Reclaiming My Soul: Why I Quit Making F2P Social Games 

Just FYI, she is now the VP of development for Double Fine Productions!

"I work at telltale games now" RIP

I wonder if she's alright now, considering what happened to telltale games. I love how honest she was!!

I've been working on F2P games in the Asian market for 2 years and I can tell you it completely drained my soul. One notable thing is that for a game to be successful, all successful games must have the exact game data / settings (same level up cost/ figures). This is because they got in-game economics down to an exact science and know exactly when to extract the most money for players, generated the highest ARPU. Publishers have amazing operations teams that know exactly what is going on in game and frequently push events entice players to spend real money, followed by events that encourage players to spend in game money. Problem is that any innovation is unwelcomed and seen as a threat cause the operations team etc have to change to accommodate gameplay changes.

Its really refreshing to see someone be honest for once.

And now AAA games have just as much p2w and lootbox gambling as f2p mobile market in 2014. *insert "Hallo darkness my old friend" here*

She works at Double Fine probably heavily involved in Psychonauts 2. SO it sounds like shes getting to work on her polished genuine creation! Great for her. Loved the talk, very honest she brought up MULTIPLE huge ethical problems for me in this industry that I have yet to hear many talks on. Though her points on data collection were a lil muted by the work shes done on Facebook, though it might not have been as common knowledge back then just how predatory facebook is.

"When you do game development, you gotta love what you're doing or it's not gonna be genuine." This. This should speak for itself. So many games forgot what that means anymore.

This dev, "I couldn't sleep at night knowing what kinds of experiences my customers were having with my f2p games." Other devs, "money, money, money!"

When she was talking about designing a game through A/B testing, I remembered a really interesting use of similar testing in game design. Zachtronics figures out the order of their levels by releasing a sort of beta with all the mechanics and levels that will be in the final game, but the levels are all in a random order for each player and the game will track a bunch of stats about each level. Then the development team can use that data to construct the proper difficulty curve for the final game. I may have gotten a few details wrong, but the overall idea is very interesting, especially since it can be really hard to predict how difficult a level will be in the sort of games they make.

The "Feeemium" South Park episode on this was gold. Extra Credits covered it nicely as well. While I understand the need for having a job, I feel like making these cheap money-grab Skinner box clones puts the whole industry in a bad light, especially since mobile/casual segment will be many people's first experience with video games. And this is not a good representation of what the medium can be.

One of the most important GDC talks ever! Really excellent candid account of real-world experience in a tough submarket.

it's a pity she went work to telltale, they probably wanted all that expertise on baiting and luring consumers she had from working on mobile games. she looks like a really nice person, i hope she's doing alright and i wish her the best. very interesting talk, one of the bests.

I love the way you approached this talk. You weren't emotional/hyperbolic, you acknowledged the good side of the opposing argument, AND you stood your moral ground and made clear what you saw was wrong. I really wish more people spoke about morality like this.

I am watching this video after lootboxes and premium currency became popular in triple A games and I am just laughing.The idea to run away from these practices in F2P mobile market to AAA games seems a little bit comical now.

Don't apologise for drinking water. Dry Mouth Noises are the bane of any talk. hell yeah water.

Love this talk. Actually I was struggling with all those ethic problems when working on f2p games and eventually decided to leave the industry. It has killed all my passion...

Even tho I liked this talk, I think it could have been even harsher. A lot of these games design around coversing their customers into spending as much time and money on them as possible first in I'd say quite cruel ways abusing our understanding of psychology. They'll plant intentional difficulty spikes and needless frustration to motivate you to pay to skip the grind. I think it's justified to condemn this completely.

I think 2048 was more successful because the math was simpler for most people.

You are deluding yourself if you think AAA, or even other games, don't use a lot of these same techniques. AAA games are all about DLC, engagement, season passes, etc, etc. They are a BUSINESS. And that will be about driving money to the company who paid to have this built. So that means the only type of game you can work on are indie experience games that are built solely for your own enjoyment. All of the other games are being paid for by some entity, and they expect a return on investment.

ahh, 2014 when developers still cared about the user's replay experience

Quite eyeopening talk. I do F2P games but I believe we should focus on the passion and the whole experience instead of just monetizing... I try my best to focus on this and keep my soul! Thanks for the talk!

I think most of the points here apply to all types of games, except for the bit about whales. I whole-heartedly agree with that - even the most successful "free to play" games are incredibly pushy, with entire features that are thinly-veiled money makers which don't add real value to the game. I very much prefer the "try before you buy" and "buy an expansion" models because they motivate game developers to focus on fun rather than manipulation.

Man those UVW's in the background really tile.

A honest talk here. One of the most damaging credo bull**** I ever come to pass while working in this industry is: "It is not about doing what you want it is about loving what you do" (This is 99.99% indies developpers motto). This is exactly how to compromise - in the core meaning of the word - your professional call with the means to pursue it. "You are working in video games, So you are "living the dream" no matter how small. So you should be happy with what you got for a lot of people would love to be in your shoes." Out of this kind of compromise in 22 years I worked in video games, I merley got to work on a handfull of titles I was happy and proud to contribute to. The rest was pure garbage...And I estimate being lucky with this track record, as most of the great people I had the chance to work with have not been so fortunate. If you want to aim high: it is definetely NOT about loving what you do, it IS about doing what you want.

14:36 A/B testing has the same problem as using gradient descent. The most it can do is bring you to a local minimum and get stuck there, whereas the "magic product" that you're really after isn't likely to be located at that particular local minimum, but at some other local minimum. In effect, A/B testing is like developing tunnel vision. Its usefulness is in refining a design with which one must go forward, as opposed to evaluating different ideas against each other.

Is the Q&A part of this video purchasable via microtransactions?

It really is a shame that mobile games have become synonymous with bad f2p stuff. It has potential, but actual good games get buried under the crap.

the mentality behind the people making games through this method is disgusting gaming used to be about entertainment, innovation and having fun now it is about how can i squeeze the most amount of money out of every single player with the least amount of effort and obviously from a business perspective this makes sense but from a consumer perspective it is destroying gaming. when a game that was created nearly 2 decades ago provided more creativity and content than a game now a days then you can clearly see the decline in gaming.

It's cool hearing about a dev's opinion on the F2P market. Not that she was saying that it's all bad, but that the elements that people find questionable she also finds questionable, and then some. The whole "creating "the best' minimum viable product" thing made me sad tho, in how it feels like more and more we're seeing it in the AAA space. I did noticed it here and there in the Xbox 360/PS3 era, but it almost feels like a given now.

Pretty awful luck to end up working at telltale in retrospect.

Honestly, a lot of this isn't specific to F2P games. No matter what kind of game you're working on, marketing, market research, monetization, and acquisition are serious concerns that will distract you from focusing on the fun parts of your game design.

The more we see how exploitative f2p games are the more I think they will end up being legally regulated at some point.

Community run decentralized games would be nice.

Problem with mobile games.. Problems with f2p games.. Didn't seem to talk about any problems with social games, which is what piqued my interest since I've not seen that before. Oh well.

Number 5 is like 99% of why I don't like f2p. A lot of gaming companies are literally priming kids to become compulsive gamblers and drug addicts later in life.

Nice, nothing like four minutes of black screen!

F2P isn’t very interesting for players when it seems like everything is called “Clash of []” or “World of []”. Thanks to developers like this woman who are recognizing the issues with the genre.

You are my hero I hope life has treated you well.

point 4 about getting an audience is not only unsolved, its getting worse because of the flood of clones of games and the pushed publicity of the mass produced games (see the gdc talk 1500 slot machines walk into a bar). The kinds of games that dont have trouble with finding or building a user base either have a huge built in following from being an old AAA dev (like Blizzard, Bethesda, ect) or get really really lucky with word of mouth publicity early on like Stardew Valley or Minecraft.

The audio sounds like there's a second track dubbed over the first but all the words are whispered gently into your ear. it's weird.

Her opinion on the Kim kardashian game is like my opinion on pineapple on pizza. “It’s a perfectly cromulent topping for someone else’s pizza, but not mine.”

Yeah as soon as she specified "mobile games" i understood everything instantly. So there's nothing wrong with f2p games, it's just mobile ones.

Her: "I'm Carol Shaw..." Me: She looks really young to be the creator of River Raid. (I know she spells it Caryl)

One of the things that game makers need to deal with is designers' politics..."I don't want to play "Kardashians", and I am not a fan of "Deer Hunter". These programmers who are motivated by making money to pay the bills, when they actively try to thwart the design of a game, are scum. If you are not motivated to make the company successful, go find some place else to work. The problem is, for employers, is that labor laws prevent them from asking a potential employee, "Are you ok making games for people who don't vote like you?"

Completely unrelated to the topic, but her voice reminds me of Elen Degeneres and all I can do while hearing this is picture Dory from Finding Nemo.

When the acronim sheet... I feel the pain!

what happened to the simple days of "play for free to try it out, if you want additional heroes and/or more inventory space you have to pay a monthly subscription"?

The F2P bubble has already been popped. Only games with "fair" models and very high quality survive now. The consumers and the devs themselves are tired of the model and the never-ending cycle of squeezing out more dollars. Games can be pure art, not catering to a specific demographic. Like art they just "are" and if people like it, it is a by product not something you wanted to achieve. The best games in history are made with a complete "fuck you" in mind and completely contradict what it means to have "fun". Doom, Silent Hill, Super Meat Boy/Isaac, Dark Souls are just some examples of many. Games are as deep as the human soul and when money is involved it gets tainted. Thanks for this talk! As others have said it's refreshing hearing an honest take on the F2P world and how stressful it can be on the mind. Far away from the usual "F2P is great" marketing talk.

F2P is not a genre. It is a pricing model.

Do achievements really help drive a community? I don't remember the last time I talked with a friend or posted online about an achievement. If there's a connection at all, it seems trivial. 🤷

Seems like some PC game developers should watch this conference in 2021...

Can't believe no one saw Scotty immediately. Sadness.

I think that achievements have actually helped make EU4 better by giving players who aren't really good with complete freedom some direction

I'm not sure how GDC works but the recode seem from 2015 because she says 2014 was last year....

At 2:44 she refers to another talk. Could someone point me to that talk?

So basically, to work in F2P social mobile games you need to lose some empathy?

Maybe she should have gone into the water business because she sure is thirsty. ^^ But seriously, kudos to her for staying true to herself and more importantly caring for what she is producing. That's a passionate lady with a conscience right there.

this is why we should just get into boardgames soon before it rottens up into another shitfest

Great talk.

I hope you find a good job at a different studio.

Must be some good shit in that water...

I absolutely agree.... but here's an honest question....... do we blame the Company making the game for money OR do we blame the idiots stupid enough to buy $200 worth of Virtual Clothing for their Virtual Kim Kardashian ? 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

where the wrap up room video at :D

2:44 who is she mentioning? couldn't understand completely

what games did she make for mobile btw

11:39 While i'm definitely a Whale, and it's something i'm not proud of, having spent probably hundreds of thousands of dollars on f2p games, and getting started earlier than most with the Asian f2p market. Still wish i Was part of the 1% of the real world though.

I wonder if she knew at the time that the GoT game would be garbage.

Good advice: Make great games. Better advice: Don't release shitty games to app stores. Thank you.

The lean startup, or the extortion model of game making, is why I never buy games on first release...and in the days of microprose and the old EA ...gamers making games, for Gamers I absolutely would....Not worth the risk any longer....

She overestimates how many poeoplw watch Got. The most popular tv shows now, do not even 30% of the number of viewers of the most popular shows of the past. Mostly because there is so much available.

"I'm not the right demographic" I ask myself who plays these games at all?

I remember when achievements where put into world of warceaft. Talk about going overboard.

Fortnite and PUBG. PUBG was the original battle royale.

Now look at the social casino guys...

Not surprised you decided mobile games weren't for you. You have scruples

My favorite part is 25:53 -> 29:57

Uh oh, wonder where she's at now since the shut down

reclaimed soul only to sell it for cheaper to a AAA company that does all the same shit as f2p social but worse and treats you worse. good job.

why does she hate making F2P games?? "displays cringy dating game" Me: oh

There are definitely good mobile games. They're just not my cup of tea.

Everything is a copy of something else + 1 thing better.. it's only a problem if you plan to rest on your laurels

so make an f2p antisocial game then.

Such a bad idea to grow a conscience overnight.

I'm a bit confused by a comment at the start of this presentation. Implying that F2P in 2010 was "early and new". When I remember playing games like Maplestory, ROSE Online, and Runescape back around 2005/2006 that were F2P? Seemed like by 2010-2012 F2P had gone "mainstream" as a model which ultimately lead to a lot of shitty products from developers that were doing it for all the wrong reasons (and a lot of good ones as well). EDIT: Ok, this presentation title is completely misleading. This isn't about F2P vs P2P. This is about someone not wanting to work on bad mobile games that HAPPEN to be F2P or working on games that aren't "full experiences", or do the BUSINESS side (just wants to be an artist). These things exist in both P2P and F2P. Funny that she wants to go work on AAA games when lately those are the games that aren't shipping fully complete and functional games, which is exactly what she is complaining about in her 1st point. There really is nothing wrong with a game that ships a complete experience yet continues to evolve and ADD more content, which is the case with MANY F2P GAMES.

Good talk, but so cringy. That swallowing noise... yuck... over and over. Can't someone run this through an audio clean up?

I think self reflection for what type of game your are creating is something that is still lacking in the F2P space. For a time I worked for a company that made "Social Casino Games" as lead QA... I learned many things about what types of games F2P are and for the space I worked in they are very, very preparatory and exploitive. Gambling games, or "got ya" games in the F2P space are horrible to the players that "get got". I left that company after about a year because I could not stand playing casino games anymore and I was disgusted by the amount of money that studios make from their player base. In the end all the IPs for each genre get stolen by huge companies that have hundreds of millions of dollars and code farms to build a clone game and market the crap out of it.

wolf Amongus

She was saying a lot about making complete games and not sending out garbage. My first thought was, "Well, don't work for EA or Ubisoft." Then I read the video note and who she works for..... Okay, soul reclaimed. Telltale is pretty darn good in this day and age!

I stop around 5-6th time of her drinking water. Please if you're too thirsty, make it done before talking.

People meed to learn to not smack their fucking lips during public speaking. Amateurs.

Sorry but is really hard to pay attention if you're drinking all the time

First

"its not about the people that make the games its about the kind of games that are getting made" well if _the people_ would step their own game up they could break the cyclical nature of redundancy plaguing F2P. I have some unique ideas for F2P IP's. Im currently working on a budget of $200/month, give me some funding to step up and ill make you guys millions.

women game more... no they dont they play mobile games these have little to do with gaming

this talk was not worthwhile imo. Learned nothing

These gdc talks are starting to make me think game developers are nothing but chronic complainers

I'M not sure how GDC works but the recode seem from 2015 because she says 2014 was last year....