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They’re not crown crates
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Raideen✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭Ingel_Riday wrote: »They tend to be balanced enough that I don't mind them so much. You buy one patch of 15 crates and you can usually get the emotes you want and have enough gems left over for a costume. Done.
I do feel though for the addicts who spend hundreds trying to get a specific rare mount. I also miss the old days before investor demands and psychological warfare against the consumer kicked in. I took a marketing class recently and this game uses ALL the tactics. Not some. ALL of them. To give a brief list:
1. Daily log-in bonuses to "boost engagement." Every day, you can log-in to claim a small prize and, hey, while you're here... did you see our new crown store offerings? For only 1,000 crowns, you can look like a renegade dragon priest. Oh, and...
2. Use of a micro-transaction currency to obfuscate dollar cost. I could have said $10, but then you might balk. "10 Dollars! I could buy a fairly decent pizza for that, or buy an entire retro-game for my Xbox, or get a six pack of beer! All that, for a costume that looks like a reskin of an older costume with a dragon mask glued on?" Hey now, it doesn't cost $10. It cost... 1,000 crowns. Speaking of which...
3. Sell such said micro-transaction currency in odd increments that don't match item prices. You can't buy 1,000 crowns, but you can buy 750 or 1,500. If you want this costume, you'll spend $14.99 for the 1,500 and have 500 crowns leftover that will tempt you to buy the next thing we advertise on the crown store. I mean, that Sheogorath-costumed guar is only 750 crowns and you already have 500. Might as well get some more crowns and get it. Notice again that I didn't say the critter cost $7.50. $7.50 for a single pet appearance in a full priced game with a subscription fee if you want full functionality. Oh, and you better decide soon, because...
4. Fear of Missing Out. I could leave everything on my storefront, organized by logical categories, for you to buy whenever you want... but where is the sense of urgency? You might just wait until you receive your allotment of crowns from your subscription and then use those to buy only the things you really care about. But what if things "expire" because I only have so much room for inventory in my VIRTUAL STOREFRONT MADE UP OF ZEROES AND ONES. "Gotta make room for new stock!" Oh, you might say that you'll buy the renegade dragon priest costume later... but it's only up for ten days and then it might be gone for years! That sheogorath-guar? 5 day window. The Dark Stag mount? I offer that once a year, on a random day near Halloween, for 24 hours. Costs $42 after tax... I mean *coughs* 5,000 crowns. That leaves you with 500 crowns left. See point 3. Dare you miss out on this sweet transient deal for virtual swag? At least I'm letting you buy it directly. I could always.
5. Use gambling mechanics to increase player expenditures. Instead of letting you just buy The Dark Stag, I could stick it in a loot crate. In exchange for 5,000 crowns, you can have 15 crates. The Dark Stag has a .1% chance of dropping in each crate. Oh, the average person will see this and give up on getting the mount... but not the addict. The addict will buy crate after crate to amass a collection of items they don't want that they can "dismantle" into yet another micro-transaction currency called, in this case, "gems." The Dark Stag will cost 400 gems. Duplicate trash will net you 1 gem each, duplicate regular items will net you 5, rarer items 10, and very rare items 40. If you're very unlucky, it could take you more than 80 crates to get that mount. Since you have to buy them in clusters of 15, that's six batches at $42 *coughs* 5,000 crowns each. But hey, at least you're not in it alone. I also sell new emotes through these. So instead of spending $20 every three months for a pack of three emotes, your fellow players have to spend $42 to get crates, sigh in vexation as an in-game Khajiit thief named Pacrouti openly mocks them each and every time they open one (because nothing can ever be TOO ON THE NOSE), and hope that the emotes randomly drop for them. Don't worry, though. I'll give them just enough gem trash that they can buy all of them, usually. Sometimes I'll need to meet quarterly revenue projections and I'll put one emote at 100 gems with a 1% drop rate to really rub in the salt.
So, yeah. This game is kind of textbook AAA with the Crown Store. Ironically, I detested the efforts to get the government involved with game regulation in the early digits and now I'm all for it to curtail the kind of psychological tomfoolery detailed above. This industry is not going to regulate itself, and it's just going to get worse from here. Look at Call of Duty and NBA 2K20. The Crown Store is tame compared to them, which doesn't bode well when investors realize that and start ramping things up still further. Pacrouti next to a roulette wheel comes to mind. "This one always bets on black."
I too miss the days when games were designed to be fun, and if the team succeeded the reward was profit.
Games today are designed to ensure the company makes money first, fun second. Everything about ESO revolves around this. Its designed to funnel you to the crown store to solve the problems they create (design) for you in the first place. Want a cool mount? Sorry, only 4 offered in game....but we have this store where you can buy a cool reskin of a mount!
What? Not enough bank space...well we have a solution for you. For only 1000 crowns (10 bucks) you can buy more bank slots! What is that you say? Grinding mages guild is boring?!?! Well no fear for only 30 dollars...err uhh I mean 3000 crowns you can unlock the mages guild for YOUR CHARACTER (not account).
I hate government regulation as much as they next person, but the gaming industry is the only industry that allows predatory practices against the entire customer base. Its the only industry where your complains fall flat and the only time changes are made is when it hits them in the wallet.
IF any auto manufacturer, grocery store, teleco, electric company, clothing manufacturer or insert your choice of industry, acted like video game companies do, they'd be out of business in 6 months.7 -
Raideen✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭Huge StarWars fan....will never touch a EA game. That company can burn.
I WAS a huge Star Wars fan...but Disney and their blatant greed to capitalize on everything Star Wars out of sheer greed, not love for the franchise has really put me off.
The Mandalorian looks like it will be the only new Star Wars film/series that has any potential. Solo was ok, the rest meh...a huge meh.6 -
Raideen✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭Hallothiel wrote: »@Ingel_Riday
What did you think? That Zos was doing this out of the goodness of their hearts for our benefit? This game is a product to make money. As are the majority of things in this world. Capitalism is the norm. Has been for quite a while now.
There is an odd thread of thought running through some gamers, in that these games should be some lovely free thing like ‘back in the day’. That is naive, wistful & doesn’t help.
And the response to marketing is to be aware of how it works. That is what should be taught to children - be suspicious of adverts and anyone trying to sell you things to make your life ‘better’ or some aspirational crap so you can buy this product to be more like them.
But if you know this, and don’t care about Fomo or whatever, and chose to buy what you like when you can afford it, then that is fine. Got the dark stag this time as had enough crowns & have not bought in past when didn’t.
And there are ways to get crowns cheaper, you know. Be proactive and work it out.
ITs not about them making profit, its about profit taking the front seat with fun taking the back seat. Old games were fun first, profit second. New games are profit first, fun second.
the issue is that fun is not guaranteed AND can change drastically (in the case of nerfing dots by 50%). The "old days" did not have this problem. A game was made, packaged up, sold and if it was good it made money.
GOOD is key word here. Today they don't have to make games good, just addictive using psychological hooks.5 -
Skwor✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭lordrichter wrote: »uuhm, just don't buy them then? Why does anyone care what another person buys? Especially when the purchase helps funds an activity for other people
Even if they are not purchased by a player, there is an impact. Those who do not buy have to accept that they are left out of things. This is not unusual for games, but in the past, these things have been in the game, presented for free in exchange for skill, not presented for money, in exchange for cash.
Also, we do not know what the purchase of Crowns and ESO Plus funds. Show me the ledger. ZOS has three games in various states of development and is beholden to Bethesda, Zenimax Media, and the various investors that are involved. You might be very surprised at how much of your money actually goes to the game you play.
So when I bought my Lexus GS 350 I forced an impact on others because they are left out of things. That is called Envy and is one of the seven deadly sins. I do not recall envy ever being considered a positive attribute for either the religious or the athiest.4 -
Raideen✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭lordrichter wrote: »uuhm, just don't buy them then? Why does anyone care what another person buys? Especially when the purchase helps funds an activity for other people
Even if they are not purchased by a player, there is an impact. Those who do not buy have to accept that they are left out of things. This is not unusual for games, but in the past, these things have been in the game, presented for free in exchange for skill, not presented for money, in exchange for cash.
Also, we do not know what the purchase of Crowns and ESO Plus funds. Show me the ledger. ZOS has three games in various states of development and is beholden to Bethesda, Zenimax Media, and the various investors that are involved. You might be very surprised at how much of your money actually goes to the game you play.
So when I bought my Lexus GS 350 I forced an impact on others because they are left out of things. That is called Envy and is one of the seven deadly sins. I do not recall envy ever being considered a positive attribute for either the religious or the athiest.
You are taking his comment out of context. Here is the rest " This is not unusual for games, but in the past, these things have been in the game, presented for free in exchange for skill, not presented for money, in exchange for cash."
If are going to argue, argue inside context... don't cherry pick to fit your agenda.
6 -
Libonotus✭✭✭✭✭Lol she really tried to compare paying 2-3 dollars per crate/box to a 80 cent chocolate egg that you still get a desirable prize from when you eat it.
Loot boxes you have to spend a lot to even get a shot at the good stuff.3 -
Libonotus✭✭✭✭✭Kindreds eggs should have a 99% chance of an empty egg inside and 1% chance at a toy to truly make it surprise mechanics like she claims6
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Noisivid✭✭✭✭Hallothiel wrote: »@Ingel_Riday
What did you think? That Zos was doing this out of the goodness of their hearts for our benefit? This game is a product to make money. As are the majority of things in this world. Capitalism is the norm. Has been for quite a while now.
There is an odd thread of thought running through some gamers, in that these games should be some lovely free thing like ‘back in the day’. That is naive, wistful & doesn’t help.
And the response to marketing is to be aware of how it works. That is what should be taught to children - be suspicious of adverts and anyone trying to sell you things to make your life ‘better’ or some aspirational crap so you can buy this product to be more like them.
But if you know this, and don’t care about Fomo or whatever, and chose to buy what you like when you can afford it, then that is fine. Got the dark stag this time as had enough crowns & have not bought in past when didn’t.
And there are ways to get crowns cheaper, you know. Be proactive and work it out.
ITs not about them making profit, its about profit taking the front seat with fun taking the back seat. Old games were fun first, profit second. New games are profit first, fun second.
the issue is that fun is not guaranteed AND can change drastically (in the case of nerfing dots by 50%). The "old days" did not have this problem. A game was made, packaged up, sold and if it was good it made money.
GOOD is key word here. Today they don't have to make games good, just addictive using psychological hooks.
Agreed. Unfortunately everything gets commodified eventually. Gaming was originally a pretty undergound, edge of society thing, now it's mainstream and the big corporations are cashing in. If it can happen to punk rock and gangsta rap it can happen to pretty much anything. The people who actually design and build the game may give a damn about the quality but the corporate board and execs probably don't care as long as they can max out the profits.Vogon Poet Laureate3 -
Kalante✭✭✭✭✭
✭You know what's funny. All two of my apex mounts the psijic horse and the frost camel where from the free crown crates that zos used to give as daily rewards. I guess a lot of people were also getting free stuff so zos said "oh hell naaaww pull the free crates out"
It's funny how things go when they don't work their way. It's so obvious that video game companies have become egregiously brutal in monetization. Some games even have a casino and call it not gambling just because people can't cash out real money but all of these executives surely can. Simply put its just so disgusting.
I wish I could be one of these people that say "you don't have to buy it" or "why do you care what people spend their money on" I wish was this dense but sadly I care too much about games to see them deteriorate such as in this case ESO with all of it's performance issues and class identity crisis. You have to care about this stuff because it affects the quality of games just to fill the bottom line of executive's pockets.Edited by Kalante on September 28, 2019 6:18PM4 -
Ingel_Riday✭✭✭✭✭Hallothiel wrote: »@Ingel_Riday
What did you think? That Zos was doing this out of the goodness of their hearts for our benefit? This game is a product to make money. As are the majority of things in this world. Capitalism is the norm. Has been for quite a while now.
There is an odd thread of thought running through some gamers, in that these games should be some lovely free thing like ‘back in the day’. That is naive, wistful & doesn’t help.
And the response to marketing is to be aware of how it works. That is what should be taught to children - be suspicious of adverts and anyone trying to sell you things to make your life ‘better’ or some aspirational crap so you can buy this product to be more like them.
But if you know this, and don’t care about Fomo or whatever, and chose to buy what you like when you can afford it, then that is fine. Got the dark stag this time as had enough crowns & have not bought in past when didn’t.
And there are ways to get crowns cheaper, you know. Be proactive and work it out.
I never said that I disliked capitalism, or that I thought companies built products out of the goodness of their hearts. I also didn't say that these "games should be some lovely free thing like 'back in the day.'" I understand that the "gamer entitlement" concept is all the rage in the industry today, but I think that's a red herring and a convenient cliché to stifle critique. Games weren't free back in the day; they were expensive as heck. People didn't expect free back then. Most people still don't. Rather, they expect to have some consumer surplus left over.
At issue is that the game-as-a-service trend is all about milking that consumer surplus until the very last drop is spent. For example, let's look at Assassin's Creed Odyssey. To start off with, you can buy a standard edition, a gold edition with the season pass, or an ultimate edition with a few more digital goodies. $60 / $99 / $120. Pricing along the basis of consumer surplus to hit different price points. Makes sense. Nothing to really see here.
Then they throttled xp and gold gains to the point of overt inconvenience and sold a separate $20 "permanent booster" to increase gold and xp gains by 50% as a fix to a problem of their own design. When gamers complained about this monetization excess, they were called entitled by some industry pundits. "You don't need it to play the game. You expect everything free. *sigh* How naïve and wistful."
Then they removed all in-game maps that you could purchase for the location of hidden collectibles and locked those away as $10 separate dlc, in the process creating a source of tedium and then selling the solution. When gamers complained, they were called entitled again. "You don't NEED the maps. You could find them the old fashioned way, by exploring nooks and crannies for hours while sighing in boredom or by going to a wikia page on your tablet and following a guide built by someone who did buy them. Oh, you expect everything for free. Shame."
$30 is half the price of the whole base game. Most people won't buy these, but the fans will... as their consumer surplus is drained away bit by bit. Eventually new costume packs came out that cost $15 each, a fourth of the base game price per pack. At that point, most people bought the few they cared about and gave up, their consumer surplus used up. A few whales bought all of them, using loot-urns purchased in-game with an in-game orichalcum currency for a random chance to get a few pieces of the sets and bring down the price of the remaining bundle. Save a few dollars here or there in the process.
That is what this industry is about now. Figure out the point at which the consumer has no surplus left and becomes indifferent, and then adjust just a little below that. Leave 'em a little sugar. Throw loot crates and battle passes and yearly content passes into Rainbow Six Siege until gamers start to want to quit, and then just go a little below. Lil' less. The pay pigs will still pay. They just won't feel very good about it.
Part of functional capitalism is maintaining consumer good will. Building a relationship with your customer that maintains their loyalty and fosters mutual respect. That is not at all an aspect of games as a service. This era is all about short term gains at the expense of long term brand equity (Fallout 76 comes to mind as a prime example of this cashing-in), milking wallets, and whale hunting. Drain that consumer surplus to almost the last drop.
Part of a functional capitalist system is having safeguards in place so that companies can't take excessive advantage of consumers by psychologically manipulating them into acting against their own interests. Look at Call of Duty, Battlefront 2, FIFA 20, NBA 2K20, and the like. There are no safeguards here and the firms in this industry OWN their self-regulatory organization (ESA) and staff its board.
With no safeguards or respect for the consumer, you just have a wild west scenario where people have to fend for themselves against the wolves. It's not impossible to do so; I fell into a hole with this game for about six months before I pulled myself out of it. I have a monthly budget I follow tightly now (kept to it for the past 10 months, so hurrah), I ignore a bunch of Crown Store items (which is hard when they are intentionally shoving them right in front of your face aggressively EVERY TIME YOU LOG ON), I only buy big ticket items when they do the semi-annual Crown discount where you can get $150 of crowns for $80, I read marketing articles to keep my awareness of scummy psychological exploits current and front-in-center, and I do okay.
However, how many teenagers are doing this? How many people are trying to do this and failing? I get the impression you'd just tell them, "tough luck, addict. Capitalism. Your own fault you spun that roulette wheel fifty times to get Lebron James for your NBA 2K20 ultimate team." I think looking out for each other and maintaining empathy aren't bad things. Invoking "gamer entitlement" to defend questionable monetization tactics lacks both.6 -
red_bird✭✭Hmm lets see
Typical "surpise mechanics" in Crown Crates (per crate)
Crown Potions (I make the ones I actually use by the 100)
Crown meal (I also make food by the 100)
Crown soul gem (I think I have around 4000 regular soul gems on my account atm)
Riding lesson (especially common when all your characters have maxed out horses)
XP scrolls (for the player with 18 max level characters)
Crown repair kit (the only useful item to a max level player)
Oh What a "surprise"......more crap I cant use.....and I get about 10 gems for
I'm GLAD about that. Sure, there are a ton of those, and it's probably what someone's going to 'win', but these are the only things that could technically help us in combat situations. And as you said, they're easy to access without crates. What people actually consider a 'win' in ESO crates is an outfit or a mount that goes the same speed as the one they give you for free at level 10.
To me that's far better than EA tying game progression to crates for p2w.
It's true that crates exist to use psychology to make us want to give them more money than we would in a traditional sale, so they're not a beacon of ethical behavior, but to make it worse EA got greedy and made people feel like they needed the crates to play the game well.pve on ps41 -
Glurin✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭It's true that crates exist to use psychology to make us want to give them more money than we would in a traditional sale, so they're not a beacon of ethical behavior, but to make it worse EA got greedy and made people feel like they needed the crates to play the game well.
Oh there is no "feel like they need the crate" about it. Not with the way EA likes to lock actual progression behind crates. There's no question you really do need crates in order to advance.Edited by Glurin on September 28, 2019 7:56PM"He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster...when you gaze long into the abyss the abyss also gazes into you..."1 -
red_bird✭✭It's true that crates exist to use psychology to make us want to give them more money than we would in a traditional sale, so they're not a beacon of ethical behavior, but to make it worse EA got greedy and made people feel like they needed the crates to play the game well.
Oh there is no "feel like they need the crate" about it. Not with the way EA likes to lock actual progression behind crates. There's no question you really do need crates in order to advance.
Yes, I said it poorly... I meant they actually do need the crates.pve on ps40 -
Elsonso✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Reistr_the_Unbroken wrote: »
I never even purchased Sims 4. That series peaked with Sims 3. Downhill now.3 -
IndianaJames7✭✭✭✭✭I personally don't have an issue with the concept of crown crates. All of the rare items in them are purely cosmetic and offer no in game advantage to having (not pay2win). This allows zos to price discriminate players who are more willing to spend money on the game, meaning that they are able to offer a lower price entry point into the game and for monthly subs (in theory at least; I have no idea what their actual profit margins are).
The only issue I have is that they should be more up front about the drop rate of some of their rarest mounts. Many people likely buy crates thinking that the odds of getting a radiant apex are MUCH higher than they actually are.0 -
IndianaJames7✭✭✭✭✭Watch they make a set in game that converts to store stats
The Way of the Gambler
1) When you buy crowns 2% chance of obtaining 50% more crowns
2) 2% chance of obtaining crowns when spent on the store
3) .5% chance of doubling purchased crowns
4) 5% chance of better odds in crown crates
5) 10% chance of obtaining a daily crate after logging in for 4 hours
That's actually pretty funny, and I'd definitely farm that set if it existed. It would sell for a lot of gold if it was hard to get
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Raideen✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭IndianaJames7 wrote: »I personally don't have an issue with the concept of crown crates. All of the rare items in them are purely cosmetic and offer no in game advantage to having (not pay2win). This allows zos to price discriminate players who are more willing to spend money on the game, meaning that they are able to offer a lower price entry point into the game and for monthly subs (in theory at least; I have no idea what their actual profit margins are).
The only issue I have is that they should be more up front about the drop rate of some of their rarest mounts. Many people likely buy crates thinking that the odds of getting a radiant apex are MUCH higher than they actually are.
So you believe that it's ok for one portion of the population (role players/collectors/achievement hunters etc) to be expected to fork out LITERALLY THOUSANDS of dollars on top of the purchase of the game, and expansions, and subscriptions in order to have as much fun as the other portion of the population who likes to just kill things?
People play MMORPG's for different reasons. How come the role players/collectors/achievement hunters have to spend thousands of more dollars to have as much fun as the kill kill kill crowd?3 -
MLGProPlayer✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Girl_Number8 wrote: »She sounds like a skooma dealer
I mean, she is in the business of selling an addictive substance.Edited by MLGProPlayer on September 28, 2019 10:25PM3 -
MLGProPlayer✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Deathlord92 wrote: »I laugh so hard when I watched this I think they believe there own bs lol 😂
Oh, they definitely don't believe their own BS.3 -
IndianaJames7✭✭✭✭✭IndianaJames7 wrote: »I personally don't have an issue with the concept of crown crates. All of the rare items in them are purely cosmetic and offer no in game advantage to having (not pay2win). This allows zos to price discriminate players who are more willing to spend money on the game, meaning that they are able to offer a lower price entry point into the game and for monthly subs (in theory at least; I have no idea what their actual profit margins are).
The only issue I have is that they should be more up front about the drop rate of some of their rarest mounts. Many people likely buy crates thinking that the odds of getting a radiant apex are MUCH higher than they actually are.
So you believe that it's ok for one portion of the population (role players/collectors/achievement hunters etc) to be expected to fork out LITERALLY THOUSANDS of dollars on top of the purchase of the game, and expansions, and subscriptions in order to have as much fun as the other portion of the population who likes to just kill things?
People play MMORPG's for different reasons. How come the role players/collectors/achievement hunters have to spend thousands of more dollars to have as much fun as the kill kill kill crowd?
You aren't forced to do that in any way. These are cosmetic items that have no affect in game other than 'look at me, I have this rare item that other people don't'. I am one of those collectors/achievement hunters you have mentioned who is not willing to spend thousands of dollars for a radiant apex mount. So I spend like $100 for each crown season to get the apex camel mount (plus whatever else the crates may drop) and then I call a day. If I have enough crown gems left over to get the new camel I don't buy any crowns for that season etc...
If all crown items were cheap, there would be no such thing as rare mounts. As an adult (as mandated by TOS) it is your own responsibility to determine how much you are willing to spend on in-game pixels and make your own decisions from there.
And yes, I do think it is acceptable for one portion of the population to make their own decision to spend significantly more money than other populations in the game on cosmetics. No one is forcing you to do this. However, there are many people in game who because of IRL situations are unable to spend much money in game.
If lowering the price floor on content (DLC's and QOL from ESO+) is an outcome of these crown crates (I don't know for certain that this is what is happening, and if it isn't then my view on the issue would possibly be different) allows more people to enjoy the game then I think this is a good thing. I have been in enough nCR groups where some members were unable to port in because they don't own Summerset to know that many people who play this game do not have all of the DLCs because they can't afford it. Some of these people are members of guilds that I am in, and add to the overall health of the game through their activity.
We might have to agree to disagree on this, but I believe that price discrimination on cosmetics is healthy for MMOs if it allows them to charge less for other content.2 -
spekdah✭✭✭Ingel_Riday wrote: »They tend to be balanced enough that I don't mind them so much. You buy one patch of 15 crates and you can usually get the emotes you want and have enough gems left over for a costume. Done.
I do feel though for the addicts who spend hundreds trying to get a specific rare mount. I also miss the old days before investor demands and psychological warfare against the consumer kicked in. I took a marketing class recently and this game uses ALL the tactics. Not some. ALL of them. To give a brief list:
1. Daily log-in bonuses to "boost engagement." Every day, you can log-in to claim a small prize and, hey, while you're here... did you see our new crown store offerings? For only 1,000 crowns, you can look like a renegade dragon priest. Oh, and...
2. Use of a micro-transaction currency to obfuscate dollar cost. I could have said $10, but then you might balk. "10 Dollars! I could buy a fairly decent pizza for that, or buy an entire retro-game for my Xbox, or get a six pack of beer! All that, for a costume that looks like a reskin of an older costume with a dragon mask glued on?" Hey now, it doesn't cost $10. It cost... 1,000 crowns. Speaking of which...
3. Sell such said micro-transaction currency in odd increments that don't match item prices. You can't buy 1,000 crowns, but you can buy 750 or 1,500. If you want this costume, you'll spend $14.99 for the 1,500 and have 500 crowns leftover that will tempt you to buy the next thing we advertise on the crown store. I mean, that Sheogorath-costumed guar is only 750 crowns and you already have 500. Might as well get some more crowns and get it. Notice again that I didn't say the critter cost $7.50. $7.50 for a single pet appearance in a full priced game with a subscription fee if you want full functionality. Oh, and you better decide soon, because...
4. Fear of Missing Out. I could leave everything on my storefront, organized by logical categories, for you to buy whenever you want... but where is the sense of urgency? You might just wait until you receive your allotment of crowns from your subscription and then use those to buy only the things you really care about. But what if things "expire" because I only have so much room for inventory in my VIRTUAL STOREFRONT MADE UP OF ZEROES AND ONES. "Gotta make room for new stock!" Oh, you might say that you'll buy the renegade dragon priest costume later... but it's only up for ten days and then it might be gone for years! That sheogorath-guar? 5 day window. The Dark Stag mount? I offer that once a year, on a random day near Halloween, for 24 hours. Costs $42 after tax... I mean *coughs* 5,000 crowns. That leaves you with 500 crowns left. See point 3. Dare you miss out on this sweet transient deal for virtual swag? At least I'm letting you buy it directly. I could always.
5. Use gambling mechanics to increase player expenditures. Instead of letting you just buy The Dark Stag, I could stick it in a loot crate. In exchange for 5,000 crowns, you can have 15 crates. The Dark Stag has a .1% chance of dropping in each crate. Oh, the average person will see this and give up on getting the mount... but not the addict. The addict will buy crate after crate to amass a collection of items they don't want that they can "dismantle" into yet another micro-transaction currency called, in this case, "gems." The Dark Stag will cost 400 gems. Duplicate trash will net you 1 gem each, duplicate regular items will net you 5, rarer items 10, and very rare items 40. If you're very unlucky, it could take you more than 80 crates to get that mount. Since you have to buy them in clusters of 15, that's six batches at $42 *coughs* 5,000 crowns each. But hey, at least you're not in it alone. I also sell new emotes through these. So instead of spending $20 every three months for a pack of three emotes, your fellow players have to spend $42 to get crates, sigh in vexation as an in-game Khajiit thief named Pacrouti openly mocks them each and every time they open one (because nothing can ever be TOO ON THE NOSE), and hope that the emotes randomly drop for them. Don't worry, though. I'll give them just enough gem trash that they can buy all of them, usually. Sometimes I'll need to meet quarterly revenue projections and I'll put one emote at 100 gems with a 1% drop rate to really rub in the salt.
So, yeah. This game is kind of textbook AAA with the Crown Store. Ironically, I detested the efforts to get the government involved with game regulation in the early digits and now I'm all for it to curtail the kind of psychological tomfoolery detailed above. This industry is not going to regulate itself, and it's just going to get worse from here. Look at Call of Duty and NBA 2K20. The Crown Store is tame compared to them, which doesn't bode well when investors realize that and start ramping things up still further. Pacrouti next to a roulette wheel comes to mind. "This one always bets on black."
Best post of the year!!!
The combination and layers of misdirection is so predatory.
People like to defend this crap which is worse. They don't even acknowledge the stacked deception.4 -
starkerealm✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Huge StarWars fan....will never touch a EA game. That company can burn.
I WAS a huge Star Wars fan...but Disney and their blatant greed to capitalize on everything Star Wars out of sheer greed, not love for the franchise has really put me off.
The Mandalorian looks like it will be the only new Star Wars film/series that has any potential. Solo was ok, the rest meh...a huge meh.
I'm with this guy, but even The Mandalorian can't save this one for me. Killing the EU, and then turning out the rough draft of TLJ as a finished film was a bridge too far.6 -
kpittsniperb14_ESO✭✭✭✭Ingel_Riday wrote: »They tend to be balanced enough that I don't mind them so much. You buy one patch of 15 crates and you can usually get the emotes you want and have enough gems left over for a costume. Done.
I do feel though for the addicts who spend hundreds trying to get a specific rare mount. I also miss the old days before investor demands and psychological warfare against the consumer kicked in. I took a marketing class recently and this game uses ALL the tactics. Not some. ALL of them. To give a brief list:
1. Daily log-in bonuses to "boost engagement." Every day, you can log-in to claim a small prize and, hey, while you're here... did you see our new crown store offerings? For only 1,000 crowns, you can look like a renegade dragon priest. Oh, and...
2. Use of a micro-transaction currency to obfuscate dollar cost. I could have said $10, but then you might balk. "10 Dollars! I could buy a fairly decent pizza for that, or buy an entire retro-game for my Xbox, or get a six pack of beer! All that, for a costume that looks like a reskin of an older costume with a dragon mask glued on?" Hey now, it doesn't cost $10. It cost... 1,000 crowns. Speaking of which...
3. Sell such said micro-transaction currency in odd increments that don't match item prices. You can't buy 1,000 crowns, but you can buy 750 or 1,500. If you want this costume, you'll spend $14.99 for the 1,500 and have 500 crowns leftover that will tempt you to buy the next thing we advertise on the crown store. I mean, that Sheogorath-costumed guar is only 750 crowns and you already have 500. Might as well get some more crowns and get it. Notice again that I didn't say the critter cost $7.50. $7.50 for a single pet appearance in a full priced game with a subscription fee if you want full functionality. Oh, and you better decide soon, because...
4. Fear of Missing Out. I could leave everything on my storefront, organized by logical categories, for you to buy whenever you want... but where is the sense of urgency? You might just wait until you receive your allotment of crowns from your subscription and then use those to buy only the things you really care about. But what if things "expire" because I only have so much room for inventory in my VIRTUAL STOREFRONT MADE UP OF ZEROES AND ONES. "Gotta make room for new stock!" Oh, you might say that you'll buy the renegade dragon priest costume later... but it's only up for ten days and then it might be gone for years! That sheogorath-guar? 5 day window. The Dark Stag mount? I offer that once a year, on a random day near Halloween, for 24 hours. Costs $42 after tax... I mean *coughs* 5,000 crowns. That leaves you with 500 crowns left. See point 3. Dare you miss out on this sweet transient deal for virtual swag? At least I'm letting you buy it directly. I could always.
5. Use gambling mechanics to increase player expenditures. Instead of letting you just buy The Dark Stag, I could stick it in a loot crate. In exchange for 5,000 crowns, you can have 15 crates. The Dark Stag has a .1% chance of dropping in each crate. Oh, the average person will see this and give up on getting the mount... but not the addict. The addict will buy crate after crate to amass a collection of items they don't want that they can "dismantle" into yet another micro-transaction currency called, in this case, "gems." The Dark Stag will cost 400 gems. Duplicate trash will net you 1 gem each, duplicate regular items will net you 5, rarer items 10, and very rare items 40. If you're very unlucky, it could take you more than 80 crates to get that mount. Since you have to buy them in clusters of 15, that's six batches at $42 *coughs* 5,000 crowns each. But hey, at least you're not in it alone. I also sell new emotes through these. So instead of spending $20 every three months for a pack of three emotes, your fellow players have to spend $42 to get crates, sigh in vexation as an in-game Khajiit thief named Pacrouti openly mocks them each and every time they open one (because nothing can ever be TOO ON THE NOSE), and hope that the emotes randomly drop for them. Don't worry, though. I'll give them just enough gem trash that they can buy all of them, usually. Sometimes I'll need to meet quarterly revenue projections and I'll put one emote at 100 gems with a 1% drop rate to really rub in the salt.
So, yeah. This game is kind of textbook AAA with the Crown Store. Ironically, I detested the efforts to get the government involved with game regulation in the early digits and now I'm all for it to curtail the kind of psychological tomfoolery detailed above. This industry is not going to regulate itself, and it's just going to get worse from here. Look at Call of Duty and NBA 2K20. The Crown Store is tame compared to them, which doesn't bode well when investors realize that and start ramping things up still further. Pacrouti next to a roulette wheel comes to mind. "This one always bets on black."
Spot on. Also since the bulk of the revenue from these games is now coming from these "surprise mechanics" there is little incentive to invest into the actual game. This folks is the reason we still have huge lag problems, broken mechanics, broken skills and unbalanced classes 5 plus years after launch.Magicka DK-Rowsdowerr
Tertiary Meat GM
"they're going to say, there's Daniel and he has 20 people with him, I want to kill him and there's
40 more behind me."
"I'm tired of the BS excuses, if you're going to do what you do at least admit what you're doing"
YEEEEEAAAAAHHHH!!!5 -
Zacuel✭✭✭✭✭
✭I'm starting to think people ramble on over these kinds of topics to show off how sophisticated they sound...
Meeeeeehhhh *groan*
Nobody cares! Somebody post a funny meme or something I'm dying here2
