@@jaya2812 People have been hiring Game Economists and people with the vids exact mentality for the past 5 years now. They even advertise it all as gambling rather than game design, it's rather depressing. Especially for recent grads like me.
One thing most people don't notice is that he also manipulates the audience right away, the first slide he shows is a moral justification for the audience. He makes a joke about a Wall-Street trader and an oil sheik, implying that those are the whales we are talking about, that is what whales look like. But have you seen people with gambling addiction?! They are usually not traders or oil sheiks, they are people with high debt who live in poverty since they have an addictive personality and can't control their impulsive behavior. These are the people the gaming industry is exploiting, maybe there is an oil sheik in there as well, but the majority of whales are not.
Great point. It's pathetic how people wanted to make money through making others addicted, AND still want a moral justification so it doesn't feel bad. The greediness is beyond imagination.
@@michaelfinger6303 The problem for me is with gambling is their is no set price. Just price what you want for the game and let me buy it, If not I'll just pirate it and you get nothing. That's the way I see it.
@@ebenezerspludge8369 not sure if i understood you but i am talking about gambling/casino the real gambling and that does not belong in a game, a video game should be a one time purchase, an affordable subscription model or fund patches and further development via cosmetics and expansions not by predatory models applied on gamers, even the casino industry is not as bad as blizzard right now and thats shocking...
Gacha is like a better version of gambling. Normal casinos exploit you with the temptation of winning money, Gache games make you gamble away your money for digital prizes. They don't have to give any money back at all. Whoever integrated Gacha into games is a genius.
Thing is, Gacha games are just a digital adaptation of Gachapon machines, which *do* cost money for the company as the prizes are physical (and some of them are genuinely neat - I got a Judy Hopps alarm clock from one when I was in Japan). Physical Gacha machines have been huge for decades, to the point that in major cities, you frequently stumble past random spaces that exist solely to house a couple hundred Gacha machines. The fact that the digitally adapted Gacha model is so profitable was likely completely by accident.
Casinos for the most part give you the illusion that you’re going to make money from the money you gamble. This can arguably be worse because it creates a sunk cost fallacy with the gambler and can cause much more aggressive spending. Slot machines in casinos are algorithmically designed to drain money from you the more you play. Gacha games have predatory models but at least the gamer is under no illusion about what they’re buying. Legally gacha games have to show you your odds upfront about what you’re buying. Casinos have no such obligation.
@@ozone8839 Yeah but everyone knows that the casino is the one making the money. They're just hoping to get lucky and be one of the few who get money out of it.
That's not only applied to the game industry as well, it almost applies to every single industry nowadays, the main goal from every industry is to make money, i get it. But the predatory practises doing so are only getting worse and worse year after year, exploiting the ways the human mind works as much as possible. I remember when i started studying to become a Trainer at a Gym and the most important thing i was supposed to learn was how to convince people buying supplements they do not need at all and shoving them down their throat. I was so passionate about the Fitness-scene up until that point - until i noticed that it's all about marketing and squeezing as much money out of your customers as possible. That said, again, it applies to almost every industry nowadays, it's unethical and painful for me to realize the way it is, but that is how the economy works. Everybody is trying to make as much money as possible.
You forgot the best part: That game developer you're talking about? They don't get majority of that money. It all goes to the top executives who had no passion for games to begin with - just profit!
What? Most successful mobile gacha games did that long before Diablo. Why do you think they ARE so successful? Blizzard is just slow to follow the trend.
@@K3rberoZ Yes but the key difference is one being a wolf that haunt you and the other being T-rex that chasing you relentlessly. Heck even genshin doesn't bug me to spend money as much as immortal.
23:15 Going through the rift and beating enemies could also obfuscate that it is just a loot box and possibly protect them from legislation. Making it seem this drops from the boss just like other games with drop rates which are deemed mostly innocent game design. No this isn't a loot box, while it's obviously loot boxes with extra steps.
If legislature wanted they could easily classify every randomized drop, that CAN be bought with real money, as a lootbox. No matter if there is gameplay attached to it.
It does 2 things. One it's what the dude said about having to work a bit to get the gacha (running the rift). Two it allows blizzard to hide the lootbox nature of the Legend Crests so they don't have to give exact rates of drops for them.
@@HeresorLegacy Let's hope so. The couldn't release in the Netherlands because you can buy the items with real money in the auction and cash out. So it can be somewhat done. It's just a bit more advanced than the straight loot box so politicians unfamiliar with this might not make an accurate assessment. Legislating too much like regular drop rates or becoming a loophole.
@@CraShFTW that doesn't work, they're targeting the whales specifically, not the general public. They'll keep making games worse for everyone just to make more money from whales.
Then every big only shop would classify as abuse too. Pretty much every successful business is using psychological tricks to make it more likely for you to buy something.
@@toddtaylor6506 even supermarkets for having the essential items at the back of the store so you have to walk past everything else and potentially make other purchases this is literally in every facet of life…
I love the "You're just made cause you're poor" argument. I caught shit for giving halo infinite a hard time for its monetization and all I got back was "You're just poor".
People need to realize that this is happening everywhere - not only in p2w mobile games. Imagine a world where a ton of manipulative techniques are used to build our commercial streets, malls, stores, airports, gyms, websites, tv programs, operating systems, phone apps - everywhere where you can spend a dollar. This is the world we live in. The worst part in the games is the gambling techniques being allowed for people under 18. There is a saying that the kids of the marketing guys who do not use very pushy or deeply manipulative techniques are skinny. The ones that are the best at it get to build our world.
This is only true to a point. Yes, general marketing is trying very hard to engage these systems, but they do not have two key factors that really distinguish games specifically as completely predatory - the refusal to offer a way to directly purchase something you want (Gacha & loot boxes), and their ability to create addiction loops by engaging you with something you find fun. A used car salesmen is going to try all sorts of dirty tricks to encourage you to buy something at a higher price than you would otherwise accept. But no one I know actually enjoys negotiating with douchebags like that, so it is MUCH easier to walk away from that shit than a game that you enjoy. Likewise, no one would accept a grocery store selling mystery boxes of steaks... spend $50 and maybe you'll get 3 lbs of fillet mignon, maybe you'll get a pack of hamburger meat. Mobile gaming is such a unique distillation of psychological tricks, that really can't exist anywhere outside of a digital gaming space. Edit: Grammar
There's a lot of indie game developers out there that could use attention and support, but people decide to throw money at Blizzard anyways for catering to a self-destructive personality type. Just because you yourself doesn't spend money doesn't somehow mean the time you're spending on something is a positive thing.
To diablo fans, just fucking play Grim Dawn, Torchlight, Last Epoch. There are alternatives people that are just as good if not better. Grim Dawn is way better than Diablo if you ask me
@@MrMittenshasatophat To me the problem is that people want to irrationally fk themselves over and find every excuse to do it. Thus we have people who play these kind of games with predatory practices and justify it somehow. It may sound stupid but otherwise why would you play these kind of games if you know what to expect(and yes, you do, don't fool yourselves)?!
@@SeaL995 As gacha player and RPG fan, I like the idea of collecting party members and doing dungeons with what I manage to have thanks to thoughtful resource management (in-game money, since I enjoy them as f2p). And it is actually part of the game to not have what you'd want unless you planned long ahead. There are a TON of mega toxic gachas, but with experience you recognize them and avoid them (PvP centric, leaderboards centric, with LOT of "events" to the point you can't do the story, the "ads" spamming one too). It's like a different kind of experience. For example, I like Skyrim, it's calming, but Elden Ring is also a banger, however I expect from it to be a lot harder on me.
@@MrMittenshasatophat I was thinking why didn't you mention path of exile and then I was like oh yeah stash tabs are absolutely p2w. Or maybe you just don't like it idk
I've always said the problem isn't the those vulnerable to manipulation; stupidity, grief, addiction, whatever. It's those willing to take advantage of those people. How do we stop the manipulators? Tough question.
Easy: heavily regulate gambling. Only allow gambling in physical establishments. In those establishments you have people regulate the whales. Do not allow gambling machines in bars, etc. Now of course America's government is stupid complex, so it would have to come from the top down, hard.
less shitty parents is the answer, trust me, if a parent slaps the shit out of his kid if he catches him gambling or spending money on useless predatory monetization on games, that kid will never do it again, and afterwards if the parents take the time and explain WHY it is so stupid and give examples on how to actually make it worth to spend, proper full games, signal out what is a good dlc and what is a cashgrab, over time give propper advice and then when the kid grows up he will not have gambling problems and he will be more aware of this predatory bullshit. But parents everywhere are just lazy or straight up stupid, they just give anything to their brats to keep them quiet or use the excuse of "it is what i wanted when i was a kid" instead of you know, teaching them proper dicipline, morals or fcking common sense so that people and specially companies cannot scam them all their lives, a lot of parents have the stupid idea that schools will teach their kids and that is wrong in so many levels. I have seen well rised 6yr olds with good manners and far better common sense than young ADULTS online and that is just sad
On an individual basis, you can't do much to stop the manipulation, unless you have a large following. What you *can* do on an individual basis is educate yourself and your peers / family. This video is highly informative on what kind of manipulation to watch out for. Apart from that it depends on the actions of the people in the industry, and the whales. For me, I'd rather work a boring IT job for a random business than help some scumbags develop a p2w game.
In-game microtransactions aren't illegal but loot boxes are. Whether you like it or not there will always be people trying to make you act in a certain way through pyschological means. Loot boxes are easy to make but that's only one way of making players pay. There will always pop up a new way to get the whales to spend as much money as they can when the old way gets banned by governments.
@@_ebrq People speed and run red lights when no one is around to see it even though they can get fined or lose their license. I dislike comments like this because it strikes me as defeatist and that because these things will still happen trying to so much as mitigate it is an exercise in futility.
The fact that diablo immortal "isn't even hiding it anymore" is why the game will probably flop imo. If Blizzard listened to this guy, they did a poor job!
The thing is diablo already has strong and wide follower, yes some probably openly hate it but that's not stopping other fans or regular people to install and play it. And in some countries moblie gaming culture (Asia, South America, etc), spending a lot of money for mobile gaming is already normal. Diablo immortal need very strong backslash form western for them to stop, otherwise the money will be enough for Blizzard to continue their model and other AAA game developer to try slowly follow Blizzard.
Flop? The game probably made more than it's profit margins in the first 3 days. Probably due not in any small effort than a certain streamer, probably gave more successful exposure to the game than Blizzard marketing strategy ever would have...
@@robertfugate2232 They could not make another dime and I bet they've paid for it ten times over by now .... the dipshits that continue to believe if 50K shit on something it counterbalances10 million supporting it, lol.
So my profession, is in door to door sales. There are so many sales tactics that they mentioned in this video, that are super effective. 1. F.O.M.O - Fear Of Missing Out(builds a sense of urgency) 2. Keeping Up With The Jones - seeing everyone do it makes it acceptable. 3. A confused Mind, says No - keeping it simple, or not having as many options. Because a confused mind, will say no. and so much more! once you know these tactics, you can't get suckered xD
People don't want to hear that chance in monetized video games is not aleatory. They have modifiers thrown in that make it multiple times more likely or less likely to get the juicy reward according to what kind of players the company is more interested in keeping in their games. Moreover, it goes beyond lootboxes and mobile games. In a game like WoW, those who spend more money in the store, whether buying mounts, services, or tokens, are the ones getting the sweet drops like the max ilevel weapon from the vault in the first week of a patch, or back in the day, the sweet max ilevel titanforge from an M+ 2 five times, or tier from the vault 4 times in a row, or super rare mounts on their second attempt. They do similar things with returning players that haven't subscribed for longer than a month. They throw lots of hooks like the ones I just mentioned to get them to sign up for 6 months. "Hey I just got my BIS trinket from the vault in the first week." It's not true chance, and never will be.
If you're seeing this video, and you're seeing my comment: Stop playing this game if you are playing it. It's not worth your time, or your money, because it wasn't made by people who respect you as a customer, or as a person. Give it to people who deserve it. Not these clowns.
@@VoidEternalas much as it piss me off Theres no hope casuals have been playing trash for decades MADDEN 2K FIFA FORTNITE ECT just the worst kind of individuals
Even at a community college (granted a nice one) I took classes on marketing... It made me very conservative with how I spend money. Our parents and grand parents never had the sheer quantity or availability of products we do today which is good but the downside is constant non stop marketing and I've seen it in the way some friends spend, constantly small amounts with medium purchases mixed in, constantly having money trouble because they can't stop.
Technically the dungeon bundles aren't true hot state sales, even though they definitely presented the same way. The dungeon bundles don't disappear if you don't buy them. They stay in the shop under bundles and they force you to look at it every day when you claim your daily free bundle. 😂
Since the example is candy crush, that's not the bundles. Those are the things being offered when you lose a level and you got a few seconds to buy it (similar to continue timer in arcade) I have to warn my wife to never press that button, cause how expensive that offer actually is
At 18:45 you missed the point. The whole point of the “loss aversion” bias is that even though logically you gain more than you lose, you still care more about the loss than the win. It hurts more to lose something you have than the happiness you feel when you gain the same amount. That’s why people do NOT take the deal which is logically advantageous for them.
The only gacha ive ever actually enjoyed are the ones where the mechanical value to me of any potential reward is the same and low cost ... Think of the little rubber ball machines in the stores for 25-50¢ ... Bunch of different colors but I'd only use them as a ball so it was fun to toss a quarter or 2 and hey if I get a unique one then cool ... If not oh well at least I had a bouncy ball
Mom only lost out if it was her last quarter she refuses to deny you out of that brutal maternal compassion. But on a macro scale it occurs continuously.
The thing with manipulation of all kinds is that once you know how the manipulation works it’s far less effective. They should have a warning video at the start of these games that explain the techniques that are used.
Why would they have warning videos at the start of their own games? To cuck themselves out of the possible money they can make? Nice thinking there, lol
Theres also the "immediate decision making" in a game I play: Board Kings Its a relatively harmless game where you get bombarded as well with ads of "buy this roll pack, and buy this extra booster for your event cards so you have the set full", but you don't actually need any of those to play normally A reoccuring event is the battle ring where you hop along on a ring against a big baddie in the middle, and depending where your dice lands you attack the baddie for lowest:10, medium:25 or bighit: 40/50 damage. There are also spaces where YOU can be hit instead, the ring has 24 fields and 4 spots are attack-player-fields. ONE IN SIX, see a pattern here? No matter where you are on the ring, you are ALWAYS in range of your next roll landing on a damage player tile. The 4th hit will take you out; If you lose you get the option to *_keep fighting AND refill 2 hits for 2 enter tokens_* That is the issue here: NEVER refill for 2 tokens. Just cancel the fight, go in again fresh for one token and try again with full HP. You gain NO benefit doing this You pay double for half the potential (Your HP) which isn't even guaranteed, since RNG can fist you up at any given time anyway The event in itself is pretty much doable without paying, did it before when it debuted and I came back to the game and they just gave me like 1000 rolls. You take a higher roll multiplier to cut time and get everything you land on multiplied by the same amount. That includes event items. Finished my rolls with like 50 tokens and rolled over the event 3x
Just saying on the coin flip: I couldn't pay the debt if I lost. Yeah if you can flip the coin multiple times it will probably come out in your favor, but if you don't have the spare capital to offset losses then it doesn't matter what the long-term probability is.
The limited time offer part also reminds me of the arcade where when you die, they give you a few seconds for you to insert a coin for you to retry again
You know, after hearing that last bit - the LoL skin offer where you get a discount specifically for a skin for one of the champs you already play every few months is a really smart thing. Its regular so it keeps people coming back, its tailored specifically to the player receiving it and personalised because it simply picks one that you don´t own at random which will be different from the ones your friends get, its not that hard to do with an algorithm... genius, really.
Well its not like its not fun for the players, if you are collecting skins for one or two champs you like a lot, you wait for the My Shop offers and hope to get a legacy or high tier skin at a good discount, which you normally wouldn't buy at full price.
The more games become monetized like Diablo Immortal the more these games remind me of actual gambling sites. Diablo especially shocked me at how many times you were notified to open the codex or some other menu to claim stuff. Even as a F2P player the systems really feel like a dopamine IV-drip much like actual gambling sites. I think regular games are starting to resemble gambling games more and more. And the point isnt whether you are spending actual money or not like Asmongold said once on another gambling related video. The point is that instead of having actual fun while gaming we are gonna end up telling ourselves we are having fun when we are actually just addicted now to this dopamine IV-drip, just like actual gamblers.
Tbh on Diablo Immortal, it feels pretty much like a chore to have to open the menu and claim everything manually AND wait for that long ass animation. Personally I plan to play it till endgame. If the endgame is too demanding, then I'll play something else. But from what I've seen, even f2p can breeze through it.
The whole "if you fall for it you deserve it" is inherently ableist and short-sighted. People of any age, life experience, mental health status, or disability status should be able to live their lives and play games without being taken advantage of. Kids, addicts, people without much savvy about these systems, and people who have a harder time understanding abstract cause and effect shouldn't just be prey for bad people.
Concerning Labeling: Founder's packs are sort of the devs telling the community they're good boys for supporting the game development. Lost Ark sold those but so do many other games that are less predatory.
I never realized how bad mobile games got these days since I literally never played on my phone/tablet. Some flappy birds back in the day but that's about it. Diablo Immortal is a disgrace for the gaming industry and I can't believe that so many people pay so much money for such a stinky ass game.
It’s a PC issue. The monetization came from PC browser games years before they ported those games onto smart phones. Some of the oldest mobile games still have their original browser version. JP still makes browser versions & mobile ports of the browser game.
About cards 12:00 , Anti-Monetary Card : This spell cost 0 to cast if you see a game with heavy microtransaction , target controller of the game will discard their game from play store and Anti-Monetary Card deals 2B $ of damage to it. Exile Anti-Monetary Card. Instant Trap -> If the controller owns " Diablo Immortal " , Anti-Monetary Card deals 4B$ damage instead of 2B $. and you may choose to shuffle this card into your deck(edit-library ) instead of exiling it . The next time you cast this cost each of five colors and sacrifice a creature with power 3 or more.
Blizzard has been a scourge in the making for well over a decade, and yet still some people convince themselves otherwise and defend them. Absolutely unbelievable, and disgusting.
tricks is an understatement. Its brutally nefarious. Its straight up casino tactics. The fact that you guys want to spend $20'000 on a silly little video game like Diablo immortal, tells you everything you need to know (its a fun game but what do you treally get for your $20'000?, really.....think about it for a second, sure streamers get their money back, but 99% of the players that spend big are getting NOTHING back lol). Theres games like Titans quest that has larger areas and way more content and larger areas than Diablo immortal on mobile. But its single player. Heres the kicker though...........you dont have to actually spend anything , ive beaten the game with the crusader class im level 60, paragon 7.........and i dont have to spend a $1. But as this video suggests, Blizzard isnt interested in me spending a measely $20, they are interested in the whales (and their rich kids) that will get hooked and just give up their credit card to compete with their wealthy friends. The trick is , is if you realize you can not compet with the whales. The addiction subsides quite easily. It snot jealousy, but if you cant compete because of money you are just playing the loop. You might aswell go play Diablo 2 resurrection or diablo 3 or titans quest for the same gameplay.
in was in Tokyo 2019 and this Gatachs machines are EVERYWHERE. they did an opening, wie a red robe, and there were people standing infront of them and waiting to spend money. i have photos with maybem 50 of them stacked on each other on a street.
When it comes to games like Diablo Immortal or most mobile games, ratings really don't matter. At this point it's completely based off whether people are incentivized to spend or not, and developers can see that in their metrics. Publishers and developers at this point know how to hook consumers, and Chinese consumers consist of the majority of mobile games profits and will be a serious consideration for what types of monetization developers pursue in the future. As a result I feel that the vast majority of complaints from the US or European countries will be ignored. They can be as blatant as they want, but they understand how consumers will react so it doesn't matter.
Best example is ea. Every fifa or maden got worst rating but generates billions of money no matter that the games are blatant reskins of the games before
This whole line of "you shouldn't say capitalism is bad because the problem is greedy in any system" is profoundly ignorant. The problem with capitalism is that it creates an unequal and undemocratic relationship between the people who own the means of production and the people whose labor actually creates the value consumers want. The goal should be to give labor a stronger position, rather than subjecting it to domination by law. We ought to require that corporate boards include representatives elected by workers the way Germany does.
A bit of a PSA : A lot of the examples the Tribeflame CEO mentioned and similar ideas can be found in the book Predictably Irrational, which is a book on behavioral economics. I really recommend it and its very interesting
They say that videogames should prove its gambling and only THEN they will be eligible to fall under gambling regulations. But in reality, videogames should be regulated even more cause thyre much more predatory. When youre betting against a casino - casino still has risk attached to it. Casino may lose money. When youre betting against a game company when u buy a lootbox or whatever - company doesnt risk anything. They give u digital goods that they create in infinite amounts. Imagine playing vs casinos that print their own infinite dollars.
as a person that plays cod Mobile its legit pain when the game teases you to buy a COSMETIC In a game like a Legendary weapon/Operator or a Damn Mythic gun skin and kids on that game calls it fair to the F2P players that dont have money and they keep getting away with it and it needs to stop.
The man giving the presentation is not on stage talking about how they use free market capitalism to manipulate people they’re talking about the human psyche and how to manipulate that which is worldwide in any economy…
I'm so glad I quit WoW recently. I was doing exactly what this guy is saying. I was the hobby guy. Raiding mythic and buying WoW tokens to buy all the consumables thinking it's no big deal... pots/flasks/food/auggies/armor kits/whatever the fuck. And it wasn't just me, most of the raid were doing the same thing. This shit is exactly like drugs. You have this amazing product everyone loves and gets addicted to. Then the dealer slowly adds shit to the product over time to increase profits but taints and ruins the original product by doing so. But it was so damn addictive in the first place that people still want it and end up with some powder thats 75% creatine.... Except in video games, it's not real crack. It's World of Warcrack..
Another factor is knowing how much you have spent on a game. If you have spent enough money on a game, you'll feel more inclined to keep playing, because all that money would have been wasted if you abandon the game.
This is so evil. Deliberately using these manipluation tactics and making the players ruin gaming without them noticing it because every gaming company now knows this works perfectly. Even showing the picture of a devil. And "The problem is not capitalism. Its greed" thats the real truth. Greed ruins every kind of society.
The solution then is to set up a system were greed is punished or otherwise disincentivized. I don't see how capitalism can do that without a lot of regulation from a strong government that it also accountable to its citizens.
You could also argue greed is one of our strongest qualities as humans. It was “greed” and that feeling of nothing is ever enough that led us to discover new lands, find new expansive projects/ technologies, sent us to space, etc… greed is a good virtue actually, and leads to significant human discovery and investments into technology.
@@Bobbysmith54999 Thats some copium excuse right there. Greed is when an ape is hoarding more bananas than he could ever eat while other apes are starving. Its not a virtue at all. Discovery and invention has nothing to do with greed. Don't mistake wanting to discover new lands with taking land by force from others.
@@ZhaneBadguy wrong. It’s that same feeling that nothing is ever enough that leads us to always search for something else. It’s the drive to keep on exploring and searching no matter that resources you currently have. It’s in our DNA and is a big reason why we are so successful. Embrace the greed!
Yeah, F2P games were always targeted towards whales. When I was working at a company that makes F2P games with microtransactions it was the very 1st thing they told me - we care only about those who pay, but not everyone, only those who pay the most. We had players who have spent well over 1M bucks in the game. And the best thing was that whatever they bought would usually be gone from their account within hours eg. soldiers or food to keep them alive. By design, recruiting an army was so bad in the game that people were paying for bots to do it for them because you could make like 10 units at a time and you'd have to come back to the game in an hour to make more. And you needed food to keep them or they would abandon your castle. It was a 24/7 grind with little profit and you had to balance between making an army and attacking other players to get food for your army. Or you could spend 10-100 bucks to get both. People would always come to us for refunds because their newly bought army was gone before they could use it becauses they did not have enough food to keep them.
no they were not always made that way. League of Legends, valorant, team fortress 2 , Warframe and path of exile are all experiences that try to be worth your money. even mobile games used to be fine : cut the robe used to sell levels doodle jump just had ads and even subway surfer was only ads. this cancer that is growing in the industry needs to be removed and if that is too much to ask it at least needs to be cut down to size and I will not stop talking about this to every politician every election that wants me to vote for him.
@@MrWilliGaming Well, you have pc/console games mixed up with mobile/browser games as well as their genres. Games like Valorant or TF2(which used to be B2P) have no actual character progression so there is not much room for P2W microtransactions like in Diablo Immoral. The reason why LoL doesn't have microtransations is simple - 95% of people would stop playing it and how tournaments would look like with players buffed with P2W stuff? Warframe/PoE are "from gamers for gamers" so people would probably lose all hope if such projects were designed to abuse monetisations to drain their wallets for character progression. Although, PoE inventory/stash expansions are kind of bad imo. Same thing was pushed in Diablo Immoral too. Personally, I feel like those games would be good with cosmetics alone if those were more affordable to general public. Packs that are like 50-100 bucks for an armor and some additional vfx/sfx are overkill.
@@KillMeIfYouCanPL waframe basically discourages p2w, their prices are so high compared to the effort required to actually get the stuff that it's stupid to buy primes
"Greed is capatalism" My brother in christ, Communism has failed every single time BECAUSE of Greed. Greed will always exist in any economic structure.
and the reason things are way more greedier now than say even 60 years ago is because we are heading into marxist and communist ideologies and the people are to dumb to realize it and blame it on capitalism.
@@andrews9695 I wouldn't go that far, we are just reaching the edge of the bubble that unregulated capatalism has created. There's only a finite amount of resources before shit hits the fan and we're close to bursting. Any marxist/communist ideologies that have gained power in the last couple of decades really don't have that much sway on the economy, if any at all.
Again the underlining problem is Greed, corperations place more value on increase their per annum by large percentages short term for personal gain over small incremence over longer periods of time. Eventually we will hit the ceiling we've just hit it faster due to Greed.
@@Quintessence4444 Captalism encourages Greed because there's no regulation to how Greedy a corperation can be. They take because they can. You want to eliminate Greed? Eliminate scarcity. Until we can do that Greed will always rear its head in whatevery system we're apart of. It's just human nature.
@@Quintessence4444 You'll never eliminate scarcity, unless we somehow manage to create material out of nothing we have finite amount of resources on our planet. If we take all the wealth heald by the 1% and passed it down to the 99%, yes things would be alot better...for a time. The aim isn't to build a system that benefits us for the short term, we need to start thinking longterm. All problems we have today are the product of people who were not thinking of the future.
To the person who said "This is capitalism." - Capitalism assumes a free market, a free market assumes there's no discrepancy in power or knowledge, which means, there's no manipulation by people who studied psychology of people who are unaware of these psychological tricks. Once you allow said manipulation in, it's no longer a free market, by the classic definition. Also, exploitism exists without greed, but what the comment in chat was suggesting wasn't a 1-to-1 connection, but that all capitalism is also exploitism, not that all exploitism is also capitalism. Venn diagrams.
Interested how your opinion on capitalism change over the next few years. Glad to see you are starting become more radicalized, even if you deny some of the criticisms others give. I think you'll change you mind over time. I believe we are just beginning to see this paradigm shift. Glad you are exposing the explorative practices in the industry and continuing to be critical off them.
I remember when this video first leaked and Jim sterling just about lost his mind covering it. The funny thing is that this video is a relic of 2016 its Much MUCH worse now.
Asmon reacting to this is great because it brings more eyes to this. In fact people starting to have problems with react content feels like it's not just about money, but about trying to minimize watching audience for certain videos.
Capitalism being bad doesn't mean other systems can't be bad too. So, I don't see the point in that argument. The core of the system is rewarding greed and that is what people have an issue with. The key is a system that rewards equality. You can see this is medical fields across the world. The healthier systems are ones that reward based on preventative care and the overall health of the patients rather than the total number of procedures done (like our system). Capitalism has no incentive to help others and rewards greed. Yes there are other systems that do that too.. that doesn't excuse capitalism. It's a dumb argument. Pretty sure it's a lack of knowledge in the subject on his part. Doesn't seem like he actually understand the meaning of Capitalism or all the other options and reasoning out there.. and that's sad.
Not "helping" the consumer when they buy goods or services is so stupid in a "capitalist" system, why would people part of their money (their effort & time) in exchange of something if they don't receive uses or benefits from it. Capitalism, even with its problems, is a system that benefits from indiscrimination because talented people come from all races and ideas. Being a discriminatory capitalist will put you at a disadvantage to someone who is not.
I think his point is that they are all flawed and that it’s human nature, so with that reasoning you might aswell have a capitalist system where you at least get what you work for
@@darrenegan3891 That's the point. There are hundreds of system variations and people know nothing about them.. which is apparent in both replies. There are systems other than capitalism where you get what you work for. Shit even capitalism doesn't do that. You get what the people in power decide what you're worth. Not bothering to reply to the other dude. He obviously didn't bother to read what I wrote.
23:55 similarly i remember as a kid some dudes we're scamming/luring players in runescape. counter lured them for a while. There way of convincing themselves it was ok to continue doing so was that they saw themselves as being smarter, thus they were allowed to take advantage of "stupid" people. The game is very good at teaching you from a young age to not trust strangers and not show too much wealth.
@@ragerontilt4778 It's basically when you unwillingly hyperfocus on certain specific sounds and get incredibly frustrated by them. For example, in this video the speaker kept smacking his lips rather frequently which made it really difficult to keep watching. Having this "condition" is definitely not the worst thing that exists but it can be really annoying at times.
@@Lickwit thanks for explaining, I'm like the opposite aha. People will point out an annoying sound and I will have been tuning it out completely until they said something
These are techniques that salesmen & advertisement firms for ever , just like you said it was going on before money existed. New to your channel but really enjoying your content and agree with with you on a lot of these outlooks you discuss.
The difference between games and Netflix is that games want players to buy quicker and more frequently, therefore giving less options. Netflix, on the other hand can't be accessed unless you are subscribed, they already have your money but the longer time you spend looking for something to watch, they earn revenue
Setting up rifts so that players in a party can see what crests the other players are using and also what rewards they got after is another trick to pressure players to spend more.
When you are aware of game companies doing this, breaking the ice becomes harder and harder. Best thing to do is not to play these type of games at all. It just saddens me how gullible and stupid people still are, tossing their money away into a mobile game.
This reminds me of the social space added to cod ww2, where everyone compared it to Destiny, and the loot boxes you opened there would be projected in front of you massively so everyone could experience YOUR lootbox.I assumed that was how cod was gonna do it from then on.
I think the skill point also is impicative of a game that REQUIRES a lot of skill to play. If the game is catered toward people with high personal skill levels, they may not feel they need the 500% deal box to play, and if the game is too difficult for the casual player, they most likely will give up and see no point in upgrading if its not going to impact their ability to complete the challenges, because it forces them to "git gud" first.
When in a game is easyer to progress by working your day job and spending the money in it, than actualy playing said game, is not a game worth playing in my opinion.
last part he could mean players who log in a lot. like some games do the whole. log in 2 weeks nonstop get a cool sword. or hey man if u grind nonstop for a year u get this epic pegasus mount. barely anyone has it because u need to log in the whole year each day. or hell he could even mean kickstart backers? as he said personal gift?? or what some games do: suprise update everyone asked for for years.
Games that use these "techniques" should be made illegal. People are too stupid to correct the market themselves and this is ruining gaming. Not to mention it's taking advantage of children and fools.
And than society is held responsible to take care of those very same people who are exploited. Just make the techniques illegal and be sone with these companies
About the MTG booster pack comparative, I'll also like to add that you can trade them, even if you didn't find the card you were looking for you could trade some of the valuable cards for it.
I think that this type of gaming monetization had only been possible not because of capitalism but because of our money system. If we had a hard currency that was backed by something real and valuable that wasn't the full faith in the us government People in society would have a literal mental shift from a time preference that is short and fast which enables this type of predatory schemes to a longer time preference. People would be more incentivized to save their money because why would I buy this TV today at 500 dollars when if I save my money it would be worth 450 tomorrow Time preference is something everyone has. When a government has an inflationary monetary system you are incentivized to spend now because if you save it then your your money would be worth less
What is a real and valuable thing you could base it on then. Gold and precious stones don't really have much value. Perhaps you could tie it to energy like oil, solar, nuclear, etc. All of that has real value. But all that means is that we can enter a post scarcity society once we figure out things like nuclear fusion or being able to build a Dyson swarm.
Holy crap. At this point people will need full time jobs in order to play their favorite games or they will not even be able to play it properly. As one wise big orange guy said once "times change..."
There is a big difference between taking advantage of people and providing a service to society and that is where capitalism has completely missed. Think about what you are worth, hourly. I know that my effort on a day to day basis is worth a certain amount, and everyone can come up with a general number based on their hours, experience and intelligence. People are 100% allowed to work harder than me and therefore be weatherier than me. There is 0% chance that a CEO of any company can work 150 times harder and be 150 times smarter than me. And they know that too. They tried to say "I lived in the office for 5 years of my life, I was on the grind all day every day, just work as hard as me!" Yea you maybe your worked double the hours, heres double the salary, not 150 times the salary. The whole addiction model is so fucked because it undermines the American dream of work=compensation. Honestly there is no way to come back. With the conglomeration of money there is no way to fight against entrenched money. Generational weath trumps a lifetime of effort by the majority (85% minimum of people). It leaves us with a feeling that we need to scape and claw away whatever I can get and fuck everyone else. I want to cry.
The biggest manipulation tactic is the 800 percent value. With Diablo immortal imagine how many people paid for it, found out how heavily and unfairly monetized it is; but still can't leave cause they already committed to playing the game for at least 30 days to get the full value, so now they are emotionally trapped despite knowing that this is an abusive relationship.
This video will be DELETED in 12 hours, watch it now or miss out!
Pay 2 win comment
I see you have learned a thing or two from this video sr. You are ready to make your own gacha game now KEKW
FOMO :D
@@808master so you don't miss out obviously. act quick
phew glad I bou.. watched it
"We can discuss morality later, on our way to the bank laughing."
They disscus morality like we disscus politics online. FOR FUN😂
Oh yeah, I was shown this in Game Design course, on a seminar on ethical design and essentially "what not to do."
Great pfp, one of the best albums ever
Good teacher if you ask me. Our generation will rule this Cultivation star, learn well.
@@balthasargelt4098 I came to say the same thing lol
lmao ethics in business
@@jaya2812 People have been hiring Game Economists and people with the vids exact mentality for the past 5 years now. They even advertise it all as gambling rather than game design, it's rather depressing. Especially for recent grads like me.
One thing most people don't notice is that he also manipulates the audience right away,
the first slide he shows is a moral justification for the audience. He makes a joke about a Wall-Street trader and an oil sheik, implying that those are the whales we are talking about, that is what whales look like.
But have you seen people with gambling addiction?! They are usually not traders or oil sheiks, they are people with high debt who live in poverty since they have an addictive personality and can't control their impulsive behavior.
These are the people the gaming industry is exploiting, maybe there is an oil sheik in there as well, but the majority of whales are not.
Didn't even realize that. Great point.
Great point. It's pathetic how people wanted to make money through making others addicted, AND still want a moral justification so it doesn't feel bad. The greediness is beyond imagination.
the problem for me is with gambling the rules are clear... but we talk about gaming here and that shit has no place in gaming
@@michaelfinger6303 The problem for me is with gambling is their is no set price. Just price what you want for the game and let me buy it, If not I'll just pirate it and you get nothing. That's the way I see it.
@@ebenezerspludge8369 not sure if i understood you but i am talking about gambling/casino the real gambling and that does not belong in a game, a video game should be a one time purchase, an affordable subscription model or fund patches and further development via cosmetics and expansions not by predatory models applied on gamers, even the casino industry is not as bad as blizzard right now and thats shocking...
Gacha is like a better version of gambling. Normal casinos exploit you with the temptation of winning money, Gache games make you gamble away your money for digital prizes. They don't have to give any money back at all. Whoever integrated Gacha into games is a genius.
Thing is, Gacha games are just a digital adaptation of Gachapon machines, which *do* cost money for the company as the prizes are physical (and some of them are genuinely neat - I got a Judy Hopps alarm clock from one when I was in Japan).
Physical Gacha machines have been huge for decades, to the point that in major cities, you frequently stumble past random spaces that exist solely to house a couple hundred Gacha machines. The fact that the digitally adapted Gacha model is so profitable was likely completely by accident.
Casinos for the most part give you the illusion that you’re going to make money from the money you gamble. This can arguably be worse because it creates a sunk cost fallacy with the gambler and can cause much more aggressive spending. Slot machines in casinos are algorithmically designed to drain money from you the more you play.
Gacha games have predatory models but at least the gamer is under no illusion about what they’re buying. Legally gacha games have to show you your odds upfront about what you’re buying. Casinos have no such obligation.
@@ozone8839 Yeah but everyone knows that the casino is the one making the money. They're just hoping to get lucky and be one of the few who get money out of it.
Not a genius move. Just a calculated decision to fuck with millions of youths. Don’t call it genius.
@@Knsy So a genius move. Genius doesn't have to be positive.
Imagine studying game design for years for passion and having to throw it all away just to squeeze as much money as possible from your players
800% value right there
That's not only applied to the game industry as well, it almost applies to every single industry nowadays, the main goal from every industry is to make money, i get it. But the predatory practises doing so are only getting worse and worse year after year, exploiting the ways the human mind works as much as possible. I remember when i started studying to become a Trainer at a Gym and the most important thing i was supposed to learn was how to convince people buying supplements they do not need at all and shoving them down their throat. I was so passionate about the Fitness-scene up until that point - until i noticed that it's all about marketing and squeezing as much money out of your customers as possible. That said, again, it applies to almost every industry nowadays, it's unethical and painful for me to realize the way it is, but that is how the economy works. Everybody is trying to make as much money as possible.
You forgot the best part: That game developer you're talking about? They don't get majority of that money. It all goes to the top executives who had no passion for games to begin with - just profit!
Imagine you want money. Stop playing games and and go get paid.
@@CodeguruX Irrelevant
The funnies thing I found in this whole situation is, most mobile gachas aren't even close to being as predatory as Diablo is
What? Most successful mobile gacha games did that long before Diablo. Why do you think they ARE so successful? Blizzard is just slow to follow the trend.
Absolutely true. Even the meme game itself, Raid Shadow Legends is not as predatory, as Diablo Immortal.
Yes and no. Games like Genshin are fundamentally just ad bad, but in their defense they aren't as aggressive with it. But it's all there.
@@K3rberoZ Yes but the key difference is one being a wolf that haunt you and the other being T-rex that chasing you relentlessly. Heck even genshin doesn't bug me to spend money as much as immortal.
@@dezmodium Genshin has so many weeb defenders it feels like the battle is lost there.
Presenter: "Any questions?"
Me: "Yeah, I have a question, how do you sleep at night?"
23:15 Going through the rift and beating enemies could also obfuscate that it is just a loot box and possibly protect them from legislation. Making it seem this drops from the boss just like other games with drop rates which are deemed mostly innocent game design. No this isn't a loot box, while it's obviously loot boxes with extra steps.
If legislature wanted they could easily classify every randomized drop, that CAN be bought with real money, as a lootbox. No matter if there is gameplay attached to it.
@@flipnshifty wdym? This is how he acts for a long time.
@@flipnshifty
Sardonicism
Your head
It does 2 things. One it's what the dude said about having to work a bit to get the gacha (running the rift). Two it allows blizzard to hide the lootbox nature of the Legend Crests so they don't have to give exact rates of drops for them.
@@HeresorLegacy Let's hope so. The couldn't release in the Netherlands because you can buy the items with real money in the auction and cash out. So it can be somewhat done. It's just a bit more advanced than the straight loot box so politicians unfamiliar with this might not make an accurate assessment. Legislating too much like regular drop rates or becoming a loophole.
We really need governments to reclassify this as psychological abuse.
No we don't the government to do shit when the players can literally not buy this piece of shit and let it die by itself
@@CraShFTW that doesn't work, they're targeting the whales specifically, not the general public. They'll keep making games worse for everyone just to make more money from whales.
Then every big only shop would classify as abuse too. Pretty much every successful business is using psychological tricks to make it more likely for you to buy something.
@@K3rberoZ Seriously, why you think Coke and Pepsi sell their products like everyone is partying when they buy them. Same with the beer ads,lol.
@@toddtaylor6506 even supermarkets for having the essential items at the back of the store so you have to walk past everything else and potentially make other purchases this is literally in every facet of life…
Asmongold - You shouldn't do these things.
Blizzard - Write that down. WRITE THAT DOWN!
Zamn
Why..
Why is it going to be deleted?
@@NostraDavid2 It's already been 13 hours, that's a joke about FOMO based on the pinned comment.
I love the "You're just made cause you're poor" argument. I caught shit for giving halo infinite a hard time for its monetization and all I got back was "You're just poor".
Brainwashed npcs 😂 imagine having taste so bad in gaming that you have to resort to defend gambling gaming is truly dead
People need to realize that this is happening everywhere - not only in p2w mobile games. Imagine a world where a ton of manipulative techniques are used to build our commercial streets, malls, stores, airports, gyms, websites, tv programs, operating systems, phone apps - everywhere where you can spend a dollar. This is the world we live in. The worst part in the games is the gambling techniques being allowed for people under 18.
There is a saying that the kids of the marketing guys who do not use very pushy or deeply manipulative techniques are skinny. The ones that are the best at it get to build our world.
This is only true to a point. Yes, general marketing is trying very hard to engage these systems, but they do not have two key factors that really distinguish games specifically as completely predatory - the refusal to offer a way to directly purchase something you want (Gacha & loot boxes), and their ability to create addiction loops by engaging you with something you find fun. A used car salesmen is going to try all sorts of dirty tricks to encourage you to buy something at a higher price than you would otherwise accept. But no one I know actually enjoys negotiating with douchebags like that, so it is MUCH easier to walk away from that shit than a game that you enjoy. Likewise, no one would accept a grocery store selling mystery boxes of steaks... spend $50 and maybe you'll get 3 lbs of fillet mignon, maybe you'll get a pack of hamburger meat. Mobile gaming is such a unique distillation of psychological tricks, that really can't exist anywhere outside of a digital gaming space.
Edit: Grammar
we live the world of Robocop, corporation won and we don't know it yet
This together with high speed internet and "release now fix later" ruined gaming, period.
There's a lot of indie game developers out there that could use attention and support, but people decide to throw money at Blizzard anyways for catering to a self-destructive personality type. Just because you yourself doesn't spend money doesn't somehow mean the time you're spending on something is a positive thing.
To diablo fans, just fucking play Grim Dawn, Torchlight, Last Epoch. There are alternatives people that are just as good if not better. Grim Dawn is way better than Diablo if you ask me
@@MrMittenshasatophat To me the problem is that people want to irrationally fk themselves over and find every excuse to do it. Thus we have people who play these kind of games with predatory practices and justify it somehow. It may sound stupid but otherwise why would you play these kind of games if you know what to expect(and yes, you do, don't fool yourselves)?!
@@SeaL995 the secret word of the day is “Nostalgia”
@@SeaL995 As gacha player and RPG fan, I like the idea of collecting party members and doing dungeons with what I manage to have thanks to thoughtful resource management (in-game money, since I enjoy them as f2p). And it is actually part of the game to not have what you'd want unless you planned long ahead.
There are a TON of mega toxic gachas, but with experience you recognize them and avoid them (PvP centric, leaderboards centric, with LOT of "events" to the point you can't do the story, the "ads" spamming one too).
It's like a different kind of experience. For example, I like Skyrim, it's calming, but Elden Ring is also a banger, however I expect from it to be a lot harder on me.
@@MrMittenshasatophat I was thinking why didn't you mention path of exile and then I was like oh yeah stash tabs are absolutely p2w. Or maybe you just don't like it idk
I've always said the problem isn't the those vulnerable to manipulation; stupidity, grief, addiction, whatever. It's those willing to take advantage of those people. How do we stop the manipulators? Tough question.
Easy: heavily regulate gambling. Only allow gambling in physical establishments. In those establishments you have people regulate the whales. Do not allow gambling machines in bars, etc.
Now of course America's government is stupid complex, so it would have to come from the top down, hard.
@@greenfroggood2392 lol good luck getting everyone to do that
less shitty parents is the answer, trust me, if a parent slaps the shit out of his kid if he catches him gambling or spending money on useless predatory monetization on games, that kid will never do it again, and afterwards if the parents take the time and explain WHY it is so stupid and give examples on how to actually make it worth to spend, proper full games, signal out what is a good dlc and what is a cashgrab, over time give propper advice and then when the kid grows up he will not have gambling problems and he will be more aware of this predatory bullshit.
But parents everywhere are just lazy or straight up stupid, they just give anything to their brats to keep them quiet or use the excuse of "it is what i wanted when i was a kid" instead of you know, teaching them proper dicipline, morals or fcking common sense so that people and specially companies cannot scam them all their lives, a lot of parents have the stupid idea that schools will teach their kids and that is wrong in so many levels.
I have seen well rised 6yr olds with good manners and far better common sense than young ADULTS online and that is just sad
@@NostraDavid2 Largely just creates a black market run by criminals and doesn't stop the activity. The war on drugs.
On an individual basis, you can't do much to stop the manipulation, unless you have a large following.
What you *can* do on an individual basis is educate yourself and your peers / family. This video is highly informative on what kind of manipulation to watch out for.
Apart from that it depends on the actions of the people in the industry, and the whales. For me, I'd rather work a boring IT job for a random business than help some scumbags develop a p2w game.
This should be illegal. It straight up is in some European Countries.
In-game microtransactions aren't illegal but loot boxes are. Whether you like it or not there will always be people trying to make you act in a certain way through pyschological means. Loot boxes are easy to make but that's only one way of making players pay. There will always pop up a new way to get the whales to spend as much money as they can when the old way gets banned by governments.
Yeah it's only the lootboxe. Marketing based on psychology is pretty much encouraged by governments.
@@_ebrq People speed and run red lights when no one is around to see it even though they can get fined or lose their license.
I dislike comments like this because it strikes me as defeatist and that because these things will still happen trying to so much as mitigate it is an exercise in futility.
@@Mrgiggles9007 welcome to the real world
@@aternialaffsalot ‘Welcome to the real world’. The world where laws maintain order and stability you mean?
The fact that diablo immortal "isn't even hiding it anymore" is why the game will probably flop imo. If Blizzard listened to this guy, they did a poor job!
The thing is diablo already has strong and wide follower, yes some probably openly hate it but that's not stopping other fans or regular people to install and play it. And in some countries moblie gaming culture (Asia, South America, etc), spending a lot of money for mobile gaming is already normal. Diablo immortal need very strong backslash form western for them to stop, otherwise the money will be enough for Blizzard to continue their model and other AAA game developer to try slowly follow Blizzard.
10,000,000 downloads in the first week. Far from a flop.
Flop? The game probably made more than it's profit margins in the first 3 days. Probably due not in any small effort than a certain streamer, probably gave more successful exposure to the game than Blizzard marketing strategy ever would have...
@@robertfugate2232 They could not make another dime and I bet they've paid for it ten times over by now .... the dipshits that continue to believe if 50K shit on something it counterbalances10 million supporting it, lol.
Even if diablo immortal died tomorrow, it's already been a huge success.
Rich Evans: "How does it feel to live long enough to see all your favorite franchises go down in flames?"
Gamers: "It feels great"
So my profession, is in door to door sales. There are so many sales tactics that they mentioned in this video, that are super effective.
1. F.O.M.O - Fear Of Missing Out(builds a sense of urgency)
2. Keeping Up With The Jones - seeing everyone do it makes it acceptable.
3. A confused Mind, says No - keeping it simple, or not having as many options. Because a confused mind, will say no.
and so much more!
once you know these tactics, you can't get suckered xD
People don't want to hear that chance in monetized video games is not aleatory.
They have modifiers thrown in that make it multiple times more likely or less likely to get the juicy reward according to what kind of players the company is more interested in keeping in their games. Moreover, it goes beyond lootboxes and mobile games.
In a game like WoW, those who spend more money in the store, whether buying mounts, services, or tokens, are the ones getting the sweet drops like the max ilevel weapon from the vault in the first week of a patch, or back in the day, the sweet max ilevel titanforge from an M+ 2 five times, or tier from the vault 4 times in a row, or super rare mounts on their second attempt.
They do similar things with returning players that haven't subscribed for longer than a month. They throw lots of hooks like the ones I just mentioned to get them to sign up for 6 months. "Hey I just got my BIS trinket from the vault in the first week."
It's not true chance, and never will be.
The company I work for has "Financial meetings" that are mandatory. They do Q&A at the end but they usually "don't have time"
If you're seeing this video, and you're seeing my comment: Stop playing this game if you are playing it. It's not worth your time, or your money, because it wasn't made by people who respect you as a customer, or as a person. Give it to people who deserve it. Not these clowns.
good luck trying to tell people what they should/shouldn't do - no one cares
@@aternialaffsalot Thanks for giving up and not trying. Very helpful.
@@VoidEternalas much as it piss me off
Theres no hope casuals have been playing trash for decades MADDEN 2K FIFA FORTNITE ECT just the worst kind of individuals
If they sell it to you like a scam, if you feel like you're being scammed, if they talk about it like it's a scam, it's a scam.
“I don’t think they’re gonna have time for that later.” RIP that true
Even at a community college (granted a nice one) I took classes on marketing... It made me very conservative with how I spend money. Our parents and grand parents never had the sheer quantity or availability of products we do today which is good but the downside is constant non stop marketing and I've seen it in the way some friends spend, constantly small amounts with medium purchases mixed in, constantly having money trouble because they can't stop.
Technically the dungeon bundles aren't true hot state sales, even though they definitely presented the same way. The dungeon bundles don't disappear if you don't buy them. They stay in the shop under bundles and they force you to look at it every day when you claim your daily free bundle. 😂
Since the example is candy crush, that's not the bundles. Those are the things being offered when you lose a level and you got a few seconds to buy it (similar to continue timer in arcade)
I have to warn my wife to never press that button, cause how expensive that offer actually is
Children should be taught this in schools like "cigarettes bad", "gambling bad, videogame monetization bad"
At 18:45 you missed the point. The whole point of the “loss aversion” bias is that even though logically you gain more than you lose, you still care more about the loss than the win. It hurts more to lose something you have than the happiness you feel when you gain the same amount.
That’s why people do NOT take the deal which is logically advantageous for them.
The only gacha ive ever actually enjoyed are the ones where the mechanical value to me of any potential reward is the same and low cost ... Think of the little rubber ball machines in the stores for 25-50¢ ... Bunch of different colors but I'd only use them as a ball so it was fun to toss a quarter or 2 and hey if I get a unique one then cool ... If not oh well at least I had a bouncy ball
Mom only lost out if it was her last quarter she refuses to deny you out of that brutal maternal compassion. But on a macro scale it occurs continuously.
The thing with manipulation of all kinds is that once you know how the manipulation works it’s far less effective. They should have a warning video at the start of these games that explain the techniques that are used.
When someone hops on the game, they just wanna play the game. They're not gonna be in the mindset to absorb any of those warnings
Why would they have warning videos at the start of their own games? To cuck themselves out of the possible money they can make? Nice thinking there, lol
@@ticktockbam of course it would need to be enforced by regulations
Theres also the "immediate decision making" in a game I play: Board Kings
Its a relatively harmless game where you get bombarded as well with ads of "buy this roll pack, and buy this extra booster for your event cards so you have the set full", but you don't actually need any of those to play normally
A reoccuring event is the battle ring where you hop along on a ring against a big baddie in the middle, and depending where your dice lands you attack the baddie for lowest:10, medium:25 or bighit: 40/50 damage. There are also spaces where YOU can be hit instead, the ring has 24 fields and 4 spots are attack-player-fields. ONE IN SIX, see a pattern here?
No matter where you are on the ring, you are ALWAYS in range of your next roll landing on a damage player tile. The 4th hit will take you out; If you lose you get the option to
*_keep fighting AND refill 2 hits for 2 enter tokens_*
That is the issue here: NEVER refill for 2 tokens. Just cancel the fight, go in again fresh for one token and try again with full HP. You gain NO benefit doing this
You pay double for half the potential (Your HP) which isn't even guaranteed, since RNG can fist you up at any given time anyway
The event in itself is pretty much doable without paying, did it before when it debuted and I came back to the game and they just gave me like 1000 rolls. You take a higher roll multiplier to cut time and get everything you land on multiplied by the same amount. That includes event items. Finished my rolls with like 50 tokens and rolled over the event 3x
My fellow Swede has one the most badass viking names ever *Torulf Jernström* which directly translates to *Thorwolf Ironstorm.* ^^
Just saying on the coin flip: I couldn't pay the debt if I lost. Yeah if you can flip the coin multiple times it will probably come out in your favor, but if you don't have the spare capital to offset losses then it doesn't matter what the long-term probability is.
The limited time offer part also reminds me of the arcade where when you die, they give you a few seconds for you to insert a coin for you to retry again
You know, after hearing that last bit - the LoL skin offer where you get a discount specifically for a skin for one of the champs you already play every few months is a really smart thing.
Its regular so it keeps people coming back, its tailored specifically to the player receiving it and personalised because it simply picks one that you don´t own at random which will be different from the ones your friends get, its not that hard to do with an algorithm... genius, really.
Well its not like its not fun for the players, if you are collecting skins for one or two champs you like a lot, you wait for the My Shop offers and hope to get a legacy or high tier skin at a good discount, which you normally wouldn't buy at full price.
The more games become monetized like Diablo Immortal the more these games remind me of actual gambling sites. Diablo especially shocked me at how many times you were notified to open the codex or some other menu to claim stuff. Even as a F2P player the systems really feel like a dopamine IV-drip much like actual gambling sites.
I think regular games are starting to resemble gambling games more and more. And the point isnt whether you are spending actual money or not like Asmongold said once on another gambling related video. The point is that instead of having actual fun while gaming we are gonna end up telling ourselves we are having fun when we are actually just addicted now to this dopamine IV-drip, just like actual gamblers.
Tbh on Diablo Immortal, it feels pretty much like a chore to have to open the menu and claim everything manually AND wait for that long ass animation.
Personally I plan to play it till endgame. If the endgame is too demanding, then I'll play something else. But from what I've seen, even f2p can breeze through it.
I bought Diablo 1 with about a day and a half of farm wages.
Now I need to take out a mortgage to upgrade my equipment?
The whole "if you fall for it you deserve it" is inherently ableist and short-sighted. People of any age, life experience, mental health status, or disability status should be able to live their lives and play games without being taken advantage of. Kids, addicts, people without much savvy about these systems, and people who have a harder time understanding abstract cause and effect shouldn't just be prey for bad people.
The slide at 37:18... It's no wonder I like rogue-lites so much... They have 3 of the 4 progression types, and lack the most toxic of them all haha.
Gotta say Asmon I appreciate the constant content. You’re the Goat 🐐
Concerning Labeling: Founder's packs are sort of the devs telling the community they're good boys for supporting the game development. Lost Ark sold those but so do many other games that are less predatory.
This is not a CEO "exposing" something. Its a guide made for people to build games themselfs
"Make sure your games aren't too skill based."
I never realized how bad mobile games got these days since I literally never played on my phone/tablet. Some flappy birds back in the day but that's about it. Diablo Immortal is a disgrace for the gaming industry and I can't believe that so many people pay so much money for such a stinky ass game.
It’s a PC issue. The monetization came from PC browser games years before they ported those games onto smart phones. Some of the oldest mobile games still have their original browser version. JP still makes browser versions & mobile ports of the browser game.
yeah it's been this way literally since 2009.
If you want a good mobile game play magic survival, it's the inspiration for vampire survivors. It's free and has not p2w nor p2p
In Diablo Immoral, Rifts are effectively loot boxes.
The only difference is that instead tapping to open you kill the boss at the end.
The book he was talking about is actually about helping people. This guy turned it around and uses it for scamming.
It's not a scam though. At worst it's a trick based on human behaviour.
About cards 12:00 ,
Anti-Monetary Card : This spell cost 0 to cast if you see a game with heavy microtransaction , target controller of the game will discard their game from play store and Anti-Monetary Card deals 2B $ of damage to it. Exile Anti-Monetary Card.
Instant Trap -> If the controller owns " Diablo Immortal " , Anti-Monetary Card deals 4B$ damage instead of 2B $. and you may choose to shuffle this card into your deck(edit-library ) instead of exiling it . The next time you cast this cost each of five colors and sacrifice a creature with power 3 or more.
Aim bot is pay to win but still cheating but when you buy the best gear that's "supporting the game"
The bonus point at the end was addressing Recruit A Friend type systems.
Blizzard has been a scourge in the making for well over a decade, and yet still some people convince themselves otherwise and defend them. Absolutely unbelievable, and disgusting.
This is the guy Asmon should talk to on stream !
tricks is an understatement. Its brutally nefarious. Its straight up casino tactics. The fact that you guys want to spend $20'000 on a silly little video game like Diablo immortal, tells you everything you need to know (its a fun game but what do you treally get for your $20'000?, really.....think about it for a second, sure streamers get their money back, but 99% of the players that spend big are getting NOTHING back lol). Theres games like Titans quest that has larger areas and way more content and larger areas than Diablo immortal on mobile. But its single player. Heres the kicker though...........you dont have to actually spend anything , ive beaten the game with the crusader class im level 60, paragon 7.........and i dont have to spend a $1. But as this video suggests, Blizzard isnt interested in me spending a measely $20, they are interested in the whales (and their rich kids) that will get hooked and just give up their credit card to compete with their wealthy friends. The trick is , is if you realize you can not compet with the whales. The addiction subsides quite easily. It snot jealousy, but if you cant compete because of money you are just playing the loop. You might aswell go play Diablo 2 resurrection or diablo 3 or titans quest for the same gameplay.
I'll be curious if Blizzard will change anything when Torchlight Infinite finally launches.
Titan quest worth playing? was thinking about buying it before
in was in Tokyo 2019 and this Gatachs machines are EVERYWHERE. they did an opening, wie a red robe, and there were people standing infront of them and waiting to spend money.
i have photos with maybem 50 of them stacked on each other on a street.
When it comes to games like Diablo Immortal or most mobile games, ratings really don't matter. At this point it's completely based off whether people are incentivized to spend or not, and developers can see that in their metrics. Publishers and developers at this point know how to hook consumers, and Chinese consumers consist of the majority of mobile games profits and will be a serious consideration for what types of monetization developers pursue in the future. As a result I feel that the vast majority of complaints from the US or European countries will be ignored. They can be as blatant as they want, but they understand how consumers will react so it doesn't matter.
Best example is ea. Every fifa or maden got worst rating but generates billions of money no matter that the games are blatant reskins of the games before
I remember reading about casino/gambling consultants gave outlines and advice to Blizzard all the way back during Cataclysm rework
They had too, because they were counting cards!
This whole line of "you shouldn't say capitalism is bad because the problem is greedy in any system" is profoundly ignorant. The problem with capitalism is that it creates an unequal and undemocratic relationship between the people who own the means of production and the people whose labor actually creates the value consumers want.
The goal should be to give labor a stronger position, rather than subjecting it to domination by law. We ought to require that corporate boards include representatives elected by workers the way Germany does.
Or maybe have the entire corporate boards be reps elected by the workers like a full on socialist system.
A bit of a PSA : A lot of the examples the Tribeflame CEO mentioned and similar ideas can be found in the book Predictably Irrational, which is a book on behavioral economics. I really recommend it and its very interesting
They say that videogames should prove its gambling and only THEN they will be eligible to fall under gambling regulations. But in reality, videogames should be regulated even more cause thyre much more predatory. When youre betting against a casino - casino still has risk attached to it. Casino may lose money. When youre betting against a game company when u buy a lootbox or whatever - company doesnt risk anything. They give u digital goods that they create in infinite amounts. Imagine playing vs casinos that print their own infinite dollars.
as a person that plays cod Mobile its legit pain when the game teases you to buy a COSMETIC In a game like a Legendary weapon/Operator or a Damn Mythic gun skin and kids on that game calls it fair to the F2P players that dont have money and they keep getting away with it and it needs to stop.
The man giving the presentation is not on stage talking about how they use free market capitalism to manipulate people they’re talking about the human psyche and how to manipulate that which is worldwide in any economy…
You know if they applied this stuff to gameplay, story and overall skill progression instead of just getting money it would've been really cool
I'm so glad I quit WoW recently. I was doing exactly what this guy is saying. I was the hobby guy. Raiding mythic and buying WoW tokens to buy all the consumables thinking it's no big deal... pots/flasks/food/auggies/armor kits/whatever the fuck. And it wasn't just me, most of the raid were doing the same thing.
This shit is exactly like drugs. You have this amazing product everyone loves and gets addicted to. Then the dealer slowly adds shit to the product over time to increase profits but taints and ruins the original product by doing so. But it was so damn addictive in the first place that people still want it and end up with some powder thats 75% creatine.... Except in video games, it's not real crack. It's World of Warcrack..
Another factor is knowing how much you have spent on a game. If you have spent enough money on a game, you'll feel more inclined to keep playing, because all that money would have been wasted if you abandon the game.
I’ve never spent money for extras in games it has no point I like playing and earning my experience
This is so evil. Deliberately using these manipluation tactics and making the players ruin gaming without them noticing it because every gaming company now knows this works perfectly. Even showing the picture of a devil.
And "The problem is not capitalism. Its greed" thats the real truth. Greed ruins every kind of society.
The solution then is to set up a system were greed is punished or otherwise disincentivized. I don't see how capitalism can do that without a lot of regulation from a strong government that it also accountable to its citizens.
You could also argue greed is one of our strongest qualities as humans. It was “greed” and that feeling of nothing is ever enough that led us to discover new lands, find new expansive projects/ technologies, sent us to space, etc… greed is a good virtue actually, and leads to significant human discovery and investments into technology.
@@stevenclark5173 wrong, greed is good. See my argument above
@@Bobbysmith54999 Thats some copium excuse right there. Greed is when an ape is hoarding more bananas than he could ever eat while other apes are starving. Its not a virtue at all.
Discovery and invention has nothing to do with greed. Don't mistake wanting to discover new lands with taking land by force from others.
@@ZhaneBadguy wrong. It’s that same feeling that nothing is ever enough that leads us to always search for something else. It’s the drive to keep on exploring and searching no matter that resources you currently have. It’s in our DNA and is a big reason why we are so successful. Embrace the greed!
Ah yes! ''Support your game developers!''... I'm sure they are going to see so much of the game's extra money!
Yeah, F2P games were always targeted towards whales. When I was working at a company that makes F2P games with microtransactions it was the very 1st thing they told me - we care only about those who pay, but not everyone, only those who pay the most. We had players who have spent well over 1M bucks in the game. And the best thing was that whatever they bought would usually be gone from their account within hours eg. soldiers or food to keep them alive. By design, recruiting an army was so bad in the game that people were paying for bots to do it for them because you could make like 10 units at a time and you'd have to come back to the game in an hour to make more. And you needed food to keep them or they would abandon your castle. It was a 24/7 grind with little profit and you had to balance between making an army and attacking other players to get food for your army. Or you could spend 10-100 bucks to get both. People would always come to us for refunds because their newly bought army was gone before they could use it becauses they did not have enough food to keep them.
no they were not always made that way. League of Legends, valorant, team fortress 2 , Warframe and path of exile are all experiences that try to be worth your money. even mobile games used to be fine : cut the robe used to sell levels doodle jump just had ads and even subway surfer was only ads.
this cancer that is growing in the industry needs to be removed and if that is too much to ask it at least needs to be cut down to size and I will not stop talking about this to every politician every election that wants me to vote for him.
@@MrWilliGaming Well, you have pc/console games mixed up with mobile/browser games as well as their genres. Games like Valorant or TF2(which used to be B2P) have no actual character progression so there is not much room for P2W microtransactions like in Diablo Immoral. The reason why LoL doesn't have microtransations is simple - 95% of people would stop playing it and how tournaments would look like with players buffed with P2W stuff? Warframe/PoE are "from gamers for gamers" so people would probably lose all hope if such projects were designed to abuse monetisations to drain their wallets for character progression. Although, PoE inventory/stash expansions are kind of bad imo. Same thing was pushed in Diablo Immoral too. Personally, I feel like those games would be good with cosmetics alone if those were more affordable to general public. Packs that are like 50-100 bucks for an armor and some additional vfx/sfx are overkill.
@@KillMeIfYouCanPL waframe basically discourages p2w, their prices are so high compared to the effort required to actually get the stuff that it's stupid to buy primes
"Greed is capatalism"
My brother in christ, Communism has failed every single time BECAUSE of Greed. Greed will always exist in any economic structure.
and the reason things are way more greedier now than say even 60 years ago is because we are heading into marxist and communist ideologies and the people are to dumb to realize it and blame it on capitalism.
@@andrews9695 I wouldn't go that far, we are just reaching the edge of the bubble that unregulated capatalism has created. There's only a finite amount of resources before shit hits the fan and we're close to bursting.
Any marxist/communist ideologies that have gained power in the last couple of decades really don't have that much sway on the economy, if any at all.
Again the underlining problem is Greed, corperations place more value on increase their per annum by large percentages short term for personal gain over small incremence over longer periods of time. Eventually we will hit the ceiling we've just hit it faster due to Greed.
@@Quintessence4444 Captalism encourages Greed because there's no regulation to how Greedy a corperation can be. They take because they can.
You want to eliminate Greed? Eliminate scarcity. Until we can do that Greed will always rear its head in whatevery system we're apart of. It's just human nature.
@@Quintessence4444 You'll never eliminate scarcity, unless we somehow manage to create material out of nothing we have finite amount of resources on our planet.
If we take all the wealth heald by the 1% and passed it down to the 99%, yes things would be alot better...for a time. The aim isn't to build a system that benefits us for the short term, we need to start thinking longterm.
All problems we have today are the product of people who were not thinking of the future.
To the person who said "This is capitalism." - Capitalism assumes a free market, a free market assumes there's no discrepancy in power or knowledge, which means, there's no manipulation by people who studied psychology of people who are unaware of these psychological tricks.
Once you allow said manipulation in, it's no longer a free market, by the classic definition.
Also, exploitism exists without greed, but what the comment in chat was suggesting wasn't a 1-to-1 connection, but that all capitalism is also exploitism, not that all exploitism is also capitalism. Venn diagrams.
*Soviet anthem stops playing*
Interested how your opinion on capitalism change over the next few years. Glad to see you are starting become more radicalized, even if you deny some of the criticisms others give. I think you'll change you mind over time. I believe we are just beginning to see this paradigm shift. Glad you are exposing the explorative practices in the industry and continuing to be critical off them.
I remember when this video first leaked and Jim sterling just about lost his mind covering it.
The funny thing is that this video is a relic of 2016 its Much MUCH worse now.
Asmon reacting to this is great because it brings more eyes to this. In fact people starting to have problems with react content feels like it's not just about money, but about trying to minimize watching audience for certain videos.
Asmons viewers know those things already tho. It's all inside this bubble of people that are involved in the topic anyways
Reminds me of the "Skins no Skills " we used to comment in LOL 30:12 before orbs existed
Capitalism being bad doesn't mean other systems can't be bad too. So, I don't see the point in that argument. The core of the system is rewarding greed and that is what people have an issue with. The key is a system that rewards equality. You can see this is medical fields across the world. The healthier systems are ones that reward based on preventative care and the overall health of the patients rather than the total number of procedures done (like our system).
Capitalism has no incentive to help others and rewards greed. Yes there are other systems that do that too.. that doesn't excuse capitalism. It's a dumb argument.
Pretty sure it's a lack of knowledge in the subject on his part. Doesn't seem like he actually understand the meaning of Capitalism or all the other options and reasoning out there.. and that's sad.
Not "helping" the consumer when they buy goods or services is so stupid in a "capitalist" system, why would people part of their money (their effort & time) in exchange of something if they don't receive uses or benefits from it. Capitalism, even with its problems, is a system that benefits from indiscrimination because talented people come from all races and ideas. Being a discriminatory capitalist will put you at a disadvantage to someone who is not.
I think his point is that they are all flawed and that it’s human nature, so with that reasoning you might aswell have a capitalist system where you at least get what you work for
@@darrenegan3891 That's the point. There are hundreds of system variations and people know nothing about them.. which is apparent in both replies. There are systems other than capitalism where you get what you work for. Shit even capitalism doesn't do that. You get what the people in power decide what you're worth.
Not bothering to reply to the other dude. He obviously didn't bother to read what I wrote.
23:55 similarly i remember as a kid some dudes we're scamming/luring players in runescape. counter lured them for a while.
There way of convincing themselves it was ok to continue doing so was that they saw themselves as being smarter, thus they were allowed to take advantage of "stupid" people.
The game is very good at teaching you from a young age to not trust strangers and not show too much wealth.
As someone with Misophonia, this man's way of speaking bothers me way more than it should.
What is Misophonia?
@@ragerontilt4778 It's basically when you unwillingly hyperfocus on certain specific sounds and get incredibly frustrated by them.
For example, in this video the speaker kept smacking his lips rather frequently which made it really difficult to keep watching. Having this "condition" is definitely not the worst thing that exists but it can be really annoying at times.
@@Lickwit thanks for explaining, I'm like the opposite aha. People will point out an annoying sound and I will have been tuning it out completely until they said something
These are techniques that salesmen & advertisement firms for ever , just like you said it was going on before money existed. New to your channel but really enjoying your content and agree with with you on a lot of these outlooks you discuss.
Hook, Habit, Hobby
The difference between games and Netflix is that games want players to buy quicker and more frequently, therefore giving less options. Netflix, on the other hand can't be accessed unless you are subscribed, they already have your money but the longer time you spend looking for something to watch, they earn revenue
They should’ve even be called “games” at this point
i agree it is pure cancer
Setting up rifts so that players in a party can see what crests the other players are using and also what rewards they got after is another trick to pressure players to spend more.
When you are aware of game companies doing this, breaking the ice becomes harder and harder. Best thing to do is not to play these type of games at all. It just saddens me how gullible and stupid people still are, tossing their money away into a mobile game.
This reminds me of the social space added to cod ww2, where everyone compared it to Destiny, and the loot boxes you opened there would be projected in front of you massively so everyone could experience YOUR lootbox.I assumed that was how cod was gonna do it from then on.
This is like a third of the sessions at GDC
I think the skill point also is impicative of a game that REQUIRES a lot of skill to play. If the game is catered toward people with high personal skill levels, they may not feel they need the 500% deal box to play, and if the game is too difficult for the casual player, they most likely will give up and see no point in upgrading if its not going to impact their ability to complete the challenges, because it forces them to "git gud" first.
I'm still waiting for the talk about the morality of this
When in a game is easyer to progress by working your day job and spending the money in it, than actualy playing said game, is not a game worth playing in my opinion.
in germany people will defend p2w by calling you "low income boy" (gering verdiener)
Gering verdiener also works in Dutch weird enough.
last part he could mean players who log in a lot.
like some games do the whole. log in 2 weeks nonstop get a cool sword.
or hey man if u grind nonstop for a year u get this epic pegasus mount. barely anyone has it because u need to log in the whole year each day. or hell he could even mean kickstart backers? as he said personal gift?? or what some games do: suprise update everyone asked for for years.
Games that use these "techniques" should be made illegal. People are too stupid to correct the market themselves and this is ruining gaming. Not to mention it's taking advantage of children and fools.
And than society is held responsible to take care of those very same people who are exploited. Just make the techniques illegal and be sone with these companies
About the MTG booster pack comparative, I'll also like to add that you can trade them, even if you didn't find the card you were looking for you could trade some of the valuable cards for it.
I think that this type of gaming monetization had only been possible not because of capitalism but because of our money system. If we had a hard currency that was backed by something real and valuable that wasn't the full faith in the us government People in society would have a literal mental shift from a time preference that is short and fast which enables this type of predatory schemes to a longer time preference. People would be more incentivized to save their money because why would I buy this TV today at 500 dollars when if I save my money it would be worth 450 tomorrow Time preference is something everyone has. When a government has an inflationary monetary system you are incentivized to spend now because if you save it then your your money would be worth less
What is a real and valuable thing you could base it on then. Gold and precious stones don't really have much value. Perhaps you could tie it to energy like oil, solar, nuclear, etc. All of that has real value. But all that means is that we can enter a post scarcity society once we figure out things like nuclear fusion or being able to build a Dyson swarm.
I liked the meta of his last remark - the surprise gift to encourage reciprocity
Diablo immortal!? More like diablo immoral, am I right?
Ah ah ah ah
Truly a knee slapper
Blizzard is so confident about the ripoff that they don't even try to hide it.
@@paule4566 rip off? Can someone explain.
Poe is so good because they applied this in a different way. The allow "you" to take advantage of the other players so you can feel good.
Holy crap. At this point people will need full time jobs in order to play their favorite games or they will not even be able to play it properly. As one wise big orange guy said once "times change..."
Guess what? Don’t make these games your favorite games you f***** tools.
There is a big difference between taking advantage of people and providing a service to society and that is where capitalism has completely missed. Think about what you are worth, hourly. I know that my effort on a day to day basis is worth a certain amount, and everyone can come up with a general number based on their hours, experience and intelligence. People are 100% allowed to work harder than me and therefore be weatherier than me. There is 0% chance that a CEO of any company can work 150 times harder and be 150 times smarter than me. And they know that too. They tried to say "I lived in the office for 5 years of my life, I was on the grind all day every day, just work as hard as me!" Yea you maybe your worked double the hours, heres double the salary, not 150 times the salary. The whole addiction model is so fucked because it undermines the American dream of work=compensation. Honestly there is no way to come back. With the conglomeration of money there is no way to fight against entrenched money. Generational weath trumps a lifetime of effort by the majority (85% minimum of people). It leaves us with a feeling that we need to scape and claw away whatever I can get and fuck everyone else. I want to cry.
Please get your dad on and get him to talk about what Blizzard is doing wrong with Diablo Immortal
The biggest manipulation tactic is the 800 percent value. With Diablo immortal imagine how many people paid for it, found out how heavily and unfairly monetized it is; but still can't leave cause they already committed to playing the game for at least 30 days to get the full value, so now they are emotionally trapped despite knowing that this is an abusive relationship.