219 - GTS March News roundup - Part 1 - Games, Gimmicks and Gatekeepers

Gaming the System – March News Round-Up (Part 1)

In This Episode:
This week, your favourite feminist gaming trio—Alex, Jem, and Matt—dive into the March headlines with their signature mix of insight, laughter, and righteous indignation. From poker-playing indie darlings to FOMO-fueled spending sprees, we dissect the news through a feminist lens, asking: who benefits, who loses out, and what’s hiding beneath the surface?

This is Part 1 of 2 in our March news round-up. Please stay tuned for more in Part 2, where we continue our exploration of power, money, and representation in gaming culture.

🔑 Key Moments This Episode:

🎯 “Tinder for Games” – or just another algorithm trap?
We kick off with Ludocene, the swipe-right-style discovery app that promises to help players find hidden indie gems. But is it a playful solution to choice paralysis, or another gatekeeping algorithm dressed up in novelty? (Spoiler: capitalism always finds a way.)

🎮 PEGI, Poker & Power Plays
Matt breaks down the absurd saga of Balatro, the wildly successful “poker with cheating” indie game that was slapped with an 18+ rating, despite no gambling or real money changing hands. The twist? Triple-A games with actual loot boxes skate through with lower age ratings. Jem and Alex expose the hypocrisy, gatekeeping, and who sits on the ratings boards. Hint: it’s the people with the most to lose if indie games thrive.

🛍️ Epic Fails?
Jem brings the heat on Epic Games and their shady “limited-time sale” tactics, currently under legal fire from concerned parents. We examine the ethics of engineered scarcity, the pressure it places on young gamers, and how companies exploit gambling mechanics to drive sales. Matt adds a union perspective on consumer exploitation—and how education is our best defence.

🎧 Why You Should Listen:

• You want to understand how capitalism, marketing, and corporate power affect the games we play and the people who make them.
• You're into indie games and want the inside scoop on the battles they face just to be seen.
• You’re raising a young gamer (or are one yourself) and want to feel a little less alone navigating the manipulative side of modern game stores.
• You want to hear Jem roast age ratings while Matt goes full “union dad” on corporate greed, and Alex tries (valiantly) to keep the show on the rails.

🔗 Mentioned in the Episode:

• Ludocene – “dating app for games” helping players discover indie titles. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr52rey0ng8o
• Balatro – the indie card game at the centre of a PEGI age rating dispute. https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/gaming/balatro-what-to-know-breakout-game-b1218954.html 
• PEGI & ESRB – game rating bodies with questionable ties to industry giants.
• Epic Games lawsuit – over manipulative sale countdowns and FOMO-based purchases. https://www.eurogamer.net/fortnite-maker-epic-games-sued-for-

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Thanks for listening, and remember – there’s always another game to play that isn’t full of nonsense. 🎮✨

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Transcript

Alex: 0:15

Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of Gaming the System, the podcast where three intersectional feminists examine gaming and games through a feminist lens. Today, I'm your host, Alex, and I'm joined by my friends, Gem and Matt. Before we get started, if you want to support us, you can subscribe to our Patreon at patreon. com forward slash gaming the system for some exclusive content. Or you can send us a one off donation via PayPal to our email address wearegamingthesystematgmail. com this week we're going to be talking about gaming news for the month of March. So I think what we'll do is go round in a round robin fashion. Is there something you can't wait to share? Feel free to jump in.

Matt: 1:11

I'm going to start with a tidbit as like a, as a an order of a starter. The Super Bowl was, took place in February. My team, the Kansas City Chiefs, who I love and have done an unbelievable job this season. Played against the Philadelphia Eagles. It was a rematch of The year before last Super Bowl where the Chiefs beat the Eagles Which was and then they went on to beat the 49ers in the Super Bowl last year so they were on the run to get their third Super Bowl in a row something that I think had never been done before in history and They got the living piss Absolutely beaten out of them It was a jaw dropping, utter humiliation of the Chiefs. The Chiefs got absolutely pounded into the dirt, and I still haven't quite gotten over it. I think the last score was

Alex: 2:15

Yeah.

Matt: 2:16

22, but it really was, it may as well have been 40 0.

Alex: 2:21

sucks. I'm sorry. Sport is cruel. It's why we love it so much. We don't know what's gonna happen, but sometimes it can be heartbreaking. I've been there. I find it very emotional. Like my whole mood for the day depends on how a result goes sometimes. So it does have a big impact on people around me as well. But yeah, sorry to hear that much. But

Matt: 2:44

Yeah, I don't have anything else to say about it other than just,

Alex: 2:48

Tough times. There's always another season, isn't there? I have quite an interesting story that I've picked up. It ties into one of our recent episodes, actually, where we talked about having a gaming backlog and things like that, and just there being too many games. And one of the ways that someone has decided to tackle that problem within the gaming industry what is being reported as a dating app for video games. I think it's pronounced Ludocene. ludocene. I don't know. I'll spell it out. L U D O C E N E. And it works, In a similar sort of way a bit like tinder, but hopefully not as toxic as tinder But yeah, so the article that I found which actually is on BBC news starts off by explaining that Almost 19, 000 titles went live on PC Games Store Steam in 2024. That's 360 a week, which we've quoted similar figures on the pod ourselves. And so basically there's a lot of choice for gamers out there. So how do you narrow down that choice? And the tool that people are reporting that we use is this app. It's all about discoverability, essentially. The article is saying that it's never been a more challenging landscape for smaller games, indie games. I think there's a revival in terms of indie games. Becoming slightly more popular than the larger games now. I think there's a kind of shift going on, I don't know if you guys agree, but that's my take on the industry at the moment is that gamers are shying away from larger blockbuster games because we're all just a bit fatigued by them. The app itself works like a dating app so it's created by games journalist Andy Robertson who says the goal is to help people find games that got away. Essentially hidden gems, almost, that they would never find otherwise. And how it works is essentially You just swipe games away that you're not interested in. And then recommendations will come in. And you just keep cutting it down and cutting it down until you've got a catalogue of games that you might be interested in trying. And then I guess based on that you can refine what's recommended to you in the algorithm, there is, some hesitation about the format and the mechanic behind the dating app. So, some people are saying it's quite binary in that it's A swiping, but only one way. So if you ignore a particular game, they worry that might cut out a whole bunch of other games that the algorithm has deemed similar. So you could in fact be missing out on entire genres that you might be interested in at a later date, but you wouldn't have got the chance to through this app because it thinks that you're not interested in that. But yeah, how do you feel about it as a concept? Do you think it's a good idea?

Jem: 5:49

I think it's a really interesting idea. I think there's definitely times when I've gone out searching. I like this kind of game. Suggest some that are similar. Or games that maybe I enjoyed. a long time ago, and I'm looking for an updated version of that, so I recently did a search for games like Settlers because I really enjoyed that many years ago, but I don't like the newer versions of the game but I wanted something that had the same feel as the old school version. You can usually find lists and people talking about it. Like how broad a brushstrokes are we talking about? The proof is always in the pudding, isn't it? But I think it's a nice. And you can see from a sort of marketing perspective, there's quite a lot of opportunity there for them to link to the games and sell the games through. Through that and and advertising and all of that around it.

Alex: 6:50

You've got to wonder whether Maybe some developers with a bit more money might be able to pay their way into a more prominent part of the, of what is displayed to people on the app. I don't know how these things work, but you've got to think that has to be on the table somewhere. How many games are going to get that level of eyes on them. That's a slight worry from my perspective, but in general I think the idea is is an interesting one, because sometimes I'll go on to the PlayStation store and I'll spend half an hour browsing the catalogue of games and I'll be like I guess that's me done, and then I wouldn't have actually bought anything, but I've just spent ages looking and thinking maybe that one. Maybe this one. But there's sometimes just so many games on the screen that you get quite a lot of overwhelm and you're just like I don't know which ones are good and which ones are not good. I think what it comes with when you swipe a game that you think you'll like, you'll get a description on One side and a kind of picture on the other, but whether that could also contain maybe reviews or Things like that would be helpful To help players make decisions about which games they might go for Yeah,

Jem: 8:06

helpful because just because something, a game seems like it might work for you on paper, doesn't mean it actually will in practice.

Alex: 8:15

If you picked a game through there and the app knows that you've picked it, how many times is it going to bug you to be like, tell us what you thought because that happens quite a lot with other types of retail you'll be looking at something, browsing something in an online shop and then you'll get an email a day later being like, have you, did you want to buy this or not? That's not usually something that, that happens with when you're looking at games, but it might be through these types of of applications, but, and it's interesting and I think I like the idea of giving a higher platform to smaller developers, definitely. What do you think, Matt?

Matt: 8:54

It seems pretty harmless. This is, searching for types of content is a thing where artificial intelligence and databases is one of the good guys. I use watch and listen to all of my music on YouTube and YouTube is miraculous at suggesting more music and finding ways to curate things and starting mixes and so many different options just generated and I've found some of my favorite music I've ever listened to recently through Being curious and looking for more stuff. And that's the best that apps like this can do, is show you things that you otherwise wouldn't have found. And as long as you're using multiple sources of random information, then you'll be okay. Because, if you look on Steam, or like you say, looking through online catalogues, The thing is, you never know what the right next game is gonna be. It's impossible to know that until you arrive at it. So, it's good that when there are sales on, you think one positive thing that indie games have in their favour, they're always going to be cheaper. They're very rarely going to be 60. Even Split Fiction is only 40 at release, which is wonderful. So, when, if you get a list of 20 games and seven of them are indie ones and they're less than 20 pounds. It's a lot easier to go All right, I'll buy three of them and then maybe I won't play them for a year and maybe I'll come back to them It's a very It's a very organic and undulating process finding games because they're longer form things. Like with music it's a couple of minutes and then you go oh yep I like that and you listen to 50 songs and then YouTube knows what your tastes are going to be for the next three years. Whereas I've just finished playing Final Fantasy Rebirth for a hundred hours and I go oh god I have no idea what I'm going to do next. But hey, if it helps you find that next great game. Yep,

Alex: 11:16

mean it's apparently hit it's crowdfunding goal as well so it's definitely in the making.

Jem: 11:21

I am interested though as to whether it would have got as much coverage and as much interest if it hadn't called itself a dating

Alex: 11:31

Yeah, I'm not sure,

Matt: 11:33

that's the marketing,

Jem: 11:34

in, yeah. So,

Matt: 11:35

that's the million dollar phrase, just like cat with a backpack with stray. You go, yep a million people are going to buy that because of those few words. So, good for them. Come on up with that.

Alex: 11:51

Matt, what stories do you have to share?

Matt: 11:54

They're all quite depressing ones, but it's okay. It'll be okay. Have either of you heard of

Alex: 12:00

Tom requested it for one of his friends to buy for his birthday, because he'd heard that it's pretty good, and a lot of people are quite addicted to it, actually. And I think he's enjoying it so far. So, yeah.

Matt: 12:13

Yeah, so basically it's a poker, a game where you play poker against computers. There's no actual gambling in it. There's no, I don't think there's any multiplayer, but if there is, it's just you're playing with the cards, but it's, you can, you play cheat hands. So it's basically poker with cheating and it's incredibly popular. It's sold a couple of million. versions of it. It's an indie game company, less than 20 to buy, and I think it was voted for Game of the Year at the Game Awards, if I remember right. it has been rated by PEGI, which is the European Gaming rating commission that decides whether it's going to be PG3, 7, 12, etc. And Peggy decided that it because it depicts gambling it should be an 18. But there is no money changing hands, there's no actual real life impact of it, it's just a game based on poker. So, the developers took Peggy to court to appeal this decision, and they pointed out that games like Madden and all games with loot boxes and these card packs that are literally gambling, that they are, they use gambling mechanics, they are undeniably, it's impossible to look at them and go, this isn't gambling, and teaching kids to gamble, addicting kids to gamble. And their appeal was successful because you can't look at opening these card packs like they do in Madden and go that isn't as bad as, isn't as bad as this. Playing a card game and. I apparently the reason that games like Madden and these other lootbox games are, get their really low rating is because the CEOs of these fucking companies are on the boards of these ratings people. So the CEO of the, I think it's Take Two games, the ones who make Madden. It's on one of the massive global ratings panels, and it's just one of those things like, who do you trust when it comes to deciding? is allowed in games and what people are allowed to play because it's definitely cost the ballot show developers millions of pounds because it means that you're not it's not able to be sold in certain places and to certain people so this corrupt system how can we trust these ratings

Alex: 15:21

Yeah, it's definitely an issue, isn't it? But I am glad to hear that they got the appeal. I'm just glad to hear that. Hopefully, Bellatro will continue being a very popular game in the places where it is allowed to be played because that will help the developers for sure. But yeah, it does raise the question of who decides what is and isn't suitable for certain age groups and why and what agenda is behind it as well. And it's all about, again, it's the same with any type of media, it's about power and control, isn't it?

Jem: 15:58

It's a difficult Area, isn't it? Because it's a very complex one. I think the problem here is that there seems to be mixed and duplicitous rules. So it's One role for one set of people and another role for another set of people. And even if this guy being on the board isn't actually influencing the decisions, it's definitely a conflict of interests and it definitely makes it appear from the outside that it's problematic. I remember years ago having a conversation with people about age ratings in games and they were saying, that in order to move a game from 18 down to 16, they had to change the blood

Alex: 16:48

ah, yes.

Jem: 16:50

to blue because then it's not realistic. And I would argue, and we have definitely had this conversation many times. On this pod that there are other issues other factors that are often appearing games that are for younger audiences that are very problematic and no one's worrying about those I think that when people are trying to work out the certifications for games and movies and TV shows and what have you, it, obviously, they're taking a lot of factors into play, and they're not going to get it right all the time. But there definitely seems to be double standards. There definitely seems to be an issue with what they think is okay and isn't okay. Stranger Things was a 15 and that had some considerable violence and scare scenes and sex and all sorts of things in it that I just don't think probably would be appropriate for many 15 year olds, especially when, and I know that obviously they can't make their choices based on this, but especially when a lot of. People use it as a sort of top level, so they'll say Oh my child is a mature 13 year old, so they can watch 15 rated things. I think that within the games world, I think there are some really bizarre rules about what is and isn't. acceptable. It usually comes down to, is there sex? Then it's an 18, but anything else is fine. Sex or gambling is 18. Everything else is fine. I was looking at Epic Games getting sued again for setting up fake

Alex: 18:50

Wow.

Jem: 18:51

fake sales end times. So, parents in the U. S. have filed a case this week suing Epic Games because they're saying that they put these timers that do a countdown and then When they expire, the games are actually often left there either at the same price, the deal price, or they come back at the deal price relatively quickly after, and they're saying, this is encouraging children to spend money. They're arguing, it's creating. feeling of FOMO, fear of missing out if they don't get in and buy it. And they're saying, one of the issues is that Fortnite especially is, has a lot of skins and things that can be bought and then become extremely valuable. And there was one that, that was very valuable. They brought it back later as part of the OG event. For the people who had bought the original skin, they actually changed it. So they still, they had it, the, what they had was slightly different from what was being sold. However, Epic Games argue that actually they've removed these timers last year and they have a whole heap of, changes in place and protections in place. You can't accidentally buy things that they've got instant cancellations. They've got a self service return for shop purchases and they also have a very explicit yes, no to saving payment in information. So you can't just accidentally. Save your card on it. And they said that if you're under 13, then you're unable to make real money purchases without a parental agreement. Although. They, I don't know how they achieve that. They also said that they'd made it so that if the sale is going to expire within 48 hours. Then you can't buy it if you're under 18. To me, that doesn't solve the problem, because that's still a deadline, isn't it? That 48 hours becomes the deadline. It feels a little bit like this might be a non issue really, that it's a, it's an older issue that maybe has since been resolved. However, the parents are trying to make it a, I think it's called a class action, which means that then other parents can get involved. And it's off the back of one that. Epic Games lost in, in the Netherlands, I think. Which they are currently appealing. Whether or not this the specifics of this particular case are valid, I think what we are seeing is a greater recognition of the potential impact. Of what we do in the online space on our general well being. And I think they are linking this to gambling. Because it's, it creates that I've got to get in. I've got to buy this thing. But I don't know about the research around gambling. Cause there's huge amounts of research around gambling. And I, I don't personally know very much about it. So I don't know how. impactful these kind of situations are on the whole gambling addiction and what impact they have going forward. it is a problem. And I think for young people and children, expecting them to be able to make Good choices. Yes. In these scenarios is very, it's very challenging. So I'm really glad that these people are bringing it to court, because even if they don't have a case, what they are doing is they are raising The issue, and they are hopefully forcing games companies to consider how they approach this topic. And I think that is the important thing that we need to keep the pressure on the games companies to be constantly evaluating the bridge between Money and caring for your customers. I think that's important that we encourage that.

Alex: 23:13

There's a lot of pressure on us as consumers to buy things quickly, and that comes across all different types of retail. I was like I'm sure Matt will talk about in a very capitalist society. We are very pressured to buy things a lot of the time. So I'm glad that this is being challenged, as you say, Gem. Because, I've seen those timers on places like the PlayStation Store and on Steam for different sales and it does make you feel like, oh gosh, if I don't decide to buy this now, then it might not ever be this good a price again. So you do catch yourself thinking, oh gosh I've got to decide now. and expecting children to have to make those decisions, as you say, Gemma, is not something we should be placing on them as a burden to navigate, particularly when they're going to be influenced by the games that their friends have and not wanting to miss out on maybe, if it's a game that allows them to play with their friends, they're gonna be the only one that doesn't have it. So, like you said, there's a lot of FOMO going on there and I think that's something we want to try and avoid as well, definitely. So it is a concerning topic to think about in general, just who, what ways The sellers of these games are pushing us to spend more money and the different ways in which that manifests. So, it's a good topic to bring to the discussion. Thank you, Jim.

Matt: 24:44

I'm going to go into my union organizing mode. One of the crucial elements when you're teaching and educating workers and your colleagues. about union organizing is inoculating them against the exploitative and propaganda pressures that they are going to receive as a result of standing up for themselves. So you say to someone what would happen if you go went to your manager and asked for an extra one pound an hour for your for your work. They'd laugh. You're out the building and you need to get'em thinking about those kinds of things. And then they go they're gonna come to you and say, these union organizers, they just want chaos. They're just lazy. They don't want anything. And that's if you've never heard them, my baby saying, thinking of them saying that before, you could be taken in by that. Whereas if you warn someone, this is what they're gonna try and do, because they don't want to pay you that extra one pound. That's why they're doing it. The same thing comes with. Raising children, you need to inoculate them against this kind of exploitative behavior. Because, it's just part of life learning when to spend your money, when to splurge on something, when to save it. It's, that is a skill, and money is one of those things that, unless you get to generational wealth, it's always going to be fluctuating and that's just part of life. So as long as you teach children about gambling and about the ways in which corporations and businesses try and hook you in, the more you know about those techniques, the more in command you're going to be of what you do in your life. So having this kind of lawsuit, even if it doesn't necessarily go anywhere, it's starting the conversation of going, yeah, we see you're doing this. We see what you're doing, we see these tricks you're trying to fuck us over, and transparency as well. Just, that's why whistleblowers are the most brave people in society, because they're the ones that come out and go, they're doing this! Everyone, you need to look at this, because they're doing this. So, whenever things, unlike that woman who went to court that we talked about in a story a while ago, Gem, I think you brought it up, who said that It was something about games ruining her son's life when it obviously had,

Alex: 27:35

his life because he was addicted to gaming and that was the fault of the gaming companies, right?

Jem: 27:40

Yeah, he, Yeah.

Matt: 27:43

yeah, that's, so that wasn't helpful. But this sounds like a helpful thing for her. For gamers and parents of gamers and if anyone could, I think Epic Games are in an interesting position because they've come into their stratospheric wealth quite recently but it didn't start off with them making games because it started off with the Unreal Engine and that was their, and you can't bullshit with a game engine, it has to be, it has to be what it says on the tin. unlike with shit games like Suicide Squad for example. And then they got Fortnite and all of a sudden they're stratospherically wealthy. They're going up the the capitalist ranking system. And it feels like with stuff like this they're at that tipping point where they could shoot off into absolute, the predatory CEO's takeover, or they could stay where they are making insane amounts of money but not taking the piss so yeah and who knows