• hornedfiend@sopuli.xyz
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      6 months ago

      This is literally p2w

      “There are no pay-to-win mechanics - Any gameplay impacting content that is purchasable is also unlockable through challenges to ensure fair play amongst our community.”

      They should fire their marketing people.

      • derpgon@programming.dev
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        6 months ago

        In the long run, yes. Once everything is unlocked, it is fair game. Until this happens tho, then of course it is P2W.

        Maybe unranked does not have to be balanced, but ranked totally should be - all mechanics unlocked.

      • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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        6 months ago

        I don’t get the “launcher hate”. Yes, they’re not the most convenient, but I’m not playing in the launcher for hours.

        Currently I play moddedDragon Age Inquisition. The launch sequence is:

        Frosty Fix -> Frosty Manager -> Epic Games -> EA App -> Dragon Age.

        Takes a few seconds and I’m in the game.

        • RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          I dont hate them because theyre inconvenient. I hate them because there are so many of them. I don’t want more bloatware.

          Include the necessary binaries to access your servers in the game’s master executable, its not hard.

          • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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            6 months ago

            I have several hundred games and a handful of launchers. I start one of them. Sometimes two when necessary. What’s the hassle?

            • WallEx@feddit.de
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              6 months ago

              Because of bloatware, which they wrote. Its not that hard. Might not be a problem for you, but that doesn’t say anything about others.

            • ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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              6 months ago

              “Oh, cool. I don’t want my 6 different launchers to all start every time I turn on my computer, so I’ll only start the launcher that has the game I want to play, so long as I remember what launcher it is.”

              “Oh, awesome. I started the launcher. Now it’s showing 278GB worth of updates to download since I haven’t opened this one for a few months. Guess I’ll start playing tomorrow.”

              • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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                6 months ago

                Exactly, I’ll start the game shortcut which launches the needed game store and then the game, done. None of the apps is in auto-start.

                Updates are off course done via winget.

                Please stop making up problems where there aren’t any. I already do acknowledge that launchers and game stores aren’t an ideal solution. But they work fine.

        • rtxn@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          I don’t get the “launcher apologists”. Yes, the companies insist on using their own, but I’m not willing to expend system resources on multiple badly made memory-hog software doing fuck-knows-what running simultaneously that I don’t even interact with.

        • Slab_Bulkhead@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          imagine a car company adding like another door or lock/2nd key you’d have to open/unlock every time. thats what those represent. we know the 95% of games don’t need it. now for ones like paradox interactive games that have mod playlists support and is mostly utilitarian (they do have a little banner ad space for dlc etc), hell yeah thats fine, but when their just gross multi layer ads, odd trophy points shops/weird 2nd store front that smack of walled garden ecosystem shit those can fuck right off.

          i mean im also someone who 99% of the time mod out intro/and dev splash screens to save seconds.

            • LinyosT@sopuli.xyz
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              6 months ago

              And those extra launchers take up unnecessary resources and extra steps between you and the game.

              If I buy a game on one launcher, I should only have to deal with that launcher.

              • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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                6 months ago

                I agree, launchers are one superfluous piece of software that require additional resources.

                Steam takes half a gig of RAM. From my 32 gigs available.

                Also around 1 or 1.5 gigs on my drive. Many games take 50 to 100 gigs.

                It’s a minor inconvenience. If one can’t afford one gig for a launcher how would a game be installed anyway?

                • LinyosT@sopuli.xyz
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                  6 months ago

                  It’s not just one launcher in a lot of cases. Many cases have you also run another launcher such as Ubisoft and EA games that require their launchers to run along side Steam. It all adds up and it doesn’t need to be that way nor does it need defending.

                  I don’t really understand why you’re defending something thats worse for you than the alternative.

        • Cornelius_Wangenheim@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          Except everyone wants to have their own launcher and they all want to register background services that chew up resources constantly and do god knows what.

          • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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            6 months ago

            I currently have 8 stores installed and 1 (in words: one of them) runs a background task: Windows/XBox services. Come again.

            • A_Very_Big_Fan@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              You can take them off of the “launch on startup” list to make them not do that, but he said they “want” to, which is true.

              • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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                6 months ago

                Yes, just like Discord and many other apps that are useful but annoying: You take them off autostart once.

                I don’t get why people would rather be angry all the time instead of just performing these five clicks once.

                • LinyosT@sopuli.xyz
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                  6 months ago

                  It doesn’t stop being an issue just because you can brush it under the rug and ignore it.

                  The point is that the user shouldn’t have to work around these extra launchers. How about companies just stop pushing their own bloatware. If you buy a game through Steam, it should just require Steam. Same for GOG and all the others.

        • FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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          6 months ago

          For the majority of users, launchers are not only unnecessary but also an unnecessary privacy and security risk, imo. They’re running administrative privileges while in the background the entire time, when they only really need to be run for updates. That said, it’s not a dealbreaker for me, either, I just don’t like these companies in general.

          • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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            6 months ago

            The only time any launcher ever had administrator-like rights is while updating. Don’t know why you would run them as admin.

            • FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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              6 months ago

              That’s literally what the launchers do, they try check for updates every time you start the game. It’s going to prompt for admin rights every time a windows user runs it, without fail. How many of them run with no errors without the rights given, I’m not sure.

              • Perfide@reddthat.com
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                6 months ago

                It’s going to prompt for admin rights every time a windows user runs it

                I can personally confirm: No, it does not.

                • FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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                  6 months ago

                  Bro.

                  It’s not gonna prompt after it finds out there are updates to install.

                  Are you dudes installing things to AppData, lmao?

        • lad@programming.dev
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          6 months ago

          Also, once they discontinue the launcher there’s a fat chance the game will not start at all, like it happened with some games tied to M$ Games for Windows live

          • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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            6 months ago

            I paid 5€ for all three Mass Effects and another 5 for DA:Inquisition.

            How long am I considered to “own” that before I can let go for good because I got my money’s worth?

            I won’t ever play them a second time, so I gain nothing from games hogging my game library.

              • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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                6 months ago

                Again, I got to play four AAA games for the price of a movie ticket. How many lifetimes do I have to “own” these games?

                I think I got my money’s worth out of the deal. Four big games for a tenner and people are still like "but you don’t really own them ". Yes, I know. It’s more like a very long rental.

        • thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca
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          6 months ago

          Well… That’s like alot of steps, lol. In UX design, we would call that a violation of the Three Click rule, and obfuscating the expression of user intent.

          Like… Do you gain anything from these launchers? I guess Frosty you opt into because you use it to manage your mods. Maybe launching through that is how your mods get bootstrapped. Kay cool.

          Epic games, you definitely need and want to use for other reasons-- Shopping for games and managing your library-- but is it really benefitting you to open that app so that you can open the app you actually want to use? Maybe you have a reason that you actually like that better, idk, but I’d rather just open the app that I want.

          And then the EA app… What does it offer that makes it worth putting another step between you and your game? Login to the EA account you don’t need? DRM? Ads for other games? The premise of most launchers is that the company has some goals that you don’t share, and they’re willing to add friction to your experience to achieve those.

          Some launchers aren’t so bad. I dunno what EA’s deal is. Speaking of Ubisoft Connect specifically:

          • It’s an online-only service that forces you into having an account to play… It’s not just an extra launcher in front of your game
          • Ubisoft Connect is part of their DRM mechanism
          • It wants admin privileges on your system
          • It leaves processes running in the background when you aren’t using it
          • And more

          Those things aren’t necessarily all bad per se, and you’d certainly tolerate them for some apps… But it’s a big imposition for the company to insist on, IMO, and part of the reason for the launcher hate.

          I didn’t downvote btw, I think you’re entitled to your opinion and maybe you’re fine with the launchers you use… But personally, I just choose not to play Ubisoft games for that reason, even though there are games that I would like to have played.

          • coffinwood@discuss.tchncs.de
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            6 months ago

            When playing modded games some rules of good practice don’t apply because of jank. It’s in the nature of things that aren’t designed to be modified. Specifically for my DA:I installation I count about 5 clicks and the game is launched. Compared to the hundreds of clicks in the game itself it’s a tiny inconvenience.

            But to be clear once more: I never claimed launchers and game or app stores are an ideal solution, especially concerning their abundance and varying quality.

            I want to play a certain game that requires a launcher, then I’ll either get that launcher or I won’t play the game.

        • ThunderWhiskers@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          Sorry you upset the hive mind buddy. You’re absolutely right, but there are tons of people out there that can’t even handle literal seconds of inconvenience. It’s just not that big of a deal.

    • ScoreDivision@programming.dev
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      6 months ago

      Fantastic if its your kind of game. Very well made and clear the devs know the type of product they’re putting out. Has its niggling initial release issues like every game but all have been acknowledged and are supposedly worked on. Also has a very vocal director who is communicating a lot with fans about what the direction is.

      • Smallwater@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        It’s why Ubisoft baffles and aggravates me.

        They clearly have wonderful game devs and designers working for them. A lot of their games have some really neat mechanics that are fun to play with.

        But then they fuck it all up by monetizing it all to shit, or padding the game with so much useless bullshit it becomes a chore to play, or fucking up the pacing of the story with the sheer amount of useless side quests.

        I’ll freely admit - I enjoy playing their open world collect-a-thon games. But I have to play it in parts, because it just gets too grating. And of course I only buy their games when they’re already a few years old, so I can take advantage of sales. No way I’m paying €120 for a game, even with all the spinning rims and fancy baubles.

        • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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          6 months ago

          I think the only way I’d be willing to play their modern open world games is through piracy, assuming piracy let’s you have the paid xp boosts to make it a reasonable rate. I played Odyssey for a bit, but if feels so slow to level if you aren’t willing to hand over more cash to make leveling faster. They actively make their games worse to sell the cure, which wouldn’t be too horrible if they weren’t also so expensive.

      • Guntrigger@sopuli.xyz
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        6 months ago

        I think fantastic is overstating it a bit. It feels like a middle of the road CoD. Kind of a boots on the ground version of one of the hero shooter Black Ops entries with a little roughness to it.

        Not bad but not great either. For the price though, it’s great value.

        • ScoreDivision@programming.dev
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          6 months ago

          It hasn’t gained the traction it has by being just OK. Its a great game, just might not be a great game for you.

          As much as cod gets shit on, the reason its so unanimous is because its arguably been the absolute best game of its kind for over a decade, the fact that xdefiant is remotely threatening that. I would say is proof alone that it is a fantastic game.

          • Guntrigger@sopuli.xyz
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            6 months ago

            It gained traction by being free.

            I see there are good numbers on release but I would take them with a pinch of salt. Apparently it had between 500,000 and 700,000 concurrent players on release which is already down to 300,000. Estimates of over 7mil unique players.

            Now look at The Finals which has 8mil unique players. It had 250,000 concurrent players on release and is now down to around 15,000 6 months later.

            Reviews wise The Finals did better on both critic and public ratings. Arguably (in my opinion) the Finals has a less interesting replayability loop but is more polished and higher quality gameplay wise.

            The fact is these numbers are sadly pretty common drop offs for f2p shooters, as a lot of people want to check them out but not stick with them. Will be interesting to see how the player number fare when the next CoD comes out on Game Pass.

            • ScoreDivision@programming.dev
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              6 months ago

              I guess that’s where me and you differ then because I’d say the finals is a fantastic game also. The number of people who play a game long term doesn’t factor into my opinion on that.

  • Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    6 months ago

    lol the class you unlock with 700000 exp, which takes a long time to get as f2p player, is OP and can be unlocled with real money

  • DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    6 months ago

    They will release OP squads that will either require grinding or pay. DedSec is kind of trash tier because it is a test

    Edit: apparently there is already exclusive weapons in paid battlepass

  • Arrkk@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Somehow people always forget that Ubisoft published Trackmania (2020). (Limited) F2p, one time purchase for Standard access, yearly sub for club access, which is isn’t even worth it if your not a dedicated player.

    • セリャスト@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      6 months ago

      They changed the sub model
      It’s now an unique 20e/year price with everything included. 0 in app purchase. Ubisoft may have published it but I think Nadeo also put some pressure to have those restrictions. They have always been very consumer friendly

  • Katana314@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Can anyone here name many P2W games? The closest I can think of is hero-based games like R6Siege, where it’s relatively cheap to get the new, generally-balanced characters, but most monetization is in skins.

    • lorty@lemmy.ml
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      6 months ago

      Literally any mobile game. Outside of that, you have your eastern gring MMOs like Black desert or Lost Ark, Fifa with it’s ultimate team, and the general pay for skipping the western market has fallen into like you have on the newer Assassin’s Creed games.