You go to lengths to disprove the very point you trying to make.
Not everything you think is made for a given objective is.
The only objective that people seem to understand, albeit in a very “scarce” manner is that a business is there to make money.
I had people even going to lengths to compare “selling progression” with “selling [insert the most trendy illegal substance here]”, as if the aim of any sale on a game is the same as the aim of sale of anything else in terms of morality.
People make a lot of assumptions about what others, or everyone, or a given group of people does things for. That leads to wrong conclusions in most areas of “public choice economics”.
A classic example, I dare say a text book example, as it is what most of us studied in college at the “1.01”: What is the most effective solution for traffic jams given the options: Larger roads where the traffic gets heavier, more alternative roads to the most sought destinations or more convoluted paths to the most sought destinations ?
Like players choosing the “best approach to handle player choices”, mostly people get the wrong answer. Larger roads will lead to more traffic jams, statistically, and with causal inference. Larger roads leads people to choose that path, which leads to more people using that path instead of seeking alternatives. In real situations, larger roads even lead to larger and longer jams in places which have narrower multiple paths that lead to faster travel and shorter travel time.
When you are dealing with multiple people of multiple backgrounds in expect them to make decisions, ALMOST always you have to give the options that the “most rational idea” will find puzzling. You might need to get people to decide not do something by making it unatractive instead of forbidden, you might entice people to choose a given alternative because it is the most edgy, not the most rational, and often you need to make options so stupid they are what most people will choose.
And it is not because “people are stupid”. Smart people do stupid things from time to time. People are ignorant of different subjects, or aware of different aspects of choices. There isnt 100% equality of information in a population that must make the same choices, and it decreases the large the population is.
Then there is the “cost of opportunity”. Most people understand the concept of cost of opportunity when it is obvious. Anyone will know that paying for a given meal is more expensive than not paying for the exact same meal, but when it does not involve payment or exchange, things get very cloudy to the average person.
Another text book example:
Group A and Group B are put into a larger Group C. In this group C, a leader proposes that Group A which has 30 people, must pay 2 bucks a month and all the money will be divided and distributed equally to group B, which has 10 people. The proposal will be subject of optional vote monthly costing 3 bucks. The average “northfolk” will say “oh, it is democracy, vote with your wallet” and other things “northfolk” usually say.
What does vote with your wallet means ?
Group A will risk not winning the vote if not everyone votes, sometimes some of group A might feel group B “needs” that, etc etc. Not all group A is bothered about it.
Vote with wallet means the “smart” on group A will just shrug it and pay 2 bucks for the pool instead of making a point costing 3 bucks to vote against. Group B has an incentive to vote for, because it costs 3 bucks to vote, but that means they receive 6 bucks, net 3 bucks. Which means they are not losing 3 bucks, they are earning 3 bucks.
Someone might say “oh, that is a in a vacuum proposition”(meaning it is a mute example).
Well, that is EXACTLY how governance science makes effective use of public money, assigning how much the money people pay on taxes distributes through the social services and administrative needs. We convert assets and hours of work in values, which also is converted by a token from free time, land needed, etc, and at the end of the day, we find out how much your “bother” cost and how much one can charge for it.
That to find out another common misconception from the average person: “Raising taxes/prices not always lead to more revenue, and number of tax payers/customers also doesnt”.
So sometimes what you say “drives players away” is a selective filtering of the playerbase you are not aware of. Meaning, sometimes, you are bothered until you leave and stop being a bother, and a cost.
There is so many things to consider, and that is why they pay people who have 5, 10, 20 years studying it, and companies like Tencent, to tell you about it, rather than bothering about it yourself.
And it always work out well for the BUSINESS.
