EU wants to change how devs use "Free-To-Play"

WiiCube_2013

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Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate: Core Fighters for example is a Free to Play game it has around 3-4 playable free characters with Arcade Single/Tag modes available and I have not spent any money at all with this or any other F2P game out there.
 

orcid

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I don't really think that changing the name is the solution, but these "free-to-play" games need to be regulated. E.g. I started playing hearthstone and this game is really made to make the players addicted and make them spend money. I don`t think that there is a huge difference between such a game and casino games (e.g. micro limits poker). I didn't spend any money and won't do it, but people who tend to have a gambling problem will easily spend a huge amount of money. Ok, it`s possible to win more than 7 games in the arena and play for free if you are addicted in getting new cards, but since you play against real players for the majority of players this is not possible (simple maths).
 
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Ashtonx

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Yeah that's the problem those games are mostly based on conditioning people to keep playing and pay for content, like psychological drugs, i mean games like farmville and other crap ain't even good, they just condition people to keep playing them. Stuff needs to get regulated, also i'm not against f2p games with micro transaction, however im against calling them free and various other marketing scam that seems to be happening in the industry lately. Rather than regulating just games i think whole marketing industry needs some serious regulations and cleanup, there's a line between marketing and scam and marketing industry crossed it way too many times.
 
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calmwaters

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I think the first sentence in the article says it all. "Complaints from consumers who unwittingly purchased in-game upgrades in free-to-play titles have become common enough that the European Commission is taking action on the matter."

See, they unwittingly purchased upgrades and then complained about it. And this is calling the EC to action? To do what? To prevent people from unwittingly purchasing upgrades or complaining aboutunwittingly purchasing the upgrades? There are three things that come to mind: stupid, moronic, and cringe-worthy.

See, I complain about wittingly purchasing of upgrades being the sole method in which to advance in the game (or a 50-75% advancement rate). It's almost like charging you a dollar or so to get a Cat Suit in Super Mario 3D Land (I know you don't need them since you're all kick-ass gamers, but that's not my point). I like to be able to play a game and not have to spend real money on it unless I have to. I mean, it's the reason why I play the game. I have no money to actually buy one, so I settle for this one where I don't have to buy a disc to play it. Or like in Mario Kart: I never had to fork over money to unlock a new circuit. I also don't approve of the Wallet Warriors; they ruin the experience for everybody. It'd be like paying $40 to unlock a very special weapons pack in Borderlands 2; people don't go for shit like that. (I hope.) And the people that would buy something like that would have the rest of gaming population up in arms.
 
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Nightwish

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That first site has a really nice presentation, but the audio is so terribly low!
The thing is, people aren't really very smart once they have all the worries of adult life and all they want most of the time is to get through shit that needs to be done. Online services hire people to push so many little things to you that you can't really pay attention to everything all day long. It's just basic psychology and really has nothing to do with the idea of capitalism but has everything to do with what con artists have done for milllenia.
 

WiiCube_2013

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The government(s) have many flaws but they aren't responsible for what numbskulls do with their money, they are after all, adults who decide where they'll spend their money not anyone else.

I hate idiotic customers so much not only are they a headache to deal with but also dumb as hell.
 

Kalker3

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The government(s) have many flaws but they aren't responsible for what numbskulls do with their money, they are after all, adults who decide where they'll spend their money not anyone else.

I hate idiotic customers so much not only are they a headache to deal with but also dumb as hell.


I think the problem with these types of games is that it's not adults who play them the most, it's actually children.
 

Kalker3

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My problem with these games is that many of them are literally designed to exploit the human psychology in order to trick people into buying stuff.


Well yeah, that too.
But the demographic target of these games are pre-teens (see MLP for instance, 50$ for a character and the story won't continue until you get it).
 

Qtis

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An interesting future and well worth it. While some people think that governments should go into area x or y, think about it this way: some things are meant to protect you. Consumer protection is law based in many countries (and federal law in the US?), it wasn't made by companies to give free repairs or upgrades.

The free-to-play model is flawed in many ways for quite a few mobile games. In some cases, like RuneScape, it worked well, since you could use pretty much everything with just the basic version. Paying for the premium features was optional and added content (permanent in a matter) compared to just a few strawberries. There was no way of advancing in the games by paying for it, at least legitly. At least hopefully we'll see less of these "3 yo learned to click dad's credit card number/pin for the store and bought 10k worth of berries in a game" incidents.
 

WhiteMaze

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"The free-to-play model originated in the late 1990s and early 2000s, coming from a series of highly successful MMOs"

Year 2014

- They began acting against the false publicity, dirty psychological marketing, and the all out lying the Free to Play genre has to offer.

...........................








14 years, maybe even more, for something to be done against this.

What kind of world is this?
 

FAST6191

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Why can you not pay money and the dev have income further supplemented with adverts? It is hardly a new tactic or one that went away

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I can not say I care for it but it makes sense.
 

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