ericbomb

Definition: A gaming dark pattern is something that is deliberately added to a game to cause an unwanted negative experience for the player with a positive outcome for the game developer.

Learned about it from another lemmy user! it's a newer website, so not every game has a rating, but it's already super helpful and I intend to add ratings as I can!

While as an adult I think it'll probably be helpful to find games that are just games and not trying to bait whales, I feel like it's even more helpful for parents.

Making sure the game your kids want to play is free of traps like accidental purchases and starting chain emails with invites I think makes it worth its weight in gold.

EDIT: Some folks seem to be concerned with some specific items that it looks for, but I've been thinking of it like this:

1 mechanic is a thread, multiple together form a pattern. It's why they'll still have a high score even if they have a handful of the items listed.

Like random loot from a boss can be real fun! But when it's combined with time gates, pay to skip, grinding, and loot boxes.... we all know exactly what it is trying to accomplish. They don't want you to actually redo the dungeon 100 times. They want you to buy 100 loot boxes.

Guilds where you screw over your friends if you don't play for a couple days because your guild can't compete and earn the rewards they want if even a single player isn't playing every single day? Yeah, we know what it's about. But guilds where it's all very chill and optional? Completely fine.

Games that throw in secret bots without telling you to make you think you're good at the game combined with a leader board and infinite treadmill, so you sit there playing the game not wanting to give up your "top spot"? I see you stupid IO games.

But also, information is power to the consumer.

I do like having games on my phone, but it's always a struggle looking for games with 0 microtransactions. So would like a game I can out right pay for, or one with ads. The ability to disable ads for $5 is chill though.

I've played a lot of games that you can "have fun being f2p" but some days I just get really sick and tired of games I play trying to sell me things every 30 seconds.

So do you guys have any?

If not I may go back to playing GBA games on my phone XD

EDIT: Oh selling like expansions is probably fine if it's legit like a full other game. I'm on android

Eating the proper amount is hard. Eating when you have low time, money, mental energy, or education on cooking is even harder.

This book assumes nothing. Do you know how to turn on your stove? You are properly prepared to use this cookbook.

Just want to share it with more folks!

So my mom has been saying for awhile how she wished she could play Hogwarts legacy, and my older sister just replaced her gaming PC. So my sister sent her old pc to my mom. Nothing crazy, but meets minimum system requirements! My mom is now kind of speed running learning about gaming and it's been amusing. I just think these are adorable.

1. She complained that she couldn't find the game for sale for PC anywhere, she could only find it for XBOX and PS. She was looking on amazon, and I had to point her towards steam, and help her setup an account for steam.

2. She happened to purchase it while it was on sale and she was super confused why it was randomly on sale! Had to explain how steam works. She's disabled and the $60 was the extent of her fun money for the month, so getting it on sale was a huge deal to her.

3. Complaining at how long it took to download the game off wifi when she was ready to play RIGHT NOW. She kept asking if we could use an Ethernet cable to make it go faster, but her PC was like 40 feet from the nearest jack and we didn't have a long enough ethernet cable (No I wasn't driving home to my house to look for one, and no I wasn't buying her one. Love you momma! You gotta wait!)

4. She realized she hates mouse and keyboard, so used the money she saved from the sale to buy a little controller from walmart.

5. She talked about how much she likes that because she's on "story mode" she can skip puzzles/challenges she thinks are stupid. Considering there are games I never beat as a kid because of a specific mini game/challenge I couldn't beat, I resonated with that. Back when we were kids if there was a quick time event you couldn't beat, we quit the game!

6. A few weeks later she talked about how she was super happy to finally find a youtuber that would give walk through/tips/advice on how to do things in a not annoying way. The one she likes are basically "Here is a 30 second clip of doing this specific thing in this room". She is not a fan of 30 minute lets plays with intros/outros.

7. Complaining about long load times between rooms, and quests that make her go through multiple loading zones. No comment, she's just right to complain.

All her revelations were super relatable and I just thought it was cute that at an older age she went through modern gaming transition in a few weeks, and hit on emotions we all basically hit.

It's a website that lets you sort amazon by price per ounce/pound/count

https://bangyourbuck.com/

Some examples are:

Cheapest rice per pound https://bangyourbuck.com/search/rice/Lb/US/grid

Cheapest batteries by count: https://bangyourbuck.com/search/aa%20batteries/Count/US/grid

Hard drives by terabyte: https://bangyourbuck.com/search/hard%20drive/Terabyte/US/grid

Been using it for months, and I can't stand using Amazon without it now.

Went to a movie theater and saw a trailer for a movie where I was interested in the first 30 seconds of it, but the trailer then showed what looked like something probably from the last 10 minutes and spoiled the entire movie, so lost all interest.

So what movies come to mind as having done really good, where it makes you interested and gives you an idea of the movie, but doesn't ruin any big reveals?

My two:

Very cliché, I played Ocarina of Time a ton as a child, have memories of playing it both on N64 as a wee child and on game cube as a less small child. Never got past water temple even with the game guide.

Yu-Gi-Oh forbidden memories. Played the crap out of that game on play station, constantly playing on free play praying for the cards I would need to get further. I was never able to beat more than 1-2 of the high mages. Watching speed runs on the game it turns out I was never ever going to beat that game as a kid. The final 6 are just disgustingly brutal.

I personally know some folks who spend all their money on fast food, and then online it seems pretty common folks not knowing how to cook causes massive financial problems.

My super duper cheap meal that takes no effort is "lazy rice veggie soup": Can of peas and carrots cooked with a bouyon cube until cube is dissolved Add cooked rice to mix, and heat until rice is flavorful with absorbed broth

I do a cup of dried rice, and a can of peas and carrots which means the soup has 800ish calories and I think it's pretty good as it's either 2 small meals that you can have sides with, or one large one!

So what are your cheap meals you like to make? The less well known, the better!