Over the years, there’ve been various red flags in gaming, for me at least. Multi-media. Full-Motion Video. Day-One DLC. Microtransactions. The latest one is Live Service Game. I find the idea repulsive because it immediately tells me this is an online-required affair, even if it doesn’t warrant it. There’s no reason for some games to require an internet connection when the vast majority of activities they provide can be done in a single-player fashion. So I suspect Live Service Game to be less of a commitment to truly providing updated worthwhile content and more about DRM. Instead of imposing Denuvo or some other loathed 3rd party layer on your software, why not just require internet regardless of whether it brings value to customer?
What do you think about Live Service Games? Do you prefer them to traditional games that ship finished, with potential expansions and DLC to follow later?
I find the word “service” off-putting. I want to buy things outright and own them. I do not want recurring fees.
its perfect really, they all should put it front and center! cause it tells me right of the bat i i never should touch said product, its a money saver really.
Live service comes across as life service. A game made to monopolize my time and become a significant part of my life by using addictive systems. By the very nature of enjoying the variety of games, it will immediately turn me off a game.
Butnot a problem in free to play games, not in full price gamesI don’t have a problem with the core concept since it can technically be done well (Fortnite, despite it not appealing to me personally) but since everyone wants the “live service” staying power and money without putting in the “live service” effort it’s become a red flag to me to prepare for an unfinished, buggy, likely money-grubbing “game” with a shaky future - case in point, Halo Infinite’s campaign pretty much going nowhere and being Act 1 of what will be pretty much nothing now since all the campaign staff went bye-bye.
Theoretically it’s not a turnoff: for example, I was fine with paying the subscription for World of Warcraft back in 2007. But in practice I know what it means today, and that means being psychologically manipulated and crit in the wallet, so hell freakin no.
I actually am in favour of government legislation against them since they generally appeal to the young, who are essentially psychologically defenceless against most of the trickery. I don’t quite think they’re “spiritual opium” as the PRC would say, but the line was crossed long ago
I don’t have the long term attention span demanded of live service games, since once I’m done with a game I move on.
I just stopped buying main stream games for the most part. Indie games is where it is at. Often better gameplay loop and comes at a better price and I would rather see my money going to creative people instead of some greedy CEO.
Live service is a no from me.
Well said, I definitely lean towards indie with the occasional Fromsoft/Larian/Bethesda purchase
In anno 1800 (which is the only game I’ve played with denuvo) it still needs to have a connection to the ubisoft servers to run, so live service isn’t just about dodging 3rd party drm
Live service games/ games a service are an automatic no from me. Too many have little to no content, constant delays on content, a dying community, or ridden with predatory monetization. Not to mention I dont like to pay for games that i cant play when the servers go down.
I simply don’t buy live service games. I hate them
I’m fine with it, if it’s fun enough. I’m no gaming activist/snob.
I’m grateful for activists, particularly those with a focus on archiving gaming. That’s another area where I think supporting Live Service Games might be shortsighted on the part of the consumer. By accepting it as a practice, ownership is ceded toward the publisher or creator. We’re less owners and more renters when it comes to gaming property.
I remember when I bought Street Fighter 2 for the SNES and realized, I no longer have to go to the arcade to play this game. I no longer have to submit an endless amount of quarters to play what I can play endlessly at home for a one-time fee. It was an amazing feeling. And with LSG it’s like we’re coming back around.
No and I think it’s kind of silly that people find the mention of the term so upsetting. Content aside, I like multiplayer games. I’ve been playing them for years. The idea of a multiplayer game that gets content updates is nothing new. CoD (just one example) has been doing it since 2008 and I’m supposed to be upset with that now that the big chunks of content they release are free and it has a different term describing it?
Like I said, just one example, but that’s generally how it goes. And you’re free to buy whatever cosmetics you want. Maybe it’s because I’ve never been one for microtransactions and I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything because skins I’ll probably never use are up for sale. Which is the flip side to more complete content packs being sold.
Also, the idea that games are unfinished simply because they’re offering more content is weird to me.
Multiplayer games are great. I think the upsetting part is that from the word Go, whether it warrants being a Live Service Game or not, it implies an expiration date and an online-only requirement. When I bought Overwatch, I never heard them describe it as a LSG. Maybe they did and it just didn’t register. What I know though is that having bought 2 copies, one for PC and the other for PS4, I cannot play those games now and in their place is a reportedly substandard product (one I didn’t pay for or ask for).
So now I have this game which I loved and still played occasionally is gone because the publisher made a decision to expire it arbitrarily (read: to get people to pay them more money).
Overwatch could’ve run on player driven servers. Much of this stuff can. That might only serve a few thousand or few hundred people 10 years after launch, but that’s the right thing to do.
