2 ms·

I enjoyed Zynga games for a while, but there was a change at some point along the line where you could no longer play the game as it was designed without spendi

I enjoyed Zynga games for a while, but there was a change at some point along the line where you could no longer play the game as it was designed without spending money. That's when I stopped playing. It's fine to have the spend-money parts as fun add-ons. I might even spend a dollar or two here or there on such things. But I will not play a game that tries to hook me in for free but then requires me to purchase pieces of it just to play it as it is designed. That's a tricky line, of course. I'll play WoW sometimes, and I pay for that. But I'm not paying real money to give my character some spell that's required for basic play. For a funny hat or a cool mount (that's functionally the same as a free one), sure. Greed, for lack of a better word, killed Zynga. They pushed it too far.

ChuckMcM 14y ago
I think this captures a very common sentiment. Certainly folks I know have expressed it as well, which is that its one thing to have 'bonus' items cost real money but its another thing entirely to feel 'duped' into investing in something without knowing the costs. Its a challenging line in the freemium world because on the one hand you can 'dial in the amount of money you want' and on the other hand folks defect. There is an interesting corollary in taxation [1]. With Blizzard, one wonders if they will begin to compete with their customers by creating and then selling through their auction system rare or unique, and by definition game changing, items. The temptation will always be there of course, a company has to choose not to step over that line. [1] I worry about using that example because it sounds like a troll, it is not.