What is anti-consumer behavior to you?

[Deleted member 42]

I'm seeing the phrase anti-consumer used more and more lately around these parts

As someone who absolutely despises phrases being overused, like 'disingenuous', 'bad faith', and 'No, Bronson, we are still not developing the MintPad 2 and renaming it the BronPad', I do still recognize that it has its' use case more and more these days.

So what constitutes anti-consumer behavior from a company to you? Is it locking a game behind an exclusive platform/device? Is it not dropping the price of games/not having enough sales? Is it not having things like backwards compatibility as a priority, and vice versa? Cough it up, what ya got?

 

[ara]

When a company doesn't seem to care about me as a person :(

 

[nadbmal]

When they don't put the game on Steam

 

[johnnydork]

Whenever Jim Sterling alerts me to it

 

[Rosebud]

Gambling mechanics
Full priced games with part of the story as DLC

 

[Asbsand]

Idk. I don't honestly care about how developers treat me, I just wish more developers treated their own product with more dignity, but not all developers consider themselves artists.

 

[Slayven]

I think it gets thrown around to much because the marketing of "these companies are your friends" works too well on the gaming industry. Companies are not your friend and should be treated in a semi skeptical manor. The company will always think "How will I get the most amount of money out of the least amount of effort", consumers should always have this in mind.

 

[Deleted member 48897]

Supporting capitalism

"but muteKi, that's sort of inherent in being a company in this sociopolitical environment"

yes exactly

 

[Deleted member 9135]

Withholding pertinent information on a product or service with the intent to deceive.

A business making a decision I don't like isn't anti consumer. It isn't tied to my perception of the company but to product / service only

edit: I think most who abuse the term should be pema'd. A lot of complaints about "anti consumer" come from folks who knew exactly what they were getting and what they were paying for it.

 

[Canucked]

When a sale is mostly of benefit to the seller and an equal exchange hasn't happened. Starting to feel like a buzzword and is losing all meaning.

 

[Rosebud]

No refunds
No regional pricing
Save backups behind a paywall
Internet behind a paywall

 

[Bit_Reactor]

Anything that acts in direct opposition to a consumer making a rational decision regarding purchasing something and/or taking advantage of a consumer by promising something that isn't there. This is especially egregious if there is a dollar value placed on something without a known or explicit value.

Examples include:
1. Trailers that aren't made in game pretending to be final graphics to enhance sales.
2. Selling incomplete games as products and then charging season passes or MTX in order to make enough money to "fix" them in post.
3. Selling Season passes without a consumer being able to make a rational decision on if that content is valuable for the dollar price.
4. The entirety of Gacha games and their mechanics, and any variation implemented in mainline gaming.
5. Shoving premium currencies and phone game currencies into 60 dollar games in order to get something the player wants, especially when the values are skewed so the consumer has to pay more than they need for values of items that will be left over in the bank, taunting the consumer of their inability to use them.
6. Selling preorder incentives in order to provoke players to pay for "Fear of Missing Out" for content even if that game/content isn't worth it.
7. Blatantly lying about mechanics/updates/features in said game.
8. Repackaging the same game with slight variety to encourage user spending on a yearly cycle, without making good enough content to encourage spending that way.
9. Going radio silent on a game as service when communication and feature enhancement is the most important part of their "services."
10. Games as service implementation in which a game does not make substantial changes without charging for multiple season passes and/or sequels.

And those are just the ones I could recite off the top of my head.

 

[Strangelove_77]

I don't actually know myself, I just parrot shit I've heard on the internet.

 

[Loanshark]

Selling a defective product, deceiving or lying to your customers, not providing good customer support. Besides that, predatory & cynical MTX schemes. Worth noting that not all microtransactions are this way.

 

[MrS]

Paywalling online gaming/multiplayer.

 

[lt519]

Anything designed to generate more money off of something that was once a free norm or designed to trap someone in an ecosystem. Loot boxes, micro-transactions, region lock, preventing cross-play/save, and DRM are all on my list. That's about it for me. False advertisement (bullshots, etc) to an extent, but do your own research should be on the consumer as well.

Things like backwards compatibility come at a cost to the manufacturer and I don't think it's anti-consumer to not have that. You can always keep your old console around. They are also free to charge whatever they want for their games, I fail to see how not having sales is anti-consumer.

 

[VariantX]

Basically, when companies go and stack the deck against you and try their hardest to restrict your rights and choices as a consumer. Things like:

- not being able to repair your own electronics or take it to a third party repair shop when they've broken down
- not offering refunds for a product that isnt fit for purpose or failed to even work upon purchase
- companies making sure that they're the only game in town so you have no choice but to go through them (US Telecoms)
- hardware companies going out of their way to brick cheaper third party peripherals ( not the ones that allow piracy or cheating )
- locking third party accounts to their platform (essentially what happened with fortnite earlier with Sony)

 

[Freezasaurus]

I know it's going to vary from person to person, but to me it's when a company excessively exploits the consumer.

The best examples of this are usually in the form of too much goddamn DLC. Like DOA5:LR having what, $300 worth of DLC by the time Tecmo was finished? Sure, the "you don't HAVE to buy it" excuse is always there. But some people have a psychological compulsion to have all of the content, and these practices prey on that. Same with things like lootboxes that don't let the customer choose exactly which items they want to buy.

One recent example that kind of irked me was the new DLC for Starlink. I had a pretty good time with the game, so I was looking forward to the new Starfox DLC and whatever else they released. Turns out, for the whole batch of new DLC, they wanted me to fork out another $50, and that pack didn't even include the Starfox Pack, which would have run me another $12. It's obvious there's not going to be anymore support for the game going forward, so Ubisoft just thought they'd hit me for the cost of another full game on the way out the door. Not happening.

 

[Professor Beef]

Withholding pertinent information on a product or service with the intent to deceive.

A business making a decision I don't like isn't anti consumer. It isn't tied to my perception of the company but to product / service only

Click to shrink...

 

[P-Tux7]

For me, it's Nintendo disapproving of fan games. It shows that they care more about Mario's "console exclusivity" than the fandom celebrating Mario when they don't allow free PC fangames of him (that oftentimes don't hold a candle to official releases).

 

[Fredrik]

When they force me to swap platforms because of exclusivity deals...
...then release the game on my favorite platform 6 months later...
...but don't offer a cloud save solution and license transfer...
...so I'll have to buy the game twice and start over from the beginning...
...then they'll brag about record breaking sales.

 

[karnage10]

For me anti-consumer is

• increasing costs while adding no discernible good features
• removing features while keeping the same price
• Selling a product with less rights/features then those done by similar companies
• Selling a product in which the ToS are bypassing a law

 

[Zen Hero]

Personally, I think a game simply offering a bad value isn't anti-consumer. Like being too expensive, or having a bad monetization strategy. It's a bad game and not something I would buy, but I wouldn't call it "anti-consumer". I just ignore those games and leave it at that.

I also don't think exclusives are anti-consumer. I accept the market reasoning behind them.

Something I would consider to be anti-consumer is something like region locking. There may be legitimate financial or legal reasons behind it, but still, it just feels so arbitrary and wrong. Luckily the industry has mostly moved in from it.

 

[lt519]

For me, it's Nintendo disapproving of fan games. It shows that they care more about Mario's "console exclusivity" than the fandom celebrating Mario when they don't allow free PC fangames of him (that oftentimes don't hold a candle to official releases).

Click to shrink...

It has nothing to do with console exclusivity and everything to do with protecting their IP and brand from being cheapened. Some fan made games may be great, but some may be awful. They don't want potential new customers first impression of Mario to be a knock-off that is a broken mess and plays nothing like a real Mario game. I've always been fine with this. People that make games in the dark for 3 years and then complain when they get a C&D on their reveal know exactly what they are doing.

 

[Bit_Reactor]

It has nothing to do with console exclusivity and everything to do with protecting their IP and brand from being cheapened. Some fan made games may be great, but some may be awful. They don't want potential new customers first impression of Mario to be a knock-off that is a broken mess and plays nothing like a real Mario game. I've always been fine with this. People that make games in the dark for 3 years and then complain when they get a C&D on their reveal know exactly what they are doing.

Click to shrink...

Yeah protecting an IP isn't anti-consumer. It doesn't in any way invalidate any purchases or ask for a consumer to make a monetary choice. (sans maybe console purchase, but that's an incentive, not working against the consumer directly)

 

[Andri]

Anti consumer is the buzz word people use when they cant from a coherent argument otherwise.

 

[Remo Williams]

I try to look at it the other way. Sure, there are behaviours that I consider anti-consumer, like limiting my options in a way that primarily benefits some company, but I like to focus on things that I consider pro-consumer, and spend my money in ecosystems that give me more choice, that don't punish me for my preferences, and instead make me feel good no matter which option I pick.

 

[Deleted member 8001]

Actions that over a period of time negatively impact the consumer's enjoyment in terms of elaborate and specific decisions without a fair reason to do so.

 

[Eoin]

There's a broad range of potential anti-consumer behaviours, including:

- tricking the customer in some way (false or misleading advertising, nondisclosure of relevant information, non-provision of promised goods or services, etc.)
- price discrimination that is significantly out of line with local purchasing power
- regional lockouts or severe discrepancies between regional versions of a game that means that some players have an objectively inferior version
- making it unnecessary difficult (or practically impossible) for customers to take advantage of their statutory consumer rights
- actively engaging in behaviour which is outside of market norms to the disadvantage of the consumer and the advantage of the seller

Things that normally aren't anti-consumer:

- bad pricing. If the price is visible up front, and so is what the product offers, players can choose to buy or not based on an accurate portrayal of the product. A choice to buy a product at an offered price is acceptance that the price is fair
- price changes. They happen. This is not new information to anyone
- the existence of microtransactions. That certainly doesn't mean that microtransactions aren't ever anti-consumer. It just means that they're not anti-consumer as an inherent concept
- platform choices. A company has no obligation to make a game available on every platform, no matter how much additional availability would suit some subset of players

 

[Wulfric]

Deception is a pretty big one. Being Xbox exclusive is not one of them.

When a sale is mostly of benefit to the seller and an equal exchange hasn't happened. Starting to feel like a buzzword and is losing all meaning.

Click to shrink...

I'm gonna need you to eleborate. Are you talking about companies buying another studio, or you as an individual purchasing a game on sale?

 

[Bit_Reactor]

I try to look at it the other way. Sure, there are behaviours that I consider anti-consumer, like limiting my options in a way that primarily benefits some company, but I like to focus on things that I consider pro-consumer, and spend my money in ecosystems that give me more choice, that don't punish me for my preferences, and instead make me feel good no matter which option I pick.

Click to shrink...

This is why being informed is so important. I bought the Seasons Pass for Smash despite my hatred of passes for things no one knows what they are because the last pass got me Cloud and because Nintendo tends to be pretty good on that front. Context, track record, and looking at material ahead of time (although some of it is faked, something I feel gaming enthusiasts still give way too much leniency on) helps inform these choices.

Xenoblade 2 was crazy good post launch support.

Witcher 3 had great post launch support and incentive to spend.

Warframe does a great job of ensuring that purchases are made worth it, while adding coupons and dev streams to constantly show you where your money is going towards in development, allowing for a consumer to make a decision to either continue supporting or stop supporting the game.

So I spend on those games. None of those purchases are against my rights or interests as a consumer, who wants to support game devs to keep making good stuff.

 

[Deleted member 8593]

If they do something that mildly inconveniences me and they don't tuck me in at night.

 

[NoblesseOblige]

Almost anything done with the intended purpose of profiting is 'anti-consumer'. It's all some form of manipulation and/or exploitation.

 

[Deleted member 42]

Lot of good responses in here and then there's Slayven's

For me, I think my big ones would be:
Deceptive trailers/marketing
Abusive DLC and/or lootboxes all left to chance

Most companies aren't really pro-consumer per se, but it's a balancing act kinda thing IMO

Like Sony isn't really down with crossplay, but are down with lots of sales
Nintendo is down with crossplay, but keeps their pricing up

etc etc

 

[WestEgg]

A company either intentionally misleading me on the function of its product or in someway violating my legal rights.

 

[Deleted member 721]

to increase price after you reduced the ammount of games per month, and to lock online behind a paywall

(i'm still pissed with sony)

 

[Inuhanyou]

behavior that makes it harder for me to buy and support products.

 

[NoblesseOblige]

Also I find irony in this whole 'anti-consumer' thing. Like... why would you see view yourself as a consumer. How demeaning.

 

[Tatsu91]

When they don't put the game on Steam

Click to shrink...

Thats not though? It does not hurt you or try to cheat you.

 

[fracas]

It means absolutely nothing to me. You can skew literally anything as anti-consumer when the entire point of the video game industry and any business in existence is to earn/squeeze money out of a consumer. No business is your friend, just buy whatever junk you want.

Anti-consumer pretty much now only means "I don't like thing."

 

[Deleted member 2791]

Withholding pertinent information on a product or service with the intent to deceive.

A business making a decision I don't like isn't anti consumer. It isn't tied to my perception of the company but to product / service only

edit: I think most who abuse the term should be pema'd. A lot of complaints about "anti consumer" come from folks who knew exactly what they were getting and what they were paying for it.

Click to shrink...

YES
a thousand times yes
pin this post
change the resetera logo for a screenshot of this post

THIS is the only meaning of Anti-consumer and anything else is a wrong answer.
Although it's maybe just a bit too restrictive, but the general idea is a company intentionally deceiving a consumer by not respecting their [consumer] rights.

 

[Deleted member 42]

Withholding pertinent information on a product or service with the intent to deceive.

A business making a decision I don't like isn't anti consumer. It isn't tied to my perception of the company but to product / service only

edit: I think most who abuse the term should be pema'd. A lot of complaints about "anti consumer" come from folks who knew exactly what they were getting and what they were paying for it.

Click to shrink...

This post is really good so I'm gonna pretend I made it

Withholding pertinent information on a product or service with the intent to deceive.

A business making a decision I don't like isn't anti consumer. It isn't tied to my perception of the company but to product / service only

edit: I think most who abuse the term should be pema'd. A lot of complaints about "anti consumer" come from folks who knew exactly what they were getting and what they were paying for it.

Click to shrink...

 

[Deleted member 48897]

Almost anything done with the intended purpose of profiting is 'anti-consumer'. It's all some form of manipulation and/or exploitation.

Click to shrink...

Right. And for most devs working outside the indie environment, they're salaried. The whole profit thing is money being asked of by consumers that doesn't account for the cost in goods and human labor that was used to make the...well, any product. And very little of it goes back to the people whose labor was responsible for it.

But hey those rockstar strip club parties that represent a huge breach in boundaries between the company/executives and their employees don't pay for themselves

 

[Professor Beef]

damn good post Somewhatgroovy , i wish the OP had the brains to put together something as riveting

 

[Vault]

Capitalism especially the American form of it.

 

[Deleted member 42]

damn good post Somewhatgroovy , i wish the OP had the brains to put together something as riveting

Click to shrink...

kiss mah fluffy ass

 

[Deleted member 8001]

I believe there's also anti-consumer actions without the intent to be anti-consumer directly. Some companies value a certain image at the detriment to consumers options.

 

[Professor Beef]

kiss mah fluffy ass

Click to shrink...

i'm sure the fluff is there to hide that hank hill-esque backside of yours

 

[Deleted member 9135]

damn good post Somewhatgroovy , i wish the OP had the brains to put together something as riveting

Click to shrink...

He's the worst. <3

 

[Brotherhood93]

Quite simply when a company does something that negatively affects the consumer for their own benefit.

The argument as to whether something is anti-consumer is to whether it fits the above description. For example, lootboxes aren't inherently anti-consumer because you could argue they make games more fun and increase engagement despite the fact that I and many find them terrible and wish they didn't exist. Something like suppressing negative reviews, though, would be anti-consumer because it serves no purpose other than to attempting to mislead and misinform consumers.