I think it is possible to be successful in games without being predatory. Humble Bundle was a demonstration of that.

I don’t believe that ultra-predatory mechanics are long-term sustainable. They usually yield a “ring of fire” effect that creates a growing ring of users for a while but really you’re burning out all your core users and will implode. This is how many describe the original Zynga model.

Supercell (founded around the same time) has cultivated longterm ecosystems and IP by respecting their players.

EGG takes a similar long-term perspective.

>I don’t believe that ultra-predatory mechanics are long-term sustainable

I don't think they're trying to be. I think they're whale hunting, find a few high spenders, and milk them for all they're worth. Then they spin up a new IP (or license one out), rinse and repeat

> Humble Bundle was a demonstration of that.

No idea what it is, but it has double digit million in revenue, across everything. How is it being successful.

It's successful in my opinion by offering really good value with fair practices. It's not a secret, I think.

If you don't consider tens of millions of dollars in revenue a success, your definition of "success" is completely out of whack.

Depends on development cost, no? If game development costs 10s to 100s of millions of dollars, 10 million in revenue is a failure.

It’s not successful for a VC.

VCs are looking for the billion dollar exit. 10s of millions is 100-1000x off what they look for

Yes they are. The implementation tends to differ from how eastern-developed gacha games work, but they're making billions from virtual slot machines nonetheless.

Yeah, I still indulge in video games, and understand that on the surface CSGO skins feel different than Genshin summons, but from 100 feet up it's all the same crap, imo

I do kinda get what you mean, though. Gacha mechanics feel expected in anything western, while 'loot boxes' are still a 'feature' of some games in the east. Eastern studios have definitely noticed, though, and are running the same playbook.

...I think I mixed up East and West oops

Overwatch is not

Didn't they bring back loot boxes?

Yes, but you basically can't pay for them. Revenue is basically all from direct cosmetic sales or the battle passes

I see. You can remove 'Overwatch' from my original comment and the point still stands, but I do appreciate the fact check. I know Blizzard from HearthStone and Diablo....not great experiences with gacha there haha (Diablo Immortal, atleast), but those are far from the most popular Eastern games

The battle pass contains loot boxes though, right?

Yes