[casual_games] Jonathan Blow interview: Do you believe social games are evil? “Yes. Absolutely.”

[Bryan Wagstaff]

Quoting oscar is oscar <oscar.oscar.oscar at gmail.com>:


> Wondering if anyone has an opinion on Mr. Blow's statement. See the

> full article at the link below. ;)

>


Having read the entire article (not just the headline or the quote), I  
think the more accurate excerpt from the article would be the  
paragraph below:

They know when they show up in the office – "My goal is to degrade the  
player’s quality of life". They probably won’t think about that exact  
phrase. But [will think], "My goal is to get people to think about my  
game and to put more money into my game and get other friends to play  
my game to the exclusion of all other games and all other things that  
they might do with their free time." That is the job description of  
those designers. And that’s evil.



In that respect, I completely agree.  There are many games that seem  
to be designed to extract money and time rather than to benefit  
players.  I wouldn't have used the word "evil", perhaps I would prefer  
the phrase "the bad side of capitalism".

We've all seen the arcade games designed to maximize the quarters  
placed in the machine.

We know of the MMO games where some people focus on how to keep  
subscribers paying rather than improve player experience.

And we've seen the social games that spam your friends and effectively  
encourage you to sign in at fixed interval to maintain your farm,  
designed not for player fun but for continuous exposure and revenue.

So yes, but some definition, many social games are evil.  But they are  
certainly not alone.