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InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)E
Posts
59
Comments
237
Joined
3 yr. ago

  • I'm sure it worked for some people, but for me my brain just picked up the super obvious patterns before picking up much spanish.

  • It really is, and it kills me when there are legit good games under there.

    For a few months I played a cool monster catching game where it was like 5v5 style. The amount of cool combos you could do, the emergent game play with that many, each monster having own unique abilities and moves, etc. was so cool! PVP was really good because once you were proper placed, the games were close and often times came down to either a choice in game or realizing a mistake in team building "Why did I only bring one party member that can counter X?? As soon as they got focused down I got rolled by a team built around it!"

    But the pve battles would get harder and harder, but the monsters you could catch weren't getting stronger. So to continue in the main story you had to do events to get new ones, or.... that lovely gacha shop. Eventually in the story the ability to catch new monsters was just removed. You could go back to the early parts to catch the old monsters, but there was maybe one in the main story that was any use once you were to where catching was disabled. Oh and evolving the monsters required you to do events which took.... energy! Oh also chapter 1 of the story didn't require energy to play, and had ability to catch monsters... but later on it did require energy.

    So it opened with this really cool game where you could catch monsters, the fights were fair based on what you could catch, and overall was a fun time. Then slowly but surely every team member would need to be replaced by Gacha monsters (that could only be leveled up by gathering materials from events), and all the infinite play game modes would run out of content, leaving only the game modes that require energy.

    UGH.

  • Yeah I did the Spanish for months and it was like "You're so high level!" but I realized as soon as I stepped back that I mostly had just gotten good at playing their games because they were formatted where the answers were generally obvious, to where I felt like just memorizing key words then trying to read children's books would have been more helpful.

    So yeah they for sure use a dozen dark patterns. Making you feel like your account is valuable, making you feel bad for skipping, giving you bonuses for playing on their schedule, and making you feel better at the language than you are.

  • Oh no! That's so annoying, maybe can help her quit by finding a better version of the game.

    Like stupid match 3/candy crush trash has a million free clones.

  • They said they'll expand to steam eventually, but sounds like they wanted to focus on mobile to start because it has biggest player base and most of the dark patterns are industry norms for mobile.

  • Very much so :( I've played some genuinely really fun games in the top list, but the instant you start playing you can feel what they are about.

    Like I've been playing Warhammer 40k Tacticus. It's really cool!... I'll probably play it for another week or two at most. Every action I take brings up a suggestion for me to buy something. Everything requires energy. There are about 50 different currency types. I get alerts that I've completed quests... that I can't turn in because they are quests only available if you buy the premium Battle pass. Or the ULTIMATE battle pass. Like you unlock a new character and instantly it pops up like "Congrats on your new character, would you like to spend $20 to level them up so they're not useless?"

    It's fun because I'm still unlocking more story content at a decent clip, but as soon as it's a day between 20 second lore drops I'll have to uninstall. Which sucks, because the game play is fun and interesting since it's modeled after the mechanics of 40k with the customization of a video game.

    So yeah, very sad.

  • I mean I think this site goes with "overly broad so you can pick what you want" approach.

    Also the way I'm viewing it, is each individual item is a thread of a dark pattern. Weaved into normal game play it's completely fine. It's just when all the threads of a category come together is it a pattern designed to trigger addiction and over spending.

    Like competition is listed under a category, but if that's the only item in the category, it still has a stellar score and rightfully so and isn't listed as a dark pattern.

  • Well 1 dark pattern doesn't ruin their score or make a dark pattern game. Because like games with random loot where every piece is viable and goes for a fun build like a rogue like is wonderful, but it's a thread of a dark pattern. Alone it's not scary, and can be fun. Combined with time gates, terribly low drop rates, and pay to skip? Suddenly we have a very nasty dark pattern.

  • I mean it is a dark pattern. It drives us to play more even when we're not having fun. How many times have we all done a dungeon 10+ times, not because it's fun, but because we want it to drop the thing?

    But at the same time, if that's the "only" dark pattern, that's probably fine! And it'll most likely get a high score of 3+ on the positive side. But if you combine the random loot with time gate, pay to skip, pay to win, etc. then the score rightfully craters.

    I think the site is good because it empowers us to pick what we actually want to deal with.

  • Hahaha yeah it felt a bit on the nose.

    I'll let you guess how often I completely forget to do an important task.

  • Probably depends on state or whatever what requirements are.

    They had me do a test using a VR headset, and I was like "Oh this will be fun!"

    No, it wasn't. I had to stare at a VR aquarium and press a button based on instructions for 20 minutes like

    "If you see a clown fish, then a blue fish, press the button" or

    "If you hear me say Sturgeon, or you see a clown fish, press the button"

    "Press the button if you hear the name of any fish that isn't a clown fish, or see any fish that isn't a sturgeon"

    Apparently I did VERY poorly on instruction switching, with it taking several minutes between tasks for me to get the instructions down where they like bleed together. Also like little kids would walk in front of me, or a phone would ring, or TVS would flash.

  • I actually went to a science/nature camp as a kid where a pig part was we would catch pot guts (ground squirrels)!

    Almost every animal there had been caught dozens of times. Because they would go in, get peanut butter, be shown to a counselor that would mark that they were caught, then let go. So pretty sure all of them were trap happy since a 100 traps were out in a field 4 months out of the year, every single year.

  • The happiest birthday makes me upset.

    Because his point is so stupid, but I can't argue at all.

    His choice would be a legendary birthday. Your friends would know your birthday before they knew their parents' birthdates.

  • A reasonable policy

  • Sleep five minutes, play five minutes, eat, repeat! Very busy kitty.

  • Aww that's so cute!

  • I mean I still see comics from time to time from his that are amusing.

    At this point I kind of just accept that all long running comics/web comics have some absolute awful arcs/panels. I think I assume it just comes with having to come up with content daily and they probably can't spend a lot of time thinking about it?

  • This is bad and you should feel bad.

    How dare you take the most out of pocket and tone deaf comic and make it a heart breaking political piece?

  • The fact that he took this chance to target a group of innocent immigrants again who have already been the target of death threats as a result of his lies, and then he had the audacity to tell them not to fact check him?

    He's a monster and I can't stand him.