Maybe I am biased. I worked in the gaming industry and developed a F2P game 18 years ago… And of course we added features that encourage habit forming behavior and manipulative marketing. F2P are free but developers have to earn money at some point. I am all for OSS gaming but let’s face it: they cannot rival with games developed by for-profit gaming companies… not because they have no talent but because developing a game is a huge investment and requires a lot of people that deserve a salary.
Now the honest question is: is the world worse because there are F2P games?
Sure, some people will have problems, but at the same time, many people will be happy to play the game for free.
To phrase it as a utilitarian question: does the overall happiness increase or decrease because of these games?
My opinion is that overall happiness increases. YMMV :)
Yes. The world is objectively worse because of free to play video games.
It’s created gambling addicts and debt in ways traditional game development physically couldn’t until the onset of lootbox mechanics.
I won’t pretend it’s the no.1 issue facing society currently but there wasn’t an industry of exploitation before and through free-to-play there’s now a brand new industry that exploits people on top of the others.
Objectively it’s another capitalist grift and by that assessment yes, the world is objectively worse when you add another exploitative industry to the pile.
The world is objectively worse because of free to play video games.
That was not my argument. I did not say it was all pink and that nobody suffered from f2p. I talked about the overall happiness. The same utilitarian approach can be used when talking about vaccines. Some people die because they took a vaccine shot. However the overall population is better because of the vaccine.
I’m not saying that f2p games are comparable to vaccine. I’m just trying to make clear that my argument is utilitarian, and that I’m not disregarding people having issues because of f2p games.
Utilitarian as in maximising happiness? Again i disagree.
What markers of overall increased happiness are you measuring? How have you measured and defined and overall increase in happiness through f2p?
You haven’t to be blunt. At minimum you’ve assumed that more access to video games means increased happiness but we both know its not anywhere near as cut and dry as that. Given that game taste is subjective, the access to increasingly manipulative video game models has only annoyed me. Not made happiness increase so to use your logic as an example that would make f2p objectively anti-utilitarian but I’m not the world so you can’t measure it through me or a handful of individuals or users is my point.
You can’t say with any reason of certainty that access to f2p games that require micro transactions and manipulative gameplay loops have increased happiness because the material conditions of what each game and the experience mean to an individual are so nebulous.
Some people may say “having access to candy crush has made me happier” but what’s actually increased there happiness isn’t access to a video game but distraction from the world around them as an example. That can be accomplished through several means and none of them require exposing oneself to potential manipulation for profit by a company.
I’m all for increasing people’s happiness but as we’ve seen in western society, the markers and justifications for quality of life and happiness defined by those in positions of power have historically being horseshit given that access to variety of cereal in the west (as a result of capitalism they say) has not improved my material conditions or my overall mental health and happiness.
If people want to play f2p that’s there perogative and so be it, but I can’t justify the mechanisms of their design personally in the same way that British drinking culture while fun and people’s choice has not objectively increased happiness but I’d argue in the long run actively prevented it.
Again, very good argumentation. Thank you. Your comments are much appreciated.
Some people may say “having access to candy crush has made me happier” but what’s actually increased there happiness isn’t access to a video game but distraction from the world around them as an example. That can be accomplished through several means and none of them require exposing oneself to potential manipulation for profit by a company.
That particular argument gives me much to think about. 👍
No need to thank me for been an opinionated bellend online, again apologies If I’ve came cross like I’m lecturing.
Overall increase in happiness is the end goal, its important we understand how to achieve this meaningfully through changing material conditions and agency vs metrics on a feedback survey.
Maybe I am biased. I worked in the gaming industry and developed a F2P game 18 years ago… And of course we added features that encourage habit forming behavior and manipulative marketing. F2P are free but developers have to earn money at some point. I am all for OSS gaming but let’s face it: they cannot rival with games developed by for-profit gaming companies… not because they have no talent but because developing a game is a huge investment and requires a lot of people that deserve a salary.
Now the honest question is: is the world worse because there are F2P games? Sure, some people will have problems, but at the same time, many people will be happy to play the game for free.
To phrase it as a utilitarian question: does the overall happiness increase or decrease because of these games? My opinion is that overall happiness increases. YMMV :)
Yes. The world is objectively worse because of free to play video games.
It’s created gambling addicts and debt in ways traditional game development physically couldn’t until the onset of lootbox mechanics.
I won’t pretend it’s the no.1 issue facing society currently but there wasn’t an industry of exploitation before and through free-to-play there’s now a brand new industry that exploits people on top of the others.
Objectively it’s another capitalist grift and by that assessment yes, the world is objectively worse when you add another exploitative industry to the pile.
That was not my argument. I did not say it was all pink and that nobody suffered from f2p. I talked about the overall happiness. The same utilitarian approach can be used when talking about vaccines. Some people die because they took a vaccine shot. However the overall population is better because of the vaccine.
I’m not saying that f2p games are comparable to vaccine. I’m just trying to make clear that my argument is utilitarian, and that I’m not disregarding people having issues because of f2p games.
Yeah ngl that’s not an accurate comparison.
Utilitarian as in maximising happiness? Again i disagree.
What markers of overall increased happiness are you measuring? How have you measured and defined and overall increase in happiness through f2p?
You haven’t to be blunt. At minimum you’ve assumed that more access to video games means increased happiness but we both know its not anywhere near as cut and dry as that. Given that game taste is subjective, the access to increasingly manipulative video game models has only annoyed me. Not made happiness increase so to use your logic as an example that would make f2p objectively anti-utilitarian but I’m not the world so you can’t measure it through me or a handful of individuals or users is my point.
You can’t say with any reason of certainty that access to f2p games that require micro transactions and manipulative gameplay loops have increased happiness because the material conditions of what each game and the experience mean to an individual are so nebulous.
Some people may say “having access to candy crush has made me happier” but what’s actually increased there happiness isn’t access to a video game but distraction from the world around them as an example. That can be accomplished through several means and none of them require exposing oneself to potential manipulation for profit by a company.
I’m all for increasing people’s happiness but as we’ve seen in western society, the markers and justifications for quality of life and happiness defined by those in positions of power have historically being horseshit given that access to variety of cereal in the west (as a result of capitalism they say) has not improved my material conditions or my overall mental health and happiness.
If people want to play f2p that’s there perogative and so be it, but I can’t justify the mechanisms of their design personally in the same way that British drinking culture while fun and people’s choice has not objectively increased happiness but I’d argue in the long run actively prevented it.
Again, very good argumentation. Thank you. Your comments are much appreciated.
That particular argument gives me much to think about. 👍
No need to thank me for been an opinionated bellend online, again apologies If I’ve came cross like I’m lecturing.
Overall increase in happiness is the end goal, its important we understand how to achieve this meaningfully through changing material conditions and agency vs metrics on a feedback survey.