WEBVTT - EA Alters the Deal 0:00:03.600 --> 0:00:06.600 A comment on Reddit from game publisher e A broke 0:00:06.720 --> 0:00:09.280 all the records for most down votes with more than 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:13.880 half a million responses. But how did gamers really fee 0:00:14.600 --> 0:00:21.319 I'm Jonathan Strickland and this is tex Stuff Daily. There's 0:00:21.320 --> 0:00:23.279 a lot going on with this story, so I'll take 0:00:23.280 --> 0:00:26.600 it piece by piece. Reddit, an online community where people 0:00:26.640 --> 0:00:29.960 share stories, tell jokes, ask questions, and linked to things 0:00:29.960 --> 0:00:33.000 they find interesting, has a simple system that allows users 0:00:33.080 --> 0:00:35.880 to up vote or down vote comments. It's a way 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:39.400 for the community to express approval or disapproval. A recent 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:42.360 post by games publisher e A smashed the record for 0:00:42.479 --> 0:00:45.159 most down votes. At the time of this recording, there 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.920 are more than six hundred seventy seven thousand down votes. 0:00:49.640 --> 0:00:53.120 Previously the record was about twenty four thousand. Now a 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:55.640 lot of those may come from bots and not real people, 0:00:55.800 --> 0:01:00.800 but still an astounding number. Gamers were angry about, well, 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:05.880 a lot of stuff. Gamers are always angry, but in particular, 0:01:05.959 --> 0:01:08.120 they were angry in the way e A had structured 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:11.000 rewards in the new game Battlefront two, which is set 0:01:11.040 --> 0:01:14.280 in the Star Wars universe. A critical point was that 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:18.000 when you first launched the game, you cannot just jump 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:21.039 into any of the iconic characters from the series. You 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:24.000 have to earn that ability, either by grinding away in 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:27.280 the game for forty hours or more just to play 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:30.560 as your favorite character, or by coughing up some cash 0:01:30.600 --> 0:01:33.720 to purchase the privilege of playing those characters. And this 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:35.520 is on top of paying the full price for the 0:01:35.560 --> 0:01:39.319 game itself. Many players felt that this is unfair. It's 0:01:39.319 --> 0:01:42.160 as if e A had published a game, charged sixty 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:44.280 dollars for it, and then locked away the most fun 0:01:44.400 --> 0:01:47.160 aspects of that game until you pay them more money 0:01:47.160 --> 0:01:49.160 to access it. And if you take a look at 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:51.960 the economics behind the modern approach to video game publishing, 0:01:51.960 --> 0:01:55.440 you realize that's pretty much what's going on. There are 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:58.800 different terms for it in the industry. The company Woulbisoft 0:01:58.880 --> 0:02:03.240 calls it player recurring investment or p r I. Publisher 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:07.640 Take Two calls it recurrent consumer spending or r c S. 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:10.280 But whatever you call it, it's all about creating an 0:02:10.360 --> 0:02:13.480 environment in which players will continue to spend money playing 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:17.960 your game after the initial purchase. That might include micro transactions, 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:21.680 supplemental downloadable content that adds more gameplay elements such as 0:02:21.760 --> 0:02:26.120 additional story or levels, cosmetic changes, to an existing game, 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:29.000 or various types of player awards that may or may 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:33.600 not affect gameplay, and it's a big business. Let's take Ubisoft, 0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:37.160 for example. During the company's midyear shareholder call, the company 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:41.679 revealed that player recurring investment contributed fifty one of all 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:45.960 digital revenue in the first half of That means the 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:49.920 company made more from these ongoing purchases than from selling 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:53.560 digital copies of the games themselves. With that sort of 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:56.320 financial performance, you can expect to see a lot more 0:02:56.360 --> 0:02:59.519 games include some form of incentive to encourage players to 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:03.640 continue pouring money into a title after it launches. Depending 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:06.960 upon the implementation, players may not care so much with 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:10.760 downloadable content or DLC. You might get new chapters of 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:13.760 a game's story or new levels to play. If you 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:16.239 really enjoyed playing a game, you may feel that another 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:19.160 purchase is perfectly fine to get more of what you like. 0:03:20.160 --> 0:03:23.280 Many players are also fine with the concept of cosmetic purchases, 0:03:23.600 --> 0:03:28.080 either buying specific assets outright or through what are called lootboxes, 0:03:28.120 --> 0:03:32.400 which represent a random assortment of digital items. Many players 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:34.960 aren't so crazy about games that allow you to purchase 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:39.280 items that actually affect gameplay. The dismissive term among gamers 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:42.520 for such practice is pay to win, meaning a player 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:45.400 doesn't need to develop any skill or expertise with a game, 0:03:45.560 --> 0:03:48.240 but instead pay extra to get access to high powered 0:03:48.280 --> 0:03:50.480 items that give him or her an advantage within the 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:54.840 game itself. Typically, these games allow you to earn rewards 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:58.800 through actual gameplay, but at a very deliberate pace. There's 0:03:58.840 --> 0:04:01.640 a delicate science to this. A game developer wants to 0:04:01.680 --> 0:04:04.760 make a game that's compelling enough to convince people to play, 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:08.440 but reserve just enough interesting content to convince a percentage 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:10.960 of that game's audience to shell out some bucks to 0:04:11.000 --> 0:04:14.480 get that content early. However, if you reserve too much, 0:04:14.600 --> 0:04:17.440 players may feel like the base game isn't worth playing, 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:20.360 or that you're extorting them for cash, or that you're 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:22.760 sending the message that the game is only fun if 0:04:22.800 --> 0:04:25.200 you're willing to keep paying for it, and if the 0:04:25.240 --> 0:04:27.240 stuff you reserve has a big effect on how the 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:30.320 game plays, players will resent either having to pay extra 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:34.160 to avoid being left behind by less skilled players with 0:04:34.240 --> 0:04:38.159 more disposable income, or dealing with a game where they're 0:04:38.200 --> 0:04:41.560 constantly at a distinct disadvantage because they refuse to engage 0:04:41.560 --> 0:04:45.920 in this economy. Meanwhile, as this drama unfolds between game 0:04:45.960 --> 0:04:50.240 companies and their customers, other concerns are popping up. In Belgium, 0:04:50.440 --> 0:04:54.160 a gaming commission is investigating whether lootboxes are a form 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:57.159 of gambling. If the commission decides that loot boxes count 0:04:57.200 --> 0:05:00.280 as gambling, then companies that incorporate that mechanic in their 0:05:00.320 --> 0:05:02.600 games would first have to pay a fine for any 0:05:02.600 --> 0:05:05.760 existing games being sold in Belgium that have that mechanic, 0:05:05.880 --> 0:05:09.159 and then secure a permit for any future implementations. The 0:05:09.160 --> 0:05:12.039 crux of the matter is this, in these games, players 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:14.840 can earn or purchase a chance to get some supplemental 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:18.000 materials for a video game. Typically it might be a 0:05:18.040 --> 0:05:20.960 new costume or prop that has little to no effect 0:05:20.960 --> 0:05:23.960 on gameplay, but some games will also include new items 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:27.560 or weapons that have in game advantages. Game developers will 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:30.640 frequently compare this feature to trading card games like Magic. 0:05:30.680 --> 0:05:33.920 The Gathering Magic players are used to buying booster packs 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:37.040 of cards to supplement their decks. You aren't guaranteed to 0:05:37.080 --> 0:05:40.840 find anything particularly useful or rare in any given booster pack. 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:43.440 You might look out, or you might draw a bunch 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:47.120 of Dud's lootboxes, argue video game developers are pretty much 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:50.200 the same thing, and if you don't designate trading card 0:05:50.279 --> 0:05:52.880 games as gambling, why would a video game version be 0:05:52.920 --> 0:05:56.320 any different. Whether the Belgian Gaming Commission feels the same 0:05:56.360 --> 0:05:59.280 way remains to be seen, but one thing really isn't 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:03.200 a gamble unless gamers stopped buying supplemental content entirely, we 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:05.880 can expect these practices to be the norm moving forward. 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.680 To learn more about video games and all other things technological, 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:13.000 subscribe to the tech Stuff podcast we published twice a week, 0:06:13.000 --> 0:06:15.520 and do a deep dive on all things tech. I'll 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:16.520 see you again soon.