I don't know if this is a joke or not (Destiny)

by Kahzgul, Wednesday, October 25, 2017, 11:46 (2590 days ago) @ MacAddictXIV

It's not a joke. I am not attempting to suggest that there is no predation/abuse/addiction occuring.

However, the article that was previously linked referencing those numbers has no information provided (no demographic information is provided at all) to extrapolate those claims, and the use of 0.15% of players providing 50% of revenue without acknowledging that only 1.5% of players are providing any MT revenue is misleading verbal spin, as "10% of purchasing customers provide 50% of revenue" is the exact same information but sounds substantially less exploitative.

I believed the statistics to be purely for example purposes. Kahzgul would have to explain further.

Here's an explanation of the data from recode.net:

https://www.recode.net/2014/2/26/11623998/a-long-tail-of-whales-half-of-mobile-games-money-comes-from-0-15

It deals with both the 0.15% of all players and 10% of paying players, both sets of numbers of which are, in my esteem, pretty damning.

The article also nicely illustrates the hand-waving by devs about whales, complete with a quote from one saying that a small number of people spending huge amounts on a game does not an ethical dilemma make.

So here's an article from ign about the dangers of addiction and intentionally addictive game design:

http://www.ign.com/articles/2017/04/24/the-troubling-psychology-of-pay-to-loot-systems

It opens with this: “In behavioural psychology, that randomised system of reward is the one that creates the most addiction,” says Emil Hodzic, who runs the Video Game Addiction Treatment Clinic. “That’s the one that causes all the drama.”

So on the one hand we have game devs saying, essentially, it's player choice, we just show them a door, and they choose to walk through it. And on the other hand you have behavior psychologists saying that particular door is addictive. Addicts don't have free will when it comes to their addictions.

Here's a good article about the pitfalls of microtransactional abuse, from staunch F2P advocate Rob Fahey:

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-01-fearing-the-micro-transaction-future

I kind of love this op-ed because he's coming at it from what I view is a very pragmatic place. To paraphrase, he's essentially saying: Microtransactions are here to stay, they are the future, and you can't fight them, but some people *will* fight them anyway, and the more we (the games industry) mess up and make them abusive, the more ammunition those naysayers will have, and that ammo is completely valid in today's market.

This is a great summation. There's opportunity to abuse (no regulation) and there's motive (massive profits). The latter is a fact and not a thing that can be (or even should be) changed. Which means regulation is our only option. We need assurances, *legal* assurances that there's no behind the scenes finger on the scale. Every roll of the gambling-microtrans dice is a big question mark... Is there someone who has figured out what item you're after, how much you'll gamble for it, and is maximizing their returns by preventing you from getting it until you've hit your cap? Remember when online poker sites were found to be cheating? For video games, there is not even a gaming commission in existence to ask to license any of the equally non-existent third party gambling oversight committees that are needed to ensure fair play.

One last thing: Do people who buy microtransactional gamble boxes know what they are actually buying? In fact, the FTC says that, no, they don't, because there are no published odds and no protections against malfeasance by the seller. There are not even guarantees that the buyer knows they are buying something or is legally authorized to buy it.

So are my study-based numbers misleading? I don't think so. I trust the findings of these organizations. Should we be concerned about devs possibly abusing (yes, that word, specifically) addicts in order to get more money out of them? It's a possibility we should be open to. And is it doubly concerning that there is absolutely no governing body regulating the microgamblactions to ensure the odds are fair and equal for all players, and that players know the odds before they purchase so that they can make an informed buy? Yes, it is definitely doubly concerning.

If there was nothing wrong with how microtransactions are implemented in video games, there wouldn't be a preponderance of evidence suggesting that something is wrong.

Now back to Destiny: As I've said elsewhere in this thread, Destiny is a mild form of microtransgamblactions. It's purely cosmetic stuff, doesn't impact gameplay, and can be acquired via non-monetary means. Good guy Bungie. But I can't ignore the gambling element which is still in place, is scientifically proven to be addictive, and was designed by someone with a PhD in human behavioral psychology, who definitely should have known about the addictive nature of this feature. Not so good guy, Bungie.

Hency my concerns.