this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2025
249 points (93.7% liked)

Games

39433 readers
1088 users here now

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.

Rules

1. Submissions have to be related to games

Video games, tabletop, or otherwise. Posts not related to games will be deleted.

This community is focused on games, of all kinds. Any news item or discussion should be related to gaming in some way.

2. No bigotry or harassment, be civil

No bigotry, hardline stance. Try not to get too heated when entering into a discussion or debate.

We are here to talk and discuss about one of our passions, not fight or be exposed to hate. Posts or responses that are hateful will be deleted to keep the atmosphere good. If repeatedly violated, not only will the comment be deleted but a ban will be handed out as well. We judge each case individually.

3. No excessive self-promotion

Try to keep it to 10% self-promotion / 90% other stuff in your post history.

This is to prevent people from posting for the sole purpose of promoting their own website or social media account.

4. Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts

This community is mostly for discussion and news. Remember to search for the thing you're submitting before posting to see if it's already been posted.

We want to keep the quality of posts high. Therefore, memes, funny videos, low-effort posts and reposts are not allowed. We prohibit giveaways because we cannot be sure that the person holding the giveaway will actually do what they promise.

5. Mark Spoilers and NSFW

Make sure to mark your stuff or it may be removed.

No one wants to be spoiled. Therefore, always mark spoilers. Similarly mark NSFW, in case anyone is browsing in a public space or at work.

6. No linking to piracy

Don't share it here, there are other places to find it. Discussion of piracy is fine.

We don't want us moderators or the admins of lemmy.world to get in trouble for linking to piracy. Therefore, any link to piracy will be removed. Discussion of it is of course allowed.

Authorized Regular Threads

Related communities

PM a mod to add your own

Video games

Generic

Help and suggestions

By platform

By type

By games

Language specific

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I have been avoiding multiplayer Valve games like Counter-Strike 2 and Team Fortress 2, due to their in-game economies that have created an underage gambling gray market, which Valve has done little about. However, I am on Linux, and the choices for multiplayer shooters are few. Besides, my small boycott is not stopping Counter-Strike 2 from being the most played steam game. Are boycotts really the best solution to stop this epidemic in gaming? How can we best prevent these gambling grey markets and the gaming to gambling addiction pipeline?

(page 2) 45 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Sunsofold@lemmings.world 3 points 2 months ago

If the loot boxes affect your ability to win, don't buy the game. If they are just cosmetic, meh.

But don't stop there. If it has day one DLC, don't touch it. If it has DLC to patch game functions that should be in the base game, don't touch it. If it has any kind of pay to win function, don't touch it. If it has a subscription, don't touch it. If it's a pre-order, don't touch it. If it's put out by a conglomerate publisher that eats real developers and shits out imitations of their IP, don't touch it.

And most of all, teach these things to gamer kids and their parents. Kids are ignorant of the effect their purchases, and parents don't have the time and energy to go learn for themselves. Spreading awareness helps everyone.

[–] abbotsbury@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I've been boycotting CS2 (née CSGO) since November 2019 when they introduced Fortnite skins with annoying voices that you couldn't turn off or disable.

I don't think it has worked but I'm definitely never playing another Valve multiplayer game, they always turn out the same way.

[–] FeelzGoodMan420@eviltoast.org 3 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Video game boycotts are an absolute fucking joke. Especially if organized here. I mean what % of consumers are on Lemmy? Like 0.00000000000000001%? For fuck sake.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] sith@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 months ago
[–] BlackLaZoR@fedia.io 3 points 2 months ago

Just don't play them. You're not going to convince millions of players that lootboxes = bad so they shouldn't play the games they love. But you can just play games from companies that respect their customers.

[–] Vipsu@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

If one wants to play F2P games I would like to recommend the no gatcha challenge. Meaning no gatcha or any in-game purchases. Rewards from forced tutorial pulls can often be sold / deleted or if the first pull isnt random then that doesnt count.

For battle pass games with only cosmetics I encourage to only use default skins, emotes, avatars, frames or etc. It probably annoys a lot of people to get owned by someone wearing "noob" skins.

If the games are still good / enjoyable after these restrictions then they just might be actually good f2p games.

[–] natryamar@lemmy.world 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Do you have nay suggestions?

[–] Vipsu@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

Pretty much any game with gatcha like the Hoyoverse games. These often have some sort of endgame paywall but it could take hours to reach it. If the game is bad or simply unplayable without gatcha its a bad game. Free premium currency can often be used for non-rng non-gatcha stuff.

Competitive games usually only have cosmetics so you can just use default skin, ignore battle pass and focus on getting good and having fun. Some people could even get salty for getting their ass handed to them by someome using default costume.

[–] hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 months ago
[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I pretty much can't play anything any more because I refuse to play anything with loot boxes or timers or in-game currency.

There are very few games on Android you can just buy and play casually to relax for a few hours.

[–] kuberoot@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 2 months ago

As for android games... If you like puzzles like sudoku, check out Simon Tatham's Puzzle collection. Simple ad-free online experience with a varied collection of puzzle games.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] monkeyman69@lemmynsfw.com 2 points 2 months ago
[–] missingno@fedia.io 2 points 2 months ago

I know that I'm one guy, and my purchasing decisions ain't gonna change nothin'. But I still try to vote with my wallet as much as I can in order to feel like I'm doing the right thing. I'm the guy old-fashioned enough to still only buy native Linux games because I don't like the idea of replacing official support with just hoping Proton happens to work, knowing full well that this replacement happened long ago and I am too late to turn back the clock. And I've got a whole list of publishers I will never buy from under any circumstances.

I will never ever ever spend money on gacha, because if I don't know what I'm buying then I'm not buying it. Even putting aside the ethical concerns, that's just a stupid purchase.

But I have a lot of nostalgia for TF2, and I don't know how to reconcile that. They kinda got away with sneaking in gacha before we realized how evil this is. I haven't touched the game in a long time anyway, but if the Heavy Update ever saw the light of day (it won't) or even if they just brought back rd_asteroid (even more not happening), I'd be very tempted and I dunno what I'd do.

There are two gacha games I still play, without spending any money on, while knowing what a hypocrite I am for playing them. Mahjong Soul and Riichi City. They're the two most populated Riichi Mahjong clients - it's either these or Tenhou, but Tenhou isn't in English, hasn't been updated in a long time, paywalls a number of features behind a subscription model, and is steadily losing players to its competitors. If a new client with an ethical business model took off I'd switch in heartbeat, but I can't imagine one would ever take off to a point where I could queue at any time of day and get high-ranking opponents at my level. So I'm kinda stuck with these.

[–] Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 2 points 2 months ago

Wasn't playing them in the first place. Also a Linux gamer, if you want a shooter. Isonzo. Easy Red 2 is alright too, not quite as polished as Isonzo but it does have vehicles in it and is more single player/coop focused than PvP.

Will me not buying lootbox microtransaction bullshit games make any difference to the industry? Almost certainly not. But it really doesn't matter much either. I can buy the few good games instead and just ignore what the rest of the industry is doing.

[–] RedFrank24@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

I'm still waiting for a reliable way to pirate games with micro transactions and lootboxes.

Like, I know Assassin's Creed Odyssey has daily quests and a rotating cash shop, and that must be talking to some sort of server that isn't guaranteed to be there. Surely there's a way to mock that server?

[–] Quill7513@slrpnk.net 2 points 2 months ago

yes, if for no other reason than that they're tricking you into thinking they're more fun than they are. you can have more fun playing other games with actual mechanic designs

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 months ago

I don't play CounterStrike or Team Fortress 2 because I'm not a god damned masochist.

In the end, I'm technically already boycotting them.

[–] pory@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

Just not buying something isn't a boycott. Don't buy bad games, and it's a good idea to include dark patterns in the criteria for what makes a game bad.

[–] SuperSpruce@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 months ago

Definitely boycott paying real money for lootboxes or games with real money lootboxes.

If you're not paying, then it's just a factor to consider, the companies won't care about you much

[–] Katana314@lemmy.world 1 points 2 months ago

I think your voice could actually be better than your wallet on this.

For one, these games are free. So, are you harming the world by playing them and just not buying loot boxes? Minimally, at best. I also advise people enacting boycotts to represent vocal action around them. For instance, I called Target directly about my boycott when they ended DEI hiring.

You can also help lobby politicians to make clear how you feel on the issue. That can put a lot more panic on publishers. Politicians don’t have a strong reason to defend them - often it only gets ignored because they don’t think voters find it a significant issue. Even if you don’t get a federal ban, sometimes you can get state laws like limiting physical advertising; which can also sometimes spread to other states.

Basically, boycotting as a form of inaction, especially when it makes your days boring, isn’t necessarily an effective approach.

[–] Yerbouti@sh.itjust.works 0 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

Yes. And you should boycott Steam because they practically invented gambling for underage. Watch the coffee-something video about it.

Now, 3,2,1 watch all the so-called gamers rip their shirt to defend this evil soulless capitalist business because "they offer a good service and care about gaming blablabla ubisoft bad blablabla".

[–] zipzoopaboop@lemmynsfw.com 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Fut existed for a couple years before TF2 added loot crates, which was 3 years before CS added them

[–] gandolfini_the_grey@lemm.ee 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)
load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments