jackinthebox

I was watching the Game Dungeon episode on the Division yesterday, and something Ross said got me thinking. Then I started thinking about the "Games as a Service" is FRAUD video, and GDs like Battleforge and The Secret World (Relavent timestamps embedded in the links. Yeah, I am one of those weirdos who watches old AF videos with some frequency). (EDIT also I removed the secret world link, but it'll come up later in this essay) I'm pretty sure I see a pattern here, and I think I see why. 1. Company makes a game. 2. Company sets up that game to depend on a central server. 3. Company starts selling that game for money. 4. Company starts giving that same game away for free. 5. Company shuts down the central server, killing the game. I have begun to wonder, do companies give games away for free in order to avoid legal liabilities after shutting the game down? This feels tricky and lovecraftian, in the way that only modern laws can be, but follow me here. If they didn't sell you a product but merely let you experience it and then they shut it down at a later time, they didn't steal from you. They didn't sell you a product for money and then destroy it after the point of sale. They could frame it like a free art show - at some point the exhibit has to close. As a "free service to the public", they don't make enough money to pay for the rent to keep those paintings up all the time! This was just a temporary thing! Ross even even agrees* with this in his Fraud video, because it might hurt creativity. "People will want to experiment with concepts and throw bad experiments out sometimes." (I mean, Flash was a heartbreaking end for me - yes I know it had security problems, but I still don't understand why that couldn't be fixed - but indeed, all of those games that died were not games that were *sold* to me. Still, it was like watching a company bulldoze a historic area of the internet to make room for a parking lot (this was caused by Chrome, right? I remember Chrome being part of that story). Homestar Runner, Weebls Stuff, Newgrounds, Go To Hell, Salad Fingers, and the works of Adam Phillips, they all hold a place in my heart. A colorful, weird, unsettlingly creepy place in my heart ...What was I talking about? Oh yeah.) (*Now Ross did add the qualifier of it being *truly* free. Free to play games let you buy collectables or items to improve the game. Maybe an art show might sell you some kind of special title while you're there. Or a better example, a concert. We buy "seats" at a concert, and some seats are better than others. I've actually been to a few concerts where a lot of people can listen for free, and even watch the concert for free, but if you want the better seats you have to pay up. But you don't get to pick up that seat and take it with you out of the concert. I bet companies would probably be able to be like "you wanna keep your specially purchased sword from the Free to Play game? well here - we included the 3d model and code in this email. Enjoy your sword." Don't get me wrong, I wanna preserve games, I just think Free to Play, Free to Win, and "Freemium" games will be a much bigger battle, like streaming only games.) EDIT: sorry for swapping the above two sections around, I think they have better flow this way Now, what if a game company decides to start making a game free to play? Nothing illegal or even immoral about that (assuming they've paid their workers well enough, and there aren't contracts regarding percentages of revenue based on copyrighted content that's included in it. Which is probably another thing to look into on this... (EDIT: Like, can underpaid employees sue their employer for not selling the product they make at a higher price?)). I mean, if you have a department store selling wool socks all winter long, you make decent money. When spring hits, you might have some wool socks left that are harder to get rid of at full price. You wouldn't punish a store for selling socks at 50% off, would you? 75%? That could be a nice deal for people who couldn't afford them before! And they get out of your store and stop cluttering your shelves! Granted, videogames are code, but your servers take up space! (which makes me wonder if *selling* the server software prior to a game shutdown is a solution companies, gamers, and the law could agree to, but that would probably have a host of other issues). I'm getting way off track here. So a 75% off sale is perfectly legal! What about 100% off? They're just doing this out of the goodness of their heart. We made enough money off of the paying customers. You couldn't sue because you purchased socks during the winter, and then in springtime found out you could have saved money by waiting, could you? So you can't sue us for giving away to someone else something that you bought for like, 60 bucks last year, right? This is my thinking. They give away the game, and maybe wait until they have enough customers to make the argument that it was mostly a given-away game. Maybe the paying customers are compared legally to something like a kickstarter campaign, or early access, like front-row concert tickets. Or maybe they give away the game to hurt the profits just enough to show that the game was a statistically significant loss, or was about to become a loss (nevermind that it going out for free was an intentional decision). I mean, no incoming profits are certainly lower than whatever it costs to keep a server running. Then they shut down the game, claiming either that it was a free service (for the most part) or costing more money than it was making (because of their own decisions). Heck, that could even happen with significant markdowns, even if they said the game would run *forever* (EDIT: Hmmm, what could that be?). They sell the game at first to make a profit, then give it away for free later in order to allow them more legal freedom to kill it. They operate like a business for a while, have a 100% off sale, and then claim they're going out of business or were never a business in the first place (EDIT: It sounds like a Looney Toons kind of legal practice to me, but laws allow for all kinds of crazy loopholes if you're ambitious enough). Again, I want to preserve games. I think they're on the hook for at least the copies of the game that they sold. I'm just trying to put myself in their heads so I can understand why they do this. Hey, maybe it's a genuinely positive practice to get games out for free - maybe the artists and creators find out about a planned shutdown date, and *insist* on it's free release so they can reach as many people as possible before the company throws the game in a vault like Disney or burns it at the stake/buries it in the desert like E.T.. I don't know though, I more think it's a malicious decision on the company's part. I wonder if they could still get into legal trouble for doing this, especially if they've done this more than once. Like, these excuses are to protect them from liability at multiple points in the progression of this practice - when they're giving it away for free, it's just a sale, then when they're killing the game, they weren't making any money, or most of the customers didn't pay - but if they've done this in the past, you could make a convincing case that it's a pattern of behavior. Plus, you could also probably really mess up this excuse by people boycotting a free to play game, with a court saying “Yes, you sold the game, and then you gave it away for free. But nobody played it for free, all of the customers were paying ones. Thus all of the customers are entitled to a working game.” I don't know. What are your thoughts? My thinking is that maybe courts can't handle it, because they tend to only deal with crimes long after they happen, and the excuses might be working so far. But regulatory agencies in governments could probably set a policy that would make this impossible, because they don't have to wait for a crime to happen, or worry as much about the logic of the regulations. So long as it's not unconstitutional or against the primary governing principles of the country or counter to the administration in power at the time, regulatory agencies can do what they want. Anyway, sorry for the rant, I get chatty after caffeine. And as a wise man (several of them in fact**) once said, "if I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter." Lemme know your thoughts. Best Wishes, John **John Green, Churchill, Pascal, Thoreau, Cicero... Probably alot of others

You seem like a fellow who's played a bunch of this game. I just started. At first, i could play solo, which was great for getting to know the game. But later on i accidentally put it in multiplayer mode and i just dont wanna play like that. how do i get back to solo mode?

Dear Ross, In a recent live stream, I wanted to ask if you take regular days off: days where you have nothing to do except relax and enjoy life. Well before I even asked, you answered by saying that you haven't really had a day off (or maybe time off) since you were in your 20s, and that you were going to take a vacation. This was simultaneously heartening and horrifying for me: heartening to hear that you were going to take a vacation, but horrifying that you haven't for so long. And I wasn't the only one, based on the responses to "A Drastic Proposal: Time Off for Ross" and "Ross, take off as much time as you want, screw those redditors!" So this is an open letter directly to you, to encourage you to take it easy. Or, if you have trouble doing that because of habit or financial necessity, try to take it easier. I put a poll on the "Drastic Proposal" thread, asking people if you should take more time off, or none at all. Well some 92% of people thought you should at least take more time off, and 86% of people thought you should get 1 day off a week after chores PLUS vacation time and holidays. Some responders went further than I did. The goal of that poll and this letter was never to manage your time for you - since mad people tend to have odd ways of managing our madness, and turning it into entertainment. But there is an overarching goal of all of this: TAKE IT EASIER. Please take MORE vacations, MORE days off, and MORE time to celebrate your favorite holidays. This is partly for your benefit, but its also a selfish desire: well-rested creators can be more creative. It's hard to come up with jokes when you're sleep deprived! It's hard to get time to explore games if you're constantly worrying about your work. It's hard to make excellent work if you're missing time with those you love. So I think the easier you take it, the better your videos will be (not that they don't rock already. There's a reason you have a cult-like fanbase). But again, this isn't totally selfish: even if the quality or the frequency of uploads suffer, I would still support you taking more time off. Now this is long enough already, so most of what follows will be quotes from other people. I'm not the only one who feels this way. I'll be pulling this list from the comments on those two above links, but if I email I'll also pull comments from the reddit letter and the mirror on the Accursed Farms forum too. Hope you have a kickass vacation, and that you're neglecting to read this while hanging out on a Polish beach somewhere. Best Wishes, A Loyal Fan (jack_hectic/jackinthebox/Professor Newman) P.S. If you only read one comment from your fans, read this suggestion from u/RCDv57. It may be useful especially for a unique creator like you: P.P.S. The quotes! To start with, a comment from b14ckm4g1c on the forums: And another from there by Interlinked: As for reddit, there's u/_TickleMeElmo_: Finally, the best ideas came from u/RCDv57. I included his best idea all the way back up as the first P.S., but here it is in full: P.P.P.S. I may be emailing this to Ross as well, to make sure he sees it at some point.

ALRIGHT, SO THE FINAL VOTE COUNT IS IN: Somewhere in the middle: 5 votes GET BACK TO WORK MAGGOT!: 7 votes Let Ross eat time off: 76 votes That comes out to 86% in favor of the rough amount of time off i wanted to recommend, and only 8% of folks against. And I bet even they were just joking around, not really serious. I would love to hear your all's input on the stuff we talked about there. A Drastic Proposal: Time Off for Ross

FOUND IT!

I'm guessing it isnt a GD episode, as I've watched and rewatched all of those multiple times probably a videochat (one of the very very few you watched) or a random video

Did he get a honeymoon? I'm a fairly new fan, only for like... Maybe 2-3 years?

You all might be surprised at how reddit is reacting to a proposal I made there for Ross to take EVEN MORE time off, on a regular basis. I'm totally on board with him taking all the time he wants, but he seems like he won't unless we like, pressure him to take it easy and relax. If you wanna see the response I'm getting though, check out A Drastic Proposal: Time Off for Ross. So far, people overwhelmingly support him being a nicer boss to himself.

It's my first post. Lemme know if linking to videos is okay or not. Anyway- You guys seen this guy's video? Explained one problem with 3d things. I figure Ross already know this, but... maybe he doesn't! Also, this isnt ripping on 3D, this is more calling attention to a thing to be fixed/thought about when one is making 3d things. The TLDR of the video though is, don't have anything appear closer to the viewer than the screen is. the screen is the hard limit of the closest an object should be. Everything should sink back into the screen, rather than pop out from it. Otherwise... "Why 3D sucks - the vergence accommodation conflict" by Steve Mould