I haven't updated or bought anything from itunes in a while. But the last time I did, my password and debit information was saved. And I know I'm not the only one out there.rees263 said:
Eight-Year-Old Girl Blows $1400 on Smurfberries
- Thread starter Andy Chalk
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Pretty much sums up my opinion, albeit without the obscenities (not that i feel offended reading it). It shouldn't be that easy for an 8-year old to fill a bill of $1400 in a game. Whenever money transfers over the internet is made, it should be complex enough to avoid simple "click = pay" mistakes.danpascooch said:
$99 dollars of real world dollars for an in-game item within a free game is simply price gouging. When it's placed in a children's game, it's simply evil incarnate. I hate micro-transactions as much as the next gamer, but this is ridiculous. There is no way someone should spend 99 dollars on virtual anything. Not even a Virtual Boy.
I completely agree with this. While "banning" may seem a little bit heavy handed, this disgusting method of transaction has to stop. We're not just talking about adults who purchase at their own discretion, we're talking about this getting into the hands of children and circumventing an all too easy system to rack up thousands of dollars worth of goods. The fact no credit card information was even needed to make these purchases was, frankly, vile and unacceptable.Therumancer said:
Going back to the 11 year old who spent £1000 on XBL, i'll tell you how this happens. Instead of paying for your add-ons or DLC or games or whatever in real money, they dress it up with that fucking points system that makes it all too easy to spend. Honestly, you may have to pay for said points with real money, but a child is not going to see a microsoft point symbol or virtual dollar symbol as real money. No fucking way. How can they? I'm all for children having a concept of money, but it's not money. Not even close.
I'm sick of these microtransactions and i'm sick of F2P games disguising themselves as being just that. Nothing is free in this world, we learn that the hard way, and we don't learn it as a preteen. I hope all those F2P businesses and games go right under and get taken to court.
If you want to sell DLC or game items, make people pay it with real money and make them punch in their credit card every single time. For god sakes, at least make them enter the three digit security code on the back.
And lastly, 99 dollars for a virtual item. Yeah, because children will have that much money at that age. I'm sure the parents would be delighted to pay that about for a non-tangible item, too. This is predatory, disgusting and pervasive behaviour that only perpetuates video games as being not only toys for children (the smurfs game in question), but toys that actively prey on children and rob their parents' bank accounts.
Utterly repugnant.
I think both parties are to blame:
The Mother: shouldnt have let her daughter mess around with an iPad, should have known what she was doing, etc.
The Game: obviously didn't have any failsafe for this sort of thing. this isn't like the frigging hambeast whose son ran up that huge ass Xbox bill, this obviously required NO imput from the parents.
I'm not sure if this has happened before, but I actually think the MOTHER is in the right here.... yeah, it's irresponsable to let an 8 year old fuck around with an iPad, yeah she should have paid closer attention, but frankly, "The Smurfs" does sound like a game where, "oh, it's just a kids' game" IS justified.
The Mother: shouldnt have let her daughter mess around with an iPad, should have known what she was doing, etc.
The Game: obviously didn't have any failsafe for this sort of thing. this isn't like the frigging hambeast whose son ran up that huge ass Xbox bill, this obviously required NO imput from the parents.
I'm not sure if this has happened before, but I actually think the MOTHER is in the right here.... yeah, it's irresponsable to let an 8 year old fuck around with an iPad, yeah she should have paid closer attention, but frankly, "The Smurfs" does sound like a game where, "oh, it's just a kids' game" IS justified.
And people wonder why I disagree with digital purchase. Too much shit can happen. And no don't tell me this and that 1000 pound kid are the only mistakes in this thing. Odds are a lot of people lost their bloody money because microsoft's default setting for XBL is to extend your Gold subscription automatically. And then there's family/friends/dickheads who jack your iPhone /iPad/ XBL account for a minute to buy apps/games/DLC. It's practically like having your credit card cloned on 3 devices. I do not approve.
When I was a kid the Smurfs were a relatively harmless cartoon, toy line, and associated merchandise, no different than any Saturday morning kids' show out there.
But then there was the UNICEF Smurf massacre film, the strange promo for the Smurf movie that looks like "CGI Garfield 3: Now He's Blue!", and now the Smurfs are selling fake berries to kids far too young to know better in exchange for their negligent parents' real money.
They've been on a downward spiral from "kiddie product" to "something you should check BEFORE your kid sees it" to "don't let your kids near this".
Next week will some small blue figures be standing in alleyways, attracting distracted toddlers with "PSSST! Hey kid, want some berries? They'll get you real smurfed up." ?
But then there was the UNICEF Smurf massacre film, the strange promo for the Smurf movie that looks like "CGI Garfield 3: Now He's Blue!", and now the Smurfs are selling fake berries to kids far too young to know better in exchange for their negligent parents' real money.
They've been on a downward spiral from "kiddie product" to "something you should check BEFORE your kid sees it" to "don't let your kids near this".
Next week will some small blue figures be standing in alleyways, attracting distracted toddlers with "PSSST! Hey kid, want some berries? They'll get you real smurfed up." ?
That knife company preyed upon my child because bought knife and left lying around then she stab herself whilst playing with it. Damn you knife company I will have my revenge.archvile93 said:
Just realized I said under 4 instead of above 4. My answer still remains the same though.Hungry Donner said:
I agree with what you say, I would even suggest making it $40 instead. And make sure to announce noticeably that some items must be bought with real money and what the price ranges are.
Question.
Does anyone know what those smurfberries actually *do* in the game? First time I hear about micro transaction item for a hundred bucks and in a smurf game no less.
Do you need them to get Smurfette to remove her panties or something daft?
Does anyone know what those smurfberries actually *do* in the game? First time I hear about micro transaction item for a hundred bucks and in a smurf game no less.
Do you need them to get Smurfette to remove her panties or something daft?
You know, I'm absolutly cool with it destroying all those free to play games. The free to play model has been a cancer on gaming to my way of thinking for a while. To begin with we had tons of those cheap korean games all over the place spamming the living crud out of people, which pretty much took the strategy of luring people in by saying "free" and then hitting them with the charges to progress beyond a certain point. That's more annoying than anything, and once your "onto" it, it's easy to avoid other than seeing them everywhere, though even then we had a few incidents of money being spent by parents who didn't understand the system, and playing some of those games despite the quality can actually be MORE expensive thana $15 a month subscription. Then you've got the entire "Zynga" facebook game thing which has been where most of the "accidental" uber-bills have been coming from before the most recent handfull of problems we've seen reported here. Then of course there was Second Life and the money some people were spending (and in response making) off of that one.D Moness said:
I think it hasn't gone unnoticed that in a lot of cases there are people being lured into spending a lot more than $15 a month in these games, sometimes knowingly, sometimes not, which is one of the reasons why you see so many Western games emberacing a model that used to be exclusively done by fly-by-night asian companies.
I've also noticed a major trend for games going the way of "hybrid" products where not only do you pay a subscription, but they also hold out a lot of content to sell it to people piecemeal. An example of this would be DC Univer Online's very limited costume creator compared to other hero games, apparentled so they can launch a costume shop to sell people more pieces.
Most of this is just annoying, and not something I'd scream "ban cash shops" for. I mean heck, I think Downloadable content has been out of control and responsible for a lot of the same annoyances as what games like DCUO and "Star Trek Online" have been up to, but I haven't been yelled for people to ban it.
What's changing my opinion now is simply that companies are designing their games to be deceptive (I think Zynga once admitted it designed it's menus to be deceptive so people would misclick and waste "free points" to encourage them through frustration to spend money), and as time goes on we're seeing more and more issues with people's kids spending small fortunes, or even adults themselves managing to spend money without realizing it, and truthfully in a lot of cases I am going "the guy was an idiot" but not always, and it's getting worse over time.
This is one of those cases where I don't think it's a matter of a few bad eggs ruining the whole bunch, I think the problem is that the entire system was conceived to scam money out of people. All of those korean games had some kind of sneaky angle to them to try and get people to spend money right from the beginning, or to get kids to do it without any real idea of what they were doing. The Smurf game seems very korean in the style of the bright, cutesy graphics, and an entire setup designed to lure in children (as befits the liscence). I think that it's going to taint pretty much any game it's part of, and be a stain on the online gaming community if it continues.
When it comes to games going free to play in order to survive, my basic attitude right now is they should just let them die, and if they can't compete in the MMO space, simply have the developers go back to making single player PC games. The entire "cash shop" thing is just going to get sleazier as time goes on and taint the whole thing, it's just that kind of system, either on it's own, or spliced with a subscription model as well. Attempts to regulate it are going to be just like the whole foreign pay line problem (which is why I mentioned it) the system can potentially be used legitimatly, but it's very nature is intended for abuse and exploitation, any changes involved are going to be circumvented, and as long as it's there, your going to have people go "WTF, how did I get this bill", until someone pretty much takes an axe to it.
I'll also be honest, for all my laughing at people for being idiots on a small scale at times, I'm really not that big of an elitist bastard in most respects. I do not think you should have to be smart to play video games, despite some of my elitist rants about missing the old days of gaming, I just wish not everything was not dumbed down for casual players. I don't think that because someone isn't too bright, that they deserve to be scammed, and that is going to hurt gaming. When your looking at a market increasingly catering to the lowest human denominator, you have to look out for scams directed at that level of person. X-Box Live aside, you'll notice most of the games doing the cash shop thing right now (though not all) follow a certain trend. We've got the over-simple facebook games custom made for those of very limited intelligence, we've got games based on comic books (Champions Online, DC Universe Online), and we've got cutesy games developed to be appealing to children like Smurfs online. I would normally consider things like "D&D Stormreach" to be an exception, but D&D has been being aimed at an increasingly younger audience for a while too, and that's the one that was leading the pack.
My opinion might change at some point, but the bottom line of this rant is that I'm actually hoping that now there is goverment attention they decide to really "overreact" to this and pretty much smite the whole cash shop and point transaction systems with a zeus-like bolt of lightning. Things like XBL will recover, but a lot of scam oriented games won't, and I think Zynga will stop being such a group of sleazes (in a general sense... I mean the entire company bugs me in their whole attitude above and beyond the cash shops, which are the key to the whole thing. They pretty much admit to designing their games to addict/screw people from what I've read over the years).
And of course this is all Apple and Capcom's fault. It's not the mother's fault for not knowing and paying attention to what her kid was playing. Of course not, that would make too much sense.
Sorry but no. This mother is just as stupid as the one who let her son spend $1,700 on Xbox Live. She should have checked the game out before letting her daughter play it. Maybe if she had, she would have noticed the $99 wagons of berries and said "you're not playing this game". Assuming that it's all free because it's the smurfs is just plain stupid.
I don't think she deserves her money back, either. They should keep it and call it the idiot tax. Don't want to lose $1,400 again? Pay attention to what you're giving your kids.
Sorry but no. This mother is just as stupid as the one who let her son spend $1,700 on Xbox Live. She should have checked the game out before letting her daughter play it. Maybe if she had, she would have noticed the $99 wagons of berries and said "you're not playing this game". Assuming that it's all free because it's the smurfs is just plain stupid.
I don't think she deserves her money back, either. They should keep it and call it the idiot tax. Don't want to lose $1,400 again? Pay attention to what you're giving your kids.
Charging $99 for something with no value should probably be illegal. It's not like a whole game, which has value in that was created by X number of people for X number of man-hours.
This is a line of code for $99.
In a children's game.
Parent's have enough to worry about without having companies trying to scam them and their children. The whole purpose of this game is to create accidents like this or, and this is nearly as bad, get kids to whine to their parent's demanding they buy them some non-existent furniture or berries or whatever. It's bullshit and everyone knows it.
This is a line of code for $99.
In a children's game.
Parent's have enough to worry about without having companies trying to scam them and their children. The whole purpose of this game is to create accidents like this or, and this is nearly as bad, get kids to whine to their parent's demanding they buy them some non-existent furniture or berries or whatever. It's bullshit and everyone knows it.
I would like to challenge these "Parent should have been paying attention to what the kid was doing" naysayers to try and actually raise a kid. Or heck, even take 5 minutes to think back to when YOU were a kid. Seriously, I get that we're still sore from all the "everything is video game's fault" fire from random parents, but we need to cut with the "It's 100% the parent's fault" knee-jerk reactions to stories like these. I'm not saying the mom is completely absolved of fault, but honestly: try raising a kid and never have something similar happen. Just try it.
What kind of mother who will give their 4 y/o children an Ipod? dumb or rich (or both) mother that is.
4 y/o is not meant to use expensive gadgets yet, give them Game boy advance or something.
4 y/o is not meant to use expensive gadgets yet, give them Game boy advance or something.
My mom did it twice without any problem.WhiteTigerShiro said:
Users, friends, people of the world--let's recount what we did when we're 8. Oh, I know--I am responsible enough to handle a gun, that's what I did at 8. I know of many people who helped with their family business by that time. I know of people responsible enough to take a bus half way across town by themselves when they're 8.
8 years is a good chunk of your life. Sure, you'd only be in 2nd grade, but by that point, you know what money is, and you know that you should look both ways before crossing the streets.
If these kids don't understand that they have to pay for things by the time they're past kindergarten, something is wrong with them and their upbringing as well.
I think the difference is that the hands-off approach of child-rearing in the west causes them to learn from their own mistakes, meaning they WILL make mistakes (and hopefully learn from it). On the other hands, the Asians are much more protective and teach their kids what NOT to do ahead of time. Sure, the kids grow up with less experience, but they end up making less mistakes too.
And these programs have to start charging on debit instead of credit.