Well, the "against it" crowd has made all the good arguments and I agree with those.
1) Vanity items do matter, as proven by player's desire to have them.
Cosmetic items do matter to some portion of the audience, yes - that's not necessarily an argument against cash shops with vanity items, but premise accepted.
2) Can and almost certainly will lead to suits adding sales of items that matter mechanically in the game.
This is a fallacy. It is possible, but you have no evidence to logically suggest it is probable with any given game.
3) Overpriced rippoffs
That's a separate issue - what if they were fairly priced in the next cash shop? They'll charge what people are willing to pay.
The statement "They'll charge what people are willing to pay." is, in my opinion, very vague. Do you mean "They'll charge what at least a few people are willing to pay. ", "They'll charge what a majority of the people are willing to pay.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 1 year.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 5 years.", "They'll charge what they think will give them a high-end profit during 1 year." or something else? You are asking other people to argue in a more proper manner, yet you, at least once in this thread, use very poor argumentation in form of vague statements.
I'm happy to clarify: by my statement about charging what people are willing to pay, I meant they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve them the highest total revenue (that means in the long run) - I thought that was implied by my other statements. I don't believe that was too vague, but all anyone had to do was ask and I'd provide an explanation - I don't see how that's poor argumentation, just another facet of argumentation in general.
4) Boosts the profit structure, boosting stock values, boosting suit's stock options, meaning it's done for greed over good game design.
A lot of factors can do these things. Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit. Greed does not equate unless higher-ups are laundering money from their own companies. That's not what's best for the firm, however. Doing what customers demand most is what's best for the firm. If good game design is what's demanded most (which it may or may not actually be) then that's what the firm will try to accomplish.
You state that the most important goal of any firm is to maximize profit. Therefore, it is sufficient to find at least one firm where the most important goal is not to maximize profit, in order to prove you wrong in that case.
First of all we need to clarify what is meant with "firm" in the phrase "goal of any firm". If we assume that it either means "leadership of the firm" or "owners of the firm", then I can inform you that a such goal is not the main one in several firms owned by the government in several countries; their main goal is instead to deliver as good service as possible for those that use their service.
Heck, I can even link you to privately owned firms whose main goal is to create as "good" highschool as possible for the students.
I was using the term "firm" in the economic sense - as in a privately owned for-profit business competing in a capitalist economy without special advantages such as monopoly or collusion. I think that was pretty clear considering the subject is a decision a game publishing firm will make. That's a basic rule of capitalist economics - you can take it up with an econ professor or economist if you want to argue the point.
"Doing what costumers demand is what's best for the firm" implies that doing what costumers demands is always best for any firm at any given situation. However, in several occassions, doing what the costumers subcounciously would appriciate without them demanding it, can be far better from a profit perspective.
There are also scenarios where the owners have a vision which contradicts what most costumers are demanding. In such cases, it is hard to judge what would be "best" for the "firm".
This point does warrant some clarification on my part: by "what consumers demand" I didn't make a distinction between what they actually ask for and what they subconsciously want. I was actually referring to what they really want, whether they say it or not. I agree that it can be difficult to tell.
5) Devalues in-game play, especially in achieving said vanity items.
If they offer different items that can't be attained in game, or anything similar to them, then the gameplay would not be devalued, right?
Similarity comes in different degrees; for instance, any mount is similar to any other mount in the sense that they are both units in the category known as "mounts", but they might not be similar in the sense that they have the same size; therefore, the statement "anything similar to them" is vague.
Furthermore, there are scenarios where a new product shares some similiraties with an old one in such way that the affection for the old one diminishes, once the new one is introduced.
I defined what I meant by a purely cosmetic item earlier in the thread. Someone used the example of the celestial steed mount from WoW which they sell in a cash shop and claimed it devalues mounts that can be attained in raids. It's not similar enough to be sought after equally though. It has a somewhat similar shape than 1 mount you can get in a raid (similar in the way that it's supposed to resemble the form of a horse vaguely), but completely different in texture and animations - factors which make a big difference in how the item is valued compared to others. Furthermore, in my experience, the desire for the similar mount from raids has not diminished at all - since it's seen as a symbol of achievement, and not a symbol of having money to blow in the cash shop.
6) Matters to some of the players, therefore the idea of cash shops is meaningful whether some of the other players don't care or not.
Again, I have no qualms with that - but like I said, simply assigning the items meaning has nothing to do with whether there should or should not be cash shops.
"Should" and "should not" are words used exclusively to describe opinions.
There is one more issue that I haven't seen mentioned. Cash shops offer RMT type players another venue to buy for real cash and then sell in-game for game money. Some use this to boost their in-game success (which isn't earned through game play), and others use this to sell the cash shop items for more than "street value" and turn around and sell the "gold" for more than they originally paid for the item. This has the secondary effect of inflating prices in game, making those with less gold less competitive inside the game. And this has a tertiary effect that forces players to do likewise even if they don't like it, if they want to be competitive in the game's economic perspective, and what that can buy for in-game power.
That has been mentioned - I was arguing with another poster about it. This is solved simply by the dev making their cash shop items Bind on Account.
very nice sum up hehe. also Id want to know why in the world would ppl defend it?
To clarfiy - I don't care whether or not the game I play has a cash shop selling vanity items. I am, however, upset when people use logical fallacies to defend their position. Both sides of the argument are doing it - but I've seen the same ones repeated consistently on the "against" side, so people apparently believe their arguments are logically valid and sound when, in fact, they are not. If this doesn't convince someone to see the errors in reasoning being made, then I don't know what else to say. I'll leave it be.
In a similar manner, I ask you to stop writing vague statements when you argue. I will also ask you to refrain from posting false statements.
I'm sorry that my post did not seem clear to you, but most of what you call vague was strongly implied. Even if I was vague - being ambiguous in certain wording (that does not commit any fallacy) is not the same as committing those fallacies.
Well, the "against it" crowd has made all the good arguments and I agree with those.
1) Vanity items do matter, as proven by player's desire to have them.
Cosmetic items do matter to some portion of the audience, yes - that's not necessarily an argument against cash shops with vanity items, but premise accepted.
2) Can and almost certainly will lead to suits adding sales of items that matter mechanically in the game.
This is a fallacy. It is possible, but you have no evidence to logically suggest it is probable with any given game.
3) Overpriced rippoffs
That's a separate issue - what if they were fairly priced in the next cash shop? They'll charge what people are willing to pay.
The statement "They'll charge what people are willing to pay." is, in my opinion, very vague. Do you mean "They'll charge what at least a few people are willing to pay. ", "They'll charge what a majority of the people are willing to pay.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 1 year.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 5 years.", "They'll charge what they think will give them a high-end profit during 1 year." or something else? You are asking other people to argue in a more proper manner, yet you, at least once in this thread, use very poor argumentation in form of vague statements.
I'm happy to clarify: by my statement about charging what people are willing to pay, I meant they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve them the highest total revenue (that means in the long run) - I thought that was implied by my other statements. I don't believe that was too vague, but all anyone had to do was ask and I'd provide an explanation - I don't see how that's poor argumentation, just another facet of argumentation in general.
If that's what you implied, then I can be even more nitpicky by pointing out that they will almost never charge precisely what will achieve them the highest total revenue. Those analyzing the situation can only give their estimations and hope they were accurate enough to please their superiors and themselves. It is not difficult to imagine situations where optimizing the income to perfection, is not the main goal for those analyzing the impact of setting the prices; their main objective can be to just get income that is "good enough".
It is poor argumentation in the sense that you use terms and phrases that require preknowledge about your style of writing and personal view on context instead of letting the facts and logic themselves do the full argumentation.
For instance, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false due to complexity and non-neglictable inpredictability of economic systems. However, I am guessing you meant "they will charge whatever the balance is that THEY THINK will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)"; nonetheless, while your implication might be correct in most cases, your actual written statement was wrong in all cases. In a better argumentation, your written statement would not be 100% wrong.
4) Boosts the profit structure, boosting stock values, boosting suit's stock options, meaning it's done for greed over good game design.
A lot of factors can do these things. Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit. Greed does not equate unless higher-ups are laundering money from their own companies. That's not what's best for the firm, however. Doing what customers demand most is what's best for the firm. If good game design is what's demanded most (which it may or may not actually be) then that's what the firm will try to accomplish.
You state that the most important goal of any firm is to maximize profit. Therefore, it is sufficient to find at least one firm where the most important goal is not to maximize profit, in order to prove you wrong in that case.
First of all we need to clarify what is meant with "firm" in the phrase "goal of any firm". If we assume that it either means "leadership of the firm" or "owners of the firm", then I can inform you that a such goal is not the main one in several firms owned by the government in several countries; their main goal is instead to deliver as good service as possible for those that use their service.
Heck, I can even link you to privately owned firms whose main goal is to create as "good" highschool as possible for the students.
I was using the term "firm" in the economic sense - as in a privately owned for-profit business competing in a capitalist economy without special advantages such as monopoly or collusion. I think that was pretty clear considering the subject is a decision a game publishing firm will make. That's a basic rule of capitalist economics - you can take it up with an econ professor or economist if you want to argue the point.
"Firm" is then a word that has different meaning in general compared to how it is used in capitalist economics. Another example is the word "theory", which is equivalent to "guess" in general language, but requires a lot of scientific evidence when used in a context where natural sciences is predominant.
While "firm" in a capitalistic economic sense, in which the absolutely dominant goal is to maximize profit, might be the most common form of game publishing "firms" in a general sense, you can't be sure that every gaming firm (in general sense) works that way without further investigation. The result of such investigation is far from obvious and would therefore have to be refered to obtain "high" credibility .
SquareEnix is a company that has given the impression that visions, not necessarily the most profitable visions, are important when making decisions. That is just my impression formed by following them over the years. For instance, implementing swimming and jumping in FF XIV would yield at least a small increase in potential costumerbase based on the reactions in different forums, in which some miss them and most don't care about those features.
A main point is though, that if we were a forum for econonomic science students, it would be far easier for people to know the exact context. In a forum where the more general meaning of the word "firm" is used, a clarificition of context is required for a better argumentation. Otherwise it is just a vague statement and such are not prefered in "good" argumentation.
"Doing what costumers demand is what's best for the firm" implies that doing what costumers demands is always best for any firm at any given situation. However, in several occassions, doing what the costumers subcounciously would appriciate without them demanding it, can be far better from a profit perspective.
There are also scenarios where the owners have a vision which contradicts what most costumers are demanding. In such cases, it is hard to judge what would be "best" for the "firm".
This point does warrant some clarification on my part: by "what consumers demand" I didn't make a distinction between what they actually ask for and what they subconsciously want. I was actually referring to what they really want, whether they say it or not. I agree that it can be difficult to tell.
5) Devalues in-game play, especially in achieving said vanity items.
If they offer different items that can't be attained in game, or anything similar to them, then the gameplay would not be devalued, right?
Similarity comes in different degrees; for instance, any mount is similar to any other mount in the sense that they are both units in the category known as "mounts", but they might not be similar in the sense that they have the same size; therefore, the statement "anything similar to them" is vague.
Furthermore, there are scenarios where a new product shares some similiraties with an old one in such way that the affection for the old one diminishes, once the new one is introduced.
I defined what I meant by a purely cosmetic item earlier in the thread. Someone used the example of the celestial steed mount from WoW which they sell in a cash shop and claimed it devalues mounts that can be attained in raids. It's not similar enough to be sought after equally though. It has a somewhat similar shape than 1 mount you can get in a raid (similar in the way that it's supposed to resemble the form of a horse vaguely), but completely different in texture and animations - factors which make a big difference in how the item is valued compared to others. Furthermore, in my experience, the desire for the similar mount from raids has not diminished at all - since it's seen as a symbol of achievement, and not a symbol of having money to blow in the cash shop.
The practical implications of a lack of desire might be not notable, but that does not mean that desire itself has not been decreased. People can feel less inclined to do something, but not badly enough to stop them from doing it. The decline is certainly strong enough for some people to complain about it in forums.
6) Matters to some of the players, therefore the idea of cash shops is meaningful whether some of the other players don't care or not.
Again, I have no qualms with that - but like I said, simply assigning the items meaning has nothing to do with whether there should or should not be cash shops.
"Should" and "should not" are words used exclusively to describe opinions.
There is one more issue that I haven't seen mentioned. Cash shops offer RMT type players another venue to buy for real cash and then sell in-game for game money. Some use this to boost their in-game success (which isn't earned through game play), and others use this to sell the cash shop items for more than "street value" and turn around and sell the "gold" for more than they originally paid for the item. This has the secondary effect of inflating prices in game, making those with less gold less competitive inside the game. And this has a tertiary effect that forces players to do likewise even if they don't like it, if they want to be competitive in the game's economic perspective, and what that can buy for in-game power.
That has been mentioned - I was arguing with another poster about it. This is solved simply by the dev making their cash shop items Bind on Account.
very nice sum up hehe. also Id want to know why in the world would ppl defend it?
To clarfiy - I don't care whether or not the game I play has a cash shop selling vanity items. I am, however, upset when people use logical fallacies to defend their position. Both sides of the argument are doing it - but I've seen the same ones repeated consistently on the "against" side, so people apparently believe their arguments are logically valid and sound when, in fact, they are not. If this doesn't convince someone to see the errors in reasoning being made, then I don't know what else to say. I'll leave it be.
In a similar manner, I ask you to stop writing vague statements when you argue. I will also ask you to refrain from posting false statements.
I'm sorry that my post did not seem clear to you, but most of what you call vague was strongly implied. Even if I was vague - being ambiguous in certain wording (that does not commit any fallacy) is not the same as committing those fallacies.
Where did I post any false statement?
"Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit" is a false statement if the general definition of the word "firm" is used. However, since you explained your context, then it just becomes a matter of a vague statement.
However, in your reply, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false in absolutely almost all cases, like I explained above.
Well, the "against it" crowd has made all the good arguments and I agree with those.
1) Vanity items do matter, as proven by player's desire to have them.
Cosmetic items do matter to some portion of the audience, yes - that's not necessarily an argument against cash shops with vanity items, but premise accepted.
2) Can and almost certainly will lead to suits adding sales of items that matter mechanically in the game.
This is a fallacy. It is possible, but you have no evidence to logically suggest it is probable with any given game.
3) Overpriced rippoffs
That's a separate issue - what if they were fairly priced in the next cash shop? They'll charge what people are willing to pay.
The statement "They'll charge what people are willing to pay." is, in my opinion, very vague. Do you mean "They'll charge what at least a few people are willing to pay. ", "They'll charge what a majority of the people are willing to pay.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 1 year.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 5 years.", "They'll charge what they think will give them a high-end profit during 1 year." or something else? You are asking other people to argue in a more proper manner, yet you, at least once in this thread, use very poor argumentation in form of vague statements.
I'm happy to clarify: by my statement about charging what people are willing to pay, I meant they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve them the highest total revenue (that means in the long run) - I thought that was implied by my other statements. I don't believe that was too vague, but all anyone had to do was ask and I'd provide an explanation - I don't see how that's poor argumentation, just another facet of argumentation in general.
If that's what you implied, then I can be even more nitpicky by pointing out that they will almost never charge precisely what will achieve them the highest total revenue. Those analyzing the situation can only give their estimations and hope they were accurate enough to please their superiors and themselves. It is not difficult to imagine situations where optimizing the income to perfection, is not the main goal for those analyzing the impact of setting the prices; their main objective can be to just get income that is "good enough".
It is poor argumentation in the sense that you use terms and phrases that require preknowledge about your style of writing and personal view on context instead of letting the facts and logic themselves do the full argumentation.
For instance, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false due to complexity and non-neglictable inpredictability of economic systems. However, I am guessing you meant "they will charge whatever the balance is that THEY THINK will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)"; nonetheless, while your implication might be correct in most cases, your actual written statement was wrong in all cases. In a better argumentation, your written statement would not be 100% wrong.
4) Boosts the profit structure, boosting stock values, boosting suit's stock options, meaning it's done for greed over good game design.
A lot of factors can do these things. Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit. Greed does not equate unless higher-ups are laundering money from their own companies. That's not what's best for the firm, however. Doing what customers demand most is what's best for the firm. If good game design is what's demanded most (which it may or may not actually be) then that's what the firm will try to accomplish.
You state that the most important goal of any firm is to maximize profit. Therefore, it is sufficient to find at least one firm where the most important goal is not to maximize profit, in order to prove you wrong in that case.
First of all we need to clarify what is meant with "firm" in the phrase "goal of any firm". If we assume that it either means "leadership of the firm" or "owners of the firm", then I can inform you that a such goal is not the main one in several firms owned by the government in several countries; their main goal is instead to deliver as good service as possible for those that use their service.
Heck, I can even link you to privately owned firms whose main goal is to create as "good" highschool as possible for the students.
I was using the term "firm" in the economic sense - as in a privately owned for-profit business competing in a capitalist economy without special advantages such as monopoly or collusion. I think that was pretty clear considering the subject is a decision a game publishing firm will make. That's a basic rule of capitalist economics - you can take it up with an econ professor or economist if you want to argue the point.
"Firm" is then a word that has different meaning in general compared to how it is used in capitalist economics. Another example is the word "theory", which is equivalent to "guess" in general language, but requires a lot of scientific evidence when used in a context where natural sciences is predominant.
While "firm" in a capitalistic economic sense, in which the absolutely dominant goal is to maximize profit, might be the most common form of game publishing "firms" in a general sense, you can't be sure that every gaming firm (in general sense) works that way without further investigation. The result of such investigation is far from obvious and would therefore have to be refered to obtain "high" credibility .
SquareEnix is a company that has given the impression that visions, not necessarily the most profitable visions, are important when making decisions. That is just my impression formed by following them over the years. For instance, implementing swimming and jumping in FF XIV would yield at least a small increase in potential costumerbase based on the reactions in different forums, in which some miss them and most don't care about those features.
A main point is though, that if we were a forum for econonomic science students, it would be far easier for people to know the exact context. In a forum where the more general meaning of the word "firm" is used, a clarificition of context is required for a better argumentation. Otherwise it is just a vague statement and such are not prefered in "good" argumentation.
"Doing what costumers demand is what's best for the firm" implies that doing what costumers demands is always best for any firm at any given situation. However, in several occassions, doing what the costumers subcounciously would appriciate without them demanding it, can be far better from a profit perspective.
There are also scenarios where the owners have a vision which contradicts what most costumers are demanding. In such cases, it is hard to judge what would be "best" for the "firm".
This point does warrant some clarification on my part: by "what consumers demand" I didn't make a distinction between what they actually ask for and what they subconsciously want. I was actually referring to what they really want, whether they say it or not. I agree that it can be difficult to tell.
5) Devalues in-game play, especially in achieving said vanity items.
If they offer different items that can't be attained in game, or anything similar to them, then the gameplay would not be devalued, right?
Similarity comes in different degrees; for instance, any mount is similar to any other mount in the sense that they are both units in the category known as "mounts", but they might not be similar in the sense that they have the same size; therefore, the statement "anything similar to them" is vague.
Furthermore, there are scenarios where a new product shares some similiraties with an old one in such way that the affection for the old one diminishes, once the new one is introduced.
I defined what I meant by a purely cosmetic item earlier in the thread. Someone used the example of the celestial steed mount from WoW which they sell in a cash shop and claimed it devalues mounts that can be attained in raids. It's not similar enough to be sought after equally though. It has a somewhat similar shape than 1 mount you can get in a raid (similar in the way that it's supposed to resemble the form of a horse vaguely), but completely different in texture and animations - factors which make a big difference in how the item is valued compared to others. Furthermore, in my experience, the desire for the similar mount from raids has not diminished at all - since it's seen as a symbol of achievement, and not a symbol of having money to blow in the cash shop.
The practical implications of a lack of desire might be not notable, but that does not mean that desire itself has not been decreased. People can feel less inclined to do something, but not badly enough to stop them from doing it. The decline is certainly strong enough for some people to complain about it in forums.
6) Matters to some of the players, therefore the idea of cash shops is meaningful whether some of the other players don't care or not.
Again, I have no qualms with that - but like I said, simply assigning the items meaning has nothing to do with whether there should or should not be cash shops.
"Should" and "should not" are words used exclusively to describe opinions.
There is one more issue that I haven't seen mentioned. Cash shops offer RMT type players another venue to buy for real cash and then sell in-game for game money. Some use this to boost their in-game success (which isn't earned through game play), and others use this to sell the cash shop items for more than "street value" and turn around and sell the "gold" for more than they originally paid for the item. This has the secondary effect of inflating prices in game, making those with less gold less competitive inside the game. And this has a tertiary effect that forces players to do likewise even if they don't like it, if they want to be competitive in the game's economic perspective, and what that can buy for in-game power.
That has been mentioned - I was arguing with another poster about it. This is solved simply by the dev making their cash shop items Bind on Account.
very nice sum up hehe. also Id want to know why in the world would ppl defend it?
To clarfiy - I don't care whether or not the game I play has a cash shop selling vanity items. I am, however, upset when people use logical fallacies to defend their position. Both sides of the argument are doing it - but I've seen the same ones repeated consistently on the "against" side, so people apparently believe their arguments are logically valid and sound when, in fact, they are not. If this doesn't convince someone to see the errors in reasoning being made, then I don't know what else to say. I'll leave it be.
In a similar manner, I ask you to stop writing vague statements when you argue. I will also ask you to refrain from posting false statements.
I'm sorry that my post did not seem clear to you, but most of what you call vague was strongly implied. Even if I was vague - being ambiguous in certain wording (that does not commit any fallacy) is not the same as committing those fallacies.
Where did I post any false statement?
"Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit" is a false statement if the general definition of the word "firm" is used. However, since you explained your context, then it just becomes a matter of a vague statement.
However, in your reply, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false in absolutely almost all cases, like I explained above.
At this point you are just splitting hairs - and none of this is relevant to the discussion at hand. I've made my points logically, shown my reasoning (many times in this thread, in fact) and I'm not obligated to give full denotative definitions for each word I use.
I expect my fellow forum users to read between the lines to a certain degree, or look up terms they may be unfamiliar with. I even link the definitions each time I call someone out on a fallacy that I believe they have not heard of. I don't bother to give exhaustive definitions of words, that have limited possible meanings within the scope of the current discussion. All anyone ever had to do if they were confused about how I worded something, or what I really meant, was ask. If someone needs clarification, that doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on my argumentation skills. Perhaps my overall communication skills, but it does not effect my logic.
Now if you're through badgering me on semantics that are irrelevant to the original topic, I'd like to retire from this particular discussion.
Well, the "against it" crowd has made all the good arguments and I agree with those.
1) Vanity items do matter, as proven by player's desire to have them.
Cosmetic items do matter to some portion of the audience, yes - that's not necessarily an argument against cash shops with vanity items, but premise accepted.
2) Can and almost certainly will lead to suits adding sales of items that matter mechanically in the game.
This is a fallacy. It is possible, but you have no evidence to logically suggest it is probable with any given game.
3) Overpriced rippoffs
That's a separate issue - what if they were fairly priced in the next cash shop? They'll charge what people are willing to pay.
The statement "They'll charge what people are willing to pay." is, in my opinion, very vague. Do you mean "They'll charge what at least a few people are willing to pay. ", "They'll charge what a majority of the people are willing to pay.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 1 year.", "They'll charge in such way that they maximize their profit during 5 years.", "They'll charge what they think will give them a high-end profit during 1 year." or something else? You are asking other people to argue in a more proper manner, yet you, at least once in this thread, use very poor argumentation in form of vague statements.
I'm happy to clarify: by my statement about charging what people are willing to pay, I meant they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve them the highest total revenue (that means in the long run) - I thought that was implied by my other statements. I don't believe that was too vague, but all anyone had to do was ask and I'd provide an explanation - I don't see how that's poor argumentation, just another facet of argumentation in general.
If that's what you implied, then I can be even more nitpicky by pointing out that they will almost never charge precisely what will achieve them the highest total revenue. Those analyzing the situation can only give their estimations and hope they were accurate enough to please their superiors and themselves. It is not difficult to imagine situations where optimizing the income to perfection, is not the main goal for those analyzing the impact of setting the prices; their main objective can be to just get income that is "good enough".
It is poor argumentation in the sense that you use terms and phrases that require preknowledge about your style of writing and personal view on context instead of letting the facts and logic themselves do the full argumentation.
For instance, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false due to complexity and non-neglictable inpredictability of economic systems. However, I am guessing you meant "they will charge whatever the balance is that THEY THINK will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)"; nonetheless, while your implication might be correct in most cases, your actual written statement was wrong in all cases. In a better argumentation, your written statement would not be 100% wrong.
4) Boosts the profit structure, boosting stock values, boosting suit's stock options, meaning it's done for greed over good game design.
A lot of factors can do these things. Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit. Greed does not equate unless higher-ups are laundering money from their own companies. That's not what's best for the firm, however. Doing what customers demand most is what's best for the firm. If good game design is what's demanded most (which it may or may not actually be) then that's what the firm will try to accomplish.
You state that the most important goal of any firm is to maximize profit. Therefore, it is sufficient to find at least one firm where the most important goal is not to maximize profit, in order to prove you wrong in that case.
First of all we need to clarify what is meant with "firm" in the phrase "goal of any firm". If we assume that it either means "leadership of the firm" or "owners of the firm", then I can inform you that a such goal is not the main one in several firms owned by the government in several countries; their main goal is instead to deliver as good service as possible for those that use their service.
Heck, I can even link you to privately owned firms whose main goal is to create as "good" highschool as possible for the students.
I was using the term "firm" in the economic sense - as in a privately owned for-profit business competing in a capitalist economy without special advantages such as monopoly or collusion. I think that was pretty clear considering the subject is a decision a game publishing firm will make. That's a basic rule of capitalist economics - you can take it up with an econ professor or economist if you want to argue the point.
"Firm" is then a word that has different meaning in general compared to how it is used in capitalist economics. Another example is the word "theory", which is equivalent to "guess" in general language, but requires a lot of scientific evidence when used in a context where natural sciences is predominant.
While "firm" in a capitalistic economic sense, in which the absolutely dominant goal is to maximize profit, might be the most common form of game publishing "firms" in a general sense, you can't be sure that every gaming firm (in general sense) works that way without further investigation. The result of such investigation is far from obvious and would therefore have to be refered to obtain "high" credibility .
SquareEnix is a company that has given the impression that visions, not necessarily the most profitable visions, are important when making decisions. That is just my impression formed by following them over the years. For instance, implementing swimming and jumping in FF XIV would yield at least a small increase in potential costumerbase based on the reactions in different forums, in which some miss them and most don't care about those features.
A main point is though, that if we were a forum for econonomic science students, it would be far easier for people to know the exact context. In a forum where the more general meaning of the word "firm" is used, a clarificition of context is required for a better argumentation. Otherwise it is just a vague statement and such are not prefered in "good" argumentation.
"Doing what costumers demand is what's best for the firm" implies that doing what costumers demands is always best for any firm at any given situation. However, in several occassions, doing what the costumers subcounciously would appriciate without them demanding it, can be far better from a profit perspective.
There are also scenarios where the owners have a vision which contradicts what most costumers are demanding. In such cases, it is hard to judge what would be "best" for the "firm".
This point does warrant some clarification on my part: by "what consumers demand" I didn't make a distinction between what they actually ask for and what they subconsciously want. I was actually referring to what they really want, whether they say it or not. I agree that it can be difficult to tell.
5) Devalues in-game play, especially in achieving said vanity items.
If they offer different items that can't be attained in game, or anything similar to them, then the gameplay would not be devalued, right?
Similarity comes in different degrees; for instance, any mount is similar to any other mount in the sense that they are both units in the category known as "mounts", but they might not be similar in the sense that they have the same size; therefore, the statement "anything similar to them" is vague.
Furthermore, there are scenarios where a new product shares some similiraties with an old one in such way that the affection for the old one diminishes, once the new one is introduced.
I defined what I meant by a purely cosmetic item earlier in the thread. Someone used the example of the celestial steed mount from WoW which they sell in a cash shop and claimed it devalues mounts that can be attained in raids. It's not similar enough to be sought after equally though. It has a somewhat similar shape than 1 mount you can get in a raid (similar in the way that it's supposed to resemble the form of a horse vaguely), but completely different in texture and animations - factors which make a big difference in how the item is valued compared to others. Furthermore, in my experience, the desire for the similar mount from raids has not diminished at all - since it's seen as a symbol of achievement, and not a symbol of having money to blow in the cash shop.
The practical implications of a lack of desire might be not notable, but that does not mean that desire itself has not been decreased. People can feel less inclined to do something, but not badly enough to stop them from doing it. The decline is certainly strong enough for some people to complain about it in forums.
6) Matters to some of the players, therefore the idea of cash shops is meaningful whether some of the other players don't care or not.
Again, I have no qualms with that - but like I said, simply assigning the items meaning has nothing to do with whether there should or should not be cash shops.
"Should" and "should not" are words used exclusively to describe opinions.
There is one more issue that I haven't seen mentioned. Cash shops offer RMT type players another venue to buy for real cash and then sell in-game for game money. Some use this to boost their in-game success (which isn't earned through game play), and others use this to sell the cash shop items for more than "street value" and turn around and sell the "gold" for more than they originally paid for the item. This has the secondary effect of inflating prices in game, making those with less gold less competitive inside the game. And this has a tertiary effect that forces players to do likewise even if they don't like it, if they want to be competitive in the game's economic perspective, and what that can buy for in-game power.
That has been mentioned - I was arguing with another poster about it. This is solved simply by the dev making their cash shop items Bind on Account.
very nice sum up hehe. also Id want to know why in the world would ppl defend it?
To clarfiy - I don't care whether or not the game I play has a cash shop selling vanity items. I am, however, upset when people use logical fallacies to defend their position. Both sides of the argument are doing it - but I've seen the same ones repeated consistently on the "against" side, so people apparently believe their arguments are logically valid and sound when, in fact, they are not. If this doesn't convince someone to see the errors in reasoning being made, then I don't know what else to say. I'll leave it be.
In a similar manner, I ask you to stop writing vague statements when you argue. I will also ask you to refrain from posting false statements.
I'm sorry that my post did not seem clear to you, but most of what you call vague was strongly implied. Even if I was vague - being ambiguous in certain wording (that does not commit any fallacy) is not the same as committing those fallacies.
Where did I post any false statement?
"Frankly, the goal of ANY firm is to maximize profit" is a false statement if the general definition of the word "firm" is used. However, since you explained your context, then it just becomes a matter of a vague statement.
However, in your reply, the statement "they will charge whatever the balance is that will achieve the highest total revenue (that means in the long run)" is false in absolutely almost all cases, like I explained above.
you dont post anything false for my little read through, but you keep going on about how any company looking at max their profit which is VERY obvious, now the question is WHY DO YOU WANT TO BE THE ARSE WHO MAKE ME PAY MORE IF I WANT THE FULL GAME. now thats street niveau.
and if you know think I d be some poor guy or be a teenager...well Im not, but I dont want to be fucking cheated, when I buy a product, that you let yourself being screwed over is just hillarious, and even tho you talk a very smooth and calm way I have to say I question your sense of what money is worth.
like alot have talked about the 25$ mount...how much effort do you think were putted into that, is 10 minutes of someone´s time really worth 2million$ in 4 hours was it?. tbh if I were the guy he made that mount Id be outraged if I didnt get a cut of that ....on other hand if I were that guy...well I d laugh my arse off over all the fukkin morrons who acctually gave that kind of money for that little efford.
its what this whole discussion is about...how much is your money worth? what do you expect when buying a game? I tell you most teenagers without rich parents are playing WoW on private servers.
and I feel outrages when someone defend this kind of abuse of their customers....back when I bought EQ2 it said loud and clear this game need you to put in an subscribtion fee pr. month.....okay I almost didnt pay that but were curious, and well sadly enough got hooked ;P I never accepted to have to pay extra for various things in game.
EQ2 got me hooked but if I ever see a cash shop in my next MMO with a sub fee I ll not even buy it.....I do not buy a game to play a mall.
you call our statements vague*? wtf did you spend your money on? it only show that you most likely spended money in WoWs or which game you play item shop and dont want to feel like the jerk who force future MMO players to pay more than what they know they have to, to get the full value of the game.....even after paying for the game, paying the monthly fee they claim is to keep the server going.....which is by far from true, ofc Ive not read through the whole EULA of games but it its claimed they only take the price of server maintain in that you could without a doubt sue them.
end question...do you work for a company currently using P2P+sub fee + cash shop or are you just the jerk that accept them, and by that make those who refuse to either miss out on pixels or have to pay....and its fun how some ppl talk about how cheerished pixels is to some of the others when in fact that is the ONLY thing every one of us pay for, be that MMOs or other games....all that ppl that Id find sensible ask for is their money worth, which is an enjoyable game, and not a fukkin mall, trying to sell you things.
its stupid and a waste of yours and others money to defend cash shops in P2P + sub games, nothing less....do you really think WoW as the prime example doesnt earn afew $$ for its company and shareholders? they should feel lucky to have this kind of monthly income and not just spit ppl in the face, by ask them to pay extra for afew extra polygons n pixels.
you dont post anything false for my little read through, but you keep going on about how any company looking at max their profit which is VERY obvious, now the question is WHY DO YOU WANT TO BE THE ARSE WHO MAKE ME PAY MORE IF I WANT THE FULL GAME. now thats street niveau.
and if you know think I d be some poor guy or be a teenager...well Im not, but I dont want to be fucking cheated, when I buy a product, that you let yourself being screwed over is just hillarious, and even tho you talk a very smooth and calm way I have to say I question your sense of what money is worth.
like alot have talked about the 25$ mount...how much effort do you think were putted into that, is 10 minutes of someone´s time really worth 2million$ in 4 hours was it?. tbh if I were the guy he made that mount Id be outraged if I didnt get a cut of that ....on other hand if I were that guy...well I d laugh my arse off over all the fukkin morrons who acctually gave that kind of money for that little efford.
its what this whole discussion is about...how much is your money worth? what do you expect when buying a game? I tell you most teenagers without rich parents are playing WoW on private servers.
and I feel outrages when someone defend this kind of abuse of their customers....back when I bought EQ2 it said loud and clear this game need you to put in an subscribtion fee pr. month.....okay I almost didnt pay that but were curious, and well sadly enough got hooked ;P I never accepted to have to pay extra for various things in game.
EQ2 got me hooked but if I ever see a cash shop in my next MMO with a sub fee I ll not even buy it.....I do not buy a game to play a mall.
you call our statements vague*? wtf did you spend your money on? it only show that you most likely spended money in WoWs or which game you play item shop and dont want to feel like the jerk who force future MMO players to pay more than what they know they have to, to get the full value of the game.....even after paying for the game, paying the monthly fee they claim is to keep the server going.....which is by far from true, ofc Ive not read through the whole EULA of games but it its claimed they only take the price of server maintain in that you could without a doubt sue them.
end question...do you work for a company currently using P2P+sub fee + cash shop or are you just the jerk that accept them, and by that make those who refuse to either miss out on pixels or have to pay....and its fun how some ppl talk about how cheerished pixels is to some of the others when in fact that is the ONLY thing every one of us pay for, be that MMOs or other games....all that ppl that Id find sensible ask for is their money worth, which is an enjoyable game, and not a fukkin mall, trying to sell you things.
its stupid and a waste of yours and others money to defend cash shops in P2P + sub games, nothing less....do you really think WoW as the prime example doesnt earn afew $$ for its company and shareholders? they should feel lucky to have this kind of monthly income and not just spit ppl in the face, by ask them to pay extra for afew extra polygons n pixels.
/rage quit thread ;P
I really don't know how to respond to this other than my reasoning is stated earlier in the thread. I also talk about it in the TERA cash shop + sub thread. Please refer to those - I don't feel like rehashing it yet again. I didn't call anyone's statements vague - that was the person attacking me. Please do not make baseless assumptions about me or what I believe.
Thanks - I've said all I'm going to say on the matter.
I have never had an issue with P2P mmorpg charging extra for vanity item but people here seem to go crazy when it happens.
I always hear the argument if I pay $15 a month I want 100% of the game...which I think is a little silly...what is wrong if someone is willing to pay a little extra for a few pixels that will not affect your game play in any way at all.
In a P2P game, the customer is already paying money to play, expect fixes, expect game additions, etc. A P2P customer is in a way paying up front, every month on good faith with the company to get a proper gaming experience. But I guess the industry doesn't like that idea anymore.
Now, this is where I personally have problems with P2P + Item Shop games.
1) I'm paying on good faith every month as I mentioned already.
2) I have a very big problem where devs put content for additional purchase when I'm already forking out money on a regular basis. Note that I have no problem paying for a massive expansion pack. Note that I DO have a problem paying for an expansion pack that adds very little.
3) I have an even bigger, nastier problem when devs put content on the Item Shop when the MMORPG itself is woefully inadequate, blatantly unfinished, and half-a$$ed (I'm looking at you, Star Trek Online).
4) I can't help but believe that the devs have intentionally chopped the game up in smaller pieces, incomplete pieces to make even more money. Part of what I call "Nickel & Diming" the player.
My experience is that it just doesn't stop at "vanity items." The devs need to put a d*mn good reason to make money off the Item Store in a P2P game to begin with. So it doesn't end just for "looks."
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
I have never had an issue with P2P mmorpg charging extra for vanity item but people here seem to go crazy when it happens.
I always hear the argument if I pay $15 a month I want 100% of the game...which I think is a little silly...what is wrong if someone is willing to pay a little extra for a few pixels that will not affect your game play in any way at all.
In a P2P game, the customer is already paying money to play, expect fixes, expect game additions, etc. A P2P customer is in a way paying up front, every month on good faith with the company to get a proper gaming experience. But I guess the industry doesn't like that idea anymore.
Now, this is where I personally have problems with P2P + Item Shop games.
1) I'm paying on good faith every month as I mentioned already.
2) I have a very big problem where devs put content for additional purchase when I'm already forking out money on a regular basis. Note that I have no problem paying for a massive expansion pack. Note that I DO have a problem paying for an expansion pack that adds very little.
3) I have an even bigger, nastier problem when devs put content on the Item Shop when the MMORPG itself is woefully inadequate, blatantly unfinished, and half-a$$ed (I'm looking at you, Star Trek Online).
4) I can't help but believe that the devs have intentionally chopped the game up in smaller pieces, incomplete pieces to make even more money. Part of what I call "Nickel & Diming" the player.
My experience is that it just doesn't stop at "vanity items." The devs need to put a d*mn good reason to make money off the Item Store in a P2P game to begin with. So it doesn't end just for "looks."
I think that is the method most of the game industry is going for now mmo and single player games and the DLC craze
Comments
At this point you are just splitting hairs - and none of this is relevant to the discussion at hand. I've made my points logically, shown my reasoning (many times in this thread, in fact) and I'm not obligated to give full denotative definitions for each word I use.
I expect my fellow forum users to read between the lines to a certain degree, or look up terms they may be unfamiliar with. I even link the definitions each time I call someone out on a fallacy that I believe they have not heard of. I don't bother to give exhaustive definitions of words, that have limited possible meanings within the scope of the current discussion. All anyone ever had to do if they were confused about how I worded something, or what I really meant, was ask. If someone needs clarification, that doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on my argumentation skills. Perhaps my overall communication skills, but it does not effect my logic.
Now if you're through badgering me on semantics that are irrelevant to the original topic, I'd like to retire from this particular discussion.
you dont post anything false for my little read through, but you keep going on about how any company looking at max their profit which is VERY obvious, now the question is WHY DO YOU WANT TO BE THE ARSE WHO MAKE ME PAY MORE IF I WANT THE FULL GAME. now thats street niveau.
and if you know think I d be some poor guy or be a teenager...well Im not, but I dont want to be fucking cheated, when I buy a product, that you let yourself being screwed over is just hillarious, and even tho you talk a very smooth and calm way I have to say I question your sense of what money is worth.
like alot have talked about the 25$ mount...how much effort do you think were putted into that, is 10 minutes of someone´s time really worth 2million$ in 4 hours was it?. tbh if I were the guy he made that mount Id be outraged if I didnt get a cut of that ....on other hand if I were that guy...well I d laugh my arse off over all the fukkin morrons who acctually gave that kind of money for that little efford.
its what this whole discussion is about...how much is your money worth? what do you expect when buying a game? I tell you most teenagers without rich parents are playing WoW on private servers.
and I feel outrages when someone defend this kind of abuse of their customers....back when I bought EQ2 it said loud and clear this game need you to put in an subscribtion fee pr. month.....okay I almost didnt pay that but were curious, and well sadly enough got hooked ;P I never accepted to have to pay extra for various things in game.
EQ2 got me hooked but if I ever see a cash shop in my next MMO with a sub fee I ll not even buy it.....I do not buy a game to play a mall.
you call our statements vague*? wtf did you spend your money on? it only show that you most likely spended money in WoWs or which game you play item shop and dont want to feel like the jerk who force future MMO players to pay more than what they know they have to, to get the full value of the game.....even after paying for the game, paying the monthly fee they claim is to keep the server going.....which is by far from true, ofc Ive not read through the whole EULA of games but it its claimed they only take the price of server maintain in that you could without a doubt sue them.
end question...do you work for a company currently using P2P+sub fee + cash shop or are you just the jerk that accept them, and by that make those who refuse to either miss out on pixels or have to pay....and its fun how some ppl talk about how cheerished pixels is to some of the others when in fact that is the ONLY thing every one of us pay for, be that MMOs or other games....all that ppl that Id find sensible ask for is their money worth, which is an enjoyable game, and not a fukkin mall, trying to sell you things.
its stupid and a waste of yours and others money to defend cash shops in P2P + sub games, nothing less....do you really think WoW as the prime example doesnt earn afew $$ for its company and shareholders? they should feel lucky to have this kind of monthly income and not just spit ppl in the face, by ask them to pay extra for afew extra polygons n pixels.
/rage quit thread ;P
I really don't know how to respond to this other than my reasoning is stated earlier in the thread. I also talk about it in the TERA cash shop + sub thread. Please refer to those - I don't feel like rehashing it yet again. I didn't call anyone's statements vague - that was the person attacking me. Please do not make baseless assumptions about me or what I believe.
Thanks - I've said all I'm going to say on the matter.
In a P2P game, the customer is already paying money to play, expect fixes, expect game additions, etc. A P2P customer is in a way paying up front, every month on good faith with the company to get a proper gaming experience. But I guess the industry doesn't like that idea anymore.
Now, this is where I personally have problems with P2P + Item Shop games.
1) I'm paying on good faith every month as I mentioned already.
2) I have a very big problem where devs put content for additional purchase when I'm already forking out money on a regular basis. Note that I have no problem paying for a massive expansion pack. Note that I DO have a problem paying for an expansion pack that adds very little.
3) I have an even bigger, nastier problem when devs put content on the Item Shop when the MMORPG itself is woefully inadequate, blatantly unfinished, and half-a$$ed (I'm looking at you, Star Trek Online).
4) I can't help but believe that the devs have intentionally chopped the game up in smaller pieces, incomplete pieces to make even more money. Part of what I call "Nickel & Diming" the player.
My experience is that it just doesn't stop at "vanity items." The devs need to put a d*mn good reason to make money off the Item Store in a P2P game to begin with. So it doesn't end just for "looks."
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
I think that is the method most of the game industry is going for now mmo and single player games and the DLC craze
Kinda sad really.
March on! - Lets Invade Pekopon