(05-16-2014, 08:34 AM)Ignacius Wrote: Holy shit, are people dropping that much money in those games? Â How frequently are they doing that, do you think?
I mean, yeah, in that case, if you're bitching about subscriptions yet tossing more of that into a F2P game for gear, you need to reevaluate your reasons for playing. Â F2P games have one and only one advantage over the subscription games I've played: they're FREE-TO-PLAY! Â If you're actually dropping more money in a F2P game than 15$ a month, you've somehow missed the point.
There is an explanation though. Ever heard of the Less is More Idea?
Let's say FTPMMO1 has the following average of items on the shop.
5$ Boosters that last a week for 30% increase.
2.50$ crate keys to unlock lock boxes.
1$ per ingame like token to "gamble" on lottery styled boards with odds never in your favor
and cosmetic items ranging from 5$ for one item to 50$ for a whole set.
Now because the ingame store restricts the items to only be available on the store (With small exceptions of games that offer minor versions of exp boosts and such) people feel compelled to buy them at random times. Made worse by the fact that some items can only be obtained though the lottery system...made even FAR WORSE that those said items in boxes and lotteries are only around for say....2 months only before being replaced. Making them EVEN HARDER TO GET AND FORCING PEOPLE TO BUY MORE TO GET IT!
In time they can gamble anywhere between 25$ to 150$ alone. And no, the items in boxes and lotteries usually have no counterpart to obtain in the cash shop. the next example is Elsword's Ice Burners.
http://elwiki.net/w/Ice_Burners
You will see that a lot of the sets can't be obtained anymore and the entire ice burning thing is more or less a lottery with the starting price is 1$ per burner. The odds of obtaining a certain armor piece for the character you play is about 1/5 on top of the ludicrous RNG it has.Â
These free to plays are only masking the hideous forced buying through manipulating people's "drive to obtain all the lewts" mentality. The core essence of an RPG is to kill a monster and grab it's loot (which is another reason why FF13 sucked hard...) which then you use to kill stronger monsters for stronger loots.
in an MMO some of those loots are cosmetic and not so much needed but a "want" because it either looks pretty or it is only here for a limited time (See the Mists challenge mode armor.)
So when people say 15$ a month is too much, they are masking their shame of spending 55$ a month on useless shit and they know it. Plus most of the people who said that as well just feel like they NEED to play 15$ worth of a game to get the full experience....which is false. I pay 12$ a month for the FF14 game and i still think i got my share of content for what limits it has for characters.
People just are stupid to realize they spend more when no limit is given to them on a "store".