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When people play a genuinely and totally free game which no-one pays a cent to play it is one thing to trash everything and force everyone to start from scratch. That's bad enough.

But when people pay real-world hard-earned cash in good faith over long periods of time to upgrade, build and reach a desired result that the game promises but that now gets trashed and removed totally and they are forced to start all over again and their past purchases are now worthless in the game? That's a completely different story. That's extremely serious and could even be described as corporate malpractice.
Apparently pointing-out the bleeding obvious is a 'personal attack'.
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Comments

  • rockster#6227 rockster Member Posts: 1,860 Arc User
    P.S. My point is really that people pay money in good faith that what they purchase will have something of value for them. This is their reasonable expectation when they make a decision to give the company their money. Fair enough, they may expect a few tweaks and changes along the way, but this is a total wipe of everything they have paid to get. As the game is almost 8 years old, those who pay to purchase upgrades in it can reasonably expect the game is not going to dump everything and start all over again. I would suggest that if a nearly 8 year-old game still doesn’t think the design of the game itself is finished and is going to now drastically re-start everything over, thereby rendering past purchases useless, they should consider re-branding it a Beta version so that those who make purchases from this point forward have a better idea of that they are buying.
    Apparently pointing-out the bleeding obvious is a 'personal attack'.
  • jules#6770 jules Member Posts: 709 Arc User
    edited December 2020
    edit... forget it
    - bye bye -
  • drago#3250 drago Member Posts: 190 Arc User
    greywynd said:

    And which is covered in the Terms of Service where they can change anything they want whenever they want to whatever they want.

    That is true. But companies acting like this in a player unfriendly way will never been chosen again by me and many others.
  • drago#3250 drago Member Posts: 190 Arc User
    greywynd said:

    And, yet, here you are...

    In a game I paid real money and spent many of my time. In a game wherein I have a huge friendlist. Would I play Magic:Legends? Not in a hundred years. I would skip this genre and would wait for Diablo 4.
    And if they introduce Neverwinter 2.0 as intended I will leave aswell.
    But now we have still M19.
  • plasticbatplasticbat Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 12,184 Arc User

    greywynd said:

    And, yet, here you are...

    In a game I paid real money and spent many of my time. In a game wherein I have a huge friendlist. Would I play Magic:Legends? Not in a hundred years. I would skip this genre and would wait for Diablo 4.
    And if they introduce Neverwinter 2.0 as intended I will leave aswell.
    But now we have still M19.
    This is the nth time they have done this type of overhaul. It will not be the last time. I already get used to it.
    *** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
  • dionchidionchi Member Posts: 913 Arc User

    In a game I paid real money and spent many of my time. In a game wherein I have a huge friendlist. Would I play Magic:Legends? Not in a hundred years. I would skip this genre and would wait for Diablo 4.
    And if they introduce Neverwinter 2.0 as intended I will leave aswell.
    But now we have still M19.

    I suppose some people would call this a life lesson...

    And perhaps the next life lesson should be, if something makes you persistently unhappy and you doubt there are any redeeming qualities pending - walk away.

    DD~
  • mythdemeanourmythdemeanour Member Posts: 87 Arc User
    edited December 2020
    This is my 3rd time having to remake my character(s) from the ground up and honestly Cryptic it stinks! I payed many hundreds of dollars in the past to give me a slight edge up, but that has come to an end. I only play now to let my membership run out and just play low level characters as something to do. I know the end-user agreement gives you the right to redesign or balance whenever you like, but honestly I feel at this point I have paid for a Lamborghini and have been given a trade in for model T. These are not small changes is my point, and as such there needs to be a large amount of compensation in order to try and win back the players (like myself) now in revolt.

    My final point being do you thing you have enough player confidence left to risk another exodus like the one that happened with mod 16?
    Post edited by mythdemeanour on
  • callumf#9018 callumf Member Posts: 1,710 Arc User
    kreatyve said:

    greywynd said:

    And which is covered in the Terms of Service where they can change anything they want whenever they want to whatever they want.

    Agreed - but it is still very poorly thought out Customer Service for players to buy something with real life money and then trash it in front of their eyes.

    Imagine buying a dozen eggs, paying for them and as you leave the shop the security guard takes them out of your bag and smashes them on the floor. This latest change does seem very much out of order even compared to Mod 16.

    But I shall wait and see. I stopped giving the game money some time back when I realised that the Terms of Service are literally a license to do just waht you rightly point out ;)
    Technically - you didn't buy anything. If you want to get technical about it, you are renting pixels. You are not allowed to sell anything off your account for cash. You get no physical goods. The sooner that players come to terms with that reality, the happier off they will be.
    Oh yes I know the score and I appreciate what you are saying, its rental, but still if I rented a flat or house and the landlord came round and took out all the windows and doors that would be bad customer service.

    So I paid to rent my bonding runestones [so to speak] or other items [companions, mounts etc] and their "value" at the time I rented them was good, chop the powers of those rented items and the value is now bad.

    To clarify, I am more than aware its a rental, just that to keep players in the game, make that rental good value for money long term.
  • winteranestiwinteranesti Member Posts: 135 Arc User
    edited December 2020
    b0rkch0p, I agree. I like the idea of giving an option to show off to players who pay into the game, this way showing if we so choose to display our feathers of mass contributions like peacocks. I wouldn't mind running around in Mythic colors on the forums. Even Showing how ancient we are in terms of gamer years...That could be my red dragon side showing...but I like your idea. So far, all I have is my Caturday Survivor title and Cape.
  • zyronaxzyronax Member Posts: 153 Arc User
    > @kreatyve said:
    > Technically - you didn't buy anything. If you want to get technical about it, you are renting pixels. You are not allowed to sell anything off your account for cash. You get no physical goods. The sooner that players *realize not to spend money on this kind of ponzi scheme*, the happier off they will be.

    Fixed that for you. You're welcome.
  • hotfrostwormhotfrostworm Member Posts: 447 Arc User
    Whenever someone tells me they bought into a game (any kind) for cash, I am reminded of the old phrase "A fool and his money are soon parted." by the poet Thomas Tusser.

    I have personally known too many people who invest a great deal of cash into online games. I don't believe one should call something "free to play" when there is an expected hidden cost. I know people including my wife who spent $50 per release of the online game "Guild Wars" which contained 3 games and 1 expansion at that price for a total cost of $200. However it did not end there, the item mall has 17 different costumes at $7 each, storage expansion at $10 each, makeover $10 each, extreme make over $10 each, mercenary hero pack $40, and more. A person could spend well over $500 on this game and while it was purchased, the company only had to sell players on the idea that it was "free to play" meaning no monthly fee.

    End User License Agreement (EULA) is a software contract, where you agree to use their software, you never own the software. When the game ends you are expected to delete the software. Very few people seem to grasp this concept.

    The people I personally know, are friends and family, they foolishly throw money at these games buying nothing physical at all. All of these items are just as @kreatyve said, virtual items that can and will vanish when the game ends. All things end. The difference between the people I know and the people complaining here, seem to understand this is a gamble or a risk. I never heard them complain about the games, other than QoS (quality of service) and then the only option you have is to continue or give up.

    Looking at the example I gave above, she spent somewhere around $350 to $400 on that game and played for about 4 years very often. She still plays on there, just not as often, for a total of about 12 years. If I were to depreciate the cost over the first 6 years that comes to roughly $65 a year. Which is much less than anyone would pay for a subscription. If you have paid any money at all to Cryptic Studios over the 8 years, then simply divide your cost by the 8 years, and you basically paid that much a year to play this game. That is your non-refundable fee.

  • zyronaxzyronax Member Posts: 153 Arc User
    > @hotfrostworm said:
    > Whenever someone tells me they bought into a game (any kind) for cash, I am reminded of the old phrase "A fool and his money are soon parted." by the poet Thomas Tusser.
    >
    > I have personally known too many people who invest a great deal of cash into online games. I don't believe one should call something "free to play" when there is an expected hidden cost. I know people including my wife who spent $50 per release of the online game "Guild Wars" which contained 3 games and 1 expansion at that price for a total cost of $200. However it did not end there, the item mall has 17 different costumes at $7 each, storage expansion at $10 each, makeover $10 each, extreme make over $10 each, mercenary hero pack $40, and more. A person could spend well over $500 on this game and while it was purchased, the company only had to sell players on the idea that it was "free to play" meaning no monthly fee.
    >
    > End User License Agreement (EULA) is a software contract, where you agree to use their software, you never own the software. When the game ends you are expected to delete the software. Very few people seem to grasp this concept.
    >
    > The people I personally know, are friends and family, they foolishly throw money at these games buying nothing physical at all. All of these items are just as @kreatyve said, virtual items that can and will vanish when the game ends. All things end. The difference between the people I know and the people complaining here, seem to understand this is a gamble or a risk. I never heard them complain about the games, other than QoS (quality of service) and then the only option you have is to continue or give up.
    >
    > Looking at the example I gave above, she spent somewhere around $350 to $400 on that game and played for about 4 years very often. She still plays on there, just not as often, for a total of about 12 years. If I were to depreciate the cost over the first 6 years that comes to roughly $65 a year. Which is much less than anyone would pay for a subscription. If you have paid any money at all to Cryptic Studios over the 8 years, then simply divide your cost by the 8 years, and you basically paid that much a year to play this game. That is your non-refundable fee.

    Some valid points there. However, the 'divide by 8 years' ought to be changed to 'x' as the amount of years/time actually played can/will wary wildly between different players.

    As for ToS and EULAs, they are binding only in-so-far as they don't run afoul of existing local national laws (and sometimes international laws,) in whichever territories and regions the company in question is officially operating in. Hence why Valve had to update its ToS in 2012 after a German court ruled that users had the legal right (ownership) to transfer software licenses they paid for to other potential users. That law then became a precedent for the entire EU zone. (Valve being crafty removed the offending bits of their ToS stating licenses couldn't be transferred, but provided no direct means of selling or transferring a user account since the court ruling didn't specifically address that such a function be provided, only that users had the right to do so. Technicalities matter.)
  • greywyndgreywynd Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 7,083 Arc User
    The return value is "entertainment".
    I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
  • callumf#9018 callumf Member Posts: 1,710 Arc User
    benyr said:

    You have to look at this like a hobby, for many many years when I was younger I played a whole raft of team sports. In order to participate I had to pay a club membership fee each year, subscriptions for each match I played in, travel expenses for away games and even accommodation expenses for tours. I literally spent £000's of pounds a year on my hobbies.

    Then I got old (it happens to all of us) and had to give up team sports, and having paid what probably amounted to in excess of £40k over 25 years the only thing I have to show for it is fond memories. I wouldn't change anything from that time at all, it was money well spent.

    So I found myself a new Hobby, and Neverwinter happened to be it. I also found myself with several £000's a year extra cash I was no longer spending to play sport. So given I could spare the money, I believe in supporting whatever my hobbies are and to be brutally honest my time is worth more than the money, I happily spent away to get what I wanted without the need to grind quite as much as others. So I think its a bit disingenuous to say a fool is easily parted with his money. A fool is easily parted with money they cant afford, but money spent to save the more precious commodity of time is money well spent, provided you're enjoying yourself doing it.

    The interest point here is, it really is a foolish Business that pays absolutely no heed to its paying customers. I cant think of any other industry that does this. TV programs put out pilots to gauge interest, restaurants trial run taster menu's at reduced prices, almost every product release garners consumer feedback before releasing new products or making significant changes. The reason they do this is because they understand that unless people are willing to pay for their service or product they don't have a business.

    I don't know the financial numbers for this game, and I highly doubt they will ever release them. But id be surprised if it has more than 10,000 genuinely active and unique accounts based on factors like the steam log in data and volume of players online at any given time.

    Most people you meet in game swear blind they are free to play, and lets be honest we know the game only has a small team managing it, and they're quite slow at fixing issues and they're not exactly rolling out new and innovative features or modules with any great regularity, so I don't think they're making money hand over fist, they probably have little cash to work with above and beyond wages and overheads. The chances are that less than a thousand players are regularly contributing decent sums of money.

    If this is even close to being true then the games very survival sits in a very concentrated group of players, and I find it extraordinary that they would risk a significant number of those players walking away without either having a guaranteed new income stream in place to replace them (which online games can't have, its speculative that new players will both join and pay to play) or without some sort of genuine consultation with its paying customers to mitigate potential fall out.

    Ultimately the developers have more to loose than we do, I've paid my money I've enjoyed my time, I'm walking away and will find a new hobby and carry on with my life. However how many people who contribute financially can the game afford to see walk away? They get it wrong its not their hobby but their livelihood that's on the line.

    Like I said, I don't know the numbers, maybe the game is already haemorrhaging money, the people who pay to play are not enough and this is a last desperate throw of the dice? Maybe the game has million active accounts with tens of thousands of pay to play players and they can afford to loose several hundred of them. Only time will tell. But as someone who's worked in Corporate Banking for decades, the management attitude to its own customer base is extremely unusual and not one I've ever seen from a successful business, and if I were their Banking Partner it would not give me the confidence to back them financially.

    Probably the best post ever on the Neverwinter Business Model, thank you
  • araneaxaraneax Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 639 Arc User
    edited December 2020
    greywynd said:

    The return value is "entertainment".

    So what happens when that " entertainment " you payed for, is suddenly taken away?
    There's no incentive for you to stay as a customer.
    How does that help anyone?

    It does not help the developers.
    t does not help customers.
    It does not help the business or the game. And in the end it will result with dissatisfaction on all sides.
    The company will lose money, since customers will tigthen their wallets or leave the game.

    I do not really see the benefit on any side.
    And lets not forget many customers had to tigthen their wallets already this year. Duo to the state of the world.

    Asking the same customers to somehow pay for a change of a system in the game, by replacing everything they have sunken their money into before, does not seem like something that will turn out good. Or is going to be recieved well.

    d7d81448-df6b-48cf-94a0-cf1ba87d861a_zpsish6zr2v.jpg

  • greywyndgreywynd Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 7,083 Arc User
    Did you have fun playing? Did you get use out of what you paid for?
    I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
  • rockster#6227 rockster Member Posts: 1,860 Arc User
    greywynd said:

    The return value is "entertainment".

    I disagree with this, you get your basic entertainment by playing free. By paying money you get a value-add to your experience, same as paying for VIP, just at lower tiers. It is not a complicated concept, in life you pay money you get in return something of value back for that specific transaction. By paying money into a free game you expect a certain extra result or experience that the game promises which you also reasonably expect will have a certain longevity.
    Apparently pointing-out the bleeding obvious is a 'personal attack'.
  • greywyndgreywynd Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 7,083 Arc User
    But in the end it is still only entertainment. You own nothing except maybe the device you're playing on.
    I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
  • zyronaxzyronax Member Posts: 153 Arc User
    > @greywynd said:
    > Did you have fun playing? Did you get use out of what you paid for?

    Ever the one to skirt the issue, and try to avoid answering legitimate observations and questions directly that make for uncomfortable reading if one is on or for Team Cryptic. Feel free to try another glib reply in an effort to redirect and avoid the line of query which you clearly understand the point of. It is somewhat amusing to watch, even if it is as vapid as it is predictable. 😊
  • zyronaxzyronax Member Posts: 153 Arc User
    edited December 2020
    > @greywynd said:
    > But in the end it is still only entertainment. You own nothing except maybe the device you're playing on.

    And that does nothing to instill confidence or desire in the player/potential customer to spend/continue spending money (which Cryptic needs them to do as a business). Are the basics of quality customer service and enticing offers that result in less resistance between the customer willingly spending money vs. begrudgingly doing so (and eventually walking away) that difficult to grasp?

    Tl;dr: It's about emotional intelligence and business savvy. Just because you can do something doesn't always mean it's the wisest/most lucrative thing to do.
  • greywyndgreywynd Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 7,083 Arc User
    And what they've already done is set in stone. What they are going to do may still have some fluidity.
    I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
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