One interesting thing I've heard when working for a company that had microtransaction mechanics is, "Non paying players create content". By engaging in the community, even if in isolation they cost the devs money to host, they create the content and also the audience for the whale's behaviour.
I think a lot of us have a vision of a childlike, halcyon "purity" of experience, in the joy of gameplay itself, that we would seek and enjoy with or without other people's presence, with or without money. We want to experience that, we also as programmers (who may have learned to code because we like games) often have a deep desire to create that, to give it to others. It's like the "Beatific Vision" in the life of one who likes games.
We all know there always was a need for money, and passionate creativity exists in its margin. I think the complaint here really is that this margin seems to have less room in the eyes of the complainers, because the pull for money is present in virtually every game loop now, as opposed to being outside of the box...
A question I want to ask is, for newest generation of whales, is there a memory of some great, memorable exploratory rush in the big spend for them, part of a broader set of social interactions that gave them great joy and built them up in their community? Would their experience with the game due to this purchased power inspire them in any way, maybe to make some potentially positive, impactful life decisions? Or is it literally just a borderline scam at every single possible level?
I dislike microtransactions of any kind strongly, but I am at least trying here to be open to the possibility that someone who did them was able to feel something similar in relationship to them somehow.
I guess I’m not quite a whale but for a brief period of time I was spending several hundred dollars a week to run contests and pay for ships and game time for an Eve: Echoes (the mobile version, although I did play the original) corporation. We had 100+ people playing, I was their fearless leader, we had a war at one point, lots of fun. I knew once I stopped all the spending a lot of people would just leave and I wanted the party to keep going for a little while longer. I bought an iPad Pro so it’d be easier for me to administer my corporation. It was during COVID and it made me feel important and felt like I had friends. I couldn’t keep it up though, and maybe 75 people evaporated to wherever they came from.
We ended up with about 25 people sticking around, people idolized me and it was fun for awhile. Eventually (after a few months) I got bored and gave the reins over to a much less “fearless leader founder” person and much more “I am an accountant irl and Eve sounds neat” type person, which worked out pretty well, and the corporation thrived. I think back fondly to that and felt like it was worth it.
Alternatively, maybe ten years ago I spent a similar amount of money on this mobile game that was like sim city and Pokémon and time lapse command and conquer all rolled into one. I hate that I played that and hate how they managed to get my addiction loop just right and I was spending most of my paycheck on this stupid game. I had a guild and “friends” there too but it just felt like we were a bunch of addicts justifying each other’s spending habits. We knew what the in app purchase limits were for apple and how to get around them and stuff that just seems insane to me now.
I think a lot of us have a vision of a childlike, halcyon "purity" of experience, in the joy of gameplay itself, that we would seek and enjoy with or without other people's presence, with or without money. We want to experience that, we also as programmers (who may have learned to code because we like games) often have a deep desire to create that, to give it to others. It's like the "Beatific Vision" in the life of one who likes games.
We all know there always was a need for money, and passionate creativity exists in its margin. I think the complaint here really is that this margin seems to have less room in the eyes of the complainers, because the pull for money is present in virtually every game loop now, as opposed to being outside of the box...
A question I want to ask is, for newest generation of whales, is there a memory of some great, memorable exploratory rush in the big spend for them, part of a broader set of social interactions that gave them great joy and built them up in their community? Would their experience with the game due to this purchased power inspire them in any way, maybe to make some potentially positive, impactful life decisions? Or is it literally just a borderline scam at every single possible level?
I dislike microtransactions of any kind strongly, but I am at least trying here to be open to the possibility that someone who did them was able to feel something similar in relationship to them somehow.