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Are the zen store prices a detriment to the game?
beryc
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 8 Arc User
I know there are some similar topics about the prices being too high and all that, but I mean my question more in a grander sense.
I've played around with the beta just a little bit, and the game is alright. I enjoy it, I like doing quests, and the combat is fun and all, but I took a look at the zen store, and I was flabbergasted. $35 for a companion, $6 for a re-spec, etc...it's made me not even want to play the free-to-play part.
See, I don't have a problem spending money in either the P2P model (played SWTOR and Rift for a while) or the B2P model (played GW2 for a while and currently playing Defiance). GW2 had useful things to buy for reasonable prices (an extra character slot was $5, I think, for example). And I don't - in theory - have a problem paying for stuff in the F2P model. If the base game is good, I will play it. If there are things I want from the store, I am okay buying them, just as I was in GW2. Probably even more so, since I didn't put any money down on the game itself, I feel I have at least $60 to make up for (and yes, I know I could get the Hero pack or whatever, that's an aside). The problem is, with the extravagant prices, I feel like it's not a good use of my money, and in accordance with that, I am concerned that PWE is going to basically dangle a strip of bacon in front of me the entirety of the time I play.
Essentially, I feel that the insane prices of the zen store are detracting from my desire to play even the base game. Is that crazy?
(Also, it doesn't help that I was stupid and bought a lifetime sub to STO like three years ago or whenever that game came out, and have like 10k zen from stipends sitting in a game I am never going to play again, that can never be used...)
I've played around with the beta just a little bit, and the game is alright. I enjoy it, I like doing quests, and the combat is fun and all, but I took a look at the zen store, and I was flabbergasted. $35 for a companion, $6 for a re-spec, etc...it's made me not even want to play the free-to-play part.
See, I don't have a problem spending money in either the P2P model (played SWTOR and Rift for a while) or the B2P model (played GW2 for a while and currently playing Defiance). GW2 had useful things to buy for reasonable prices (an extra character slot was $5, I think, for example). And I don't - in theory - have a problem paying for stuff in the F2P model. If the base game is good, I will play it. If there are things I want from the store, I am okay buying them, just as I was in GW2. Probably even more so, since I didn't put any money down on the game itself, I feel I have at least $60 to make up for (and yes, I know I could get the Hero pack or whatever, that's an aside). The problem is, with the extravagant prices, I feel like it's not a good use of my money, and in accordance with that, I am concerned that PWE is going to basically dangle a strip of bacon in front of me the entirety of the time I play.
Essentially, I feel that the insane prices of the zen store are detracting from my desire to play even the base game. Is that crazy?
(Also, it doesn't help that I was stupid and bought a lifetime sub to STO like three years ago or whenever that game came out, and have like 10k zen from stipends sitting in a game I am never going to play again, that can never be used...)
Post edited by beryc on
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So in protest to pay to win enchants, I won't buy any zen. That is personal opinion, I'm sure the guys that spent 250€ for a this game won't agree with me.
You might have the 10k on here if you start i know when I started i had 600ish zen from when I played Champions online before cyptic merged with PW. That would be something you would have to check tho.
And when you leave the company will not hurt any. because right now you are just a leech feeding off them till something new comes out.
I've spent just over $2k on League of Legends between mine and my son's accounts, over $400 on D3, over $500 on Battlefield Heroes, over $200 on Firefall, almost $300 on TERA when it went F2P and other titles as well. I always felt like I got my money's worth on cosmetic items and felt good about supporting the game because of reasonable prices.
The point is that when a game is good, I dump disposable income into games. It's my hobby. I will not however support the biggest cash grab of a business model I've ever seen in a game release. The zen market is the most blatant form of virtual theft I've ever seen. This company will not see a single dime from me, or another minute of game time. I know for a fact that the guys I play with are not spending a dime on this either and they usually support games monetarily, only on a slightly smaller scale than I do.
Good riddens Neverwinter. So much potential too, tsk tsk.
Peace.
LOL spent money on games that if you want something from a cash shop you have to pull out your wallet but won't take in-game currency and turn it into cash shop currency... I love these QQ idiots.
Right now, they are extremely unreasonable.
Oh, I was wondering why I had 600 zen, that must be what it's from, Champion's Online.
Honestly, I want to spend money on the zen store, but I do feel that everything is way overpriced. I usually allow myself $20-30 a month to spend on micro-transactions (or game subscriptions), but with the zen store the way it is that would allow me to buy ONE outfit and that's it. It's not even enough money for the wolf mount.
Guild Wars 2 has a great cash shop, and I don't feel bad spending money on it at all. They also have an in game gold to cash currency transfer and they still don't super inflate the prices. Limited time only mini pets are usually about $10 for three of them, awesome seasonal outfits that are bound to account and not to character are usually about $10-15.
I agree with the OP, the prices the way they are deter me from spending money. At first I felt like I didn't even want to play the game if I couldn't afford to buy the items I wanted. I wanted like one bag and a cosmetic outfit, which unfortunately is out of the monthly micro transaction budget. But I'll accept that I am just going to be one of those players that can't justify the cost and play without those things. I'll just spend that money on a different game I guess.
edit: after reading every else's posts, I really hope that Perfect World takes our feedback into consideration. I bet many people who do not frequent the forums have the same reaction that we have. It seems like they are missing out on a lot of potential sales.
In GW2 you had to buy the game in order to play not just download and install. So they could have the cheaper pricing. GW2 did not have in game currency to a cash shop currency that is another reason the shop is cheaper in GW2. Now for the mount I can see paying a good bit of money for them because when you buy it you don't just get it on one character you get it on every character. Now if that is just the default two or if you hit the max character limit of 50 guess what... they all get the mount.
This game is cute and all, but nowhere near worth your cash at the moment. People who've already paid probably won't be on the same page.. understandably.
GW2 has always (since launch) had an in-game-currency-to-cash-shop-currency conversion method available (and it's not via a silly third currency, you pay in-game gold for gems, their cash shop currency)
But you're totally right, I did have to buy the $60 Guild Wars 2 in order to play it. That's why I feel like I could spend $60 in the zen shop without feeling bad. $60 in the zen shop will get me a mount, and a respec, and that's about it. Even if it is account-wide, that still isn't a great deal. In Rift, you could literally buy an entire special edition of the game which includes an account-wide mount, free game time, and a handful of other bonuses, for less than the price of one mount/companion/costume here.
And play with it for a month, and then never again without spending more money. Here, you can spend that slightly greater amount, and play with it for the life of the game. Which should be quite some time, since PWE has yet to shut down a game that shows even a glimmer of success.
Play Rift for three months, and this game for three months with that mount/companion purchase, and then tell me which purchase got you a better bargain.
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Your points correct as long as your not talking about companions. They are character specific. So no you can't purchase everything once and have it for everyone.
And rift would still be a better value in 3 months. Becasue for 45 dollars I could get everything. 45 dollars in neverwinter gets one horse and a few keys.
Guild Wars 2 does have an in game currency to real money currency transfer, the rate is actually pretty reasonable too.
I paid the same amount of money for Guilds Wars 2 that I did for my founder's pack for Neverwinter, and Guilds Wars 2 is a more complete game experience, they gave me way more bank space, way more inventory space, more characters, more armor dye colors, more customization, and the ratio of time spent farming gold in game and trading for gems (gems is the Guild Wars 2 version of Zen) is much better than in Neverwinter. For that buy in of $60 I have a lot more than I do for my $60 buy in to Neverwinter. My dollar has stretched a lot further in Guild Wars 2 than in Neverwinter and continues to stretch further by means of the in game cash shop, that is the bottom line.
I don't have a problem with Neverwinter being free to play and not giving me as much stuff as a buy to play game (for the same amount of money), but I can't justify how little my dollar buys in the cash shop the way it is currently.
Noble cause, but in the end you are doing more harm than good. Do you think PW cares about why you buy zen? They don't, they just look at the numbers and determine if their business model is okay or not. Meaning, that by spending money, you decrease the chance that they will reason with the community and change their model.
It is not YOUR job to keep the game alive, it is that of the developer and the publisher. It is not YOUR responsibility. By withholding your money you tell them in NUMBERS that their business model is flawed, and thus to keep the game alive, which is very much in their interest TOO, they will change it.
If you keep spending money, they won't.
Vote with your wallet, I can not stress it enough
Smoke@stonedbill - Mindflayer - 60 Rogue
So?
This claim is endlessly repeated on the forums - "I won't spend anything here because (X), and Cryptic should care because I spend a lot on games." "I'm leaving and I'm taking my 1000-member guild with me."
Talk is cheap. Cryptic knows whether or not they're making money, and that's what they care about, not about unverifiable claims on the forums.