Thar be whales in them tharr hills (Destiny)

by narcogen , Andover, Massachusetts, Saturday, November 02, 2019, 10:39 (1645 days ago) @ Cody Miller

Think about the raid, for instance. Given the number of people who actually play and complete it, it's sort of crazy Bungie invests in making it. I think it's why the entire raid "event" is now structured around streamers and the "world's first" race, to the detriment of ordinary players who want a reasonably unspoiled experience when they can reasonably approach an appropriate power level.

But the raid comes free with your purchase.

Yes, but not sure what the point is of that?

Nobody's ever going to raise the price of games like they should, so it doesn't actually change anything for the players by it being there except to give them the option to play it.

Yes, they will, but not sure why you say they should.

If what you mean is that the people who actually make games should be paid better, then yes! If you're saying the register price needs to go up to make that happen, I'd say... no, probably it doesn't.

Foam swords, Eververse silver, and Fallout 1st to me now, as well as the proliferation of "special editions" in the past, Virtual Reality hardware, concern me about a market going forward where games aren't like movies or TV-- entertainment for everyone-- but exotic cars, a market where it's deemed more profitable to seek many thousands of dollars a year or more from a smaller audience.

This is okay by me. I would rather spend the same amount of money and have fewer, better experiences. If I could only afford 2 games a year, but those games were perfect 11s, I wouldn't mind. That's not the problem. The problem is the games and the experiences are becoming more terrible at the AAA level.

I think you're only going to get one of those things. As the "live services" trend continues to get pushed, everyone is trying to make more games that are the kind of game you could only play one or two of, because nobody has more time than that.

The response to the "there are too many good games and not enough time" is going to be to make games that are less good, but consume even more time. And to hook in-game purchases to them.

But it doesn't have to be that way. Death Stranding has no microtransactions.

That is a whole other kettle of fish, though. Neither does Outer Worlds.

But yes, it doesn't have to be that way. But for Destiny, right now, it is.

There are a lot of anti-consumer practices that go unnoticed when those using them are at least able to execute their jobs with competence and deliver an entertaining product. That's what makes Destiny "not everyone's cup of tea" and makes Fallout 76 an embarassing farce.

But strictly with regard to the business practices themselves, there is less separating those two than I think I would like to comfortably admit.