{"id":1251,"date":"2011-07-13T00:51:29","date_gmt":"2011-07-12T15:51:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/?p=1251"},"modified":"2011-07-13T06:58:24","modified_gmt":"2011-07-12T21:58:24","slug":"freemium-how-to-know-when-youre-doing-it-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/?p=1251","title":{"rendered":"Freemium &#8211; how to know when you&#8217;re doing it evil"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I don&#8217;t hate freemium.  I love the concept of free game\/app downloads coupled with optional painless micro-transactions for extra features.  It&#8217;s the future, man.<\/p>\n<p>But take a look at CrowdStar&#8217;s Top Girl, a good example of the latest form this new model has been taking:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/topgirl_itunes.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/topgirl_itunes-300x230.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"topgirl_itunes\" width=\"300\" height=\"230\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1252\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/topgirl_itunes-300x230.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/topgirl_itunes-1024x787.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/topgirl_itunes.jpg 1275w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>People are spending hundreds of dollars on tiny new pretend shoes in this ridiculously shallow (my opinion, from admittedly limited testing) single player game.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/IMG_0293.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/IMG_0293-300x200.png\" alt=\"\" title=\"IMG_0293\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1254\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/IMG_0293-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/IMG_0293.png 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>$144 USD?!  CANCEL, CANCEL!<\/p>\n<p>Read <a href=\"http:\/\/www.untoldentertainment.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/08\/do-social-games-exploit-the-mentally-ill\/\">Do Social Games Exploit the Mentally Ill<\/a> for Ryan Henson Creighton&#8217;s take.  (hey, that&#8217;s the Ponycorn dad)<\/p>\n<p>Looking at these games I simultaneously feel disgust and a grudging respect, similar to playing a well designed Pachi-Slot machine.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=tJYb953RR-s&#038;feature=player_detailpage#t=405s\">Pachi-Slots<\/a> are the ultimate unholy merger;  a vegas slot machine crossed with casual mini-games that use the absolute best psychological conditioning tricks to keep the player feeding in paper bills.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe comparing this new breed of exploitive freemium &#8220;games&#8221; to gambling isn&#8217;t fair &#8211; I mean, a real casino is limited to targeting adults and actually pays out tangible goods. (sometimes)<\/p>\n<p>If your business success is dependent on locating people who are poor at discerning value, <em>you&#8217;re doing it evil<\/em>. <\/p>\n<p>Why does this game offend me when <a href=\"http:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/app\/finalfight-capcom-arcade\/id397347348?mt=8\">Capcom Arcade for iPhone<\/a> doesn&#8217;t?<\/p>\n<p>Is there any kind of objective way to measure the &#8220;exploitive asshole&#8221; factor of a game?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I don&#8217;t hate freemium. I love the concept of free game\/app downloads coupled with optional painless micro-transactions for extra features. It&#8217;s the future, man. But take a look at CrowdStar&#8217;s Top Girl, a good example of the latest form this new model has been taking: People are spending hundreds of dollars on tiny new pretend [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-development","category-tech-tips"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1251"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1283,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251\/revisions\/1283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedojo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}