7 Deadly Gaming Sins - ENVY

With the ever-increasing presence of "Games As A Live Service" so too are we seeing a massive rise of timed events, exclusive items rewarded for logging on, and battle passes that require constant maintenance by the player. Each of these factors are designed to lock players into a title for months if not years, and yet if you take a step back from this practice, you'll see that this directly feeds into an emotionally manipulative sequence that looks to prey on FOMO.

FOMO or Fear Of Missing Out is a social anxiety that stems from the belief that others might be having fun while the person experiencing the anxiety is not present and "Games As A Live Service" secretly, or not so secretly depending on how aggressive the marketing is, preys on this condition. By creating a divide between those able to earn such rewards and commit the time to grind their way through battle passes, you also create a social gap between players, leading to some extreme cases where reports of online harassment and bullying for those who do not deck their avatars out in the latest clobber or use rare items for online clout are more common than you might expect.

Envy of these players, drives others to either play games more to catch up or spend real life money to bypas all the grind, yet none are able to see their strings being pulled by the publishers who have exactly what they want, more people playing their games.