I thought it was an interesting video.
http://www.dorkly.com/embed/61472/extra-credits-how-to-fix-free-2-play
direct video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mhz9OXy86a0
Has anyone here played a F2P, or even a purchased, game that was fun or rewarding to spend some money in?
I've felt extorted a couple of times with F2P games and for the more part I avoid them for that very purpose. Any time I start to play such a game now I will carefully examine the revenue/gameplay model and will decide whether to play based on that.
What gets me is how unreasonable some F2P games are. I realise that some companies (and therefore their employees jobs) are based around earning money from games, but giving the option to spend 100 pounds/euros/dollars for ingame currency which can then be used up within minutes is exploitative and just waiting for a few money rich common sense poor people to become addicted to. By all means have a model which encourages people to pay a few pounds/euros/dollars a week or month, but be responsible about it.
Incidentally I am playing a F2P game at the moment, and have made a few ingame purchases, but I set a limit on those (say, around £10 a month) because otherwise I could clear my bank account and any savings I had within an hour if I wasn't careful.
Path of Exile (https://www.pathofexile.com/shop) has a great and generous F2P model. All microtransactions are cosmetic and have no effect on gameplay. Its generosity makes you *want* to spend money on it rather than feeling coerced to do so.
Some MMOs have tolerable models, too.
This discussion makes me glad that Simutrans is an amateur, open-source project.
Edit: One particularly dislikeable aspect of many free to play models is that they only work if developers artificially disable "modding", which greatly impoverishes the game experience for all.
I picked up Ghost Recon Phantoms, and this is definitely one of those pay-to-win games.
Hopefully, this game reworks its pay vs. free element, because I was surprised to see how little $10 went.
Yes, Ubisoft's contributions to the F2P market are notably lacklustre, especially when they're conversions of well-respected IP.
Another example of this is Rollercoaster Tycoon 4 for iOS (which isn't even free, but has the same terrible microtransactions and gameplay). Review here (http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-04-18-rollercoaster-tycoon-4-mobile-review).
Ditto Dungeon Keeper (http://www.usgamer.net/articles/dungeon-keeper-ios-review-not-a-keeper)...
But it's really not all bad. Hearthstone (http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/) is amazing, and you don't have to buy anything if you don't want to. Dota 2 (http://store.steampowered.com/app/570/) and League of Legends (http://na.leagueoflegends.com/) have generous F2P models. And I can't help but recommend Path of Exile (http://www.pathofexile.com/) again.