The thread on the official forums about some of the new c-store items being character specific instead of account wide has reached 119 pages. Only a few diehards even bother to defend this latest PR clusterfrack/blatant desperate cash grab.
WOW!!!! i thought all that stuff was supposed to be account wide? so now if you want a galaxy-x.... you have to pay 25$ per character????
im actually stunned at how low cryptic will stoop, that is truly as pathetic as ive seen any company act (without facing legal repurcussions anyway). 25$ per character for a ship to fly around in a game that still not release worthy 6 months after launch.....WOW.
do the people who found 5 suckers for the raf program at least get it on all accounts?
No, most of the stuff is acount wide. I think the Galaxy-X is account wide. There were a few items added recently like extra bridge officer slots that aren't. AFAIK everything except respecs and account services were account wide before the latest couple items.
As a long time MMO gamer I too was naive about Cash Shops for a long time. Over time as I went from one F2P and P2P with Cash Shop MMO to another I learned one some very important things, the most important of which is this:
"We are wholeheartedly against the "pay for a permanent advantage" model and our balance designers are dedicated to making sure that items in the C-Store have enough advantage over other in game items long enough to get people to buy them before we re-balance them or put in things that are better. This way we get paid, some get to kick some arse for a while and the rest get to laugh at those that wasted money on such an inferior ship later when better ships are added."
This statement sums it all up in a nice package... why the Cash Shops exist... How Developers NOW make MMO content... who really runs MMOs (it's not Devs)... how much respect and concern MMO management has for Players...Zilch.
All Cash Shop MMO always sell the best stuff in the Cash Shop...even if it drops ingame because the drop rate will be so low as to make it almost impossible to get it... and even if in the beginning the Cash Shop only sells "cosmetic" items eventually it will sell the good stuff...because Cash Shops have to do this to make a profit and fund the MMO. All MMOs not already F2P are going F2P (very few exceptions). We Players are now just here to get milked. period.
If as a Player you have no issue with the all of this then cool. Enjoy playing MMOs now in 2010. Make sure to pay your credit card bill each month.
I have a huge issue with all this, yes I bought STO and consider it the worst MMO I ever paid to play and I should have known better... I have learned my lesson the hard way.
Question is how many of us have learned our lesson?
Or maybe the question is how many of us see no problem with all of this and are will to keep these money grubbing jerks in business?
Let me know when we as Player are done with role playing milk cows, then we all can get good MMOs back *perhaps someday* and enjoy them without all the crass commercialism infecting MMOs now.
I will never download and install a F2P MMO at all since these are all Cash Shop.
I will never again purchase a P2P MMO that has Cash Shop or that is strangely silent or political when Players ask if they will add a CS in the future... and since no Publisher would definately say no to a Cash Shop now, well I will never again for a long time to come be purchasing a MMO.
To all of you Players that buy stuff from Cash Shops and bought gold from gold Farmers and tempted the Devs to get the profits with a Cash Shop I will say this....
Thanks alot for ruining MMO Gaming. If you are still playing STO and buying from a Cash Shop you are killing my hobbie. Hope you gain pleasure from that.
/rant off but still pissed off.
I am the Player that wonders... "What the %#*& just happened?!" ............... "I Believe... There should be NO financial connection or portals between the Real World and the Virtual in MMOs. " __Ever Present Cockroach of the MMO Verses__ ...scurrying to and fro... .munching on bits of garbage... always under foot...
You are actually missing out on some quite decent games, just because they are F2P and have cash shop. The quaility of them has been increasing, to a point now their's quite a few better than those with subscriptions.
Cash shops are only a problem if the company is greedy. Having (or wanting) to buy things monthly for a (so called) F2P has zero issue, providing in doing so it costs no more than a subscription would. After all they do need to keep their business funded.
STO has both a subscription and cash shop model, while they have been milking the c-store more than fleshing out the game. Hence they fall in the greedy bracket. If they had kept it to a smaller number of cosmetic and account related features (only), its likely most wouldn't be concerned about it. Provided they improved the game. Something they aren't doing, even with season 2. It just more of the same, which will be over in no time. We are even now starting to see posts from devs, saying they are being forced to push out half finished content (for example the discussion around the Intrepid refit). This is while they are permitted to revisit c-store items to add polish to them.
I'm pretty sure they know STO is going to take to long for them to fix, hence why the milking. I can see most of their effort being diverted to CO (which is actually improving more and more) and their next MMO. Actually it already seems to be happening anyway.
Yeah I wouldn't lump all cash shop games together either. I've played some good F2P games without spending a dime in a cash shop. Then subscription + cash shop games like STO, STO is not F2P, might put stuff there but it's mostly cosmetic or things like XP or energy potions, and more importantly the cash shop is not the focus of the game. It all depends on the company and how it manages the game. When your management is making statements like this..
"We are wholeheartedly against the "pay for a permanent advantage" model and our balance designers are dedicated to making sure that items in the C-Store have enough advantage over other in game items long enough to get people to buy them before we re-balance them or put in things that are better. This way we get paid, some get to kick some arse for a while and the rest get to laugh at those that wasted money on such an inferior ship later when better ships are added."
it suggests:
1- our game is really still in development so what we put in the store might give you an advantage now but won't later so buy at your own risk
2- HAHAHA we the developers think you are an idiot because you spend real cash on our stuff that we will later turn into useless junk, spend more dummy HAHAHA
Given the Atari and Cryptic track record on this game, it's probably more 2 than 1. The blatant 'you're just $$$ to us and we think you are funny' attitude is what seems to anger most people about STO. So STO shouldn't really be used to say all cash shop games are bad, it's more like an extreme example of a mismanaged cash shop gone bad.
I think several people here are over-reacting to the cash shop. What's really in there? Some costumes and preorder items? Granted, that one ship is an early opportunity to have a pvp advantage over others, but that will disappear soon enough. I agree that the other equal ships should have been released about the same time, but I don't see this situation as blatant pay to win through the cash shop tactics by Cryptic. I haven't bought anything from the cash shop yet. I will probably buy the original series uniforms when I get around to it, but I don't think that has any real impact on gameplay.
Maybe people are upset that the developers are working on cash shop items over new content. I don't think this is correct. Most cash shop items are simple cosmetic skins or were preorder items that were already developed for the game. They are not far out from season two, and the game has only been out for how long? 6 months if that. I believe that's a reasonable rate of new material. Many people are upset with the state of the game at release (especially Klingons), but I don't think the cash shop has made any significant impact on the rate of development.
What do you get if you ignore the cash shop?
All areas of the game/missions are open to play. No ranks or ship levels are locked away (note I said ship levels not ships, there are certain ships that are for cash shop customers, but ships of equal power/level are available for just a normal subscription). Crafting (albiet weakly implemented) and market options are all available.
If people have a problem with the way the game was designed, that's fine, but I think several people are pinning the blame for every flaw on the cash shop. When I play STO, the cash shop has no part in my enjoyment or frustration with the game. I see cash shops in games with subscriptions as an opportunity to access preorder items, vet rewards or cosmetic skins that might otherwise be unavailable. That's it. They are no big deal. If you don't like them, ignore them. I do for the most part.
Nah it's just the direction this thread went. The cash shop rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, especially STO's early supporters who saw their exclusives dumped into the c-store only weeks after spending hundreds of dollars on the game. Whether you are sympathetic to them or not, a lot of people did pre-order and get LTS for the exclusives thinking they would be exclusive for a long time or at least a year, not just a few weeks. Of course there are still plenty of other reasons to be disappointed with the game; lacking content, worst crafting system ever in an mmo, bad design (spacebar mash fest I had to buy a new keyboard because STO broke mine), buggy ground combat, PvP being a joke, neglected Klingons, awful customer service, total non-Star Trek feel, and on and on... Just my observation the c-store and then Cryptic's obsession with budgets and money broke the camel's back for a lot of people though and that's why people seem to focus on it. Still a feeling of being burned and if there is one thing people will never forget it is when they think you ripped them off.
I think several people here are over-reacting to the cash shop. What's really in there? Some costumes and preorder items? Granted, that one ship is an early opportunity to have a pvp advantage over others, but that will disappear soon enough. I agree that the other equal ships should have been released about the same time, but I don't see this situation as blatant pay to win through the cash shop tactics by Cryptic. I haven't bought anything from the cash shop yet. I will probably buy the original series uniforms when I get around to it, but I don't think that has any real impact on gameplay.
putting items in the cash shop that have an advantage before adding equal ships that can be earned in game is the definition of pay to win. some of the pre order items are also arguably game effecting (when they have abilites that can not be chosen on a character creation, that is game effecting) good for you for not buying from the c-store, but your missing the point, there shouldnt be a cash shop in a game thats still not ready for release.
Maybe people are upset that the developers are working on cash shop items over new content. I don't think this is correct. Most cash shop items are simple cosmetic skins or were preorder items that were already developed for the game. They are not far out from season two, and the game has only been out for how long? 6 months if that. I believe that's a reasonable rate of new material. Many people are upset with the state of the game at release (especially Klingons), but I don't think the cash shop has made any significant impact on the rate of development.
i disagree. the game was released with maybe 25% of the content it should have had, and what they have added since then is a joke. no one can seriously beleive that 8 missions for the klingon faction to "show it love" is an honest effort to fill out that faction. this might be considered a reasonable rate of adding content for a game that wasnt so desperately short on content from day one. as to the cash shop..... again its insulting spending time on this to gouge customers when the games not ready for release...6 months after release.
What do you get if you ignore the cash shop?
All areas of the game/missions are open to play. No ranks or ship levels are locked away (note I said ship levels not ships, there are certain ships that are for cash shop customers, but ships of equal power/level are available for just a normal subscription). Crafting (albiet weakly implemented) and market options are all available.
If people have a problem with the way the game was designed, that's fine, but I think several people are pinning the blame for every flaw on the cash shop. When I play STO, the cash shop has no part in my enjoyment or frustration with the game. I see cash shops in games with subscriptions as an opportunity to access preorder items, vet rewards or cosmetic skins that might otherwise be unavailable. That's it. They are no big deal. If you don't like them, ignore them. I do for the most part.
what are you missing if you dont buy stuff from the cash shop...... well just what the money you spent on the game went to develop. and this is the issue, as you say its not just the c-store in particular. rather its the unscrupulous, unethical, moneygrubbing way cryptic has been treating its customers. so if your happy paying cryptic a monthly sub for a half finished game, so they can take your money and make stuff for a c-store to try and sell to you again. have fun!
personally i wont do business with a company that not only views me as a cash cow but has no problem letting me know thats what they think of me and that my opinion doesnt matter (unless im telling about something id pay even more for in there c-store).
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
From the last two posts it appears the real problem is not so much the c-store as the lack of content (especially Klingon). We can agree or disagree to what extent the c-store is responsible for this, but only the devs know how much of a time sink the c-store has actually been. As far as people upset about exclusives being available in the c-store, I expected all of that to be available at launch. That's why I didn't buy more than one pre-order. Everyone knew there was going to be a c-store. How could they not expect that stuff to become available rather quickly? As for LTSers, if they bought that only for the exclusives, they were doing it for the wrong reasons anyway. People warned about that in the forums during beta.
As a casual player, lack of content has yet to be an issue with me. I still haven't reached the level cap. I enjoy the combat system in this game. It at least requires a little bit of thought as far as postion or ship outfitting. I find the combat more enjoyable than Eve online or any other auto-target and click ability MMOs. I like the power allocation and shield facings in space and flanking bonuses on the ground. Some of the story missions are pretty good for a Star Trek fan. I like having bridge officers and being able to develope them alongside my main character. They are the best pets I have seen in any MMO. Is the game as good as it could be? No. However, I have yet to encounter an MMO that has had rave reviews about how much content was available from launch. AoC and Champions also were critisized for the states of their games at launch; however, both of those games appear to be getting better with time (especially AoC after the latest expansion). I expect STO will be gradually better as well. I hope they add Klingon content (I have yet to roll a Klingon due to how horrible their content is supposed to be), and I hope they revamp crafting (wasn't the discovery or development of new materials/technologies part of Star Trek?).
I would advise any MMO gamer who expects a high level of polish and content to wait for any MMO to have at least a year of live play before giving it a shot. Otherwise, they will probably be disappointed. Prediction: 6 months after release, the SWToR forums will have people complaining about the lack of content for that game. Let's just hope they don't have a microtransaction store
I would advise any MMO gamer who expects a high level of polish and content to wait for any MMO to have at least a year of live play before giving it a shot. Otherwise, they will probably be disappointed.
People willing to accept that is going to run this genre straight into the ground.
How about people hold these companies that decide they're going to rip consumers off, and essentially trick them to pay for 3/4 of a game's development before it's developed (without any return on their investment by the way), responsible? How about just don't give them any more fricken money once it's seen how little they did BEFORE releasing the game, since that is the only way these shoddy and shady companies can be held in check, and held up to some basic standard.
What defines enough content for a game to be released, and how much more would that cost in time and money? Can you name an MMO from the past several years that launched with enough features and content to satisfy every player? I can't. The more established games that have all of the bells, whistles and content didn't launch in that state. These games take tremendous amounts of time and money to implement. Most companies would never be able to carry the development costs to cover everything most players seem to want these days. They are economically forced to launch what they feel will be enough material to satisfy average players and hope to recoup enough of their initial investment to expand the core game. Is it a perfect system? No, but it keeps the genre alive. This applies to all MMOs and studios, not just STO and Cryptic.
The bottom line is that you are free to spend your money how you choose. If you don't like the state MMOs are being launched in, then aviod trying out recently released MMOs. Frankly, these games are an extremely cheap form of entertainment. I can't hardly take my wife to a movie for under $30 (the cost of two subscriptions to a typical MMO for a month), and that entertainment wont last more than 3 hours, tops. Forget talking about going to dinner, clubs, casinos, sporting events or other live performances. Golf, bowling, or playing pool regularly will set you back far more than $15 per month. How far would $15/month get you into a car or motorcycle hobby? If I can enjoy an MMO for 10-20 hours a month, it is an absolute bargain for my entertainment dollar. I feel sorry for people who feel ripped off if they can't experience new content while playing a game 20+ hours a week. I believe they are simply asking for too much from a newly released MMO. Thus, I stick to my advice: If you want to play a fully developed MMO with tons of features and content, don't play any MMO that has been live for less than a year.
See that's the same cappola that Cryptic shills have been spreading since just before release, and the thing is it's utterly false. Most games do in fact release with enough content to satisify most players. Sure in the last few years since WoW's release we've seen a couple that simply haven't, like AoC for instance, but for the most part they have. Now Cryptic, and those foolish enough to support them, are trying to change the rules by BSing through their fricken teeth.
I don't care what it costs them to develop the game to a decent release state. I'm not supposed to care. They chose to develop the game. It's their responsibilty to budget for enough money and development time to get it done. It's not my responsibilty to pay them to develop the game.
All of a sudden now we're supposed to feel sorry for these companies that bight off more than they can chew? Or in Cryptic's case, feel sorry for a company that just decides to come up with a business plan that involves bilking tens of thousands of people out of their money?
You think it's fine to make the choice to go ahead and pay them to finish their game, but what you're in fact doing is contributing to them turning potential mmo fans off of mmos. That majority of people that don't follow the game's every twist and turn in development, don't do the CB and OB phases, and just buy the game because it sounds interesting. Sure you can spout off all you want about how it's their responsibilty to do some research, but why should they have to? Why shouldn't they be able to expect that there's going to be a whole game there for them to play instead of a couple of weeks worth? The answer is they should be able to expect that, and when they don't get it, they get a bit angry for wasting their hard earned money, and a lot of them just say screw mmos. Ya, companies like Cryptic are real good for the genre allright. They're a fricken blight on it is more like. A parasitic entity.
From the last two posts it appears the real problem is not so much the c-store as the lack of content (especially Klingon). We can agree or disagree to what extent the c-store is responsible for this, but only the devs know how much of a time sink the c-store has actually been. As far as people upset about exclusives being available in the c-store, I expected all of that to be available at launch. That's why I didn't buy more than one pre-order. Everyone knew there was going to be a c-store. How could they not expect that stuff to become available rather quickly? As for LTSers, if they bought that only for the exclusives, they were doing it for the wrong reasons anyway. People warned about that in the forums during beta.
no it is not the lack of content, it is a combination of multiple major failings of sto, lack of content is one of those failings. exclusives in sto are not exclusives as you point out, which is another major failing on cryptics part, dishonesty. marketing something as "exclusive" while fulling intending to sell it in the c-store weeks later is a prime example of how cryptic has no respect for its customers.
As a casual player, lack of content has yet to be an issue with me. I still haven't reached the level cap. I enjoy the combat system in this game. It at least requires a little bit of thought as far as postion or ship outfitting. I find the combat more enjoyable than Eve online or any other auto-target and click ability MMOs. I like the power allocation and shield facings in space and flanking bonuses on the ground. Some of the story missions are pretty good for a Star Trek fan. I like having bridge officers and being able to develope them alongside my main character. They are the best pets I have seen in any MMO. Is the game as good as it could be? No. However, I have yet to encounter an MMO that has had rave reviews about how much content was available from launch. AoC and Champions also were critisized for the states of their games at launch; however, both of those games appear to be getting better with time (especially AoC after the latest expansion). I expect STO will be gradually better as well. I hope they add Klingon content (I have yet to roll a Klingon due to how horrible their content is supposed to be), and I hope they revamp crafting (wasn't the discovery or development of new materials/technologies part of Star Trek?).
games that had content at launch.. lotro and wow come to mind (both wildly more succesful than sto). as to combat, i disagree... it requires almost zero thought. point at enemy ship and mash space bar while recharging shields facing target doesnt require me to think a lot. ground combat... i didnt even shoot, just let my ground crew do all the work while i walked around.... thats challenging? thats interesting? i find it amusing the only other games you find to compare sto to are aoc (which as you say is getting much better) and CO... another cryptic game. in fact CO is the engine that sto was built on and is generally considered a failure.
I would advise any MMO gamer who expects a high level of polish and content to wait for any MMO to have at least a year of live play before giving it a shot. Otherwise, they will probably be disappointed. Prediction: 6 months after release, the SWToR forums will have people complaining about the lack of content for that game. Let's just hope they don't have a microtransaction store
thank you for your advice, however i would advise that rather people check the forums here and see what the game is lacking or has and if they would be interested in the game. for example.. sto is not worth trying dont buy it, in fact dont buy any cryptic product as they dont seem capable of making a decent mmo. theres lots of games out there worth trying from decent companies (eve, lotro, vanguard) however cryptic has shown they consider there customers as nothing more than cash cows. if your a HUGE star trek fan maybe you will be able to ignore all of this games faillings, otherwise dont bother.
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
What defines enough content for a game to be released, and how much more would that cost in time and money? Can you name an MMO from the past several years that launched with enough features and content to satisfy every player?
First off, that argument about satisfying every customer is a copout; we all know full well that you cannot satisfy every human, no matter what we talk about. What you can do is satisfy the majority of people your product is targetting. As to your first question, I find it humorous that there were MMOs launched even in the last few years that did indeed have enough content to satisfy most MMO players. AoC, for all of its problems and the content gap around level 40-50, did indeed have far more content than the 80 hours Cryptic stated STO would had. When you create an MMO that has the same or less amount of playtime than single player games, then there's definately a distinct lack of content.
Let's look at Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, a fairly recently released game that had a very troubled launch: Vanguard at launch had a few hundred hours of gameplay at launch; there were multiple starting areas on three different continents and just levelling one race up would present you with more content than STO has, not to mention the crafting and diplomacy aspects Vanguard had (both of which were nearly games in their own right). Oh yeah, Vanguard also had an endgame at launch as well; sure it was buggy and/or pointless at launch, but it did give additional things to do.
The truth of the matter is, where 'enough' content is concerned, you are in the minority when it comes to MMO gamers (the ultra-casual crowd). Most players average about 4-6 hours per game session. A newly released MMO should have enough content to keep the average MMO player playing for at least two months, so that the company can at least get one month's subscription out of the customer. When people are reaching the end of your game (and for the first couple of weeks, STO indeed did have an end since they hadn't implemented any endgame content other than the lackluster PvP) within a couple weeks, with people reaching the level cap within three days, there is a serious problem with the amount of content that game has.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
I am no one's shill. I don't work in the video game industry and am no one's spokesperson.
I asked for examples of recent MMOs. IMO WoW, Everquest and LoTRO are previous gen MMOs. I'm pretty sure they've been out for 5 years or more.
Recent MMOs that have been lambasted for being incomplete or bad product: Spellborne, DDO, Auto Assault, Warhammer, Hellgate:London, & yes, Vanguard. For Vanguard, what's the point of having content if the game is unplayable? Large numbers of bugs are at least as bad if not worse than lack of content. It's an incomplete game.
I cited AoC and CO because I either played or knew several people who played them. Both games, like Vanguard, were slammed out of the gate; however, both of them, like Vanguard, have improved pretty significantly. How long have they been live? A year or two. That's part of why I say wait until an MMO has been live a year or more before trying it if you play them for lots of hours.
"Finish their game" Hagonbok? MMOs are in constant development. They aren't really "finished" until the devs decide it's time to prepare to shut down the servers.
The exclusives stuff is a matter of opinion. I already said that I expected them to become available. The exclusives didn't cost anything extra when bought with a new copy of the game. Later players will have to pay extra to join the club of people with the "exclusives." Besides, I doubt anyone decided to stick with or quit a game based on their exclusives. I don't think Cryptic was dishonest in this area. You disagree with me there.
If you are skating through combat without difficulty, I would suggest increasing the mission difficulty feature. The game is "easy" by default, but there are two more difficulty levels available above that.
In an ideal world, every MMO released would be complete, and they would never need to tweak or expand anything. I just don't think that will ever happen. Everyone is entitled to their opinions about what is enough content, features or bug-free play to make a good game. In the past several years, one of two things have happened: Either players demand too much or developers across the MMO board are failing to deliver good product. All I know is that I enjoy STO more than EvE (18 months played), WoW (1 month played), AoC (1 month played), or DDO (1 week played). I'm burned out on CoH (4 years), and this is my current MMO. I will play it as long as I enjoy it, and I don't feel ripped off in the least.
Hello, you're on a mmo centric site. When we that play mmos say "finished" it's a given we know that mmos continue to expand, but we talk about having at least a bare minimum of content to keep players occupied for more than a couple of weeks, and most if not all glaring bugs fixed. Finished means release ready. STO wasn't, and still isn't, release ready.
What some are trying to get through to you, or at least I am, is that even though you don't feel ripped off, the vast majority did and still do. I mean hundreds of thousands of people if we're to believe their initial reports of boxes sold and then the sorry state of their population just one short month after release. So with you not feeling ripped off and continuing to support Cryptic and that game, you're supporting a company that's ripped a lot of people off, and is still doing so. Not only that, you're possibly contributing to the perception being given to other companies that pulling off the crap that Cryptic did is worthwhile doing.
That's the damage you're doing supporting that game. We as mmo gamers have no other way to "police" these companies other than via our wallets and warning others off of bad games, but when too many people are willing to just accept substandard as the norm these companies will just keep pumping the crap out.
I am no one's shill. I don't work in the video game industry and am no one's spokesperson.
I asked for examples of recent MMOs. IMO WoW, Everquest and LoTRO are previous gen MMOs. I'm pretty sure they've been out for 5 years or more.
if sto is an example of "next generation" mmo's... what did i miss? when did technology go back to the 80's?
Recent MMOs that have been lambasted for being incomplete or bad product: Spellborne, DDO, Auto Assault, Warhammer, Hellgate:London, & yes, Vanguard. For Vanguard, what's the point of having content if the game is unplayable? Large numbers of bugs are at least as bad if not worse than lack of content. It's an incomplete game.
i played auto assault,ddo and vanguard at release... all three of these titles had more content and less bugs than sto at launch. im not saying they were incredible games, but they were better than sot by a very very wide margin.
I cited AoC and CO because I either played or knew several people who played them. Both games, like Vanguard, were slammed out of the gate; however, both of them, like Vanguard, have improved pretty significantly. How long have they been live? A year or two. That's part of why I say wait until an MMO has been live a year or more before trying it if you play them for lots of hours.
problem with this idea as it regards to sto is, sto is going to be at the state most games release at when its one year old, if they add enough content and fix some major failings in the first year.
"Finish their game" Hagonbok? MMOs are in constant development. They aren't really "finished" until the devs decide it's time to prepare to shut down the servers.
hagonbok answered this, to be honest to act like you didnt know he meant "in a release worthy state" is.... well childish at best.
The exclusives stuff is a matter of opinion. I already said that I expected them to become available. The exclusives didn't cost anything extra when bought with a new copy of the game. Later players will have to pay extra to join the club of people with the "exclusives." Besides, I doubt anyone decided to stick with or quit a game based on their exclusives. I don't think Cryptic was dishonest in this area. You disagree with me there.
if these items has been released a year into the games life... sure no problem... but a few weeks in?
If you are skating through combat without difficulty, I would suggest increasing the mission difficulty feature. The game is "easy" by default, but there are two more difficulty levels available above that.
sorry not going to resub so i can shoot stuff ten times as long, not when the game was terminally boring after 10 days.
In an ideal world, every MMO released would be complete, and they would never need to tweak or expand anything. I just don't think that will ever happen. Everyone is entitled to their opinions about what is enough content, features or bug-free play to make a good game. In the past several years, one of two things have happened: Either players demand too much or developers across the MMO board are failing to deliver good product. All I know is that I enjoy STO more than EvE (18 months played), WoW (1 month played), AoC (1 month played), or DDO (1 week played). I'm burned out on CoH (4 years), and this is my current MMO. I will play it as long as I enjoy it, and I don't feel ripped off in the least.
have fun and good luck.
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
That's the damage you're doing supporting that game. We as mmo gamers have no other way to "police" these companies other than via our wallets and warning others off of bad games, but when too many people are willing to just accept substandard as the norm these companies will just keep pumping the crap out.
I love capitalism. It has a wonderful way of weeding out companies that fail to produce marketable products. As you stated, we vote with our wallets. If enough people support and enjoy games you consider "substandard", then you will probably face a lot of disappointment going forward. I have tried many games and products that I did not like. I don't begrudge other people enjoying them. If STO ends up going the way of several other MMOs with sparse populations or shut down servers, so be it. The players would have spoken.
Thank you for the luck, Raistalin. I hope you find a more suitable game to play.
It is interesting how much the MMO genre has changed. We used to get full featured games, at a decent price and basic subscription. Games like DAOC and Vanguard have giant areas, and multiple areas per level, along with a large selection of different classes, skills, etc. It was all expected to be in the game.
We now have a game like STO, that is based on a gigantic IP franchise. According to the old standards, we should expect both Klingon and Federation areas to be large, with several areas per level, and lots of gameplay choices (skills, etc). There should be 2-3 different paths for Klingon and 2-3 for Federation.
So STO was released when it was about 1/2 done. They still charged full price for it, and a full price subscription. And now they want to charge extra for new stuff.
That's the damage you're doing supporting that game. We as mmo gamers have no other way to "police" these companies other than via our wallets and warning others off of bad games, but when too many people are willing to just accept substandard as the norm these companies will just keep pumping the crap out.
I love capitalism. It has a wonderful way of weeding out companies that fail to produce marketable products. As you stated, we vote with our wallets. If enough people support and enjoy games you consider "substandard", then you will probably face a lot of disappointment going forward. I have tried many games and products that I did not like. I don't begrudge other people enjoying them. If STO ends up going the way of several other MMOs with sparse populations or shut down servers, so be it. The players would have spoken.
Thank you for the luck, Raistalin. I hope you find a more suitable game to play.
You're either not getting it, or just pretending to be obtuse to carry on your argument.
People start to accept substandard products when they don't know any better. Like yourself. Your belief that most games lack content and polish when released clearly shows that to anyone that DOES actually have a history of playing many of these games. It's the not taking good advice that's freely given that is exactly the problem. From what we can surmise from the info Cryptic themselves have let out, hundreds of housands of people didn't find the product acceptable at release and still don't, while only a fraction did and still do. Sorry, that's not a matter of taste going on there, that's people trying to tell you somethinig. Every 9 out of 10 people posting in this section talking about what a ripoff the game was at release, and still is, is people trying to tell you something. If people would just stop giving Cryptic money then that would not only teach them a lesson for the next game they try and make, but it would teach other companies thinking of trying to pull the same shannanigans the same lesson as well.
Comments
No, most of the stuff is acount wide. I think the Galaxy-X is account wide. There were a few items added recently like extra bridge officer slots that aren't. AFAIK everything except respecs and account services were account wide before the latest couple items.
This going to be a rant.
As a long time MMO gamer I too was naive about Cash Shops for a long time. Over time as I went from one F2P and P2P with Cash Shop MMO to another I learned one some very important things, the most important of which is this:
"We are wholeheartedly against the "pay for a permanent advantage" model and our balance designers are dedicated to making sure that items in the C-Store have enough advantage over other in game items long enough to get people to buy them before we re-balance them or put in things that are better. This way we get paid, some get to kick some arse for a while and the rest get to laugh at those that wasted money on such an inferior ship later when better ships are added."
This statement sums it all up in a nice package... why the Cash Shops exist... How Developers NOW make MMO content... who really runs MMOs (it's not Devs)... how much respect and concern MMO management has for Players...Zilch.
All Cash Shop MMO always sell the best stuff in the Cash Shop...even if it drops ingame because the drop rate will be so low as to make it almost impossible to get it... and even if in the beginning the Cash Shop only sells "cosmetic" items eventually it will sell the good stuff...because Cash Shops have to do this to make a profit and fund the MMO. All MMOs not already F2P are going F2P (very few exceptions). We Players are now just here to get milked. period.
If as a Player you have no issue with the all of this then cool. Enjoy playing MMOs now in 2010. Make sure to pay your credit card bill each month.
I have a huge issue with all this, yes I bought STO and consider it the worst MMO I ever paid to play and I should have known better... I have learned my lesson the hard way.
Question is how many of us have learned our lesson?
Or maybe the question is how many of us see no problem with all of this and are will to keep these money grubbing jerks in business?
Let me know when we as Player are done with role playing milk cows, then we all can get good MMOs back *perhaps someday* and enjoy them without all the crass commercialism infecting MMOs now.
I will never download and install a F2P MMO at all since these are all Cash Shop.
I will never again purchase a P2P MMO that has Cash Shop or that is strangely silent or political when Players ask if they will add a CS in the future... and since no Publisher would definately say no to a Cash Shop now, well I will never again for a long time to come be purchasing a MMO.
To all of you Players that buy stuff from Cash Shops and bought gold from gold Farmers and tempted the Devs to get the profits with a Cash Shop I will say this....
Thanks alot for ruining MMO Gaming. If you are still playing STO and buying from a Cash Shop you are killing my hobbie. Hope you gain pleasure from that.
/rant off but still pissed off.
I am the Player that wonders... "What the %#*& just happened?!"
...............
"I Believe... There should be NO financial connection or portals between the Real World and the Virtual in MMOs. "
__Ever Present Cockroach of the MMO Verses__
...scurrying to and fro... .munching on bits of garbage... always under foot...
You are actually missing out on some quite decent games, just because they are F2P and have cash shop. The quaility of them has been increasing, to a point now their's quite a few better than those with subscriptions.
Cash shops are only a problem if the company is greedy. Having (or wanting) to buy things monthly for a (so called) F2P has zero issue, providing in doing so it costs no more than a subscription would. After all they do need to keep their business funded.
STO has both a subscription and cash shop model, while they have been milking the c-store more than fleshing out the game. Hence they fall in the greedy bracket. If they had kept it to a smaller number of cosmetic and account related features (only), its likely most wouldn't be concerned about it. Provided they improved the game. Something they aren't doing, even with season 2. It just more of the same, which will be over in no time. We are even now starting to see posts from devs, saying they are being forced to push out half finished content (for example the discussion around the Intrepid refit). This is while they are permitted to revisit c-store items to add polish to them.
I'm pretty sure they know STO is going to take to long for them to fix, hence why the milking. I can see most of their effort being diverted to CO (which is actually improving more and more) and their next MMO. Actually it already seems to be happening anyway.
Yeah I wouldn't lump all cash shop games together either. I've played some good F2P games without spending a dime in a cash shop. Then subscription + cash shop games like STO, STO is not F2P, might put stuff there but it's mostly cosmetic or things like XP or energy potions, and more importantly the cash shop is not the focus of the game. It all depends on the company and how it manages the game. When your management is making statements like this..
"We are wholeheartedly against the "pay for a permanent advantage" model and our balance designers are dedicated to making sure that items in the C-Store have enough advantage over other in game items long enough to get people to buy them before we re-balance them or put in things that are better. This way we get paid, some get to kick some arse for a while and the rest get to laugh at those that wasted money on such an inferior ship later when better ships are added."
it suggests:
1- our game is really still in development so what we put in the store might give you an advantage now but won't later so buy at your own risk
2- HAHAHA we the developers think you are an idiot because you spend real cash on our stuff that we will later turn into useless junk, spend more dummy HAHAHA
Given the Atari and Cryptic track record on this game, it's probably more 2 than 1. The blatant 'you're just $$$ to us and we think you are funny' attitude is what seems to anger most people about STO. So STO shouldn't really be used to say all cash shop games are bad, it's more like an extreme example of a mismanaged cash shop gone bad.
I think several people here are over-reacting to the cash shop. What's really in there? Some costumes and preorder items? Granted, that one ship is an early opportunity to have a pvp advantage over others, but that will disappear soon enough. I agree that the other equal ships should have been released about the same time, but I don't see this situation as blatant pay to win through the cash shop tactics by Cryptic. I haven't bought anything from the cash shop yet. I will probably buy the original series uniforms when I get around to it, but I don't think that has any real impact on gameplay.
Maybe people are upset that the developers are working on cash shop items over new content. I don't think this is correct. Most cash shop items are simple cosmetic skins or were preorder items that were already developed for the game. They are not far out from season two, and the game has only been out for how long? 6 months if that. I believe that's a reasonable rate of new material. Many people are upset with the state of the game at release (especially Klingons), but I don't think the cash shop has made any significant impact on the rate of development.
What do you get if you ignore the cash shop?
All areas of the game/missions are open to play. No ranks or ship levels are locked away (note I said ship levels not ships, there are certain ships that are for cash shop customers, but ships of equal power/level are available for just a normal subscription). Crafting (albiet weakly implemented) and market options are all available.
If people have a problem with the way the game was designed, that's fine, but I think several people are pinning the blame for every flaw on the cash shop. When I play STO, the cash shop has no part in my enjoyment or frustration with the game. I see cash shops in games with subscriptions as an opportunity to access preorder items, vet rewards or cosmetic skins that might otherwise be unavailable. That's it. They are no big deal. If you don't like them, ignore them. I do for the most part.
Nah it's just the direction this thread went. The cash shop rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, especially STO's early supporters who saw their exclusives dumped into the c-store only weeks after spending hundreds of dollars on the game. Whether you are sympathetic to them or not, a lot of people did pre-order and get LTS for the exclusives thinking they would be exclusive for a long time or at least a year, not just a few weeks. Of course there are still plenty of other reasons to be disappointed with the game; lacking content, worst crafting system ever in an mmo, bad design (spacebar mash fest I had to buy a new keyboard because STO broke mine), buggy ground combat, PvP being a joke, neglected Klingons, awful customer service, total non-Star Trek feel, and on and on... Just my observation the c-store and then Cryptic's obsession with budgets and money broke the camel's back for a lot of people though and that's why people seem to focus on it. Still a feeling of being burned and if there is one thing people will never forget it is when they think you ripped them off.
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
From the last two posts it appears the real problem is not so much the c-store as the lack of content (especially Klingon). We can agree or disagree to what extent the c-store is responsible for this, but only the devs know how much of a time sink the c-store has actually been. As far as people upset about exclusives being available in the c-store, I expected all of that to be available at launch. That's why I didn't buy more than one pre-order. Everyone knew there was going to be a c-store. How could they not expect that stuff to become available rather quickly? As for LTSers, if they bought that only for the exclusives, they were doing it for the wrong reasons anyway. People warned about that in the forums during beta.
As a casual player, lack of content has yet to be an issue with me. I still haven't reached the level cap. I enjoy the combat system in this game. It at least requires a little bit of thought as far as postion or ship outfitting. I find the combat more enjoyable than Eve online or any other auto-target and click ability MMOs. I like the power allocation and shield facings in space and flanking bonuses on the ground. Some of the story missions are pretty good for a Star Trek fan. I like having bridge officers and being able to develope them alongside my main character. They are the best pets I have seen in any MMO. Is the game as good as it could be? No. However, I have yet to encounter an MMO that has had rave reviews about how much content was available from launch. AoC and Champions also were critisized for the states of their games at launch; however, both of those games appear to be getting better with time (especially AoC after the latest expansion). I expect STO will be gradually better as well. I hope they add Klingon content (I have yet to roll a Klingon due to how horrible their content is supposed to be), and I hope they revamp crafting (wasn't the discovery or development of new materials/technologies part of Star Trek?).
I would advise any MMO gamer who expects a high level of polish and content to wait for any MMO to have at least a year of live play before giving it a shot. Otherwise, they will probably be disappointed. Prediction: 6 months after release, the SWToR forums will have people complaining about the lack of content for that game. Let's just hope they don't have a microtransaction store
People willing to accept that is going to run this genre straight into the ground.
How about people hold these companies that decide they're going to rip consumers off, and essentially trick them to pay for 3/4 of a game's development before it's developed (without any return on their investment by the way), responsible? How about just don't give them any more fricken money once it's seen how little they did BEFORE releasing the game, since that is the only way these shoddy and shady companies can be held in check, and held up to some basic standard.
What defines enough content for a game to be released, and how much more would that cost in time and money? Can you name an MMO from the past several years that launched with enough features and content to satisfy every player? I can't. The more established games that have all of the bells, whistles and content didn't launch in that state. These games take tremendous amounts of time and money to implement. Most companies would never be able to carry the development costs to cover everything most players seem to want these days. They are economically forced to launch what they feel will be enough material to satisfy average players and hope to recoup enough of their initial investment to expand the core game. Is it a perfect system? No, but it keeps the genre alive. This applies to all MMOs and studios, not just STO and Cryptic.
The bottom line is that you are free to spend your money how you choose. If you don't like the state MMOs are being launched in, then aviod trying out recently released MMOs. Frankly, these games are an extremely cheap form of entertainment. I can't hardly take my wife to a movie for under $30 (the cost of two subscriptions to a typical MMO for a month), and that entertainment wont last more than 3 hours, tops. Forget talking about going to dinner, clubs, casinos, sporting events or other live performances. Golf, bowling, or playing pool regularly will set you back far more than $15 per month. How far would $15/month get you into a car or motorcycle hobby? If I can enjoy an MMO for 10-20 hours a month, it is an absolute bargain for my entertainment dollar. I feel sorry for people who feel ripped off if they can't experience new content while playing a game 20+ hours a week. I believe they are simply asking for too much from a newly released MMO. Thus, I stick to my advice: If you want to play a fully developed MMO with tons of features and content, don't play any MMO that has been live for less than a year.
See that's the same cappola that Cryptic shills have been spreading since just before release, and the thing is it's utterly false. Most games do in fact release with enough content to satisify most players. Sure in the last few years since WoW's release we've seen a couple that simply haven't, like AoC for instance, but for the most part they have. Now Cryptic, and those foolish enough to support them, are trying to change the rules by BSing through their fricken teeth.
I don't care what it costs them to develop the game to a decent release state. I'm not supposed to care. They chose to develop the game. It's their responsibilty to budget for enough money and development time to get it done. It's not my responsibilty to pay them to develop the game.
All of a sudden now we're supposed to feel sorry for these companies that bight off more than they can chew? Or in Cryptic's case, feel sorry for a company that just decides to come up with a business plan that involves bilking tens of thousands of people out of their money?
You think it's fine to make the choice to go ahead and pay them to finish their game, but what you're in fact doing is contributing to them turning potential mmo fans off of mmos. That majority of people that don't follow the game's every twist and turn in development, don't do the CB and OB phases, and just buy the game because it sounds interesting. Sure you can spout off all you want about how it's their responsibilty to do some research, but why should they have to? Why shouldn't they be able to expect that there's going to be a whole game there for them to play instead of a couple of weeks worth? The answer is they should be able to expect that, and when they don't get it, they get a bit angry for wasting their hard earned money, and a lot of them just say screw mmos. Ya, companies like Cryptic are real good for the genre allright. They're a fricken blight on it is more like. A parasitic entity.
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
People that pay for crappy games, only encourage more crappy games.
First off, that argument about satisfying every customer is a copout; we all know full well that you cannot satisfy every human, no matter what we talk about. What you can do is satisfy the majority of people your product is targetting. As to your first question, I find it humorous that there were MMOs launched even in the last few years that did indeed have enough content to satisfy most MMO players. AoC, for all of its problems and the content gap around level 40-50, did indeed have far more content than the 80 hours Cryptic stated STO would had. When you create an MMO that has the same or less amount of playtime than single player games, then there's definately a distinct lack of content.
Let's look at Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, a fairly recently released game that had a very troubled launch: Vanguard at launch had a few hundred hours of gameplay at launch; there were multiple starting areas on three different continents and just levelling one race up would present you with more content than STO has, not to mention the crafting and diplomacy aspects Vanguard had (both of which were nearly games in their own right). Oh yeah, Vanguard also had an endgame at launch as well; sure it was buggy and/or pointless at launch, but it did give additional things to do.
The truth of the matter is, where 'enough' content is concerned, you are in the minority when it comes to MMO gamers (the ultra-casual crowd). Most players average about 4-6 hours per game session. A newly released MMO should have enough content to keep the average MMO player playing for at least two months, so that the company can at least get one month's subscription out of the customer. When people are reaching the end of your game (and for the first couple of weeks, STO indeed did have an end since they hadn't implemented any endgame content other than the lackluster PvP) within a couple weeks, with people reaching the level cap within three days, there is a serious problem with the amount of content that game has.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
A few points for the last three posts:
I am no one's shill. I don't work in the video game industry and am no one's spokesperson.
I asked for examples of recent MMOs. IMO WoW, Everquest and LoTRO are previous gen MMOs. I'm pretty sure they've been out for 5 years or more.
Recent MMOs that have been lambasted for being incomplete or bad product: Spellborne, DDO, Auto Assault, Warhammer, Hellgate:London, & yes, Vanguard. For Vanguard, what's the point of having content if the game is unplayable? Large numbers of bugs are at least as bad if not worse than lack of content. It's an incomplete game.
I cited AoC and CO because I either played or knew several people who played them. Both games, like Vanguard, were slammed out of the gate; however, both of them, like Vanguard, have improved pretty significantly. How long have they been live? A year or two. That's part of why I say wait until an MMO has been live a year or more before trying it if you play them for lots of hours.
"Finish their game" Hagonbok? MMOs are in constant development. They aren't really "finished" until the devs decide it's time to prepare to shut down the servers.
The exclusives stuff is a matter of opinion. I already said that I expected them to become available. The exclusives didn't cost anything extra when bought with a new copy of the game. Later players will have to pay extra to join the club of people with the "exclusives." Besides, I doubt anyone decided to stick with or quit a game based on their exclusives. I don't think Cryptic was dishonest in this area. You disagree with me there.
If you are skating through combat without difficulty, I would suggest increasing the mission difficulty feature. The game is "easy" by default, but there are two more difficulty levels available above that.
In an ideal world, every MMO released would be complete, and they would never need to tweak or expand anything. I just don't think that will ever happen. Everyone is entitled to their opinions about what is enough content, features or bug-free play to make a good game. In the past several years, one of two things have happened: Either players demand too much or developers across the MMO board are failing to deliver good product. All I know is that I enjoy STO more than EvE (18 months played), WoW (1 month played), AoC (1 month played), or DDO (1 week played). I'm burned out on CoH (4 years), and this is my current MMO. I will play it as long as I enjoy it, and I don't feel ripped off in the least.
Hello, you're on a mmo centric site. When we that play mmos say "finished" it's a given we know that mmos continue to expand, but we talk about having at least a bare minimum of content to keep players occupied for more than a couple of weeks, and most if not all glaring bugs fixed. Finished means release ready. STO wasn't, and still isn't, release ready.
What some are trying to get through to you, or at least I am, is that even though you don't feel ripped off, the vast majority did and still do. I mean hundreds of thousands of people if we're to believe their initial reports of boxes sold and then the sorry state of their population just one short month after release. So with you not feeling ripped off and continuing to support Cryptic and that game, you're supporting a company that's ripped a lot of people off, and is still doing so. Not only that, you're possibly contributing to the perception being given to other companies that pulling off the crap that Cryptic did is worthwhile doing.
That's the damage you're doing supporting that game. We as mmo gamers have no other way to "police" these companies other than via our wallets and warning others off of bad games, but when too many people are willing to just accept substandard as the norm these companies will just keep pumping the crap out.
IF THE ONLY DEFENCE FOR CRITICISM OF A GAME IS CALLING SOMEONE A TROLL OR HATER, THAT SAYS A LOT ABOUT THE QUALITY OF THE GAME
I love capitalism. It has a wonderful way of weeding out companies that fail to produce marketable products. As you stated, we vote with our wallets. If enough people support and enjoy games you consider "substandard", then you will probably face a lot of disappointment going forward. I have tried many games and products that I did not like. I don't begrudge other people enjoying them. If STO ends up going the way of several other MMOs with sparse populations or shut down servers, so be it. The players would have spoken.
Thank you for the luck, Raistalin. I hope you find a more suitable game to play.
It is interesting how much the MMO genre has changed. We used to get full featured games, at a decent price and basic subscription. Games like DAOC and Vanguard have giant areas, and multiple areas per level, along with a large selection of different classes, skills, etc. It was all expected to be in the game.
We now have a game like STO, that is based on a gigantic IP franchise. According to the old standards, we should expect both Klingon and Federation areas to be large, with several areas per level, and lots of gameplay choices (skills, etc). There should be 2-3 different paths for Klingon and 2-3 for Federation.
So STO was released when it was about 1/2 done. They still charged full price for it, and a full price subscription. And now they want to charge extra for new stuff.
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2025: 48 years on the Net.
You're either not getting it, or just pretending to be obtuse to carry on your argument.
People start to accept substandard products when they don't know any better. Like yourself. Your belief that most games lack content and polish when released clearly shows that to anyone that DOES actually have a history of playing many of these games. It's the not taking good advice that's freely given that is exactly the problem. From what we can surmise from the info Cryptic themselves have let out, hundreds of housands of people didn't find the product acceptable at release and still don't, while only a fraction did and still do. Sorry, that's not a matter of taste going on there, that's people trying to tell you somethinig. Every 9 out of 10 people posting in this section talking about what a ripoff the game was at release, and still is, is people trying to tell you something. If people would just stop giving Cryptic money then that would not only teach them a lesson for the next game they try and make, but it would teach other companies thinking of trying to pull the same shannanigans the same lesson as well.