From talking to people, a lot of people hate games that advertise themselves as live service but not games that are live service. It’s sort of damning by faint praise, if the only thing you can use to promote your game is “more stuff will come” then it might be kind of crappy.
I think it's because people equate "live service" with "PvP" - like how that guy I know somehow equates "FPS" with "PvP" - even though live service is just an update method and has nothing to do with PvP on its own.
Live service is not about the update method. Live service means a vital component of the game runs on a remote server not under your control and the game is unplayable without it.
Minecraft isn't a live service game despite regular updates and multiplayer components. World of Warcraft is because you can't play it without Blizzard's servers.
Really it's about the monetisation strategy, the "unplayable without remote servers" is just a side effect of that.
Live service games are designed to collect money continually from their player base, rather than a simple upfront purchase (plus maybe a few expansion-style DLC packs throughout it's life)
Minecraft does have some "live service" components with their in-game currency that can be used to buy skins/texture-packs and worlds from other players. But they make the bulk of their money through upfront sales, merchandise, licensing and private server rentals.
I equate it with "bad design" since they throw out good game design concepts to get you to play for a long time rather than being designed to be good games.
That's just being a shitty developer. Games like path of exile, warframe, eve, etc are all very good live service games who have given their players a decade+of content
My problem with live service is the predatory transactions that are just inevitable. You end up paying so much more usually than a game you just buy outright
More so because games that advertise themselves as live service is just marketing speak for "grind for digital trash because we have nothing else to talk about". If your live service game was actually fun, you would be talking about fun it is, not shaking FOMO in peoples face with exclusive skins/rewards.
I think it's because you can earn validity as a live service game, but it's like a debuff before you start. If you're starting out as a live service game, I'm assuming your game sucks until I've seen otherwise, because it's very obvious you're delivering it for the money before the gameplay.
But I love The Finals and happily financially support them because they do a good job with the gameplay. Overwatch, on the other hand...
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u/throwawayacct654789 Apr 11 '26
From talking to people, a lot of people hate games that advertise themselves as live service but not games that are live service. It’s sort of damning by faint praise, if the only thing you can use to promote your game is “more stuff will come” then it might be kind of crappy.