
Apple Arcade launches later this month for $4.99/mo - artsandsci
https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/10/apple-arcade-launches-later-this-month-for-4-99-mo/
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alteria
As a Consumer, I'm really excited about this. I'm fed up with skinner box RNG
money extraction apps, and the ability to pay once to try a catalog of games
is great. I've always been hesitant to buy pricer games because I didn't know
if I would like them.

On the other hand, iOS is probably the mobile marketplace with the highest
proportion of customers willing to buy non-lootbox games. If this gains enough
market share, devs will feel forced to join this program, and it's currently
unclear how they will be paid out.

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makecheck
This move will probably obliterate game developers more than it first seems.

Apple Arcade _refused_ to port any existing games; they only wanted brand new,
exclusive content that was painstakingly developed for all their platforms.
Not only is this a giant “GTFO” to developers that have stuck with their
platforms for years but it practically ensures that the initial game library,
no matter how big it is, will take forever to grow. Players can blow through
content _really_ quickly. And a “library” of X games doesn’t really count
because each person will always have their favorite genres, making most games
unplayable (so we are really talking about an initial library where X/30 games
are actually interesting).

At the very least, they should have invited existing App Store games into the
Arcade, provided that they met some basic requirements (no in-app purchases,
etc.).

It is also really rich to see Apple point out questionable game behaviors on
their own App Store, when Apple has complete control and could have solved the
entire problem many years ago without introducing Apple Arcade at all. _Fix
your damned App Store._ I hate to imagine the millions of dollars that have
_clearly_ been funneled to all the wrong parties, Apple included, by simply
scamming people for more than a decade while legitimate developers beg for
scraps.

Also, the existing game market will be destroyed by $4.99/month. It was
already like pulling teeth to convince anyone on _mobile_ to spend money but
at least on the _Mac_ you saw almost-traditional pricing for some games. Now,
if lots of cross-platform games are available for peanuts, it will be
_impossible_ to charge _anything_ for games, _even on the Mac_. The Mac as a
gaming platform will be completely incinerated by this: if you can’t put a
game in the Arcade and you can’t charge for it because Arcade is cheap, where
does the game belong? On Windows and Switch, apparently.

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stfwn
Seems like a fair enough price. I don’t know what the deal with the developers
is, but I hope it enables them to make quality games rather than the ‘free’
dopamine clickers that dominate the charts now.

