I would say the vast majority of micro transactions are cosmetic or time unlocking. Not adding much novelty.

Also the context of this post is about gifting kids on Christmas, so no, not necessarily “up to you”. I guess there’s an argument to just give kids whatever they want, but I don’t think think that leads to the best development outcomes. You can’t force kids to do anything either, but there does exist a middle ground.

Not sure why novelty is in quotes, it’s a quantifiable measurement based on differences. Anyway, novelty has shown to have a wide range of mental benefits. This is a pretty good overview, and if you want to dig into specific papers they’re listed as well.

Even if you want to ignore any potential benefits of novelty, generally when you have a new experience for the first time, you will have more fun that you typically do. The downside is some new experiences may not be fun, but that’s very low risk in the context of gaming.

I think it’s a little different. With new games comes novelty. Sticking with a single game and just buying cosmetics doesn’t provide nearly as much novelty.

I don’t think this is a children only issue either. Its a trap adults fall into as well.

Yea I’m not sure of OP’s ability and the requirements for games was vague. But IPX isn’t that big of a hurdle, DOSBox has an emulator for it: https://www.dosbox.com/wiki/connectivity

Bigger issues would be sourcing and playing some of these games on modern systems at all. And some dedicated servers can be a pain.

SOLDAT 2 was recently released. Basically just a minor face-lift.

Warcraft 2/3, Starcraft, Halo 1, Command and Conquer 1/2/3. Red Alert 1/2. Battlefield 1942, 1943, 2, Vietnam, 2142. Joint Ops. Doom 1,2, Quake 1/2,3, Unreal Tournament 1/2004. Farcry 1/2, Crysis 1, Burnout, Half-Life 1/2, Couterstrike 1.6/Source/GO. TeamFortress 1/2. Worms Armageddon. Soldat 1/2. Armegetron. Any Source Mods. Minecraft. Age of Empires 1/2/3. Age of Mythology. Neverwinter Nights. GTA 2. OpenTTD, Factorio, Terraria, ARMA 1/2/3. Left 4 Dead 1/2. Killing Floor 1. Call of Duty 1/2/4. Viscera Cleanup Detail, Magicka 1. etc etc

Most multiplayer PC games before 2010ish.

No don’t break up Steam. Standardize DRM and make digital games licenses ownable/transferable. I could see the EU eventually doing this.

I say this as someone who loves Steam but wants more ownership, in the games I “own”.

If it’s anything like the first one, the story is fine. The long script is mostly just a lot of side quests unrelated to the main story.

But it’s not what the quote is talking about. You’re just correlating different things.

No, that’s what consumers like you are thinking in hindsight and unrelated.

The context Gabe is talking about is when he was approaching publishers. They were just being anti tech and believing in traditional brick and mortar. They were definently pro-DRM. They just couldn’t fathom a digital marketplace.