I’m on a game, Whiteout Survival, you’ve probably never heard of it. I haven’t spent a penny, but I was curious about how much one obscure “upgrade” cost. Mind you, there are hundreds of purchases in the game.
It was $100 US, and it said 29,000 had been sold… in the last WEEK!
2.9 million dollars a week for NOTHING. And that’s just that one obscure item, far from their biggest seller.
And that’s just in one game you’ve never heard of.
Because every single thing about those games is a psychological ploy to get people to spend as much money as physically possible. They run studies on what tweaks get people to spend more or less and I guarantee the numbers they show in the store have been studied.
Also, who’s going to call them out on that? What court wouldn’t throw that out immediately? And even if you did win, the company wouldn’t even notice. You probably signed away the right to be part of a class action lawsuit in the Terms of Service anyway.
A buddy of mine spent several thousand on Marvel Heroes. He wouldn’t go out to lunch with us, and finally I asked him what was going on. He eventually told me, we had a “dude…we are adults and can’t be doing that shit. Imagine the hookers and drugs you could have bought!”
He quit, but still tells me he thinks about it and is immediately filled with regret.
It’s crazy to me how we went from buying a complete game for $50, and now we get an enshitified, half completed mobile game for free but people spend hundreds of dollars playing it.
I was suckered into the shark cards on GTA Online, I worked terrible hours and it was my escape.
I bought shark cards for thousands of SEK ocer a year or so, not much in compared to normal whales, but I did feel the addiction drawing me in harder.
Then one day I had just had enough, and uninstalled the game, else I knew I would continue.
I am glad though, the money I spent was not wasted, it taught me a valuable lesson about what to look out for, and how to recognize sinkholes like this.
They have ARPU targets (Average Revenue Per User) and UAC targets (User Acquisition Costs). Whales contribute significantly to the game’s bottom line. Non-paying customers are vital, because player population is a game quality, and Whales need a population to notice how awesome they are.
But game companies don’t tend to separate Whales from other players (at least not the ones I’ve worked for), they tend to care about ARPU, which is more stable, and a much easier target to shoot for. And they want to keep UAC down, which lowers the required ARPU for a successful game.
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I’m on a game, Whiteout Survival, you’ve probably never heard of it. I haven’t spent a penny, but I was curious about how much one obscure “upgrade” cost. Mind you, there are hundreds of purchases in the game.
It was $100 US, and it said 29,000 had been sold… in the last WEEK!
2.9 million dollars a week for NOTHING. And that’s just that one obscure item, far from their biggest seller.
And that’s just in one game you’ve never heard of.
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Yeah it’s been showing me that banner every time I start the game since the very beginning.
And I nope it every time.
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It’s highly likely they fudge those numbers or outright lie.
Reason for saying that?
BTW: not the company reporting those numbers. Google Play’s numbers.
Because every single thing about those games is a psychological ploy to get people to spend as much money as physically possible. They run studies on what tweaks get people to spend more or less and I guarantee the numbers they show in the store have been studied.
Also, who’s going to call them out on that? What court wouldn’t throw that out immediately? And even if you did win, the company wouldn’t even notice. You probably signed away the right to be part of a class action lawsuit in the Terms of Service anyway.
I knew multiple people who spent several ten thousands USD in State of Survival. A fucking mobile game.
A buddy of mine spent several thousand on Marvel Heroes. He wouldn’t go out to lunch with us, and finally I asked him what was going on. He eventually told me, we had a “dude…we are adults and can’t be doing that shit. Imagine the hookers and drugs you could have bought!”
He quit, but still tells me he thinks about it and is immediately filled with regret.
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It’s crazy to me how we went from buying a complete game for $50, and now we get an enshitified, half completed mobile game for free but people spend hundreds of dollars playing it.
And it’s nowhere near as good.
I was suckered into the shark cards on GTA Online, I worked terrible hours and it was my escape.
I bought shark cards for thousands of SEK ocer a year or so, not much in compared to normal whales, but I did feel the addiction drawing me in harder.
Then one day I had just had enough, and uninstalled the game, else I knew I would continue.
I am glad though, the money I spent was not wasted, it taught me a valuable lesson about what to look out for, and how to recognize sinkholes like this.
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Thank you, I do my best, I had no idea obout the dolphin name, fun!
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They’ve just learnt it all from Vegas.
They hire behavior specialists.
They have ARPU targets (Average Revenue Per User) and UAC targets (User Acquisition Costs). Whales contribute significantly to the game’s bottom line. Non-paying customers are vital, because player population is a game quality, and Whales need a population to notice how awesome they are.
But game companies don’t tend to separate Whales from other players (at least not the ones I’ve worked for), they tend to care about ARPU, which is more stable, and a much easier target to shoot for. And they want to keep UAC down, which lowers the required ARPU for a successful game.
Here’s an industry talk about how to prey on whales
https://youtu.be/xNjI03CGkb4?si=1sjNUt8VX4Z5wky2
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