Microtransactions, games as business and a discussion of profits and monetization

Carbonised

A lot of the time when we discuss prices for stuff here in ESO, someone always without fail pops into the discussion and writes something along the lines of "They are a company, they need to make money. They need money to keep the servers going, to develop new content etc."

On the surface, it might seem like a reasonable statement, but if you have any interest in the way modern games are monetized, tweaked for maximizing profits, and perhaps have followed some of the latest furore regarding especially EA and their microtransaction scheme, I suggest you take 12 minutes to listen to good old Boogie2988 explaining the flipside of that argument, and especially how and why we got into this situation where we are drowning under "games as a service", microtransactions, monetization schemes and psychological manipulation on such a degree that it's now even drawing the attention of politicians and government lawmakers.

While the video is primarily talking about single player games and especially EA, the same principles could easily be applied here to ESO and their monetization through the Crown Store and especially lootboxes, ahem, Crown Crates. Cosmetics, especially RNG-rewarded cosmetics, and also an ever creeping "pay to progress" or selling of Crown Store "services" to bypass the actual ingame time sinks, are designed not to "get their money back" or even "get their money back twice, or thrice", but like Boogie says in the video, to get as much money back as humanly possible from their cash cattle, aka playerbase.

I found it an interesting video, which also mirrored pretty much my own thoughts regarding the current state of monetization in modern day gaming, and I particularly found it interesting when you apply the same line of thought to a game such as ESO, and the back and forth discussions we have had through the years regarding ZOS' cash shop. I hope you will find it interesting too.

Electrone_Magnus

I don't like the fact that some stuff is too hard to get because its also sold in the crown store like the buoyant armiger motifs,the robust refabricated centurion or the rare blueprints. The rest of the stuff is fine though except the radiant apex mounts.

Bax

However, you miss a basic difference between this game and some EA game. This is MMORPG. It's continuously developed. Require continuously running online services in large scale. Simply development of game is iterative with continuous releases of a new content.

Traditional EA games which are criticized are developed in one iteration.

Now you could argue, that they also release content for a while and also require online access, but the game has some concrete support period. Once that ends, they might release next generation of that game. MMORPG doesn't work like that, or just really rarely. We will hardly see ESO2 and ESO itself will run for time during which several generations of the EA-type of games would be released. And when it comes to online access, multiplayer is nearly completely different concept than online play in MMORPGs. Also if online access is required in single player mode, that is mostly there as anti-pirate protection. So also something quite different.

People often use arguments which works in single player world for MMORPGs and that's wrong as well.

Now that being said, I'm completely against random lootboxes, but I am fully in favour of microtransactions for cosmetics (tho I would prefer direct payment instead of proxy currencies), especially in MMORPG field. Unless the game has mandatory subscription, then I'm against such practices.

Also I am ok with lootboxes if they are implemented in a fair way. I saw this so far only in one game and it's not ESO unfortunatelly. The system there was that you had finite set of lootboxes, lets say 200 lootboxes with 5 items each. Then you had finite set of 1000 items (rare item was only once in a set, more common items 20+ times). Now each time you purchased lootbox, items you drew were taken out of that items set meaning after 200 opened boxes you had whole set of those 1000 items. If you were hunting only for 1 specific item, you could reset the box content anytime, so if you get lucky early and got that rare item you could reset it and try again. Also you could see the current state of the item pool anytime you wanted.

I think this pseudo random implementation of mechanic is quite fair and I would accept it in more games

Aisle9

Carbonised

Bax wrote: »

However, you miss a basic difference between this game and some EA game. This is MMORPG. It's continuously developed. Require continuously running online services in large scale. Simply development of game is iterative with continuous releases of a new content.

It's quite irrelevant though. Zenimax, just like EA, isn't "just making their money back", or twice over, or thrice over. You can rest assured that Zenimax is earning a tremendous load of money off of us, which again renders the whole argument of "they need money to keep the servers going" really moot.

If you did watch the video, instead of just replying to my comment, you would also see that EA isn't the only one being mentioned, Rockstar's GTA V/Online is also being mentioned as a real cash machine, albeit one of the more benign ones.

Carbonised

Aisle9 wrote: »

[/img]

Thanks for contributing meaningfully to the discussion? You do realise that the more brainless memes that are posted, the more possibility for actually getting the thread locked? But maybe that is your goal all along.

In any case, there has been plenty of discussion about the monetization of ESO and opinions about the Crown Store, and as long as it's being kept in a civil tone, it hasn't been moderated at all.
So I really can't see why you would think a thread like this should be calling to be locked *shrug*.

SugaComa

ESO pricing on crown items is mental ... But if people are paying it so be it, but doesn't mean I have to

Let's look at housing as an example

You can buy a house for 13000 crowns , that's £64.97

Which in its self is mental when you think a new chapter is £39.99 and the base game cost me £44.99

klowdy1

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

DieAlteHexe

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

Yeah, the "horse" is pretty much a smear of goo by now.

The gaming world has changed, the genie is out of the bottle and is not going back in. Despite objections, it will carry on in some form or another.

Narvuntien

Games are extremely expensive to make and players expect them to be low cost/free.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhWGQCzAtl8

Wrubius_Coronaria

Thank you for sharing it, it's a very interesting video indeed.

I remember, when ESO was released in 2014, I was really offended ot see they were selling the palomino horse and imperial upgrade in addition to the game base.
Actually and sadly, I've spent a lot of money (mounts, crown crates and oher stupid stuff), and I'm feeling addicted to all this bad microtransactions, and I hate what they did with the game, just turned it into a giant cash grab machine. What I can say, their manipulation is quite effective sadly.

And now, microtransaction have invaded so many aspects of the game, and affects them in a bad way.

Crown store exclusive furnitures for housing.
Really low droprate for some motifs, (buoyant armiger) to incite purchase in crown store. Crown crate in this case.
Abyssal droprate for furnitures blueprint. (almost non existant for clockwork city)
The best skin, bloodforge, from horn of the reach sold in crown store and replaced by a poor helmet as reward in dungeon, while the really ugly other one remain as reward.
And so many others things similars.

Edit, I'd like to share a thought about droprate of rewards in crowncrates: I'm sure the chance to loot something like an apex reward is affected by the number of items in our collection and the money we spent for buying crowns.
the more you spent, the worse will be your loots to encourage you to spend more money.

The microtransaction has its roots implanted in many aspects of the game and goes beyond the window of the crownstore. This is why I think this game is like a rotten apple eaten half by the worms.

Despite its microtransactions the game has good quests, dungeons and environnments.

heaven13

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

But crowns (ie money just in a psuedo currency to mask the real life cost of items) is a HUGE driving point to this entire game. If you want DLCs, you pay crowns, which also means those items are locked to only half your account, despite crowns themselves crossing servers. If you want more than 8 character slots, you pay crowns. If, oh crap, I misspelled my toon's name, but really like their look you...yep, that's right, have to pay 2500 crowns or the real life equivalent of $25 (which, by the way, is $10 more expensive than a new slot).

That's not even getting into the cosmetics that "no one is forced to buy". Cosmetics and "pay-for-convenience" items have become the bread and butter for ESO as well as the meat and veggies. Sure, no one is going to make me spend my real life money on a digital house or pixel mount. But when, as SugaComa pointed out above, digital houses are costing more than the game or even a new chapter, it's time to consider if the term microtransaction is really what we want to call these in-game purchases. Because micro, they are not.

Aisle9

Carbonised wrote: »

Aisle9 wrote: »

[/img]

Thanks for contributing meaningfully to the discussion? You do realise that the more brainless memes that are posted, the more possibility for actually getting the thread locked? But maybe that is your goal all along.

In any case, there has been plenty of discussion about the monetization of ESO and opinions about the Crown Store, and as long as it's being kept in a civil tone, it hasn't been moderated at all.
So I really can't see why you would think a thread like this should be calling to be locked *shrug*.

You are welcome.

Not sure why did you assume my goal was to get the thread locked, but hey, everyone is entitled to their point of view, not matter how wrong it is.

Hope this helps.
Safe travels.

Carbonised

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

No, I'm not going to stop making discussions simply because you don't want to hear any more about it.

I mean, as the moderators usually say here on the forums, if you there is something you don't like to discuss, you're free to simply just move on to the next topic.

Discussions about monetization and payment has been the hot topic in thr gaming industry all winter, and it's a heated topic here in ESO as well, and of course we are going to discuss it continually.

If you think it's a dead horse and don't want to participate, you do know where the door is.

Carbonised

Narvuntien wrote: »

Games are extremely expensive to make and players expect them to be low cost/free.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhWGQCzAtl8

The video I linked in the original post is actually a reply to that video.

Basically what Boogie is saying is that yes, video games have become larger and cost more money to make, but the audience has also become massively larger than it used to.

And yes, while it probably would make more sense to raise prices from 60 dollars to 70 or even 80, companies are not going to do that simply because it is so much more profitable to instead monetize your game via microtransactions, day 1 DLC, year passes etc etc.

And his final point, everyone with a bit of common sense knows it isn't about making your ends meet or making just enough money to pay emplyees and keep the servers going. Every one of these stock traded companies or shareholding companies (Zenimax included) are going to try and bring home as much money as they possibly can to their stockholders, shareholders and investors, even if it means deploying every possible gambling and psychological scheme in the book in order to do so.

Just look at the annual numbers from big companies like EA and Zenimax, and it's pretty clear they have struck a gold ore with this whole microtransaction era, and they're now mining it for as much as they can.

aubrey.baconb16_ESO

heaven13 wrote: »

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

But crowns (ie money just in a psuedo currency to mask the real life cost of items) is a HUGE driving point to this entire game. If you want DLCs, you pay crowns, which also means those items are locked to only half your account, despite crowns themselves crossing servers. If you want more than 8 character slots, you pay crowns. If, oh crap, I misspelled my toon's name, but really like their look you...yep, that's right, have to pay 2500 crowns or the real life equivalent of $25 (which, by the way, is $10 more expensive than a new slot).

That's not even getting into the cosmetics that "no one is forced to buy". Cosmetics and "pay-for-convenience" items have become the bread and butter for ESO as well as the meat and veggies. Sure, no one is going to make me spend my real life money on a digital house or pixel mount. But when, as SugaComa pointed out above, digital houses are costing more than the game or even a new chapter, it's time to consider if the term microtransaction is really what we want to call these in-game purchases. Because micro, they are not.

And what do you recommend as the alternative funding model to deliver the bread and butter plus meat and veggies for ZOS to continue developing ESO.

Or do you believe that current subscribers plus DLC sales are adequate to cover current running costs?

What about the original multi-million dollar investment to write the game, do you believe that it is paid off?

Where do you get your insider knowledge of ZOS's finances from?

Carbonised

aubrey.baconb16_ESO wrote: »

heaven13 wrote: »

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

But crowns (ie money just in a psuedo currency to mask the real life cost of items) is a HUGE driving point to this entire game. If you want DLCs, you pay crowns, which also means those items are locked to only half your account, despite crowns themselves crossing servers. If you want more than 8 character slots, you pay crowns. If, oh crap, I misspelled my toon's name, but really like their look you...yep, that's right, have to pay 2500 crowns or the real life equivalent of $25 (which, by the way, is $10 more expensive than a new slot).

That's not even getting into the cosmetics that "no one is forced to buy". Cosmetics and "pay-for-convenience" items have become the bread and butter for ESO as well as the meat and veggies. Sure, no one is going to make me spend my real life money on a digital house or pixel mount. But when, as SugaComa pointed out above, digital houses are costing more than the game or even a new chapter, it's time to consider if the term microtransaction is really what we want to call these in-game purchases. Because micro, they are not.

And what do you recommend as the alternative funding model to deliver the bread and butter plus meat and veggies for ZOS to continue developing ESO.

Or do you believe that current subscribers plus DLC sales are adequate to cover current running costs?

What about the original multi-million dollar investment to write the game, do you believe that it is paid off?

Where do you get your insider knowledge of ZOS's finances from?

ZeniMax Media has in less than 10 years more than doubled its value from 1.2 billion dollars in 2007 to 2.5 billion dollars in 2016.

Do you really think they are lacking money for bread and butter?

Btw, do yourself and actually watch the video in the post before posting some comment that the video actually adresses.

Kel

Carbonised wrote: »

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

No, I'm not going to stop making discussions simply because you don't want to hear any more about it.

I mean, as the moderators usually say here on the forums, if you there is something you don't like to discuss, you're free to simply just move on to the next topic.

Discussions about monetization and payment has been the hot topic in thr gaming industry all winter, and it's a heated topic here in ESO as well, and of course we are going to discuss it continually.

If you think it's a dead horse and don't want to participate, you do know where the door is.

The problem with this kind of thinking is that it can be flipped.
If you don't like lootboxes and the business side of ESO, you know where the door is.

Prof_Bawbag

No idea why the finger always gets pointed squarely at the devs. I mean, if we the gamers didn't encourage them to fleece us, it wouldn't make financial sense to keep pushing micro transactions etc onto us.

We buy them. Hell, look back over the forums there's also threads created by gamers who actively encourage Zeni charge us for this item or for 'X' to be implemented before the event. "OMFG, I'd pay 5 month wages for this feature" etc. We're our own worse enemy.

SlinkySlack

The question I have is: Why is the abundant profit not used to fix the really important stuff that is broken before its to late? I'm sure they have their allocated budget to work with, but if there is no repair money in budget, why not use some of the profit to address the problems.

It can only be one of 2 things:
1 they have realized very early on that the main problems can not be fixed and thus they rather develop new "salt lick" items for their "cash cows", I'm one as well since I pay eso+ since ps4 launch together with the
crowns/month I buy. So they will just milk us until there is no one left to milk, or

2 they are so consumed with greed and target profit that they really just don't care about "our" issues with the game and they will milk whom ever is available to milk, in other words milking the new players until they leave and then just milk the new ones coming in.

Both these reasons for NOT fixing the game seems very possible to me. Like I said I've played ESO since PS4 launch and from there I've been promised better performance with every patch but instead found more and more LAG each time they patch. Currently I can not play any vet content, ANY. No vet trials for I can not reach 30k dps any more, right now I'm getting 12 to 14k DPS and it does not matter which character with whichever build and gear, does not matter if my own or internet build I just can not reach above 14k DPS anymore. Basically I can harvest and play casual, helping others level and so forth.

I really hate the fact that I've made piece with the fact that I'll never be able to play vet again, never be able to go on trials, the one thing I loved most. I've made piece with the fact that ESO has become selective for it is only for players living close to sever. Those with distance to server lag are fooked, like me. I've hate that I've made piece with the fact that ESO is not for me anymore. To think there was a time in my life that I thanked all the gods for I truly believed that they made this game especially for me. I truly loved ESO, but LAG with broken game have twisted that love into hate and I feel gloomy these days just by logging in. But let me buy that new skirt for my toon, then at least I can look good doing nothing, hey!!
Can not wait for FARCRY5, hopefully that will brake my ESO addiction.

Carbonised

Prof_Bawbag wrote: »

No idea why the finger always gets pointed squarely at the devs. I mean, if we the gamers didn't encourage them to fleece us, it wouldn't make financial sense to keep pushing micro transactions etc onto us.

We buy them. Hell, look back over the forums there's also threads created by gamers who actively encourage Zeni charge us for this item or for 'X' to be implemented before the event. "OMFG, I'd pay 5 month wages for this feature" etc. We're our own worse enemy.

I love it when I specifically link and mention a 12 minute video in my original post, and not a single person takes the time to watch it before making comments about everything under the sun

Actually Boogie does mention at the end of the video, that the problem is also partially created by us, him, we who support these monetization schemes. And I fully agree with that as well.

However, it's pretty much the same as saying "why is it always the tobacco and alcohol companies who are to blame, if people just didn't smoke and drink they wouldn't be doing this".

I believe the blame is partially to be laid in front of the consumers - us - and partially in front of the large companies who take advantage of said people.

RobbieRocket

I would like games and game development to be an art form satisfying customers and developers alike with the result.

I think in the 1980s games were developed in a way that was fun and had elements of escapism. If we move to games today - which contain many of the things I dreamed of such as immersion and multiplayer-in-same-world - the games have evolved and by that I simply mean, evolved. Some elements are more desirable than others but they are all the result of that evolution, changes that have happened slowly over time as a result of real-world environment as well as technological advancement.

There is also a "herd" element going on here, herding by business and herding by customer.

Then there is the susceptibility/addiction element. Many addictions are related to a specific part of the brain that deals with positive feeling, craving, desire, a motivation for something that can often override social, moral, ethical, financial and logical reasoning. The chemistry of hard drugs is often used as the cause for addiction yet we know that how we connect with society, fulfill our lives or feel a part of things very much effects our susceptibility to addiction.

Gambling, as in proper old school money on the horses, lottery, bets on a fight, multi-bets on a round of sports matches, poker for money, slot machines...is such a thing. It is oh-so rewarding to win. It is oh-so thrilling to try, and it is oh-so not really as off-putting as it should be to lose.

It's easy to sit here and write about how our brains work.

In the end ESO is set up as it is because it can be, other enterprises behave in this way, even individuals do what we do because we can. Sometimes we may grab some extra ESO time to fix something up or finish a set, a quest, something because we can, when perhaps there was a real world activity we probably should be taking care of.

And then of course, we click on that extra crown purchase because we can, just in the same way. And thus the system is complete, inadvertently supporting and giving positive feedback a thousandfold the sound of this thread to the system that it works.

One day, maybe, when we look at how dependency is duped into consumerism in all walks of life (here, for example) and how quality of life becomes indiscernible, from addiction and how risk-taking is a positive skill (but really where's the "chance" factor in all this), then maybe it will be cool to just put out a non-profit product "because we can".

Until that time, here we are.

xbobx

Bax wrote: »

However, you miss a basic difference between this game and some EA game. This is MMORPG. It's continuously developed. Require continuously running online services in large scale. Simply development of game is iterative with continuous releases of a new content.

Traditional EA games which are criticized are developed in one iteration.

Now you could argue, that they also release content for a while and also require online access, but the game has some concrete support period. Once that ends, they might release next generation of that game. MMORPG doesn't work like that, or just really rarely. We will hardly see ESO2 and ESO itself will run for time during which several generations of the EA-type of games would be released. And when it comes to online access, multiplayer is nearly completely different concept than online play in MMORPGs. Also if online access is required in single player mode, that is mostly there as anti-pirate protection. So also something quite different.

People often use arguments which works in single player world for MMORPGs and that's wrong as well.

Now that being said, I'm completely against random lootboxes, but I am fully in favour of microtransactions for cosmetics (tho I would prefer direct payment instead of proxy currencies), especially in MMORPG field. Unless the game has mandatory subscription, then I'm against such practices.

Also I am ok with lootboxes if they are implemented in a fair way. I saw this so far only in one game and it's not ESO unfortunatelly. The system there was that you had finite set of lootboxes, lets say 200 lootboxes with 5 items each. Then you had finite set of 1000 items (rare item was only once in a set, more common items 20+ times). Now each time you purchased lootbox, items you drew were taken out of that items set meaning after 200 opened boxes you had whole set of those 1000 items. If you were hunting only for 1 specific item, you could reset the box content anytime, so if you get lucky early and got that rare item you could reset it and try again. Also you could see the current state of the item pool anytime you wanted.

I think this pseudo random implementation of mechanic is quite fair and I would accept it in more games

halo 5 did it well.

LadyAstrum

My feeling on games, like a lot of products these days is that we pay more, and get more, but at a reduced quality. The money-men want to push development, push cash stores, push as much as possible, as "cost-effectively" (cheaply) as possible, for maximum profits.

I see it in ESO. Love the game, the people who design the assests and write the stories are talented, but the actual structure of the game (bugs, poor QoL, lag, loadscreens etc) is poor, and I blame the money-men, not the devs themselves, for that.

The money-men, the shareholders, the suits aren't bothered about players having a smooth, quality experience. They want things done cheaply, but with big profits.

It's sad, but it's the way things are with many things, and it's not ok, which is why people should feel free to complain where possible.

Carbonised

LadyAstrum wrote: »

My feeling on games, like a lot of products these days is that we pay more, and get more, but at a reduced quality. The money-men want to push development, push cash stores, push as much as possible, as "cost-effectively" (cheaply) as possible, for maximum profits.

I see it in ESO. Love the game, the people who design the assests and write the stories are talented, but the actual structure of the game (bugs, poor QoL, lag, loadscreens etc) is poor, and I blame the money-men, not the devs themselves, for that.

The money-men, the shareholders, the suits aren't bothered about players having a smooth, quality experience. They want things done cheaply, but with big profits.

It's sad, but it's the way things are with many things, and it's not ok, which is why people should feel free to complain where possible.

I agree. I think Boogie says it really well in that video, the goal for the shareholders (those you call the money-men) is to earn as much money as humanly possible, with as little effort and work as they can get away with.

And it does shine through even here in ESO.

Reverb

I fail to see the problem here. It's not as if game studios are non-profit organizations, putting out content solely for the benefit of the community. They are for-profit corporations, operating in a capitalist society. Of course they are trying to make their money back twice, thrice, and more. As consumers, we can choose to participate, or we can spend with more discretion.

I don't see this same level of ire directed at stores for stocking thousands of little items at the checkout lines, or movie theatre concessions, or car dealership add-ons. No one is saying that it's not ok for Whirlpool, PepsiCo, or Duracell to make as much money off of us as possible. Why would anyone expect game studios to operate differently? Do people imagine there should be revenue cap, after which free stuff should be given, or that optional purchases should stop being released?

NewBlacksmurf

Thanks for sharing

My point of view is this, as a whole, people make very bad decisions in large group mentality. That applies to both the consumers and the companies. Good decisions aren’t typically a result of group mentality, but this is often confused with getting feedback or running ideas off a few appropriate others.

Short and simple.....people will come an argue that it’s what the company needs cause they themselves feel a need to justify their spending and want to have others spend so they don’t feel alone.

Some will justify just cause with no reason or rationale.

Some will argue against with no reason or ration

Others may argue against due to a need to justify not spending.

Wrubius_Coronaria

Sometimes I have feeling ESO is just a malware installed by myself for mining money from my bank account.

(the same goes for others game like this one)

Prof_Bawbag

Carbonised wrote: »

Prof_Bawbag wrote: »

No idea why the finger always gets pointed squarely at the devs. I mean, if we the gamers didn't encourage them to fleece us, it wouldn't make financial sense to keep pushing micro transactions etc onto us.

We buy them. Hell, look back over the forums there's also threads created by gamers who actively encourage Zeni charge us for this item or for 'X' to be implemented before the event. "OMFG, I'd pay 5 month wages for this feature" etc. We're our own worse enemy.

I love it when I specifically link and mention a 12 minute video in my original post, and not a single person takes the time to watch it before making comments about everything under the sun

Actually Boogie does mention at the end of the video, that the problem is also partially created by us, him, we who support these monetization schemes. And I fully agree with that as well.

However, it's pretty much the same as saying "why is it always the tobacco and alcohol companies who are to blame, if people just didn't smoke and drink they wouldn't be doing this".

I believe the blame is partially to be laid in front of the consumers - us - and partially in front of the large companies who take advantage of said people.

Sorry, mate. But I'm not going to watch a 12 min video. I read your comment that was posted and took from it what I wanted. It's not realistic to expect everyone to watch a 12 min video. Maybe it would have been better had you picked out the main parts and posted them ALL within your own post. Not a criticism, just an idea. Nor am i disagreeing with you, I actually agree with your points that you did put down in writing.

Narvuntien

Carbonised wrote: »

The video I linked in the original post is actually a reply to that video.

Basically what Boogie is saying is that yes, video games have become larger and cost more money to make, but the audience has also become massively larger than it used to.

And yes, while it probably would make more sense to raise prices from 60 dollars to 70 or even 80, companies are not going to do that simply because it is so much more profitable to instead monetize your game via microtransactions, day 1 DLC, year passes etc etc.

And his final point, everyone with a bit of common sense knows it isn't about making your ends meet or making just enough money to pay emplyees and keep the servers going. Every one of these stock traded companies or shareholding companies (Zenimax included) are going to try and bring home as much money as they possibly can to their stockholders, shareholders and investors, even if it means deploying every possible gambling and psychological scheme in the book in order to do so.

Just look at the annual numbers from big companies like EA and Zenimax, and it's pretty clear they have struck a gold ore with this whole microtransaction era, and they're now mining it for as much as they can.

Mircotransactions are the future.

Tell me how did they get that larger audience?, simple, they lowered the barrier to entry and funded their games with mircotransactions. Da da! more people now play games. Including making them more accessible to developing countries.

Err Umm yeah making money is typically the purpose of a game company. I don't know what you expect them to do, only just make ends meet? They should be making money if they aren't making money then the servers close down and the game stops existing. Your issue is they are making too much money? do you have a similar issue with literally every other industry? Clothing companies making stuff in Bangladesh for $1 and selling them for $100 in stores. Internet companies finding a country with a 0 tax rate then running all transactions through that country. Do you have a problem with capitalism?

The psychological tricks have been there since the dawn on gaming, they aren't exactly new. The subscription model was also filled with psychological tricks to keep you paying money. The buy the same game every year to get the new players model for the EA sports games was a psychological trick. People trick people to sell them things constantly. The human brain is a terribly flawed machine that is laughably easy to "hack". Just because its new doesn't mean its bad.

If you don't have the money to spare don't spend it on mircotransactions, if you have $20 lying around and decide to spend it on a new hat for your character instead of a bottle of alcohol go ahead. At least that hat isn't going to cause you physical harm. Loot boxes are gambling, but people like gambling, they should be able to do so.

If the prices are too high don't buy, if you have the money go ahead. I waited until Morrowind was on sale for half price before I bought it because only then did I feel it was a fair price.

I don't think you have properly articulated what the actual problem is with a game company making money.

Elsonso

DieAlteHexe wrote: »

klowdy1 wrote: »

Can we stop bringing up money in a video game forum? No one makes anyone pay money, outside of actually buying the game, and that is your choice, too. Let the horse be.

Yeah, the "horse" is pretty much a smear of goo by now.

The gaming world has changed, the genie is out of the bottle and is not going back in. Despite objections, it will carry on in some form or another.

It certainly will be that way if players are willing to share their pocket with the studio's hand. I slap that hand as much as possible, but it is always trying to wiggle in there.


And, no, this game does not use microtransactions.