It is indeed easy. Much easier than the complex “explanation” you give.
As soon as Diablo Immortal was announced, you could go on battle.net (with a battle.net account abviously) and pre-register.
Completely free, took one click. Literally just registering your interest in the project.
When they put that in place, Blizzard said they would give everybody pre-registered an ingame gift if they reached 30 millions. This was reached before March.
That’s it. It doesn’t mean buyers, or suscribers, or anything financial. Just interested people. I don’t see why they would make up a fake number.
Diablo is Diablo. It is legendary. I know quite a few people with zero interest in action RPGs who will always buy a Diablo game just to have a quick look, for old times sake.
[Edit: that makes the decision of not going for a box price even harder to understand. They would have sold loads just on the name.]
To come back to the subject, all these “casuals” won’t give a hoot about a cash shop being there or not, and care even less about streamers’ opinions: they just come for a quick romp anyway. And I still believe there is far more of them, in sheer numbers, than hardcore gamers interested in competition and the “pay-to-win” fallacy.
If you’d watched the video you’d have heard Ziz, briefly, explain his stance/view on pay-2-win twice. Personally I found Bellular’s video on it much more interesting as he went into far more detail on what was gated by what.
Of course its idealist… Good god man cant you read between the lines? Once again, you interpret things in a very narrow minded way and miss the general point I am trying to make. Its not about the $100 - thats an arbitrary figure I pulled out of my arse… It could have been $1 or $10 or $1000. Of course $100 is too much for most gamers to pay as a box price… thats exactly why the companies try and hide it.
Its condescending because you feel the need point it out as if I am a moron not knowing this… Am I supposed to write a doctoral thesis with clearly defined points, rebuttals, justifactions and harvard formatted references just for you to understand that I understand the background involved.
I know for a fact my 15 year old kid has zero clue how much money he has forked over for playing CS:GO or fortnite or any other game that allows microtransactions or even subscriptions/season passes… and I can assure you, I keep track and he has spent WAY more than $100 on each game… and interestingly his max hours played are all on fixed price boxed games without microtransactions that just have once off dlc payments every so often.
The point I was trying to make is that companies taking microtransaction route are trying to hide this fact from the players and lets face it, I figure most people playing games these days are younger, impressionable and in danger of suffering from addiction because they dont know better.
I could not tell how much money I put into Warframe or Rocket League. A season pass here, a small pack there. Oh, there’s a a discount running? Let’s just buy some ingame currency…
I’m a grown adult and perfectly able to keep track. But I don’t. And so many other people don’t. That’s the whole purpose of MTX. Having people losing track.
It is. But it’s also naive to state that everybody without mental health issues is fully aware of any MTX he did on his games.
But you don’t need to explain how the world functions. Vapour is fully aware. It’s just his view on that topic. It’s not his expectation what will happen.
It’s also naive to think we could stop climate change. But nevertheless we should try.
It’s also naive to think by not buying LE MTX you have helped some Uyghurs. But some people do.
It’s about a moral standpoint. That’s what matters. It’s not about how likely something is.
I’ve done nothing but read between the lines. The only thing I’ve found there is that you think excessive/irresponsible spending on MTX should be the responsibility of game companies to prevent, rather than the responsibility of people who are spending the money to pay attention and make good decisions.
“Here is a store you can buy in-game things from. Thing A costs $X, Thing B costs $Y.”
There is nothing being hidden from anyone. It is right out in the open. It is not deceptive to offer additional features at a clearly communicated cost after an initial purchase.
You literally asked “Why isn’t $X good enough for a business?” Thought exercise: Who is more likely to ask that question - Someone who doesn’t understand that the purpose of a business is to make money, or someone who does? What you’re supposed to do is not ask rhetorical questions that make it look like you don’t know things if you can’t handle someone else pointing out what you appear not to know.
And if you have a problem with that, the only place you should be pointing a finger is the mirror. If your 15 year old can spend money on games unfettered without paying attention to how much he has spent, that’s not on Valve or Epic for “trying to hide it”, it’s on you.
I didn’t say “is”. I’m very well aware of how little some grown adults pay attention to the money they spend on, well, just about anything.
What I said was they can be, they should be, that it is their responsibility to be, that nothing is stopping them from being, that curtailing it is not a responsibility they get to dump on a game company, and that I’m not sympathetic to cries of “hiding the costs” by mentally healthy adults who willfully don’t pay attention to their finances.
Please remember to keep conversations civil. I understand this is certainly a highly controversial topic and it’s easy to get heated, but please try to debate points or opinions raised rather than attacking the posters.
Cept for the Trade marked mental manipulation tactics like skewed match making, mental fomo tactics, offering deals when you are losing on chain etc. that these companies use.
like how can anyone watch this and blame consumers when these guys literally start off with “lets leave morality out of it”
I agree with you in a lot of games, if you are spending 10k on league skins in a year you might have a problem. But the devs/companies have responsibility to engage in moral choices.
We flame companies for using children workers in other countries because thats morally wrong. Just like its morally wrong to manipulate consumers underhandedly.
That’s the typical “blame it on the customer” behaviour.
There’s a reason why Belgium and Netherlands ban lootboxes and predatory financial models. You can’t play Diablo Immortal and Lost Ark in these countries. I don’t think it is because their governments think that all their citizens are from mental illness suffering fools with addiction problems.
Mobile games scam people. It’s not only “keep track of your payments”. Those games play with peoples minds. Mechanics are created by psychological experts to trigger a certain behaviour. This happens all the time when you go shopping, but the games industry is one of the most predatory in that regard. Just saying “look in the mirror” truly is naive.
Edit: @DiceDragon well written. I wholeheartedly agree.
If you sincerely dont believe that consumers should be protected from companies seeking to maximise profit by utilising underhanded ploys and psychological methods to trick them into spending more money then there isnt much more I can say.
I really pity those people who you think are not intelligent, educated, experienced or financially astute enough to not fall for these companies methods.
No, I didn’t, nor will I. As I said above, I watch streamers’ vids occasionally on builds or game mechanics but that is all. I have less than zero tolerance for listening to “opinion pieces” from streamers. I form my own opinions, I don’t give a rat’s ass for others whose opinions may or may not be tainted by payment bias. On an individual basis, I respect all the work Ziz does in making informative build and mechanics vids and also his dev work in some games, but he is also allegedly paid income by gaming companies like other streamers. Therefore I prefer not to possibly taint my good opinion of him by listening to opinion pieces or editorials that may or may not be clouded by external motivations. I bring you back to my 2nd hand car dealer example above.
That’s fair enough & I definitely agree that when there’s a sniff of money around it’s a good idea to take things with a pinch of salt. I guess I trust Ziz in this & he was quite clear on his stance on pay 2 win (he mentioned it several times) & I then watched a few other videos from other people on the matter.
Yeah. For me it depends on how the subject is presented. Imho it is possible to judge if an opinion is biased by what arguments there are and how they are voiced. And important: I don’t base my opinions on single people. I have several streamers I follow for my information about the gaming world and I extract and compile all the infos on a certain matter from all that sources.
Sometimes my favourite guy turns out to have an opinion that not matches my expectations. Sometimes I get surprised by people I usually don’t like that much or disagree with in most cases by matching my view on a topic. And sometimes I change my initial view on the topic.
Ziz’ opinion about DI is legit an viable from my point of view. So no matter if I like him or not, I usually follow him or not, it’s ok.
I prefer basing my opinion on the topics on the arguments and not the streamer that presents them. This way I think I can prevent being spammed by opinions the algorithm wants me to see (as they propably match my average behaviour).
Ditto.
First alarm bell: these guys are commonly called “influencers”. That’s seriously dangerous.
Second alarm bell: they choose video as a support, which is much harder to analise and judge objectively than a text.
So no, I never watch streamers, and never will. I only read written reviews. Read this morning an interesting review of Diablo Immortal on MassivelyOP (love this site), I guess I like it because the writers generally share my point of view, being more RPers than Competitors (the writer specifically mentions the Pay-to-Win aspect but says he personally doesn’t care, feels like me).
Plus, seriously, in this specific case, Zizaran actually named his video “Don’t play this game”!
Really???
Who do you think you are, sir?
For a start, nobody tells me what to play.
And honestly, advising people NOT to try a free game for themselves and make their own opinion is incredibly presumptious (and utterly stupid).
But if it had been a written review that came to the conclusion that D:I’s monetisation was obscene, offensive and egregious and suggested that you didn’t play it you’d have been totally OK with that opinion?
I would be perfectly ok with saying that DI monetisation is excessive, and I would respect your opinion that it is obscene, offensive and egregious (I would pretty much respect any opinion, even if I don’t share it, as long as it worded as an opinion, not an absolute truth).
You would have said that in a written review, giving me time to go through your arguments at my own pace and weigh them.
I wouldn’t be ok with you telling me not to play it, because
What I play is none of your business.
The game is FREE. The only sensible advice is something along the lines of “It is free, do try it and see for yourself, but be very careful before you spend any money on it”.
What a proper review should be: giving your opinion, to HELP people make up their own. NOT to try and influence them into thinking like you.
The Zizarans and Asmongolds of this world should try and remember that.
Yeah, not picking on Ziz in particular but modern “influencers”, media, papers etc etc; this is another example of what I hate about things today.
The title said it all “Don’t play this game”. That is not an opinion, that is an instruction. All media seems to do this now, they all want to tell you how to think or what to do.
Titles I would have preferred are “I won’t play this game”, or “I don’t like this game”, or even “I think this game sucks”. Opinions on why could have then been expressed, but no, it’s all in the form of an instruction. Again, this is not Ziz alone, this is media in general.
The media are even worse in the way they show “news”. After maybe a few scant actual facts, they don’t even bother saying their editorials in the form of “we think”, instead they shove out their OPINIONS on the events in the guise of additional facts; and people are so gullible they can no longer distinguish the difference between fact & opinion.
It’s called click-baiting. In today’s world, sensationalism rules the nest. Hate the game, not the player. Ziz’s income is determined by the amount of clicks he gets, so he’s going to do everything he can to get people to click. Having an alarming title such as “DO NOT PLAY THIS GAME, OR YOUR FAMILY WILL DIE!!!” gets clicks. One like “I would personally not recommend this game, but go ahead and try it anyhow if you want” does not. It’s really that simple. But if you choose to be offended because he is “instructing” you, then that’s on you, really.
What upsets me, personally, is when the thumbnail has a hot girl in a bikini, but that doesn’t exist anywhere in the video… :\
That’s almost the same as showing a nice looking casual puzzle game, but when you download that game it turns out to be a totally different town builder! I mean, wtf!! Who thinks this is funny???!!
I was already aware of your initial comments, the explanation of “click baiting” was not news, nor was it really related to what I posted.
If that is what you got from reading my post, I would suggest you didn’t really read it all, but merely skimmed it and guessed at what I was posting, which ties in with my above comment on click baiting. In fact, one could argue that you “click baited” a reply to my post
