Going on the same topic as a post earlier today, it seems that a few industry participants have opened a discussion on the ethics of the free2play model.
My personal stance, if I may reiterate, is that it is pretty unethical for designers to purposefully exploit their players by making the game impossible to play without paying real money. Another example is mentioned by Nik Davidson, who says that social game developers exploit the psychology of game design to make players do what they want instead of helping players better enjoy the experience.
I agree with most of these guys who are saying that social games and free2play games might be a case of poisoning the well. I also disagree with Scott Dodson mainly because his piece of anecdotal evidence doesn’t really provide a convincing argument that the industry doesn’t need to supervise unethical practices. Afterall, there are stories where kids have spent hundreds of dollars on their parents credit cards.
