Skate players were explicitly told map areas would not be "locked behind a paywall"
EA invents new microtransaction nightmare as it breaks paywall promise on Skate: rent a playable area for 24 hours or buy a premium pass, bucko
8 months ago by Agent_Karyo to c/games
Skate players were explicitly told map areas would not be "locked behind a paywall"
Indies are where its at. Or classic games, especially with mods
Games are a modern media and I think suffer from a lot of modern engagement mechanics.
We need to stop viewing them as a constant stream of "new content" and more as an established library.
Absolutely the problem. They've stopped trying to make fun and started trying to exploit psychological weaknesses and hijack our internal reward systems to rinse us of both time and money.
Fun is no longer the driving factor, and it makes me feel not quite angry or nauseous, but somewhere around those emotions.
They've stopped trying to make fun and started trying to exploit psychological weaknesses and hijack our internal reward systems to rinse us of both time and money
Exactly, and the fact that Jeffrey Epstein was pro microtransactions really tells you the kind of scum we're dealing with here
I shifted to that view a long time ago. I have a selection of "classics" I play on rotation and I add a few indies or modern ports every now and then.
The multiplay scene went in a direction I don't intend to follow. Some old friends are thinking about hosting a retro lan party, but I'm going to make it clear that I'm walking if they try sneaking in any modern shit.
Thinking about it now, I haven't bought any game with EA's name on it since Dead Space 3.
Man, remember back in the day when you just went and bought a game and then played it?
In American-style neo-liberalism, everything must have a price tag. If it doesn't generate a profit, it can't exist.
Then people should stop buying, otherwise nothing will change. People complained about Nintendo switch 2, yet they bought it.
This is actually good advice... in isolation. Encouraging people to spend their money more wisely can bring awareness to an issue but it ultimately does little to implement change. Sure, you and I (and the Fediverse as a whole) might be hyper-vigilant about these kind of things but the average consumer isn't. Continuing with your Nintendo example, Nintendo has decades of brand recognition and a zealous fanbase to satisfy the demand. An eager gaming press will gladly take free hardware from Nintendo for positive coverage.
Real change won't happen until the tap is turned off, so to speak. These companies are taking advantages of gaps in the law that permit them to get away with this. Antitrust law in the US dates back to a time when steam-powered trains were still common and the last breakup involved a telephone company. When AT&T was broken up, the home computer (desktop in modern parlance) was just starting to take off.
So, yes, we should spend our money elsewhere when we see this kinds of corporate abuses but until you starve the beast, keep expecting these kinds of behaviors.
Why days worth of farming? To help give the player a sense of "pride and accomplishment" of course.
there's no moral consumption under capitalism so many people just don't care

That poor cat, are you forcing it to play EA games?????
Animal Humane Society operates the primary animal cruelty reporting line in Minnesota: 612-772-9999 or report online at investigations@animalhumanesociety.org.
i know, for my persuasive argument let me start with
you are just a piece of shit humanbeing
yeah, a bit too extreme take from me. I'm just so annoyed about people who apathetically keep supporting things that make our world worse or that are produced from suffering of others.
What kind of sucker buys from EA?
Split Fiction and It Takes Two were pretty great.
Add Mass Effect, Dead Space and Star Wars Jedi series..
But yeah I wish all of these were DRM free, without any online connection and on GOG.
I only bought Split Fiction because it didn't come with the EA launcher. It seems to be a recent decision of theirs to not include it on some games on Steam, but they're not doing it retroactively. It Takes Two I played on Game Pass for a dollar, because I'm not willing to put up with EA's additional DRM.
It Takes Two actually removed the EA App in a patch a while back.
I think they allow studios they only publish for and don't own like Hazelight the freedom to remove the EA App DRM now, but EA won't pay for the dev time for their back catalogue.
I have it takes two, played the whole thing on steam without EA launcher. Was on my steam deck, so maybe linux dodged that somehow?
EA gives their studios the ability to decide their own revenue models.
This change likely came because they weren't as profitable as predicted so they had targets to make up for.
This is a great example for the moral justifications of piracy. The bytes for the maps are on your hard drive, why the fuck should you not be allowed to play on them? When someone playing a pirated copy has a better experience than someone on a bought licensed copy something's not right.
Uh...Jared Kushner owns EA now, so I don't know why this would be relevant to anyone.
Along with his Saudi oil tycoon buddies.
I don't know why EA would be relevant to anyone for the past 20+ years, but here we are.
because they have exclusive rights to making an NFL video game
The fun part is..I tried the newest one on game pass recently. Aside from roster updates it’s the same game I bought on disc 20 years ago
lol if it was the same game from 20 years ago itd actually be pretty good. that would be madden 05 era which some say is the peak of madden
Well, I was looking forward to a new Mass Effect, but playing something like that made by Kushner and the Saudis would probably make tears in reality. Like, I'm pretty sure the paradox will make serious issues.
Majority of people are NPCs
We're now expected to rent imaginary spaces for our characters to play the game we already purchased in?
Is advocating people be burned at the stake against the ToS here? Because I'm advocating the fuck out of that.
Yes. Remember when we burned people at the stake? Whatever happened to that? Just live stream a few billionaires and child rapists being slowly burned as an object lesson to the rest and I imagine things would change fairly quickly.
Yet people have zero self control and keep giving them money.
I really don't understand people like that, though. There are plenty of great games that don't have predatory monetisation. Yet millions and millions opt to get fleeced. This shit won't stop as long as people keep falling for it.
I would settle for Skate 2 without the soundtrack so they can release it again. No improvements. There is a glitch where you push a few buttons(throw board, turn right, jump, force pull board and grab board before landing) and go flying while the game physics shits the bed. It was great for getting to places that were otherwise inaccessible or not yet unlocked and for getting real high Hall of Meat scores. Imperfections like that are what make a great game perfect.
I would say this tracks for Saudi Arab-EA, but they did this kind of shit before the Saudis owned them.
Honestly from a business perspective, EA is one if the smartest publishers out there. They made a game and stripped away most of the functionality and then sold it for full price. They then slowly added the content back in content packs and people gladly paid. That was The Sims. And it’s had like three sequels, all monetized the exact same way. And people keep paying them.
EA invents a new way to assure I never purchase their products. Ever.
The fact anyone has bought any of their products in the last 15 years is why they can keep doing this stupid shit. Stupid things for stupid people.
The suckers who buy this trash and pay for it deserve it. There's so much good gaming to be had, at this point it's a choice.
I don't think that's really fair, especially considering this game was popular among kids & teens who don't have the lived experiences we have
I absolutely hate the whale hunting that developers go through these days.
It's more profitable for them to find a few whales spending $10,000 on their game every year than making a good product.
Paying for a game you don't own, only to have to rent the gameplay inside the thing you don't even own to begin with. Presumably all content also being locked on company servers meaning it will get EOL'd and inaccessible at some point in the future.
Immaculate.
I was moreso talking about the future of gaming monetisation.
I looked on EA's games released over the last 1.5 years and it is a bunch of sports game, the Sims, Battlefield 6, Plants & Zombies remake, Split Friction (EA is publisher), Dragon Age: the Veilguard and Tales of Kenzera: Zau (EA is publisher).
It is difficult to understand how EA can be valued at 55 billions of dollars with those releases over 1.5 years. And in the list for upcoming games it is only one game, Star Wars Zero Company, that is listed.
Soooo, the metaverse paid plots? I swear, every company with even an inkling of a 3d environment now just wants to “build” and sell worthless plots as if it’s real land, and literally nobody who uses these actually fucking asked.
Obviously ridiculous.
That said I dunno, it’s very easy for me to just play the game and never give them a dime.
All I want from the game is to dick around from time to time and it gives me that for free.
Every time I play I just find things to launch my ass off over and over. I just accept the free shit and play occasionally.
Obviously not going to defend EA for this decision but I dunno, it’s still maybe blown a little out of proportion. I guess it depends on how invested in the game you are as a player, and as someone who has Skate 1-3 still and had good fun with them when they came out, the current game gives me what I want in a way that I don’t have to pay for so I’m fine with it.
Usual reminder:
If you know a parent who is not an active gamer, remind them to never buy games for their kids that have microtransactions, passes, or any form of post-purchase payment. They often will have no idea what they are contributing to as it is not part of their 'bubble' to be aware of what these things do to their kids, their kids' friends, and the industry and society as wholes.
That's on part of EA, look at sims 4, you have to spend 1000€ to buy all DLCs.
Same logic as “Lottery is a tax on those who didn’t pay attention in math class.” And I agree.
I don't buy anything from EA, but I'm curious: Is it difficult to acquire their games via the high seas?
Their permanently online (until their inevitable shutdown) DRM slop games? I bet it is quite difficult.
EA lies more than Trump. News at 11.
Unrelated, but when did all Magazines start faking youtube thumbnails as the meta image..? I bet times are desperate, but I mean at what point do you understand that it's all the deceit and desperation that drives literally everyone away to the media they imitate?
I tried it and it’s shitty compared to skate3. SkaterXL is a better option and has better controls but a lot less content.
But SkaterXL has mods. Soooooo many mods.
I came here to say "the good news is this game sucks anyway." Coming from someone with literally hundreds of hours in the first three games.
Now I just play Session.
That's really disappointing. I have already completed all of the major challenges in this game and it was really great. I'm pretty disappointed to hear this is the direction they've went off to since I last checked in. I would say that if you miss playing the old skate games you can either get an Xbox series X and play them on backwards compatibility mode. Or you can give this a shot because at least it's pretty fun for quite a while without any spend.
works well in emulators too or skater xl https://www.xbox.com/... is the true spiritual successor
Does anyone remember how Skate 2 was the best one and they won't release it again? I suspect it is because of the music.
Music is the bane of all the 2000's games that dared to use any form of musical experimentation. Copyright strikes galore.
It really sucks that all it would take is George Lopez letting them use the theme song to his show.
What's Andrew Rousso doing in the image? Seems completely unrelated to the content of the article.
Fucking lol.. This is the Metaverse with extra steps.
Welp, uninstalled.
Using in game credits to rent content? Not exactly new, I remember that being the entire business model of EA's Battlefield Heroes (circa 2009). That was only 3 years after Bethesda was first selling horse armor.
If the DLC is permanently owned and pays to the artists who made the map, that's fine.
Even if it is "permanently", but tied to a server that could be shutdown, it's not permanently owned. Fuck that
If the DLC isn't permanently owned, but "rented", that profit only goes to the executives that probably fired the artists. Fuck that.
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@lemmy.world

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.
Video games, tabletop, or otherwise. Posts not related to games will be deleted.
This community is focused on games, of all kinds. Any news item or discussion should be related to gaming in some way.
No bigotry, hardline stance. Try not to get too heated when entering into a discussion or debate.
We are here to talk and discuss about one of our passions, not fight or be exposed to hate. Posts or responses that are hateful will be deleted to keep the atmosphere good. If repeatedly violated, not only will the comment be deleted but a ban will be handed out as well. We judge each case individually.
Try to keep it to 10% self-promotion / 90% other stuff in your post history.
This is to prevent people from posting for the sole purpose of promoting their own website or social media account.
This community is mostly for discussion and news. Remember to search for the thing you're submitting before posting to see if it's already been posted.
We want to keep the quality of posts high. Therefore, memes, funny videos, low-effort posts and reposts are not allowed. We prohibit giveaways because we cannot be sure that the person holding the giveaway will actually do what they promise.
Make sure to mark your stuff or it may be removed.
No one wants to be spoiled. Therefore, always mark spoilers. Similarly mark NSFW, in case anyone is browsing in a public space or at work.
Don't share it here, there are other places to find it. Discussion of piracy is fine.
We don't want us moderators or the admins of lemmy.world to get in trouble for linking to piracy. Therefore, any link to piracy will be removed. Discussion of it is of course allowed.
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My brain just shuts off when I read stuff like this.
Man, I dunno. Fuck AAA gaming, I'll go play something else.
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