Hardline Mike wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 19:54:People generally aren't going to spend *more* on games when they think information about their quality is unreliable. The people who are most prone to disregard this as "more internet bullshit" without looking into it are people who don't buy *any* games to begin with. This kind of noise will reach the ears of those whose opinions actually matter to Blizzard. Given that there are places where regulatory action against gacha mechanics has already been taken, it's a kind of heat Blizzard has an interest in reducing, no matter how stupid it seems to the uninvolved.
You're right that bad press can get corpos to change things up, but that's when you're talking about things like "Our company is full of rapists" or "Oops we accidentally all the baby formula." coupled with simultaneous state and Federal investigations. When some people see a low user review score on Metacritic they just assume it's a bunch of people upset that there's a Black character or something since that's typically why it happens, and pay-to-win whales are just going to see the complaining about the business model and laugh at the "butthurt poors" or whatever.
Because of review bombing being so common now, when I'm looking at whether or not I'm going to enjoy playing a game, the Metacritic user review score sits right above a Ouija board and a Magic 8-Ball in usefulness.
Orogogus wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 18:48:It's a weird question to begin with because there are so many equally valid but mutually exclusive framings. If we were talking about drugs, you would not be able to predict my stance on the issue by starting from what I've said about gambling addiction in this thread.
That doesn't sound like a review to me, which normally I'd consider something like, "I played this for a while and this is what I thought about it." Political or not, this comes across more as a product of the Internet outrage machine, mostly useful for knowing what the Internet thinks about the game. I wouldn't give any credence to good reviews from people who haven't played a game, so it doesn't seem reasonable to just let the bad ones through.
Orogogus wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 17:42:That's not quite what I'm saying, or I'd have done it myself. It's more that I get why it's happening, and if there's anyone that deserves it, it's Blizzard.
It sounds like people are spending 0 minutes on it; there's at least one person below saying people should be leaving bad reviews even if they haven't played it.
Hardline Mike wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 16:55:I understand why, given how much of it they blatantly ignore, but you seriously undervalue how effective bad press can be against large corporations. That vitriol is the seed that occasionally rouses regulators and legislators from their stupor, and the corps will bend over backwards to avoid that. Lobbying only works when it's actually cheaper than doing right. Scream enough, and it won't be anymore.
A hyperbolic enraged version of "I don't like this business model." from someone who was never going to play the game anyway is not going to make this type of business model go away. The only way it goes away is if people stop giving them money. Which they won't, because as you said, addicts.
Huzsar wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 16:49:This right here. If you are familiar with the business model, you don't have to play it to know it sucks. I do play some of these, and I have paid for a tiny proportion of them, and I still think it sucks. Lots of games that would be decent get wrecked by this business model because it's difficult to calibrate it for a winning value proposition, and you only get the big money if you decide to actively not do that and chase whales instead. There are whole genres that were born or popularized on mobile that are unfairly seen as dumb trash for latchkey kindergartners because it's almost entirely split between heavily-advertised cash grabs and a few actually-free games made by real artists that therefore have no advertising budget.RedEye9 wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 13:07:After a quick look though some of the reviews in your link I see only one review related to the Blizzard scandal which if those were all of them I would agree that they are review bombing as it does not have have to do with the games quality. But the rest of them deal pretty much with the poor implementation of the monetization systems that make the game crappy for those people, so how are they not valid reviews?Huzsar wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 12:47:https://www.metacritic.com/game/ios/diablo-immortal/user-reviews?dist=negative
I think review bombing is usually when people score the game low for something that does not have much to do with the quality of the actual game. I do not see this as review bombing, and more of reviewing the poor quality of the game due to mechanics Blizzard implemented.
The Zero (0) reviews do not agree with your hypothesis that it's due to "the poor quality of the game."
This is quintessential review bombing.
Hardline Mike wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 16:41:Generally, yes. When it comes to predatory business practices that are known to be problematic, nah. "Just don't buy/play the game" isn't good enough to get devs to stop this trash. People mostly don't, after all. These things persist because the genre conventions were molded by psychologists teaching unscrupulous devs to wring small playerbases full of addicts (not enthusiasts, actual addicts) like sponges. It's a dirty tactic, and dirty tactics are called for in opposing it.phinn wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 13:40:
Probably the most valid review bombing of all time. Game is a horrible predatorial gambling fest. This franchise has fallen very far from the masterpiece of Diablo 2.
There are no valid review bombs. If you haven't played the game, don't fucking review it, period.
Sepharo wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 16:10:Yeah, that dude really needs to come back when he's five days in. Five hours is a demo, of course it's free.Quinn wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 12:57:
The problem is ppl (read idiots) rate a mobile game as a pc game. Ppl say the game is "too much like D3" and have it in their mind that's a bad thing.
I have 5 hours into DI, haven't paid one cent yet, didn't hit any paywalls yet and got my third legendary dropped today.
As long as you're okay with never coming close to max gear... but some people play these grindy games specifically to max out... and apparently playing without spending money, that will take two lifetimes... and spending it will cost north of $80,000.
Steele Johnson wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 15:01:I know where the term comes from. I'm saying that it's more useful to us, as consumers trying to advocate for our interests, to generalize it. What you want to call "pay to finish" and P2W are expressions of the same irresponsibly greedy intent, which will always try to find a place to do what it does outside your definitions, and then claim you're being immature and unreasonable when you complain. Define your terms broadly and it's harder to do that.
pay2win is historically a way to allow players to buy better gear or to make better items, giving you an unfair advantage over players who haven’t purchased these microtransactions. Making microtransactions to actually “finish” the game (i.e., even just the single-player mode) is not the same thing. Anyhow, after reading this thread, I don’t think anyone knows the actual details, including me. And I don’t really give a rat’s ass. If a game sounds like a scam, then don’t buy it. 😂
Kxmode wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 14:54:
Most of the core gameplay, including the story campaign, is free. Immortal pushes people to buy things, including the monthly "Battle Pass" subscription, but it doesn't affect gameplay. Where the P2W stuff happens is after the campaign with the end-game progression to reach the top-tier stuff.
Steele Johnson wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 14:18:What for? When you play against a game, finishing is winning. Not every solo game has that kind of adversarial experience, but it is overwhelmingly normal even in traditional "you bought it, it's yours" games. It's definitely present in the case of a game that aggressively tries to get you to quit if you're not at least on a $10/wk sub. (No idea if D:I has a price structure like that specifically, but I've seen that and worse before.)007Bistromath wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 14:08:Steele Johnson wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 13:24:Not really. $110k to actually finish the game means that's what it is. "Winning" doesn't have to be relative to other players when it's that bad.
How do you pay2win single-player and co-op? I think we need a new acronym 😂
Ok, so it’s not pay2win, it’s pay2finish. Welp, sounds like we’ve got our new acronym
phinn wrote on Jun 7, 2022, 13:40:I think the business model is egregious, but from what I've seen of the gameplay, this wasn't originally intended to be a full-fledged part of the franchise. It's at least in part an idle game with extravagantly animated progress bars. If they'd *marketed* it as such, I probably would've tried it during the initial release. The problem was when they (probably actually only their marketing execs) insisted on telling everyone it was actually a Diablo game, and not a fun spin-off targeted to people (me) who like idle games.
Probably the most valid review bombing of all time. Game is a horrible predatorial gambling fest. This franchise has fallen very far from the masterpiece of Diablo 2.
Bodolza wrote on Feb 7, 2022, 15:30:Your position begins with the assumption that the artist minted the NFT. You can't possibly actually believe that; you must be aware of the staggering number of artists who refuse to engage with this technology. You are therefore arguing in bad faith, because the value of your tokens relies on people being unaware of NFT being used as a protection racket by exactly this method.MoreLuckThanSkill wrote on Feb 7, 2022, 15:26:
You can find plenty of stories online of artists getting copyright striked on their OWN artwork, by random people who bought (illegitimate) NFTs of their work, and now the burden of proof is on the original artist.
I'd be curious to hear more about this. NFTs should make proving ownership trivial. The timestamp on the block should clearly show which NFT was created first. You could also easily trace the history back to the address of the creator.
Bodolza wrote on Feb 7, 2022, 14:39:It isn't like that at all, because e-mail wasn't an extension of a previous shitty technology. In the most charitable possible accounting, NFTs can only be as legitimate as crypto itself.
I very much disagree with their tweet. NFTs are just a technology, and it has legitimate uses. This is like saying e-mail is a scam because it used by spammers.