329 replies to this topic

[Hades Trooper]

DaZur, on 04 December 2012 - 11:50 AM, said:

While I empathize with the pricing concerns...

"It's cosmetic"... They are in no way forcing you to purchase these bits but if you are so inclined to fancy up your kit... ya gotta open you wallet.

I think ya'll are over optimistic as to how many folks would want to put this stuff in their pit regardless of the price-point...

what a load of crap, atm i'm taking a few minutes to read the forums but every other game i'm into i can get christmas season stuff bling for FREE, ie earn it in game, it's bloody seasonal crap, look at how many other games let you earn snata hats, outfits, and all that crap for free than PAY TO GET IT!.

ON THAT NOTE I'M OFF TO PLAY ddo WHERE I CAN GET XMAS STUFF FOR FREE!

P.s.s From ym thread orginally the dev closed

when patching i was like, hmmm, i'm in the festive spirit and ti's only a short time, why not get a santa atlas and a holiday lights.

then i see the price and asked are 2 ockpit items and a the wreath worth 2500mc when a hero wang is only 2750?

lets get real people, ockpit items are cool, i'd like to have them in all mechs, but at this insane price it's never going to happen. even the hula girl at 500 was huge cost. why not make them reasonable price say, 100 MC and then people can buy them for all mechs, instead of ajust 1 and swapping in and out to all there other mechs, this way, you'd sell a hell of a lot more and make more money than sell a few.

I say and hope everyone who agrees with the idea votes this a +1 and agree that until they reduce the price on xmas items and cockpit stuff in general is a joke.

I say lets BOYCOTT till they get a decent pricing structure!

Who's with me on this???

Edited by Hades Trooper, 13 December 2012 - 06:32 AM.

[Hades Trooper]

P.s if after 16 pages of complaints they haven't taken notice yet i'm not gonna bother playing for some time and as a founder who ponied up cash before ever seeing the game i'm highly disappointed.

Same with Diablo 3, Blizzard has ruined there rep with me now and only when i see a blizzard game going and active will i think about buying it, no pre purchase for me, Same now goes for PGI. Now being a smaller firm, i should also take note of the devs names so if they change firms or pgi changes it name i can keep an eye out best i can for sub standard dev's.

[Dieselpunk]

I still haven't seen an official response regarding the aforementioned exorbitant price tags of the holiday novelty items...well, unless the official response is the current sale on MC, lol. So, I guess we can conclude that things are "working as intended" regardless of the community's outrage.

[Tolkien]

Hades Trooper, on 13 December 2012 - 06:28 AM, said:

P.s if after 16 pages of complaints they haven't taken notice yet i'm not gonna bother playing for some time and as a founder who ponied up cash before ever seeing the game i'm highly disappointed.

Same with Diablo 3, Blizzard has ruined there rep with me now and only when i see a blizzard game going and active will i think about buying it, no pre purchase for me, Same now goes for PGI. Now being a smaller firm, i should also take note of the devs names so if they change firms or pgi changes it name i can keep an eye out best i can for sub standard dev's.

I don't think it's fair to call the devs substandard - they are tackling a gigantic set of problems.

For example, one of the previous mechwarrior games I loved was MPBT3025 - it died in 2001 during a restructuring at EA, but some choices they made during development were critical to reducing their workload.

For example, the devs in MPBT3025 didn't try to implement role warfare, they made it so that some worlds could only be attacked/defended by light mechs. In fact the majority of worlds. As you got closer to capitals you would be allowed to use mediums, then heavies, then assaults. In this way every single class of mech had to be usable by every player, depending on where the front line was. Having to square the circle of mech classes is a gigantic undertaking, one that I fear will haunt the game.

Also, there was the question of mech customization. In MPBT the devs restricted mechs to only stock variants of only some mechs. This meant that there were a lot less unforseen interactions or 'cheese builds', which also made the devs lives much easier. Incidentally it also made the player lives easier in some ways as it eliminated the bewildering array of mech customization options. Don't get me wrong, I love mech customization but the devil is in the details.

In terms of weapons and technology balance, MPBT3025 was as you can probably guess, set in 3025. Only low level inner sphere technology was available, no streak, no ultra, no pulse, no double heatsinks, no endosteel, no ferrofibrous, and I don't think there was any ECM. What did this mean? It meant that they dramatically reduced the number of variables in play, and made their balance job much easier.

Anyway, what I am getting at is that the devs have a gigantic job in front of them, partially of their own making. They're not bad, they are just really ambitious.

[Zinitiate]

You know... after thinking about this for awhile, I would actually pay the current prices for the items, if they were unlocked for ALL my mechs.

Edited by Zinitiate, 13 December 2012 - 11:46 AM.

[Tolkien]

Zinitiate, on 13 December 2012 - 11:46 AM, said:

You know... after thinking about this for awhile, I would actually pay the current prices for the items, if they were unlocked for ALL my mechs.

I would even be satisfied if they allowed proper unlocks rather than charging every time you want to *change* cammo/skin.

[Gallowglas]

I'm hoarding my mc's. I don't have any hard feelings or belief that the dev's are greedy. I simply don't think the prices are compelling. I, and several of my friends who play regularly, would have bought camo and the Ilya by now if the prices were better. Were they 10-50% of the prices they are now and/or were we able to use purchased paints across multiple mechs, I'd be buying like a fiend. The fact that I dropped $120 on this game sight unseen should tell you that I'm not shy about buying things I want so long as I feel like I'm getting my money's worth in entertainment. Take that for what it's worth.

[Azalie]

I love it when customers try to set the prices...these are luxury items. The entire point of them is to give the haves something to have and have nots something to wish for. If they didn't cost fourteen times what they are worth us Upper Class mechwarriors wouldn't want them. They are nothing more than digital status symbols for us to adorn our mechs with. Just as the optional hood ornaments on some luxury cars cost thousands of dollars these will shine in our mechs to make us feel better about ourselves.

So while you waste your time wishing you could pick up a hula girl with a handful of fiddle-faddle I'll enjoy my money well wasted on my skunk paint job, my Christmas lights, and that FRR banner which only I can see.

Edited by Azalie, 13 December 2012 - 04:45 PM.

[Thomas Covenant]

I bought the xmas lights. But I gotta admit, its only because its an item I would use out of season personally.

[Elessar]

I assume they try to experiment with prices (by looking how many items they sell for this price [compared to cheaper ones]). Therefore I assume we´ll see more reasonable prices in future actions, if the sale of their more expensive christmas items didn´t go well.

Well, for me 500 CB would be the maximum ... and only for items I definitely love ... therefore no MC from me for christmas items

[Strykeforce]

As silly as it might sound.. if the prices were lower, I certainly would have spent more to get more, rather than buy just one item (which I did)

[Father Christmas]

I don’t understand this at all - if we are to invest money in this good game, that’s fine with me, them why is it so freaking expensive.
I would like a miniature Santa in each cockpit - but to pay 1250 MC for one, and that is 1250 MC for every freaking cockpit - that’s just plain robbery .

So I (sight) bought one for the atlas, and must dream me to the rest - because Christmas are coming.

in short - perhaps you should speak with a few professional people about "supply and demand". A posts have already said it - lower the price and funny enough more will afford to buy.

One question - the first movers - founders - do you accumulate MC while playing?. Because that could explain why there are a low insight in the actual marked value.

I started a few weeks ago - and everything have a very high price in this game.

Edited by Father Christmas, 14 December 2012 - 01:30 AM.

[Elessar]

Father Christmas, on 14 December 2012 - 01:24 AM, said:

...
One question - the first movers - founders - do you accumulate MC while playing?
...

Nope ... we got a fixed amount of MC with our founder packages, but aside from this we are just like other players with regards to MC, i.e. we only get additional MC if we pay for them

[Herzog]

Father Christmas, on 14 December 2012 - 01:24 AM, said:

in short - perhaps you should speak with a few professional people about "supply and demand". A posts have already said it - lower the price and funny enough more will afford to buy.

Yup, "realized demand" where the price is low enough that people will actually buy it. Sometimes lowering your price-point will increase your sales volume to the point where you are generating *more* revenue.

[SpankN]

Was there ever any sort of official response to this? I'm certainly not looking at buying any MC, even with a special deal, if this is going to continue being an issue.

[StealthTpr]

Azalie, on 13 December 2012 - 04:31 PM, said:

I love it when customers try to set the prices...these are luxury items. The entire point of them is to give the haves something to have and have nots something to wish for. If they didn't cost fourteen times what they are worth us Upper Class mechwarriors wouldn't want them. They are nothing more than digital status symbols for us to adorn our mechs with. Just as the optional hood ornaments on some luxury cars cost thousands of dollars these will shine in our mechs to make us feel better about ourselves.

So while you waste your time wishing you could pick up a hula girl with a handful of fiddle-faddle I'll enjoy my money well wasted on my skunk paint job, my Christmas lights, and that FRR banner which only I can see.

Agreed. There is something for everyone. For the less financially advantaged, you have the lump of coal; while those seeking the extra bling can roll a strand of x-mas lights and a Satlas. If the price of said Satlas was dropped to say 50MC, I wouldn't bother with it, since everyone else has it and it's not quite as flashy. People buy the stuff to show it off. Though, I will say more exterior bling for everyone to see would be worth the money. Five or even ten bucks isn't a whole lot of money these days. Many people drop that kind of money everyday for their "gotta have" Starbucks "Artesin" Coffee, or equally expensive bottled water. But when it comes to a the price of a virtual item, it suddenly is out of the question. The prices are fair enough. If people don't like it, nobody is putting a gun to their head forcing them to buy the stuff.

I also love the fact that people complain "You have to buy one for every mech." No, you go to your cockpit, remove the items, move to a different mech and put them in. I can't help but laugh at that widely spread lie, though I'm still torn whether it's simply ignorance, being ill-informed, or if these people are trying to spread a campaign of misinformation.

[Homeless Bill]

TLDR: I agree that there should be a line of ridiculously overpriced vanity items, but the rest need to be cut across the board by around 50%. Their business model depends on high turnover, and right now I think they're kneecapping themselves financially. There is also no reason anyone should have to pay for multiples of a single item or manually switch them out between rounds.

StealthTpr, on 15 December 2012 - 11:14 PM, said:

Agreed. There is something for everyone. For the less financially advantaged, you have the lump of coal; while those seeking the extra bling can roll a strand of x-mas lights and a Satlas. If the price of said Satlas was dropped to say 50MC, I wouldn't bother with it, since everyone else has it and it's not quite as flashy.

I'll agree with this half-way. And though I do think prices should be cut across the board by around half, I also think that there should be ridiculously overpriced vanity items. There are many items that I think should be straight-up "I have the money and you don't" items to show off.

That said, they desperately need a set of of more affordable items as well. A set of Christmas lights that I leave up all year round doesn't exactly scream "classy." Right now, it's almost all overpriced. A lump of coal? Yeah... Just what I've always wanted. The least desirable item I could imagine having for $1.50.

The people screaming for everything being 10% of the current cost are out of it. But equally so are those who think what they have now is a sustainable F2P model.

StealthTpr, on 15 December 2012 - 11:14 PM, said:

Five or even ten bucks isn't a whole lot of money these days. Many people drop that kind of money everyday for their "gotta have" Starbucks "Artesin" Coffee, or equally expensive bottled water. But when it comes to a the price of a virtual item, it suddenly is out of the question.

I can't explain why, nor can I speak for anyone else; however, for me, there's this $5 threshold where I'll actually think about a purchase. $2, $3? Whatever. I'll buy three of them. But the minute something virtual hits $5, it crosses a line that makes me ask, "Do I really want this? Do I care enough?"

It gets back to your point about how not everything should be affordable. I ask myself, "Is the worth the ridiculous price for being one of the only ones to have it?" Most of the time, it's no. Especially for Christmas lights for ****'s sake.

StealthTpr, on 15 December 2012 - 11:14 PM, said:

The prices are fair enough. If people don't like it, nobody is putting a gun to their head forcing them to buy the stuff.

Here's the problem that you and the rest of PGI's defenders miss: their business model DEPENDS on high turnover. They won't be able to milk the dedicated people enough to sustain this game. I die enough to see a lot of cockpits, and the vast majority are bare. They should want everyone to have an item or two and a few people to have expensive items.

StealthTpr, on 15 December 2012 - 11:14 PM, said:

I also love the fact that people complain "You have to buy one for every mech." No, you go to your cockpit, remove the items, move to a different mech and put them in. I can't help but laugh at that widely spread lie, though I'm still torn whether it's simply ignorance, being ill-informed, or if these people are trying to spread a campaign of misinformation.

I drive three 'mechs in about equal frequency (usually switching every round or two). Why should I have to manually switch out items every time? I would rather burn in the fiery bowels of Hell than pay them twice for the same item. That "feature" along with how they implemented paint jobs are nothing more than thieving money-grabs by PGI.

Again, if they were selling to more people, they'd need to screw their current customers considerably less.

[Azalie]

Homeless Bill, on 16 December 2012 - 02:41 PM, said:

I drive three 'mechs in about equal frequency (usually switching every round or two). Why should I have to manually switch out items every time? I would rather burn in the fiery bowels of Hell than pay them twice for the same item. That "feature" along with how they implemented paint jobs are nothing more than thieving money-grabs by PGI.

Again, if they were selling to more people, they'd need to screw their current customers considerably less.

It takes a mere 19 clicks of the mouse to completely move three items from the cockpit of one mech to the cockpit of another if starting from the Mechbay. Is that too much work for you?

[StealthTpr]

Homeless Bill, on 16 December 2012 - 02:41 PM, said:

I drive three 'mechs in about equal frequency (usually switching every round or two). Why should I have to manually switch out items every time? I would rather burn in the fiery bowels of Hell than pay them twice for the same item. That "feature" along with how they implemented paint jobs are nothing more than thieving money-grabs by PGI.

Again, if they were selling to more people, they'd need to screw their current customers considerably less.

It would be nice to have that feature added, but in the meantime; I'm simply saying that one doesn't need to buy six strands of Christmas lights to put on every mech. Additionally, if someone can't afford $1.50 for a lump of coal or $3.00 for a hula girl. There are items of varying price, ranging from the $1.50 lump of coal to the more expensive what, $6.00 Satlas. The problem is that several people want the most awesome looking item and cry for the price to be dropped. It'd be nice to have a slew of items that people wouldn't mind having in their cockpit for a buck or two here and there to help generate revenue. After all, even a small, semi-attractive vanity item is better than nothing at all.

I do agree with you on the paint jobs. I think the prices are fine if the colors are unlocked (even if it was unlocked for that particular mech, but drop the price 25% or so.). To pay for a reskin on every mech, or when I want to change my style to have to fork over roughly 500 mc or so is a bit steep. I'd suggest if they keep things the way they are for the paint jobs, to drop the prices 50-60%, that way more people would be apt to skin their mech, or pay for a weekly reskin.

There should be something for everyone, from the garage sale junkie to the 1%'er.

tl;dr: Nope.

Edited by StealthTpr, 16 December 2012 - 09:24 PM.

[Homeless Bill]

Azalie, on 16 December 2012 - 08:40 PM, said:

It takes a mere 19 clicks of the mouse to completely move three items from the cockpit of one mech to the cockpit of another if starting from the Mechbay. Is that too much work for you?

Yes, actually; 19 clicks is far more effort than I'm willing to expend moving meaningless vanity items around every few rounds. I love my Christmas lights, but I don't love them that much.

Here are my questions for you: Regardless of how much work it is, why should I have to? What are they gaining? Do you really think they're going to make bank selling duplicate items?

All I'm saying here is there's no reason for them to do it the way they're doing it, and all it's accomplishing is ******* off their fiercely loyal player base. I'd bet you an overpriced strand of Christmas lights that they're losing more money now on items that people don't buy than they'll ever recuperate in duplicate sales.

Edited by Homeless Bill, 17 December 2012 - 12:52 AM.