Gaming is several parts fun and one part addiction; lets get right to the truth of that. It is far from alone in this however. In a way we tolerate various states of addiction in our first world countries. People drive to places five minutes away because they don't want to or have the time to walk, people shove all their dirty dishes in the dishwasher rather then get out a sponge and some fairy liquid. People drink and smoke and cheat in search of that 'better' state, where life is easier, more fun, and we feel more alive. Satan explains it quite well! (Thanks Southpark!)
Arguably, society is made up of addictions we we do or do not accept. If for example, it came to a choice between all of our technological advancements and eventually, the livelihood of the world, which would we choose? And how many people would sink into a depression if all this amazing technology were to suddenly be lost? How many people would feel lesser without internet, games, TV, cars, and the other things that sustain us in their own little ways?
So yes games are addictive. Mostly it's not a bad thing at all; the very best movies in life are the ones we can't tear ourselves away from and the same applies to many games. Addiction grabs all gamers in some way or another. And it maybe is this realisation among other things that has lead to the rise of 'Free-To-Play' (FTP) games; a genre that in it's very name is a lie. A person can pick up one of these games for nothing and play for a while in relative peace; but elements of the game are locked away, behind a paywall you remove with money. If Free-To-Play were a building, it would be like a Shopping Mall; biggish, lots to explore, but lots of tangible, fun elements hard to reach or even beyond reach without money.
Put simply, it's a big fib; a PR name for a game that wants/needs your money even if it claims otherwise. This has been talked about and written about in various ways in a much better style then I can even attempt; fore-mostly in one of South Parks more awesome episodes (Thanks again Southpark). We know plenty about the outright exploitative nature of FTP games like EA's corruption of Dungeon Master, or the massively, depressingly successful Farmville; you wouldn't have to look far in google to find gamers angry about what EA turned the classic Dungeon Master into anyway.
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| A small variety of different 'skins' you can buy for your champions in League Of Legends. |
What we don't talk so much about perhaps are the high roadsters of the Free-To-Play circuit; and there are more then a few. League Of Legends, DOTA, Team Fortress 2, Hearthstone and a bundle more. There is a reason that these games aren't criticised for their practices in the same vein; for those most part they are very very good games to a one, far from the 'barely fun' Free-To-Play games Southpark eviscerates. Team Fortress is a flowing shoot of variety, League Of Legends is arguably the most popular game the world has ever seen and DOTA (Defence Of The Ancients) is it's bigger brother, with a little more maturity and arrogance to it perhaps. And then we have Hearthstone, a simple-play-hard-master collectable card game. There is far more variety, tension, fun. Shining bright euphoria.
But does that make these games any better then the Free-To-Play games that many have torn apart? If we think of a gambling addict and the casinos he might go to, which is the more dangerous to him? Is it the dank casino in a basement and a single swinging lamp over a craps table? Or is it the glitzy casino with the fine waitresses, the clean floors and the endless, endless array of gambling options? The answer surely, is both. A casino looking good doesn't make it less dangerous to the gambler, doesn't make it less likely to bankrupt him, or destroy his livelihood and possibly his relationships. Could the same be argued to be true of these glitzy games, where the fun and the money come in equal amounts?
Many would say that a person gets what they are paying for in a game like this, and many do. Plenty of people genuinely don't feel like spending thousands of pounds on games like these is a waste of money; and at least unlike the gambler, they're getting something back from the investment poured in: that 'better' state that all people crave.
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| A small selection of Team Fortress hats we wear to win the ladies. |
Or is this just a delusion? See, the thing about games like Hearthstone and League and Team Fortress is that there is a little caveat to the fun; there is a need that grips players in all of these games to ascend. To be the best in that game, to be the best at a champion. League Of Legends has an epic ranking system, Team Fortress has a strange economy based around having the best hats and fashionable gear (so I've been led to believe). Hearthstone has a ranking system where, it could be argued, the best decks require lots of rare or 'legendary' cards that require a lot of effort to get. Or, of course, you could simply pay for them. One legendary card, incidentally, can cost nearly twenty pounds. Accessories in Team Fortress can cost over a hundred pounds. Legendary cards (Hearthstone) in particular live on the edge of the much despised pay-to-win system; you don't need them to rise to the promised summit that is Legendary rank in Hearthstone. You don't need to buy champions in League Of Legends to rise up the rankings. But boy, it really could help.
Quality games they may be, and far lower down the Pay-To-Win scale then many Free-To-Play games are. But at what point to we argue that someone paying thousands of pounds for a game, no matter how good, is exploitative, or too far? Surely there are many great games which offer plenty for fifty pounds? So why spend many times that just to get value if not head over heel addicted?
But then we could apply this to many popular and profitable games. Magic The Gathering, a phoenix from the ashes of a card game is more popular now then ever, and uses a business model where many cards bought a year ago simply stop being usable in standard play; forcing players to but new cards to rebuild their decks. This is arguably the most exploitative of gaming systems, yet do people keep coming back? Hell yes they do: Magic The Gathering has improved profit margins by over 20% last year. And again it's not Pay-To-Win in the raw way Free-To-Play games can be; Magic can be played in all kinds of modes which allow you to use the same old cards you had before. It's just centered around this standard format in which the customer consistently buys to keep up; and boy, is that cynical.
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| Legendary Cards can also come in partly animated gold form. They also come at a price. |
Whether any of this should be acceptable is another thing entirely. These games are there to intentionally feed on addicts like many mobile games are cynically designed to do. In fact the revenue system of League Of Legends was criticized by one Teut Weidermann, of Ubisoft, who suggested that he could double the revenue from the game if he were pulling the strings; losing 60% of the customer base but doubling the sweet money the game made. Hooray? A critical part of his talk however was this; Riot makes money from 5% of it's player base. Mobile games make money from 0.15% of their player base. If the mobile games are a measure of leeching their profits of addicts, then arguably games like League Of Legends are still quite close to that exploiting line.
These games will make victims of some whether the developers or gamers like it or not; addiction is a part of life and Free-To-Play has just brought it more into the gamers sphere then ever. The Free-To-Play system is a very slippery slope like that; future Free-To-Play games will be judged as much on the nature of their money spending systems as the mechanical quality of the game they support. It is both the future of some genuinely great games that can use it to sustain their life spams far beyond most games, and the cynical business strategy of games companies who know they can make money off the select few by pushing the right buttons; to get people addicted enough to spend thousands and still be satisfied by the experience.
Where do we draw the line? This writer has no idea. Does it even matter if people with addictive personalities get addicted to certain games? Should we be angry, that tapping into addiction, the need for better and better has become a core gaming business strategy?
The answer is very much up for debate.
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