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Dead Space In Your Face: Gaming and Rent-Seeking

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Well, that was quick.

Last week I was discussing how monetization was going to be an issue in your gaming career – since there were many options that would obviously affect how you get paid.  Or if you get paid.  Or if you have any hope in hell of success.  Well, now I’m still talking about it – along with my current obsession of analyzing game careers, of course.

One of my inspirations for that post, by the way, was the weird news in Dead Space 3 about how one could purchase quicker collection of crafting materials.  Yes, a big console game that just happens to let you act like you’re in a typical free-to-play game, in a way that seemed kinda obvious.

EA was appropriately and mercilessly skewered by Penny Arcade, as was appropriate.  However they were also skewered by resource collecting bugs that made the micro transaction thing a null issue.

I’m wondering if they’ll patch it or not.

Here we see another risk to gaming – and a factor to take into any gaming career you may want to have.

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Can You Bring Business Along?

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Last week Rocky Agrawai of Venture Beat noted the simple painful fact that big box retailers have more online competition and need to upgrade.  He then documents his own painful big box experiences which you really don’t see in online retail (often because they’re screwups caused by being there).

Big Box retail needs an upgrade, he concludes.  I concur myself; most of my experience with Big Box these days is Frys, who has wisely chosen their own focus (crazy selections and sheer enthusiasm in bulk).

In fact, Rocky then went on to discuss how department stores need help too.  I imagine if he is going to fully explore businesses who are behind the times, he’s going to be very busy – and I encourage him, he’s got great insights.

We probably wouldn’t be complaining about this two decades ago as the stores wouldn’t have comparable experience.  We also probably wouldn’t be complaining as much as it’s a different economic and cultural time.  But in a day of cut-it-to-the-bone, short-term thinking, Big Box stores and many others often feel rather miserable.

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For Us, Easy Bake is Easy To Take

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Well, it’s happened.  Hasbro, after criticism, is going gender neutral on it’s Easy Bake Oven.  As a guy who likes to cook, let me say “bravo”, and may I suggest a line of gender-neutral kid’s cookbooks and cooking utensils.  No I’m serious, have you seen how kids are eating?

It appears there’s awareness of gender issues and toy sales, even if attempts are a bit offbeat.  Of course geeks like us know that there’s plenty of cases of gender-bent preferences.

  • Hasbro, of course, has My Little Pony, which makes the easy-bake over issue look like nothing.  If they released a Pinkie Pie Microwave, grown men would buy it.
  • There’s “The Transformers,” whose fandom taught me that if your last name is “Prime” there’s no small amount of women who, when younger, thought you were the sexiest thing on two legs or four wheels.  Peter Cullen, and that large cast of Rodimi, do you know what you did?
  • Huge amounts of anime targeted at men with casts of buff guys punching stuff and bonding attract huge female audiences because it’s buff guys punching stuff and bonding.  Yaoi is a kind of cultural alkaheist.

Nothing here really surprises us.  The issues of gender-target expectations being off doesn’t surprise us.

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