Big money maker, and people seem to have no issue with getting 90% of the crap they don't want, just to get the one item they do want. I would rather just buy the item outright then subject myself to a game of chance. To each his own I guess but I really feel like we on the verge of this getting even more out of control, and many folks don't seem to mind it.
Keep in mind in GW2 you can can do the gold conversion which works out to be around 2300 gold in this case, but someone had to purchase that 9000 gems with cash at some point. I can now see why more and more companies have moved away from the sub based model. This seems way more lucrative. Back in the day that would buy you a years worth of gaming to a subscription based game. Can't say I see an increase in quality on the flip side either. They still charge you for expansions either way.
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if you are playing a game that is targeted toward the young and highly impressionable adults then yeah.
otherwise you have options
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doesnt one have to kinda sorta admit that Battlefront even without the lootboxes is a bit of scam of sorts anyway...I mean there really isnt anything we havent seen before so why act like its the second coming of christ?
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however good games are not gone, they are just not in the MMO space.
Its best to just accept it, find a clan and play some of these private server type games.
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I support cosmetic only loot boxes
"Oh well I got coins left over after i bought every cosmetic item in the store so I'll buy some exp pots, hmm need a few more coins...MOM can I use your CC again? its just $10!"
/facepalm* oh the good old days.....
So? Why is it a problem if some whales want to pour $1000 down the drain buying virtual clothing. It is not like you are forced to buy anything.
And if some whales pay through the roof for some virtual stuff, and i got my game subsidized ... so much the better.
If that was the worst we got we should be happy but it isn't. There are plenty of games selling lootboxes that actually matters.
However: Forever is a long time. While it is hard to close Pandoras box once it is opened there is the chance that the customers eventually tire of all the crap and stop buying games like that. Right now some but far from enough people are doing that but 5-10 years in the future that might very well change.
As long as it is profitable (and legal) to sell lootboxes many companies will. If it sells so many fewer games that actually skipping them will earn you more they will be gone.
I think they eventually will disappear but that make take a long time.
WoW wouldn't be subscription based if it started today, it only gets away with that model because it's been using it for so long and the players have a long time invested in the game. Compare that to say Rift or any one of the other ones and you have about zero time invested in those by comparison, so you're more apt to drop the game if you had to keep paying in order to play.
Reality is, none of these games have any real staying power over the long haul... just short spurts here and there.
Pantheon, Star CItizen, Chronicles of Elyria and the like, while as of now some have a store because the big companies are still trying to sell us shit games while these people are small groups of devs or privately funded dev groups trying to push out actual games instead of the same old tired store F2P shit some of us are just sick as shit of....oyi....don't mean to rant at ya btdt lol just releasing some tension lol
Modern MMOs are made so you max out your character in 2-3 weeks and only have to collect raid gear after that, there is no way you could spend as much time in them as Wow 2005 or EQ 1999, you will have so much less to do that only the superfans stay for more then a couple of months.
If you want to make a game people play for years instead for a month after each expansion you need to make playing long term fun again. The problem as I see it is that most devs want a quick profit, that you actually make more money long term with the old model matters little since most Ceos are gone long before the development time + 10 years are gone anyways so they rather have 300 mils 6 months after release then 100 mil each year for 10 years.
Short term fun is important too hook players but it is long term fun take actually made the genre a hit from the beginning and the lack of it is bleeding the genre rather badly. There were a lot of crap with the old P2P model as well, many games had rather bad and boring timesinks to keep the players busy but wee need a middle thing between EQ 1999 and todays game. Funny enough did Wow hit rather well there in 2004 but as soon as it started with expansions it started to loose that balance.
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Because Subsscription games die when forums like this don't like it... People see a price tag and balk unless the game has gotten glowing reviews from practically everyone.
With a F2P game, the developer can lull players in with a $0 price tag, then lock them in via their own progression or time investment... At that point, they can ramp up their monetization aggressiveness by introducing more and more things that competitive players want via the store.
This is basically what NCSoft did when Lineage II went "Truly Free."
I think people are confusing things a bit.
The goal of these game companies is to make the most amount of money possible. That's their priority, and they will develop suitable business models to make this happen.
Expansion Packs (always available on Day One, cause they intentionally don't finish the game to make sure you have to pay more for the other parts).
Tons of weapons, cosmetics, skins, etc. in cash shops.
Single Player Games are already there - particularly RPGs and Shooter-type games.
ARPGs are there as well - Path of Exile charges you for stash tabs.
What MMORPG doesn't charge you for character slots, these days.
The sad thing is that MMORPGs tend to have the worst F2P models - so restrictive, that they're more of a deterrent than an attraction; though some are changing this. Age of Conan's gold limit for Free Accounts comes to mind. I think even EQ2 is veering towards F2P at this point. I know I quit playing once they started chopping up content and putting it in the store (Age of Discovery), and never looked back.
Just let me buy the game, pay my subscription, and buy the expansions when they release... TYVM.
I think our problem is you "need" everything. Think of it this way, if i only get a level of a single player game for free, that is some free entertainment i would not otherwise have. So why complain?
Just enjoy the free part and move on.
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