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Giant Bomb Thread #5 - We love you, Ryan Davis

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Clunker said:
I can understand people having an ideological problem with F2P as it exists. There's no real arguing against that. From a functional standpoint, however, PvZ2 is just about the least obstructive F2P model available. You earn a ton of in-game currency through normal play; I have $21,000 in coins after playing maybe 30-35 levels, and powerups are 800 to 1200 coins a pop (I haven't purchased any so far; any wipes on levels just means I need to adapt my plant setup and build order).

And for folks who would rather just "buy" the game outright and not worry about the individual plant unlocks...would $15 or $20 be okay? Because here are the six plants available in the store:

Jalapeno: $3
Torchwood: $4
Snow Pea: $4
Squash: $3
Power Lily (new, this creates one Plant Food powerup): $3
Imitater (this is new, AFAIK, and it mimics any other plant): $3

So if you were staunch about having the plants from the original game, you can "buy" the game from the F2P "demo" for $14. Or if you want to just buy all of the optional plants, you can "buy" the game for $20. Granted, this is much, much more than the original PvZ on iOS (I remember buying PvZ1 for $2.99), but if you have some kind of mental block about it, the game is fully purchasable.

I don't know about balance completely, as I'm only on the second world, but the new plant types that are completely free and given to you in-game as you progress seem to give you just as many options for loadouts. And the star challenges really go a long way to forcing you out of any "I'm only taking these six plants for every single level" mentality, or at least the more compelling ones do. I almost always used potato mines (the single-use instakill plants that take a while to sprout), but if the challenge parameters require you to not lose a single plant, then using that plant will end the level once it dies off.

I think anyone who liked the first game owes it to themselves to at least try PvZ2 (it's free, anyway), run through the first set of 11 Egypt levels, and then start going through the challenges that you need to unlock the second world of levels. Give yourself an hour to try it and decide for yourself.
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The bolded is the crux of the problem. Not so much from a playing the game perspective, but from a designing the game perspective.

A traditional game where you pay up front for the entire game is going to be designed from the perspective of delivering the player with the best experience possible. An appropriate challenge at an appropriate pace, balanced by the designer so that things are earned in the right order, at the right time, for the right amount of effort. (Granted, there are plenty of examples where this is done badly, but that doesn't change the original intent.)

A F2P game like PvZ2, on the other hand, is designed to take the above philosophy and turn it on its ear, so that rather than delivering the player the best experience they can out of the box, the designers build the game to tease the player with that experience, locking the things the player wants behind a price tag. Rather than having a game where resources are designed to offer a good play experience, they're designed such that the free resources offer a sub-optimal experience, with the (sometimes) optimal or (more commonly) way beyond optimal experience being right there at the player's fingertips for a small fee.

It's almost impossible to play a F2P game designed this way as an optimally-designed experience and even if it is possible, determining that balance is incumbent on the player to figure out ahead of time - a level of metagaming that renders the original game designer obsolete.

At the end of the day, these F2P games aren't really designed to be games. They're designed to be advertisements with built-in storefronts.
 
Brashnir said:
The bolded is the crux of the problem. Not so much from a playing the game perspective, but from a designing the game perspective.

A traditional game where you pay up front for the entire game is going to be designed from the perspective of delivering the player with the best experience possible. An appropriate challenge at an appropriate pace, balanced by the designer so that things are earned in the right order, at the right time, for the right amount of effort. (Granted, there are plenty of examples where this is done badly, but that doesn't change the original intent.)

A F2P game like PvZ2, on the other hand, is designed to take the above philosophy and turn it on its ear, so that rather than delivering the player the best experience they can out of the box, the designers build the game to tease the player with that experience, locking the things the player wants behind a price tag. Rather than having a game where resources are designed to offer a good play experience, they're designed that the free resources offer a sub-optimal experience, with the (sometimes) optimal or (more commonly) way beyond optimal experience being right there at the player's fingertips for a small fee.

It's almost impossible to play a F2P game designed this way as an optimally-designed experience and even if it is possible, determining that balance is incumbent on the player to figure out ahead of time - a level of metagaming that renders the original game designer obsolete.

At the end of the day, these F2P games aren't really designed to be games. They're designed to be advertisements with built-in storefronts.
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Again, I can understand this from an ideological perspective. There are games like Candy Crush Saga that, as I understand, give that slow drip and then pretty much force players to cross the bridge and spend real money. Or Puzzles and Dragons. I think Brad himself talked about it with Kingdom Rush vs. Fieldrunners 2; Kingdom Rush has IAP but is 100 percent completable and wonderful without spending a cent, as opposed to Fieldrunners 2, which pretty much grinds the shit out of the player toward the end.

So far in PvZ2, though, there isn't any indication that the player is being handicapped by not having these optional plants. Or using any of the optional powerups. Have you played the game at all and felt yourself pushed against a paywall, or are you speaking from a broader theoretical perspective?

Regarding the bolded: agreed. I just think it's something that people should try to experience on their own -- or actually listen to people who are in the process of playing the game to form an opinion on it -- as opposed to a carte blanche denial of anything that involves IAP or is F2P in nature. Again, the game is free; the only real cost to the player is time, and fans of the original should check it out and gauge for themselves whether they think the game is worth a time investment. It's entirely possible that I can come back in a few days and say "Fuck this game, it requires Torchwood and Snow Pea to actually push through the final level and you need to grind out coins out the wazoo to use powerups," but it's also possible that the game has been balanced well enough not to need it. It's not like the original PvZ was particularly challenging; hell, I finished it, and I'm not the greatest at TD games.
 
Clunker said:
Again, I can understand this from an ideological perspective. There are games like Candy Crush Saga that, as I understand, give that slow drip and then pretty much force players to cross the bridge and spend real money. Or Puzzles and Dragons. I think Brad himself talked about it with Kingdom Rush vs. Fieldrunners 2; Kingdom Rush has IAP but is 100 percent completable and wonderful without spending a cent, as opposed to Fieldrunners 2, which pretty much grinds the shit out of the player toward the end.

So far in PvZ2, though, there isn't any indication that the player is being handicapped by not having these optional plants. Or using any of the optional powerups. Have you played the game at all and felt yourself pushed against a paywall, or are you speaking from a broader theoretical perspective?

Regarding the bolded: agreed. I just think it's something that people should try to experience on their own -- or actually listen to people who are in the process of playing the game to form an opinion on it -- as opposed to a carte blanche denial of anything that involves IAP or is F2P in nature. Again, the game is free; the only real cost to the player is time, and fans of the original should check it out and gauge for themselves whether they think the game is worth a time investment. It's entirely possible that I can come back in a few days and say "Fuck this game, it requires Torchwood and Snow Pea to actually push through the final level and you need to grind out coins out the wazoo to use powerups," but it's also possible that the game has been balanced well enough not to need it. It's not like the original PvZ was particularly challenging; hell, I finished it, and I'm not the greatest at TD games.
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I don't need to spend hours playing the game to see that it was designed with the tease in mind. You can see plenty of evidence from simply looking at the overworld map in the Quick Look. As for the assertion that the only thing you lose by trying is time, that's the rub. I don't have enough gaming time to play all the games I already own. My time is more valuable than the money required to buy a better game.
 
PVZ2 is one of the scummiest things i have ever seen.

While most people will continue to hate EA i will continue to thank them for saving me money. Thanks for continuing with your scummy ways so i can continue to not buy any of your products.

PVZ should of never went F2P and i don't have a problem with F2P when it's done right, this? Not done right. Yeah, it's not as shitty as most F2P ios games but it's pretty fucking scummy.
 
PedroLumpy said:
If I ever even have to ask the question "Did the developer add/tweak this in order to microtransact me?" then they've gone too far.
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Pretty much this, for my part. I'm fine with something like having to pay to unlock more heroes in Marvel Heroes. That makes sense. It's a very simple exchange of value. But when it gets to the point of "Well, there's this arbitrary barrier we've put on your progress, buuuuut if you'd like to maybe purchase some of our value-abstracting Super Coinz for $4.99 then you could get through this an awful lot faster! Or maybe you'd like to spam your Facebook friends instead?" then fuck right off.

Bad free-to-play games give me the same skeezy feeling I get from being in casinos. Regardless of how enjoyable the game might be, I can't get past the feeling that everything in the game exists to psychologically manipulate me.
 
styl3s said:
PVZ2 is one of the scummiest things i have ever seen.

While most people will continue to hate EA i will continue to thank them for saving me money. Thanks for continuing with your scummy ways so i can continue to not buy any of your products.

PVZ should of never went F2P and i don't have a problem with F2P when it's done right, this? Not done right. Yeah, it's not as shitty as most F2P ios games but it's pretty fucking scummy.
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What specifically don't you like about it?
 
The bank has a "pay wall". Some call it a "safe", I think.

Two highly trained ferrets and a solid paywall end-around later... I lost 20 years to Ma Prison.

The ferrets got to live in a nature preserve with Zweebo the Magical Rhinoceros. That's what they call justice, man.

Sigh.
 
I wish they would tell you exact damage numbers of some plants and/or hp stuff. Is a Bloomerang doing full damage on all three zombies hits AND on the return trip? The thing I enjoy most about PvZ2 is discovering the plant food abilities for every plant. Some are amazingly useful! Having a repair button for your wall-nut is great.
 
rudds said:
It's not just the deceptive labeling on the transactions. The game also takes several of the fan-favorite plants from the first game and puts them individually behind paywalls that cost more than some entire games on the App Store. It's just an ugly value proposition all around.
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The store is absolutely gross, but worse is the fact that it clearly influenced game design. There's no way that you would be required to go back and replay levels if it weren't for that $5 door. This went from a game that I would have gladly bought to a game that I literally will not download for free. Good job, EA.
 
SteveWinwood said:
The fact that you need an article to avoid all the payments in a free to play game sounds like a problem to me.
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Some things need to be clarified, for better or for worse. But it seems that any argument for or against the game is completely disregarded by those who aren't willing to give the opposite opinion a shot - so maybe your right that it's pointless? It's not really avoiding payments (by navigating anywhere), it's just ignoring them.

edit: For the record, I understand that the model itself is gross. I just think the game is worth giving a try though. This model is disgusting, but it's clear that it's not going anywhere. Plenty of value for free to me.
 
SteveWinwood said:
The fact that you need an article to avoid all the payments in a free to play game sounds like a problem to me.
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But you really don't. It's not like the article is imparting any real wisdom. The whole can be summed up with, "How to not spend money in PvZ 2? Don't buy anything and play the game." The one thing they do address that is actual "news" is that every plant listed to buy can be earned through playing except for one so the complaints about having to spend $20 for the six plants behind the paywall are silly as that's the usual option for those that'd rather get them earlier than later. Of course that could be handled in game a little better by having a notification state that they can be earned later in the game.

Free-to-play games obviously are intended to get people to spend money because it makes zero sense for a publisher to make a game that would never earn them anything back. I honestly think it's pretty ridiculous that people get upset over them putting in options for people that wish to spend the money to get through the game easier/quicker when their still leaving the content in there for everyone to play through if you choose to not pay any money. Instead of restricting actual content practically everything to pay for is to simply speed up the process of progression (aside from the one plant that is purchase-only).

Consider it this way. If the game came out and they removed all of the IAP but everything else remained the same (needed 15 stars to progress to the next world, random keys drop over time to unlock gates, etc.) would people think it's the scummiest thing they've ever seen? Of course not. I wonder if those that are complaining and asking why they couldn't put the game out for $5-10 without these free-to-play practices would do a one-time purchase for $5 to get rid of all IAP mentions within the game while keeping everything else the same because that's what they're asking for and writing it like that sounds ridiculous.

Everyone should play the game for themselves instead of jumping to conclusions and then come forth when they run into real issues. My only complaint is that I want a PC version because that's how I played the first game and I played four or five levels on my phone right before this and I don't like trying to play with a tiny screen and mis-clicking things.
 
Wibblewozzer said:
Consider it this way. If the game came out and they removed all of the IAP but everything else remained the same (needed 15 stars to progress to the next world, random keys drop over time to unlock gates, etc.) would people think it's the scummiest thing they've ever seen?
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No, I'd simply think it was absolutely awful game design for no apparent reason from a developer that knows better. The fact is the game wouldn't be designed that way if they didn't need an excuse to make you want to pay to skip bullshit.
 
Lunzio said:
Some things need to be clarified, for better or for worse. But it seems that any argument for or against the game is completely disregarded by those who aren't willing to give the opposite opinion a shot - so maybe your right that it's pointless?
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I'm probably never going to play pvz2. I wasn't a big fan of the first. I just think that when f2p is done right you shouldn't even notice it, and especially not need it. That guide suggests to me it's neither.

I'm gonna go back to dota and super monsters ate my condo now.
 
Archaix said:
No, I'd simply think it was absolutely awful game design for no apparent reason from a developer that knows better. The fact is the game wouldn't be designed that way if they didn't need an excuse to make you want to pay to skip bullshit.
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Then I hope you're always calling down any game that sets up gates based off of collected items because there's loads of full retail games that gate things in this same way. Should you have been able to do any level you wanted in Mario 64 from the outset? Most platformers used this exact concept following Mario 64. But so do things like Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit and many games from other genres.

The only reason people are upset about this is because the option is there to spend money to get through the content quicker. If that wasn't there nobody would care because we've played games this way for well over a decade.

There's already been good impressions posted in this thread about how the challenge levels to earn more stars are a great way to add more variety and it's not just mindlessly replaying beaten levels to grind away in a free-to-play game. It's a content full game that offers ways to skip through content more easily by paying money. Yet people seem upset that a free-to-play game has any sort of method to earn money however easy it is to ignore it and play through all the content without spending a cent. There's people in this thread prepared to pay $5-10 (or more?) for PvZ 2 yet as soon as they hear the game is free-to-play they start tearing it down with the idea the game will try to get some money from them.

Also, most people are posting purely from hypotheticals. Once people start getting further into it and everyone's running into a wall because the difficulty ramps up so high that you feel you're being pushed to purchase stuff then the arguments will make some sense. But as it is people aren't actually playing the game. They're simply bitching.
 
Wibblewozzer said:
Then I hope you're always calling down any game that sets up gates based off of collected items because there's loads of full retail games that gate things in this same way. Should you have been able to do any level you wanted in Mario 64 from the outset? Most platformers used this exact concept following Mario 64. But so do things like Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit and many games from other genres.

The only reason people are upset about this is because the option is there to spend money to get through the content quicker. If that wasn't there nobody would care because we've played games this way for well over a decade.

There's already been good impressions posted in this thread about how the challenge levels to earn more stars are a great way to add more variety and it's not just mindlessly replaying beaten levels to grind away in a free-to-play game. It's a content full game that offers ways to skip through content more easily by paying money. Yet people seem upset that a free-to-play game has any sort of method to earn money however easy it is to ignore it and play through all the content without spending a cent. There's people in this thread prepared to pay $5-10 (or more?) for PvZ 2 yet as soon as they hear the game is free-to-play they start tearing it down with the idea the game will try to get some money from them.

Also, most people are posting purely from hypotheticals. Once people start getting further into it and everyone's running into a wall because the difficulty ramps up so high that you feel you're being pushed to purchase stuff then the arguments will make some sense. But as it is people aren't actually playing the game. They're simply bitching.
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You do hit on part of it, Mario 64 holds your progression back based on skill. Many other games these days, both Free 2 play and Full price titles, will hold your progression back based on grinding. As you say, one is good, the other is bad.

But there is another problem with typical microtransaction implementation. When certain gameplay elements like weapons, abilities, or one-shot consumables especially, are put behind microtransactions, it effectively destroys the difficulty curve. Something like 'Very Hard' difficulty means a very different thing when you can potentially spend a bunch of money to buy yourself better abilities, some screen clearing smartbombs, score multipliers, and a couple extra lives let's say. Which then robs beating that difficulty of meaning as there is no longer a consistent challenge. As you grind, or as you spend money, that 'Very Hard' difficulty no longer means the same thing.
 
PedroLumpy said:
You do hit on part of it, Mario 64 holds your progression back based on skill. Many other games these days, both Free 2 play and Full price titles, will hold your progression back based on grinding. As you say, one is good, the other is bad.

But there is another problem with typical microtransaction implementation. When certain gameplay elements like weapons, abilities, or one-shot consumables especially, are put behind microtransactions, it effectively destroys the difficulty curve. Something like 'Very Hard' difficulty means a very different thing when you can potentially spend a bunch of money to buy yourself better abilities, some screen clearing smartbombs, score multipliers, and a couple extra lives let's say. Which then robs beating that difficulty of meaning as there is no longer a consistent challenge. As you grind, or as you spend money, that 'Very Hard' difficulty no longer means the same thing.
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Likely my last post on this as I realize most people aren't really looking to consider other opinions on the matter but I mainly agree with you here. But it remains to be seen if the content reaches a point where it becomes simply impossible without using power ups to earn all the stars and complete everything or not. Since coins can be earned through grinding frugal use of power ups (used by spending coins) there's at least some likelihood that you'll have them if needed but I do agree that those aren't a great gameplay element when something is impossible without using them. There's two ways things can go:

- The bad way would be how Rock Band Blitz handled their power ups. It was similar in that you spent an in-game currency to use power ups and these power ups directly influenced your score so to get the best scores/rankings you had to always use power ups but before the game was patched you spent more than you earned anytime you replayed a song meaning that people were grinding in-game currency by replaying levels without power ups earning sub-optimal scores/ranks just to get a chance to then use power ups while aiming to set new high scores. This was absolutely terrible and they eventually patched it after enough people complained.

- The other way it could go is much like rage meters in games like God of War. Essentially the power ups and rage meters are the same. The currency is earned behind the scenes by fighting and once the meter is full you can spend it on the power up. But it's designed so that you don't have to rely on it if you play well enough. Obviously they don't design encounters with the rage meter in mind so everything is surmountable without it but you can choose to use it when you want to relieve some pressure or when you come across something that's troubling for you while others may not find it as difficult.

Until people either run into that wall or cross it and complete everything possible we won't really know where the game stands in terms of being tuned for difficulty. This is less about having the power ups there and more about how the developer's handled difficulty tuning.
 
Wibblewozzer said:
Then I hope you're always calling down any game that sets up gates based off of collected items because there's loads of full retail games that gate things in this same way. Should you have been able to do any level you wanted in Mario 64 from the outset? Most platformers used this exact concept following Mario 64. But so do things like Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit and many games from other genres.
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I think the problem is that when a free to play game does something like this (and gives you a way to buy your way past the gate), you have to wonder whether the decision was made because of the business model. They might have made the game the same way had it been sold for $10 or something, but the fact that the free to play model even makes me think about things like that when I just want to enjoy a game is one of my big problems with it.
 
sixghost said:
I think the problem is that when a free to play game does something like this (and gives you a way to buy your way past the gate), you have to wonder whether the decision was made because of the business model. They might have made the game the same way had it been sold for $10 or something, but the fact that the free to play model even makes me think about things like that when I just want to enjoy a game is one of my big problems with it.
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There's no need to wonder. As soon as you see a dollar value attached to something that affects the difficulty or time requirement of a game, there is a 100% certainty of why it was put there. And if they dangle it right in the UI in front of you as soon as you hit that wall, there's also a 100% certainty that it was intentionally put there for very cynical reasons.

A game can have difficulty spikes and grinding elements without cynical intentions, but there is no way you can convince me that any of these F2P games use them for genuine game mechanics reasons. When the marketing and monetization of a game comes before the design of the game itself, that can only ever serve to undermine the game mechanically.
 
The best thing about that video is I think I have only gotten "E SPORTS WHAAAAA" ads and the occasional xbox one on GB for months.

Those e sports adverts are the worst.
 
Man, that PvZ2 QL made me so sad.

I actually don't mind the monitization system PopCap (or EA) added to PvZ1 which you pay for the game up front, and then there's a unobtrusive microtransaction system to buy coins to purchase extra modes or upgrades in the game. These are coins you get pretty easily through general play of the game and you can still easily get most if not all the upgrades without grinding (aka good game design).
I've actually put money into the PvZ1 game to buy some extra coins and was perfectly happy with what I got out of it.

PvZ2 is like having your annoying friend hovering over your shoulder all the time offering to help you beat the game your playing every seconds. "Hey man, stuck on this level? I can help you out with that!"
Except in this case it's even worse because it's NOT your friend and you have to pay him to help you out.

I don't even mind requiring going back and collecting stars to unlock worlds since I'll probably want to do that anyways, BUT I think it's pretty shitty game design to force people to do that if they are the type of players that don't want to do that and would prefer to just play through the levels once and still get to see everything.

To make everything worse: I think the game looks great, I'm excited to play with the new plants and powers, and the new enemy types look like they mix things up nicely.
But as I don't own an iOS device and I hate how poorly the in-game transactions are presented to players, I just have to hope that there's a non-F2P version for Vita, 3DS, PC, or Android that will remove all the in-game purchases.
I will pay a full standard game price of $50 to do nothing more than to get a copy of this game without all of the real money store crap.
...But since they already have $100 individual "micro" transactions in the game already, I don't see much hope of a normal version of this game releasing any time soon. Not until they've rung every cent out of the iOS and Android markets first.
 
Rodney McKay said:
I don't even mind requiring going back and collecting stars to unlock worlds since I'll probably want to do that anyways, BUT I think it's pretty shitty game design to force people to do that if they are the type of players that don't want to do that and would prefer to just play through the levels once and still get to see everything.
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Those levels that Brad unlocked in the quick look are different challenges than what he played before and are not just the same thing that he played before.
 
I watched the latest spookin with scoops last night, and boy he did not like that one game with the jump scares. I agree with him though. That shit was cheap and they didn't earn the scare. Garbage ass game.
 
Megasoum said:
I love that like 75% of the comments on that blog are "Join Giantbomb" lol.
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He would be a great fit but man it is so hard to go back. I was thinking of people who have left te press side for dev and gone back and Navarro/Rorie are about the only two I can think of.
 
renitou said:
Jeff Green, Jeff God.
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sshot1tmsew.png
 
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