• ampersandrew
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    10 hours ago

    I hate to say it, but the business model always affects the game design. The “meta” is to make a game that’s longer than 2 hours if you want to avoid this, or that the player otherwise won’t want to part with after that 2 hours is up.

    • terranoid@lemmy.cafe
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      8 hours ago

      If your game doesn’t provide more content than 2 hours that’s kinda on you IMO

      And I say that as an indie game developer. Like it someone just thought it was neat to play for an hour then they were completely done touching my game… Why would I be shocked they refunded it? They might have refunded it because they expected… Dun dun dunnnn… More content?

      It’s a fuck load of work to make a game. It is kinda ridiculous to go to all that trouble then just stop after making 2 hours of gameplay, like 2 hours total without even a good sandbox.

      • VerdantTome@programming.dev
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        6 hours ago

        It’s a fuck load of work to make a game. It is kinda ridiculous to go to all that trouble then just stop after making 2 hours of gameplay, like 2 hours total without even a good sandbox.

        Not that it’s Steam’s fault, but this is the same way of thinking that has led to big budget, story focused games getting padded with repetitive fetch quests and annoying collectibles that unlock progression.

        Yes, it’s a lot of work to make a game, but the only way to extend the play time of a story-focused single-player game without having to do even more work, is to water it down with low-effort filler content that reuses the expensive assets.

          • terranoid@lemmy.cafe
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            1 hour ago

            … Or just don’t put it on Steam. I don’t see why this is so controversial when it protects the players far more to have the refund option.

            And just because someone finished and refunded it doesn’t mean they enjoyed it. These devs complaining about people “playing it to the end” then refunding it need to realize that part of it might be their game just isn’t that good.

            • huey_m@reddthat.com
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              24 minutes ago

              I don’t think that’s a good reason for a refund, honestly. If you go to a restaurant or a movie, most places won’t give you your money back if you finished the meal or movie. If you finished it, you should pay for it… if it really is so bad you feel you should get your money back on principle, you know before the end of the meal/film. This just feels like an excuse to be a cheapskate.

      • HereIAm
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        6 hours ago

        I 100% agree. I always refund every movie and music album under 2 hours as well. If they wanted to keep my money they should have added an extra hour of slop. /s

      • ampersandrew
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        8 hours ago

        Eh, not every game needs more “content”. Clickolding and And Roger are, as I understand it, very good at what they do, but you can finish them both in an hour. It would probably be to their detriment to make them any longer.