#Google Play Pass Users Get to Experience the old "Bait and Switch" money grab.

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

mellow creek
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Let me start by saying that I 100% support the SMG developers wanting to find a better way to monetize their game. With that out of the way, the move to delete the content of long time players that happened to discover the game through their play pass subscription is probably one of the most egregious money grab moves I have ever experienced in the gaming community.

It definitely took a decision and an effort to locate players who paid for the "unlimited gems" perk with their Play Pass subscription.
Once located on the SMG servers, it took additional effort to find out which content was redeemed with the "unlimited gems" perk and which content was redeemed with gems purchased or given as in game rewards.

This appears to be a 100% conscious decision on the part of SMG to retroactively ask players who have had this content for years redeem the content again.
Players with "unlimited gems" perk were at no time ever offered by SMG to make a purchase of gems. The gem pack purchasing screen and the ability to enter credit card details was hidden because why would SMG want to ask players with the "unlimited gems" perk to buy gems?

This also means that players who had the "unlimited gems" perk and used that perk to redeem limited edition MAPS have no ability to play those maps ever again.

FWIW, I have spent 1000's of dollars over many years, probably 10's of 1000's. I love to pay developers to support their efforts. With these kinds of moves though, these game devs don't really deserve to be paid, at all. Sorry, bad move to take content away from gamers, regardless of why you think its a good idea. Its not a good game industry business model.

shell turret
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We used to have gems still listed in the store, the problem is that the Google payment overlay just sets everything in the app to free (so it was an exploit for purchasing gems that you'd keep outside of play pass, and was quite heavily abused by some players 🫠)

Play Pass explicitly states in their FAQ that when your subscription ends or when an app leaves play pass, that any perks/benefits from it will also expire. So even when your subscription ends/ended while play pass was still supported will also have lost all benefits for it, as play pass is effectively a rent content model.

It's also mostly (if not all? I'm not sure personally) beneficial to Google, the only benefit on app itself is that it'll be featured to play pass users on Google's end

When play pass was initially added to RISK too, it was when we had premium & like 6 map packs, it's persisted across to when we have over 2x map packs & a ton of content items now too (so it was massive value to $ as well from when it was initially there)

-# we've probably chatted already if not still chatting on support side, just saying hello here too 🙏

wise urchin
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I see both sides of the issue. I do think it's a bit unfair though to the unsassuming player who didn't set out to deceive but was simply advertised to that if they spent their money on a subscription, it would unlock the items in the game that they were hoping for. So the money was spent as google play pass is an annual subscription, and now the items are removed from the players accounts. I know for myself it appeared to be right in line with going premium. Pay for a certain thing and get the rewards that come with it. So if you purchased the play pass solely for this purpose, and have spent lets say two years on it or roughly $60, that's all gone now.

stoic berry
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I must say I disagree with you, AlSyntax. I used Google Play Pass (GPP) in the past. I found it to be an incredible deal back then. Today it is even more of a steal in my opinion. Everything in the game for $4.99/monthly or as low as $2.49/month for a yearly plan? I am amazed SMG even offered it.

As Luci mentioned Google does expressly say you lose access to any content granted via GPP. I have understood this would also be the case if SMG ever discontinued participation in GPP or Google discontinued GPP altogether. I don't know if it is the same now as when I used it. Back then if you reactivate GPP any content you claimed before would be restored, assuming you are using the same Risk account.

shell turret
stoic berry
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So, SMG discontinued Risk: GD participation in GPP? Google removed Risk: GD from GPP?

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GPP itself isn't discontinued as far as I can tell.

shell turret
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I believe we'd opted to not renew but I'm not 100% sure (more of a business thing than customer support thing), it was partially stopped on Google's end (specifically renewals) before 2025, but continued sending new subscriptions (weird huh?)

stoic berry
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Yeah I know that's not your department. Makes more sense now though. Thanks.

viscid geode
# mellow creek Let me start by saying that I 100% support the SMG developers wanting to find a ...

I highly recommend reading the post I’ve replied to by @mellow creek. It is excellently written and very informative. However, there are a couple of things he missed which also impacted former Play Pass players.During our time on Play Pass, there were a number of giveaways. Since we get everything anyway, there is no point in participating so we missed all these opportunities. There were also numerous specials and sales. As AISyntax pointed out, we weren’t even allowed to purchase anything since we received those products automatically. We have forever lost access to those deals.
The worst thing is none of this was necessary. SMG made no effort to convince us to move away from Play Pass. Like lots of players, I joined Play Pass because of one of Google’s extremely low-cost deals. Once the price returned to normal, if I hadn’t found anything worth my money, I planned on leaving. I found one thing – RISK: Global Domination. Since this was the only thing keeping me in Play Pass, virtually any promotion to move over to direct support of this game would have been enough to make that happen. It simply never entered my mind.
That was a missed opportunity on SMG’s part. This appalling treatment of former Play Pass players is yet another missed opportunity. They may make a great game but they seem to lack any business sense.

fathom parrot
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I mean, you don't expect to be able to watch Marvel movies if you cancel Disney Plus 🤷‍♀️

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Play pass is clearly a subscription and clearly states you won't keep the stuff you get from it

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It's not SMGs fault for expecting people to have common sense

upbeat scaffold
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That really sucks honestly

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I remember having a blast with it once the cosmetics came out in mid 2021 to like 2022

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I do understand the removal though. They want more monetisation and since Google play pass was basically a rental, Google was profiting almost entirely from it rather than SMG and since there's so many cosmetics and stuff you could unlock with it, for a cheap price is GOD tier deal. Then again... why not announce the removal in advance? Like lots of people probably don't even know this is a thing (I didn't as well if I didn't explicitly ask about it elsewhere in other chat sections). The consumers should have been given a warning, big announcements from SMG about the cancellation of it, like I don't understand why not just announce it and instead keep it a secret for consumers to find out and get disappointed? Then you're surprised why they are angry/frustrated in the first place, you gotta be 100% transparent.

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And again, I wouldn't have found out about this if I didn't explicitly talk about it somewhere in the Discord Servers, where I was actually lucky one of the few people knew about it before me. This is why ''we'' as a players are always sceptical about SMG's plans. They often don't get finalised and/or completely changed.

So yea, imo this was a HUGE mistake to not announce in advance about the removal and instead just remove it in secret, that's not transparent and is not healty for the community growth!

shell turret
upbeat scaffold
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I don't see that in my game

image.png
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So apparently it was announced but wasn't made public for everyone in game?

shell turret
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I'm pretty sure it was android specific news post

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As play pass is android specific

upbeat scaffold
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Hmmmm ok

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idk why skip Steam though

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because it affects through Steam as well

shell turret
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I'm not sure how it was sent out, it was intended to be sent to anyone with recent play pass subscription, but it may only apply to if you access via android maybe

upbeat scaffold
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Alright

shell turret
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I double checked, it's sent out to all android users

So anyone that opens RISK on android will see that there 👍

upbeat scaffold
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Yea I also checked it on my end, fair enough

wise urchin
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Not to get deep into this topic again but I'll just confirm that yes as an android user I did get a notice in Dec about it. Along with an email.

upbeat scaffold