Stop Making Should-Be Achievement Gear.."Optional Gear"

[Talraen]

If a company goes "This is our service and this is what is included in our service charge" and then starts taking items out of that package for no reason than to charge separately for them you can be sure there will be consumer blowback.

Can you show me where Square Enix ever said that? They used to give people a second chance at seasonal items, now they don't. There was no formal policy in place for the former, nor the latter. What basis do you have for assuming they would remain free forever?

In fact its the exact reason that when cable, internet, and phone providers update their packages for new subscribers they dont go back and ninja the customers on existing plans, they keep them as they were for previous subscribers, because thats what they signed up for (also contracts but y'know).

Contracts are kind of important in this case, since they are literally the reason this happens at all.

So can they decide to charge for it? Sure, they can.

Most companies however deem the practice unethical (lol they don't want to deal with the blowback) so they don't do it and consumers have the right to voice an opinion if they disagree with the service.

No company considers charging for something unethical. Because if they did, they would go out of business pretty quickly. Companies split off products that were previously included in a package, or stop giving things away for free, all the time.

Allowing players to re-obtain seasonal event items in-game was something this game allowed before the Mogstation, it was a feature of the game one could count under what their subscription covered. Then when the next year came around suddenly the vendors no longer provided those items and you could "look forward" to them being charged for an additional fee on the Mogstation.

If you counted on that to be part of your subscription, that's on you. That was never promised. And they gave subscribers a chance to get every item from 1.0 before they started charging for anything.

The argument is "Why am I suddenly paying an additional fee for something I didn't have to before?"

That's not an argument, that's misunderstanding how business works. And besides, you're not paying an additional fee, since you indicated you don't buy the cash shop items. What they have done is stop offering something they used to offer for free. Much like they stopped offering the original version of Diadem, or the entirety of 1.0 (which free for some time before they started charging for it, I might add). It's their game, they can do that, and every user should expect it. One day they'll shut down the servers and everything you ever earned or even paid for will be gone.