Cash shop is OK for P2P game, but only if it features only cosmetics, and if those cosmetics are available through game as well.
All of this was explained during kickstarter. The time to protest or object to the inclusion of a cosmetic shop was THEN, and deciding to back the game with full knowledge this was going to be a thing only to now take issue with it is a non-starter.
WoW has a cash shop, box and expansion prices and a sub. FFXIV has a box price, expansion price, a sub and a shop. ESO has an optional sub and cosmetic shop, but also has a box and expansion prices.
Ashes only requiring a sub and having a non P2W shop makes it one of the least monetized games I have had any involvement with. Stuffertons is a small price to pay for getting the game for free. Without him and cosmetics like him, we'd have a box price. I Guarantee it.
Yeah. Its basically a way for the Devs to say...hey people...heres something to troll others with. Enjoy the salt.
I doubt they had any idea there would be a controversy at all. I was pretty surprised myself when I heard about it. This kind of stuff is in nearly every MMO with cosmetic microtransactions, only worse. I feel bad for anyone who actually thought they could make a cosmetic shop that pretty much replaces the box price of the game and fill it with the same exact stuff you can get in game. It has to be shiny or nobody is going to buy it.
I am also perplexed how anyone's immersion can be broken when they know next to nothing about the world's aesthetic to have formed an opinion on what is immersive on Verra in the first place. What has happened is people headcannoned a bunch of stuff they wanted to fill the void in what was known about the world, and are now having to adapt their inaccurate assumptions to the end product.
This will not be the last cute item. Far from it. The good news is you don't have to use them. Your sense of immersion does not trump anyone else's though. And I find this bear increases my own immersion into a FANTASY world full of magic.
Show me anything that approaches a stuffed teddy bear as a mount. The only cute... is kitten and puppies. Living realistic things. And these are not mounts.....they are pets.
The dawnbreaker is the only thing that approaches a cute teddy concept and thats a hyrbid. Steven was even asking about mixing animal types a long long time ago.
And no you cant turn off someone else riding a mount or ignore them because they exist in the same virtual world as you. I could of course cover my eyes when playing...but that kind of makes playing a 'visual' game difficult.
Cash shop is OK for P2P game, but only if it features only cosmetics, and if those cosmetics are available through game as well.
All of this was explained during kickstarter. The time to protest or object to the inclusion of a cosmetic shop was THEN, and deciding to back the game with full knowledge this was going to be a thing only to now take issue with it is a non-starter.
WoW has a cash shop, box and expansion prices and a sub. FFXIV has a box price, expansion price, a sub and a shop. ESO has an optional sub and cosmetic shop, but also has a box and expansion prices.
Ashes only requiring a sub and having a non P2W shop makes it one of the least monetized games I have had any involvement with.
All very valid points Ashes is doing the bare minimal cash grab compared to other MMO this will make me respect Intrepid and actually blow my money on the store to support the company
Cash shop is OK for P2P game, but only if it features only cosmetics, and if those cosmetics are available through game as well.
All of this was explained during kickstarter. The time to protest or object to the inclusion of a cosmetic shop was THEN, and deciding to back the game with full knowledge this was going to be a thing only to now take issue with it is a non-starter.
WoW has a cash shop, box and expansion prices and a sub. FFXIV has a box price, expansion price, a sub and a shop. ESO has an optional sub and cosmetic shop, but also has a box and expansion prices.
Ashes only requiring a sub and having a non P2W shop makes it one of the least monetized games I have had any involvement with.
All very valid points Ashes is doing the bare minimal cash grab compared to other MMO this will make me respect Intrepid and actually blow my money on the store to support the company
Show me anything that approaches a stuffed teddy bear as a mount.
Just because he didn't announce it does not mean it wouldn't happen. Going by other cosmetic shops in the industry, you should have expected this unless it was explicitly stated it would not happen. I don't understand where you got the idea that no cute mounts were ever going into the shop, when this is a very common feature of cosmetic item stores. Steven is sensitive to your concerns as the responses show, so I hope you will come around once we see the mount in game.
That's pretty much what I tried to deliver with my posts, we just don't know what would be considered immersion breaking and even if we did, there would always be some people that say it is immersion breaking no matter what. The chopper in WoW is not immersion breaking. Have you ever looked around in WoW? Have you seen gnomeregan City of gnomes? The tanks they build, teleporting devices, heck the gnomes are a freaking masterpiece of allowing whatever you want. Have you been in Uldum? You know there is a flying mechanical head as a boss. It's flying, not just driving. The fuck do you know about immersion? Apparently nothing.
I have seen the same in Guild Wars, you can have gigantic golems powered by..something, have a flying city hovering far above ground, but any gun that is technologically more advanced than a flintstone pistol is bullcrap and can't exist. Please people, what did you smoke?
The point is @GMSteven don't let people talk you out of the fantasy YOU created. Some will always be displeased no matter what you do and if one simple skin can turn them away, they never intended to play anyway. (Do give us some more lore tho please, It doesn't need to be story, but you know, some little insights into the people and stuff)
I wouldn't have said it so bluntly, but you're exactly right. You can say you don't like certain things within the game-world, but as long as its internally consistent then it's not really immersion breaking.
Like you said, WoW is a world where technology slowly advances in real time. It's also a world full of ancient magi-tech. It makes perfect sense to see motorcycles, battleships, helecopters etc. In WoW, I never get the sense that something doesn't belong, no matter how wacky it may be. It fits within the world they've established.
You can have a world that's silly, crazy, whimsical, and divorced from our own perception of reality, while still remaining relatable and immersive. If anything, that's the ultimate challenge of a fantasy world. Give me something crazy, and make me believe it.
As long as AoC accomplishes this, then everything else is a matter of taste. Personally, I'm tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy. It's one of the main reasons I finally gave up on The Elder Scrolls. Give me something weird, zany, and strange. I want my fantasy to feel fantastic.
Edit: Also, just gotta say how cool it is to see developers engaging with the fans. Coming from ESO and SWTOR this is basically unheard of. Thanks @GMSteven!
Not to be unsympathetic but to me this just seems like whining. This is not a medieval game. It´s a Fantasy RPG and to me that means their should be fantastic features like living dolls, wings, cute pets, eg. Furthermore about the RPG part: the more variety of visual customization there is the more i can connect/roleplay my character and there simply are people like me who want to have that stuff. (else it wouldnt be that popular in other mmo´s)
Comments
WoW has a cash shop, box and expansion prices and a sub. FFXIV has a box price, expansion price, a sub and a shop. ESO has an optional sub and cosmetic shop, but also has a box and expansion prices.
Ashes only requiring a sub and having a non P2W shop makes it one of the least monetized games I have had any involvement with. Stuffertons is a small price to pay for getting the game for free. Without him and cosmetics like him, we'd have a box price. I Guarantee it.
Show me anything that approaches a stuffed teddy bear as a mount.
The only cute... is kitten and puppies. Living realistic things.
And these are not mounts.....they are pets.
The dawnbreaker is the only thing that approaches a cute teddy concept and thats a hyrbid. Steven was even asking about mixing animal types a long long time ago.
And no you cant turn off someone else riding a mount or ignore them because they exist in the same virtual world as you. I could of course cover my eyes when playing...but that kind of makes playing a 'visual' game difficult.
Like you said, WoW is a world where technology slowly advances in real time. It's also a world full of ancient magi-tech. It makes perfect sense to see motorcycles, battleships, helecopters etc. In WoW, I never get the sense that something doesn't belong, no matter how wacky it may be. It fits within the world they've established.
You can have a world that's silly, crazy, whimsical, and divorced from our own perception of reality, while still remaining relatable and immersive. If anything, that's the ultimate challenge of a fantasy world. Give me something crazy, and make me believe it.
As long as AoC accomplishes this, then everything else is a matter of taste. Personally, I'm tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy. It's one of the main reasons I finally gave up on The Elder Scrolls. Give me something weird, zany, and strange. I want my fantasy to feel fantastic.
Edit: Also, just gotta say how cool it is to see developers engaging with the fans. Coming from ESO and SWTOR this is basically unheard of. Thanks @GMSteven!