StoneyDcrew

Oh I got it! It's a picture right?! Pictures are very majestic.

I'd like to take a minute, just sit right there.

I'll tell about the time I mauled some kid with a bear!

I love these two dorks. Great fanart.

Dungeon no Osananajimi/Dungeon Friends Forever is the name of the manga with these characters if you are interested.

Apathy is worse than the whales.

Let's do some theoretical scenarios for microtransactions:

-apathy with whales: "we need to ensure a good monetisation model to extract value from the whales, even if the normal players are missing out"

-apathy without whales: "let's try adding microtransactions to extract more value per player, it won't hurt our sales!"

-No apathy with whales: "no one is buying our game! And our whales have no one to play with! Are the whales even enough to fund this on its own? We got to undo the microtransactions soon!"

-No apathy no whales: "why did we even add microtransactions! Every business knows that only quality games and good marketing can help sales!"

A little hyberbolic but surely you see my point.

Ah. The "I'll just tolerate this until it gets worse" mindset. Never backfires!

Surely even you can admit that slipping this in on release was a scummy move.

It's "theoretical" only because there is no non-monetised version. They could have created a cheat shop with the items for free. Even if you choose not to use them having that option means it is a better experience, so it would still be a "diminished experience".

If someone can pay extra money to get a different game experience from you then the publishers have denied you the chance at that experience which is "diminished".

This isn't even mentioning the performance issues on lunch that would be tolerated because "surely they'll fix it later!".

Sure you don't care. Many people don't care. And surely someone is going to try and highlight this apathy as a virtue somehow. And so publishers get to continue experimenting with how to milk franchises for every dollar it can instead of making an optimal game experience, overall making the game industry worse.

I don't like the idea of them being slid in there

Yeah, but you're tolerating it. which is good enough for greedy publishers.

If you want it to stop, don't buy it. It's the only option. Otherwise you allow publishers to make your game experience worse for profit.

The reason people like me are disappointed it is selling well is that these anti-consumer practices are not a deal-breaker for most people thus it allows these practices to persist in the game market. That is hardly "nonsense" as you put it.

I'm sure I'll get a lot of "tolerating" people commenting that these "can be easily ignored", but I doubt I will get a single person that says their experience was enhanced by these microtransactions, which could have simply been a cheat code instead.

I think you are underestimating Anakins power!

While I understand that, I'm kinda sick of game companies trying to sell cheat codes in an already full priced game. It incentives creating a frustrating gameplay loop which can be bypassed for money.

If the game was a live service game, where there is expected updates (and thus development cost/server cost) then it could maybe be okay, but it is walking the line between full priced game and free to play game and I'm still figuring out if I'm okay with that or not.

I think klei may be my favourite studio. They create amazing games that are all truly unique but backed by strong game design concepts.

Mark of the ninja - great 2d stealth game were most games in the genre are 3d.

Invisible Inc - great turn-based Rougelike stealth game.

Don't starve - probably one of the best survival games out there that relies on clever resource management rather than combat

Oxygen not included - a base building survival game, that is well designed to ramp up difficulty with the long term needs of your base

Griftlands - deck building game with a charming plot and interesting mechanics.

Each game they output is truly unique and interesting experience with some really clever design choices, but I think the point they became my favourite studio is when I read their article on Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic rewards to appreciate how well thought out their games were.

Haha. Glad you enjoyed it. Really great game that I think deserves more attention.

I like to imagine the last one is the koala developing a smooth brain so it use less calories so it can continue eating leaf.

I recall that scene. Didn't he lower his hand as they fell into it so it slows them? I remember appreciating that detail when I saw it