Games as a "service"

lots of companies have been taking this approach to distributing games, what are yalls opinions of it?

I personally hate it, if you pay for something you should own it.

MUDKIP!!! said:

I personally hate it, if you pay for something you should own it.

Click to expand...

I agree, especially if it's a 50-60 dollar game

I despise this business model. Not because it means you don't own the game (as every game that has had an EULA normally states they can take away the game for any reason (ala you don't own it)) It's because it's essentially the practice of jipping the consumer for as much as possible. It encourages holding back content to release as DLC. It encourages rampant microtransactions in full price games that are becoming more and more relevant to winning. Less single player content, more copy paste multiplayer.

To sum it up, games as a service directly translates to "We don't care about you, we just want as much of your money as we can squeeze out of you"

I look to GTAO as my Games as a Service example. The Singleplayer DLC was ditched as their Shark Cards became very profitable. The Shark Cards became profitable because the game's difficulty was rigged to be very long amounts of repetitive grinding, and Shark cards were a quick way to get the good items. They retasked their DLC team to make 5 different themes of the same mission type that pays terrible, and a few vehicles that would take 20 or more playthroughs to afford just one. Not to mention you have to grind up to afford the properties that allow you to even go and have access to the grinding missions.

The game is set up to force you to grind long amounts of time, or give in and pay for a Shark Card. And a lot of people have given into that much easier way out (myself included). This is the future of Games as a Service. Pay us money or spend 8 hours grinding for one car (That will probably be blown up by someone who gave in and paid for everything with shark cards).

The thing that concerns me about this sort of GaaS mindset isn't actually just about companies taking advantage of their consumers. As primarily a Nintendo-based gamer, they're good enough at that already - and don't do much, if any, GaaS right now. They'll be the slowest to adopt. And besides - are we really surprised about some publishers or developers squeezing every dime out of their content? Some have never been all that concerned with their consumers and fans.

Rather, what bothers me is additionally a question of creative output and ownership.

GaaS started in the mobile space because it only works well there. Free-to-play makes sense because mobile casual gamers often need to be drawn in, enticed, before they're willing to start paying for something. So, putting content behind a paywall was a rather natural development in that space. It's absolutely not natural or efficient in traditional console/PC gaming, which evolves along a totally different path. While the mobile space evolved with that from nearly the beginning, the regular gaming industry went several decades before that was considered at all.

Trying to bring that into the traditional gaming space simply makes no sense. Creatively speaking, most games are produced as a full package with a cohesive purpose, be that a closed-end story (unless sequels are planned) or effective, complete multiplayer. Particularly speaking about the story, I think it's dangerous to start placing necessary story content behind a paywall - it's why I took some issue with one of my favorite games, Destiny, and how it started to frame its paid story DLC as being extensions of the main plot. Extending the story with optional side content makes sense - it just gives fans a chance to explore the world in a more deep, nuanced manner while waiting for the next chapter of the main plot. Having the main story set behind paywalls, though, compromises the game creatively. I don't want a rushed, bare-bones game for $40-60 on release day with the knowledge that I'll be spending $40 more on main story DLC (looking at you, Fire Emblem Fates). I want something complete, something well-written, and something that feels like it tells a whole story, even if that's just chapter one of some grand, long epic. The only way I could see this model working is by releasing full games first, and then whole sequels as massive paid DLC that attach themselves to the main game. If it's not that, I don't want this model; I don't want Nintendo to say "hey so Xenoblade 2 sold really well and was great, so we're going to put out Xenoblade 3 - but before that, you'll need to pay $10 for this new story episode that we're attaching to Xeno 2 that sets up everything you'll need to know to be ready for the next one." That's cheap and offensive. I'm fine with investing in games I think are worth it, but not to the point that I'm spending hundreds of dollars on content and extras for one standalone title.

From an ownership standpoint, what concerns me is the ability to revoke access and limit use. In the mobile environment, your access to an app - which you may or may not have paid for, and which may contain additional purchased content - can be revoked remotely, at any time. It's happened more than once already. This simply does not work in traditional gaming; could you imagine if Sony suddenly said that you could absolutely not play GTA 5 anymore, and your downloaded copy disappeared? Establishing that concrete ownership - as in, "I paid for this disk, cartridge, or download and reserve the right to play it whenever I please and as long as my hardware allows" - is key to me. I know that's not a hard and fast legal right, but it's long-established precedent and I would be deeply concerned if at any point it were threatened in console/PC gaming.

And honestly, I absolutely hate the way that the industry and media talk about this. Rather than thinking about concerns like these, they frame it as "constant attention to gamers" and "constantly tuning the game for the perfect experience."

imo the only games you should need to pay more than once for are MMOs, and even they don't need to do that. Just look at ESO. Paying again for a second character is different, I can see the logic behind that.