I wonder if people are naive or just plain stupid.
Who in their right minds thinks a company will let you play their game, which they spent millions on btw, for free and have exactly the same access as people who pay have...
That said, this whole thing about swtor f2p model is, to say the least, an exaggeration.
I've played as preferred (for which i spent a bit less than 5€ if i remember correctly) from 1-40, and aside from very minor things i have yet to run into something that really breaks my game experience. Not leveling at the same speed as other people is probably the biggest one, but i don't really like blowing through the leveling process specially for the 1st character and also when the lvling bits of the game are not dumbed down completely(which is something i like).
Overall i'd rate this f2p system much higher than most of the other f2p mmos, simply because having sub is apparently all you need and they won't squeeze you harder for important stuff beyond that which is the most important thing in f2p models for me, and there are some that go way beyond the sub if you want top access to everything...
11 pages boils down to "even tho they state clearly on their website what F2P, Preferred Statues and Subscriber gets you I still think I should get everything for free cause i played path of exiles and I bought swtor 3 years ago". Le sigh. I was hoping the forums here would be a step up from the official forum whining. I fail at understanding the interweb.
I have not seen the latest statistics, however, about a year ago it was determined by internal analysts for some of the larger game companies that the average F2P player will spend $80 a month on a game, compared to the $12.99 - $14.99 that subscription players pay.
Micro-transactions are sneaky in that way. You spend $1.99 here, $4.99 there, etc... and before you know it you're well above a basic subscription. It's designed that way to be misleading. It's the same reason that stores put prices at $19.99 instead of $20. We're wired to view things considerably cheaper because we do not register their actual price as our minds mislead us by reading the lower number. Most of the population view that as $19 when in all truth it is $20.
It's consumer psychology at it's best. EA knows this, they have made a fortune by using it to their advantage, as have many other companies.
I think we will reach a point very soon where people will finally start talking with their money and not be willing to put up with the constant shady accounting going on.
Star Citizen is the perfect example. F2P models like SW: TOR have paved the way for people like Chris Roberts to generate $61 million dollars in free money. It's pure insanity. We would never do this with any other product.
Originally posted by Calgor 11 pages boils down to "even tho they state clearly on their website what F2P, Preferred Statues and Subscriber gets you I still think I should get everything for free cause i played path of exiles and I bought swtor 3 years ago". Le sigh. I was hoping the forums here would be a step up from the official forum whining. I fail at understanding the interweb.
Oh maybe this will help you understand this section of the interweb...
So I came back today, or I was going to, I bought the game at launch and played for a few days with a friend, logged in when it went F2P and you had to pay for actionbars, and then I decide to redownload it today and I see this. (http://i.imgur.com/3SEMFiE.png)
I also checked out the free to play restrictions, they seem pretty horrible, you can't sprint until you're level 10 as F2P, but if you pay you have it unlocked at level 1, chat restrictions, support restrictions. I would've rather paid for a subscription today and be even with everybody else, this game even outlines how F2P it is on it's restrictions page. (http://www.swtor.com/free/features)
Idk, it just seems like a complete mess, like most of these business models.. /shrug
You don't have to pay for anything. All those unlockables you mention can be bought on the Auction House.
Secondly, The XP Boost was for anyone who pre-ordered the expansion before Nov 2nd and had a subscription. It was an incentive to purchase the expansion and gain subs, not just an xp boost for subs.
You admit you don't even know what the credit cap is? So you don't even play the VIDEO GAME you are attempting to bash...well since you DONT play let me educate you a little. Those who sell the unlocks DO KNOW what the credit limit is. Those selling these unlocks also know who they are selling too. You put these two together and yes MOST unlocks go for far less than the credit cap.
"False advertising " please point out where the "false advertising " is on the following link...
You admit you don't even know what the credit cap is? So you don't even play the VIDEO GAME you are attempting to bash...well since you DONT play let me educate you a little. Those who sell the unlocks DO KNOW what the credit limit is. Those selling these unlocks also know who they are selling too. You put these two together and yes MOST unlocks go for far less than the credit cap.
"False advertising " please point out where the "false advertising " is on the following link...
As much fun it is to educate those like you, I recommend you stick to topics you may actually have some knowledge on...
False advertisement with a misleading title "F2P" which stands for Free to Play. This phrase is being abused by the gaming industry to mislead people into thinking it is F2P which of course, it is not. I'm not saying it would decrease revenue or server population, but calling these games Free to Explore is a more accurate assessment.
SWTOR's F2P model is definitely not Free to Play, which is the whole point of this thread. Apparently the UK and maybe a few other European countries have a government smart enough to not put up with it anymore. The U.S. has better things to do then protect it's consumers.
EDIT: As for not knowing the exact amount on the credit cap was actually in your favor. It's not even close to 350k, it's only 200k which most cash shop unlocks do not sell for, sorry.
Just for fun im looking at the GNT...
Customization Control: Display Legacy and Title: 100K
Originally posted by Tasslehoff35 Originally posted by RhoklawOriginally posted by Tasslehoff35@RhoklawYou admit you don't even know what the credit cap is? So you don't even play the VIDEO GAME you are attempting to bash...well since you DONT play let me educate you a little. Those who sell the unlocks DO KNOW what the credit limit is. Those selling these unlocks also know who they are selling too. You put these two together and yes MOST unlocks go for far less than the credit cap. "False advertising " please point out where the "false advertising " is on the following link...http://www.swtor.com/free/featuresAs much fun it is to educate those like you, I recommend you stick to topics you may actually have some knowledge on...
False advertisement with a misleading title "F2P" which stands for Free to Play. This phrase is being abused by the gaming industry to mislead people into thinking it is F2P which of course, it is not. I'm not saying it would decrease revenue or server population, but calling these games Free to Explore is a more accurate assessment.SWTOR's F2P model is definitely not Free to Play, which is the whole point of this thread. Apparently the UK and maybe a few other European countries have a government smart enough to not put up with it anymore. The U.S. has better things to do then protect it's consumers.EDIT: As for not knowing the exact amount on the credit cap was actually in your favor. It's not even close to 350k, it's only 200k which most cash shop unlocks do not sell for, sorry.Just for fun im looking at the GNT...
Customization Control: Display Legacy and Title: 100K
Galatic Trade network 10 sale slots: 105K
Unlock Inventory Module: 115K
Unlock Cargo Hold: 145K
Newcomer bundle 200K
Just to name a few for you...
Not having any of that doesn't prevent you from playing... for free. While I sub, my wife has not dropped a dime in months... she plays for free. It's pretty simple.
So I came back today, or I was going to, I bought the game at launch and played for a few days with a friend, logged in when it went F2P and you had to pay for actionbars, and then I decide to redownload it today and I see this. (http://i.imgur.com/3SEMFiE.png)
I also checked out the free to play restrictions, they seem pretty horrible, you can't sprint until you're level 10 as F2P, but if you pay you have it unlocked at level 1, chat restrictions, support restrictions. I would've rather paid for a subscription today and be even with everybody else, this game even outlines how F2P it is on it's restrictions page. (http://www.swtor.com/free/features)
Idk, it just seems like a complete mess, like most of these business models.. /shrug
There is not a single real free to play game out there and if there was, you wouldn't want to play it. I really suggest you get over it, move on, or subscribe.
You admit you don't even know what the credit cap is? So you don't even play the VIDEO GAME you are attempting to bash...well since you DONT play let me educate you a little. Those who sell the unlocks DO KNOW what the credit limit is. Those selling these unlocks also know who they are selling too. You put these two together and yes MOST unlocks go for far less than the credit cap.
"False advertising " please point out where the "false advertising " is on the following link...
As much fun it is to educate those like you, I recommend you stick to topics you may actually have some knowledge on...
False advertisement with a misleading title "F2P" which stands for Free to Play. This phrase is being abused by the gaming industry to mislead people into thinking it is F2P which of course, it is not. I'm not saying it would decrease revenue or server population, but calling these games Free to Explore is a more accurate assessment.
SWTOR's F2P model is definitely not Free to Play, which is the whole point of this thread. Apparently the UK and maybe a few other European countries have a government smart enough to not put up with it anymore. The U.S. has better things to do then protect it's consumers.
EDIT: As for not knowing the exact amount on the credit cap was actually in your favor. It's not even close to 350k, it's only 200k which most cash shop unlocks do not sell for, sorry.
Yeah... F2P is not getting charged to play the game, I don't know why that concept is so hard to grasp. Yes, they do put restrictions to the game to make you feel that you NEED to subscribe to get the full experience, but you are not required to have a subscription to play the game, so therefor it is F2P. It's not that hard to understand. Also, you can buy all those restrictions with in-game cash, you just have to play harder.
We are all puppets in a fancy show, the trick is to seize the ropes that bind us, and become the puppeteer
Originally posted by ElRenmazuo F2P players have no idea how good they have it these days because back in the day sub mmos only had a 7 day free trial and then you had to sub if you wanted to keep playing it.
My point is the complete opposite of this though, I'd rather pay $10-$15 a month and be equal to everybody else than being able to potentially spend thousands of dollars in a cash shop and being able to level 12x faster than others just because I paid.
But your point is kinda invalid because you can subscribe and you are right there with everyone else. F2P should have tons of restrictions that they can pay to have removed. The main problem with this game is that even if you pay you have to pretty much have to unlock it on every toon or pay 2 or 3 times as much to do an account unlock.
I think the guy was right, the point he was trying to make was there was no F2P, you got a trail if you where lucky for a few days and then you paid to play or you didn't play.
F2P is horrible for the gaming community. It just leads to the publisher lining their pockets with money they would have never gotten if it was a P2P game. Lot of people tend to spend 3 times as much as the cost of a subscription without really thinking about it.
I quit the first month of launch right after the Ilum debacle. To me, charging for action bars is too much. I refuse to sub to a game that does that.
I did return briefly to level a different class but there's too much overlap between classes leveling and only one path to level. They desperately needed two leveling paths like WOW provided on launch.
False advertisement with a misleading title "F2P" which stands for Free to Play. This phrase is being abused by the gaming industry to mislead people into thinking it is F2P which of course, it is not. I'm not saying it would decrease revenue or server population, but calling these games Free to Explore is a more accurate assessment.
SWTOR's F2P model is definitely not Free to Play, which is the whole point of this thread. Apparently the UK and maybe a few other European countries have a government smart enough to not put up with it anymore. The U.S. has better things to do then protect it's consumers.
EDIT: As for not knowing the exact amount on the credit cap was actually in your favor. It's not even close to 350k, it's only 200k which most cash shop unlocks do not sell for, sorry.
Yeah... F2P is not getting charged to play the game, I don't know why that concept is so hard to grasp. Yes, they do put restrictions to the game to make you feel that you NEED to subscribe to get the full experience, but you are not required to have a subscription to play the game, so therefor it is F2P. It's not that hard to understand. Also, you can buy all those restrictions with in-game cash, you just have to play harder.
(Broadly speaking)
EA were found "guilty" of "advertising" Dungeon Keeper Online as a F2P title when it wasn't by the UK's Advertising Standard's Authority (ASA). They judged that a reasonable person couldn't play for free.
This triggered the UK's Office of Fair Trading to "activate" the guidelines it had previously published
The guidelines were then adopted by the EU (EU wide).
(Assumed) Fear of possible EU lawsuits led to Apple renaming its F2P titles as "Get to Play".
A more recent case that came before the ASA - involving a child's game that promoted itself as f2p - was thrown out. In a nutshell it was about transparency as well as whether the game was playable.
If you check out the guidelines or the reasons behind the above ASA decisions and apply them to SWTOR then you would conclude that SWTOR qualifies as a f2p game.
As for unlocking the restrictions on GTN in theory yes, realistically no. A few things maybe. When the game first went f2p maybe - a higher percentage of subscribers perhaps. Today GTN is pretty dead when it comes to unlocks. This doesn't mean that the game cannot be played without spending anything.
Originally posted by Calgor 11 pages boils down to "even tho they state clearly on their website what F2P, Preferred Statues and Subscriber gets you I still think I should get everything for free cause i played path of exiles and I bought swtor 3 years ago". Le sigh. I was hoping the forums here would be a step up from the official forum whining. I fail at understanding the interweb.
Oh maybe this will help you understand this section of the interweb...
its called the entitlement mentality...
Nice spin on what is obviously "False Advertisement" but who cares right?
False advertising? ROFLMAO now THAT'S spin! They say right on their website what you get at each level. Its not hidden in some mega-paragraph of tiny print at the bottom of a page. Keep on whining about not getting what you didn't pay for when they told you upfront what was in store for F2Pers, its not silly at all I promise.
Comments
I wonder if people are naive or just plain stupid.
Who in their right minds thinks a company will let you play their game, which they spent millions on btw, for free and have exactly the same access as people who pay have...
That said, this whole thing about swtor f2p model is, to say the least, an exaggeration.
I've played as preferred (for which i spent a bit less than 5€ if i remember correctly) from 1-40, and aside from very minor things i have yet to run into something that really breaks my game experience. Not leveling at the same speed as other people is probably the biggest one, but i don't really like blowing through the leveling process specially for the 1st character and also when the lvling bits of the game are not dumbed down completely(which is something i like).
Overall i'd rate this f2p system much higher than most of the other f2p mmos, simply because having sub is apparently all you need and they won't squeeze you harder for important stuff beyond that which is the most important thing in f2p models for me, and there are some that go way beyond the sub if you want top access to everything...
I have not seen the latest statistics, however, about a year ago it was determined by internal analysts for some of the larger game companies that the average F2P player will spend $80 a month on a game, compared to the $12.99 - $14.99 that subscription players pay.
Micro-transactions are sneaky in that way. You spend $1.99 here, $4.99 there, etc... and before you know it you're well above a basic subscription. It's designed that way to be misleading. It's the same reason that stores put prices at $19.99 instead of $20. We're wired to view things considerably cheaper because we do not register their actual price as our minds mislead us by reading the lower number. Most of the population view that as $19 when in all truth it is $20.
It's consumer psychology at it's best. EA knows this, they have made a fortune by using it to their advantage, as have many other companies.
I think we will reach a point very soon where people will finally start talking with their money and not be willing to put up with the constant shady accounting going on.
Star Citizen is the perfect example. F2P models like SW: TOR have paved the way for people like Chris Roberts to generate $61 million dollars in free money. It's pure insanity. We would never do this with any other product.
Oh maybe this will help you understand this section of the interweb...
its called the entitlement mentality...
You don't have to pay for anything. All those unlockables you mention can be bought on the Auction House.
Secondly, The XP Boost was for anyone who pre-ordered the expansion before Nov 2nd and had a subscription. It was an incentive to purchase the expansion and gain subs, not just an xp boost for subs.
@Rhoklaw
You admit you don't even know what the credit cap is? So you don't even play the VIDEO GAME you are attempting to bash...well since you DONT play let me educate you a little. Those who sell the unlocks DO KNOW what the credit limit is. Those selling these unlocks also know who they are selling too. You put these two together and yes MOST unlocks go for far less than the credit cap.
"False advertising " please point out where the "false advertising " is on the following link...
http://www.swtor.com/free/features
As much fun it is to educate those like you, I recommend you stick to topics you may actually have some knowledge on...
Just for fun im looking at the GNT...
Customization Control: Display Legacy and Title: 100K
Galatic Trade network 10 sale slots: 105K
Unlock Inventory Module: 115K
Unlock Cargo Hold: 145K
Newcomer bundle 200K
Just to name a few for you...
So you can't play SWTOR for free?
Just for fun im looking at the GNT...
Customization Control: Display Legacy and Title: 100K
Galatic Trade network 10 sale slots: 105K
Unlock Inventory Module: 115K
Unlock Cargo Hold: 145K
Newcomer bundle 200K
Just to name a few for you...
Not having any of that doesn't prevent you from playing... for free. While I sub, my wife has not dropped a dime in months... she plays for free. It's pretty simple.
There is not a single real free to play game out there and if there was, you wouldn't want to play it. I really suggest you get over it, move on, or subscribe.
Yeah... F2P is not getting charged to play the game, I don't know why that concept is so hard to grasp. Yes, they do put restrictions to the game to make you feel that you NEED to subscribe to get the full experience, but you are not required to have a subscription to play the game, so therefor it is F2P. It's not that hard to understand. Also, you can buy all those restrictions with in-game cash, you just have to play harder.
We are all puppets in a fancy show, the trick is to seize the ropes that bind us, and become the puppeteer
I really feel like the F2P models work as intended...
If you're a free player, you'll be worse off, but you still can play through most of the important content.
If you play anything free I don't really see why people complain? Devs listen to 2 things... paying customers and the media.
But your point is kinda invalid because you can subscribe and you are right there with everyone else. F2P should have tons of restrictions that they can pay to have removed. The main problem with this game is that even if you pay you have to pretty much have to unlock it on every toon or pay 2 or 3 times as much to do an account unlock.
I think the guy was right, the point he was trying to make was there was no F2P, you got a trail if you where lucky for a few days and then you paid to play or you didn't play.
F2P is horrible for the gaming community. It just leads to the publisher lining their pockets with money they would have never gotten if it was a P2P game. Lot of people tend to spend 3 times as much as the cost of a subscription without really thinking about it.
I quit the first month of launch right after the Ilum debacle. To me, charging for action bars is too much. I refuse to sub to a game that does that.
I did return briefly to level a different class but there's too much overlap between classes leveling and only one path to level. They desperately needed two leveling paths like WOW provided on launch.
(Broadly speaking)
A more recent case that came before the ASA - involving a child's game that promoted itself as f2p - was thrown out. In a nutshell it was about transparency as well as whether the game was playable.
If you check out the guidelines or the reasons behind the above ASA decisions and apply them to SWTOR then you would conclude that SWTOR qualifies as a f2p game.
As for unlocking the restrictions on GTN in theory yes, realistically no. A few things maybe. When the game first went f2p maybe - a higher percentage of subscribers perhaps. Today GTN is pretty dead when it comes to unlocks. This doesn't mean that the game cannot be played without spending anything.
False advertising? ROFLMAO now THAT'S spin! They say right on their website what you get at each level. Its not hidden in some mega-paragraph of tiny print at the bottom of a page. Keep on whining about not getting what you didn't pay for when they told you upfront what was in store for F2Pers, its not silly at all I promise.