DarkPattern.games » Healthy Gaming « Avoid Addictive Dark Patterns
www.darkpattern.games
external-link
Game reviews to help you find good games that don't trick you into addictive gaming patterns.
@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
104M

I’ve always wanted to make a website like this. But then I got too addicted to some game and spent all my time on that instead. /j

Only partly joking, I really wanted to make a website similar to this. But then stuff happened. You know how it is.

(Here was an entire wall of text, where I detailed the idea, before I decided to delete it all again.)

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
114M

Many of the games listed here have old or dead links, and you can’t sort by rating either. I had a very bad time finding games using this site.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
27
edit-2
4M

Can’t find your game? We’ve tried to include all games that make it into the top 200 on the App Store charts.

This appears to only cover mobile games. I’d love to see something similar for PC/console releases…

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
244M

From the website: “We are starting with iOS and Android games because this is where most dark patterns appear, but we will be adding other platforms soon.” So that looks good for your request.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
54M

Not sure of they fixed Diablo, but that one had some dark mechanics for the season stuff making people accidentally get the premium.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
11
edit-2
4M

Anecdotally Fifa (EA FC or whatever they’re calling it now) would have to be up there. Hadn’t played it in years but gave it a go last season as it was free on Game Pass.

They’ve combined the addictiveness of card collecting with loot box mechanics, FOMO and moving the goalposts (pun intended) to get the best players. The gameplay also seemed pretty rigged to prevent grinding rewards out.

Then when the new game is out, rather than dishing out all the rewards to those still playing it instead becomes infeasible to unlock any more decent players so you’re pretty much stuck with what you have.

Even if you pay full price for the next game you’ll have to use low stat players as they only seem to start releasing decent ones half way through the season.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
54M

That’s sad to hear. It’s been a long time since I’ve played any sports games and I had a hankering recently but everything has shit reviews and I keep coming across stories like yours.

Remember a game would come out with everything you need to enjoy the game? ¯_(ツ)_/¯

subignition
link
fedilink
74M

From the site:

DarkPattern.Games is a brand new website. We are starting with iOS and Android games because this is where most dark patterns appear, but we will be adding other platforms soon. Because we are new, we have a lot of games that don’t have any reviews yet. This will improve over time and we are working hard to get games reviewed. Please help us by finding a familiar game and submitting a review.

imecth
link
fedilink
74M

Brand new is definitely a stretch, their legal page seems to date back to 2019.

subignition
link
fedilink
34M

Good looking out

imecth
link
fedilink
34M

They probably just never got around to updating that description. I only inquired because I’d heard of that website before.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
-114M

Am decis să găsesc un cazinou de încredere pentru începători. După câteva încercări, am dat peste casino romania online și mi-am dat seama că acesta este ceea ce căutam. Există o mulțime de jocuri diferite aici și totul este făcut pentru confortul utilizatorilor. Sistemul de bonusuri este, de asemenea, foarte frumos, mai ales pentru cei care abia încep să joace. Datorită acestui site, am găsit cu ușurință un nou hobby pentru mine.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
24M

Interesting, but its based on user generated input, so this data could easily be manipulated by someone that doesn’t like particular games creating a few accounts to add bad data.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
54M

It could also be manipulated by someone who reports the dark patterns are inaccurate. If it were run by a single org or person, it could get sold to a company interested in gaming the ratings or used to bash things the owner doesn’t like. I’m not entirely sure what your point is. Every way to set this up is subject to bad actors. There are some checks and balances present in the website. Why are they inadequate and why should we not trust this site? Are you, perhaps, an industry dark pattern plant trying to get us to avoid something that could deter dark pattern usage?

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
-24M

Im just a person pointing out that this site has issues. Make up your own opinion, I don’t care.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
724M

Cool cool cool. The dark games list is basically all the play store recommendations

Æther
link
fedilink
English
234M

Keep in mind that the recommendations are likely influenced by being in the top 200, which is where they look for games to review. Careful of correlation fallacy

PlzGivHugs
link
fedilink
English
17
edit-2
4M

At the same time, the goal of dark patterns to to make people spend more money. Given that revenue is very likely one of the key things Google wants (and thus promotes) out of apps, its also entirely expected that the apps people find are largely those who try and get the most money from users, which requires dark patterns.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
24M

Exactly. I’m not blaming Google entirely, though I do condemn them for being an example of what emerges from a system who’s only incentive is maximum profit.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
124M

Most games fit multiple categories of dark patterns. Almost all gachas have 90% of these

Why is Roblox in the wrong list

This could encourage anyone to make an alternative for it

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
13M

im glad it also highlights the ones that have less of these patterns, some really good games there

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
14M

deleted by creator

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
6
edit-2
4M

Oh fun. A game series I used to work on is on the Dark Games first page.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
34M

Great site, lots of info on gamification

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
24M

So the only mobile game I really play often is Mad Skills BMX 2 which has 0 dark patterns. Yay

Pandantic [they/them]
link
fedilink
English
84M

My latest game:

vampire survivors

3.08 -Good

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
44M

Vampire Survivors is a great game but the mobile version is the fucking worst.

Pandantic [they/them]
link
fedilink
English
14M

I didn’t know there was a non-mobile.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
74M

I didn’t know there was a mobile version. PC version was like £3 and had no ads/payments/nonsense, what’s in the mobile version?

Pandantic [they/them]
link
fedilink
English
24M

No ads unless you want to “pay” for a free revive. No micro transactions that I’ve seen.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
44M

Hard agree

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
154M

Interestingly enough Luca Galante the creator spent 10 years coding digital slot machines. He used a lot of the techniques used by them to keep you playing. He just did it in a way to maximize fun instead of micro transactions.

@[email protected]
link
fedilink
English
0
edit-2
4M

Zenless Zone Zero

Blue Archive

I was honestly expecting a worse rating for my favourite gacha games, not gonna lie…good to see that objective opinions are still around.

Create a post

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.

Weekly Threads:

What Are You Playing?

The Weekly Discussion Topic

Rules:

  1. Submissions have to be related to games

  2. No bigotry or harassment, be civil

  3. No excessive self-promotion

  4. Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts

  5. Mark Spoilers and NSFW

  6. No linking to piracy

More information about the community rules can be found here.

  • 1 user online
  • 186 users / day
  • 791 users / week
  • 2.3K users / month
  • 6.32K users / 6 months
  • 1 subscriber
  • 4.88K Posts
  • 101K Comments
  • Modlog