Have you ever gone online and saw a game that looked amazing? It had the elements of fun, addictiveness and cost you were looking for. You paid your $20 and was ready to have hours of unadulterated fun. Slip into another world and let the troubles of this world pass you by. Then something happened. After you downloaded the game, installed it and then played it some… you came to a realization…. This is a TERRIBLE game. You feel ripped off never to play a game again purchased online. Was this the publisher’s fault exclusively, or do you bear some of the responsibility? Let’s take a look and see.
If you go onto any major game site, you will normally see two separate links. One link is to purchase a game, another link is to try it. If you have never played the game before, it makes much more sense to try the game. You may find that after 15 minutes you are bored to death. You have not spent any money and you are free to try another game or go on a cheap date with another gamer friend who is equally frustrated with the quality of some game he/she bought.
There is another way! You may want to go with the “try” links and compare several games from the same genre to see which suits you best. What can it hurt? If you are into Match 3 games, maybe it is best to try 10 different games and see which is the most fun. You can delete the lame ones from your hard drive and settle into the game YOU like the best. Not just the one that is rated the best or has the best marketing spin… but the one YOU find to be the most fun.
There is no reason to go out online and spend hundreds of dollars buying games you don’t like. The game distributors promote the use of “try” links to web publishers because the thought is the game will be fun enough for you to want to purchase. Will you every time? No, but they understand this and still want to give you the opportunity to try the game before you buy. Who buys a car without test driving it? Who buys a house without looking at it? Who buys clothes without trying them on (OK, I might be guilty there…) You get the point, products should be tested before they are bought and if there is system in place for you to test the product and you choose to ignore it… does the distributor bear the blame?
Pit one game against another and see what you like the best before buying and in doing so you will find that your game playing enjoyment will increase and your costs will decrease.
Jesse Harwell is the owner and contributer of several internet websites including http:// and http://
