Section 6(1)(14) of the Austrian Consumer Protection Act states that any contractual provision requiring a consumer to waive their right to assert claims is invalid.
Yeah that was abslutely disgusting. Business conflicts happen, and sometimes you must make unpopular choices, but blatantly misleading people and publicly throwing somebody under the bus is not acceptable
Unironically the music in the new Doom games that Mick Gordon made was like at least half of my interest in playing them. It just pairs so well and makes the experience 100x more fun than it already is.
So no Mick Gordon + they way they treated the situation already has me soured as well. They’d have to have something extremely good cooking to win me back
I’m guessing the top management didn’t learn that crunch is perceived negatively and doesn’t always yield quality results. I’m so glad I never backed this game all those years ago.
I genuinely can’t fathom why this number should be bigger. What am I supposed to take away from this knowledge? Far as I’m concerned, Valve is still a rare comparative good guy in the dense-packed field of bad guys in industry
Because we have been led to believe that the “titans” of industry are these super above average smart people. In reality it’s a bunch of nepo babies with no unique skills (other than, perhaps, a good education) which only copy each other.
After covid, all big IT companies started hiring like mad men… Then they all started firing people like crazy. They are driven more by speculation on their stock price and FOMO than any actual business strategy
Finally, let me address some of the polarized comments around Ubisoft lately. I want to reaffirm that we are an entertainment-first company, creating games for the broadest possible audience, and our goal is not to push any specific agenda. We remain committed to creating games for fans and players that everyone can enjoy.”
Creating games for the broadest possible audience is what has made Ubisoft games so lackluster in recent years, and I think players are tired of games not targeting a specific niche. It feels these games are full time jobs in themselves with how much needs to be done to complete/100% it, and I think that formula is now stale.
I’ll be interested to see what results of this investigation. Hopefully better art, but I am cynical
I think I remember Just Cause 2 had it so the top achievement in the game was only for 70% completion because they knew they had such a ridiculously huge map.
Breath of the Wild aims the same way - they like having you come across a bunch of Korok seeds while traveling, but not scouring the land with a magnifying glass looking for them.
This is the part they’re actually getting at. Not that the fundamental game design is for everyone (which, yes, is what they try and fail at), but rather they’re responding to people who think they’re failing because they put a woman as the protagonist in some game or another.
As of now, Star Citizen has raised $769,261,551. Three quarters of a billion dollars.
And now they say they need to fire the QA department to “laser focus” to meet the deadlines of the release. That’s when you need QA the most. Otherwise that release is going to be a fucking mess.
I call bullshit. This is a money saving decision, which means they’ve blown through their $760 million dollar bank account. Insane.
Here’s one: Trading cards are something you own. Skins are limited to a game you’re licensing.
Here’s another: trading cards are portable; they can be put in a collection for display, put in a safety deposit box, etc. When CS goes, all the skins go with it.
Another minor one: baseball cards are informational, the skins are cosmetic only.
Mind you, I think both are forms of unregulated gambling and trading cards as well as loot boxes should have better societal scrutiny, but they aren’t identical.
No one buys baseball cards for the informational side of it. They buy them as a collectors item. The same as these skins. The only difference is that one is digital and one is physical.
Sports cards have been around for ages and no one gave a shit. People care about the loot boxes in games because it’s easy for a kid to get their parents credit card and rack up a ton of charges.
I would say yes, they are unregulated gambling. People also spend ludicrous amounts of money on cards. Though I don’t think that should factor into whether or not something is or isn’t unregulated gambling. It’s the chance product, not the money spent on it.
So those cards have been around forever, and no one complained about them.
People care about these loot boxes because it’s easy for a young kid to get their parents credit card and rack up a ton of charges because they see a cool skin and don’t realize that ultra rare or 1/1000 chance to drop means that they won’t get t without spending a ton of money.
By definition gambling can be defined as playing games of chance for money. Well they aren’t going to win money, their reward is a collectable item.
Or to take risky action in hope of desired result. I don’t really see how this fits that definition either. There’s no risky action.
I would prefer if there were no loot boxes because I’d rather know what I’m getting, but people are focusing on the wrong thing here.
Trading cards and gambling addiction have been studied for years. TCGs may not function the same as a slot machine, but it does trigger the same thing in your brain.
You're right. TCGs with blind draw boosters are also bad. I didn't complain about Pokemon cards back in 2000 because I was a child and didn't comprehend that that was what I was doing. I definitely stopped partaking in Magic: The Gathering as an adult though when I realized it was a neverending gambling treadmill. Today I frequent fighting game locals that are kept afloat by Yu Gi Oh gambling addicts who fill the trash cans with booster wrappers as they go back to the counter over and over again to buy more packs.
So those cards have been around forever, and no one complained about them.
There have definitely been complaints about gambling in relation to collectible cards. I don’t think anything has come of them in legal terms, but many complaints have been voiced.
Many would say so. Wizards of the Coast, the makers of Magic the Gathering, have worked very hard at balancing the two sides of the coin. On one side, they design cards such that power levels determine the demand (and thus price) for rarer cards on the resale market, and on the other they argue that the cards have no intrinsic value so that buying packs can’t count as gambling since there’s technically no expected profit for the buyers.
Should we also have a ban on all sports memorabilia then? It’s a gamble for me to go to my local team and have the players sign things and then at some point in the future it could be worth a ton of money?
Would this conversation be any different if they sold the cards for what they think the expected value is? Then you’d have people complaining about how they’re charging hundreds for a card and that’s not fair because little Timmy can’t afford it.
Edit: those tumblers that people drink out of have “rarer” colors and designs, better ban those two because of gambling.
Because society has deemed gambling a problem requiring regulation. These things exist outside that regulation while being psychology the same.
Also, gambling addiction has the highest rate of suicide of all addictions. And I think we should be trying to lower the amount of people that kill themselves.
I’ve never given two shits about what society has decided about my psychology. It’s nobody’s place to decide for me. If someone wants to kill themselves, let them. Help them even.
I’m not sure if they can anymore. Civ 7 broke me on how it shoe-horned in systems to make money that ultimately broke what was a tried and tested formula.
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