Out of Game Purchasables

Amathe

Like many I hate cash shops for in game items and perks. But candidly I have gone cash shopping myself from time to time.

I would really like to see more focus on out of game purchasables - hats, T shirts, coffee mugs, figurines, a poster showing your character, an art book, music, and so on.

Some games already have that, but I don't want to plug for them. 

No one can claim this is P2W, without first showing how a coffee mug gives you an in game advantage. 

Of course as I think about it I remember steins were often carried by Everquest magic users .....

Ok so not those ones.

Cryomatrix

You can get a lot of cool out of game stuff by going on etsy and typing the game name. There are some really cool starcraft things on etsy, so i figured other games would have them too.

Sovrath

are you posting this because of Pantheon's recent newsletter? 

Amathe

Nyctelios said:

I really like out of game items tied to events or expansions. Sadly enough most games won't ship them to where I live.

OMG I am jealous of you. I would love to live somewhere so far removed or private that people would not send me things.

Amathe

Sovrath said:

are you posting this because of Pantheon's recent newsletter? 

No. I have not seen one yet.

But I did see they have a store where they sell such things. Other games do too.

Like this one for GW:

https://www.forfansbyfans.com/fandom/detailView/guildwars2.html

anemo

That coffee mug will be used as paraphernalia to consume stimulants like caffeine.  Doping is the greatest form of P2W.  :sarcasm:

I really do wish CCP had a shop that worked, for how much time I've put in that game it's amazing I don't have something physical related to EVE.  I've gotten things from webcomics stores though.

delete5230

Several bad things wrong with this,
1 )  They will sell out of game stuff, then turn around and sell in games stuff anyway.
2 )  No one will buy any of it if no point in doing so for the players.
3 )  Your asking a gaming company to run a second business on the side including shipping and sales... Why not out source Amazon ? 

Last thing I want is an Asian T-shirt !

Albatroes

Unfortunately, sales of stuff like this are usually heavily tied to in-game rewards. SE is a prime example. Buy a 120$ Odin statue and get an exclusive emote. Sounds crazy to some but then you get in game and see a bunch of people using it makes you wonder.

Now is an emote P2W or influences gameplay in any way? Objective not; however, games are heavily focused on cosmetics, whether you're a casual or hardcore 'endgame elitist.' The 'power' you acquire from 'endgame' always has a life span. This is further skewed by most games automatically increasing the power creep over time. In games like WoW/FFXIV, you can do the same activities at the start of the expansion all the way to the end, never deviating, and always get stronger, but cosmetic rewards are always from the same content they get released from (kind of except in FFXIV for certain things).

So what was the point of me saying all of that? P2W is an objective term and usually used subjectively by the masses (it kind of doesn't make sense does it?). What that means is, even though cosmetics dont affect gameplay, they influence the people that want them, which in turn skews their ideology of what 'P2W' is simply because there exists something they want that is attached to something outside of the game as the only means to get it. Of course the 'easy' fix would be to not have collectibles associated with anything in-game, but we live in a world where companies dont want to just make money, they want to make ALL OF THE MONEY.

Po_gg

Albatroes said:

Unfortunately, sales of stuff like this are usually heavily tied to in-game rewards.

You don't even need to go too much "outside" the digital world: game tie-ins... Funcom was notorious in this, Park for TSW, and Exiles for AoC, you can even chalk up to this Hide&Shriek but at least that was just a cosmetic piece. (Park's Woodcutter was considered best-in-slot for a handful of builds... borderline p2w)

Personally I'm a hoarder, I love the collector's editions, merchs, t-shirts, etc. but there's a reason why most MMOs have such feature only on a superficial level. delete has already pointed it out:

delete5230 said:

3 )  Your asking a gaming company to run a second business on the side including shipping and sales...

It's too much of a hassle. They might do occasional giveaways for events, promos, with limited items for time to time. But to set up a merch store, that's a hard pass.

They rather do a partnership deal with an outside company - and usually those won't last long either.Demand ain't too high, and those players interested can get things from independent small companies too, for a similar or even lower price the MMO could offer if they had a store - sure, it won't be an official item, but you can have a miniature from your character, can order custom designed t-shirts, mugs, hoodies, etc. any time.

AlBQuirky

Amathe said:

Like many I hate cash shops for in game items and perks. But candidly I have gone cash shopping myself from time to time.

I would really like to see more focus on out of game purchasables - hats, T shirts, coffee mugs, figurines, a poster showing your character, an art book, music, and so on.

Some games already have that, but I don't want to plug for them. 

No one can claim this is P2W, without first showing how a coffee mug gives you an in game advantage. 

Of course as I think about it I remember steins were often carried by Everquest magic users .....

Ok so not those ones.

I don't see why not? I wear a lot of t-shirts! Why not game related ones? I drink loads of coffee! Why not from my favorite games' mugs? Posters, hats, and other paraphernalia would be interesting, too. A lot of streamers on Twitch have "stores" set up to buy channel related items.

I'm not so sure it would occur to companies who seem to rely on 3rd party vendors for game distribution. Making more work for these companies seem to be kicked out the top story window once they became "businesses first, game makers second"

MMOExposed

Where my full size Ashbringer sword?