So it turns out I'm not the only political person who has taken interest in discussing halo infinite and the recent controversy over microtransactions. Washington post also picked up the story and discussed how the issue if one of a generational divide.
And I have to say, I largely agree. The article points out a generational divide between older millennials like myself, and younger zoomers, and how their attitudes and reasons for playing games are different. And I'm SOLIDLY in the millennial camp. Yay, I'm turning into a crotchety old person going on about back in my day! Well, so did the OP of this article. There was a lot of talk about how older gamers tend to play games for their own sake and they remember playing for hours...just to play games. Like, imagine playing games to play games. I know right? A revolutionary concept. At least it seems to be among zoomers, who constantly seem to need rewards via battle passes and unlocks, etc. to keep interest.
Honestly, i've been noticing a trend toward that in recent years, and how people lose their crap if they run out of stuff to grind for, and I quite frankly hate it. It makes gaming feel like a job. I know in COD sometimes I log in just to grind the battle pass to unlock the new guns and by the time i unlock them I dont even enjoy playing them because I just spent the last however many hours grinding and doing challenges to unlock stuff. It isn't fun. I like playing, as I want to play, for as long as I want to play, and I like being able to come and go from games. I hate FOMO (fear of missing out), and I hate time gated content, where I feel like I'm constantly on a treadmill to grind grind grind! I mean, if I wanted gaming to feel like work, I'd just work. And given I'm anti work, well, you can see where I'm going with that.
This also sums up the outrage over the battle pass. Apparently it's too slow, and too unrewarding, especially to free players, and while I wouldnt even notice because I couldn't give two craps about the battle pass unless they're gating essential game changing content (and please devs, don't do that, I don't want to be forced to play your game just to keep up on the rewards and the current game meta), because quite frankly, I dont care about cosmetics. if anything I like halo infinite better because not only is it f2p, but all "progression" is cosmetic, and therefore I'm free to come and go as I please and play for its own sake and quite frankly, not care about that stuff.
But, of course, the zoomers do care about that stuff. And it just baffles me. Like, to be fair to them, compared to other games I can see why this particular pass is slower and less rewarding and how that turns people off, but me? I dont need shiny new rewards to keep playing and if I do, that means your game sucks and is poorly designed anyway (and I'd even say this of COD, which i like, I'm gonna be honest, i get burnt out on it keeping up with that stuff and see it as bad game design that might be great at keeping people playing but doesn't do anything for me in terms of enjoyment).
It's the same with monetization models. I remember when xbox live was a new concept. And I hated the idea of paying $50 a year just to play games online I already paid $60 for. I hated the idea of paid DLC locking me out of playlists, where I have to KEEP paying just to play. But, if you can tell, there's a common theme to my level of outrage. I care about ACCESS to games and their core features. I dislike being locked out of multiplayer unless I pay. Whether that be a subscription model or DLC, or what have you. I believe you should pay once and get access to the full game. And of course, in recent years, developers are moving away from those models and I see it as a great thing. And even better, I see games going f2p from franchises that have traditionally been the $60+DLC model and I LOVE it. And given pay to win seems to be dying too, because guess what, people hate free to play games with pay to win and that's a reason most f2p games have been low quality for so long, well, they've gotten rid of that too.
So, from my millennial perspective, we've won the battle against the big evil corporations. They've been removing monetization I dont agree with and replacing it with monetization that I do.
Which brings me to zoomers. When halo 3, for example, since we're discussing halo, a lot of what I discussed with xbox live and DLC were hot topics. And I took strong stands on them, so strong i never played halo multiplayer until it finally was released on PC as the MCC, a collection of past halo games. And we actually were talking about who were, at the time, the console kiddies. The zoomers who were being indoctrinated to accept this crap. And we feared how the next generation would grow up not remembering a time before DLC and paid subscription services, and how they would be normalized to these models and not think twice about them.
Well, here we are. 10-15 years later, but here they are. And they're complaining about battle passes, and microtransactions, and other dumb crap that doesn't matter, and going on about how nostalgic they are for halo 3 and halo reach and that exploitative paid model. And how it's somehow better than a LITERALLY FREE GAME because they had more customization of their character, or something.
I don't really think that it's that we become conservative as we get older. I'm starting to think that the world just changes around people and we end up becoming more conservative not because we develop right wing views, but because the next generation comes along and argues over stuff so foreign to the previous generation that we have no idea how to even respond to this stuff.
I mean, in their defense, relative to other games, is their battle pass and monetization a tad excessive? Sure, I can accept that. I'll even accept that given multiplayer used to be part of their $60 purchase and now it's not, that they should be given access to season 1 stuff for free.
But generally speaking, I can't say I'm sympathetic. My fighting the good fight against the evil corporations was against fighting against stuff that mattered. If I paid for a game once, don't make me pay for the game again. Dont design your game where I feel like im on a constant treadmill of paying just to access content. But those aren't the problem with halo infinite. As far as I'm concerned, that fight is won. The game not only has no paid DLC, but it's free, and going to be free through its own lifespan. But zoomers aren't happy because cosmetics or something.
Again, I know I sound like an old boomer ranting about my generation, but I just don't get it. Like even if I kind of do, somewhat, it's just such a foreign concern, I don't care. If you told me back in 2007 the future of gaming was gonna be high quality free games that have AAA level game design and aren't pay to win, I'd see that as a bright future to look forward to. I dont care if they sell a golden spartan helmet in the shop for $1000. I'll play as the basic green one for free and enjoy every second of it.
Thank you for coming to my crotchety old man ted talk.
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