[ SECRET POST #4331 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4331 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



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02.
[Sabrina the Teenage Witch reboot]


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03.
[The Great British Bake Off, series 9]


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04.
[K/DA - POP/STARS - League of Legends]


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05.
[Pointless (Australia)]


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06.
[Penny Dreadful]


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07.
[Diablo Mobile/Blizzard]










Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 29 secrets from Secret Submission Post #620.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

While some of the reactions displayed your usual gamer toxicity, I don't think that a multi billion dollars company known for its predatory business practices should be sympathized with and made into poor little victims.

Backslash against dumb PR moves and the perceived bastardization of beloved series shouldn't be put into the same basket as your average 'guys throwing a hissy fit because oh no how dare this game have female characters', imo. Game companies aren't a protected class. Customers are allowed to have expectations for the products they are buying. Criticize the way they are showing it, sure, but the base issue isn't invalid by default.

[(Anonymous)]

I agree with this, in general.

Did people overreact? Yep. Are those people idiots? Yep.

Does that mean all their points are invalid and Activision Blizzard is the good guy? Nope. Especially not seeing their history of trying to monetize everything - with attempts like Diablo III's real money auction house going down in flames - and especially not considering who they've chosen to partner with to create this. And choosing the more and more monetized/predatory mobile space to do it in.

I don't think raging like a manbaby is how to deal with this, but neither is embracing the idea with naive optimism that it's just about "making money" and how that couldn't be a bad thing.

[(Anonymous)]

Everyone involved is a bad guy, and calling it a "minor overreaction" is a bit of an understatement when it's really the same kind of toxic entitlement that is chronically displayed over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

[(Anonymous)]

?

I didn't call it that. Neither did I imply it.

It seems you have a major axe to grind however, so I don't think any neutral conversation is possible here.

[(Anonymous)]

You called it an overreaction, not a minor overreaction, fair enough.

We should call out companies on anti-consumer behavior (the same way we should call them out for anti-labor behavior, and look how gamers got behind that one). But I just don't think it's more important to focus on what it is, at the end of the day, a rather run-of-the-mill example of the way that companies fuck consumers over.

[(Anonymous)]

You can dislike both. Both sides can have good points and bad ones.

I just commented here because the secret implied that the company doing this to make more money should be considered acceptable and nothing to be annoyed or upset by, which isn't true for lots of people who are wary about the predatory monetization schemes of giant corporations.

And at the end of the day, by your own words, this is a rather run-of-the-mill example of the way that gamers overreact.

Both are pretty standard fare. Both suck.

[(Anonymous)]

I think that's reasonable

I also still think (and I know it wasn't you that said this) that this absolutely does need to be put into the same basket as general gamer overreaction/entitlement/toxicity, because the reaction is an example of that

[(Anonymous)]

Many of the people concerned with consumer issues bailed back with forced Battle.net. Most of this outrage is coming from stans who would have been all in for supporting Blizzard on any other platform.

[(Anonymous)]

The cognitive dissonance between "Give us more Diablo and Starcraft!" and "But not on the platforms with the highest revenue of last year!" could power a small city.

[(Anonymous)]

Eh, labeling that cognitive dissonance is inaccurate at best.

I think it's reasonable to want more of a series, but without the part where, based on their own history and the history of their dev partner, it's bound to be loaded with microtransactions and P2W mechanics. I don't think anybody went, "give me more Diablo, but make it mobile and with another company known for predatory P2W!" This is pretty clearly not what the outraged gaming community wanted.

For example, Hearthstone as a spin-off of World of Warcraft is mobile and still super popular, so it's not that the mobile platform part is the main issue. But, if they made the next World of Warcraft expac available mobile only, I predict they'd get a similar reaction.

[(Anonymous)]

NAYRT but maybe this is a good reason not to get your tie your whole identity up in massive brands owned by unscrupulous corporations in the fucking first place

[(Anonymous)]

Well, I don't think anybody should do that, period. But it's also possible to be a fan of a franchise without necessarily tying up your whole identity to it.

But, consider the audience at Blizzcon. Those are going to be the die-hard fans. Casual fans wouldn't go so far as to pay for tickets, flights, hotels, to go there. So there was definitely a disconnect between company and audience, and there's also a disconnect to assume the people at Blizzcon and the outraged nolifers are the average fan.

[(Anonymous)]

nayrt

a lot of the fans considered blizzard to be fairly scrupulous with regard to their output though - they've cancelled entire titles virtually at the point of completion before now (titan and sc:ghost come immediately to mind) because they weren't good enough

so to a lot of them the betrayal is not that blizzard have been unscrupulous, but that they have lost their scruples in recent years (particularly since the activision merger) and this is just a manifestation of that

of course, your point still stands but fans gonna fan i guess

[(Anonymous)]

Anon from above

I think that's part of it too. For example, Diablo III and the real money auction house was terrible until it was removed. But at least, players could credit Blizzard with acknowledging it was bad and choosing to remove it.

I can see why, to some, this feels like they're going right back to how it was.

[soldatsasha]

Yeah, exactly. When fans want more of x game, they want more of X game, not some other shittier game reskinned to look like the game they enjoy.

Gamers don't generally mind mobile game spin-offs. There's been a lot over the years and some like Hearthstone and TES: Legends have done pretty damn well. But Blizzard made a couple of huge missteps here and it's really not surprising they're getting a lot of backlash for it.

[(Anonymous)]

Gamers need to be more socialist in their analysis.