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Whatever you do, do not let your enjoyment of Dungeon Keeper tempt you into even installing Dungeon Keeper Mobile: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpdoBwezFVA ht

Whatever you do, do not let your enjoyment of Dungeon Keeper tempt you into even installing Dungeon Keeper Mobile: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpdoBwezFVA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpdoBwezFVA It's the new poster child for the suckage that is Free to Play games with In App Purchases.

pjc50 13y ago
I assumed this promotion was GOG using the news about Dungeon Keeper Mobile's awfulness to attract attention to their own (great) service. Popular games of previous years, cheap, no DRM, no IAPs, no weird social network tentacles. Just games to enjoy.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
verisimilidude 13y ago
Dungeon Keeper Mobile's complete, abject failure (as an enjoyable game) is the reason I went to GoG and purchased the original last week. I can't be alone. Maybe GoG saw a trend in purchases like mine and decided to act.
prezjordan 13y ago
I'm curious where most HNers would draw the line between Doom's "Get 3 levels for free, pay us $50 for the rest" and something like Candy Crush's "Play the whole game for free, pay us $x for any x to get more out of it." I'm playing a bit of devil's advocate here, because I am very much against in-app purchases. But, when you think about it, you can play Dungeon Keeper Mobile for free, or you can pay something like $20 (or $10, or $5, maybe even $1) to get more out of it (boosts, etc). So where does the issue lie? I here a lot of people saying "Well they reel you in with a free app and then make you pay for it!" but isn't that exactly how shareware works?
- TheSOB888 13y ago
  You can't really play it for free. That's the thing. It's basically unplayable without payments. Why people don't just avoid it, though, that's beyond me.
- Jehar 13y ago
  At risk of turning this into an echo chamber: In-App Purchases become intrinsic mechanical elements of a player's experience of the game. This results in the design skewing towards encouraging "positive" events, namely making purchases. At this point, the mechanical goals of the game become abstracted, or even split - your game isn't about the mechanics of the puzzle anymore, it's about producing those positive events.
- cecilpl 13y ago
  It's more like Doom being "You can play the whole game for free, but you have to pay $0.50 every time you want to reload your gun."
  - prezjordan 13y ago
    But why not spend $20 right off the bat and get plenty of gems to enjoy the game? That's the point I'm bringing up.
    - DanBC 13y ago
      Because that's not how they sell it. And once that $20 is gone you'll need to spend more. If they had a single IAP of $20 to remove all timers it'd still be stupid and hated, but at least justifiable as a demo / full product model.
- resu_nimda 13y ago
  The "free" game sucks. It is intentionally entirely gimped. Playing Dungeon Keeper Mobile "for free" allows you, what, 5 minutes of gameplay per day? The whole game design is centered on making money with IAP. Even if you had unlimited funds, you still have to deal with the in-game store layer (e.g. "click here to spend X to do this thing"...not fun gameplay). With Doom, they just make a full and complete game without a ton of distractions designed to continually sap money from you. It's like getting "free Internet!!!" but it's at dial-up speed and you have to jump through a bunch of hoops and layers of microtransactions just to get a decent experience. Most people would rather pay a a simple up-front fee and not deal with that BS.
belgianguy 13y ago
Its (DK1/DK2) faithful successor would be War For The Overworld: https://wftogame.com/ https://wftogame.com/. Looks quite cool and the atmosphere certainly is there, but I don't know how far the development already has progressed. Last I heard, they were said to have Windows, Mac and Linux betas for pre-orders. But I concur, the mobile app is an insult to the original IP.

pjc50 13y ago

I assumed this promotion was GOG using the news about Dungeon Keeper Mobile's awfulness to attract attention to their own (great) service. Popular games of previous years, cheap, no DRM, no IAPs, no weird social network tentacles. Just games to enjoy.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

verisimilidude 13y ago

Dungeon Keeper Mobile's complete, abject failure (as an enjoyable game) is the reason I went to GoG and purchased the original last week. I can't be alone. Maybe GoG saw a trend in purchases like mine and decided to act.

prezjordan 13y ago

I'm curious where most HNers would draw the line between Doom's "Get 3 levels for free, pay us $50 for the rest" and something like Candy Crush's "Play the whole game for free, pay us $x for any x to get more out of it." I'm playing a bit of devil's advocate here, because I am very much against in-app purchases. But, when you think about it, you can play Dungeon Keeper Mobile for free, or you can pay something like $20 (or $10, or $5, maybe even $1) to get more out of it (boosts, etc). So where does the issue lie? I here a lot of people saying "Well they reel you in with a free app and then make you pay for it!" but isn't that exactly how shareware works?

TheSOB888 13y ago
You can't really play it for free. That's the thing. It's basically unplayable without payments. Why people don't just avoid it, though, that's beyond me.
Jehar 13y ago
At risk of turning this into an echo chamber: In-App Purchases become intrinsic mechanical elements of a player's experience of the game. This results in the design skewing towards encouraging "positive" events, namely making purchases. At this point, the mechanical goals of the game become abstracted, or even split - your game isn't about the mechanics of the puzzle anymore, it's about producing those positive events.
cecilpl 13y ago
It's more like Doom being "You can play the whole game for free, but you have to pay $0.50 every time you want to reload your gun."
- prezjordan 13y ago
  But why not spend $20 right off the bat and get plenty of gems to enjoy the game? That's the point I'm bringing up.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    Because that's not how they sell it. And once that $20 is gone you'll need to spend more. If they had a single IAP of $20 to remove all timers it'd still be stupid and hated, but at least justifiable as a demo / full product model.
resu_nimda 13y ago
The "free" game sucks. It is intentionally entirely gimped. Playing Dungeon Keeper Mobile "for free" allows you, what, 5 minutes of gameplay per day? The whole game design is centered on making money with IAP. Even if you had unlimited funds, you still have to deal with the in-game store layer (e.g. "click here to spend X to do this thing"...not fun gameplay). With Doom, they just make a full and complete game without a ton of distractions designed to continually sap money from you. It's like getting "free Internet!!!" but it's at dial-up speed and you have to jump through a bunch of hoops and layers of microtransactions just to get a decent experience. Most people would rather pay a a simple up-front fee and not deal with that BS.

belgianguy 13y ago

Its (DK1/DK2) faithful successor would be War For The Overworld: https://wftogame.com/ https://wftogame.com/. Looks quite cool and the atmosphere certainly is there, but I don't know how far the development already has progressed. Last I heard, they were said to have Windows, Mac and Linux betas for pre-orders. But I concur, the mobile app is an insult to the original IP.