x as a service has always been a net negative for the consumer, and a net positive for the seller.
It strips them away from responsibility, because you can sell incomplete dogshit under a promise of future patches, or push something out for a price, and then continue raising the price, as you pump out more stuff into the system.
In the case of games specifically, we’ve all seen the typical outcomes. Low effort slop, with a flood of “micro” transactions at a later date, or complete abandonment
I can’t read anything about this concept without hearing Liz from TrueAnon saying “Bee to bee SaaS” sarcastically
Games as a service has always been a scam. They use literally addictive gambling traps to keep people hooked to a money drip feeder with season passes and loot boxes.
All that only to rip the plug out when the servers are on life support.
Avoid them just like preordering. They are no benefit to the players.
Hard disagree -before it went Free to Play, Team Fortress 2 was a shining example of GaaS! A steady stream of updates and external media that constantly kept that game in the limelight.
Games As A Service is not a scam in and of itself - the issue is the greedy people often behind them.
before it went Free to Play
well that’s the thing, it went free to play. Pretty classic enshittification arc.
well that’s the thing, it went free to play. Pretty classic enshittification arc.
I don’t remember any one thing getting worse with TF2 after that change. What would be enshitified for it? Microtransaction cosmetics? I’ve never had a problem with those, as long as they are just cosmetic. If they change the balance of a game though, I simply refuse to play those games.
to me, loot boxes/crates are an unethical gamifying of monetization, even if it’s only for cosmetic items.
At least with Team Fortress 2 they have always had dedicated servers you can host yourself. Most GaaS never provide a server that you can run and host yourself.
One shiny red apple on a pile of rotting fruit does not make an apple pie.
Games as a service was always enshittification wearing a trench coat. TF2 and MMOs back in the day were merely bait.
they weren’t intentional bait, the MBAs just hadn’t invented all the ways to scam users with it yet.
Hard disagree -before it went Free to Play, Team Fortress 2 was a shining example of GaaS!
How was TF2 (pre-FTP) a GaaS? I bought it in the Orange Box for a one-time cost. Where is the as-a-service component to that business model you’re citing?
They performed multiple free content updates over several years. I believe Gabe is quoted as saying the GaaS model had replaced the episodic model for them, the idea being that they weren’t selling a product, but a service that would continue passed the exchange of funds. We saw that in their games during that period like Left 4 Dead 1/2 as well.
As time has gone on, we’ve seen approaches to the idea morph to the anti-consumer versions we see and associate with the name, but there was a time when it wasn’t a negative.
I don’t think Unreal Tournament 2004 would have been considered live service just because they occasionally gave out a free new map. It was a form of marketing for the thing they already made. TF2 at least was a product when they sold it up front before it was free to play, when it had no microtransactions and they weren’t the goal for getting paid for having made TF2.
I think you may be using a different definition of GaaS than mine. My definition includes a regular fee to play or a subscription as a continuous revenue generation from the product. From your replies I don’t think your definition does. That leaves me more confused about your definition.
What is your definition of Games-as-a-Service?
When I think of Games as a Service, I think of things like:
"The crux of the Newell’s address focused on the concept that direct communications with customers, transparency, and constant updates are the best ways to maximize profits from a product. In this way, Valve views its products as a service rather than a finished project. When the company shipped Team Fortress 2, work wasn’t done. Rather, the team said, “Now we can start.” The team has then gone on to ship 63 updates – which include anything from bug fixes to new game modes – to the game in just over 14 months. This can directly result in increased sales that would normally taper off over time. As Newell put it, “When you want to promote your product, you’re going to use your customers to reach new customers.” " https://www.ign.com/articles/2009/02/19/dice-2009-keynote-gabe-newell
Games as a Service I think of as an overarching concept based around the idea of service not stopping at the point of sale. After that, the different approaches are almost “sub-classifications”.
There are those games that are touted as “Live Services” - when I use that term, I think of games that provide ongoing content, and maintains the game servers in exchange for varying streams of income. These are games that will typically “stop working” when the official servers go down. I consider games like Anthem and Loadout to be examples of Live Services in this respect. Games like World of Warcraft I consider Live Services, but I go one further and call those “subscription services”, since they require the subscription to play and in theory this is the main income that funds the game staying online.
The way I see it, all Live/Subscription Services fall under the Games as a Service banner, but not all Games as a Service will necessarily be either. To me, it’s more nuanced than one general classification, especially with the way things blend together these days; games can have multiple income streams (subscription, microtransactions, battlepasses, season passes, so on), as well as multiple forms of content delivery (free updates, expansions, DLC).
The lines have been blurred further with “early access” and “incomplete” titles being released that have constant content updates simply to get to a release state. However, these types of games have those stars that typically shine through. Such as No Mans Sky or (contentiously) Fallout 76.
tl;dr To me GaaS is the literal idea of treating games as more than a one-time product, but evolution in how content is delivered and monetized have lead to many different approaches. Unfortunately, the normalized ones (the maliciously monetized and despair-inducing) are so far apart from the “good ones” like L4D2, that it is difficult to consider that they are both actually examples of “Games as a Service”.
It’s long and I’m sorry.
Funnily enough, I want an offline addicting loot machine to play with podcasts or youtube. That’s why I play arpgs, but only-only games, for money? FUCK NO!
It’s just the basic logic of maturing market. They couldn’t really increase the game prices that much more without affecting demands, nor could they improve efficiency of making games (the capital costs and team sizes have only gotten up) so they did the thing they could. Try to turn games from a product that the sell into a service they provide and can therefore lock people into their walled gardens and keep continuously charging fees and subscriptions. Too bad games are more of an art form than a news paper or a some tool maintenance contract is.
Games as a service is a piece of shit except for I can’t figure out how Helldivers 2 could function as anything else and that game is my favorite
Games as a service could work. The issue is that making money isn’t enough. You need to be making more money every year and bean counters have hijacked games as a way to squeeze as much money as possible from players.
It’d function the way it does on PC, which is to say, as a product, not a subscription locked service.
I wish I could buy warbonds on floppies
The problem is not the functionality, it’s the business model.
