Death to Video Games: The Rise of the āLive Serviceā
In reading the chapter for this week, I was somewhat amusedĀ at how outdated it was, even only being two or three years old. Itās fun to look back at when Virtual Reality was the wave of the future for the games industry, only for the major platform holders to put out a wave of first generation VR headsets and move on, often with only minimal support for the hardware they created. I have no doubt that VR will return when the technology reaches a point where these headsets can become more affordable and create less health problems for their users, but for now, itās easy to see that the games industry is going the way of theĀ ālive serviceā.
The live service model of game is, essentially, an attempt to make players engage in fewer products for longer periods of time, all while monetizing them with smaller payments in addition to the price of entry(which now ranges anywhere from $60 - $100). You can see this most easily in multiplayer games. Games like Destinty 2Ā continually update with new content. This may be daily content, weekly content, or occasional expansions that provide a significant amount of new content to the game for a higher price. This is all in an attempt to keep players attached to the game for longer amounts of time, in the hopes that theyāll give in to monetization efforts.
Monetization comes in a few key forms. Games today have a price of entry, but in addition to that will offer smallerĀ āmicro-transactionsā for items within the game, often items with cosmetic value. In addition to micro-transcations, these types of games may offerĀ āloot boxesā, essentially paying for a chance to get a random item, rather than buying the item directly. Loot boxes have been maligned for essentially being a gambling mechanic that preys on addictive behavior, and in fact some countries like Belgium have moved to ban loot boxes in games outright, but for now, they are an unfortunate part of the industry. Live services are the perfect breeding ground for micro-transactions and loot-boxes, as the longer players play, the more likely they are to at some point give in to these monetization efforts.
This model of live services has become so succesful, that even story-driven single-player games have given in to it. Games like Assassinās Creed OdysseyĀ which contains little monetization and no multiplayer elements still models itself after a live-service. Daily and Weekly content keeps players engaged, while a series of episodic stoy-arcs are released between December 2018 to Summer 2019, effectively expanding theĀ ālife-spanā of the game well beyond itās 40-80 hour story. For single-player games, this brings the benefit of expanding development time, meaning that the studio can spend more time and budget on a smaller amount of games because players will be engaged with one game much longer than they normally would be. Since the introduction of the live-service model to Assassinās Creed, the series has gone from releasing a new game every year, to a new game every two years. This saves money for Developers, and in theory gives players a higher-quality experience.
Live-Services arenāt necessarily a bad thing. Though they may incentive unethical monetization efforts like loot boxes in multiplayer games, they do have clear benefits for other types of games, namely single-player games. Though it may not be the innovative heardware of Vitual Reality, Live Services are the future for the games industry at this moment. Although in this industry, the future can change very quickly.
