Proving there's some free to play models that aren't so bad (DDO) vs this one which might be possbily the worst one I've ever seen.
I actually had some interest in this game and was considering playing it once it went live, but once this all came out I dropped any thought I had of trying it.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Yes, I just posted some feedback in thier forums dedicated cash shop feedback thread in ref, to shutting the cs down until the problem is rectified..
I didn't break the threads rules, nor did I break the forums rules for posting in any way. The intent was to suggest that if the current cash shop items are out of balance with the communities opinion, and that there is a clear motivation to rectify the problem, as well as still being in OB (considered a testing phase), that maybe it would be a good idea to take the cs offline until a solution is created.
lol.. deleted.
posted a question as to why, stating no rules or guidlines had been breached..
deleted.
It is clear to me that they have no intention of doing a damn thing. And also clear to me, they could care less about my "feedback" as it is not inline with generating money. Say one thing, delete another.
this could just be that needle.
d
"He who reigns within himself and rules his passions, desires, and fears is more than a king."
"Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much argruing, much writting, many opinions; for opinions in good men is but knowledge in the making."
Mr. Jennings: Pity you haven't linked to your MMORPG.com articles from Broken Toys in quite a while. It would be interesting to discuss this thing over there.
I never played Allods, but after this, I can hardly say I am planning to. The depressing part is that nothing will change. If some people have found a way to play Evony, it's hopeless to attempt to reason with people like those in this thread who blew $1,500 on three months' play. Undoubtedly, there will be people lined up to buy that $7,000 thingy, and as much as most of the potential players, even some of the game's most ardent supporters, might walk away in disgust, gPotato will be cracking a smile.
At the same time, I'm not sure that those who have balked will maintain their stoic resolve for very long, except those who realize they can't afford it. After all, in a case of "take it or leave it" like this, have you ever seen a company backtrack? Did EA backtrack over its Battlefield Heroes price hike (2000% in some cases) for items bought with in-game points? And in that case, they had the redeeming grace of somewhat lowering the prices in real money, effectively targeting the freeloaders. But is that wise to pull such a switch when you used to brag about how spending money on the game didn't make anyone more competitive at it? So Battlefield Heroes is a parody of its former self, but still around and unapologetic (it's not like EA is in the business of apologizing for anything). Players' quitting threats came to nothing. Life goes on. It's like the whole thing never happened.
Until players develop the resolve to just walk away from a game, and not look back at least until things have changed, developers will be free to pull such cons (what is $20 for a virtual backpack, if not a con?) as much as they want.
First i wanted to say thanks Scott for putting this in the lime light. But I want to make a few points to others here about the game, its publisher and its so called developers.
Scott hit the nail on the head with how GP does business, its not only disconnected from its playerbase but they just dont give a rats ass how they make their money, period! This is the first game thats gotten them so much bad press they may never recover from it as they have been getting away with this type of pricing throughout all their games. Can they change? Sure, they need to fire a hell of a lot of people there starting with the CM who I assume is part of the marketing team due to the recent PR posts to the community. Then I would move over to the marketing team as well as management. Replace them with people who understand the industry and who play games themselves! The GMs I feel in this game are the only ones who has went to bat for us, the community, but they have little power to change anything.
As for Astrum Nival, Astrum Nival is no more! Nival is the true developer of this game and for whatever reasons had struck a deal with Astrum entertainment to help move the game forward. The company was then titled Astrum Nival. Mail.ru comes along and buys up Astrum Nival. On Nivals main site they say they had MINORITY INTER$EST in Astrum Nival which was soon taken out of the about page to the left on their site entirely, and then they posted today that Mail.RU owns 100% of Astrum Nival. From my understanding Mail.RU is a pretty greedy company.
Nival it seems has disconnected themselves from Mail.RU and is working on a new title called Prime World, a MMORTS. Now with Mail.RU at the helm they are killing the game as fast as it was made, maybe even faster! The patch notes released for Allods in RU (v1.6 and 1.7) is a death note! Do a little snooping and you will see how Mail.RU is destroying what could have been one of the best F2Ps on this planet to date! I think GP knows this game is sinking and they were trying to make as much off the game as possible before it sinks, but it backfired and now a lot of people are not only boycotting the CS theyre boycotting the game entirely! GP is to blame for the outrageous prices but lets not forget whose actually killing the game, and thats Mail.RU!
Funny how the mmo community ruin there own game genre.
I realy can't believe people pay so much money for items or try be competetive in end game.
This whole item shop wont last long becouse there will always be guys who just can pay alot and win always, those who can't pay alot eventuall stop playing.
A mmo can't continuing with few who spent alot.
PLus there is no achievement in this you just cheat by buying yourself to top lol, and sure its maybe legit but its just replacement for cheating now developer gets money instead of gold/itemfarmer sites.
MMO genre is going down the drain and its players who couse this:(
Refuse itemshops dont play mmo's with items shops problem solved.
Games played:AC1-Darktide'99-2000-AC2-Darktide/dawnsong2003-2005,Lineage2-2005-2006 and now Darkfall-2009..... In between WoW few months AoC few months and some f2p also all very short few weeks.
Good article. I think this sort of business model preys on the bewildered. I could see someone with acute mental disability spending himself/herself into crippling debt with cash shops this overpriced.
$7000 is just plain out of line with what the market will bear and with player expectations when they go to an item mall.
I spend $20-40 a month playing Jade Dynasty, which has already been mentioned. I balked at wedding packs being $30 and one of the new mounts being $50. But I got the wedding pack I wanted from a 50 CENT random lotto box and I don't need to ride a goldfish really. I generally buy cash shop items from other players with in-game gold. Jade Dynasty lets players sell cash shop currency for game currency if you have a lot more time than money. I don't PvP much and I don't need to keep up with anybody else, so YMMV when it comes to how much you spend.
If I were going to fault JD for anything, it would be that you don't really need to spend anything til level 90 and then the game changes radically and you pretty much either have to spend real money, grind out huge amounts of in-game cash to buy cash shop stuff, or gtfo. I think that may be pretty common among "free" games though. They get you hooked and then they reel in your wallet.
But to get back on topic, $50 for a mount is a far cry from $7000 for anything, and I don't think I'm the only one who thinks $50 is too much for any one item. A hugely priced item mall is just a quick way to drive away customers and give a company a bad reputation that will hurt it in the long run, even beyond that one game.
In my limited experience, subscription games are cheaper.
I have zero problems with cash shops. I've bought plenty of stuff from DDO cash shop, and EQ marketplace. I'm not even going to look at Allod's. Like I said in another thread; gpotato = A bunch of goons from Korea who think Americans are nothing but lazy fat cats with HUGE wallets. Sorry to disappointment the world, but Americans struggle financially, too.
DDO proved their point that cash shops can be effective... But they didn't sell any stuff that really unballanced the game or made you much more powerfull, their prices where allready to high for me...
But this will meen the end of free gaming and even $15 subscriptions, if people give intoo the slowly rising prices of item shops, soon every MMO will be free and require you to buy atleast for $50 a month to be competitive..
So we all need to ban itemshops, we need to show developers that we don't want item shops and either don't buy from them or return to WoW and start spamming Blizzard over those evil goldspammers again.
I do not think there should be an all-out ban on cash/item shops in games like Allods or DDO. What we as players need to do, however, is support the ones (like DDO) that seem to have a good model and avoid the ones (Allods, currently) that do not.
Like others have said, if players will pay there is nothing to stop the developers from continuing down the wrong path. If the reasonable games get the majority of the players, though, market forces should help us and developers will start using the model that works. Just look at how it is the successful game/movie/etc that gets copied over and over. Does not mean all the copies we get will be any good, but the few that are will tend to rise over the rest and evolution can continue.
Removing the shops as an option at all is not the way to go. More variety is a good thing. We just need to step up and let them know what we will support and what we will not. (And yes, the current outcry over Allods is a start on this, but it actually needs to impact the game's bottom line for the "ones who make the decisions" to notice.)
The thing to do is play on the Russian servers. Prices on the whole are Ok there.
Prices maybe "OK" but they have now killed the game with the current patch. You will not WANT to buy anything but rather NEED to buy almost everything if you plan to play this game after level 20 to cap! Do some research and see what the new patch has done to the game to make it even more CS dependent than ever! Russian prices are great if you live outside of Russia, but try to afford this game working in Russia on a russian salary, almost impossible. The servers there has lost 50% pop now and declining (http://www.allods.ru/ scroll down while looking at right hand side of screen, youll see the servers list), which says something about the game as a whole since the new patch hit.
You know perhaps this is a sign of the costs involved in making Allods. It is the most expensive free to play MMO made to date and that have to make that money back somewhere.
When people talk about how profitable micro transactions are, they are usually because the games using them are made with really small budgets. The bigger the budget, the less viable the business model is, and Allods large ($12mil) budget means they have a lot of money to make back.
I appreciate they should be making a fair of this back from the native version, but I'm sure gPotato paid a hefty amount for the NA & EU licenses for the game.
This is capitalism comrade! Too bad it's not still the Soviet Union... then, in the finest traditions of Marxist Leninism, not only would it be free to play... of course only the Communist Party elite would have computers, and no one would have any personal freedom or civil liberties, but it'd be free to play...
I'd really love to hear what Richard Aihoshi thinks of this whole situation. Being he's the rsident F2P advocate, his opinion piece on this is extremely relevent, IMO. I mean, Scott is great, and I love reading his posts, but a little point/counter-point from soneone that supports all things F2P would be amazing, I think.
What can he say?
Its obvious that they mishandled the item shop.
Its same question like if SWTOR would come out and ask 50$ sub.
You know perhaps this is a sign of the costs involved in making Allods. It is the most expensive free to play MMO made to date and that have to make that money back somewhere.
When people talk about how profitable micro transactions are, they are usually because the games using them are made with really small budgets. The bigger the budget, the less viable the business model is, and Allods large ($12mil) budget means they have a lot of money to make back. I appreciate they should be making a fair of this back from the native version, but I'm sure gPotato paid a hefty amount for the NA & EU licenses for the game.
12 million is nothing for today game production. Heck i work in internet company that produces a certain plugin. And i am sure the team costs the few million dollars annually.
And in return they make around 9 million annually. And its way way smaller operation than MMO.
Allods is so good, it could easily have 4-5 million players. They could return investment in a year, even if 25% buy 1$ item monthly.
I'd really love to hear what Richard Aihoshi thinks of this whole situation. Being he's the rsident F2P advocate, his opinion piece on this is extremely relevent, IMO. I mean, Scott is great, and I love reading his posts, but a little point/counter-point from soneone that supports all things F2P would be amazing, I think.
Funny, I thought this article was, from start to finish, a perfect counterpoint to Aioshi's "MMO snob" article.
I'm sure we'll hear what Mr Aioshi thinks in due course, if gPotato "fix" their pricing, he'll write another article decrying people "grossly overreacting" to a "temporary anomaly" in the world of F2P....
Those words had better stick for some people who thing FTP = No cost.
"Time is money"
Is absolutely crazy for anyone to think that someone will invest truck loads of time with no pay out in the end. MMOs are not cheap.. these are not MUDs built with a few buddies in a basement PC somewhere.. they take big bucks.
But $7k... wow... that was really testing the limits of "How stupid are our players"
Its a sign of the times... MMO stakeholders (they guys who poney up the dough to pay for the time to make the game exist) are feeling out what they can get away with and what they cannot.
This article is a perfect example of "What in Gods name where you thinking" when they introduce items at astronomical prices... RIGHT out of the gate!
1 Stupid Player does not = XXX stupid players. And yes, its stupid to spend that much on a game, its stupid to run up micro-transactions and not pay the rent on your apartment or steal from someone else to feed a gaming habit.
Players are angry enough that traditional 'subscription fee' based P2P games are now adding HIGHER QUALITY content exclusively via 'extra' items shops (or lottery side-games like SWG). 'Good quality' subscription content AUTOMATICALLY gets cut back to 'low qualty' content changes to encourage players to buy the 'cool' (but additional cost) extra items.
When expansions cost $50 ~ $80 bucks.. once every three or so months.. in addition to subscriptions.. it was manageable. But adding $5 ~ $20 items, some vital, most exclusive, that require steady purchases every month or so of 5 to 10 transactions... well.. you do the math.
The player push-back is growing... the MMO genre is at risk of getting a really terrible reputation on both ends.
It will be interesting to watch what happens next... as the drama unfolds.
Ps. I used a few too many Cliches in my reply I suppose.. but cliche is supposed to be well known... just like Common Sense is supposed to be Common. $7k item...
I'd really love to hear what Richard Aihoshi thinks of this whole situation. Being he's the rsident F2P advocate, his opinion piece on this is extremely relevent, IMO. I mean, Scott is great, and I love reading his posts, but a little point/counter-point from soneone that supports all things F2P would be amazing, I think.
What can he say?
Its obvious that they mishandled the item shop.
Its same question like if SWTOR would come out and ask 50$ sub.
What would P2P advocates say ?
$50 sub if you play 3 night a week is a bargain for a good game. Most of my friends spend that on a single night out.
Microtransactions are a sad enditement of pure greed, these developers will get what they deserve. No return.
________________________________________________________ Sorcery must persist, the future is the Citadel
Something like a backpack seems like a 1 time buy, you buy the backpack and now you always have more storage. So a high price seems to make sense for such a thing.
The problem with cash shops is they are there to get the most out of a player as possible. So over time as players get more used to cash shops, the prices will creep up. This will ensure players stay used to cash shops and continually get used to paying more and more. Allods just jumped the gun. Also the $1 for a boost to maximum for 30 minutes equivalent item seems fairly priced. The only thing crazy was obviously $7000 item. Sadly we know that there are people out there who reguarly buy virtual items through other people for real money in the thousands of dollars. And it's always been that way. Back in the day there were Asheron's Call items that sold for 5-10 thousand on e-bay. This was clearly the thinking behind this companies attempt at that item.
This is why I'm happy in my, I only play sub mmos mentality.
What can one say, it's Get Rich QUICK!.. Sell Sell Sell, you have to think of a group of russian's men (could be mafia controlled) that made the game and now they want all your money.. The game is very well made but you still have to consider the cost to run these games.. Especially from Russia..
Enjoy the game free and if you don't wanna spend your hard earned money, don't.. KISS FX.. "Keep is Simple Stupid"
Something like a backpack seems like a 1 time buy, you buy the backpack and now you always have more storage. So a high price seems to make sense for such a thing. I disagree with this point. Storage space is pretty important in a game where you're goign to be carrying around gear, items, etc. It should not be something you have to pay extra $$$ for.
In FFXI, you do quests to expand your character's inventory and your primary "mog safe". You can add extra storage by putting additional furniture in your mog house. You can "rent "a mog locker in one city for extra storage. and various NPCs that will store entire sets of gear. That's all done in-game, by playing.
In WoW you can buy various sized bags to put in slots to increase your character's carrying capacity, as well as a bank.
EQ2 is similar to WoW.
And so on. It's all handled in-game.
Charging people real money for added inventory space which, if I understand correctly, is only temporary and requires additional purchases for "up-keep" is an example of a core game element being exploited to squeeze extra $$ out of the players. I remember seeing that in one F2P MMO and thinking "that's f'n lame". There's no way anyone can honestly say that more storage space for your character is merely "optional fluff"... except perhaps at the very beginning when you don't need much space.
Another example... In Perfect World, you need a "megaphone" or something like that in order to talk in the world chat channel. The megaphones are a "one use per message" consumable and are sold through the item shop. This is lame enough already... MMOs are social games, and here they are charging you - per message - to be sociable with others elsewhere in the game world. "It prevents RMT from spamming" is the typical defense I've been given for it. That would be fine if other developers hadn't found ways to prevent spamming of shout channels in ways that don't cost the players' extra money.
But... to make it completely absurd, the only way to contact a GM? Using the global shout channel requesting a GM contact you. This is the way it was the last time I played. They may have come to their senses and changed it by now. So.. Having a problem in the game and need assistance? Pay up! You shouldn't have to pay extra $$$ to be sociable in a social game. You shouldn't have to pay $$$ to use a social channel to get GM assistance in a game. Again... F'n lame.
And before anyone tries to say so... this isn't me misrepresenting or failing to understand how it works... When I asked how to contact a GM, it was explained to me, and confirmed, by several people in game that this was how it was set up, quite deliberately, by the developers.
The problem with cash shops is they are there to get the most out of a player as possible. So over time as players get more used to cash shops, the prices will creep up. This will ensure players stay used to cash shops and continually get used to paying more and more. Allods just jumped the gun. Also the $1 for a boost to maximum for 30 minutes equivalent item seems fairly priced. The only thing crazy was obviously $7000 item. Sadly we know that there are people out there who reguarly buy virtual items through other people for real money in the thousands of dollars. And it's always been that way. Back in the day there were Asheron's Call items that sold for 5-10 thousand on e-bay. This was clearly the thinking behind this companies attempt at that item. Bingo. The devs saw how much more people spend on RMT than they do on a base sub, saw that no matter what they did to stop it, the RMT persisted, and probably thought "we're doing something very wrong here... We need to get in on this". They of course needed a good way to spin it, so... "Hey! Free to play! Pay only what you want for what you want!" and then proceeded to fill item shops with items that seem innocuous enough at first, but become quite necessary as you get farther into the game.
Yes, I've played a few F2P's. Yes, I've seen how the item shops are stocked. No, I've never spent money on them. Yes, I've spoken to those farther along in the game and have gotten, consistently, a very different side to the story than what some folks here, including "Mr. F2P" Richard Aioshi present.
Anyone who thinks they're designing these games and stocking the cash shops with a mind for those who would never pay a dime are horribly deluded.
I think, in a way, the Allods folks have basically done the genre a favor by going to such an extreme. They're doing exactly what most other F2P MMOs (not all, necessarily, but certainly those I've tried and looked into) are doing... Only they've magnified it so much beyond "nickel and diming", that it's impossible to deny or dismiss. This is why I'm happy in my, I only play sub mmos mentality.
Amen. Pay one fee, have access to everything in the game, to partake in, or not, as I see fit. No extra fees required.
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
honestly this has to be the dumbest sounding thing ever $7000? who the hell comes up with these numbers and then he has the gall to say they aint going for a cash grab in the next 4 weeks doesnt seem to me they will be getting much of anythng and whats sad is i play rappelz another gpotato game and aika and neither of them have me buying garbage to keep up so wth is wrong here one word greed
$7,000 is pocket change. A space station in Entropia Universe went for $330,000... Now thats insane ^^
I have no problems with Micro-transactions, these nickel and dime charges for stuff that can make your game fun, and not have to sell your first born to pay for it, it is just a game, entertainment.. DDO, Crytpic C-Store, no biggie, gtators seems be out of touch whitht he economy, or something... to much vodka maybe LOL
As soon as I see a company pull a stunt like this, I lose all confidence. Now I don't care what they do. The fact that they tried to be this greedy tells me all I need to know about this company.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Comments
Proving there's some free to play models that aren't so bad (DDO) vs this one which might be possbily the worst one I've ever seen.
I actually had some interest in this game and was considering playing it once it went live, but once this all came out I dropped any thought I had of trying it.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
heh..
Yes, I just posted some feedback in thier forums dedicated cash shop feedback thread in ref, to shutting the cs down until the problem is rectified..
I didn't break the threads rules, nor did I break the forums rules for posting in any way. The intent was to suggest that if the current cash shop items are out of balance with the communities opinion, and that there is a clear motivation to rectify the problem, as well as still being in OB (considered a testing phase), that maybe it would be a good idea to take the cs offline until a solution is created.
lol.. deleted.
posted a question as to why, stating no rules or guidlines had been breached..
deleted.
this could just be that needle.
d
"He who reigns within himself and rules his passions, desires, and fears is more than a king."
"Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much argruing, much writting, many opinions; for opinions in good men is but knowledge in the making."
John Milton 1608-1674
Mr. Jennings: Pity you haven't linked to your MMORPG.com articles from Broken Toys in quite a while. It would be interesting to discuss this thing over there.
I never played Allods, but after this, I can hardly say I am planning to. The depressing part is that nothing will change. If some people have found a way to play Evony, it's hopeless to attempt to reason with people like those in this thread who blew $1,500 on three months' play. Undoubtedly, there will be people lined up to buy that $7,000 thingy, and as much as most of the potential players, even some of the game's most ardent supporters, might walk away in disgust, gPotato will be cracking a smile.
At the same time, I'm not sure that those who have balked will maintain their stoic resolve for very long, except those who realize they can't afford it. After all, in a case of "take it or leave it" like this, have you ever seen a company backtrack? Did EA backtrack over its Battlefield Heroes price hike (2000% in some cases) for items bought with in-game points? And in that case, they had the redeeming grace of somewhat lowering the prices in real money, effectively targeting the freeloaders. But is that wise to pull such a switch when you used to brag about how spending money on the game didn't make anyone more competitive at it? So Battlefield Heroes is a parody of its former self, but still around and unapologetic (it's not like EA is in the business of apologizing for anything). Players' quitting threats came to nothing. Life goes on. It's like the whole thing never happened.
Until players develop the resolve to just walk away from a game, and not look back at least until things have changed, developers will be free to pull such cons (what is $20 for a virtual backpack, if not a con?) as much as they want.
First i wanted to say thanks Scott for putting this in the lime light. But I want to make a few points to others here about the game, its publisher and its so called developers.
Scott hit the nail on the head with how GP does business, its not only disconnected from its playerbase but they just dont give a rats ass how they make their money, period! This is the first game thats gotten them so much bad press they may never recover from it as they have been getting away with this type of pricing throughout all their games. Can they change? Sure, they need to fire a hell of a lot of people there starting with the CM who I assume is part of the marketing team due to the recent PR posts to the community. Then I would move over to the marketing team as well as management. Replace them with people who understand the industry and who play games themselves! The GMs I feel in this game are the only ones who has went to bat for us, the community, but they have little power to change anything.
As for Astrum Nival, Astrum Nival is no more! Nival is the true developer of this game and for whatever reasons had struck a deal with Astrum entertainment to help move the game forward. The company was then titled Astrum Nival. Mail.ru comes along and buys up Astrum Nival. On Nivals main site they say they had MINORITY INTER$EST in Astrum Nival which was soon taken out of the about page to the left on their site entirely, and then they posted today that Mail.RU owns 100% of Astrum Nival. From my understanding Mail.RU is a pretty greedy company.
Nival it seems has disconnected themselves from Mail.RU and is working on a new title called Prime World, a MMORTS. Now with Mail.RU at the helm they are killing the game as fast as it was made, maybe even faster! The patch notes released for Allods in RU (v1.6 and 1.7) is a death note! Do a little snooping and you will see how Mail.RU is destroying what could have been one of the best F2Ps on this planet to date! I think GP knows this game is sinking and they were trying to make as much off the game as possible before it sinks, but it backfired and now a lot of people are not only boycotting the CS theyre boycotting the game entirely! GP is to blame for the outrageous prices but lets not forget whose actually killing the game, and thats Mail.RU!
Funny how the mmo community ruin there own game genre.
I realy can't believe people pay so much money for items or try be competetive in end game.
This whole item shop wont last long becouse there will always be guys who just can pay alot and win always, those who can't pay alot eventuall stop playing.
A mmo can't continuing with few who spent alot.
PLus there is no achievement in this you just cheat by buying yourself to top lol, and sure its maybe legit but its just replacement for cheating now developer gets money instead of gold/itemfarmer sites.
MMO genre is going down the drain and its players who couse this:(
Refuse itemshops dont play mmo's with items shops problem solved.
Games played:AC1-Darktide'99-2000-AC2-Darktide/dawnsong2003-2005,Lineage2-2005-2006 and now Darkfall-2009.....
In between WoW few months AoC few months and some f2p also all very short few weeks.
Good article. I think this sort of business model preys on the bewildered. I could see someone with acute mental disability spending himself/herself into crippling debt with cash shops this overpriced.
$7000 is just plain out of line with what the market will bear and with player expectations when they go to an item mall.
I spend $20-40 a month playing Jade Dynasty, which has already been mentioned. I balked at wedding packs being $30 and one of the new mounts being $50. But I got the wedding pack I wanted from a 50 CENT random lotto box and I don't need to ride a goldfish really. I generally buy cash shop items from other players with in-game gold. Jade Dynasty lets players sell cash shop currency for game currency if you have a lot more time than money. I don't PvP much and I don't need to keep up with anybody else, so YMMV when it comes to how much you spend.
If I were going to fault JD for anything, it would be that you don't really need to spend anything til level 90 and then the game changes radically and you pretty much either have to spend real money, grind out huge amounts of in-game cash to buy cash shop stuff, or gtfo. I think that may be pretty common among "free" games though. They get you hooked and then they reel in your wallet.
But to get back on topic, $50 for a mount is a far cry from $7000 for anything, and I don't think I'm the only one who thinks $50 is too much for any one item. A hugely priced item mall is just a quick way to drive away customers and give a company a bad reputation that will hurt it in the long run, even beyond that one game.
In my limited experience, subscription games are cheaper.
Nice reading, thanks.
well i have based an opinion about this in my blog and any who are willing to read are welcome to do so and comment on it
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/joker007mo
yea cut and paste cant seem to get it to link oh well
The thing to do is play on the Russian servers. Prices on the whole are Ok there.
DDO proved their point that cash shops can be effective... But they didn't sell any stuff that really unballanced the game or made you much more powerfull, their prices where allready to high for me...
But this will meen the end of free gaming and even $15 subscriptions, if people give intoo the slowly rising prices of item shops, soon every MMO will be free and require you to buy atleast for $50 a month to be competitive..
So we all need to ban itemshops, we need to show developers that we don't want item shops and either don't buy from them or return to WoW and start spamming Blizzard over those evil goldspammers again.
I do not think there should be an all-out ban on cash/item shops in games like Allods or DDO. What we as players need to do, however, is support the ones (like DDO) that seem to have a good model and avoid the ones (Allods, currently) that do not.
Like others have said, if players will pay there is nothing to stop the developers from continuing down the wrong path. If the reasonable games get the majority of the players, though, market forces should help us and developers will start using the model that works. Just look at how it is the successful game/movie/etc that gets copied over and over. Does not mean all the copies we get will be any good, but the few that are will tend to rise over the rest and evolution can continue.
Removing the shops as an option at all is not the way to go. More variety is a good thing. We just need to step up and let them know what we will support and what we will not. (And yes, the current outcry over Allods is a start on this, but it actually needs to impact the game's bottom line for the "ones who make the decisions" to notice.)
Prices maybe "OK" but they have now killed the game with the current patch. You will not WANT to buy anything but rather NEED to buy almost everything if you plan to play this game after level 20 to cap! Do some research and see what the new patch has done to the game to make it even more CS dependent than ever! Russian prices are great if you live outside of Russia, but try to afford this game working in Russia on a russian salary, almost impossible. The servers there has lost 50% pop now and declining (http://www.allods.ru/ scroll down while looking at right hand side of screen, youll see the servers list), which says something about the game as a whole since the new patch hit.
You know perhaps this is a sign of the costs involved in making Allods. It is the most expensive free to play MMO made to date and that have to make that money back somewhere.
When people talk about how profitable micro transactions are, they are usually because the games using them are made with really small budgets. The bigger the budget, the less viable the business model is, and Allods large ($12mil) budget means they have a lot of money to make back.
I appreciate they should be making a fair of this back from the native version, but I'm sure gPotato paid a hefty amount for the NA & EU licenses for the game.
This is capitalism comrade! Too bad it's not still the Soviet Union... then, in the finest traditions of Marxist Leninism, not only would it be free to play... of course only the Communist Party elite would have computers, and no one would have any personal freedom or civil liberties, but it'd be free to play...
What can he say?
Its obvious that they mishandled the item shop.
Its same question like if SWTOR would come out and ask 50$ sub.
What would P2P advocates say ?
12 million is nothing for today game production. Heck i work in internet company that produces a certain plugin. And i am sure the team costs the few million dollars annually.
And in return they make around 9 million annually. And its way way smaller operation than MMO.
Allods is so good, it could easily have 4-5 million players. They could return investment in a year, even if 25% buy 1$ item monthly.
Funny, I thought this article was, from start to finish, a perfect counterpoint to Aioshi's "MMO snob" article.
I'm sure we'll hear what Mr Aioshi thinks in due course, if gPotato "fix" their pricing, he'll write another article decrying people "grossly overreacting" to a "temporary anomaly" in the world of F2P....
...or maybe I'm just too cynical for my own good.
"No Such Thing as a FREE Lunch"
Those words had better stick for some people who thing FTP = No cost.
"Time is money"
Is absolutely crazy for anyone to think that someone will invest truck loads of time with no pay out in the end. MMOs are not cheap.. these are not MUDs built with a few buddies in a basement PC somewhere.. they take big bucks.
But $7k... wow... that was really testing the limits of "How stupid are our players"
Its a sign of the times... MMO stakeholders (they guys who poney up the dough to pay for the time to make the game exist) are feeling out what they can get away with and what they cannot.
This article is a perfect example of "What in Gods name where you thinking" when they introduce items at astronomical prices... RIGHT out of the gate!
1 Stupid Player does not = XXX stupid players. And yes, its stupid to spend that much on a game, its stupid to run up micro-transactions and not pay the rent on your apartment or steal from someone else to feed a gaming habit.
Players are angry enough that traditional 'subscription fee' based P2P games are now adding HIGHER QUALITY content exclusively via 'extra' items shops (or lottery side-games like SWG). 'Good quality' subscription content AUTOMATICALLY gets cut back to 'low qualty' content changes to encourage players to buy the 'cool' (but additional cost) extra items.
When expansions cost $50 ~ $80 bucks.. once every three or so months.. in addition to subscriptions.. it was manageable. But adding $5 ~ $20 items, some vital, most exclusive, that require steady purchases every month or so of 5 to 10 transactions... well.. you do the math.
The player push-back is growing... the MMO genre is at risk of getting a really terrible reputation on both ends.
It will be interesting to watch what happens next... as the drama unfolds.
Ps. I used a few too many Cliches in my reply I suppose.. but cliche is supposed to be well known... just like Common Sense is supposed to be Common. $7k item...
SWG/STO/(SWTOR)
What can he say?
Its obvious that they mishandled the item shop.
Its same question like if SWTOR would come out and ask 50$ sub.
What would P2P advocates say ?
$50 sub if you play 3 night a week is a bargain for a good game. Most of my friends spend that on a single night out.
Microtransactions are a sad enditement of pure greed, these developers will get what they deserve. No return.
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Sorcery must persist, the future is the Citadel
Something like a backpack seems like a 1 time buy, you buy the backpack and now you always have more storage. So a high price seems to make sense for such a thing.
The problem with cash shops is they are there to get the most out of a player as possible. So over time as players get more used to cash shops, the prices will creep up. This will ensure players stay used to cash shops and continually get used to paying more and more. Allods just jumped the gun. Also the $1 for a boost to maximum for 30 minutes equivalent item seems fairly priced. The only thing crazy was obviously $7000 item. Sadly we know that there are people out there who reguarly buy virtual items through other people for real money in the thousands of dollars. And it's always been that way. Back in the day there were Asheron's Call items that sold for 5-10 thousand on e-bay. This was clearly the thinking behind this companies attempt at that item.
This is why I'm happy in my, I only play sub mmos mentality.
What can one say, it's Get Rich QUICK!.. Sell Sell Sell, you have to think of a group of russian's men (could be mafia controlled) that made the game and now they want all your money.. The game is very well made but you still have to consider the cost to run these games.. Especially from Russia..
Enjoy the game free and if you don't wanna spend your hard earned money, don't.. KISS FX.. "Keep is Simple Stupid"
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
$7,000 is pocket change. A space station in Entropia Universe went for $330,000... Now thats insane ^^
www.onlinemassivelymultiplayer.com/mmo-news/entropia-universe-crystal-palace-space-station-in-planet-calypso-sells-for-330000/
I have no problems with Micro-transactions, these nickel and dime charges for stuff that can make your game fun, and not have to sell your first born to pay for it, it is just a game, entertainment.. DDO, Crytpic C-Store, no biggie, gtators seems be out of touch whitht he economy, or something... to much vodka maybe LOL
As soon as I see a company pull a stunt like this, I lose all confidence. Now I don't care what they do. The fact that they tried to be this greedy tells me all I need to know about this company.
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