Rant on the fly

So the other day I got into a discussion about copyright laws and just really wanted to post this on here to show some of the hypocrisy our laws force on us. I am not saying all laws should be null but they should not single out a group of individuals when like crimes happen on a daily basis. I am also not here to get a shit ton of flamer comments trying to correct me by saying my hypothesis is incorrect. I will start by saying in theory this is exactly what is going on and I'm not arguing semantics.

For some time now the government or should I say the MPAA and other such organizations have been after torrenters for supposedly breaking the law. While I can neither say they are or aren't I would like to point out a couple of blunders. The first blunder being the definition of theft they are using. The statement is that it is theft when there is a loss of a sale. I understand this however...flamers get ready...Gamestop does not share any of the money they make off of used games, as stores such as FYE and Blockbuster also do not share money off of pre-owned CDs or DVDs. This means in the strictest following of the law that those stores are in violation of copyright law. They have broken the law by making essentially a private sale. This is the exact same concept beings used towards torrents. I am not saying torrenting is good in every-way and that people do need to support artists but I am saying that this is unfair treatment when it is going on in other areas of life but it is ignored because they still pay sales tax.

While I am not saying this is the perfect way to phrase it I am saying the principal is the same. Game developers don't like used sales because they make no money off of them as the MPAA makes no money off of used DVD sales but you don't see them taking on Gamestop and Blockbuster. I am just saying in the strictest sense this really doesn't seem fair.

PS> sorry about the late blog...I had some projects around the house to do.

I bought it twice...

So I know a couple people, myself included, who have bought a lot of DLC for various games. The title refers to Oblivion and it's ungodly amount of DLC, which I purchased all of back in the day, and the DLC actually cost more than the original game. I can't fault the game developers for this as I am sure not all of the DLC was made by the time the game came out and in all honesty I didn't have to buy it. My one problem with DLC such as this however is that if you add as much to the game as was there in the first place it almost makes more sense to just release another game. A lot of people had complaints when Left 4 Dead did this last year. I did not have a problem with how Valve released their newest game due to the fact I don't want to pay twice for the same game through DLC. I understand people's complaints but if you were to factor in the average price of skins, maps, game modes, etc... $60 may be a lot cheaper than if they had released Left 4 Dead 2 as DLC.

This leads me to the main point I was trying to make...micro-transactions. Micro-transactions are pretty much the same as DLC in a way. Most people run into micro-transactions when playing Facebook games, MMOs, and generally any online game site. I have paid for micro-transactions when I played on Gaia, and their transactions range from monthly limited outfits available no other way than real money to random items for any other aspect of the site. This leads me to my main complaint. I don't have a problem with people paying for DLC or micro-transactions to get items early. You can do this in WOW and almost all Facebook games. A lot of people complain that this lessons the game for other people but in all honesty not everyone has the time to put 100 hours into a game to get 1 piece of armor. It doesn't lesson the game for me any because for the most part I don't even notice if people have the items or not...just if I do. My problem comes from the developer making sure you can't get the items in game at all. Freerealms stands out to me as the most obvious of this. I will say the game is free to begin with so I can slightly understand why they do it. Freerealms is a free to play online casual MMO. It costs $5 a month to be a member and some items can only be accessed if you are a member. HOWEVER, even if you are a member the items still cost more real money. This means not only are you paying to play the game but you are also paying for all the items. There are certain items that can be obtained in the game that you can buy to have them early but a lot of the items in Freerealms aren't available in game at all. This means that calling it a free game is like calling Playstation Home a game. You can run around in Home but other than that most things cost money. This is how Freerealms is. I tried out the game to see how it was and almost immediately noticed I really couldn't do anything other than walk around. I'm sure there are people who are going to read this and say, well what do you expect for free? I understand this but it is just the point I am trying to prove. Make a product and charge me money for it. Don't bleed me dry and say if you want to be able to get everything in the game or if you want to be able to have the most fun you can have then you need to drop $5 here or $10 here. WOW may have micro-transactions but you have to look at the amount of free content they give through updates. Most game devs don't do this. A tweak here and there maybe but not the type of service you get from an MMO like WOW.

This has begun to be an issue. Go on Facebook and look at any of the games and realize how much people drop into these. It's great from a business aspect I have to admit but it shows no compassion whatsoever towards the consumer. As I said before if you could get the items in game without paying and just by sinking time into it or by purchasing early I think you have given some thought into how some people just can't afford all those transactions but you have also though on the business side. I'm just saying as a consumer I'm not made of money and it limits a lot of games I can enjoy. I played Mafia Wars, and Cafe World, and a few other Facebook games for a few months but in the end it just got to be ridiculous the amount of money I would have had to spend to enjoy myself any longer. They become games you can only play for an hour a day without paying for it. Once again I understand they are free to play but that still doesn't explain how Xanga made record amounts of money off their games. I'm sure if you break down all the earnings I guarantee that many people paid well over $60 in micro-transactions for just 1 game.

I'm aware gaming is an expensive hobby to have and that the companies put a lot of money into games and they need to profit as well but when it comes down to it a lot of the time it just looks like they are trying to take advantage of the consumer.