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Ever carried around $20 in quarters in a fanny pack as a five year old? It's pretty heavy. There's a pretty low ceiling on how much you could spend back in the

Ever carried around $20 in quarters in a fanny pack as a five year old? It's pretty heavy. There's a pretty low ceiling on how much you could spend back in the day and it was impossible to silently, digitally spend an unlimited quantity of your parents' money.

the_af 7y ago
Also, in the early/mid days of coin-up games, a skilled player could win a game with a single coin while having fun in the process and using their skills instead of simply waiting for stuff to happen.
- j-c-hewitt 7y ago
  Fighting games and head-to-head puzzle games like Bubble Bobble in a popular arcade were pretty cool like this in that people would line up to go up against the reigning champion who could go hours on a single quarter. Sort of weird how most "social" games are both a( trash and b( almost entirely single player with a tacked on multiplayer 'tournament' mode in which you play single player against some other player's template. Even in turn based games that would not suffer from a mobile connection's latency, they still have you go up against the AI with another player's template. Regression from the 1990s: absolutely pathetic. I wonder if legalization of internet slot machines would wipe out mobile gaming revenue and just expose it for what it is which is a workaround for laws against gambling.
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    > Sort of weird how most "social" games are both a( trash and b( almost entirely single player with a tacked on multiplayer 'tournament' mode in which you play single player against some other player's template. Most “social games” are like that because if a game isn't like that, even if it has social elements, it's not considered a “social game”, even if on top of the social elements it has either gameplay-affecting (e.g., any of the wargaming.net games) or cosmetic (e.g., PUBG Mobile) lootboxes.

the_af 7y ago

Also, in the early/mid days of coin-up games, a skilled player could win a game with a single coin while having fun in the process and using their skills instead of simply waiting for stuff to happen.

j-c-hewitt 7y ago
Fighting games and head-to-head puzzle games like Bubble Bobble in a popular arcade were pretty cool like this in that people would line up to go up against the reigning champion who could go hours on a single quarter. Sort of weird how most "social" games are both a( trash and b( almost entirely single player with a tacked on multiplayer 'tournament' mode in which you play single player against some other player's template. Even in turn based games that would not suffer from a mobile connection's latency, they still have you go up against the AI with another player's template. Regression from the 1990s: absolutely pathetic. I wonder if legalization of internet slot machines would wipe out mobile gaming revenue and just expose it for what it is which is a workaround for laws against gambling.
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  > Sort of weird how most "social" games are both a( trash and b( almost entirely single player with a tacked on multiplayer 'tournament' mode in which you play single player against some other player's template. Most “social games” are like that because if a game isn't like that, even if it has social elements, it's not considered a “social game”, even if on top of the social elements it has either gameplay-affecting (e.g., any of the wargaming.net games) or cosmetic (e.g., PUBG Mobile) lootboxes.