this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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Gaming

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[–] ElBarto 48 points 10 months ago

Why won't these idiots pay a subscription for my shitty game!

[–] [email protected] 33 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Signs of a weak CEO - blame the customer.

Make subscriptions better. And customers will come.

But right now, Ubisoft+ has so little value. All their games ends up being $5-10 at some point, and often get released missing features from other ports, while finding ways to add micro transactions.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Make subscriptions better. And customers will come.

let me posit to you the thought that there is no price of subscription that can currently pay for the cost of development, as well as satisfy the customer as a good price.

Microsoft can get away with this because Microsoft Office and Azure are paying the cost of development for now. The music industry has been wrecked by this with the vast majority of artists (who aren't beyonce) that used to be able to make a living out of cd/digital sales can't even make enough to cover the cost of production. Movie/TV is currently in the process of finding out that ten bucks a month can't pay for all of tv and movies production.

There is no subscription price that consumers will pay, that will pay for the costs of making everything the industry does.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Exactly. 1 game is 70 dollars now. That's 7 months of 10/month, or 1.4ish games a year really is what you paid for. Except subscribers want more and more, meaning if only that many They would never use it. So without a massive amount of subscribers then the subscription is useless, and that's what they're faced with

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

Remember MMORPGs? The whole F2P garbage eventually killed subscription games. Not because they cost money, but because eventually you'd expected them to a) add micro transactions anyway and b) eventually go F2P too. It was a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy at some point.

And of course I'm not going to trust Ubisoft of all companies with shit like this. They're about as fucked in the head as EA is. Rotten companies that need to just die.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

So when they decide to save storage by stopping serving 20 years old game me and my one buddy play I have to pray it comes back one day? Fuck no. We are already loosing cinema history because of streaming.
There are games that are supposed to be consumed like fast-food (like online shooters that depend on large number of players) but these aren't even majority.

I propose a deal: they serve us games via subscriptions but the moment they pull a plug on a game they are bound by law to make it available on torrents

[–] xor 14 points 10 months ago (1 children)

yep. they shouldn't be allowed to abandon games that people paid for... if they require drm...
i really like ID software's system of open sourcing games once they've aged enough...
i think that should be the standard...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

the reality is that it can't be the standard. id Software is the exception because they happened to own 99% of the code.

Ubisoft can't release the source code to some random game because it uses a lot of other companies code for physics, sound, networking, AI, scripting, graphics, everything.

The most realistic answer to this is that if you don't offer public access to copy-written works for 10 years, then it should fall into public ownership. let people pay for it or let the public own it.

[–] xor -2 points 10 months ago

that's not the reality...

[–] [email protected] 21 points 10 months ago

I don't feel "comfortable" with Ubisoft games.

[–] Enkers 14 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Good god, I certainly hope not. I'll trust a semi-captured market (gog / steam) over a fully-captured one. It probably is good that they have to compete, though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I love the cheesy af need for speed games. I was 17 and just got my licence and the first fast and furious movie came out like 3weeks later... Then NFS Underground 1 and 2... The movies got insane but the games still held the magic.

I would absolutely pay a subscription for a constantly updated open world racer with dynamics that change the streets regularly, new hazards, etc, etc. But thats because thats my special "it makes me happy" genre.

[–] Poiar 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Couldn't this be achieved by them making new NFS games ever so often? Basically what Forza Horizon is doing?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

They do, but Id like to see a rolling career progression type deal. It shouldnt be easy to get the Lambo, if the cops catch you racing it 3 times they outright confiscate it...

Also EA keep changing the tone between titles, theres no memorable characters, it could be a universe.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

The only game subscription I am comfortable with are things like GamePass and PS+ Premium. At least for now it's been a pretty good value. If they start jacking up prices and cutting down on releases, that would certainly change things. PS+ already went up by $60/year.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (2 children)

so your comfortable with the main ones then. i'm sure you won't mind the slow price increases like you just talked about, until it's suddenly too much - but they stopped releasing games outside of subscription services so you just have to live with it.

you know, like every subscription model has worked so far.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Exactly, it’ll go just the same as Netflix did. They’re almost certainly selling at a loss to corner the market

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

but they stopped releasing games outside of subscription services so you just have to live with it.

Uh... What?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

you think that won't happen? even though it has happened with every other streaming service?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Other than original, exclusive programming, I can still buy most individual movies and shows without needing to subscribe to anything, so no. It hasn't even happened with streaming services.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Other than the movies and TV shows you can't buy, I can still buy these other movies. I'm sure this trend will stop here and won't continue.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Slippery slope arguments are unconvincing. Especially when they have no real precedent.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Yes no. Nothing else. Not anything. Of course. There are no other examples.