[mandmandam]

At least games are interactive. I've never played, but Factorio looks quite healthy for the mind.

If you want to rail at wasted time, there are much better targets out there. Try corporate tax accountants, or insurance salesmen, or fossil fuel PR goons; people actively destroying value.

We have PFAs in the rain; plastic on Mt. Everest and the Mariana Trench. We have a warming planet alongside proxy oil wars. You want to solve those problems by looking at addictive computer games? Really? Not even reality TV, or corporate media monopolies - games? ..... I think your high horse is pretty sickly looking tbh.

[Silverback_VII]

The problem is that there is some kind evolutionary pressure to create increasingly more addictive game as every new game is in competition with every other game.

I'm not saying that games cannot be beneficial especially for learning english but if you speak with a boy you will understand how these games have taken his brain hostage as many of thoughts will be about the computer game he plays.

[sabellito]

> The problem is that there is some kind evolutionary pressure to create increasingly more addictive game as every new game is in competition with every other game.

This is a sweeping statement that doesn't apply to many games, Factorio included.

A game like Factorio being addictive gives little back to the developers, as there are no microtransactions; after the game is bought, the transaction is over. If one would like to be cynical about it, games like this only have to trick people into buying a copy (and playing just for long enough for a refund to not be possible).

In the case of games with microtransactions, GTA V being the most profitable example in history, then yes, addictiveness does bring more cash to the company who owns the game.

Now, this opinion you held was incomplete and thus, wrong. What else are you wrong about in your mental model about videogames?

[danudey]

I'm not sure where in this discussion Skyrim fits in, where some people have purchased the same game half a dozen times or more. Macrotransactions?