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Discussion I am concerned about the fact that my actions in games will help profile my personality

Kenka

Kenka

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I would love to play Baldur's Gate 3. The game is outstanding and exactly the kind of experience I look for, but that's also a problem in itself.

See, Larian Studios declared in their 'Pact' (or Terms and Conditions) that all the data produced by my gameplay will be theirs. That includes my actions in game, my choices in conversations, my blunders, the frequency at which I boot the game, and when I do so, etcetera and etcetera.

I cannot play Baldur's Gate 3 without being completely absorbed by its universe, which means all my actions will accurately depict my desires and my ethics. Imagine for a second that you know exactly what the player with the username Kenka would do in a simulation.

Sure, I will never react in the real world the same way I do as a all-conquering wizard with fabulous powers in a sandbox in which said actions have no real consequences. But what if there is data out there that would allow a third-party to determine that?

Data collection is a bitch and I have no clue about how much data I have left online over the years. A "fuckton" would be a semi-accurate amount. Has a data analyst devised a method to successfully predict my buying patterns, my sexual fantasies, or even worse, my true desires in life? Can that lead to manipulation?

I thank you for having read so far. As a disclaimer, I am not encouraging you to be skeptical to the point you deny yourself what you like most.
 
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I guess on the plus side, your data is a statistic rather than them singling you out for anything.

I wish I had a better answer than that, but privacy just seems to be something we're forced to give away to play modern games.
 
I feel guilty about killing wild life for food in BotW/TotK. I bet Nintendo can see those that do it purely for fun.
 
You're posting on a internet forum. Regardless of what you do in videogames, the companies already have a super detailed profile of you just through your simple use of the internet.

If you don't want to be tracked like you're worried about, you would need to start by smashing your smartphone and getting a old dumb phone that can only text and take calls, and basically cutting off yourself from the internet.

Otherwise just go enjoy Baldurs gate.
 
this is genuinely fascinating to me and something I don't think I've ever considered but
Kenka said:
all my actions will accurately depict my desires and my ethics.
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I just don't think this is possibly true for almost anyone, even in the most open-ended game imaginable. like you say, you'll of course act differently in a virtual environment where your actions have no consequences; and even more so in a fantasy roleplaying game. I imagine any data analysts trying to connect in-game behavior to real-world personality would be able to find only the loosest possible connections

also yeah all the location data, browsing data etc tracked by your phone or computer is way more likely to be used in/useful for predicting your behavior and actions.
but this is really an interesting point to bring up and despite me trying to refute it above, it maybe doesn't seem that far out there in the future. it just doesn't seem like a major concern to me with present-day game software compared to other data tracking, but I guess it could be a more serious consideration down the road.
 
Personally I don't mind it, since from a dev perspective it's really useful to have statistics on how your players play (and can be useful for debugging as well), and with the sheer amount of players a game like BG3 has, I don't see it being used for anything other than statistics - they're not going to single someone out of the 500k players currently playing.

But for people who do, I'm pretty sure the game can be played entirely offline as long as you don't do multiplayer? You can just cut off its internet access from your computer's control panel and be good to go.

There's definitely some aspects of data collection that make me uncomfortable (and why I limit a lot of trackers on my phone, for example), but I can't say games, especially ones that aren't always-online, really worry me on that front.
 
I'm a big fan of cleromancy for determining my choices in these situations. A set of dice would be fitting.
 
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I don't know if Baldur's Gate 3 should be what you're worried about when it comes to data collection. Worry more about your phone/computer, browser, search engine, and social media accounts.
Going by Larian's own website on the subject:
When you submit data, the data we gather helps us improve the game. How much gold do you have, when do you level up, where do you die, when do you equip a different weapon.

We don't know your name, email address, IP address, or your Steam name, and we don't know your location. We are only interested in what goes on in the game. When you crash and you report it, only the crash dump is included. There is a text field where you can fill in details and you are responsible for what you fill in.
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They're only interested in what players are doing in-game. I don't own Baldur's Gate 3, but I'm not sure if they can determine your sexual fantasies from what weapon you equip. If it can, then the marketing has failed the game as I would own it several times over. It looks like they just want to see how players are playing their game so they can react in development accordingly if needed.

For example, if a significant number of players are dying in the same place with low level equipment and little gold they may need to adjust that area of the game so players aren't so underpowered. Instead of waiting for player feedback through their website, steam community page, social media, etc they can get the info straight from the game data.

Baldur's Gate 3 also used it's data collection to call out their alpha players on making boring characters, which is funny.

www.pcgamer.com

Baldur's Gate 3's most-picked character editor options created the most generic dude possible

Larian collated data from the character creator and was very surprised by what it found.
www.pcgamer.com www.pcgamer.com

That being said, many games that do this do offer a way to opt out and I wish Baldur's Gate would offer the same.
 
Mer.Saloon said:
I guess on the plus side, your data is a statistic rather than them singling you out for anything.

I wish I had a better answer than that, but privacy just seems to be something we're forced to give away to play modern games.
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And even moreso just to be on the internet.
 
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Lol on the character creator thing. Character customizations I usually just pick gender based on which voice I think sounds more interesting and if there's a randomize button for looks, I hit random a few times. Same with the character name, if there's a random button, I'm using that.

Being uneasy with the choice data profiling you is a valid concern. Even data that's anonymized, once it's cross referenced with enough other anonymized data sets, eventually the anonymous person is no longer anonymous. This web browser. I'm pretty much always signed into gmail/youtube. I use a VPN but on that VPN I'm signed into so many accounts through my web browser, all these video game clients. I post things on forums. Digital forensics guy would have no trouble tieing so many of my accounts together even if they use different usernames and emails. I bet some textual analysis tools can identify further pinpoint who I am to form posts online. Just got to tie to at least one account that has my real name, credit card usage, etc
 
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This kind of reminds me of a horrible truth that people talk about with data collection and mining.

People assume that phones and microphones and cameras are always watching you. That's why they listen into your conversations and basically recommend the exact things that they talk about.

When in reality, bugging your phones and listening to everything you say is one of the worst things to collect about data. It's way more useful to just collect location data + search history. Say I have a conversation with my dad about going fishing. Google sees that my dad searched up places to fish, and the location data showed me with him right before the search. So, after that Google recommends me fishing equipment because Google algorithms think that I will need it.

Larian is not mining you for advertising. The real stuff is in your phone.
 
There is absolutely no way your decisions in Baldur's Gate 3 could negatively impact your life.
 
bellydrum said:
There is absolutely no way your decisions in Baldur's Gate 3 could negatively impact your life.
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I don't know, every time I see that Wyll disapproves of something I decide, I feel like a horrendous person
 
I'm not playing it because I'm scared the gameplay (which isn't really my thing) will make me get maldy. Malder's Gate 3
 
Kenka said:
I cannot play Baldur's Gate 3 without being completely absorbed by its universe, which means all my actions will accurately depict my desires and my ethics. Imagine for a second that you know exactly what the player with the username Kenka would do in a simulation.

Sure, I will never react in the real world the same way I do as a all-conquering wizard with fabulous powers in a sandbox in which said actions have no real consequences. But what if there is data out there that would allow a third-party to determine that?
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Not me admitting my real desires and ethics include murdering and being an asshole if there were no consequences.
 
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The primary reason companies collect data is to better make money; either by directly selling it, or using it to try to make products more aligned to your interests.

I'd wager a guess Larian Studios is primarily interested in what decisions their players are making so they can see what's popular and tailor to it in future products to drive further sales. It's likely that they're not even looking at individual player names and figuring out what they're doing, but just looking at overall trends of what's popular and what isn't, separate from individuals.

I doubt advertisers are very interested in this data, and therefore it's not likely to be bought. I'd also think Larian Studios would have to declare their right to sell the data if they choose in the TOS, though I'm not sure. Additionally, Larian Studios can only access the data they themselves are collecting; they don't know what you're doing with your entire online presence.

Kenka said:
Sure, I will never react in the real world the same way I do as a all-conquering wizard with fabulous powers in a sandbox in which said actions have no real consequences. But what if there is data out there that would allow a third-party to determine that?

Data collection is a bitch and I have no clue about how much data I have left online over the years. A "fuckton" would be a semi-accurate amount. Has a data analyst devised a method to successfully predict my buying patterns, my sexual fantasies, or even worse, my true desires in life? Can that lead to manipulation?
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The short answer to this is no. The only way you're manipulated with online data is with ads, though they can be more subtly placed than you think.

There's no magical algorithm that can just spit out your entire personality without related data. Unless you're actively leaving a footprint directly related to your true desires or sexual fantasies, no one knows shit about them.
 
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you're just gonna be one data point in a collective pool of stats for gameplay refinement

stuff like "died at x goblin 3 times" is about the most relevant thing you're actually going to be contributing to them on an individual event level
 
In the tiny scenario that they profile your personality, what's going to happen? It won't even be accurate and all they care about is sales on the next game.
 
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