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Trying to understand the concept of ""Micro"" Transactions.
cybershadow1
Member Posts: 1 Arc User
I am curious to know how perfect worlds justifies stating that the c-store is a "Microtransaction"
based content system. from my experiences with numerous MMO's the term Micro transaction is an oxymoron. The originally coined term referred to small transactions involving between 1 and 5 dollars. however if you actually look at the exchange rates currently something as simple as a ship pack costs the equivalent of 50 USD for 3 ships. now don't get me wrong i am not just raging and asking for free stuff. i want to support the game developers it is just they have no payment options that actually appeal to someone with a lower income.
virtual items should never cost so much.
for the price of one of these content packs a person could buy a brand new top shelf game.
seriously is there anyone in the freemium business who actually understands what micro transactions are supposed to be?
these games would actually make so much more money by lowering the cost of the currency.
which is worth more?? a few thousand transaction of 20 - 50 dollars or hundreds of thousands of 1-5 dollar purchases.
the math is simple so how does this inflation happen?
i mean at this point greed isn't even a valid excuse because the models clearly state that lower cost higher volume of transactions generally nets more than large lump payments
based content system. from my experiences with numerous MMO's the term Micro transaction is an oxymoron. The originally coined term referred to small transactions involving between 1 and 5 dollars. however if you actually look at the exchange rates currently something as simple as a ship pack costs the equivalent of 50 USD for 3 ships. now don't get me wrong i am not just raging and asking for free stuff. i want to support the game developers it is just they have no payment options that actually appeal to someone with a lower income.
virtual items should never cost so much.
for the price of one of these content packs a person could buy a brand new top shelf game.
seriously is there anyone in the freemium business who actually understands what micro transactions are supposed to be?
these games would actually make so much more money by lowering the cost of the currency.
which is worth more?? a few thousand transaction of 20 - 50 dollars or hundreds of thousands of 1-5 dollar purchases.
the math is simple so how does this inflation happen?
i mean at this point greed isn't even a valid excuse because the models clearly state that lower cost higher volume of transactions generally nets more than large lump payments
Post edited by cybershadow1 on
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Lock Box keys... that's your answer
In every place,
The deeds of men remain the same..."
I'm interested to know which models you are using. Do you have some inside information on the elasticity of demand of the various items in STO? Please share the basis on which you perform your analysis.
STO Forum member since before February 2010.
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This violates the F2P principals as it basically says sure you can work to earn these items however your limited to only working a few hours a day for minimum wage. if you look at other market based games like EVE online they do have a F2P option where you can buy time codes on the in game market however they "Do Not" limit the amount of currency you can earn ingame.
in fact perfect world is one of the only FTP titles that restricts resource farming to a set daily limit. and while some games do try to limit by reducing the speed at which income is earned a daily max limit is uncalled for
it takes time to earn dilithium and if you want to spend hours a day farming instead of enjoying the game you should have that right.
its shocking and frighting to see community members supporting corporate greed. there is something fundamentally wrong with a pricing model where small packs of items can cost the same price as a full game. and while i understand that the game is infact F2P and requires a cash store to fund it's self. the micro transaction system is called micro for a reason. a "" micro transaction "" should under no circumstances ever cost more than 10 dollars. the entire point of microtransactions are to charge very small fees that are extremely attractive generating significant profit from a large number of transactions.
the current model of F2P is actually Macro Transactions. High value items that provide a significant income per purchase however due to the fact that the prices of the items are very unattractive to the average player and affordable only by players who have a vested interest in the game and a significant amount of disposable income. in the long run the profits are much lower than they could be if the prices were dropped to a more affordable level.
its exactly the same as that old math problem do you want 100 dollars a week or one penny doubled each day. the lower prices attract new customers who would otherwise see the C store as unattractive. the word spreads and you have an exponential growth of clients while making less money you end up with a higher gross due to increased sales.
there doesn't need to be research it is a well documented strategy that works quite well it is. just that most companies only care about short term profits and quick bucks
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If something is important to you, then you can make allowances/try to squeeze it out of your budget for the next few months.
On the other hand, a item like the 'Odyssey Pack', how many of these (who's development costs are much higher then a typical consumable) is the average account going to purchase? Lowering the price is not going to increase the income, just because of the limited ability to sell these items...
You're being given a free steak dinner and complaining that the lobster is so expensive? :rolleyes:
Command Officers of the USS Wyvern (from left to right):
Aurellia Eshkah (Tactical); Indigo Shae (Engineering); Nysiay Chysiayki (VA, Ship Captain)
Jeclia Sek (Science); Vally Mantivour (Security)
hell yeah i agree i made VA in 11 DAYS and spent 8 days getting dilitium which i sold for zen and bought packs.
they make a lot more money on low money consumables.
for that same 25-50 dollars i could buy an entire game from a well known game company complete with items campaign and multiplayer support.
the thing is there is no defense and if you think the prices are justified than your either incredibly ignorant of how the economy works and more than likely have free access to rich daddy's credit card / trust fund. either way you represent a very small elitist percentage of the population or worse are a paid repetitiveness of perfect worlds paid to troll posts that threaten the status quo.
remember i want to support the game i want to find good value in the c-store. basically i am saying i am willing to pay perfect worlds but i do expect to get my money's worth if i choose to do so. i am in no way asking for free zen but i am asking to get a bit more than a few token ships for such a large sum of money.
if i am going to drop 50$ i expect multiple ships and expanded DLC storyline content.
additionally the entire F2P model is a fallacy. and while you can spend time farming the fact remains that someone at some time has to pay USD for the decent items. if perfect world truly wanted to go F2P than they would allow players to earn things like key codes zen and fleet modules in game via missions and drops instead of relying entirely on the exchange. a few dropped zen or masterkeys here and there would not cut into perfect worlds profit as impatient players will always shell out money just for convenience but the players who actually want to grind should be able to find these things in game without relying on the player economy to be honest one master key a month as a rare drop would at least be a token gesture or appreciation for a loyal community.
additionally the zen earning offers through the surveys are a complete scam.
in and of it's self market research is supposed to be double blind however the majority of these ""surveys"" redirect the user to predatory data mining sites that require personally identifiable information and registration with 3rd party services not related to perfect worlds or peanut labs. another abuse of the community. if you want to allow players to earn zen through market research than do it through a more legitimate company that respects anonymity and has better privacy policies
as for the costs of development of the ship packs these costs are relatively low the most work done on these would be the texture art. as the underlying 3d model can be generated in a very short amount of time using existing art assets from the star trek universe as a template. i go to a college that has a strong focus in game design and i see people in the labs turning out compelling 3d art in a matter of hours lets not forget that many of the ships in this game do not have moving parts so that also simplifies the asset developement. as for the ship's game mechanics most of the framework is already in place and just requires cutting and pasting of script libraries and slot configurations into the database entry. so in terms of covering the development cost of the ships it would really only take a few purchases 25-50 at most to cover these costs and past that point it is all pure profit and considering that entire games can be developed by indy designers for less than 5000 Usd it means that if a single ship costs a big name company more than 1-2k to develop than they their accountant needs to be fired
tbh the development costs of modern big name games are unjustifiable there is a lot of wasteful spending and poor project management that skyrockets development costs beyond what they should be. and not only do these issues force companies to continuously increase prices but it also alienates lower income players
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In the real world I can buy a game like Injustice: Gods Among Us for $60.00 and be done with it in 3-4 hours. In the real world my wife and I can go to a movie and spend $40.00 for 1.5-2.5 hours of entertainment - and if I take my kids too it's more then double that. In the real world a day at the amusement park with my family will cost over $100.00. A day at the zoo will cost me $50.00. A walk through an museum will cost me $15.00. A round of golf will cost me $45.00 - and I've played at courses where that round cost me over $300.00.
In the real world people pay outlandish fees for entertainment. Those fees only seem outlandish if you're not enjoying yourself. You can drop $3,000.00 for a week at Disney Land and be bored stiff and you can spend $200.00 for a week of camping and have the best time of your life.
Now as far as alienating lower income folks, the game is free to play. Nothing in the C-Store is necessary to play the game. You can do an Elite STF just as well in a free Patrol Escort as you can a C-Store Defiant. If you don't PvP - which the vast majority of STO players don't do - there's no incentive to P2W - especially as there's nothing to win.
And on top of all of that STO gives you the ability to earn in-game currency to buy things you want. Even a casual player can earn 1,000.00 Zen in a month without much issue - roughly 4,500 Dilithium per day. That means that $25.00 ship only costs $15.00, an if you can wait 2 months it only costs you $5.00. You can't get much more micro then that. I mean we live in a real world where a candy bar and a soda at the gas station will cost you over $2.00 - and you don't even give a second thought to spending money for that.
Complaining about cost has nothing to do with being poor. It's about people who want everything for free and want to put zero effort into getting it. It's the entitlement generation wanting it all now - only to realize that they didn't really want it and forget about it 1 week after they bought it.
Well, look at it like this; they are using the existing model to finance a successful game that is enjoyed by thousands of players. You have trouble with first grade grammar rules.
Stop playing and go read a book.
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stating that things are the way they are and not to mess with the status quo is the reason things have gotten so bad. the fact that people are willing to pay exorbitant amounts of money for entertainment is why things have gotten so bad in the first place.
you claim that i am deluded and need to live in the real world. did you ever think for a moment that i have been living in the real world all along and i see a serious problem with the way things currently are and am making my best effort to try to get people to stand up for themselves.
your forgetting that throughout history there has always been the opportunity for negotiating prices. with the depersonalization of the economy there is literally nothing people can do to get a better deal on anything and thus without this key economic function companies are free to charge anything they want without being forced to deal with individual people and negotiate deals that work for everyone.
i can get into deeper economic discussion but i doubt your double digit IQ can comprehend anything more complex than this video game
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At its basic core $20.00-$25.00 for a ship is not an unreasonable price for something you are going to use for months, if not years - and it's certainly not expensive when you realize you're not paying $15.00 a month in Subscription fees to use it in the game and that you don't even NEED the item you WANT to play and enjoy the game. And it's even less expensive when you realize you can get it anywhere from 20% to 100% off just by playing said game.
I have not purchased a single Zen since this game went FTP nearly 18 months ago and yet I own every Fed ship and item in the C-Store, most of the KDF ships, some of the Rom ships, and several Fleet ships - not to mention several different Lockbox ships I bought from the Exchange.
You don't need a doctorate in economics or more than a double-digit IQ to understand that getting everything you want for free is hella good.
You mention several times that for $50 you can purchase a top shelf game. So let me ask you this; how much did you spend to play STO? I'm guessing that answer is going to $0. So if you've spent nothing, what in the world are you complaining about?
The sense of entitlement in society now adays, especially those of the younger generation is absolutely astounding.