• BashfulBob [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    4 hours ago

    Skinner box game mechanics suck and are just hollow “entertainment”

    All Vidya Gamez are fundamentally Skinner Boxes. At the same time, when you’re trapped in a cube all day, it’s nice to get a food pellet. Stop shaming people for food pelleting themselves.

    Hated every minute of it but just couldn’t stop myself until someone hacked my Activision account and stole it breaking me out of the cycle.

    My original experience with online games was in a big social circle that whittled away over time. It’s less the game pass model itself (which always just descends into “How much pop culture can we shove into your generic Blood Gulch shooter/looter?”) than the fact that I’m playing with an endless parade of anonymous that nobodies I ultimately find so upsetting.

    I play chess with a co-worker every lunch break we’re free, and it’s far more fun and fulfilling than the time I spent grinding amid a sea of faceless nobodies.

    At the same time, it feels cruel to tell people who don’t have an active social circle to just not be online at all.

    The only thing worse than the Skinner Box is solitary confinement.

    • Gorb [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      33 minutes ago

      jesse-wtf

      Somehow you missed the point completely about predatory business practices preying on vulnerable people to draw out massive profits… The entire thing this comment and post is about

    • Are_Euclidding_Me [e/em/eir]@hexbear.net
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      4 hours ago

      All Vidya Gamez are fundamentally Skinner Boxes.

      No they are not and I will fight you. If you mean multiplayer online games, well maybe, you might have a point, but I don’t play those games and so I will make no claims about them.

      However. If you call Outer Wilds or Pathologic/Pathologic 2 or Disco Elysium or A Short Hike or Journey skinner boxes, well, you’re just wrong. Games are experiences, they’re stories that can be more immersive than a movie or a book and if they’re done well, holy shit are they good!

      Games are (can be) amazing, and I’m sick of pretending they’re not.