
| tweak all submitted proposals, at which point what you 're
| getting from the public may not be worth it.
|
| Maybe it would work if it was more just a nice kickback for
| contributing though. Design a module or something and submit
| to be accepted into core, and if it's accepted into the core
| you get a set amount of game currency which is predefined at
| certain amounts based on contribution, and a one time payout.
| Then the monetary incentive is to appease the game runners
| and provide something useful for the game, which aligns with
| any altruistic incentive to improve the game you're playing.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| Its a fair point, and as I was saying in another response
| consider the "App Store" model where this new content is
| given to the internal team to review before releasing it.
| Clearly something that unbalanced the game like this would
| be rejected.
| franciscop wrote:
| I've seen it announced a thousand times on the trains in Tokyo,
| and I'm always drooling at how beautiful it looks, but assumed
| it was just marketing and not the real gameplay. I'll give it a
| try, thanks for the review!
| kbenson wrote:
| I learned all I want to know about that game while my 11 year
| old was playing it. Sounded like BotW with annoyingly long and
| useless grinding to get weird crystals or something that are
| needed to buy better weapons (or buy loot boxes of a sort with
| low good loot chace, IIRC).
|
| It didn't sound _horrible_ , because he seemed to like the
| gameplay, but I didn't feel any desire to get into a game where
| you can pay for benefit (I tend to the other end of the
| spectrum, repeatedly punishing deaths until you get better,
| like Dark Souls).
|
| He probably spent a total of ~$80 on the game, over 4-6 months.
| I don't count that as too bad, as it's not much more than
| buying it and an expansion would cost, and it provided him a
| lot of entertainment. That said, the reason it as _only_ ~$80
| is because I was controlling the purse strings.
| ve55 wrote:
| That's the rough part with acquiring characters (or anything)
| through the equivalent of cash-funded roulette: you can set
| out to spend a certain amount to attain something you want,
| but it might not work, and if you're sufficiently unlucky it
| may turn into an order of magnitude more spending than you
| originally intended.
|
| While you could of course commit to only spending $X and
| dealing with the results even if they're unsatisfactory, this
| can be surprisingly difficult psychologically, combining the
| best of the gambler's fallacy with the sunk cost fallacy
| (among many other behaviors very cleverly inspired by the
| game's developers) into one.
| kbenson wrote:
| Worse for me, as I'll likely ignore the pay route and go
| the exceedingly long and grindy route, and if I feel
| they've made that far too punishing for the rewards, I'll
| likely feel the game isn't rewarding enough to play. I'm
| not really interesting in proving to myself that I can pay
| money to do better than other people, so it doesn't help me
| enjoy games that are competitive in any way, and if it's a
| non-competitive game, I just feel like I'm being
| manipulated, which also saps the enjoyment out of it for
| me.
|
| I don't mind purely cosmetic offerings being present in
| games, and I'll even buy a few. But if I feel like I'm
| competing on a field that's stratified by money, it just
| kills the enjoyment for me. It's the same reason I stopped
| playing Magic: The Gathering back in the mid nineties a few
| months after when it was first released. It was fun when we
| all had starter decks, but after friends started collecting
| special cards, I saw where I thought it was going an opted
| out. The realization just sapped a lot of the enjoyment out
| of the game for me.
| ve55 wrote:
| I feel like that a lot, so called pay-to-win games (or
| perhaps pay-to-progress) aren't my thing either for
| similar reasons, even though I could afford them. I've
| played GI for a bit, but very casually (even more so as
| it doesn't run on Linux, so I've only played it on mobile
| myself), and as long as I am finding things I enjoy, for
| example the music, voice acting, and UX, I don't mind the
| game's profit model, but I definitely will end up playing
| less when/if I reach the point(s) to where I am
| increasingly penalized for not paying.
| phreack wrote:
| Digital cash funded roulette is such a predatory practice.
| I believe it should just be banned altogether, there's no
| good to come of it.
| smoldesu wrote:
| I like Breath of the Wild, but trying Genshin Impact was like
| having a root canal done on my brain. After around 30 minutes
| of playing it I had to put it down, grinding a game for the
| promise of being able to buy microtransactions is not a
| effective way for me to spend my time. Maybe it's just because
| I'm not an MMO fan, but Genshin feels like a regression in the
| genre of JRPGs.
| kahrl wrote:
| CRPG.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| I'm of two minds on it. On one hand, yeah. Grind for a chance
| (a low one, even among other mobile games) of pulling a
| favorite character can be a discouraging model. And having no
| end in sight can be disenheartening for those wanting to
| binge on a compelted game.
|
| But on the other hand, JRPGs tend to not get major updates,
| and are now taking 3-5+ years per game to meat that criteria.
| Unlike fighting games, you can't make meaningful character
| DLC post release that would mesh into the game. The very
| closest I've seen to this in modern times is Kingdom Hearts'
| 3 DLC letting you play as 2 additional characters... for one
| specific boss fight each out of a ~5 hour DLC of a 30-40 hour
| game.
|
| Meanwhile, new characters, events, and areas drop monthly for
| Genshin. Without a direct subscription cost if you treat the
| game as a JRPG with some 4-5 playable characters gotten in
| story (which is average for a modern JRPG) and ignore the new
| characters other JRPGs don't have the option for. There are
| some very niche benefits and workaround of issues most JRPGs
| have today in Genshin.
|
| ----
|
| I don't really have much of a point here. Just rambling on
| some musings that I wish console JRPGs could take lessons
| from. I guess I just miss those days where is didn't feel
| like Final Fantasy (and ONLY FF) was the only big JRPG in
| town pushing graphical boundaries, and Genshin gave me some
| of those vibes. Moreso than any JRPG in the 2010's outside of
| FF and KH. Tales of Arise coming in a few weeks gives me some
| hopes, but I want to hope this isn't just a one-off fluke in
| the genre.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
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