Boycott Proposal to Improve Gaming

[AlTech]

Hi,

 

I've been thinking about this for a while and I'd like to propose a Boycott to improve the Gaming Industry.

 

For too long, Microtransactions and Lootboxes have plagued our Full Priced AAA video games. For too long, insulting and non-proper DLC and Pre-order bullshit has been a part of this industry.

 

Today I'd like to propose a Boycott to show Game Publishers and Developers that we will not stand for their bullshit anymore.

 

This boycott would include not buying or playing any Games published or developed by the following companies or their subsidiaries or parent companies:

• Electronic Arts
• Take Two Interactive (2K Games)
• Ubisoft
• Gearbox
• Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment
• Activision Blizzard
• Square Enix
• Nintendo
• Bandai Namco
• Crystal Dynamics
• Studio Wildcard
• Sony
• PUBG Corp/Bluehole Studios
• Techland
• Microsoft Studios
• Bungie
• DICE
• WarGaming
• Valve

 

This boycott would last until all or most of the companies on this list stop including lootboxes and microtransactions in full priced games, pre-order bonuses and insulting DLC.

 

I'm volunteering the name of The Great 2018 Video Game Developer and Publisher Boycott.

 

If you have any suggestions then please post a reply below.

 

The aim of this boycott would be to get game developers and publishers to understand that they can't treat consumers like they're stupid and that they can't get away with anti-consumer behavior.

 

Thanks .

[r3loAded]

Forgot about Wargaming to which I paid around £100 last month in loot boxes :)).

 

Idea - good

Implementation - mediocre

Forecast result - none, 0, nada, null

 

 

[cluelessgenius]

nice idea but for the masses to actually play along you need a prominent face. some big personality to rally the troops.  aleader if you will. otherwise not nearly enough people will participate and it will have no effect.

 

also while were calling to arms lets also burn down mining farms to set an example and keep people from destroying the hardware market

[GoldenLag]

If all LTT forum participants join this, it may be enogh to drag a smaller crowd with us. However it will only last a month or two and the boycott is over and the bad pr and loss of funds for the companies is negligable. I dont see the industry changing into making us pay less money instead of more. They have one thing on their mind and thats profit. 

[LAwLz]

Sounds like a great idea!

Hey, remember the COD boycott? The one that had over 800 members and was very successful.

 

People don't have the willpower to boycott a single game that will be replaced the next year. How do you think people will be able to boycott essentially all games.

[FeralWombat]

Haven't publishers and devs said they are using lootboxes and dlc's as a way to keep the price of the "main" games the same as it has been for the past couple of decades? In all fairness, they have a point.

[AlTech]

2 minutes ago, FeralWombat said:

Haven't publishers and devs said they are using lootboxes and dlc's as a way to keep the price of the "main" games the same as it has been for the past couple of decades? In all fairness, they have a point.

Umm no. They're making ludicrous amounts of money. Each AAA Game publisher is making tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars (or in other cases billions) of dollars. 

 

For them it's no longer about making a profit. They're well past that. For them it's about making as much money as physically possible and squeezing every last dime from each consumer.

[FeralWombat]

1 minute ago, AluminiumTech said:

Umm no. They're making ludicrous amounts of money. Each AAA Game publisher is making tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars (or in other cases billions) of dollars. 

 

For them it's no longer about making a profit. They're well past that. For them it's about making as much money as physically possible and squeezing every last dime from each consumer.

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2015/04/24/video-games-should-be-more-expensive/#3728e22e6eb9

[Xander Cousins]

Sorry to burst ya bubble, but I don't think this I gonna work

 

[AlTech]

5 minutes ago, FeralWombat said:

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2015/04/24/video-games-should-be-more-expensive/#3728e22e6eb9

That article is old and frankly is written by someone who doesn't understand the gaming industry.

 

The price has remained the same because there are falling costs. Game Engines cost less money, hardware costs less money etc.

 

The biggest expense in making a video game in 2018 is the marketing budget. That's how much the price of every other cost has gone down. Admittedly the cost of hiring devs and QA has gone up but games still cost a lot less to make than they used to.

[FeralWombat]

7 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

That article is old and frankly is written by someone who doesn't understand the gaming industry.

 

The price has remained the same because there are falling costs. Game Engines cost less money, hardware costs less money etc.

 

The biggest expense in making a video game in 2018 is the marketing budget. That's how much the price of every other cost has gone down. Admittedly the cost of hiring devs and QA has gone up but games still cost a lot less to make than they used to.

 

Hardware costs less money? Couldn't disagree more.

Effective marketing is more expensive than ever before; Staff costs are usually a companies biggest expense, especially if we're talking about customer support and specialized staff. I'm not even factoring in inflation.

 

To be clear, I don't agree with these practices, if FULL games need to be more expensive because of all these reasons, then up the price and let the consumer decide, imo.

[AlTech]

1 minute ago, FeralWombat said:

To be clear, I don't agree with these practices, if FULL games need to be more expensive because of all these reasons, then up the price and let the consumer decide, imo.

The costs haven't gone up substantially if at all. Video Game Publishers make the excuse that games are too expensive because they choose to spend too much money on games and aren't happy with how profitable they are. Games like Witcher 3 made tons of profit and yet CDPR didn't rely on Pre-order bs, Micro-transactions or lootboxes to make tons of money. They just made a good game which is apparently too much for most of the companies on that list.

[FeralWombat]

2 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

The costs haven't gone up substantially if at all. Video Game Publishers make the excuse that games are too expensive because they choose to spend too much money on games and aren't happy with how profitable they are. Games like Witcher 3 made tons of profit and yet CDPR didn't rely on Pre-order bs, Micro-transactions or lootboxes to make tons of money. They just made a good game which is apparently too much for most of the companies on that list.

There is a dark side to the CDPR story, some may argue it was  "proper" resource management, others have a different opinion; I can say I have my own, based on the fact I'm living not very far from the CDPR/GOG offices.

 

Also, as someone who budgets staff for a shared services center, cost per head has gone up not only in the country I'm living, but in the EU in general over the past 5 years. Can't speak for before that as I don't have actual data. I'm speaking with data from a remuneration benchmark report.

[-TesseracT-]

That's right, don't put Valve on this list. They do not deserve to be on this list. CS:GO cases are fine. They are good. They bring more to the game, without ruining it in any way. Same with PUBG. Why is PUBG on this list? The "loot boxes" are strictly cosmetic. Buy some if you want. If not, it's not going to affect the game in any way.

[-TesseracT-]

Also, there is no way most people would stop playing and buying games from these companies. Choose yourself: be a gamer and deal with "loot boxes" and microtransactions, or give up gaming. I mean, you even included Nintendo on this list. What the fuck. Then what am I going to play?

[AlTech]

4 minutes ago, -TesseracT- said:

Also, there is no way most people would stop playing and buying games from these companies. Choose yourself: be a gamer and deal with "loot boxes" and microtransactions, or give up gaming. I mean, you even included Nintendo on this list. What the fuck. Then what am I going to play?

Indie Games and games which don't make fun of consumers.

[AlTech]

6 minutes ago, -TesseracT- said:

That's right, don't put Valve on this list. They do not deserve to be on this list. CS:GO cases are fine. They are good. They bring more to the game, without ruining it in any way. Same with PUBG. Why is PUBG on this list? The "loot boxes" are strictly cosmetic. Buy some if you want. If not, it's not going to affect the game in any way.

the loot boxes in CSGO and PUBG are both literally gambling because you can sell the content which was in the lootboxes..

[asus killer]

1 minute ago, -TesseracT- said:

That's right, don't put Valve on this list. They do not deserve to be on this list. CS:GO cases are fine. They are good. They bring more to the game, without ruining it in any way. Same with PUBG. Why is PUBG on this list? The "loot boxes" are strictly cosmetic. Buy some if you want. If not, it's not going to affect the game in any way.

Valve takes 30% of every sale and runs a virtual monopoly. Also service is not amazing, most certainly not to the standards of what we pay (yes it's us that pay the 30%)

 

But i guess the OP is mixing developers and publishers. Dice will do as it's told most probably. They do not share the same amount of responsibility. That's like blaming the pizza guy at the pizza hut store for the price of the pizza

 

[-TesseracT-]

2 minutes ago, asus killer said:

Valve takes 30% of every sale and runs a virtual monopoly. Also service is not amazing, most certainly not to the standards of what we pay (yes it's us that pay the 30%)

 

But i guess the OP is mixing developers and publishers. Dice will do as it's told most probably. They do not share the same amount of responsibility. That's like blaming the pizza guy at the pizza hut store for the price of the pizza

 

I tried selling my skin worth 2.16 €. I would get 1.89 € from that sale. In this case, Valve takes 12.5 %. So their cut depends on the price of the item. Is this fair? I don't know, they built and maintains the service. When you buy something at a retail store, the store takes a cut as well.

[asus killer]

sorry for the double post, had to do other stuff.

 

Why boycott? those companies still make good games, just don't buy those games have shady stuff, and most certainly don't buy day one DLC, loot boxes, etc. Support the games that don't do it.

 

Why should Dice's Mirrors Edge be punished by Dice's Star Wars for example? does it make sense?

[-TesseracT-]

8 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

the loot boxes in CSGO and PUBG are both literally gambling because you can sell the content which was in the lootboxes..

But there is no offical way that Valve allows you converting the money in your steam wallet to "real money". 

[asus killer]

3 minutes ago, -TesseracT- said:

I tried selling my skin worth 2.16 €. I would get 1.89 € from that sale. In this case, Valve takes 12.5 %. So their cut depends on the price of the item. Is this fair? I don't know, they built and maintains the service. When you buy something at a retail store, the store takes a cut as well.

think how much profit Valve does and you have your answer. For every dollar that Valve takes is one less dollar for who actually has all the work. On a game 30% goes for Valve, 20% (varies) are taxes. So... yes it's too much at least i think so.

[-TesseracT-]

2 minutes ago, asus killer said:

sorry for the double post, had to do other stuff.

 

Why boycott? those companies still make good games, just don't buy those games have shady stuff, and most certainly don't buy day one DLC, loot boxes, etc. Support the games that don't do it.

 

Why should Dice's Mirrors Edge be punished by Dice's Star Wars for example? does it make sense?

I certainly think that, if for example, a publisher/developer releases two games during one year, one game with microtransactions, one without, one should just not buy the game with microtransactions. So, you are supporting the game without microtransactions instead. 

[AlTech]

3 minutes ago, -TesseracT- said:

But there is no offical way that Valve allows you converting the money in your steam wallet to "real money". 

It is still real money and can be treated as such.

[-TesseracT-]

2 minutes ago, asus killer said:

think how much profit Valve does and you have your answer. For every dollar that Valve takes is one less dollar for who actually has all the work. On a game 30% goes for Valve, 20% (varies) are taxes. So... yes it's too much at least i think so.

Wait, are you talking about Valve taking 30 % from game sales or 30 % from community item sales? If you mean the first, I agree with you.