This is, when played fairly, a request which I accept, and find myself in deep frustration when others do not. An advertising banner; in-game purchases; lite versions; add-ons - the list goes on. But there is a limit. There comes a point where a person can loose all respect for a developer otherwise favoured amongst all when their greed comes to light.
I have for now, beyond a month, been following an extremely popular developer (or development team, as it appears) within the android market, GameInsight, otherwise known as Cooper Media Corp. Where originally they were a development team focussed on iProducts only, they have recently opened up to audiences on Facebook, but struck gold with their support on the Android platform. Almost instantly Paradise Island, their first Android title, sprung up to the top of the list for most grossing on the android market in both the US and the UK, and has so far maintained its position.
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| My Country, by GameInsight/Cooper Media Corp |
Within the past week (or two, as it may have been) GameInsight released their second Android title, My Country. As a fan of the first title, I felt inclined to try it out, and I was not dissapointed. It is however, the developers greed that has outraged me. The product is fine. The product is great. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for he or she behind the product.
The aim of My Country is to start off with one road and a selection of buildings, and expand over a wide canvas. I'm actually on my second play through as I managed to totally screw my phone up this weekend, but that's another story. It's the ol' scenario of many in-game items being free, but with luxuary items as a cost for "country bucks", the in-game premium currency. This is very fair. If I want to play the lite cut down version, I simply ignore those that I cannot afford. If I want to treat this as a product that has had time and money put into its creation and support the developer, I buy an object or two. This is fair, too. Whether or not intentional however, the placing of buttons that use premium currency normally tends to be in areas that are easy to accidentally press with a double tap. For this, I should lay part of the blame on myself, but scour across the market page and the facebook page, you begin to see this as a common problem (amongst others such as launching the game to find your island/city has been wiped clean with no additionally earlier purchased premium currency), which the developer fails to even acknowledge, let alone take action upon (a confirmation of purchase would be nice) hinting more towards this being an intentional "mistake". But, even to me, to lay any disrespect to the developer for my own fat fingers would just be tedious. This is not fair.
But the thing which, of all other things is most unfair, is the grid system, and the developer's dirty tactics of luring its players in. The game uses a 4x4 grid - You start off with one block of land open, and the ability to expand using either in game currency of premium currency. A block of land is good for a varied amount of time - i.e. initially you won't need to expand for a day or two, then maybe a day, three days - it depends on a combination of your game style, pace, and in terms of requiring item drops, your luck. Getting the forth land block took me 2 days, however I played the game from wake till sleep - regardless of whatever else I was doing at the time (I know, kinda sad, but hey ho), so for a casual gamer it could take 6-10+ days before unlocking your 4th land block. This is when the shock hit me - I then noticed that, in order to unlock the next block of land, I could only use in-game currency. ok - so maybe I could collect those in game countrybucks you earn when levelling up - but then another moment of acknowledgement when I realised how many countrybucks were required... €170 - in real money that's just short of $20 (the game requires premium currency to be purchased in USD). Now - when I say I support the developer, buying them a beer costs about £5.
For anyone familliar with the modern mini-"build em up" format, will be familliar with the fact that expansions are critical to in-game growth. It's the same with FarmVille, and many games of the same genre.
Having seen this, I felt instantly deceived by the developers greed. Had I seen this in the market for $20, for what it is, I would have just left it. But it felt as though the developer of this game planted a bomb-shell by getting it's players addicted later on in the game, after the player has already (in many cases) already used real-world cash to purchase premium currency. Lets face it, if you're going to support the developer for a great product, it's likely going to take less than 6 days before you've made that judgement. So had I bought the developer a beer, so to speak, donating £5 - or the closest I could at $10, I would only have been paying for the trial/demo. Only once the player becomes hooked on the game does the bombshell drop.
As much as I enjoy the games which GameInsight release, I have always had an eerie impression of them - the first "mission" (as it where) is to write a 5 star review of the game on the android market (my review was 3 stars - I still passed the mission) - no wonder it comes across as being so popular! Another mission is to take a photo of your country and submit it to facebook - Paradise Island contained these shameless promotion missions too, but not to the extent of My Country.
GameInsight came into the Android Market a little on the late side considering their presence on iDevices, so it's no surprise their arrival co-insided with the launch of in-game purchases on android. I have seen proposals of new advertising methods too (going off topic a little, but still on the right side of 'the line'), most notably advertisements on the notification bar. The general opinion of this advertising proposal was extremely negative, from consumers and advertisers alike, though I doubt something like this would shame the likes of GameInsight, so watch out for these ads, coming to a notification bar near you!
In my opinion there are many lines to be crossed, and understandably not crossing any of these lines gives you little room to move, but in my opinion, little over a long period is much more better than a lot at once, and developers (and other businesses) that use deceiptful methods only last so long before their true colours shine.
So I'm interested to get your opinion on this - what are your views on in-game purchases vs. the more conventional payment methods for free vs. premium, such as demo vs. full? How do you see proposals of notification bar advertising affecting the industry?
I look forward to hearing what others have to say - but the best way I can conclude this (particularly long) blog post is to offer the advice to steer clear of GameInsight/Cooper Media Corp.
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