The thinking is that they want your time, a LOT of your time (Destiny)

by scarab , Thursday, December 04, 2014, 10:23 (3641 days ago) @ Leviathan

This is obviously well thought out and educated but it assumes quite a bit, especially an unvarying "we". For example, guns aren't in the top five reasons I play the game.

Nevertheless we are humans and all have dopamine neural circuitry and are subject to our own biological natures. So the vast majority of what I said does apply to all of us. I also mentioned that the literature was not settled. So I don't recognise the charge that I was being too sweeping in using "an unvarying we". I wasn't saying that there was no other possible interpretation for what Bungie is doing.

But, investment systems are understood and are a field in game making. There are experts in it and Bungie hired some. When people ask, "why can't an exotic's signature feature be unlocked earlier?", my answer would be, "because then you would not be so invested in the weapon".

They are called investment systems for a reason. They could be called, "unlocking stuff systems" or "upgrading things systems" but that doesn't reflect the idea of having gamer tie-in. If you can persuade yourself to just put a little more effort in to get what you want then you will put in more effort and get used to the amount of work that you are expending.

And since I have fun with the gameplay and the world, I'm not going out of my way to level gear. It just happens naturally. I'm patient, I upgrade when I can and if I'm not having fun I quit for the night, regardless of some statistic or the progress of a little green bar.

I get where people may not like the game. I get where someone might think Bungie made mistakes. But vilifying the developer as some evil genius mastermind manipulating all of us because you personally don't like their game? Well, you lose me there. :)

I am not saying that they are cunning foxes because I don't like the game. I am not saying that investment systems prey on inherent aspects of our biology because I don't like the game and I am not saying that there is definite method in what Bungie is doing because I don't like the game.

Would you like to argue that bungie didn't research this stuff when they set out to include an investment system? Were the experts they hired actually not experts? Did it all just happen by accident? Was every decision arbitrary or accidental?

I'm not saying that you are saying those things. I'm just engaging in Reductio ad absurdum to encourage you to think about this, to look beyond some notion that I am saying what I am saying because I, supposedly, don't like Destiny. When I say that Bungie hired experts who know what they are doing I am not saying that because I don't like the game. I am saying it because it is true.

I am also pointing out to people that some of the things they question did not happen by accident. Some people have asked why the signature features of an exotic are unlocked late in the tech tree. My answer is because the time taken to unlock them makes you invested in them.

It could be that you used unvarying we to mean that I thought that every person who plays Destiny is in it for the guns. I am not saying that. But you can't craft every post like a lawyer.

Destiny as a game is definitely majorly focussed on the gear. I would say that exploration was way down on Bungie's list. But maybe that is a discussion for another thread.

My post was addressed to Cody who would probably agree with me that the guns/gear and their levelling up are definitely the major thrust of the game. I was answering his question using what I think is a shared frame of reference (shared between myself and Cody).

Please don't take that as any form of, "don't butt in on our conversation". I didn't mean that at all. I'm just trying to explain why I used we when talking about the guns. I am explaining the context in which I used the we.