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World of Warcraft: In-Game Shopping Arrives
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
World of Warcraft players wanting to buy the latest mount or pet for their collections (among other things), can now do so via an in-game store. Blizzard has laid out the details on the World of Warcraft blog.
You can now browse and purchase a bevy of mounts and pets* from directly within World of Warcraft through our newly added Shop interface. Just click the Shop icon on the menu bar once you’ve logged in to a character, and you’ll be able to pick out a new friend to add to your collection and start your adventures together right away. By combining the best of cutting-edge goblin and gnomish technology, we’ve also made it possible for you to receive your new pal right in your inventory (or via mail if your inventory is full).
Read more on the World of Warcraft site.
Comments
Regardless if it was in game or not they already had the Blizzard store where you could buy all this so...redundant post is redundant.
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When they stop making money hand over fist from having millions of subscribers...
You make me like charity
Why are you saying that? The pets and mounts ingame aren't available in the shop. And those in the shop have been available for ages, just not thru ingame means.
Tbh the shop ones aren't very interesting to me, it's way more fun to earn one ingame.....
You're just now realizing this? They pretty much painted themselves into that corner back when they introduced flying mounts.
You make me like charity
*Wyvern and Gryphon plushies, Guardian Cubpet and Moonkin Hatchling pet are not available for purchase within the Blizzard Shop.
Guardian Cubpet is the only pet I am aware of that can treated as cash to gold on the regular blizzstore
it can be sold ingame on the AH
http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/11/02/world-of-warcraft-guardian-cub-ready-to-take-a-bite-out-of-gold-farmers-available-now/
EQ2 fan sites
I'd hardly claim that an item shop MUST be accessible in-game to be a successful freemium model.
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
Absolutely, why on earth would they want to leave money on the table ?
I think they would have to lose about 50% more, because you gotta take into account the Asian subs, and how they count towards their profit. So probably if they get down to around 2.5-3 Million it may make sense for them, but same reason they haven't put out another big mmo to compete and take money from WoW
Well the Asian markets are getting XP potions and such in the store...so I guess they are doing it so that both systems are still the same just the available content in the store is different. Makes it easier to maintain instead of an Asian UI and a Western UI. The webstore was not that easy to navigate between the out of game stuff and ingame stuff.
Personally I would wait until the new expansion drops before checking it out again. (That is if you didn't mind also buying the new expansion)
They're adding alot of features that are steps in the right direction for this new expansion. Even going so far as making it so that flying will be unavailable in the expansion area for at least 2-3 months and not just a simple "get to max lvl and buy flying again".
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
It felt good earning a mount or finding a pet. I don't think it will feel as good now.
Considering theres hundreads and hundreads more to get.
2010 wants to know where you were when they started selling the first pet and mount?
Why are people continuing saying stuff like "wow, there's no point to exploring to find pets and mounts anymore"
They are still adding plenty of pets/mounts in game to find....you're acting like they are ONLY offering new pets/mounts in the store now. In fact the majority of pets/mounts are still found in the game. Whether it be from a new faction, or pvp season, or new dungeon/raid. Or hell even some new holiday pet they came out with.
Seriously stop with the kneejerk comment "welp, there goes playing the game as an option for finding mounts/pets"
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
the first ones were "special edition" cosmetic mounts and pets. The first pet actually came in the CE. They're now moving to a full blown cosmetic cash shop in a sub game...and people will eat it up because the avg gamer wont do without to make a stand over something as trivial as a few dollars in entertainment.
These things are only a big deal on forums.
2010 was the celestial steed and the lich pet in the store. The beginning of this shop.
What still feels good is getting a mount or pet from a very extremely difficult boss. I can care less if someone spent real money on one.
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Probably because many F2P games give content for free and charge you for vanity stuff like pets and mounts. In WoW you have to pay for new content via a subscription and then they are going to charge you again for vanity pets. It doesn't matter whether or not the argument is actually valid, what matters to Blizzard's bottom line is that players feel like they are getting screwed and that Blizzard is making a cash grab. Impressions are everything and people don't like to feel cheated.
These mounts and pets have been in their cash shop for a long ass time, way back in wrath if not before. And these pets are specialty so yeah... you are gonna have to fork some dough. There are still plenty of pets/mounts to farm for and these are just the few unique ones. Hardly what I call being cheated.
An argument can be made that pets and mounts are no way related to what people are paying for via sub as a counter argument can be made that content, class balance, and balancing are what people are paying for and all these mounts and pets are just fluff items and no way an obligation by Blizzard to fulfill.
I didn't like the store to be being with, but it was kept OUT of the game, so if you really wanted something you had go get it and adverts were kept to the web site or launcher. It's obvious what their intensions are, they're hoping people who can't control themselves money wise will splurge what they can in the store, the temptation will be much higher. It's like sticking a cake shop in a fat mans house and saying "you don't have to buy it if you don't". Why do you think F2p games do it? because players will be much more tempted to buy crap if it's sitting in their face all the time.
At the moment, yeah there is nothing on the store to be worried about, but that they've decided to move it in-game just makes me think there going to start adding more stuff. Why? because there is nothing in the store that warents having it in-game, everything on there is a one time payment, so logging off and hopping on the store isn't to much of a problem. but with items you buy every so often or have time limits, having the store in-game is needed.
Well the argument is still there, blizzard are just twats, think the 9 years has gone to their head. they're taking their playerbase for a ride and seeing how far they can go before people catch on. While the rest of us watch from the sidelines as they head towards the cliffs edge.