Cash shop confirmed

[RaddCuban]

Just cancelled my recurring subscription.
Now, I still have about 4 month of game time I've already paid for that I will try to enjoy with the friends I've made, but I'm not sticking around to be bent over by SE. This cash shop thing has just trod on two of the things I valued most in this game.

The first is my enjoyment of the collection of curious seasonal and commemorative nick nacks. Since I subbed, I've been religiously collecting all these I can. So far I've only missed the Hatching-tide stuff due outside reasons keeping me away from the game. I was still subbed; I just lacked the time to sit down and play. As such, I was looking forward to getting my chance to in next year's version of the event. That same anticipation was held for this year's All Saints' Wake, Starlight Celebration, and Heavensturn(or really next year's for this last one, but that's just being pedantic).(Continued)

[Aussir]

Btw, if we wanna talk about attitudes, let's not forget the other side of the medal and how some users here have already started showing the I-have-more-money-than-you attitude, mocking those who are not able to afford said items... which is also one of the reasons why I don't like the idea of a cash shop with exclusive items. It's e-peen contest galore.

This... I know of at least 2 people already showing off their e-peen in advance because... e-peen.

Actually I can only feel pity for people that need to shove money into pixels and try to rub those pixels around in order to have some kind of achievement in their non-existent life.

[RaddCuban]

(Continued)That anticipation is now crushed by the knowledge that I will have to pay SE Well over a month's subscription fee if I want access to the items from just one of these past events. Hell, even then I frantically held on to a small hope and searched the event locations for a vendor like in events past.

The second was a little dream I had. Let me tell you a little story of how I met Odin in game. During my first week I happened to, by coincidence, be nearby him when he spawned. I was perplexed by the sudden and strange new weather so I asked a friend was informed that about the FATE. In less than a minute I of searching I managed to stumble across the people gathering to fight him and ended up watching and rezzing the fallen as it went on. Now this experience gave my first real focused goal for the game: to one day cosplay as Odin during a spawn and give and have some laughs over said shenanigans.(Continued)

[RaddCuban]

(Continued)As you could imagine, when they datamined Urth's Gift and the Sleipneir Horn I was tremendously excited. The cosplay would be almost perfect; it would be glorious! When Fan Fest confirmed that an Odin trial was coming I even managed to get hyped at the thought of earning that mount, and shield I hear, through an entertaining and challenging fight. All of this was dashed upon finding out that you have to buy this mount. Sure I could still go through with the original plan, but it somehow wouldn't feel the same. I didn't play the game to be able to do this cool/fun thing. I opened up my wallet for it.

Now, it would be fair to say that my heartbreak was brought upon myself by building expectations of things I didn't know how they would turn out, but it doesn't make it sting any less.(Continued)

[RaddCuban]

(Continued)I've always thought highly of this team. They have been able to admit to mistakes and generally treat us with a modicum of respect, on top of turning around a horribly broken game into a wonderful experience. But this kind of thing whether it originates from within the team or is mandate given by the corporate overlords from on high is not something I can just grin and bear. I have been an SE customer long enough to know their MO, and know it is only going to get worse from here.

P.S. Two things:
1. The minions being in the shop is pure bull crap since it is obvious that they were designed along with the event minions and their inclusion in the event was foregone in favor of selling them for a premium by sticking in the cash shop.
2. I will admit that I'm weak and have purchased an extra retainer, but I loathe myself for it. I would much prefer to pay a gil subscription to the retainer vocate than pay even a cent for better access to a game function.

[Vhailor]

If SE keeps all cash shop items as vanity only, and makes them also obtainable in-game by completing content, similar to what they've done for everything else up to this point, that will be fine. Whether it be quests, FATE drops, seasonal events, crafting recipes, whatever... As long as I, and anyone else, has the option of obtaining those same items by actually playing the game, rather than pulling out the credit card, I see no problem with it.

There are a couple of ways this can still harm the game, depending on one's view.

The first is that the presence of a cash shop, by definition, changes the nature of the community which chooses to play the game. As I've said before, I played FFXI over WoW largely because I preferred the community. The continuing effort by the development team to emulate aspects of WoW is therefore, to me, harming the game.

The second is theoretical, and obviously there is no way to prove it, which I freely admit. However, given that there's a cash shop alternative, I can't help but wonder whether this will continue to embolden SE to release vanity items with the ridiculously low drop rates that a lot of them currently have. For instance, the 1% or so drop rate on the Primal horses is absurd. It should never have been this low - ever. Were there no cash shop, these artificially low drop rates would become a source of increasingly vocal complaints by the community, eventually leading to change. With a cash shop, on the other hand, those complaints will largely vanish - and SE will have effectively created its own market, while still technically maintaining the ability of players to get the item via in-game content. To me, this type of decision would also harm the game, though again, it's hard to say whether these two decisions have been intentionally correlated on the development side.

So, I'm not sure it's a fair "compromise" really.

To broaden my response slightly, the main issue here is that compromise is somewhat impossible. I think the core complaint of people opposed to the cash shop is that they don't want XIV to appeal to larger populations; they want it to be a more selective title, like FFXI was. The existence of a cash shop, no matter the form, no matter how restricted, is still a problem for these individuals - not because it directly affects them, but because it indirectly alters the composition of the community in ways they don't like.

Edit / Addition:

You can just pay your subscription and that's it...be thankful they aimed for that option instead of charging MORE out of the subscription.

Frankly, I'd have actually rather seen them attach $5/mo more to the subscription price. As alluded to above, I explicitly do not want FFXIV catering to the masses to the extent that it is. A higher price range helps to make it more selective, and a corresponding lack of a cash shop (with preferably a wholesale shift away from the amount of vanity gear being released) would also help to improve the community, in my eyes. One of the best aspects of FFXI's development, in my eyes, is that the game was created under a consistent image, rather than catering to the most people possible. It's what gave it the unique feel and complex world that many of us treasure to this day. FFXIV has thus far tossed that philosophy out, which might make for more subscribers, but results in a weaker game, in my opinion.

[Sho86]

Well,
So, instead, I will leave this here as my input:
If SE keeps all cash shop items as vanity only, and makes them also obtainable in-game by completing content, similar to what they've done for everything else up to this point, that will be fine. Whether it be quests, FATE drops, seasonal events, crafting recipes, whatever... As long as I, and anyone else, has the option of obtaining those same items by actually playing the game, rather than pulling out the credit card, I see no problem with it.
.

Then you should have a problem with it already. All Saints Wake, no past event items. Oh, but lookie there, $30 gets all the past items for that event.

Edit- and to clarify on those who talk about ' its not the same event.' I'm not even sure how you can come up with that on the base fact its the same event. But even going along with that, is a continuation of the story from last years event, even bringing back old characters/themes/items in the CS's, stuff they will never have access to now (unless you wanna take out the wallet, sans lore).

[Xairos]

To broaden my response slightly, the main issue here is that compromise is somewhat impossible. I think the core complaint of people opposed to the cash shop is that they don't want XIV to appeal to larger populations; they want it to be a more selective title, like FFXI was. The existence of a cash shop, no matter the form, no matter how restricted, is still a problem for these individuals - not because it directly affects them, but because it indirectly alters the composition of the community in ways they don't like.

I agree with you on this one. I can empathize with those who want FFXIV to remain small scale. I mean I kinda loved that about FFXI. But another part of me wants people to take this game as a proper MMO. and If (a big speculation as I dont know what SE will do with the extra funds) the extra money lends to higher quality books and cds or dvds or real life events, then thats the best I can hope for. If this is the dark-ish path SE needs to take to make a MMO that people will see, then *sigh* I can see how it pans out.

Frankly, I'd have actually rather seen them attach $5/mo more to the subscription price. As alluded to above, I explicitly do not want FFXIV catering to the masses to the extent that it is. A higher price range helps to make it more selective, and a corresponding lack of a cash shop (with preferably a wholesale shift away from the amount of vanity gear being released) would also help to improve the community, in my eyes. One of the best aspects of FFXI's development, in my eyes, is that the game was created under a consistent image, rather than catering to the most people possible. It's what gave it the unique feel and complex world that many of us treasure to this day. FFXIV has thus far tossed that philosophy out, which might make for more subscribers, but results in a weaker game, in my opinion.

They somewhat tried being different with FFXI, while it was profitable for what it was, it was a very small game and as such it took it a long time to be profitable.

[Sinroth]

Not a disappointment if you support a game that deserves to be supported.

When I hear the words cash shop I think of SWTOR. But this is not at all along the same lines.

SWTOR, for an example doesn't deserve to be supported by any means. Their method is to put the cash shop first AHEAD of Subscribers satisfaction. Any Studio who does that deserves to be shunned like they are.

The only way the cash shop in FFXIV will be a disappointment is if they follow BioWare Austin Studio/EA's adoption. And I know they won't be doing that. It would mean major changes, and why fix something (even though it wasn't a fix at all for the players) that isn't broken unlike SWTOR's weak and broken, well... everything.

I see it as more like Blizzards approach to the cash shop. As long as it stays away from gambling loot boxes, its perfectly fine for a pet here and a mount there.

[whoopeeragon]

The attitudes in this thread can be summed up perfectly by the tag cloud already...

There's too much name-calling and dung-flinging going on now. If you want to be heard, make it civil, and not use the opposing party as an avenue for you to bash on. It goes both ways.