Pay2Win sucks.. end of. :) - Always was a fad... and offensive to true mmo'ers/gamers.
I'm sure there will always be a MMO out there with a p2w cash shop, always folks willing to pay these days. I'm hopeful they settle into their own niche, as different types of MMOS settle into theirs. One thing I know 100% for sure, I do NOT want to see Pantheon using a cash shop.
-Garmr
This is becoming less of a thing in the West, but its still going strong in the East. It was really such a shame to see it infect some games that could have been great otherwise. I think if ArcheAge in particular wasn't designed to be a cash grab, it would have been a game I'd have played for years.
I'm not sure it will ever go away altogether. It will probably be the go to for struggling games for a long time. Its a sad thing, but as long as games continue to struggle to find ways to keep their players, they will resort to anything to make money before going under.
P2W is a clear NOGO. If you like to add a Shop, just add useless stuff like "a robe that looks like X w/o any stats on it" or a "companion, thats following you, w/o and stats or fighting abilities". As soon you add "worthy items", like gear, potions, pets, ..., you go clearly in the wrong direction! I personal prefer to pay a monthly fee to you and have access to all ingame stuff.
P2W is just not in my gaming future. Archeage was an awful experience as a whole and will never again touch such a game.
I'll happily pay my monthly sub for years on a game that delivers interesting/challenging content that has me work for things in game with meaningful and measurable progression throughout that time.
Aside from pay-to-win cash shop items, cash shop costume items can be pretty immersion breaking for me. Sometimes the costumes and items available in cash shops don't make sense with a game's world/lore/art. If Pantheon went P2W that'd be a deal breaker for me, but if there is a cash shop related costumes, that those items make sense in context of the game world, lore, art, etc. In general, I'd prefer there just not be a cash shop though.
It's still viable for some games but I think it's inherently wrong particularly if you already have to pay a subscription and/or paid for the software to begin with.
If the game is free otherwise, I don't think it's nearly as 'evil' but I won't play these games usually to begin with just because of the pay to win aspect.
Yeah, I don't particularly like it myself and do not support it in any way but there are games that still use it as a way to earn a ton of extra revenue! I think some of those Eastern games it kind of suits since they are not really meaningful or very in depth but for game slike EQ/VG/Pantheon it just cheapens the experience in my opinion. By passing any teamwork, skill, challenge to purchase items that give you an advantage over another player will ruin a game like EQ/VG/Pantheon faster than the company can count their earnings from it! ;)
With games like EQ/VG/Pantheon, longevity is the key, which is why I think a sub model is the way to go and if some lore friendly cosmetic items/pets made it in, I wouldn't have a problem with that at all as long as it wasn't too over the top!
I absolutely hate when games implement a cash shop. Everything about it is wrong, as I should be able to obtain anything the game has to offer by dedicating the time, and putting forth the skill and effort required to obtain it. I'm also a bit of a collector, and when cash shops come in and start offering mounts and pets (which cheapens and invalidates any effort required to obtain) I either have to fork over the cash for it or be satisfied knowing I could never obtain said "collectible". It's especially bad when there are game features locked behind the cash shop such as inventory space, hair options, emotes etc.
I was a little interested in trying a certain "coloured desert" game during my (seemingly endless) gaming lull right now, but the fact that it has a cash shop (among many other things) is a major reason why I won't even bother to try it, and I won't touch any mmo that has one.
I would however support a real pantheon store that sold things such as clothing, mugs, mousepads, models of prominent in-game characters, artwork etc. (I think this has a thread of its own though :P)
Rachael
It's hard to claim "Pay to Win" is still a fad. For better or worse, it is a viable business model that has grown in use due to the changing play style of MMOs. I suspect that at some point VR had that coversation if only to outright reject it. As the market becomes more crowded with options there is less revenue for each game, but players are demanding content more frequently so companies have to find a way to make up the difference. There are games like Archeage that make a mockery of the business model by taking it to the extreme and other games that fail because their player base is too small for the extar cash transactions to fully support continued work. Ultimately it is a decision that should take the target player base into consideration. For casual games where the race to end game is not a big deal I think the business model can work if handled properly, but for old-school games I think there would be too much resistance to make the extra revenue worhwhile.
If the game and cash shop is set up so that the some items either cannot be obtained at all by normal playing, or you only have an abysmally low chance to get them (it would take literally years to gather components for example), then the cash shop is no longer optional, but required. Especially if these items are "the best" (for endgame gear), and there's no alternative. At that moment it becomes a cash-grab, and something that I do not like and won't take part in.
As long as there are viable alternatives in-game, I would accept such a P2W shop. Because then its really optional, and something you just have to make up with your conscience/wallet :)
Pay to win or
Paying for apperance item/services like name changes, character transfer etc?
Pay to win = no thanks
Paying for apperance item/services like name changes, character transfer etc is totally viable economic model, in the end this is a business and it needs to make money.
Just because Kilsin is asking this question does not mean that PRF is going to be P2W. Take off your tin foil hats, put down your conspiracy theory notebooks and just answer the question how you normally feel about it, not how you feel about it in conjunction with PRF...
This is a big edit.
OK basically I am against pay to win. I am even against paying for appearence items and gear. The only thing I could half support were things like Krono in EQ 1 and PLEX in EVE Online which just give you extra game time. If they are tradeable they are a nice secondary currency to have and earn VR some extra money on the side which would help support the game for longer.
Kilsin said:Yeah, I don't particularly like it myself and do not support it in any way but there are games that still use it as a way to earn a ton of extra revenue! I think some of those Eastern games it kind of suits since they are not really meaningful or very in depth but for game slike EQ/VG/Pantheon it just cheapens the experience in my opinion. By passing any teamwork, skill, challenge to purchase items that give you an advantage over another player will ruin a game like EQ/VG/Pantheon faster than the company can count their earnings from it! ;)
With games like EQ/VG/Pantheon, longevity is the key, which is why I think a sub model is the way to go and if some lore friendly cosmetic items/pets made it in, I wouldn't have a problem with that at all as long as it wasn't too over the top!
I 100 percent agree with this. You see many PTW games get going have a strong year or 2 and fizzle out. I personally if I was an investor would much rather have a game wqith a couple million subs giving me a promised 15 bucks a month for a decade
Kalgore said:I 100 percent agree with this. You see many PTW games get going have a strong year or 2 and fizzle out. I personally if I was an investor would much rather have a game wqith a couple million subs giving me a promised 15 bucks a month for a decade
I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
Dreconic said:Kalgore said:I 100 percent agree with this. You see many PTW games get going have a strong year or 2 and fizzle out. I personally if I was an investor would much rather have a game wqith a couple million subs giving me a promised 15 bucks a month for a decade
I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
Yeah those are the sort of figures I was thinking of when I thought how many subscribers the game would have. VR have already said they are not trying to make a game with a huge number of subscribers just going to for the niche market and 100k should be enough for that I would hope.
Cromulent said:Dreconic said:I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
Yeah those are the sort of figures I was thinking of when I thought how many subscribers the game would have. VR have already said they are not trying to make a game with a huge number of subscribers just going to for the niche market and 100k should be enough for that I would hope.
I would think that 10k would keep the game moving forward. Wouldn't have as much money to develop new content but even 150k a month should be enough to keep servers and devs going...
Dreconic said:Cromulent said:Dreconic said:I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
Yeah those are the sort of figures I was thinking of when I thought how many subscribers the game would have. VR have already said they are not trying to make a game with a huge number of subscribers just going to for the niche market and 100k should be enough for that I would hope.
I would think that 10k would keep the game moving forward. Wouldn't have as much money to develop new content but even 150k a month should be enough to keep servers and devs going...
Yeah but I'm hoping they'll have enough money to also develop expansion packs for the game as well to help keep it fresh.
Dreconic said:I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
FFXIV probably.
I hate cash shops, always have. I remember back when EQ2 had LoN cards you could purchase that were redeemed in-game for stuff, that it was the slippery slope towards a marketplace. Those of us that said this though, were shushed and told we were overreacting. Now look at things over there.
Thing is, I don't dislike cash shops in and of themselves. I think the idea is nice, that is the idea of being able to buy purely cosmetic items, but the problem is, no matter what the original intention is, it is almost always too much of a temptation for these companies to reneg on their original promises. It is just too easy to begin to push the boundaries just that little bit, and before you know it, you have a fully blown cash shop that is directly selling items that affect gameplay. This is especially true when the company begins to hit the inevitable slump in revenue, or new management takes over and sees it as an easy way to print money.
So if given the choice between that, and no cash shop, I'll take the latter.
itvar said:Dreconic said:I don't think any MMO game has more than a million active subscribers besides WoW. I think if PRF can have 100k active subscribers in a years time after launch it will be a successful game.
FFXIV probably.
I hate cash shops, always have. I remember back when EQ2 had LoN cards you could purchase that were redeemed in-game for stuff, that it was the slippery slope towards a marketplace. Those of us that said this though, were shushed and told we were overreacting. Now look at things over there.
Thing is, I don't dislike cash shops in and of themselves. I think the idea is nice, that is the idea of being able to buy purely cosmetic items, but the problem is, no matter what the original intention is, it is almost always too much of a temptation for these companies to reneg on their original promises. It is just too easy to begin to push the boundaries just that little bit, and before you know it, you have a fully blown cash shop that is directly selling items that affect gameplay. This is especially true when the company begins to hit the inevitable slump in revenue, or new management takes over and sees it as an easy way to print money.
So if given the choice between that, and no cash shop, I'll take the latter.
I agree. If it is a choice between no cash shop and a cash shop but with the risk that it becomes an unfair cash shop at a later date then I do go with no cash shop. Although I still can't really see a big problem with having Krono or PLEX on the server in a cash shop kinda like EQ 1 and EVE Online since all that gives you is extra game time.
The only game worth playing that is pay to win is life itself. In video games, hell to the **** no. In my opinion, anyway.
Realistically, there will always be whales willing to throw down huge stacks of cash on games, but I think that hardcore pay to win is becoming just as much of a niche as games like Pantheon.
It was ever a fad? I dont think players ever liked p2w, generally speaking. Theyd put up with or ignore it in favor the rest of the game (maybe) but p2w has always been a negative to everyone but the whales who feed the machine. Least from what ive seen, read, or heard.
Personally, I just dont do cash shops anymore unless its B2P and even then it should only ever be cosmetic alternatives, more character slots, mounts, etc... and not an excessive amount either. Even those can easily be a turn off if too much of the content ends up in the shop.
P2W F2P... (or just F2P in general) I just play them till im bored IF it catches my interest like B&S has recently, but never pay much usually nothing. And thats IF I do play them. Fractions of what id ever pay if I had a good P2P game with all content available in game in one way or another (minus name changes, transfers, etc).