Sunk Cost Fallacy and FO76

[zanity]

Note- I'm having a general discussion about Fallout 76 on a forum labeled "General Fallout 76 Discussion". There's a very good reason a FO76 mod discussion forum does not exist on The Nexus.

 

Anyway there's a concept called 'Sunk Cost Fallacy' which today is given one of two meanings. The first, original meaning refers to something like producing a movie- where a studio may have spent say 100 million on a film that is likely to flop, yet will continue to spend money that can never be recovered in future screening revenue. Economists know you must NEVER look at the level of past investement, only at likely future returns. If future returns cannot cover new costs, investment must stop.

 

The more recent meaning refers to gamers who, having paid a lot for a game, will contort and twist reality to 'prove' their investment makes sense, even when the game proves to be terrible. Now this is not another post aout how bad FO76 is, but something else.

 

Shortly after the truth about Fallout 76 became apparent, I posted a thread in another forum about FO76 going F2P (free-to-play). Many of the mods on the Nexus have direct links to Bethesda, so anything Todd Howard wants closed down gets closed down here. The thread was locked almost immediately.

 

Six months or so later, every industry expert expects FO76 to go F2P- and like myself know would actually be good for the game and those that play it. Todd Howard wants to go F2P- the AAA priced sales have bombed, critics hate that the game dares to claim the right to a AAA price tag, and the initial period of highest sales for a new game is now well and truly over. All possible major future revenue for FO76 must come from the Atom Shop, and the fact that people still have to buy FO76 is a major disincentive for many to spend more money on Atom Shop items.

 

F2P, and the vast majority of current criticisms of FO76 would vanish. So what's the issue?

 

The issue can be witnessed in any fanboy forum of Fallout 76- Beth's own forums or the notorious three Reddit forums. Here people who actually paid full prive for the game SCREAM that the game must never be made free. This is the 'sunk cost fallacy' at play.

 

Let's say you were foolish enough to pay 60 dollars for FO76. You actual got exactly what Todd Howard promised. A large empty world full of bugs (yes, Howard promised the bugs when describing the purpose of the B.E.T.A. at a time when pre-order peeps could have requested refunds). Now for people still playing FO76 there are two major issues.

 

1) current playerbase- mostly empty servers are no fun.

2) current playerbase spending money in the Atom Store- thus giving Howard a desire to continue supporting the game.

 

Going F2P would mean the game sees a massive influx of new players, and a massive increase in Atom Store revenue- both fantastic news for all those who claim FO76 is currently worth playing.

 

We know FO76 has the loot boxes (lunch boxes) all ready to go- the usual Beth incompetence seems to have kiiled plans to launch them (as an initial free holiday giveaway) on Xmas or New Years- but they are coming. And locking my threads won't alter this fact. Many intended features of online games end up delayed for the usual reasons.

 

There are Reddit reports of brick-n-mortar shops removing FO76 from their shelves- always a sign of a change in pricing/marketing. Yet the sticking point remains the very fans of FO76 themselves- for Todd Howard 100% does NOT want to refund what these people have paid for the game- and in my opinion he doesn't even have a moral duty to refund- having spent six months describing in painful detail what FO76 was going to be. Beth bamboozled no-one. People like me have been saying for months exactly what FO76 would be solely based on listening carefully to all the info coming out of Bethesda. No-one is entitled to refunds if/when the game goes F2P- and it is a bizarro world claim anyway when F2P will make the game better for all current players, which is surely something all current players want?

 

However, I don't know how Todd Howard will handle the fan backlash- for most recent games that have gone F2P in the last couple of years offered refunds of some type- so this expectation is kinda established. Some refunds took the form of 'free' DLC etc- but Fallout 76 already promised it would be free anyway, so Beth cannot go that route. The idea of giving those that paid for FO76 'free' Atom Store money has been fatally tainted by the 500 Atom Dollar 'bribe' for non-canvas bags that went down like a lead balloon.

 

Yet if in the end, current FO76 gamers have their way, and Beth is unable to go F2P, this 'game' is going to wither away quite quickly. Zenimax is way too large a publisher to support its flops, when instead it can try again with new better efforts. The owners of Zenimax UNDERSTAND the 'sunk cost fallacy' and will never be victims of the fallacy themselves. An online game needs players- as many as possible. Howard wanted his cake and be able to eat it too, so outrageously he did initially sell a game designed to all the F2P metrics for full AAA price, but he was always open about this. But now that initial cash grab is mostly over, and the F2P economics model needs to kick in.

 

PS vastly more people will respect FO76 as a F2P game than ever respected FO76 as a AAA priced title. And this is the paradox I don't get. If you play FO76 and are still a fan of Bethesda, why would you object to Howard making a move that actually gained back respect for the company you like?

 

I bought a ryzen 1700 (fantastic CPU) for 300 quid. A year later I could have got it for 125 quid. I REJOICE over this fact, not sulk about it- for it shows how, after years of Intel driven stagnation, the CPU industry is surging forward again. It is selfish and pointless to say "I paid x for this, so anyone who wants to use this in the future should damned well have to pay what I paid".

 

PPS it is the greatest irony that I get attacked for what I post here, yet all my constructive criticism would IMPROVE the gaming experience of Beth fans and improve Beth's reputation and revenue streams. We know Beth is in trouble for the last existing Beth fans are largely toxic haters of anyone who dares to speak sense and the truth. Reading the torrent of abuse commonly found in the Bethesda reddit gaming forums aimed at anyone who dares to mod a Beth game using a free mod from The Nexus should open everyone's eyes here. Howard and Hines have chosen the route of encouraging extreme fan behaviour - "you are with us or you are our enemy" mentality.

[TheFriendlyBandit]

Seeing as my previous post was removed without warning, all I'll say, as politely as possible, is to restate that your criticism has hardly been constructive. If you truly wish to help, please be less insulting and accusatory. Maybe then will people be less hostile.

[TheGadget1945]

[ZeroAndOne]

Dude, man. Yeah, sure. You're right. But you're missing out on the reality. Seventy Six is a game that was made with a particular idea in mind. Seventy Six exists as it is now because it is brand spankin new. It might have taken them 3 years to make F76, but we are 4 years behind. We're still 1 year behind on FO4. In fact, this is the best year for FO4. That's just how it is. Video games come & go. The gamer decides what to play based on having options.

 

 

If Seventy Six was offered as a add on DLC to FO4 for $60, you better believe we would have bought it. We did! We did buy 76. There's a reason why. We bought 76 so that we could play it. Have you not met any of the veteran players or modders whom refuse to buy the new game until 1 year after launch? People that bought 76 were opted into that pain & suffering. Take it with a grain of salt. It's a year long BETA basically.

 

 

The game can so drastically change in the first few years that everyone that used to play it vanishes. The reason why is because you are all mostly wasteland tourists. Fallout is a 20 year hobby. I'm not sure you can say anything that is going to stop that hobby from being enjoyed. So I mean, yeah. Psychology, it's a thing. You do like Fallout, right? If you want to be a wasteland tourist, fine. Speak your peace, and quietly leave.

 

 

Let It All Out,

 

 

\o/

Edited January 9, 2019 by ZeroAndOne