• peppersky [he/him, any]
    ·
    4 months ago

    I'll die reinforcing the flank of this (ant)hill (or whatever).

    First of all I'm not trying to defend Capcom here, these microtransactions are obviously stupid as fuck. But they are nothing but additions made by out-of-touch executives at the last possible minute. In comparison to the predatory design found in 90% of videogames made today it barely even registers on the scale of bullshit. It's so half-assed they don't even allow you to buy the packs that give you in-game currency more than one time. The game was clearly not designed with this in mind and at no point does it feel like any of its design was altered so you'd be inclined to spend money on the microtransactions.

    Every single live-service game that works on the users FOMO is a hundred times more predatory than this. Cosmetics in multiplayer games are a hundred times more predatory than this (sure they don't "affect gameplay" but they are most often the only way to make your character be in any way unique compared to the other players and always function as displays of wealth to an audience of literal children). I'd even argue that shit games like the lauded "Vampire Survivors", which is five bucks and doesn't feature any microtransactions is more predatory since it's from the ground up designed to hit your dopamine receptors just the right amount with no other apparent goal in mind other than to lobotomize you for half an hour whenever you play it.

    Every single fucking mobile game is literally eating peoples brains as they play them and this is the shit people get mad about? This is at least still a videogame designed and made by people who have some goals besides brainwashing its users into becoming whales. Yeah it fucking sucks that there's barely any devs left who are completely free from this bullshit, but I'd gladly take this bullshit over the other 99% of games that are designed to be microtransaction-machines first.

    • LaughingLion [any, any]
      ·
      4 months ago

      You are agreeing with me. You point out that this game is pay-2-win but just that others in the market are worse. Sure, I agree. This game is pay-2-win and others are worse. Welcome to my side. The march up the hill isn't so bad and there's a nice breeze.

      • peppersky [he/him, any]
        ·
        4 months ago

        Yeah I agree with you, except for the fact where I think it's important to actually look at the actual games, how they are designed and how things like microtransactions work within them and not just spout "pay-to-win" like it somehow means the same thing in battlefront 2, world of tanks, some mobile idle game, the resident evil 4 remake or this game.

        • LaughingLion [any, any]
          ·
          3 months ago

          You are paying for things that give an advantage in a game. In some that advantage is gainable in the game. In some it is not. In some that advantage is huge. In some it is trivial. But fundamentally it is all the same at it's core. It is the purchasing of that advantage that makes it pay-2-win even if the specific variations and severity differs from product to product.

          I fully agree it's worse in other games. Sure, that's a gimme.