I think you’re somewhat demonstrating their point, given that I’ve fairly consistently liked D3 and D4 and don’t have any experience with Immortal. I’ve seen lots of critique about 4 that doesn’t necessarily ring true (I can’t imagine playing well at all on mobile, especially given my choice of skill rotation) and that makes sense mostly when it’s grouped with Immortal in a way I find somewhat arbitrary. Immortal itself isn’t especially predatory within the context of mobile games, though being one is a factor in why I haven’t tried it.
I think it’s easy to dunk and point out things like “you can’t earn enough currency to get the next battle pass for free” without honestly examining what the battle pass in D4 is and realising that it offers extremely little. The free armour is cool and interesting enough that I get the dopamine reward when looking at my toon on the loading screen without paying for it. Indeed I think paying for a set to some extent cheapens that experience vs. getting that reward multiple times via picking up gear and not using transmog at all.
Might be some other parts of its monetisation I’m not considering in my assessment but I don’t think it’s predatory. So when I constantly hear all about how predatory it is, often it instead serves to drive me toward the brand loyalist lapdog tribe. I wouldn’t say it’s shameful at all, but it’s tiring to engage with as though there’s a more nuanced perspective behind it than just general naysaying, when often that just doesn’t seem to be the case.
This is gonna be super offtopic: Diablo 4 was fine, I didn’t bring it up and only specified Immortal for a reason. If only the latest iteration of an IP counts, then I should have said OW2, but I mentioned Immortal because it was so terrible. It IS especially predatory even for a handphone game, worse than the final fantasy ones, Maple, PoGo etc. An actual fun app with it’s progression covered in so much monetization that f2p players can literally never catchup to payers, with gambling systems that can cost up to several thousands. Don’t take us ‘naysayers’ at our word, go ahead and invest your time into it if you’d like. People complain about OW2 mtx but it doesn’t even come close to how bad Immortal gets.
Still, I get your point as to why it’s better to have some nuance on this kinda thing and not hop on corpo hate trains.
Thanks for the reply, I appreciate the nuance where it’s offered. I think the difference in my summary perspective of these issues is in considering its intended targets. I’m aware f2p players in Immortal don’t have a hope of catching up - I do think that’s a predatory part of the summary monetisation of the game - but I think it’s mitigated by being targeted at whales. Because paying in that game doesn’t only gatekeep player power; power scales linearly with the amount you pay. So even people tricked into paying for some power aren’t really able to realise that advantage. IMO this changes the paradigm a bit, because the material effect of the monetisation to the informed consumer (regardless of their level of participation) is to part rich people from some of their riches - something I don’t really find compelling as a summary argument against it. The main other group predated on would be those that choose to be uninformed, which is something that I can’t really think of a good a reason to take some kind of moral stance on
I think you’re somewhat demonstrating their point, given that I’ve fairly consistently liked D3 and D4 and don’t have any experience with Immortal. I’ve seen lots of critique about 4 that doesn’t necessarily ring true (I can’t imagine playing well at all on mobile, especially given my choice of skill rotation) and that makes sense mostly when it’s grouped with Immortal in a way I find somewhat arbitrary. Immortal itself isn’t especially predatory within the context of mobile games, though being one is a factor in why I haven’t tried it.
I think it’s easy to dunk and point out things like “you can’t earn enough currency to get the next battle pass for free” without honestly examining what the battle pass in D4 is and realising that it offers extremely little. The free armour is cool and interesting enough that I get the dopamine reward when looking at my toon on the loading screen without paying for it. Indeed I think paying for a set to some extent cheapens that experience vs. getting that reward multiple times via picking up gear and not using transmog at all.
Might be some other parts of its monetisation I’m not considering in my assessment but I don’t think it’s predatory. So when I constantly hear all about how predatory it is, often it instead serves to drive me toward the brand loyalist lapdog tribe. I wouldn’t say it’s shameful at all, but it’s tiring to engage with as though there’s a more nuanced perspective behind it than just general naysaying, when often that just doesn’t seem to be the case.
This is gonna be super offtopic: Diablo 4 was fine, I didn’t bring it up and only specified Immortal for a reason. If only the latest iteration of an IP counts, then I should have said OW2, but I mentioned Immortal because it was so terrible. It IS especially predatory even for a handphone game, worse than the final fantasy ones, Maple, PoGo etc. An actual fun app with it’s progression covered in so much monetization that f2p players can literally never catchup to payers, with gambling systems that can cost up to several thousands. Don’t take us ‘naysayers’ at our word, go ahead and invest your time into it if you’d like. People complain about OW2 mtx but it doesn’t even come close to how bad Immortal gets.
Still, I get your point as to why it’s better to have some nuance on this kinda thing and not hop on corpo hate trains.
Thanks for the reply, I appreciate the nuance where it’s offered. I think the difference in my summary perspective of these issues is in considering its intended targets. I’m aware f2p players in Immortal don’t have a hope of catching up - I do think that’s a predatory part of the summary monetisation of the game - but I think it’s mitigated by being targeted at whales. Because paying in that game doesn’t only gatekeep player power; power scales linearly with the amount you pay. So even people tricked into paying for some power aren’t really able to realise that advantage. IMO this changes the paradigm a bit, because the material effect of the monetisation to the informed consumer (regardless of their level of participation) is to part rich people from some of their riches - something I don’t really find compelling as a summary argument against it. The main other group predated on would be those that choose to be uninformed, which is something that I can’t really think of a good a reason to take some kind of moral stance on
Damning with faint praise
Might as well say Alcatraz isn’t particularly difficult to escape from within the context of island prisons.
What about Gitmo or Nauru? I kid. I didn’t mean to praise it, my bad. I avoided it personally.