Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

From my more up to date gamers at work, new games sound full of dark patterns.



There's a handful of big game publishers (EA and Activision mostly) that put out big AAA games full of microtransaction nonsense. But after you subtract those the market of quality games without those dark patterns is still massively bigger than it ever has been in the past.

(I am talking solely of the PC market of course. Mobile games have way more widespread crap, and all the app stores have discoverability issues that result in all the good games basically being impossible to find unless you find out about them from somewhere else (yes there are actually good, non microtransaction based mobile games too)).


Many are, and many aren't. Sadly, you can't just pick something up and expect not to be exploited for it


Is there a good website or somebody who logs this stuff?


https://www.lorenzostanco.com/lab/steam/store/

I linked this steam search tool in another reply - I like to specify a minimum number of user reviews and sort by user review score after adding some genre tags I'm interested in. I find the steam community doesn't look particularly favourably on microtransaction/loot box gambling heavy games (at least ones where the microtransactions make you more powerful, as opposed to just being extra single player content a la expansion packs or whatever.) So generally you end up with some good recommendations.

Setting the minimum user review score higher or lower tends to filter out/let in lower budget/more niche indie titles depending on your preferences.

Also just avoiding the major AAA publishers is a good strategy - EA and Activision are by far the worst. I don't really want to say to stay away from Ubisoft because they put out some great games (check out the Anno series) and almost always don't employ the same tactics as EA and Activision, just be aware that some of the most recent Assassins Creed games do have some weird microtransaction stuff, although you can completely ignore it and still see all the content.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: