skye

I see what you mean, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the context of the question that prompted the statement, and yes when you put it like that I can see how the context can be important. So I did a bit of Googling to see what I could find after I read your reply, and here’s what I found:

From what I can tell this is the first article that broke the news, and it’s a conversation with Philippe Tremblay, the director of subscriptions at Ubisoft. Here’s a long excerpt of the relevant portion:

The question remains around the potential of the subscription model in games. Tremblay says that there is “tremendous opportunity for growth”, but what is it going to take for subscription to step up and become a more significant proportion of the industry?

“I don’t have a crystal ball, but when you look at the different subscription services that are out there, we’ve had a rapid expansion over the last couple of years, but it’s still relatively small compared to the other models,” he begins. "We’re seeing expansion on console as the likes of PlayStation and Xbox bring new people in. On PC, from a Ubisoft standpoint, it’s already been great, but we are looking to reach out more on PC, so we see opportunity there.

"One of the things we saw is that gamers are used to, a little bit like DVD, having and owning their games. That’s the consumer shift that needs to happen. They got comfortable not owning their CD collection or DVD collection. That’s a transformation that’s been a bit slower to happen [in games]. As gamers grow comfortable in that aspect… you don’t lose your progress. If you resume your game at another time, your progress file is still there. That’s not been deleted. You don’t lose what you’ve built in the game or your engagement with the game. So it’s about feeling comfortable with not owning your game.

"I still have two boxes of DVDs. I definitely understand the gamers perspective with that. But as people embrace that model, they will see that these games will exist, the service will continue, and you’ll be able to access them when you feel like. That’s reassuring.

“Streaming is also a thing that works really well with subscription. So you pay when you need it, as opposed to paying all the time.”

Streaming is a distribution method that appears to lend itself to the subscription model, although currently it remains a very niche corner of the business. Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot told GI in June that Ubisoft believes in streaming, but that it needs time. “It’s getting there,” he told us. “Just not as fast as we thought. When you are in a good city with good internet, it’s fantastic. But it’s not the case for everyone. The Nvidia experience, for example, is fantastic, but we thought it would go faster. We’ve learned a lot by working with these services, and we’re using that experience to enhance what we’re doing,”

So yeah it sounds to me like the journalist directly asked how subscription models could become more accepted and normal. It sounds like Philippe Tremblay wants, in particular, for Ubisoft to get in the streaming market, like if you don’t have a powerful enough computer to run a game, pay to stream it from a computer that is.

I’m on your side now I think, but I would maintain that Ubisoft would probably love a future where all games are subscription based, but that would just be speculation on my part only based on my bias against corporations ;3

So yeah I get you now, sorry for pressing you, thanks for bearing with me

if the statement does accurately represent the position of Ubisoft as a company, why is the context important? What is the context that would improve peoples’ perception of Ubisoft telling their customers that exchanging your money for their products doesn’t grant you ownership of the products?

Yeah, End of Dragons came out in 2022 and Secrets of the Obscure came out in 2023. End of Dragons had just come out right when I was putting the game down

i’ve thought about picking it back up now and then too, but nowadays i’m mostly couch-gaming with a controller, and to my knowledge GW2 doesn’t have controller support. And finding a new guild and everything sounds overwhelming to me right now lol. The only “online” game I currently actively play is No Man’s Sky, which is probably much better suited to my general preferred playstyle. But I have no idea how to go about finding player civilizations to join lol. I also recently got Helldivers 2 to play with my bf, but it doesn’t seem like the kind of game that would be my usual cup of tea so idk how likely I’ll be to find friends/communities through it. I also recently got Sea of Thieves but so far I’ve been too shy to actually play it >.<

but you should totally play GW2 again if you want to, imo it is definitely the best MMO i ever played

Are you saying that Ubisoft doesn’t actually believe that people shouldn’t own their games and that this was a hypothetical discussion that was taken out of context? Because my impression was that this was sort of a response to people complaining about subscription-based games and DRM content that makes the concept of owning games blurry.

Because if this position doesn’t really represent Ubisoft, then what should have been said is whatever does represent Ubisoft. Ideally they should agree that people have the right own the games they purchase.

In my opinion someone should generally own what they buy. That’s why I like GOG, which distributes DRM free games, and part of why I often pirate games especially from large companies. In my opinion the take that people should only have a license representing permission to use a product that is actually owned by a company is delusional if not dystopian, and Ubisoft should be made fun of for having that position, and their games should be pirated.

Here’s an explanation/rant/opinion I more or less agree with by Louis Rossmann if you’re/anyone’s interested

Problem solving and overcoming challenges through your own determination and skill is really rewarding! I wish there were online communities for people like us! lol i mean i guess there probably are I just don’t know about them

oof I’ve had friends who liked to do research on the games they played and learn how to do things externally before coming into the game and doing the things, but if they ever expected me to do that homework I would probably have felt the same as you. I get that it must be fun for them to give themselves that homework (otherwise they wouldn’t do it right? lol) but for me I have fun by exploring, learning on my own, and overcoming challenges on my own. The only way my friends like that ever spoiled anything for me was by telling me how things worked before I had figured it out on my own or giving me items that they had learned how to get externally before I knew how it was possible etc

For me the main reason I ever played MMOs was that they seemed like an easy genre to play with friends and to find new friends in, and I did both a lot. But I just didn’t know at first that in most MMOs the main thing to do for most people is all the post-game activities lol. My fav things to do in games are usually to explore and learn the lore, which in my experience aren’t things many MMO players care much about. The last MMO I got really into was GW2, and I had helped build a guild that didn’t mind casual players, but even in that guild I couldn’t really participate in end game content because they’d still get frustrated if I didn’t follow the meta strictly. I ended up being “that guild lady” who ran overworld event trains, sometimes dungeons, and sometimes pvp, cuz everyone else who had the rank to run community schedule stuff usually only ran Fractals and Raids and I generally didn’t feel welcome in those categories since I didn’t stick to the meta. That’s not to say I didn’t like the guild, I met a lot of good friends in it and the community was overall really sweet and welcoming, it’s just that despite being essentially one of the founding members and one of the highest ranking members I still couldn’t even participate in most of the content we did without being lectured about doing it “wrong.” And after a while I just got bored and lost interest in playing it (I mean there were other reasons too but that was a big part of it), and haven’t had the motivation to really try any other MMOs since then :/ (GW2 is still probly my fav MMO though, it had a really good story and a lot of cute mounts and pets, I personally especially liked the POF expansion which had a couple big existential moments imo. But after a while it’s like well I know the story pretty well and I know the world really well so because of how I like to play games there’s just not much more for me to do anymore (thanks for coming to my TED talk))

omg yes, it’s so much more fun for me to figure out how it works on my own from trial and error

one of the main reasons i stopped playing MMOs is that everyone takes end game stuff super seriously and i just don’t find it fun to be lectured on what i’m doing wrong and which meta build i should follow instead :(

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there’s peertube and odyssey but idk how viable either of them are long term. peertube at least is decentralized, not sure if odyssey is too or not

i know Louis Rossmann also posts on Odyssey

tbh, i’d be surprised if most people ever even bothered to even open the reddiquette or terms of service or anything else. i’m not trying to put anyone down or be condescending – i didn’t read any of this when signing up either! i only knew about it because i read discussions about how votes should be used on reddit lol

it’s true, most people are lazy and don’t read and intuitively assume the downvote button is a dislike button. it’s unfortunate, but i don’t know if anything can reasonably be done about stuff like that because i don’t think it’s going to change that people don’t read agreements or rules or guidelines before using a platform or program or service.

you’re right according to official reddiquette. the intended use of the downvote button is to de-emphasize irrelevant content and content that otherwise doesn’t contribute to the conversation

i have seen it argued that its intended use use doesn’t matter versus how the majority of people actively use it, similar to language and symbols. usage evolves with time, so meaning evolves with it. personally i prefer the intended usage but i can see where ppl who make this argument are coming from.

the lemmy instance i joined doesn’t have a downvote button at all!

edit: here’s the official reddiquette archived on the wayback machine

In regard to voting:

Think before you downvote and take a moment to ensure you’re downvoting someone because they are not contributing to the community dialogue or discussion. If you simply take a moment to stop, think and examine your reasons for downvoting, rather than doing so out of an emotional reaction, you will ensure that your downvotes are given for good reasons.

my theory is that most users don’t know or care about the api changes or the deaths of the third party apps. and most of the ones who do know dont care.

id also guess that a lot of people are hesitant to join the fediverse due to a choice paralysis, kinda similar to Linux distros. altho joining an instance is not actually all that complicated most people just dont want to have to bother making the choice of which one to join, and others cant be bothered to learn how instances work. ppl think it’s complicated because it’s different and new to them and ppl generally don’t like change 🤷‍♀️