Nintendo has such a great, family friendly brand. If I was in charge, I wouldn't want my brand to be anywhere close to being associated to this type of thing.
iOS and Android app stores are where creativity, quality and talent goes to die. Whole thing could disappear tomorrow and nothing of value would be lost.
Shenzhen Solitaire is probably the only quality pay once game I could name on the current App Store. There was one other but the dev stopped paying for an App Store license.
And it wasn't a particularly impressive game. There's no shortage of endless runners on mobile, and Nintendo didn't do much to differentiate themselves, so it's no surprise nobody bought it.
As for the game itself: I've played it, and it's a pretty decent runner with the physics of New Super Mario Bros. Wii/U, but it's just not the same as the more full-fledged games. It's fun to pick up and play, but not groundbreaking or particularly special.
It seemed like an anti-piracy move because the game didn’t naturally need to be online. But I never thought iPhone app piracy was much of a concern.
Recently installed it on my son’s iPad. The game has totally transformed into this kind of crap.
The recent supreme court ruling that released the sports gambling hounds has me gobsmacked with absolute disbelief.
Would be really interesting to get some hard data
I worked with a guy who spent thousands on World of Tanks when it launched 12years ago (free to play, and they didn't have anything that was pay-to-win or that resembled gambling). His income was about $40k and he had a family to support. I have since run into others who have blown similar amounts or more on mobile gaming. These people are slowly, quietly ruining their lives.
From a legal standpoint, why is it a qualified use of government paternalism to outlaw gambling? We should not be asking the government to set laws based on morality.
Practically speaking, and apologies in advance for how obvious this argument is…when you ban gambling, it doesn’t disappear, it simply goes underground. Criminal actors benefit while the state is unable to enforce any protections or see any recompense. Moreover, it’s unclear what brightline exists between “gambling” and a ton of economic decisions. If I buy a plot of land because I think it might have oil, is that gambling? When I lock in an insurance policy, is that gambling?
I get it’s popular to immediately call for government enforcement whenever you experience personal moral outrage, but the real world contains far more nuance. Making gambling and some of its “sinful” corollaries like drug use illegal has never solved the problem, and has exacerbated it for the worst off.
What an odd opinion. What about laws against murder, fraud, or narcotics? Aren't those also based on morality?
As for the brightline between economic decisions: yeah, the definition is not perfect. Poker isn't gambling for some definitions because it is 'a game of skill'. While buying a plot of land with oil is certainly a skill AND it is expected to generate profits. But we can't protect as m well against hopeful stupidity.
Buying an insurance policy isn't gambling as it reduces risk. ...selling one is gambling if you didn't do the math though.
I don't care if randos gamble in a back alley, I just don't want my kids to open up Google Play and over 90% of the games are just gambling.
I don't want gambling forced on me as the vast majority of ethical games dry up because they're all going "whale hunting".
Gambling is about addiction, and addiction is a disease.
I know i know, where to draw the line will be superhard or impossible, but this has the touch of plain betrayal to me, that classic gambling hasn't (as long as it is fair).
Government == people, like your mom.
Is it perhaps because they spent a few hundred/thousand £ on the phone itself and see that as the complete price?
I bought Super Mario Odyssey on release day in 2017 and it's never asked me for more money. In fact I think it got a few free content updates. It's the tightly-made, quality video game experience that it was when it came out.
Speaking of Super Mario Odyssey, two of us have played it from beginning to end, so we definitely got a lot of fun game time out of the cost!
A lot of the major Nintendo games are on sale this week (probably because of March 10 = MAR10), but even the oldest first‐party titles are only down to about $40 at the lowest.
Imagine how many more hours of labor goes into a modern game compared to a 1986 game. The 1986 game has nine people in the credits. Three people with the role "programmer". Two things kept prices in line. Reduced hardware costs, as the older carts are much more expensive. Increased sales, where more people buy the same software.
What age did you introduce video games to your kids?
My oldest is 5 and I let him tinker on the PS5 when I’m around playing things like Sonic or he really likes Astro’s Playworld.
We limit it to maybe 15-20 min a day but I swear it’s like I tell people I let him watch R-rated movies or something when I mention that I let him play video games at his age.
Curious what people here view as age appropriate.
I actually think video games did me a decent amount of good with reading and math skills. Lot of RPGs, minecraft, etc. I would definitely set time limits and try to push towards more "brainy" games
Our current limits for our 5 and 7 year old kids are one hour, three days a week.
In some ways it feels like letting them read visual novels. The media itself is usually great, I just worry about them getting used to the easiest forms.
We constantly played console games and board games as a family. The kids got their own handhelds about 7-8. We supervised what games they could play until high school, and limited their game playing/TV until 16 based on their grades and good behavior. After that, they really didn't need limits as they were responsible enough.
I was far more concerned about them having a cell phone. We resisted as long as possible, and then started with dumb phones without a data plan.
That being said, his reading and math abilities are quite good and we attribute that to videogames, and a healthy dose of Mo Willems books.
I bought a game (Spelunky) on the Switch online shop. Nintendo then proceeded to send me constant emails about how my “coins are expiring.” So they award coins for purchases which you can save up to get “free” games, but then make them gradually expire if you don’t use them. What kind of high pressure sales tactic is this?
I was really turned off. I can see how this would be highly manipulative to kids though.
Why is Nintendo doing this crap? They’re a privately owned, family-run company. They don’t have outside shareholders to please. They could just choose to be less profitable and focus on protecting their family-friendly brand. This excessive greed is highly unseemly.
This is not fun! This is straightforward psychological manipulation! It’s taking people’s loss aversion [1] and grinding it as hard as possible for as much profit as they can. This is especially bad when you consider that they are a family-oriented company that primarily markets to children.
So for example if you acquired 10 gold coins during July 2020 (it doesn't matter when or how many purchases or how spread they are through the month), all ten of those coins would expire simultaneously at the end of July 2021, while any coins you acquired later would remain. It's not a radioactive decay at all; it's a simple expiration date on each individual coin, like you get on coupons or other incentive programs.
The coins expire for the same reason that coupons expire, airline loyalty program miles expire, etc -- they're a liability on the company's balance sheet which potentially could build up infinitely if there wasn't some limit to how long they needed to be tracked and redeemable.
Regarding e-shop: I'd never let my hypothetical children have access to any kind of e-shop where you can purchase without me having to confirm. Parental controls FTW.
The alternative is to uncheck “save payment method for future purchases”.
Most japanese residents can tell you near every store will have a points card system where you get 1% back in points. Or 0.5% for the stingy super markets.
What is lesser known is that by law such points, and even digital in-game currency, must expire else be considered money and regulated as such.
I see this game as a capitulation and it's akin to seeing Santa Claus dying.
I would support a law against this entire business model on digital app stores, not necessarily a total ban, but something. No company can resist the temptation unless they are forced to. Google and Apple are making tons and tons of cash off unfettered addiction. Good luck though - there's an entire industry making a lot of money off this and a lot of decent jobs that depend on addicts feeding the system.
Its super confusing and hard to explain, because it doesnt make sense!