Video Game Tuesday: Gacha Games Aren’t Evil

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m back with a follow-up to last week’s post. It’s all about why Gacha Games Aren’t Evil!

Gacha?: In these games, there are usually numerous characters, cards, or other items that players can obtain, and most of them are only obtainable via the “gacha” mechanism. The “gacha” mechanism would allow players to “spin” the gacha using a specific amount of in-game currency, which would give player a randomized character or item. Sometimes, these gacha would be limited, such that those characters and items can only be obtained within a specific event time frame. Because some of these items or characters would be given less chance to appear, typically players would need to spin the gacha many times before they can get the most desired outcome.

Isn’t that just the same thing as Loot Boxes in last week’s post?: Well let me make a distinction, what I think of as a proper “Gacha Game” doesn’t actually include all the games that utilize the Gacha mechanic. Many are pretty popular in Japan and the more successful ones are ones that don’t include a PvP component. This removes the need to get the highest tier characters to do well against players who will spend loads of money on the game. They are often called Whales because they are essentially just like the Vegas equivalent.  Games like Battlefront II included loot boxes that had actual gameplay advantages like getting Heroes which offer a significant power boost over the regular player. That goes into the Pay to Win category, and should never be put into any game. The fact that EA thought they could get away with doing something so monumentally sleazy is just further proof that they are run by greedy jerks.

What’s a good example?: Fate/Grand Order is a perfect example of a proper Gacha Game.  The game is highly popular in Japan and while you are highly encouraged to re-roll an account to get a desired rare servant like Artoria from the Stay Night sub-franchise, this isn’t absolutely necessary to succeed in the game. Although it will help you out greatly if you aim for a top tier servant like Jeanne D’Arc or Waver Velvet who were Servants available at launch. I enjoy playing Fate/Grand Order quite a bit, mostly because the story is excellent. I ended up re-rolling about a hundred times to get a Jeanne for myself. That single character has probably saved my butt more times than I can count. I consider the time I spent re-doing the intro over and over again well worth it since I got a top tier Servant that will last me the entire game’s life no matter what comes along in the future.

And before people ask whether I’m a “Whale” let me answer you. No, I don’t have anywhere near the amount of spending money needed to do that sort of thing. If I had the money to do so would I? Maybe, the story of Fate/Grand Order is quite good, and I’d love to make a top tier team with my Jeanne as a highlight. The game earns tons of money because people want their favorite characters and people end up sketching or creating various things to “summon” their desired servants as a weird form of superstition. Sometimes it works for them, other’s not so much.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday, next week I’ll go back to my favorite topic for this column, bashing Destiny!

P.S.: For those wondering how my luck is in Fate/Grand Order, It’s definitely E Rank or lower. RNGs and I have always had a poor relationship. That might end up being a topic for a later column.

Video Game Tuesday: Loot Boxes Are Evil?

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m answering a question I’ve been asked recently. Loot Boxes Are Evil?

Loot Boxes?: A term used to describe a virtual item that could be likened to a booster pack for a trading card game. However since this is a virtual item and made purely of code you can’t really trade the items gained from a Loot Box to someone else for money or other goods. You won’t see people on Ebay selling Overwatch Loot Box contents like you would with rare trading cards from something like Magic: The Gathering.

Evil?: Well recently people have been in an uproar over the stunt EA pulled with the recently released Battlefront II monetization plan which was in lieu of paying for DLC. You had to either spend ridiculously long amounts of time to unlock heroes like Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader, or spend real cash to get a chance at earning them. Frankly I hate EA, I will never ever respect them as a publisher because of the practices they use like this Loot Box debacle, or yearly game releases of series like Madden. This last one is really unnecessary, just add the new atheletes that get drafted that year into the game with DLC for god’s sake.

So EA is at fault?: Pretty much, there is a bit of blame to be laid at the feet of the developers at DICE for going along with their plan for microtransactions, but at the end of the day they are working for EA to produce a game. EA has frequently been named America’s most hated company for a reason, beating out banks and telecom companies like Comcast or Time Warner. They tend to use sleazy means to get people to spend more money on their products.

So why all the uproar?: Well for one it was a Pay to Win situation, where if you spent the money to buy the heroes you had a serious advantage against other players, or at least that is how I understand the issue. I very well may be wrong on this, however as some really cool politician (and I can’t believe I’m putting those two words together in writing) from Hawaii said, EA is playing off kid’s desire to be heroes from Star Wars in a game and milking them and their parents to gamble away their money. It’s a sleazeball practice and frankly really needs to stop. Cosmetic items like Overwatches skins in their loot boxes are one thing, but getting gameplay changes like the ones in Battlefront II is unacceptable.

What about Gacha Games?: That is a topic for another day, which I’ll cover in the very near future. However there are some differences and those are pretty important. Will those differences hold out against the weight of public sentiment? I’m as clueless as the rest of you, personally I doubt they’ll get nearly as much recognition.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday! What are your thoughts on the topic? Leave a comment below!

Video Game Tuesday: Destiny’s Failure (Again)

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m explaining why I find Bungie’s actions once again unfathomable. It’s all about Destiny’s Failure (Again).

What Now?: Well they announced that we’d have one set of endgame PvE content, that we already have, for an entire year. This is a common practice in real MMORPGs, because the Developers are working on the next expansion, but Destiny has never been a real MMO. The fact that Destiny has a extreme lack of end game content is unacceptable for a game that has a 10-year $500 million contract with Activision. Though I’ve never been fan of Activision or their practices, (Blizzard is essentially an entirely separate existence thankfully) they do know how to pump out content at a pretty decent pace. It’s not amazing content mind, but it’s content at least.

Yeah but they have their free timed events: Funny thing about that, it’s timed events not a permanent addition to the game. I’d not mind if Sparrow Racing was a full feature that stayed around forever, and was built upon in the future. I had a blast this last weekend playing with 5 other friends and trash talking while I kicked their asses in a race. But the fact that this is a temporary feature and not constant is annoying. The additional facts that Bungie has gutted their own economy, a fact that even Forbes noticed, destroyed all semblance of balance in PvE content and left a fan favorite weapon class absolutely destroyed in their pursuit of “Balance” and even failed to correctly communicate the correct percentages about their most recent update trying to achieve said “Balance” is laughable. It shows a severe lack of staffing in a company that shouldn’t have such a lack, ever.

I’m not even going to get into the Kotaku article which was a very interesting read, but regardless it’s a pity that Bungie has once again shoved their feet into their mouth after shooting them a good dozen times. What was once a highly beloved developer is quickly becoming the laughing stock of the Game Developer world.

Once I earn that King’s Fall raid ship I’m done until I get asked to review the next release. I’ve got better developed games to play like Tales of Zestiria and Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday!