Microsoft patents system to freeze games and inject ads during downtimes — watching commercials earns ad-free playtime credits
https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/microsoft-patents-system-to-freeze-games-and-inject-ads-during-downtimes-watching-commercials-earns-ad-free-playtime-creditsOpen linkView original on lemmy.today
95 replies
Drink verification can
They really are trying alienate their users.
They never cared about their users -- only their investors.
Are their investors morons?
Money now! Future prospects? No care, money now!
More like out of contact with the working class
No, they'll move their money to the next company soon. Plus, I'm guessing Microsoft is one of those companies 401(k)s are legally required to invest in, so every American with a retirement account is a bagholder.
once they destroy BLIZZARD with ads it will be over.
Every day we veer closer to that Black Mirror episode.
"Which black mirror episode?"
"Yes."
Bright future ahead. Robot dogs will hunt you down and cut you to pieces. Before you die, your brain is scanned, and the copy will be tortured as long as the machine has power.
What’s the point of that, like are the people enemies of the state or something for ‘wrong think’?
Eternal torture never made sense to me, in any context
Well that’s black mirror. It’s clearly meant to be disturbing. Doesn’t have to make sense to be messed up.
Right, but specifically what did the person do in that episode? I’m just curious how it was “justified” by whoever was doling it out
I stopped watching black mirror cus it made me feel terrible. Some episodes were pretty good but it’s too heavy for me
Yeah, it's one of those works of art that aim to make you uneasy. Gotta say, they nailed it. It's a horrible show in more ways than I dare to count.
Here are the relevant episodes where digital minds get tortured.
S2E4 White Christmas: A human mind is copied to a computer that runs home automation systems. The copy is essentially coerced into slavery. When the copy refuses run the automation system perfectly, it is tortured with sensory deprivation over an extended period of time. So, basically slavery, customer satisfaction and quarterly profits are the "justification" here.
S4E1 USS Callister: A guy with some serious issues loves to larp in a digital world with copies of other people. His idea of fun involves abusing the copied minds. It's sort of like mental torture for the copies. He is bullied in real life, and this is his way of getting back to the people he hates. Just plain old revenge transformed into mental abuse, if you can call that a "justification". Hey, I never said the reasons were good.
S4E6 black museum: A museum has a copy of a human mind stuck in a toy. This counts as psychological abuse as the mind is unable to act like a normal human in such a restrictive body. You can also get to electrocute a copy of a murderer's mind, which is just literal torture. Sadistic people pay for it. In other words, money "justifies" torture, again. Actually, money justifies just about anything on this show. On the other hand, they are torturing a convicted murderer so... Oh, but the murderer could be innocent, but we don't really know so... This series just doesn't give you an easy way out.
There are also other episodes that feature copied minds, but they don't involve blatant torture. However, that doesn't make those episodes any less awful, because the writers as sick as they are creative.
The white Christmas one was a guy who had his mind copied and his copy was being interrogated to get details of the murder he did. Turned out to be a heat-of-the-moment crime-of-passion deal where he truly regrets the murder. They decide to leave his copy running for a few hundred thousand simulated years or something "for a Xmas treat".
Oh dude that jogs my memory, if the USS McAllister episode is the Star Trek esque MMO RPG, I liked that it actually had an optimistic ending
Otherwise yeah those other ones sound rough.
I've lost hearing young due to a health condition. The sales model for hearing aids is depressingly close to the Black Mirror episode with Rashida Jones.
The hearing aid costs 15 per month on "basic", rising through eight different tiers, to "platinum plus" at 120 per month. The hardware doesn't change, only the software. So if you want to be able to hear nature sounds, that's an extra 10 per month. An extra 20 to hear conversations in the car. It's 50 if you want to be able to go to a concert, and so on.
The hearing aid itself is capable of doing all of that, all the time, but the functionality is just switched off.
The term is 4 years and then it becomes obsolete and receives no further updates; you have to get a new one.
This is in the UK.
What the fuck. Is this real?
It is. They tend to hide this until the hard sell, but here's a little bit of info that I could find: https://www.bootshearingcare.com/hearing-aids/hearing-aid-prices/
There's more info that's only revealed after your second hearing test, when they put the "platinum plus" software driven device on your ears, then reveal the pricing in a handily confusing leaflet. It's similar at Specsavers where I went after, thinking "is this real? Surely they're not all like this"
Capitalism strikes again. In a just society, the people who devise these extractive schemes would be in prison.
Whoever they are, I doubt they like themselves very much.
So they should be disliking themselves from prison
Ha! Yes they should
Well, I am glad it is Microslop patenting this. That means it will only ever be used in a handful of games noone evert plays before xbox goes completely belly up.
There’s enough old good games to last me the rest of my life without giving any money to these evil companies
"It makes games more accessible for everyone! If a player does not want to experience ads, then they can purchase the game at full price!"
They are tired of people not buying their shitty games, so they want a way to at least make a bit of money before the servers go down.
Or they just want to make more money off of everyone.
And then after a while, the rug will be pulled and paid tiers will have ads too.
No, no... Paid tiers will get relevant and targeted ads, to make the experience more immersive and personal! And if people don't want it, they can opt out with a small additional fee! This will enable us to provide a better experience for everyone!
Who doesn't want a better experience?
Optting out will just result in generic, untargeted ads, doesn't everyone want ads targeted to them specifically?! Don't we all just love ads?!? Everyone loves ads right? Especially when they are tailored specifically to you right?! So personal, what else could anyone want from anything?
menu requires to watch 3 minutes ads/hr. BOSS battles(5 3 minute adds interesect in the length it takes to kill a boss)
So, is this the second or third stage of enshittification?
killstreak reward: force entire enemy team to watch an ad break immediately in the middle of the match
Pussy ass campers got your blood boiling? Chill out with MTNDW V.2.0h Gamer Sauce!
Stop giving them ideas!
I'm pretty sure there's a black mirror episode on this.
"Open your eyes!"
yep, the second episode, Fifteen Million Merits, where the MC is forced to watch aggressive sexual ads or pay to skip in order to just exist in his room in peace
Drink a verification can.
We grow ever closer
Let's make version of Proton to block all that when playing the games on Linux. It's gonna be hilarious.
They patented so we can't get games with mechanics like this for two decades, right? They did this to protect us, right? Right? ...
Yeah, do patent this microsoft, good thing only your crappy games will have this
probably going to be AI-GENERATED ads too.
Things like this tell me Microsoft doesn't care any more about what brought them to make Xbox. Only how they can get as much money out of existing users.
Reminds me of this video about Mature markets. https://youtu.be/_HJXSt7ofOU
Or, instead of ad-free playtime credits, don't inject ads in the first place.
Ah, yes, of course; let's screw with the player's flow by taking them completely out of the game, just so they can continue playing the game!
How could this possibly go wrong?
I'm sure copilot wouldn't mind taking over for a bit
Download your pirated copies now! I can totally see this being implemented in older games via updates.
What in the fuck...
Literally the Black mirror episode.
lol mobile platforms have been doing this for what decades at this point.
Lmfao
There is a reason why mobile gaming is mostly garbage.
Mostly? I havent found a single mobile game I can tolerate other than my GBA emulator.
The only ones I like are paid: Terraria, Dredge, Scythe Pocket Edition, Terraforming Mars etc. Recommended!
Yeah, and there's a reason a lot of us are unlikely to even try them. If I still bought consoles, the first one that did this would be the last I ever bought, and I'm not buying it if it's like that from the start.
I would rather read a book
Microsoft makes games?
They buy other companies that make games and then proceed to ruin everything about both.
Great another EA
EDIT: sorry, PUI
Microsoft has actually been a game company since before they made Windows. Microsoft Flight simulator came out in the early 80s
Arguably not a "game" game, it's a simulator.
Age of Empires I remember playing, Im sure there are others as well.
Everyone always says the "fun fact" about minesweeper and solitare being made by Microsoft to ensure users learned how to point and click, left/right click, and drag and drop, but I would say that was more a means to an end than a video game development aim though.
Granted. I remember Age of Empires II very fondly.
From the looks of this patent, no.
They most recently bought Bethesda and ActivisionBlizzard.
They bought ZeniMax (including Bethesda, Arkane, Tango Gameworks, and MachineGames) 6 years ago. They've since closed Arkane Austin, it looks like the rest of Arkane is on the chopping block, and Tango Gameworks was closed but then revived with about half ots former staff under new ownership (Krafton - so still not great) along with the rights of Hi-Fi Rish (but not the Evil Within or Ghostwire).
Pretty sad but hopefully some of these developers start an indie studio.
I've hated Microsoft since the late 90s. I refused to ever own an XBox. My friends rolled their eyes, but I get semi-regular reminders that validate my feelings.
I've been a console guy my whole life, but I'm starting to realize that PC is, indeed, the master race.
LMFTFY: But I’m starting to realise that
PCLinux is, indeed the master race.I actually just kind of assumed lol. I’ve been a Linux user for over a year now.
🤘
Yeah good luck with that. I'll stick with windows xp games if I have to. I'd rather play playstation 2 games than sit through ads on modern hardware. Amiga games, even.
so microsoft strategy is to make games not fun and to sell u ai slop
C-suite has never really understood the artform. They only know how to follow 'trends' and listen to the yes-men who can't understand why nobody want's to watch their adverts.
ai slop with ai generated ads no doubt.
I've seen this mechanism a hundred times already, and they want to patent it? Good luck
And yes, it sucks as bad as it sounds
Can we just drop the pretends and go straight to making everyone slaves?
I was playing an Xbox game you can only get by downloading from the store. They must have been testing out this freeze function because the game had to buffer so many times while I was playing that I will probably never play that game again.
It's my favorites series as well but I guess I'm not playing any new Skate games anymore. I didn't have that problem with all the Skate games that came with a disk.
I have a lot of complaints about skate, but buffering isn't one of them. Have tried on xbox and steam
Do these people just want everyone to not play their games and to pirate everything!
Are Mircosoft jealous of Playstation, and are trying to lose MORE customers than PS?
Genuine question: obviously there is always gonna be somebody who disagrees with scummy practices and leaves but is there any evidence that Sony is actively losing customers from all the bullshit?
just found the replies tab! I dont know, but I wouldnt be surprised if their sales are shite. I have always felt that games should be the same offline, and to me, multiplayer still means offline with friends. But I'm old as shit now
It's sad that almost none of the tech companies remain in the business that made them rich and powerful, they all kept that core business only as bait, but they switched to "sucking their victims dry" business
The tech industry is an oligopoly. Microsoft, Nvidia and Google control everything. Nvidia has an actual monopoly.
Yes, but the issue goes even deeper. Microsoft has no monopoly in gaming, but that doesn't stop them from acting like they did (for example recent Xbox life price increases), and the competition instead of pushing them out of the market, does their own stupid shit (you don't own your digital Playstation games... We said you do?!? Oh, we were just kidding).
Instead of fighting for new customers all big companies focus on extracting as much money as possible out of existing customers. It's like they are fighting us (customers) instead of each other.
Outside is too scary, books to boring, guitar too hard. I guess i have no choice.
On games I’ve purchased? Didn’t read the article.
Edit: downvoted for asking a question. That’s some reddit shit.
well, there's that whole thing about buying a game not meaning that you own it, so...
On free-to-play games. Would be really dumb to put ads on game I PAID FOR!
Thank you!
You guys do know that a patent isn't a promise to implement something.
Remember that Sony patent. Never been used and never will be.