Activision Patents Micro-Transaction Based Online Matchmaking

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

Glad we spent the last three years fighting over whether women should be allowed to work in the game industry instead of fighting back against the creep of game-breaking microtransactions.

No correlation.

This isn't something that sprung up over night. Companies have been seeing and testing the waters for years on what they can caught from the game and what people will pay for.

We've spent the last three years opening up the way for this by continually paying for these things as customers. All the social ills of gaming don't hold a candle to anything else as long as we continue to give money to barely finished games and games that are hinged on microtransactions.

 

[Wintermute_v1legacy]

I get the impression gamers feel like it's their duty to keep game companies in business, so they'll accept anything and will continue to buy all kinds of shit. Pretty soon you'll buy a game and the basic multiplayer will be, say... 2v2, if you want bigger matches you'll have to pay extra.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I thought I saw on Extra Credits that they can't patent game mechanics. Well they can try but it won't hold up. Although really they can keep that one. Also fuck Activision.

The fact they went on to try and get the patent just tells that it is wide spread and highly lucrative. Activision just takes precaution to be in advantageous position vs. any potential trolls which are lured in to wide spread lucrative concepts, that nobody thought about getting patent yet.

Well yeah because gamers collectively are morons. Nevertheless trying to enforce this patient will never hold up. Although this isn't a game mechanic per se so maybe it will hold up. In which case, as stated, Activision can keep it. Also as stated Activision can go fuck themselves. Well the entire AAA industry can go fuck itself, but Activision in particular.

 

[Zeraki]

Mark my words, The Escapist will have no opinion to present about this microtransaction patent, I doubt they'll even post an article about it. WTF.

When was the last time The Escapist published an article about anything?

 

[Ravinoff]

You need a PATENT for something like that? Why? I thought copying each other is all these devs do. They'll copy it anyway and just call it something else.

I'm satisfied with my 5+ year old multiplayer games. As if I would ever buy another Activision shooter.

The US patent system is broken as hell for anything relating to software or design. The whole thing needs to be torn down, invalidated and reexamined under intense scrutiny.

 

[megs1120]

Mark my words, The Escapist will have no opinion to present about this microtransaction patent, I doubt they'll even post an article about it. WTF.

When was the last time The Escapist published an article about anything?

Good point. Shameful.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

Sometimes, a slippery slope is NOT a fallacy.

Stop supporting shitty practices please.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Marketing has been using such strategies since pretty much forever. The American public has been lied to so many times it's not even funny, acting like video game companies are doing anywhere near equal to other industries is just asinine. Guess what, sugar causes heart disease not fat, you've been lied to in life threatening ways but a game trying to trick into spending a few more bucks is evil? What's the big deal? Doesn't anyone have any willpower these days? Skinner box shit didn't work on me when I was a kid and I didn't even know what it was then.

Also, Activision sucks anyway. The last game I even played from them was COD4 of which the single player was solid, but the multiplayer was flawed as fuck, which is why I never played another COD.

 

[Erttheking]

Just when you think they can't get any worse...

Glad we spent the last three years fighting over whether women should be allowed to work in the game industry instead of fighting back against the creep of game-breaking microtransactions.

So do I just have a unique and magical power that enables me to care about more than one thing at once? Because people talk about what I do like it's something out of myth and fable.

 

[Jamcie Kerbizz]

Just when you think they can't get any worse...

Glad we spent the last three years fighting over whether women should be allowed to work in the game industry instead of fighting back against the creep of game-breaking microtransactions.

So do I just have a unique and magical power that enables me to care about more than one thing at once? Because people talk about what I do like it's something out of myth and fable.

Meg is correct in her assessment.
As much as I would like to give more credit to people. In practise, they don't organise/unite around one issue, like here, opposing and banning illicit practices that are targeted at them.
When at the same time they jump to their throats over their characteristics and preferances pertaining to the one common thing, which defines them as a group (which is relevant to the thing they get targeted over). In this case purchasing and playing video games. To simplify, people don't unite when they infight over petty differences up until actual looming threat becomes obnoxiously vivid.

It also doesn't help much when one issue is being held under wraps or ignored by social media, while the other gets plenty of tools fanning the flames whenever infighting stops... just to mention the latest featured article by The Escapist. Which is said to be in death throes and have no writers yet somehow managed to excrete '"Gamers" Are Still Dead, Y'all' as featured content. ._. Yeah game journalism at its finest. True shield and sword of gamers and consumers vs. predatory corporate practices.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Plus, with Shadow of War and now Battlefront 2 working these things into the actual gameplay progression we're starting to have a real problem on our hands. Envy at another player's stuff is not the issue, as you said, that's always been around. It's how Activision wants to actively make the entire matchmaking and gameplay experience into one giant micro-transaction circle jerk to drive players towards buying cosmetics/boosts/etc. In my opinion the industry has officially gone too far. When games are basing their entire progression around loot boxes and it's possible to gain advantage over someone else simply by spending more money it really shows what publishers think of their customers. Fortunately, those who debate whether games are art finally have an answer. According to EA, WB, and Activision, no, they most certainly are not. They are products meant to milk as much money out of the purchaser as possible.

Thank you for putting it into some form of context. I wasn't really understanding what process was happening that made it newsworthy. Manipulating the playerbase is shady as hell and something I have no intention to be a part of. I'm not impressed by microtransactions of any sort in a SP game and while they're understandable multiplayer/online titles (at least F2P ones), there's the right way of making money and the wrong way. This kind of thing I would suggest falls categorically into the wrong way.

 

[megs1120]

It also doesn't help much when one issue is being held under wraps or ignored by social media, while the other gets plenty of tools fanning the flames whenever infighting stops... just to mention the latest featured article by The Escapist. Which is said to be in death throes and have no writers yet somehow managed to excrete '"Gamers" Are Still Dead, Y'all' as featured content. ._. Yeah game journalism at its finest. True shield and sword of gamers and consumers vs. predatory corporate practices.

Right on. If gamers hadn't wasted years fighting amongst ourselves, riled up by outsiders over a nonsensical social issue, we could have rallied against publishers and dissuaded them from going down this microtransaction path. The end result of the last several years is that promising game devs have been scared out of the industry and what's left is packed with pay-to-win bullshit. Whether you're pro-gamergate or anti-gamergate, we all lost.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

So... considering that a high percentage of their playerbase are kids, this has to surely be pushing the boundaries of ethics a fair bit...? Nobody can look at this and think anything positive except the most scummy of capitalist parasites. It would be ever so great if the law could catch up with these practices, what needs to go wrong before its' taken seriously?

Right on. If gamers hadn't wasted years fighting amongst ourselves, riled up by outsiders over a nonsensical social issue, we could have rallied against publishers and dissuaded them from going down this microtransaction path. The end result of the last several years is that promising game devs have been scared out of the industry and what's left is packed with pay-to-win bullshit. Whether you're pro-gamergate or anti-gamergate, we all lost.

Ah but you see, we can't be risking any criticisms of the advertising paymasters, cannot jeopardise le income!! Everything else is fair game. (Accidental weak pun, sorry!)

 

[deadish]

Right on. If gamers hadn't wasted years fighting amongst ourselves, riled up by outsiders over a nonsensical social issue, we could have rallied against publishers and dissuaded them from going down this microtransaction path. The end result of the last several years is that promising game devs have been scared out of the industry and what's left is packed with pay-to-win bullshit. Whether you're pro-gamergate or anti-gamergate, we all lost.

Maybe. History has shown though that gamers are all bark and no bite. Complain on the Internet but buy the game anyway - look at how well Shadow of War sold; various talking heads in the gaming circles are even rationalizing it.

We have lost.

Edit: I suppose the best we can hope for are companies running some "non-gambling" games on the side even if it's not as profitable as it could be.