I talk about Event Culture on Christmas day. Yay.

Something different this way comes.

It's Christmas I guess. Rather than spend the day being judged by my extended family (and family friends!) I''ve taken the time to treat myself to doing something that I still inexplicably enjoy; writing these blogs. As such, it should come as little surprise to hear that the topic on my mind today is 'Event Culture' and specifically how that pertains to the video gaming world, be it offline or on. (It's mostly online.) Perhaps this isn't most festive of topics or moods to get oneself in this time of year, but it's the only way that I can alleviate the massive headache that I always get this time of year so that's where I am. (I've always held that cynicism has healing properties.)

First you might ask; what exactly is it that you mean by 'Event Culture' and how does it relate to the world of gaming? Well, in the words of that one eye-gouge-worthy advert that I keep getting off YouTube "Event Culture is dedicated to those willing to invest in experiences rather than material possessions." (And no, actually, I don't remember what that Ad was for making it's entire purpose a failure.) So, in relation to video games; it is those moments in a video game's life cycle whereupon additional elements are added into the game in a temporary fashion for the end of creating valuable memories for the player rather than adding value to the permanent package itself. I suppose, at a stretch, you could relate it to a 'Fight Club'-esque 'Anti-materialism message, but then you'll have to find a spot for the 'nihilism' angle to fit in so I'd personally avoid that particular analogy.

For someone such as myself, who is forever aware of their own mortality and yet finds themselves a struggling slave to it, this is a concept that inherently makes no sense. (At least not in the video game world. Real world: Sure, whatever, I don't care.) Whenever I am dedicated to playing through a title and experiencing everything that game has to offer, the absolute last thing that I want is to be rushed towards certain activities for fear of missing out. This is the tactic that is pushed in many modern online titles such as, ESO, BDO and WOW just to name a few. The commonly accepted theories behind these attempts are two-fold; on one hand they attempt to draw in new folk by assuring people that the game is healthily active and that they'll miss out if they wait for a bit and on the other hand they want to draw existing customers back to the title for re-currency purposes as well as alternative monetisation.

Now that isn't to say that there is anything inherently wrong with the act of celebrating events and holidays in style; afterall there is nothing inherently wrong with either of those two goals. I'll never complain about being given an excuse to go back and play through a title that I love and if a title is deserving enough, I have no issues with spending a bit on microtransactions to celebrate the event, but my irrational fear of the finite plays on my nerves just enough to put me off. What is especially as baffling, are those events in which huge chunks of content are added to the game with a deadline before being taken out. It makes no sense to me; you put in all this effort to put this stuff together only to snatch it away within a manner of weeks, what's the point?

'The point', of course, is to provide value to the holidays. When Runescape would conduct it's yearly Winter questline (I presume they still do that but I don't know) it would serve as a great rallying call to the game whilst putting everyone in the right mood for Christmas. For habitual gamers, these events can be our chance to experience the fun of the holidays without having to actually force ourselves outside in order to physically see people. (Thank god.) My own neuroses about this kind of content is really unwarranted when you consider the value folk get out of events and the aura of 'exculisveness' that is generated from unique rewards of such events. Overwatch would often limit some or their best outfits to the holidays and that often made such events the best time to play those games.

There are times, however, where event culture is sought to the determent of the game. Lets take 'Anthem', for example. There's a game that certainly had a rough launch-year due to the way that it was put together in a year by a team that had no idea what they were making or where they would go with it. The title suffered from many criticisms from those that endured it, most parroted of all being; there's not enough content. Bioware were very lethargic when it came to supplying content too, with players having to wait until close to 6 months later to see a substantial addition to the game in the form of: The Cataclysm. What people weren't aware of initially, however, was that 'The Cataclysm' was conceived as an 'event'; meaning that the name play area and game mode that it offered was snatched away a month or so later. As a result, in the effort of building up and giving the community an event for their trouble, Bioware just ended up wasting their development time on an event that annoyed everyone by ending too soon. (Or at all.)

Perhaps it won't surprise you a great deal to read, but I'm not particularly the most 'event driven person'. I find that 'Events' rarely ever live up to the hype around them and the annual build-up to such moments can easily become nauseating. But then, I understand the place of events in society and do not 'wish them away', so to speak. Out of the monotony of the everyday it can be exciting to escape it all, even for a day, by escaping into a fantasy of 'love and understanding' and 'good will to all men'. I suppose being a 'habitual gamer' has desensitized me to the rush of 'escapsim'.

This blog was probably even more incoherent than my usual drivel. So I'm sorry for that, but I just needed something to catch my attention while I nurse this literal headache that I get every Christmas, so I just threw this together. I hope to tackle at least one big meaty subject before the end of the year, but it depends how I'm feeling over the next few days, might not have the right head space to get into it. Fingers crossed, I guess.

A new competitor enters the Microtransaction fight!

If there's any justice in the world.

Another day another treatise on the awfulness of modern day video game microtransactions, however, this time it's coming from an official report with legislative power behind it. (A whole report? Golly.) Once again, UK Parliament (That's my home team.) have expressed interest in managing the avarice of games companies through restrictions and regulations. I have exposited my opinion on this before, and if you read my last blog on the matter you will know that I have given up all hope of this situation being solved amicably. Government supervision is the last thing anyone needs in a creative field, but honestly, how are they going to taint the medium any worse than the greedy big corpo's already have?

If you go online to Parliament.UK, you can find an extensive report, apparently the work of 9 months,  dedicated to "immersive and addictive technologies". This report defines 'immersive techonogies' as experiences that occupy the realm of digital or augmented reality; essentially meaning VR games and games like Pokemon GO and Ninantic's other cash grabs. They believe that the 'immersion' factor of these games makes them more likely to have an influence on behaviour. Interesting stuff, but I wanna focus on that second one, because that is where Parliament really starts to go for the game's industries' jugular.

'Addictive' technologies is rather self explanatory, referring to products or devices that people either have, or perceive to have, a dependency on. This goes into 'gaming disorder' and 'engagment metrics', all subjects for other blogs, but in Section 3 we get to the juicy stuff: "Financial harms of Immersive technologies." Whenever microtransactions are bought into the world of gaming, the usual arguments start up about; value, pricing and pay-to-win. (or P2W) Lately, as we've moved into the world of rampant monetisation, video games companies have attempted to pooh-pooh any potential backlash with carefully considered statements. "It's just cosmetics" is the, much parroted, phrase that adorns the press release of many an online storefront, whilst "They're time savers" or "It's about player choice." has begun to seep it's vile way into single player games too. Oftentimes gamers are torn between these artificial battle lines that developers have set up, waging between "It's not pay to win if it's just about looks!" and "It's not 'player choice' if the choice is between a fun game and a boring one". (Just look at the recent backlash regarding Fallout 76 and it's fridge to get an example of that.)

Parliament's report will hopefully put an end to much of that debate, as they delve into the murky world of customer manipulation in it's pure form. I will follow their example and establish for everyone that there are real life consequences to systems like these. A while ago I wrote a blog about a family who's children had emptied their parent's bank accounts on FIFA Ultimate team, all wasted on lootboxes for the promise of securing Lionel Messi (Which, due to FUT's lootbox setup, they never did.) Parliament offer a similar tale that pertains to a game that was an absolute blast-to-the-past for me, Runescape. The Report reads "We were contacted by a member of the public whose adult son built up considerable debts, reported to be in excess of £50,000, through spending on microtransactions in British company Jagex’s online game RuneScape."

From this, we can see that people have fallen for the trap of microtransactions before in incredibly serious ways. This is the reason why people gawk when companies like Respawn stand up for their ludicrous price points by saying; "the majority of people never buy them anyway!" That isn't the point. The point is that there as those that do and these people can be abused whilst playing the game. If you're comfortable with creating a product that has the potential/intent to harm or abuse your consumers, then maybe you shouldn't be working in creative fields. "But what can be done?" is the question that must be asked. "Surely if there were ways to cut down on abuse then games companies would have done so!" And they would have, if it wouldn't end up cutting into their bottom line.

The makers of Candy Crush Saga, King, spoke out against accusations that they were complicit in the fleecing and exploitation of it's customers. "we would send an e-mail out when a player’s spend was $250 in a week for the first time. It was an e-mail that said, “We notice you are enjoying the game a lot at the moment. Are you sure you are happy with this?” […] We got back, “I wouldn’t spend the money if I didn’t have it” and things like, “I’m fine, please leave me alone”. We felt it was too intrusive so we stopped doing that." That is all they have done for customer protection, by the by. So that's nice. King sent people emails for a bit until some people complained and then they resolved themselves of all protective responsibilities. (What heroes)

As it just so happens, there is a tool that would be very effective of limiting the exposure of this kind of content to those vulnerable to it. (I.e. Kids and those susceptible to problem spending.) You see, a while back, the Games Industry developed this thing called a 'ratings board', that would provide content guidelines for developers, shops and consumers. (All as a bid to prevent Government oversight.) With the stipulations that this board dictates (I'm specifically referring to PEGI, here) Video games that feature gambling must be labelled as such and be assigned an '18' badge. This would mean that children would not be exposed to the thrill of gamb- I mean loot bo- I mean 'Surprise mechanics' at a young age. (If you feel I was being condescending in that paragraph. Well spotted.)

However, the 'age rating' system was proven pointless after NBA 2K20 unveiled their gambling themed trailer and still got away with a '3' rating. ("Sports games have always been rated 3, why should this one be any different") The part that really gets me is, even if we buy the age old "It isn't technically gambling because you can't cash out!", excuse, the trailer still clearly shows that the game features gambling-esque imagery, which is grounds for a 'Teen' rating under Pegi's own stipulation. Heck, YouTuber YongYea pointed out that Pokemon Red and Blue was labelled 'Teen' for that very reason, and that game didn't even have any microtransactions! (Just an ingeniously clever marketing ploy to get you to buy the game twice.)

I would encourage interested readers to take a look at the article through this link Here and see just what it is that Parliament has to say about the greedy aspects of the gaming industry. (Again, the juicy parts are in section 3.) I'm not yet sure if anything will actually come of it (Especially with the politically tumultuous time that the UK is suffering through right now.) But it's always fun to see someone shine a flashlight under the friendly facade of AAA gaming and watch the cockroaches scurry. As you have likely noticed, this is topic I could talk about until the sky falls down (Falling Skies; great show! Kinda tapered off in the later series...) but I find that situations like this are best left for the observer to look through and come to their own conclusions. Besides, after reading through all of the industries' clandestine action and motivations, I need a bath.