I keep coming back to the same question: what if the real weakness in live games is not gameplay, but rewards?
Not bad rewards in an obvious sense. I mean rewards that slowly train the wrong behavior, pull players into repetition, attract bots, and quietly flatten the world. At what point does a reward system stop supporting play and start controlling it? If players keep moving wherever incentives point, how much of their “choice” is actually choice? And if one studio turns that into infrastructure, what exactly are other games adopting: smarter design, or a better way to manage player behavior?
That feels like the more important conversation.