White Raven earring given out at The Rising event 2018

[Theodric]

The developers did not break any promises. The Terms of Service - that everybody agreed to when making an account - specifically state that anything in the game can and will change at a moment's notice. In short, it's working as intended.

Those who are truly so bothered by the decision to add the earrings to the game are free to take their business elsewhere. Though I have a feeling that they won't do that.

[Noodle_Trinidad]

The developers did not break any promises. The Terms of Service - that everybody agreed to when making an account - specifically state that anything in the game can and will change at a moment's notice. In short, it's working as intended.

Those who are truly so bothered by the decision to add the earrings to the game are free to take their business elsewhere. Though I have a feeling that they won't do that.

Terms of Service =/= Promises

They are two entirely different entities so please do not mix both of them up. The Terms of Services are an agreement between the customer and the company to make sure both parties are aware of each other's limitations with the product in hand while a promise is more of a declaration of assurance built around one's trust. What we should be worrying about is the fact that the promises,which are easily accessible plus easily associated with Yoshida and further confirmed by Bayohne, were so easily broken. It's something the community should worry about as it just sets a bad precedent for future promises for Post-2.0 content and lets be honest as it stands the game is not in a good state at the moment.

I've said time and time again I do not personally care if such things come back as long as they're added back in a way that honors their original form of acquisition and not just some mindless FATE spam but what does irk me is a Dev Team going back on promises made to their players, be you 1.0 or Post 2.0, and casually dismissing/ignoring their justified outrage. With your argument Digital Extremes can tell their Founders for Warframe that their exclusive content is now up for grabs because the Terms of Services are subject to change. Do you not understand how that would easily kill a game or create a massive rift of trust between Devs and Players alike? That's not a good standard to maintain a healthy relationship between them, already doesn't help that they are some of the most disconnected Devs that I have seen in my time playing games.

[Theodric]

-snip-

They're not different entities at all. A company can and will change their stance on various issues over time. They're not obligated to hold the same opinions in the present day that they did six years ago. They're a business. They're not your friends or loved ones. It isn't a 'betrayal' for them to change their stance on something.

If you don't like the direction of the game, by all means offer feedback or take your leave and vote with your wallet if you feel so strongly about this particular issue. As it stands, though...the people complaining about this are a minority of a minority. The argument for keeping the earrings out of the hands of present day players is entirely based around a misguided desire for exclusivity.

If you go through life expecting the status quo to never change and for past accomplishments to never lose their value then you will be in for disappointment. Let it be a life lesson for the future and focus on getting things because you like them and want to enjoy them, not because you want to hoard them and never see other players come to enjoy them even after half a decade has passed.

[Fawkes]

The developers did not break any promises. The Terms of Service - that everybody agreed to when making an account - specifically state that anything in the game can and will change at a moment's notice.

So... you think they didn't break a promise because the TOS allows them to legally break promises?

[Theodric]

So... you think they didn't break a promise because the TOS allows them to legally break promises?

Yep.

Take everything a developer says with a pinch of salt. Especially statements made many years ago. Times change. Businesses occasionally shift their stances. It's how the world works. A lot of posters set themselves up for disappointment by expecting things to play out differently.

Just look at the number of businesses who offer up a particular perk to reward loyal customers and then later remove that perk to increase their profit margin by spending less on their consumers. If people feel like a business practice is shady, they need to vote with their wallets. Otherwise it's just hot air. I'd love to know if any of those up in arms over this are actually going to quit the game. Especially those who have a different issue with the game every week.

[KisaiTenshi]

Yep.

Take everything a developer says with a pinch of salt. Especially statements made many years ago. Times change. Businesses occasionally shift their stances. It's how the world works. A lot of posters set themselves up for disappointment by expecting things to play out differently.

Just look at the number of businesses who offer up a particular perk to reward loyal customers and then later remove that perk to increase their profit margin by spending less on their consumers. If people feel like a business practice is shady, they need to vote with their wallets. Otherwise it's just hot air. I'd love to know if any of those up in arms over this are actually going to quit the game. Especially those who have a different issue with the game every week.

Pretty much every variation of "air miles" , "movie rewards points", and "hotel stay points" are like this. You know why they do it at all though? Because it's essentially a loan against future profits. So if you can make your books look better this year to investors, investors will stay. Then you just devalue those reward points every year to stay solvent.

I kid you not, reward points are a scam, but they're a scam against the existing price of things. So air travel prices are impaired by the cost of fuel, so if you collect 1000 miles when fuel cost are low and redeem it when they are high, the company has in fact lost money by you redeeming it. They make money when people just never do, and hence why many point systems expire. Use-it-or-lose it point systems are straight up scams, and you are paying for it through higher initial prices.

In the case of SE, they can pretty much say whatever they want, they are beholden to shareholders, and if the board says to scalp FFXIV profits in favor of rubbish mobile games that are insanely profitable at the risk of being cracked down on for gambling, then they are going to do that. No MMO is ever going to be an altruistic venture. You can find free content all over the internet without piracy, but the people who make that content don't make it while being homeless. No, the fact that it's basically impossible to steal a MMO subscriber base by coming out with a better cheaper game is the thing that runs counter to common business practices. People do not play a MMO because it's cheap content, they play it because it's fun. When it stops being fun, then they move on to another game.

People are not going to quit playing a MMO over any specific reward the game offers, sure people may say that it shows how tactless or greedy the developer/publisher is getting, but if players really cared about not giving greedy developers money, they would boycott cash shops of the games they play and force them to go back to "subscription-only" like all the other content that was once free until the ad market collapsed from greed.