F2P MMOs and corruption

[Longknife]

Just thought I'd ask this real quick:

 

 

How many of you have played a F2P MMO and how many of you have discovered the company behind it to be corrupt to some degree? AKA player favortism or additional rewards for the cash shopping players? (Aka they can simply request that exceedingly rare sword everyone spends months farming)

 

 

Asking because I got done with one about 6 months ago after it got overtaken with corruption, and the practice DISGUSTS me. The game is dying and I can't help but get the sense the company is rather pragmatically determining that they can probably milk it for all it's worth via a little corruption and no one would be none the wiser when they start promoting their new games. I just hate that, and I've actually put in some decent effort to find proof of it all and try to force the company to stop doing so. It's reached the point where I've actually contacted some gaming journalism websites and run the story by them and they've shown some interest.

 

 

When I ran the article idea by them I suggested they could maybe sell it as a story on F2P MMO corruption as I believe most of them are eventually corrupt.

 

I definitely believe that, but that got me curious....How many of you have actually experienced a corrupt F2P MMO firsthand? Or am I the only idiot dumb enough to get involved in those kinds of games?

[Hurlshort]

I play a ton of MMO's, and I have no idea what you are talking about.

 

It's just a video game maybe not taking it so seriously would help?  Also you are being super vague here, what is the game, what do you even mean by corruption?  The company running the game can pretty much do whatever they want to the game world.  If they want to make it pay to win or whatever, that is their prerogative.  You as a consumer do not have to pay for anything you don't like, that's pretty much where your rights end.  

 

Free to play MMO's have always concerned me, because I know it is expensive to develop and run these games and clearly they need to make their money somewhere, and I'd rather play a flat fee than get nickle and dimed to death. 

[Bester]

Even some poker rooms turned out to be corrupt without the knowledge of their owners. It's doesn't necessarily mean it's company's policy.

Also... WHO PLAYS F2P MMO??? You must have both:

1) ZERO TASTE

2) ZERO MONEY

[kirottu]

I think he's talking about free to play, but pay to win.

 

World of Tanks "gold ammo" was only available with real money. It had slightly more damage and far superior penetration. After a while they nerfed it and made also available with in game currency. Still, I wouldn't call it corruption. 

[Longknife]

I think he's talking about free to play, but pay to win.

 

World of Tanks "gold ammo" was only available with real money. It had slightly more damage and far superior penetration. After a while they nerfed it and made also available with in game currency. Still, I wouldn't call it corruption. 

 

 

I'm talking about, for example in my case, and MMO where being a heavier cash shopper means you're afforded more than what you'd actually expect. As an example maybe it's common knowledge that a cash shopper can easily pay tons of money to get the best weapon in the game, but pieces of the best armor still require lots of farming or very lucky chances come drop time, so you go in and play the game expecting to see that the cash shoppers all have the best weapon but not the best helmet (unless of course it's blatantly known they paid a crapton to another player who got it as a drop). In reality though there exists a system where they can ticket and complain to the game staff saying they spent a lot of money on this game and therefore deserve this or that, and the game staff simply hands it to them, the result being that the cash shoppers actually gain and even MORE significant boost than the non-CSers than previously expected.

 

 

  For this specific MMO I'm referring to, what happened was this: the staff was initially too ignorant of the game and thus got tricked into giving one player the best item set in the game while giving another 6 the best helmet in the game via a very basic photoshop scam, both of them being extremely rare. The helmet was achieved by photoshopping the character having it and claiming it "suddenly disappeared!" and they want it recovered, and lo and behold only the highest paying customers had their ticket responded to. The best set in the game...? Let me be clear that the game utilized chance odds here with the best set having abysmally low ones. We're talking a set that would be realistically impossible to farm without spending money on the game and even then would need upwards of $30,000 spent given the chances of a piece dropping. We're also talking a set that, once received, gives the guy double the damage, defense and HP of everyone else and makes him a virtual god.

 

  What ended up happening is that while they received complaints of course, they also must've received a shocking number of offers from their richest players offering to pay more to get some rare items. The result is it became common practice to submit a support ticket CLAIMING you "accidently" got rid of this great and powerful item you had and want it returned, and whether or not they handed you the item (without bothering to check your character history and see that you were lying) was a matter of if you were an extremely good customer or not. In short, it's gone from the game staff legitimately being tricked to now they willingly allow themselves to be "tricked" with the "we were tricked" part being nothing but a thinly veiled scapegoat to avoid any bad press or legal action against the company, whilst it's practically public knowledge that if you've spent X amount on the game and then use a ticket method claiming you got rid of X item "on accident," you can have the item given to you.

 

 

In short, items that should be exceedingly rare to the point of not existing within the game entirely are suddenly within the game, but can only be obtained by being within that top 1% of customers for the company, all while the company would claim no such practices are taking place.

 

 

 

 

 

And what I meant by F2P MMOs being corrupt was not that it's a cornerstone policy of them, but rather in my experience something like this ALWAYS ends up happening, as if it's an inevitability of the business model. The company starts weighing risk vs. reward and tries getting away with favortism here and there to encourage cash shopping, which sadly people buy into rather than taking a stand and saying "no I'm not gonna spend $5,000 more on a game just to be able to compete at the top."

[Shallow]

Always assume any f2p game with a cashshop will once they've gotten a decent sized audience, if not instantanously, heavily increase the advantage cashshoppers get. In a p2p game people will start flipping out and demanding refunds if things get too bad, and if the game has subscriptions, people will stop renewing them. In a fully f2p game with no cashshop component it isn't really possible to favor paying customers. Generally you should just avoid anything with a cash shop, especially if it is otherwise f2p.

[Hurlshort]

None of that sounds like corruption.  It sounds like capitalism, of course the higher paying customers are going to get better treatment!  That's how the world works.  

 

But seriously, how does it affect you if a bunch of other people have a helmet?  Just enjoy the game for yourself, or move on.

[Longknife]

None of that sounds like corruption.  It sounds like capitalism, of course the higher paying customers are going to get better treatment!  That's how the world works.  

 

But seriously, how does it affect you if a bunch of other people have a helmet?  Just enjoy the game for yourself, or move on.

 

Erm, it does effect the game when currently one guild is absolutely curb stomping the rest of the competition due to item sets they were given by the game staff. If that doesn't sound like corruption to you where all other factors within the game are largely moot and the big deciding factor between the winners and losers is which side spent more and did a better job of convincing the game staff to give them free stuff, then I dunno what to tell you.

 

 

And I have moved on, I haven't played the game in half a year. The only reason I show any involvement with it is because I still have friends that play who hit me up on Skype about all the problems and just complain about it but do nothing to stop it. I personally hate that "someone should do something!" mentality so decided I'd try to do something about it. Thought if I could either convince the company it'd bite them in the ass or make the news so well know that the little deals cease to be profitable for them, it could change the mentality.

 

It's depressing to see though to see how many people simply refuse to try something and continue to play it, how many workers who openly state they don't agree with the practice refuse to risk stepping out of line, and how apathetic others can be, calling those types of practices justified "because capitalism."

[Bester]

Unless there's world pvp with equipment dropping on the ground on death like in old school MUDs, there's no reason to worry about other guilds and their gear.

[Bester]

Also, capitalism is the reason that MMO even exists in the first place, you Kim Jong-un fan club commie boys. How many MMOs did the Soviets make, huh? Zero, that's how many.

[Longknife]

Unless there's world pvp with equipment dropping on the ground on death like in old school MUDs, there's no reason to worry about other guilds and their gear.

There IS world pvp that can partake in and interfere with every weekly event. Dropping is easy ENOUGH to avoid, but actually gaining new equipment is what becomes difficult when others monopolize the market via gear. That's what I'm saying.

 

It's one degree of a "problem" (potentially fair enough) when the rich elite are periodically handed "bonuses" on a silver platter that others have to farm and work for.

It's another degree of a problem when the gear they're handed is inconceivable for anyone to obtain via farming, let alone via cash shopping WITHOUT receiving it as a bonus for being in the top 1%.

It's a big freaking deal when that very same unobtainable gear they got given to them by the game staff can enable them to block everyone else from achieving anything.

 

 

 

At this point you might say "well that's bad business and their game will die because of it." I'd agree and disagree while also saying I think that's the goal. The company has other MMOs and this particular one is old and outstayed it's welcome for them possibly. Yes, I saw the updates, how they potentially created imbalance and saw no signs of future updates to fix that and I jumped ship. Big surprise, not long after some of the richest 1% "scammed" to get it. (Scammed in quotations because the staff knows damned well what's going on) they now basically run the server.

What's both shocking and bothersome to me however is that people KEEP PLAYING. If it's one thing I've learned it's that MMO communities are filled with some special ****ing people, to say the very least. Definitely not the brightest, definitely very delusional, and that goes for the people with the broken gear as well as those without it. (Those with the unstoppable gear are also not too bright and pretty delusional because controlling a game like that will quickly kill the server, rendering the cash they spent on the game moot VERY quickly)

 

Personally though I'm not the kind to say "well if they're stupid enough to keep playing and paying then they deserve it." This can hold some truth to it for sure, but when the intent of the other party is rather conniving or malicious in principle, then no wtf they should pay for it. Personally, no, I don't think it's a grand idea for us as a culture to breed that kind of attitude and shrug it off as "yep that's capitalism. :D"

Edited September 15, 2014 by Longknife

[Valsuelm]

Scanned this. Name of game isn't mentioned so far as I can see.  Until it is: baseless unsubstantiated accusations.

 

Don't be vague, be direct and to the point.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Valsuelm

[Bester]

gaining new equipment is what becomes difficult when others monopolize the market via gear

Why? No instance dungeons?

 

 

 

rich elite

being in the top 1%

Look, are you a communist or something? You better enjoy capitalism with the 1%'s and the rich elite or else you're a communist and that would only mean that you despise freedom and democracy. We will have none of it here, thank you very much.

 

P.S. Thank god I'm rich or I'd probably be writing the same pathetic excuses for being a poor who has to play f2p games and being humiliated by his betters.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Bester

[Longknife]

Scanned this. Name of game isn't mentioned so far as I can see.  Until it is: baseless unsubstantiated accusations.

 

Don't be vague, be direct and to the point.

 

 

Sure why not? Left it out cause wasn't sure how the rules are here in regards to naming another company and making such accusations.

 

Name of the game is Perfect World International, ironic since it's a Chinese game and Bester commented about how you won't see commies making MMOs.   (obviously they're not completely communist, but you get the point)

 

In a nutshell the game has gone a good....must be a year now, since an update was done that was....yknow, half-intelligent. Reason I stuck to the game was because it was the best F2P MMO I could find that was actually managed intelligently; yes there would be imbalances etc (perhaps to increase profit as each major update would re-assign which class was best and which wasn't with usual suspects, perhaps to encourage people to fund up two characters) but the company always had the sense to recognize and address those and the imbalances never really touched onto the money-making PVP aspects, so you were fine even if it was annoying to feel helpless vs. a class. EVERY F2P MMO has problems, but this one I gave a shot because the company seemed smart enough to recognize serious problems and address them. No maybe not as fast as some would like, but at least they did it.

 

   Well that all changed and they did an update about ~1 year ago that added a new style of gear known as card sets. Collect cards (cannot be traded, thus ruining any chances of farming or buying them from other players) and if you get a certain set (where every card is needed or no bonus), then huzzah you just got way stronger. Problem with these is that they absolutely curbstomp everything else in their power and impact, the upside is that they're exceedingly rare to the point where at most, a server might have to cope with ONE lucky player with one modestly powerful card set, which while useful, would not make them unstoppable. To give you an idea of how strong these are, the best card set basically adds enough attack power to let you oneshot any average player with ease (no strong skill usage required), enough defense to cap out your defense entirely (95% damage reduction was the cap, and mind you that ~80%-85% would be the average so each 1% is huge; we're dealing with thousands of points of damage so of course that makes sense), enough HP to more or less double your total HP pool, and on top of that, the killer: spirit. They added a new stat called spirit which basically, if you collect 10 more spirit than your opponent, you take 1% less damage from them and deal 1% more damage. This calculates out AFTER the 90% damage reduction, so yes you can reduce damage you take even further.

 

   The problem is that the cards are literally the only way to influence spirit beyond doing daily quests that everyone can do and can eventually cap out. The dailies would award maybe 500 spirit for example, but again they cap there, and once a server's population hits that cap, only cards work to increase spirit. The best card set gives, when maxed out, 940 spirit. Yes, someone with that best card set would deal 94% extra damage (on TOP of the insane amount of bonus damage they received from the attack cards in the bonus set) and take 94% less damage. When you combine that with base stats, you can basically imagine it as your damage going up 94% from the attack stats, then going up 94% again from the spirit. When you look at defense, it's as if you take 95% less damage and THEN 94% less of that remainder. See the problem?

 

  While the most powerful set was handed out to someone as a gift with the game staff not understanding the gravity of what they gave out, the game staff has since responded by handing out multiple sets that are essentially the second-best sets in the game, which would give 750 spirit and thus 75% additional damage and 75% less damage taken (again on top of the ~75% additional damage they got from raw attack stats provided by the set).

 

 

As you can see, yes, this single-handedly shuts down PVP. You cannot possibly hope to compete with one of these players at all, meaning they can take anything they want. As I said, many of the forms of income are in PVP enabled areas with people competing against each other, meaning that if you have something they want? They can take it. You could argue "but they have the best gear, what could they possibly want?" They could want their guilds to be the best and have that glory and recognition for leading the best guild, the result being they're still motivated to actively deny resources from their enemies and assist their own guild members in getting them. See the problem?

 

 

 

As I said, to me this was kinda obvious this system is a problem. Ever since the cards were introduced, I was sorta skeptical, but figured that perhaps such a system was implemented to provide cash shoppers with a CONSTANT motivation to cash shop. It was a chance-based system to get good cards and the chance was abysmally low. To quote a post on the forums there:

 

 

to put things into perspective, the probability of getting full set of neuma portal (best set) and crown of madness (best helmet in the game that was repeatedly scammed) from box/packs after spending 10k gold (10k USD) is less than 1 in a million.

 

So THAT was the thing. Yes these things are ridiculously broken overpowered, but no one will ever POSSIBLY get them. Realistically, the best fathomable set anyone could possibly and realistically achieve was a set that added enough spirit to make them gain about 30% extra damage and defense over the average player but did NOT provide the raw base attack and defense stats to amplify this, meaning it'd literally be a flat 30% with a 6000 damage hit becoming 7800 for example on targets that have an average of ~18,000-25,000 HP. Yes that's strong, but not insurmountable. Comparing that to the 6000 becoming 18,000 (yes, 18,000 after applying the 75% extra raw damage and 75% extra damage from spirit) with the card sets being handed out to the top 1% of CSers, it's peanuts.

  I don't think anyone within the community would complain if the cash shoppers ended up with 30% better attack and defense. Fair enough, they keep the game running so give them a slight edge. But THOSE odds? That's ****ing broken.

 

No one expected to ever see those sets. When the first guy tricked the staff giving him the set as a gift, yes it was a pain in the ass, but there was that sense of "well at least we'll only ever have to deal with this ONE jackass," and those that knew him and knew his personality knew it'd be rather easy to motivate him to quit the game entirely anyways. (he constantly needed approval and an ego stroke or he cried and ran away) But now that they're there? RIP Perfect World. Unless a future update makes those easily obtainable for everyone or makes them tradeable, the game is dead.

  Why do I doubt they'll do that in a future update when I say they have a good track record of fixing past mistakes after a season (6 months) of players dealing with them? Because now every update screams "we want this game to die." I don't think the company WANTS to keep it running. It's an older game, think it's 6 years old now. 6 or 7. It might not be profitable anymore to keep it running and keep developing for it, who knows. But in recent updates, they proceeded to break the economy by making practically every new item non-farmable or non-tradeable. Money not flowing from one hand to the next = bad, economy will die and sure enough that's what it's doing. They made another class more broken than ANYTHING has ever been before: the assassin class (YA THE ****ING STEALTH CLASS, typical MMO amirite?) kills faster than anything else and is arguably the best tank in the game too. Why? Because at this stage in the game, not having full buffs means a quick death, and assassins have a skill to avoid losing their buffs. You CAN get them off, but even then, an assassin is a logistics issue because you'll spend 4 times the team resources trying to bring one down as compared to any other class. And to top it all off, the spirit system is just ridiculous. Within the past two updates, the amount of time it's taken for someone to be end-game has gone from maybe 1-3 months (for a new player; an old player can make an endgame new character in a week) to a friggin year. It's actively discouraging new members.

 

 

 

 

Now as I said, for ME or perhaps for you guys, you can look at that and say "that's insane, only an idiot would join that game or continue playing." I would agree. Except for one problem.

 

People who play MMOs are special. In my time playing this game I've met pathological liars, people who value the game more than their job, people with ego issues, people who are straight up sociopaths and every manner of attitude you would expect to be disfunctional within the real world. As sad as it is, the harsh reality is that these people are addicted. They "NEED" this game, as it's as important to them as the reality we live in. So do they accept that the game is not being managed in a manner to make it last? No, they keep playing, unready to face the day when the game goes offline. And they continue to throw money at it, either in denial about the reality of the situation, hoping they'll get super super lucky, or thinking maybe THEY are close enough to that 1% mark to soon get one of those sweet ungodly powerful card sets if they just throw a LIIIIITTLE more money at the game staff.

 

That's why it sickens me, that's why I call it corrupt.

No one in their right mind would play a game where they knew the heaviest cash shoppers would be awarded gear and stats that make them three times stronger than the average player (and mind you this does not equate to you need 3v1 to bring them down. When they oneshot people, it becomes exponentially more difficult to kill someone). No one would sign up for that. But at this stage in the game, they know the community they've got is too addicted to do jack about it.

  As for why I'm so insistent the game staff knows damned well what they're doing, it's a long story (it'd be another wall of text, but I CAN provide if someone's curious...), but in short I've been in some discussions with some of the lower down employees who hold no power where they've accidently implied or pieced together that the idea of people "scamming" to get these sets is nothing but a ruse and a scapegoat to protect the face of the company. Likewise, I'm noticing a pattern where the very people who cash shop hard enough to be given these sets (we're talking spending upwards of $30,000. Sad but true) are chronically in need of assuring themselves they're special, and this leads to them having rather big mouths when it comes to their methods of obtaining the stuff. In short, they blatantly brag about how the little deal went down to people in hopes of coming off as important. People screenshot, word gets around, and Iunno people on the server always liked passing me info for some reason (OBVIOUSLY CUZ I SO CHARMING) so I quickly collected a fine little folder of stuff that acted as "evidence" of sorts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

You might be asking if it bothers me so much, why don't I do something about it? I'm trying, but unfortunately....as I said, I suspect the company viewed this as risk-vs-reward and determined that ENOUGH people caring enough for this to bite them in the ass later is unlikely. And they may be right... :/ We'll see.

 

You might be asking why I bother with F2P MMOs. Well for one I'm not rich, for two I go in with VERY low expectations, for three this is something I only get involved with every few years. I may spend 3 years on one then spend 3 years hiatus (currently on a hiatus). So it's a case of me knowing damned well what to expect and the risks, but it just never ceases to amaze me what they get away with.

 

 

You might be asking why I care? In short, this kinda stuff fascinates me. I honestly don't really give a damned about the game itself, it's more the business practice that bothers me. To me, it's a scary thought when what's profitable begins to outweigh what's morally right. To put this in perspective, I'm a dual citizen and HAD to leave the USA because I couldn't get healthcare. Why? I was born with one leg. I'm by no means a profitable customer for a health insurance company. If I were NOT a dual citizen, my options? Uhhhhh...suffer, basically. I'd either have some real problems or I'd end up so deep in debt I'd be living like a slave. So yes, as you can imagine, situations where logical profitable moves outweigh morally based decisions...? I'm not too fond of those. For me I care not because omg I really really care about this game or this community (honestly **** em, that community is a cess pool for the most part), but rather because this exact same attitude can exist in any kind of company or organization, such as a health insurance company or a bank involved in the mortgage crisis. This combined with my little hatred of the "Someone should do something!!!" mentality where everyone stands by and waits for someone else to do something (was jumped once on the street, had a nice little time getting hit before someone finally did something, been more active in helping others on the street with such issues ever since), yes I feel obligated to try and do something about it.

 

 

 

Why? No instance dungeons?

 

 

No actually. There ARE, but at this stage in the game, to find anything of real value or worth, you need to participate in events open to the public and compete with others. Competition is where the money's at. Even if you played a PvE locked server with no PVP, you'd have the issue of not being able to out-do your opponent in the events due to the gear gap.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Longknife

[Hiro Protagonist II]

Now that's what I call a wall of text. Nearly two and a half thousand words. You're obviously not happy. Maybe take a break from this?

 

I've only played World of Tanks and found it quite fun and frustrating at times. Mostly due to no team work and being thrown into a game with 14 other randoms. It's like trying to herd cats. Sometimes it works and everyone just knows what they're doing, most times it's chaotic. I'm glad I moved on from it.

[Bester]

Only people I know who play Perfect World are 14-15 year olds who are more into socializing and meeting guys/girls than anything else. Perfect World is like Second Life, except it's got some pve and pvp content for some reason.

 

Also, I'd recommend you to express yourself in a more concise way. I simply had to skip that last giant post, even though I was somewhat interested in the details.

[Longknife]

Now that's what I call a wall of text. Nearly two and a half thousand words. You're obviously not happy. Maybe take a break from this?

 

 

Is everyone missing that I haven't played it in about half a year?

 

As I said, I just got hit up with plenty of skype messages complaining about the very stuff that sent me packing, figured I was in a position to try and get stuff fixed and have been trying to do so, with bleh results. Not about the game for me, it's about the immoral policies and that holy crap they're getting away with it. Not the first time a F2P MMO would get away with that stuff either, sadly....

 

As for if you mean taking a break (or quit) from trying to help with that? Hell I might.

 

 

 

Only people I know who play Perfect World are 14-15 year olds who are more into socializing and meeting guys/girls than anything else. Perfect World is like Second Life, except it's got some pve and pvp content for some reason.

 

Also, I'd recommend you to express yourself in a more concise way. I simply had to skip that last giant post, even though I was somewhat interested in the details.

 

 

Sadly, having played it, I can promise you those aren't actual teenagers, but rather grown adults acting as though they were. :D

 

 

And sorry, I type walls of text. It's my gimmick. Ask any forum I participate in.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Longknife

[Bester]

Anyway, I can recommend you to try vanilla WoW servers or LA2 servers with first 4 addons. It's f2p and more fun than any modern MMO.

[Deadly_Nightshade]

The only free-to-play game I've spent any great length of time playing has been Realm of the Mad God and I didn't see any of the problems you're describing.

[Longknife]

Anyway, I can recommend you to try vanilla WoW servers or LA2 servers with first 4 addons. It's f2p and more fun than any modern MMO.

 

Lawl the LAST thing I wanna do is get involved with another MMO. xD

 

As I said, I was smart enough to see these kinds of problems coming and jumped ship.

For me though...? Reason I said I tend to take looooooooooong breaks from MMOs is because the communities are all kinds of god damn special.

 

When I first sign up for one, it's this attitude of "think of all the hours of entertainment I'll get out of watching a bunch of egotistical, anti-social and highly dysfunctional people interact with each other in a game world and show maturity on part with a 4-year-old." And it IS fun, largely for those exact reasons. I wish I'd've save a screenshot of a guild leader on my server telling my guild leader "well then we can't be friends anymore!" cause our guild declared war on theirs. xD  (I **** you not, that was sadly his exact wording, the exclamation point being the only part he didn't include)

 

Then after awhile...? It wears and tears on you. You start to be ashamed that you're in the same species as these people. You start to be driven mad by how childish and illogical the community can be, and you cease to find it funny so much as it is outrageously sad and pathetic.

 

 

And that's where I am now. I've no interest in interacting with such people again. At least not for a couple years.

 

 

I'm sure in a couple years there'll be a day where I think "OH MAN I WANNA JOIN ANOTHER COMMUNITY WHERE PEOPLE MAKE RAP VIDEOS ABOUT THEMSELVES" or "OH MAN I WANNA LAUGH AS I LURE PEOPLE OUT OF SAFE ZONE VIA PROMISES OF A REWARD FROM A BROKEN COMMUNIST HOLIDAY QUEST CHAIN, ALL TO MAKE A LIGHTHEARTED JOKE WHERE I KILL THEM, AND TO THE EXENT WHERE PEOPLE MAKE A PETITION ON THE FORUMS TO GET ME BANNED" ....

 

 

Or even "OH MAN I CAN'T WAIT TIL SOME IDIOT MAKES A VIDEO SO CRINGEWORTHY AND PATHETIC THAT I FEEL COMPELLED TO PARODY IT AND THEY DON'T EVEN REALIZE I'M MAKING FUN OF THEM."

 

That'll probably be the day I end up playing one again.

 

 

But for now? NOPE, gonna stay away. :D 

Was fun while it lasted but as they say: "Never go full retard."

Edited September 15, 2014 by Longknife

[Mamoulian War]

If you really want to solve anything about it in general and you are European, try to write up some complaint letter to European Commission. They are currently investigating EA Mobile "free to play" games as false advertising for example. More material might take their focus into whole "free to play" model and not go only after few companies.

[Erez]

f2p is a lie that should have never existed. 

I am wary of ftp games just as I am wary of people offering me free stuff on the street, phone or email.

f2p should be called by their real name p2w.

[Bluetoe]

F2P from what I have seen (being a casual gamer) is for games that couldn't retain their sub base. WoT is F2P, actually with a cash cow central shop where you can as some say "pay to win" but I would say, "pay to compete" considering that a large part of the gamer community does not have the time to grind to stay competitive. That being said, central (dev owned) shops where you can buy buffs is an awesome thing for both casual gamers AND the devs/producers of the game, imo. Wildstar (though it tanked for many other reasons) had a great idea where the casual could buy in game currency with real money AND the hardcore kid with nothing but time on his hands could sell in game currency in exchange for paid sub fees I think. Great idea, too bad the game tanked with poor optimization and bugs. I don't see anything wrong with "pay to compete" so long as it's not so op that it's pay to win. Lastly, F2P doesn't seem fair to devs who maintain an mmo (though Blizzard has been accused of treating subs as welfare checks ) so long as they remain committed to maintaining it and listening to player base once in a while.

[Blarghagh]

As someone who has worked on f2p mobile games I can tell you with absolute certainty that if you don't pay for the product, you are the product. Don't play that nonsense. Everything about these games is designed to get you to pony up cash. And I do mean everything. I recall at some point I modeled a level entirely made out of golden treasure not because we wanted to, but because the publisher needed money and needed something to put players in the mind of "my amount of coins is so small in comparison, I should get more".

[SupidSeep]

i hardly touched mobile games nor Perfect World International, but I do have 2FP MMOish PC games on my active playlist: (Marvel Heroes, Firefall)

 

As the full gameplay is available for anyone (unlike say, Star Wars: The Old Republic), I would say neither falls under P2W. Pay for extras, faster leveling, increased loot chance, convenience, cosmetics, definitely, but players can fully enjoy the game without them unless they insists on having certain cosmetics.

 

Both games enable non-paying player to slowly grind for all available characters.  Loot is available to all (Marvel Heroes focus on random drops; Firefall has a mix of drops and crafting).