Is Nothing Safe From Scamcom?

I was originally going to write a review for Assassin's Creed Brotherhood... But I recently stumbled across this little app on the iTunes Appstore and my head just hit the desk. The amount of attempted cash scamming/bleeding in this... a freaking iPhone App... is unbelievable...

The app in question is called Capcom Arcade. It's effectively a miniature attempt at recreating Microsoft's Game Room for XBLA. A virtual arcade with old and beloved retro classics from yesteryear, when games were great, and games were not vessels for scam locking and cutting of content for the sake of bleeding cash from the customer. The app is a Free* download from the App Store. That's the good part.

Unfortunately that's the only good part.

The app may be free to download, and in Scamcom's own words, they intended it to 'simulate the experience' of going to an arcade in the days when arcades still existed. So to allow for this to happen, guess what... Every game BA DUM TISS... costs tokens to play. You are given 3 free tickets for free plays per day. That entitles you to play any of the 4 games currently featured. On offer are Street Fighter II (the original World Warrior, not Champion Edition), 1942, Ghouls and Ghosts and Commando. All of these are great, great titles in their time, and their value has not diminished today. These are retro classics that really should be played by everyone.

Just don't use this app to do it.

When your 3 free tickets run out, you can go to the virtual counter and 'purchase more tokens' to play. Guess how?... Yep, $0.99... lets just say one dollar... per ten tokens. That may sound cheap as games back in the day were a quarter a play, but... That was at the arcade, that had running costs and all that. This is a freaking iPhone game... Having to pay per play on a freaking PHONE GAME is beyond ludicrous. If paying per play isn't your thing, you can always 'buy the arcade machine' for $2.99... which gives you unlimited plays.

So lets see now... For this 'free' game... In order to actually 'own' it, and play it as much as you like when you like, you have to shell out a total of $12. A small amount for a console or PC title but a very princely sum for a mobile app. Not even Street Fighter 4 for iPhone cost that much and SF4 is a VERY worthwhile purchase. Additionally, true to Scamcom's asspain cash bleeding norm nowadays... Included are also a number of 'special features' aka cheats for each title. Back in the days of yesteryear, cheats were unlocked by completing the game, or by entering in a button combination of some sort. In today's scam locked content age, they are unlocked only by Visa or Mastercard. Each 'special feature' costs another dollar, and there are 2 available for SF2, 3 for 1942, 4 for Ghouls and Ghosts and 3 for Commando. So to own this little Free* app outright and to own every aspect and feature of it, you must shell out the RIDICULOUS amount of $24.

So much for free app.

Again, to all the blind, brainwashed sheep going BUT IT'S OPTIONAL bla bla yadda yadda spare me your tired old rhetoric. The cheats may be optional but that is HARDLY the point. The point is they EXIST in a cash locked form, that they are even ALLOWED TO EXIST IN THIS FORM, should be a crime in itself.

Oh... Did I mention that even if you were to pay said princely sum... The app contains ADVERTISEMENTS, that cannot be disabled?... Words fail me at this point as to how low Scamcom have fallen in their attempt to scrape for the tiniest nickel from anywhere they can get it.

It's good however that the app is indeed a free download from the Appstore. On the Appstore, you are unable to review or comment on an app until you have purchased it. Free download means anyone can get it and review. Do feel free to get it and give it a one-star review, decrying this poor scam attempt for what it is and deny Scamcom any money from it.

For those of you with a jailbroken iOS device and feel like they absolutely must play the games in this form, there is a CCC.plist file in /var/mobile/Applications/CapcomGame/Preferences that controls the level of scam content locking. Edit the file to look like the example below, and everything shall be laid bare to your whim. The best part? Scamcom saw $0.00 from it as they so rightfully deserve. All is right with the world indeed.

PS: Please do NOT ask me how to access the file. Those with jailbroken iOS devices should know how to access the filesystem. If you don't, it's not my job to teach you. Level up your Google Fu and you will get there, young grasshopper.

*aka the 'Freemium' model. Should be called Feemium. There is no free.

The Cycle of Decline

This article over at Kotaku is a good example of the state of the industry nowadays. Company comes out on the soapbox crying foul over FUCKING PIIIIIRATES!!! stealing their hard scammed earned dollars and that they are refusing to release gaem on a platform due to the evils of piracy.

Well gee...

Let's take a step back here shall we?...

Let us take a step back in time, back to February the 17th, 2009, when vanilla SF4 was first released. Many were quite happy to jump on and buy the game then when it first came out, yours truly being one of them. We bought, we played, and the game... it was good.

In a happy sappy fappy fairytale world, this little flashback would have ended right here.

Instead, what should have been a near ideal game release, one to be savored and remembered fondly FOR ALL TIEM... Began to show signs of what we shall call the Modern Day Gaming Evil(tm) (MDGE).

The first evil: Costume DLC

The game featured alternate outfits for the characters, many of which were quite nice, and, if this had been a decade ago, unlockable through regular gameplay. Due to MDGE.. Capcom went on to nickel and dime us to unlock these costumes that were already on the disc to begin with.

Not only did that suck, it left a rather filthy taste in the mouth. But many gave in and decided that the game was good enough to allow Capcom their little extra profit. When a game is good enough, and if you like it enough, show support right?

Again, in a happy sappy fappy fairytale world, we'd be stopping right here too...

Now we move onto the second evil: A game upgrade 'patch' being announced and sold as a whole new installment not even 2 months after the vanilla game hit store shelves.

We can argue this utill we're all blue in the face and never get anywhere. Capcom claimed the Super SF4 upgrade was too big, and too major a revision to be a patch, therefore they had to sell it as a whole new game. Personally? I think that's the biggest load of shit since Guilty Gear 2 and it's XX #Reload Slash Final Really No It's Final This Time installments that put me off ever buying another Arksys game until the FINAL final definitive version has come out. No one's a stranger to Capcom and their magical god tier inability to count past 2 for years, instead choosing to rehash the same game as Super Champion Hyper What-Fucking-Ever Edition until the profit books no longer register the Idiot Dollar.

...Then they counted to 3 for the first time in years... and now finally to 4! AND THEY'RE DOING IT AGAIN!

But at least... At LEAST back then, they had the decency to wait until the corpse of the previous game was at least COLD before announcing the next installment. This? Not even 2 months? Sorry, that was a new low even for them. If you could announce it that soon, why not delay the vanilla version for a few more months and release it with the upgrades already in there instead?

...Oh wait, it wouldn't have scammed enough money then, my bad... Forget I asked.

But the fans, being blind, brainwashed and moronic enough they'd make Apple fanboys at a Steve Jobs keynote speech look objective and unbiased, lapped it all up and threw yet more money at the Capcom troll machine for this 'whole new game'.

...Only to find out, OBVIOUSLY, there was YET MORE DISC LOCKED CONTENT that, surprise surprise, they would be nickel and dimed for. Not only that, fast forward a little further today and now we have an announcement of... wait for it!... WITHHELD content, that was more-than-likely stripped out of the final product so they could charge YET MORE money for it later, when the Idiot Dollar from the scam DLC began to die out.

Oh sure, now I hear you say 'It wasn't withheld! They're really just developing it now!' and 'You're angry, bitter and jaded!' and whatever else you want to say.

But, prove me wrong? Go ahead. You can't.

You can't prove me wrong.

None of us know anymore, in this day and age of scam DLC, that DLC really is new addon content. History has shown ever since the beginning of the DLC era that how DLC should have been, and how DLC currently is... Are two very different things.

When in doubt, assume the worst... It hurts less later.

So... finally... All that above being said, now Capcom come out and say there won't be a PC version because the FUCKING PIIIIIIIIIIRATES are stealing their hard scammed earnt dollars. You know, if Capcom didn't have the amount of Disc Locked Content that it does in SSF4, not to mention all the other evils they pulled previously...a good number would be happy to NOT pirate. But after taking it up the ass repeatedly, can you honestly blame them?

If the industry was smart, there's a good lesson to be learnt here: Don't fucking go off and create more pirates by pissing people off, then get on the soapbox and cry about piracy. Yes, there are always going to be the piratefags that will never buy a game. THOSE PEOPLE WERE NEVER YOUR CUSTOMER IN THE FIRST PLACE. Stopping piracy there will NOT magically create more income for you! Get that through your fucking thick skulls!

But continue to pull the scams that you're pulling now, and you will be creating MORE pirates out of those who originally WOULD have bought your game and have decided not to simply out of anger at being scammed. You companies know exactly how it feels when you get robbed (pirated)... So why scam back? Two wrongs are NOT going to create a right here... It will push the cycle of decline further down to a point where everyone is going to lose at the end of the day.

But then again, looking at the way gaming currently is right now?... That may well be fine, nothing of value is going to be lost after all.