- 5,398
- Buenos Aires
Microtransactions wouldn't be bad if some games weren't designed with microtransactions in mind.
GT5 didn't have microtransactions (that I know of), but as a player with no access to Internet I suffered a similar problem to what microtransactions do to a lot of games nowadays. The game was designed with online rewards in mind, meaning that you will need to grind A LOT to earn money to purchase cars in the game. It was simply unplayable for me. The game wasn't that fun, and getting money was a pain in the ass. PD just didn't expect people to play GT5 and have no access to Internet. It wasn't designed to be that way. An online player would have a much easier time acquiring credits. It want to believe it was an intentional yet unintentional move on their part. Intentional, because they expected the player to play seasonal events and the like. And unintentional, because perhaps it didn't cross their mind that somebody was playing the game entirely offline, with no login bonus even.
But a lot of games that have microtransactions suffer these problems completely intentionally. The companies make their games extremely frustrating to play if the user is not willing to pay for things like lives, items, and the like, yet addictive enough for the player to want to keep playing anyways, and maybe have them fork over some cash. I'm currently playing this game, Trivia Cracker ("Preguntados"), and to add to the fact that people are lazy and may not be willing to answer right away (meaning you have to wait to continue playing), you only get three matches at a time, and have to wait 1 hour to get another life. A perfect example on how to turn a possibly good game into complete trash.
In the end, I think microtransactions are a cancer that should be purged. If game X isn't enjoyable without the microtransactions, there is something wrong about them. If game X is perfectly enjoyable without the microtransactions, only good can come out about having them.
Think of ideal microtransactions as buying Rare Candies for Pokémon. Now think about real microtransactions as having EXP reduced to 5% in addition to the above.
GT5 didn't have microtransactions (that I know of), but as a player with no access to Internet I suffered a similar problem to what microtransactions do to a lot of games nowadays. The game was designed with online rewards in mind, meaning that you will need to grind A LOT to earn money to purchase cars in the game. It was simply unplayable for me. The game wasn't that fun, and getting money was a pain in the ass. PD just didn't expect people to play GT5 and have no access to Internet. It wasn't designed to be that way. An online player would have a much easier time acquiring credits. It want to believe it was an intentional yet unintentional move on their part. Intentional, because they expected the player to play seasonal events and the like. And unintentional, because perhaps it didn't cross their mind that somebody was playing the game entirely offline, with no login bonus even.
But a lot of games that have microtransactions suffer these problems completely intentionally. The companies make their games extremely frustrating to play if the user is not willing to pay for things like lives, items, and the like, yet addictive enough for the player to want to keep playing anyways, and maybe have them fork over some cash. I'm currently playing this game, Trivia Cracker ("Preguntados"), and to add to the fact that people are lazy and may not be willing to answer right away (meaning you have to wait to continue playing), you only get three matches at a time, and have to wait 1 hour to get another life. A perfect example on how to turn a possibly good game into complete trash.
In the end, I think microtransactions are a cancer that should be purged. If game X isn't enjoyable without the microtransactions, there is something wrong about them. If game X is perfectly enjoyable without the microtransactions, only good can come out about having them.
Think of ideal microtransactions as buying Rare Candies for Pokémon. Now think about real microtransactions as having EXP reduced to 5% in addition to the above.
