Super Meat Boy Creator Hates Freemium Games

[SL33TBL1ND]

I'm not sure I entirely agree with McMillen's sentiment that "real" games have to be super difficult to offer a sense of fulfillment, but the dude did make Super Meat Boy, so at least he's being consistent.

I don't think that's what he meant, John. Challenge and fulfilment is not the same thing as super difficult. A challenge involves difficulty, yes, but without it it isn't a challenge. If you didn't overcome anything, I don't know where you'd get that fulfilment.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Does he understand how free-to-play games work? I think he just described paying money to unlock features of a game... which is different from the core free-to-play model. I mean a good free-to-play sells time saving and convenience items making paying a trade off of time over money usually. I suppose he can argue that some companies do it wrong but just attacking the whole concept is short sighted there buddy. Maybe he think convenience items are cheap? I'd hate to see what he thinks of RPGs then since every level up is a sort of convenience measure, improving your character. I wish the guy was more clear with his blind rage so I could better argue against his opinion.

 

[Doom-Slayer]

Everytime I see an article like this, it makes me fall in love with LoL's system even more.

All the runes for stat boosting are purchased with in game currency. Champs can be bought with either. The only thing that can be exclusively purchased with real live money is skins.

My thoughts exactly. I've yet to see a f2p get even close to the LoL model... it's strange, but true. I entered LoL thinking it'd be a crap f2p like all the others, but it actually has a model that makes it stand on its own, and god forbid, even MAKE YOU WANT to pay for stuff on occasion of your own volition.

So in a nutshell, yes I do agree with the dev on most cases; there are rare exceptions though

Tribes Ascend is actually very very similar. Ill grant that some items youll absolutely want which are a bit of a pain to get, but you dont technically "need" anything, and everything in the game bar skins(same as LoL) can be gained without paying a cent.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Does he understand how free-to-play games work? I think he just described paying money to unlock features of a game... which is different from the core free-to-play model. I mean a good free-to-play sells time saving and convenience items making paying a trade off of time over money usually. I suppose he can argue that some companies do it wrong but just attacking the whole concept is short sighted there buddy. Maybe he think convenience items are cheap? I'd hate to see what he thinks of RPGs then since every level up is a sort of convenience measure, improving your character. I wish the guy was more clear with his blind rage so I could better argue against his opinion.

he is targeting freemium games on mobile devices.
and these are 95% of the time as he describes.
if you have a smartphone, go and try out gun bros.
its a wave shooter.

Please, elaborate on what he is saying because I really don't understand what issue he is pinpointing, I see 3 or 4 potential issues he could be talking about.

 

[Eventidal]

I personally love the idea of freemium and the potential it has, but he's right to say that most of the time it's done poorly.

If I had it my way, I would release all my iOS/Android games as completely free, start to finish. You would be able to download the game and play through every level on every initial difficulty level as well as alternate modes, and earn points and unlockables and such, BUT... the only way to use points earned to purchase unlockables would be to buy the "full" version, or activate your game via in-app purchase. The price would be fairly low, and you'll immediately have access to everything you would have had if you had purchased it from the start. That stuff would simply be game-extending and hardcore extras, such as extra characters, super tough difficulties, challenge levels, maybe level editor, and cheats.

See, that sort of system means you can play through the whole game with no problem, unlock achievements and stuff all the same, but the only thing you don't get is the many cool features you unlock for purchase and the points you earn to buy those unlockables are stored away until you actually purchase the game.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

The freemium model isn't bad. Its that most mobile games are totally crap. Very few are worth paying anything for much less buying "buffs" in.

DDO showed how to do F2P right, its too bad mobile game makers haven't found that sweet spot yet.

 

[antipunt]

Everytime I see an article like this, it makes me fall in love with LoL's system even more.

All the runes for stat boosting are purchased with in game currency. Champs can be bought with either. The only thing that can be exclusively purchased with real live money is skins.

My thoughts exactly. I've yet to see a f2p get even close to the LoL model... it's strange, but true. I entered LoL thinking it'd be a crap f2p like all the others, but it actually has a model that makes it stand on its own, and god forbid, even MAKE YOU WANT to pay for stuff on occasion of your own volition.

So in a nutshell, yes I do agree with the dev on most cases; there are rare exceptions though

Tribes Ascend is actually very very similar. Ill grant that some items youll absolutely want which are a bit of a pain to get, but you dont technically "need" anything, and everything in the game bar skins(same as LoL) can be gained without paying a cent.

Oh. Interesting. I didn't know Tribes Ascend was f2p

 

[Something Amyss]

I like Freemium, as long as it's not "pay to win."

 

[The_Emperor]

I used to post on a forum Ed ran on his website about dead baby jokes, stayed friends and met with some of the ppls.

deadbabydressup was a fun flash game we had (jokey cartoon dead babies not like for reals dead babies.)

thisisacryforhelp.com was good back when newgrounds was cool and 56k was still around.

ot: yeah profiteering just ruins everything and makes every money making venture a vehicle for greed and poop

 

[Denamic]

I'm not sure I entirely agree with McMillen's sentiment that "real" games have to be super difficult to offer a sense of fulfillment, but the dude did make Super Meat Boy, so at least he's being consistent.

What?
That's not what he's saying. At all.
What he's trying to say is pretty clear, and I'm not sure how you came to the conclusion that he thinks games has to be super difficult.

 

[zombflux]

You said super difficult. He said difficult.

Journalism 101 folks, exaggerate.

 

[Excludos]

I'm not sure I agree with him. F2p games where you can pay for certain things have a place in this world. But I will admit that most mobile phone games are rotten to the core.

off topic: What does the [inesertwordhere] in an article mean? I used to think it was the editor putting in a word to make more sense of a quoted sentence. But if you take those words away in this article the sentences makes so little sense I honestly don't believe they could have come out of the mouth of anyone.