A Closer Look on the Addiction of Collecting Video Games.

Yes you've read the title correctly. Collecting video games, not actually playing them.

Soooo many games... why do we have sooo many bloody games. "Have i even played half of them?", "Should i buy more?", "But i'l have a huge backlog.", "But that bundle is pretty cheap.", "But i like collecting games.", "It's a hobby."

 

Those are the usual things asked and told ourselves regarding the overwhelming library of digital video games that many of us have. How did that happen? What made the accessibility of these games so easy? Well let's find out:

The Past:

I assume many avid collector of video games is familiar with this name. Unsure whenever they are the ground zero of all this, but it's a great start. Who are they?

Well Digital Homicide was (emphasis of was, it closed down in 2016) an american video game developer. They are known aside for the infamous Jim Sterling lawsuit and the lawsuit of 100 steam users for negative comments, also as the company that popularized the term "Shovelware" . The general definition of shovelware follows:

Shovelware is a derogatory term used for software that has either been quickly developed without regard to quality or function and features, or software that has been forced on customers such as those that are preloaded on laptops or smartphones by their respective carriers.

 

Meaning Digital Homicide, are known for making, to put it bluntly, absolutely terrible games. Chances are, as a steam game collector, that you own at least one or a couple of those games made by them.

So that means they're pretty terrible at making video games. Ah but no so fast, on what would seem incompetent game making on the surface, it merely acts as a smokescreen for their true motive:

Trading Cards. Likewise, you, as a video game collector, probably had/has a ton of these in your steam inventory. You probably made a couple of bucks, even hundreds from these. Well it turns out we validated an exploitative practice done by the unknown "Shovelware" Video Game companies.

As mentioned in this official statement for Valve back in 2017. Basically, when you got the opportunity to make money from trading cards, the "Bad Actors" gradually surfaced to exploit the system for their own monetary gain. As a game developer, they had the liberty of generating thousands of steam keys of their own game, distribute them to automatic bots, farm those cards, then make profit.

The large influx of terribly low budget games not only put a dent in the reputation of independent video game making, but also damaged Steam's algorithm with artificial inputs.

 

Thus, the golden age of lucrative card and video game collecting was slowly dying out as Valve made changes to their store, algorithm, and general usage of games with trading cards, imposing restrictions to prevent exploits.

 

The Present:

The damage has been done and cannot be reverted but only put to a halt, meaning many of the Shovelware developers and steam users alike got a really nice opportunity to make some cash, and many took full advantage of it. And who's to blame?

- Valve, for not being able to perceive this issue and retroactively done something to prevent it in the first place?

- The Shovelware Game Developers for starting and taking advantage of this exploit?

Well... as far as i'm concerned... Valve can't literally check every hole on their platform, the same way   @Cartire     @lampy    @Polly6789     and the rest of the admins on Alienwarearena cannot simply find out every hole in the system. It's the unfortunate reality that these "Bad Actors" will always exist to exploit something. Whenever people exploit the ARP system for points, or people exploit Steam's algorithm for money, this is the inevitable hurdle that people like those from Valve and the Alienwarearena staff has to go through their life.

The consumers are not really at fault for 2 reasons:

 1. Even if they didn't actively participate in this age of acquiring tons of trading cards, thus enabling these exploits, the Developers would still exploit it by using bots and friends of theirs to take advantage.

2. Why should you care? Oh well some devs exploited the system and you got some money. Why wouldn't you take advantage of it, it's human nature to do it. As far as you're concerned, it was one of the many opportunities to earn some money on steam.

 

 

 

So... cards aren't as prevalent anymore. But did that stop people from collecting games these days?

Promotion still exists. Free games still have a massive opportunity for lucrative promotional deals. Many even acquire their free games by completing actions on various sites like Gleam. Well those actions come with Ads, Facebook or any general social media page, different sections of their site, all for promotional value.

Then there are bundles. "But it's soo cheap", "Eh one more game wouldn't hurt" proceeded by "How do i find the time to play my giant backlog of unplayed games?"

 

Collecting video games was always a hobby since the Atari era. Yet, here's the difference:

- Games today are almost fully transition into digital state, meaning they are more accessible than they ever were

- You did not have a wide array of bundled games back in the day (unless you visited your local Gamestop for thrown games).

 

Meaning, the accessibility of acquiring so many games in such a short time, can invoke some addiction residue, sometimes minor, sometimes enough for you to spend money just to collect games.

You may ask "But why it isn't addictive for other people spending money on other hobbies?" "people spend a large amount on collecting coins, sports cards, various historical artifacts, why are we the addicts?"

You see, people spending money on other hobbies, are spending their earned cash for a specific item, often valuable. They are not hoarding their items.

People in the digital world of steam, are spending money indiscriminately on anything they don't have in their library, and if they do have it, they often give it away or activate it on their other Steam accounts.

 

But, then again, people have the liberty to spend their money however they want, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone, or preferably themselves (enough to invade their personal life) then really, collect all the games you want, i am victim of this myself, so who am i to talk about it less i would be a hypocrite to tell others not to do it.

Compared to Video Game Item Gambling (a topic for another time), this is nothing in terms of its addictive nature. As a piece of advice, don't lament too much on your backlog of video games. They are there to stay forever (or unless Valve goes bankrupt). Play whatever you like and let those looming games sit there and collect dust.

 

DISCLAIMER: This is an educated opinion of someone who has been relatively informed about today's journalism, but do not think of it as fact. It was made from varying opinions and sources other than myself.

Source of this article: Myself (Caecus est inamabilis sciurus)