The fun never ends. Clearly xbox is failing so they are trying their hardest to extract as much money as possible from whoever still hasnt sold their console yet
Companies using “Got It” to dismiss their invasive popups makes me so irrationally angry.
I hate “Maybe later” even more
Where’s the “Fuck off” option??
They are all maybe later. Regardless of the wording…
With MS especially.
I’ve had to put “I don’t like deals” in a popup close button before. I hated working in web marketing.
Keepass2Android shows a pop-up each October asking for donations. Perfectly fine, but the dismiss button is labeled “I don’t like the app that much”. Even free software isn’t spared that sort of thing.
(The pop-up also breaks the fingerprint reader prompt for extra annoyance)
I switched to KeePassDX for this reason among others.
App -> Display -> Never ever ask for a donation
well I don’t… it’s never a deal, and I’m usually forced to buy more and spend more in order to get that ‘deal’
I’m personally a big fan of doing the very tiny semi-transparent (X) that’s impossible to click on as far away from the “Yes, Please Digitally Fuck My Wallet Pussy” blinking blue bar at bottom center of the screen.
And I definitely didn’t “get it”, either. I buttoned through as fast as possible so I could use what I wanted to use.
Oh that is gonna piss people off.
Your ads are not gonna work the way you think they’ll work, when every person who sees them is gonna feel like it’s a middle finger.
Your ads are not gonna work the way you think they’ll work
They’re banking on people too young/old to know how to navigate past the screen to accidentally sign up for shit.
My one-year-old son accidentally got ahold of my TV remote and signed me back up for Netflix by pushing random buttons a month ago. Had to go through the TV and scour it of all the little pre-installed buy-me apps to make sure that couldn’t happen as easily again. Still not quite sure how to disable the “Netflix” button that’s built into the remote, shy of carving it out with a knife.
You might be able to open the remote and put a sticker over the netflix buttons contacts on the pcb
That’s a good idea. I’ll see if I can make it work.
If that doesn’t work check the board to see if you cant just drill through it.
Yes. And that shit is a one-way door.
Every customer you piss off the way you are pissed off, is A LOT less likely to be a return customer.
Sure. But a lot of the marketing is geared towards younger people unfamiliar with the service. I remember getting deluged with ads my freshman year of high school and again my freshman year of college, for instance.
They’re banking on their unsubscribe process being so obnoxious that they’ll lose fewer people than they gain, year to year. And given the steady growth of revenues for these programs, it appears to work over the long term.
Yeah, you’re pissing people off. But when everyone operates this way, it just becomes the standard for accessing this form of entertainment. Like ad reels before a movie starts. “Well, I just won’t go to the movies!” is a hollow protest in the midst of the crowds of people fighting to get into the theater.
Ok?
It’s not sustainable. Tricking people faster than they wise up to your BS is not a business model that leads to a healthy, content, customer base. And if it’s what EVERYONE does, you get an unhappy SOCIETY.
No-one will enjoy where that leads, and is already leading.
It’s a ratcheting mechanism. Unless something about capitalism changes SIGNIFICANTLY the masses will simply grow more and more discontent.
It’s not sustainable.
In the same way that slot machines and roulette wheels aren’t sustainable, sure. Once you figure out they’re a scam, you stop playing them.
But you don’t need to trick all the people all the time. You just need to trick enough people to turn a steady profit. Firms like Microsoft and EA have figured out a formula that’s worked for a long time and now they’re just running the playbook. Like any good bookie in Vegas, they make money off the suckers. And they reinvest a sizeable chunk of their profits into marketing to bring in new marks. And there’s always new marks.
No-one will enjoy where that leads
There will be a dozen senior executives in a VIP lounge absolutely enjoying where this goes in another five or ten years.
And there’s always new marks.
If your market is small enough.
You bring up gambling. Its de-regulation and consequent proliferation via online casinos has made the problems it causes more likely to be addressed than ever.
The bigger your market grows, the more aware the cultural zeitgeist becomes, the more likely you are be ousted entirely.
A bookie in Vegas, one city, could keep running their casino forever, because there didn’t use to be a casino in every persons pocket, worldwide, that might’ve already taught every new mark to be wary.
The bigger your market grows, the more aware the cultural zeitgeist becomes
You’d like to think so. But look at Robinhood. Five years ago, everyone was screaming about how it was a rigged game. Citadel Investments was manipulating the options markets. Fidelity was getting insider deals. Everything was rigged. People needed to protest. Close out your account. Yadda yadda yadda.
What happened after that? As far as I can tell, Robinhood is more popular than ever. They’re certainly more profitable than ever. There was never any reform or regulation. Mostly, Reddit and similar big name social media firms just purged all the whinners and inflated the profiles of the shills and hacks.
A bookie in Vegas, one city, could keep running their casino forever
DraftKings has been making money hand over fist. They’re desperately trying to find new things for people to bet on. This isn’t one bookie in one city, it’s an international conglomerate that’s expanded its market share around the globe. It is a worldwide bookie.
No shortage of marks. They all keep coming back.
What the fuck? Lol. They are not cartoony villains preying for the old and weak.
Somebody has made a calculation, that shows that they will make more money from people who takes the deal than they are going to loose money from people who get mad and leave their enviroment.
In the future they will do test how far they can go using a/b test and/or testing different markets.
It will work. Even if they get 10 new subscribers, it probably took them 20 minutes to whip up this splash screen. They’re wasting much more of your time. And people have proven time and time again that they will get outraged but they’ll never actually do anything about it. They won’t stop playing Xbox. They won’t stop buying games. People grow increasingly accepting of advertising and invasive business practices every day. Remember how angry everyone was at horse armor? Most people wouldn’t think twice about it these days. It’s so much worse now.
It will work. Even if they get 10 new subscribers, it probably took them 20 minutes to whip up this splash screen. They’re wasting much more of your time. And people have proven time and time again that they will get outraged but they’ll never actually do anything about it.
For now. But eventually they do. That’s how entire governments have fallen time and time again.
They won’t stop playing Xbox. They won’t stop buying games. People grow increasingly accepting of advertising and invasive business practices every day.
Indeed. People can get used to a lot. But being used to something isn’t the same as being ok with it. No-one I know is ok with there being ads on their tvs, phones and laptops. Living with something isn’t the same as accepting it. People are tolerating more BS than ever, but that doesn’t mean they wont rally the second there’s a way out of it.
Remember how angry everyone was at horse armor? Most people wouldn’t think twice about it these days. It’s so much worse now.
I still am. So are many others. Remember when people thought NMS would be a good game on day one? Remember when Fallout 76 was going to be bigger and better than 4? Remember Concord? Remember when Overwatch was going to have a story?
Suicide Squad.
There was real hype. The second people found out it was a live service, they simply didn’t play.
Every fuckup, is another portion of the masses getting the memo. And the fuckups aren’t stopping. If anything there’s more of them than ever.
These corporations used to be afraid of looking bad, but mistakes happen. Except when they did, and stocks didn’t suddenly implode, their takeaway was they could be horrible, and still make a profit. Because yeah, most people don’t learn the first time. But what about the second? Or the third? Or the tenth?
If you ask me, given time, the one thing every person on this planet can do, is learn. Eventually.
The only reason Roblox and Fortnite keep growing is that there are markets they haven’t penetrated. Finding new customers faster than the old ones leave doesn’t work forever. There are only so many humans on this planet.
Meanwhile, indie games with actual passion behind them and fair business practices that still feed the mouths of the devs, without private equity firms in the middle sucking up all the value, are absolutely exploding.
XBOX is dying. MS won’t say it, but they are less involved in the game-industry than ever. This price hike is a death-throw. Not the next step in their master plan to dominate the market forever.
IMO, the only gaming mega-corporation with the goodwill to exist 20 years from now is Nintendo, and even they are burning through the nostalgia people have for them faster than ever before in their insanely long history.
But being used to something isn’t the same as being ok with it
Doesn’t matter if they’re okay with it or not, as long as they tolerate it and don’t do anything about it.
I still am. So are many others.
Sure but many many more have accepted it. Otherwise they never would have done it again.
Remember Concord?
Concord clearly had much bigger problems.
Remember when Overwatch was going to have a story?
I remember Overwatch still being a wild success regardless.
But what about the second? Or the third? Or the tenth?
We are on like 2905295734th now.
Meanwhile, indie games with actual passion behind them
Indie game studios could only ever dream of achieving the heights of revenue of games like Fortnite, that survives entirely on microtransactions.
the only gaming mega-corporation with the goodwill to exist 20 years from now is Nintendo
They are doing everything they can to screw their own customers and yet they pile in by the millions every time they have something new.
Doesn’t matter if they’re okay with it or not, as long as they tolerate it and don’t do anything about it.
Not being happy about it is the first step on the road to doing something about it. How does that not matter?
Sure but many many more have accepted it. Otherwise they never would have done it again.
Who is doing it again? I’m not.
I remember Overwatch still being a wild success regardless.
Is it?
We are on like 2905295734th now.
And? It takes as many times as it takes.
Indie game studios could only ever dream of achieving the heights of revenue of games like Fortnite, that survives entirely on microtransactions.
Why? There are absolutely indies who’ve made millions. Why is there zero chance that one day, the next Fortnite or Roblox comes from an indie?
It already happened at least once. Minecraft.
They are doing everything they can to screw their own customers and yet they pile in by the millions every time they have something new.
Yes. But again. It takes as many times as it takes.
You continue to view everything through your personal lens while turning a blind eye to the mountains of other people who don’t care. There are no amount of times before people will walk away en masse. That much is abundantly clear at this point.
while turning a blind eye to the mountains of other people who don’t care
People, fundamentally, care.
That’s like the whole point of having a hobby.
No-one games because they don’t care.
You won’t find anything people are more passionate about, than something they do for fun.
I’m not claiming that there’s some point where people magically come together and stick it to the megacorps.
I’m saying that if you consistently burn your fans in ways that result in them hating you, eventually, you wont have any.
That’s not something that happens overnight. A slow-ass process that leads to a gradual decline, which you can only put off by duping brand new people who haven’t sworn off ever purchasing your product again. But eventually, you run out of those, too.
Surprised this isn’t like three verification cans.
Why not just have a button that says “give us more money, you fat piece of shit?”
That’s currently in QA as we speak… Slated to go live Q1 2026.
Microsoft? QA? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
lmfao ads on boot on a console you bought?
that’s so fucked. glad I’m not getting back into console gaming
Oh boy wait until I tell you about windows 11™ and all its amazing features!
Running SteamOS on my living room gaming PC. There are more options than windows 11.
I also just installed pop os on my 2021 laptop that was struggling with windows 11. It breathed new life into it. The computer is now as snappy as when I first got it
I’m gonna have to “upgrade” at work soon and it’s going to suck
I got a new computer with win11 a year or so ago. I made them buy me a win10 license because I couldn’t do my job anymore. fucking file explorer doesn’t even work on win11. astounding
Fuck the closed console. Do not throw all the computational power away.
You got a love how out of touch these marketers are. They really do think that they understand gamers while sitting in meetings at the Redmond campus.
Oh we had mass cancellations yesterday! War room, what do we do?
Full page ad?
Brilliant! Gamers will obviously see the value and be grateful for it. Maybe now we won’t all be laid off by papa Satya
That understand gamers about as much as you understand marketing. It’s about percentages. If they get some small percentage to buy the subscription, it’s a win. It matters absolutely nothing how many people are irritated by the ad.
…and they want to compete with the Steam Deck?
It’s nice to see the LCD Deck get discounted, if only to relive the old days when consoles got cheaper instead of more expensive as time went on. I almost wanted to buy another one out of principle, even though I don’t have use for more than one.
I lowkey considered getting a second SD, just to keep it plugged into my TV 24/7. I cart mine back and forth from work and home, and the minor inconvenience of packing it into my bag each morning had me considering a second purchase.
But then I remembered I’m fucking broke.
lmao imagine giving MS money in 2025
I mean, I’ll give them some money to activate developer mode so I can install emulators on my Xbox. I don’t need emulators on my Xbox but it’s gonna sit there doing nothing otherwise because I’m not paying for Gamepass
Why? It doesn’t cost them anything to flip that bit on hardware that you own.
If there’s a way to activate dev mode without paying them I don’t know about it
Sorry, my comment wasn’t clear. I’m just saying that it’s total bullshit that they would charge for that.
I’m in full agreement there, but at least it’s a small one-off payment to just use it the way I want to rather than playing cat-and-mouse with hacks and software updates
Huh? Just get an old Dell optiplex tower on Ebay or Craigslist and install Batocera on it. It’d probably cost a similar amount
I already own an Xbox, there’s no earthly way that buying an old anything would be cheaper than paying the small developer mode activation charge for the console I already have (bought second hand a few years ago from a friend who had used it 3 times)
I kinda wish I had a gamepass subscription so I could enjoy cancelling it, but alas, I’ve already cancelled everything.
These Full Screen ads are the reason I do not own a Xbox Series X and I’m not upgrading to Windows 11.
I’m turning on my console to do use it for streaming or gaming. Anything that gets in the way of going to be vilified.
Extremely scummy to not even list the price, but I shouldn’t be surprised since it appears they are going to milk whoever still has autosub on for an extra 10 bucks.
I hadn’t even turned on my Xbox One in almost a year until I helped my brother set one up for his game room this past week.
Every time you go to play a game, it brings up an entire pop-up that looks like the store page for whatever you’re trying to play, then you press “play.” Like, it was entirely unnecessary adding an extra popup screen asking if yes, that’s the game I want to play.
- On the Xbox home screen, go to “My Games and Apps.”
- Then, go to “Apps,” “Settings,” “General,” and “Personalization.”
- Go to “Games and Apps,” then scroll to the right until the three boxes below “Choose whether game hubs open automatically from the following places.”
- Uncheck the boxes on all three options: “Recently Played List,” “Groups,” and “Installed Games.”–
Thanks for this. So annoying.
Yeah, I play all the time and noticed this just a few weeks back. I fuckin hate it
“Please drink a verification can of Mt Dew Game Fuel™ and belch your Social Security number to continue”
50% price hike means Microsoft is basically betting that less than 1/3 of the current subscribers will cancel. Microsoft is also betting that some will not cancel but just downgrade to lower tier instead. If more than 2/3 of the subscriber remain a subscriber then Microsoft will come out ahead.
I actually stepped my subscription tier down because of the price increase on Ultimate. Wasn’t worth the 50% jump for me.
I did too. As much as I hate MS, Xbox live is really our only way to play with our friends (who live all over the world because my husband is a night owl). I got Ultimate for giggles and it turned out my husband games so much it was a good deal. It’s definitely not at the new price. I personally have only used the console to play Minecraft over the last two years since I can’t get Bedrock on my steam deck without some major fuckery.
Xbox has been dead since the launch of series x. Sell it and get off the train before the systems worth nothing.
