Cash Shop Overpriced?

Think it's overpriced? Don't buy it, problem solved.

Honestly the Cash Shop is way too expensive whoever pays $25 dollars for a mount is not very intelligent that is the price of a full fledged expansion pack. I mean I understand they want extra profit but its a bit too high for something that we can't even use if we stop paying the membership in my opinion these are more appropriate prices.

Minions: $1 (I mean how many times do you actually look at your minion)
Seasonal Suits: $2 on appropriate time frame / $4 outside of appropriate time frame
Rare Housing Options: $3
Mounts: $5
Packages: $10-$15 (Packages ex: Halloween package all pumpkin heads/ 2 ghost suits / Halloween mount / Halloween minion)

Not all loyal customers are rich and many of us want to support the game.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Themis

It'd take a bit more than 25 bucks to do that. It'd need a new system and animations etc for a non chocobo based companion.

---

I'm a bit confused by this statement. It technically would take "more than $25" to fix a typo in the game.

It obviously takes more than one purchase to cover the cost of development. By your logic, I'd hate to see what the cost of the expansion is going to be. :P

I personally think it's expensive for just a vanity element. However, I have no objections to it being there. I wonder whether at some point they'll throw in temporary discounts and such on items, xmas sales and whatever not. Maybe then I can be convinced to buy a few of the minions. The mount would require quite a hefty discount for me to purchase it. Otherwise I trend to prefer prioritizing my spendings elsewhere :). Still too many items on my wish list having priority over ingame vanity right now, hehe.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LittleArrow

It's not really reasonable when the pumpkin heads and ghost costumes were available in game. The pumpkin heads were available for gil. That's why I put up a petition for them to be put back in the game. 5$ for something that was once free : /

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...t-of-Cash-Shop

---

2011 you got the pumpkin heads for free
You paid with gil because you missed it 2011
And now people pay with money if they missed it 2011 and 2013

Just don't miss seasonal events, then you don't need to pay with gil or money

I'd wish people who like to buy from the cash shop would donate this money for charitable objectives instead.
24$ could help to save human lives instead of riding a virtual pony.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mugiawara

24 is reasonable?
What other P2P games has this pricing?

---

WoW: https://us.battle.net/shop/en/product/category/mounts

if the mount had 2 months of game time attached to it, cool. but for it's price? no. the halloween items shouldn't even be in the cash shop. no holiday items should be in the cash shop.

i'm going to point something out here. you are going to get what? 2000 people with tons of disposable income who buy it at this price? but if you charge $5 for it the amount you will sell would be more around 50,000 players. so at what your currently selling it at you would make $48,000 but charging $5 and getting 50k sales you would make $250,000.... so.... why charge the price of the gain?

it's a digital item that can't be traded right? it has no value what so ever in game other then, wew odin's horse wew! people wont care because it is a waste of money. this isn't entropia universe were i could buy the horse then a year later sell it for 30X what i paid for it.

continued.

you can change the price now and refund the extra cash to the people who bought them, or you could give them subscription time as a sorry.

but right now your taking the path that kills games when they add cash shops.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Andevom

WoW: https://us.battle.net/shop/en/product/category/mounts

---

http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...Of_Course!.gif

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Andevom

WoW: https://us.battle.net/shop/en/product/category/mounts

---

http://gifrific.com/wp-content/uploa...f-the-Hill.gif

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Phe

I'd wish people who like to buy from the cash shop would donate this money for charitable objectives instead.
24$ could help to save human lives instead of riding a virtual pony.

---

That $15 you pay every month could save lives instead of playing a fake virtual world.

No wait, don't ever buy anything for fun because it can go to charity instead. Or at least things that Phe feels is beneath him.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Brightshadow

Honestly the Cash Shop is way too expensive whoever pays $25 dollars for a mount is not very intelligent

---

How nice, personal insults already.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dargondarkfire

i'm going to point something out here. you are going to get what? 2000 people with tons of disposable income who buy it at this price? but if you charge $5 for it the amount you will sell would be more around 50,000 players. so at what your currently selling it at you would make $48,000 but charging $5 and getting 50k sales you would make $250,000.... so.... why charge the price of the gain?

---

Wild speculation is nice, but where is the guarantee that more people will spend money on the item if the price dropped?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Miitan

How nice, personal insults already.

---

That's the thing I detest most about this whole 'cash shop' debate. There is little civil discussion on this matter, it just ends up being a snowball fight of mindless insults.

During the 24 hr maintenance ive tried WoW and after I saw the prices there :

£22 for mounts
£14 for minions /pets

I realised SE is actually giving out the stuff on Cash Shop for a very decent price

But SE needs the money! I'm going to buy 500 Sleipnirs to support them! /sarcasm

Honestly, what did you expect? People keep defending them left and right, asking to pay for things on top of their sub (even those that were included in it before), and not caring at all about it not being customer friendly. The folks at SE are just being smart businessmen (nope, they aren't our friends :)).

Cash shop price debates are always pointless.

If they can get customer buy-in at the prices they set, they'll not lower them except during strategically-timed promotions, if at all.

If they find that their pricing model is deterring business, they'll get more aggressive with promos and/or lower prices, at least to the point where their profit margin is still acceptable.

If you look at certain other games with cash shops, they often start with extremely high prices, wait until the first rush of shopping is well and done with, then start offering "huge" limited-time sales to reach the customers who balked at the premium price.

Well I do like the fact that the cash shop is not shoved in your face. In other games, the cash shop would be in game. I'm glad SE didn't go down that path.

I bought the Wind Up Y'shtola. She's my favorite character from the game. I'm not happy that I had to pay real cash for her, but it was worth it, to me.

That slephnir mount, though... that's more than two months subbed right there. I can't really justify it. At least it's an account item?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ajx

During the 24 hr maintenance ive tried WoW and after I saw the prices there :

£22 for mounts
£14 for minions /pets

I realised SE is actually giving out the stuff on Cash Shop for a very decent price

---

not to mention Sleipnir looks way better than any mount Blizzard has put on their store. =\

I was going to buy it arround 12 to 15 USD which is a reasonable and maybe even reasonably high price of a "microtransaction". But 24 USD...? Sorry SE but thats a robbery.

Some new music would be nice for the price... the general music doesn't really fit the mount.

Is it expensive? Yes, I think so.

Will I get it? Yes, I already did actually. So did lots of others on our server from what I can see.

It is simple, if none buys it or not enough people buy it they will lower the prices sooner or later.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Teirshin

When I go to the movies, I'm getting a service in the REAL world, not a VIRTUAL thing that has no true value. My monthly sub gives me access to the service of being able to connect to the servers and play the game, again a real world service, with value.

Cash shop items? Emotional value? Sure, I suppose so. Monetary value? Nonewhatsoever.

Cash shop items are simply a way for them to suck more money out of you for the least amount of effort on their part. And it preys on those who are addicted to MMO's and the mentality of "Gotta have em all", which is a large portion of most MMO playerbases.

The real shame is people think its a great thing, but that short lived rush when you buy your new mount wont last, and it'll be replaced by a new shiny thing in short order, and the lure of shelling out more money will be right there again so you arent the only one without it among your friends.

---

Sounds like someone has pony-envy.

Save people from logging into to check prices.

Fantasia
$10. Phial of Fantasia
$28. Three Phials of Fantasia
$45. Five Phials of Fantasia

Minions
$5. Minion: Y'shtola
$5. Minion: Yda
$5. Minion: Papalymo

Mounts
$24 Mount: Sleipnir

Seasonal Event Items
Pumpkin Head
$3. Unripened Pumpkin Head
$3. White Pumpkin Head
$3. Ripened Pumpkin Head
$5. The Howling Spirit
$5. The Wailing Spirit

I think all these items should be obtainable in game.

If SE wants to make some extra money on the side, put real life toys, posters, wall scrolls, T-shirts, hats, tote bags etc. in the shop. make plush toys of each minion! That would be an epic beanie baby collection.

But in game items being cash shop exclusive is tacky. In game items should be earned in game!

They could always make the cash shop stuff purchasable, for some crazy gil sink price. Say 10 million for the Sleipnir mount. It would give people something work towards, and it's cheaper than a mansion.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DarkDedede

They could always make the cash shop stuff purchasable, for some crazy gil sink price. Say 10 million for the Sleipnir mount. It would give people something work towards, and it's cheaper than a mansion.

---

10 mil is hardly a crazy gil sink in an economy of billions and billions of gil where transactions of tens and even hundreds of millions of gil is done for sales runs. If they'd effectively want to drain gil out of the economy, the gil purchase fee would need to be set a lot higher. Along the lines of 100 million gil would be more suitable. However, then the issue arises of RMT purchasers and the 1% being the only ones to have access to these ingame alternatives.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dwill

Or people that enough spare income to purchase vanity like this. This isn't worse than going to an overpriced restaurant or to the theater for a one time thing only. But then again, you and everyone else belittling people buying just sound like a case of jealousy to me.

---

If someone can afford the sub they can almost certainly afford Odins pony.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jandor

If someone can afford the sub they can almost certainly afford Odins pony.

---

That's a huge generalization you're doing and it's one that isn't true at all.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dwill

That's a huge generalization you're doing and it's one that isn't true at all.

---

Yeah, could say the same about this.

"You and everyone else belittling people buying just sound like a case of jealousy to me."

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fyce

Why? Because it's not "tangible"? That's BS.
Plus, the "emotional value" given from these items is directly related to their price. If they were completly free and given to you with absolutly no effort required, you would not have anywhere near the same amount of pleasure for "getting" and "owning" them.

The price is the wall between people who are willing to pay for it, and people who are not.
By paying for these item, you can set yourself appart from the rest of the players. How far you are from the rest if bound to the price of the item itself.

That pleasure is valuable.
Real people have real emotions with these items. It doesn't matter if you think that a virtual world goods are worthless just because they cost next to nothing to produce.

The only proof I need to show you that you're wrong in assuming that emotions doesn't have a monetary value is the fact that the whole entertainment industry exists. And the goods produced by this industry can be virtual or real, it doesn't matter, the emotions are the same.

---

I don't have a leg in this race.. But it's a good opportunity to point out that that value is subjective to the individual. Value does not equal price or cost. Some will value the "item" more than it's cost, and others will not. You can't really argue over someone else's valuation because it's their own, made for their own reasons.

And, just an aside.. Emotions do not have monetary value outside your own mind.. You can't buy anything with your emotions, and there probably isn't anyone willing to pay you to be sad or happy or angry. Nobody wants to trade you emotions.. An emotion is a psychological influence on decision making, you can value your own emotion and compare it to the cost of enjoying, amplifying, or removing that emotion to something such as a movie or video game or virtual item in a video game - but it doesn't follow that someone else has to value that emotion the same way.

As for this statement:

Quote:

---

Plus, the "emotional value" given from these items is directly related to their price. If they were completly free and given to you with absolutly no effort required, you would not have anywhere near the same amount of pleasure for "getting" and "owning" them.

---

"Emotional Value" only effects the price insofar as how little or how much someone is willing to pay. Making the mount cost $200 instead of $24 does not necessarily increase any "emotional value" you might obtain by purchasing it. Second, something given to you for free can be just as pleasurable (if not more so) than earning it. For example, your workplace randomly selects an employee each month to receive a $100 gift card. They just draw a name out of a hat and the winner gets free money, you do nothing more than show up for what you're already getting paid to do. You wouldn't value that extra $100 a little more than just your regular paycheck at all? It wouldn't make you happy because you didn't "earn" it like your paycheck? Unlikely.. but this is a subjective, of course, you may not :P

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jandor

Yeah, could say the same about this.

"You and everyone else belittling people buying just sound like a case of jealousy to me."

---

Hence why it's an opinion and not a fact.

I'd be far happier if SE can just put all of these in veteran rewards...or a subscription-promo where you buy a year subscription you get those things and blah blah blah.
I simply hate the idea of a cash shop in a subscription based mmo, they kind of crippling the game itself in my opinion, and since we are already paying them money for the contents to be implemented to the game monthly.
I won't say virtual things doesn't have it's own value, because everything does require people to create them. I am not saying double-dipping is a good business model, but I wonder how much it costed for them to hire those artists to make that odin mount tho.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

I don't have a leg in this race.. But it's a good opportunity to point out that that value is subjective to the individual. Value does not equal price or cost. Some will value the "item" more than it's cost, and others will not. You can't really argue over someone else's valuation because it's their own, made for their own reasons.

---

Of course it's subjective. And I never said otherwise.
My point was the following: saying that something doesn't have any economical value just because it's virtual and intangible is silly, to say the least.
Even if it's subjective, one cannot say for sure that "virtual = 0 value". That's it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

And, just an aside.. Emotions do not have monetary value outside your own mind.. You can't buy anything with your emotions, and there probably isn't anyone willing to pay you to be sad or happy or angry. Nobody wants to trade you emotions.. An emotion is a psychological influence on decision making, you can value your own emotion and compare it to the cost of enjoying, amplifying, or removing that emotion to something such as a movie or video game or virtual item in a video game - but it doesn't follow that someone else has to value that emotion the same way.

---

Well, yes. But... just like above: I never said otherwise. Plus, I never talked about "selling your emotions".
In fact, I was saying pretty much the opposite: the fact that the entertainment industry is actually selling you emotions. People are paying money for a service which will provide them some emotions. And again, my point was to say that the nature of the service and/or the goods are irrelevant. No matter if they are virtual or real, in the end, you are still getting what you want from buying those: emotions.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

"Emotional Value" only effects the price insofar as how little or how much someone is willing to pay. Making the mount cost $200 instead of $24 does not necessarily increase any "emotional value" you might obtain by purchasing it. Second, something given to you for free can be just as pleasurable (if not more so) than earning it. For example, your workplace randomly selects an employee each month to receive a $100 gift card. They just draw a name out of a hat and the winner gets free money, you do nothing more than show up for what you're already getting paid to do. You wouldn't value that extra $100 a little more than just your regular paycheck at all? It wouldn't make you happy because you didn't "earn" it like your paycheck? Unlikely.. but this is a subjective, of course, you may not :P

---

This is something I'll disagree on. Studies and report showed that free stuff is less impactful than things you buy with your own money.
I remember of an Activision guy who said, during an interview, that the map pack they are selling had much more impact on the player's emotions than free updates.

That said, even if I said that price and emotional value are linked, I did not say that the more you increase the price, the more the emotional value rise. This is only true for rare collectible objects. But here, the mount isn't rare, it's virtually infinite and cost nothing to produce.
So, the goal is only to set the "correct" price and try to aim for what people are willing to pay to get it, in exchange of the joy of having it in game.

As for your second point, with your example, you are talking about getting money, at your workplace. If you go to work, it's to get money in the first place... so, this extra bunch is only a "bonus" that you can win, only by being lucky, which will break the monotony of your daily routine and paycheck. Of course people would enjoy that (or maybe not, because it can raise tension between co-workers if someone gets it and does not 'deserve' it).

Free stuff is not perceived like a reward. It's not something you'll buy with your own money, that very money you earned with your efforts. It's something you can easily see as "yeah it's cool, but whatever".
It's exacly the same as the actual mounts available ingame with the Extreme Primals. People will take the time and put the efforts into getting one, because they want it. However, if these mounts were just unlocked automatically and send to them via the mailmog, the emotional value of getting it would dramatically decrease.

In short: getting something you want in exchange of your own time and/or money is more often that not more "emotionaly valuable" than getting something for free without especially wanting it.

The mount is the price of dlc or an expansion ...
The minions however i may get a few :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Miya_Carbuncle

That $15 you pay every month could save lives instead of playing a fake virtual world.

No wait, don't ever buy anything for fun because it can go to charity instead. Or at least things that Phe feels is beneath him.

---

Why's that anger?
Did my words offend you in any way?

A P2P MMO is a hobby where you also get a social platform to interact with other people.
I don't think that's quite the same as virtual vanity items.

Don't you think it wouldn't be nice if there are some people who spent their bucks to help other people instead of using it for vanity stuff?

Consider this wish as a personal opinion.
You don't have to share this opinion, but at least please try not to be rude.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Riviere

I expected Sleipnir to be cheaper, but since it's account-wide it makes sense.

---

Phial of Fantasia are still 10 dollars and they used to be account wide. from what i hear they made it so its one per character.

Sleipnir Mount 17€ (ca 22$) - Why isnt that a drop from Odin itself?!
:confused::confused::confused:
Minions 3,50€ (4,5$) - Why where they not in the 1 year anniversary NPC Shop for 2.500Gil like Minfilia and Tranched..?

I feel like some1 is showing me his mean middlefinger and laughts to me.
Those prices are ridiculous, even for SE. :mad: