Well there are the two types of "free" to play games, the ones that are malware and the ones that are "Pay" to win.

With the latter, I think people are mostly aware of how much they spend in the "Pay" to win games even if it's just for cosmetic items. The most common argument I hear is that it's no different than spending $3.00 on a coffee or a snack and it gives roughly the same amount of value, it's just a digital asset.

From what I've heard, a big issue is kids playing on their parents' phones and just clicking OK to all the in-app coins that they need to continue playing. And then at the end of the month, the parents receive a $2000 credit card bill and are shocked.

Here's an example of a "game" that is basically gambling for kids: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/coin-master/id406889139

And here's the class action lawsuit where I heard about it: https://www.classaction.org/news/coin-master-mobile-casino-g...

Here's another game that looks like it was for kids, but is actually a "social casino": https://apps.apple.com/us/app/coin-kingdom/id1462733996

Or this one: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/piggy-boom/id1129050711 "I am completely hooked on this game! I absolutely love it! I spend more money on this game than I do my own self! It’s worth it though!"

Also, this article is excellent: https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/monetizing-children

"the design technique that Zynga describes as “fun pain”, the idea is to inflict some very uncomfortable situation on a player in their game, and then offer to remove that situation in return for money. While the vast majority of adults will make the assessment that it is in their best interest to not spend the money and to just exit the application that is designed to hurt them, it is biologically harder to come to this conclusion if the decision maker is a child."

"retailers will sell Zynga time cards for cash to children of any age, without the presence of an adult"

Kind of like AT&T’s “Unlimited” plans. AT&T just has better lawyers.

It looks to me that this is a similar concept to those malicious “virus alert” websites that instruct you to call someone in India. Then (after some fearmongering, and maybe bullying) they commandeer your computer, run netstat, and tell you that you have viruses that only an expensive yearly subscription can fix.

I also have to wonder how many people are outright ignorant about iOS’s subscription cancellation menus. The menu is kind of hidden away in the Settings app. Not only that, but in my experience, subscriptions through iOS show up as charges from Apple on bank statements; no indication of what you were charged for. Hell, even payments to the Apple Store for physical products show almost the same nomenclature, with no indication that it’s a different type of purchase.

> Kind of the same as all those "free" to play games.

Free to play isn't a scam. They're free to play. You can choose to spend money if you'd like.

Yes, but without the word "play" (because you can't play it without paying for it), it becomes "free to", which doesn't make any sense, or if you DO pay money, it becomes "to play" which sounds like toupee. Which is another kind of scam, if you think about it. Free to play is a scam if you need to pay to actually win, except that relies on Apple's review process being any good, but as we see here, that's clearly not true.

> Yes, but without the word "play" (because you can't play it without paying for it),

You can play any F2P game without paying for it.

> it becomes "free to", which doesn't make any sense, or if you DO pay money, it becomes "to play" which sounds like toupee. Which is another kind of scam,

This doesn't make any sense.

> Free to play is a scam if you need to pay to actually win

You don't.

> except that relies on Apple's review process being any good, but as we see here, that's clearly not true.

F2P means it does not cost money to play. All F2P games allow you to play without paying money. These complaints are strange, but definitely founded in some sort of confusion. I would encourage you to downloaded pretty much any F2P game - you'll find you can absolutely play it right away!