I’m a big fan of having the chance to try things out before I buy them. Before you buy a new pair of shoes, you try them on right? You have to see if they fit, see if they’re your style. I feel the same way about Apps on my phone.
Before I shell out my hard-earned money on an App, I want to try it out and see if it does what it says it does. Or see if its as entertaining as it claims to be. For this reason, I love free and lite versions of games. But I have a new pet peeve—freemium games.
I have managed to rid my phone of freemium games, but there is one straggler. I don’t know why, but I’m a sucker for golf games. I bought the first Let’s Golf! after thoroughly enjoying the lite version. So when I saw Let’s Golf! 3 for free, I wasted no time in downloading it.
I was really excited it wasn’t the lite version, I thought I’d scored some give-away deal to land the entire game for free. I shot a birdie on my first hole, after which my golfer did a backflip to celebrate. But after playing a few holes, my young golfer informed me he was too tired to continue. My 64-year-old father can play more golf that that without getting winded.
I had two choices. I could let him rest for several hours (maybe if he want’t doing back handsprings every two seconds he could play more golf), or I could buy him more energy. I would happily pay a few bucks for this game, especially if they update it with new courses, but I refuse to buy my golfer little pick-me-ups every few holes. At that rate, I’d be spending quit a bit of my cash just to play each course.
I feel duped every time I download a freemium game. What if those new shoes you tried on fit perfectly, you loved the way they looked, and the salesperson told you could have them for free; but every few steps you had to pay to walk a little bit further? Wouldn’t you rather buy them up front, that way you’d know what you were paying? I hope users get fed up with this trend quickly.
What are your thoughts on freemium games? To me, that’d be like us giving away our Spider Solitaire (which is free), but making you pay to move stacks up to the foundation. Don’t worry, we’d never do that to you.
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Today’s Deck of the Day is dedicated to The Hunger Games. I haven’t read the series, but I really want to since someone told me, “It’s the new Harry Potter.” Is it that good?
