When it comes to movies and TV, Netflix-style subscription services are a bit of a racket. They are meant to provide the appearance of value over actual value. The hope is you just keep paying and never really think about how much or how little you use it — let alone do the math to see if it is more cost-effective to just outright buy the products you actually want, as opposed to having access to a whole bunch you might want. It’s FOMO as a business model, terribly compelling and a great way to disappear a bunch of your money, roughly $15-$20 a month.
What makes them tolerable are the moments when they make you feel like the one getting away with something. Merely watching stuff on Netflix isn’t enough for this, but if you play games — the ones that come free with your Netflix sub — you kind of are.
“Wait, Netflix has games?” is a pretty common headline, the implied gag being that no Netflix subscriber comes to Netflix to play games, and that the streaming giant is wasting its time pursuing them. That may be. But there’s no reason that you shouldn’t benefit from a puzzling act of corporate hubris.
The Netflix gaming library is small but quite spectacular, and crucially, all of these games play well on smartphones or tablets — the devices you’re most likely to use Netflix for, anyway. The service launched with early hits like Poinpy and spectacular ports like Into the Breach — and even more games have joined their ranks since.
Consider Storyteller, Daniel Benmergui’s witty puzzle game about playfully rearranging characters, scenes, and desires to tell mix-and-match comic strip stories. Or one of the very best games of 2022, the intricate mystery The Case of the Golden Idol. Indulge in the classic chaos of Sonic Mania, or the visually weird but still quite playable Grand Theft Auto remastered trilogy.
Did you know you could play freaking Immortality right there on your dang Emily in Paris machine? Profane!
Of course, all of this stops being cool the second Netflix decides this is something that it ought to charge extra for. So this is not a blanket endorsement of Netflix’s current inexplicable plan to include games as a part of its offerings. Consider this a strong suggestion instead, to anyone currently subscribed: If you’re gonna rock with Netflix’s shows, maybe make their games a part of your entertainment rotation too, and stat.
Because that is another way subscription services take advantage of you: By implying that what is available now will always be there, while technically promising nothing of the sort. In fact, as we’re currently talking about a company that popularized the forced scarcity of streaming catalogs, it’s probably safer to assume that the cool show or movie you’ve been putting off watching forever will be gone by the time you make time for it. Same is likely true for games, so I say smoke ’em if you’ve got ’em.
Of course, you could also buy them too, and not have to worry about any of this.
The post Stop joking about Netflix’s games and start playing them appeared first on Polygon.
