What defines a free game?

     We've all seen the simple advirtisements with big a big 50% off and a small select purchases only. Then we step into the store and find a few shirts, shoes, or pants on sale that were all previously priced relatively low. But how far does that world extend. The digital deals offer the same type of reasoning, "order online for free shipping and handling." Sounds like a nice deal right? It's the same price as the store though, the only difference is that you're ordering offline. so what does Apple do contibute to this madness of advirtisements? Well, free has become... less free.

Displayed is the top chart list of free apps on "app store." As you can see Apple says "get" rather than free like they used to. I'll discuss that word choice later. The next thing one should notice is how under seven out of eleven of them, there is the phrase "in-app purchases." Now this doesn't mean the select four have no in-app purchases, it only means they don't tell you. Take the calculator app for example: as you can see I downloaded it, what I saw within was a calculator. Yet, if one looks deeper than the open face of the app, the person would see "skins" available for 99¢ each. This, technically, would create the app to be a paid for app, because without paying you would not get the entire app. Expansion packs, today commonly known as DLCs have been around since the for a long time now. Back before consoles expansion packs were being sold for games of the era. Today's marketing have made expansion packs the way to go. Take this for example, a calculator app with four skins costs $1.99, yet a free calculator app with DLCs is free, you can get one skin for 99¢. After downloading the free app and buying the skins, you end paying about $4, double that of the calculator that included skins. This DLC company rampage has for gotten out of hand. Most games today offer, or require, a sort of extra that one must buy in order to fully play the game. Some games even rely on the extra bundles. The hit game skylanders, Disney infinity, and others alike, are based off buying extra figures that allow you to play certain levels, or as certain people. Disney infinity heavily targets kids by using all of the favorite characters, causing them to want each and every one. 

      Apple used to use the price of the app or the term free to explain what each app was. A few years ago they changed their version of free games to "get games." So why did they do this? Well, in reality this was no marketing trick at all. The European Commisions created guidelines leading to what games can be called free. One guideline included their habit for misleading titles, each title that was labeled free yet included in-app purchases led children into a trick. However, this was made unlawful with punishment by suing. So in turn Apple changed the title of free to "get."