Folding Ideas
6 HN recommenders · recommended in 10 months, 2019–2025
21:19 · 1.7M views · Apr 1, 2019
Dan Olson of Folding Ideas critiques Fortnite's monetization, arguing it uses manufactured discontent, such as shop design and skins, to push spending. The video dissects the psychological techniques behind the game's business model.
HN commenters cite it as the definitive critique of Fortnite's monetization and of manipulative free-to-play design.
11 comments from Hacker News
> Fortnite, in my opinion, has been a gold standard for F2P monetization. No gambling, no randomized loot boxes, etc. Hard disagree. The tour-de-force on Fortnite's insane process this video
First, that was an amazing breakdown of what's happening. If you enjoyed reading that you might like Folding Ideas breakdown of Fortnite - this video Second, I've personally become very wary of any mobile app that introduces multiple currency types. There's gold, and rubies, and power balls, and stardust! At some point pretty early on I decide it's not worth it to figure out how much things /actually/ cost and delete the thing. My understanding is that the math shows companies that microtransactions are the winning move over and over again. I hope that eventually there's enough grumpy consumers both parties become worth serving better.
My favorite corner of YouTube— lengthy, thoughtful, and often artistic video essays and skits addressing culture and politics— is flourishing right now. Some examples: Unfolding Ideas – this video ContraPoints – [LINK] Philosophy Tube – [LINK] Lindsay Ellis – [LINK] Innuendo Studios – [LINK] HBomberguy – [LINK] and so on. And it seems like it's only in the past couple of years that many of these channels have reached their current levels of artistry and production value. Most stuff on YouTube is trash, but there's plenty else to watch.
Fortnite's a good example about how your two rules aren't enough, actually. Because of the way the game's designed, it pressures its audience (of primarily children) into purchasing microtransactions, to the point where there's been widespread bulling of kids who don't pay for premium Fortnite skins [1]. For a more detailed exploration of the dark side of Fortnite's monetization model, check out "Manufactured Discontent and Fortnite" [2]. [1]: [LINK] [2]: this video
If you have 20 minutes, this video[1] presents a good critique without mentioning aesthetics. It's especially notable how central the shop is to the whole experience. I personally found Fortnite to be a huge slog to play - with tons of downtime compared even to games like CS: GO, let alone old-school arena shooters like Q3. The only thing that kept me coming back is the season pass reward tracks and daily missions. [1] this video