Anyone else just feeling really disapointed this expansion?*vent*

[Deveryn]

All monetisation in a game needs to have value. In something like Genshin Impact, free-to-play users have to spend more time playing the game in order to progress than those who pay.


In the case of something like WoW or XIV, the monetisation still has value in it's micro-transactions. If you look at the mount models, for example, paid mounts often have some of the best models. Likewise in XIV, a number of paid mounts are from old seasonal events that instead of bringing back and providing more content to play on your subscription, they just make you buy it instead.


Then you get to things like the retainer service or level boosts. They might be optional but there still needs to be valueable. Levelling additional jobs in this game is mega boring and even with the XP increase, too slow... but fear not because you can boost a job to level 80. The retainer service also provides you with additional inventory and marketboard slots which you could argue is a form of pay-to-win as the in-game economy is somewhat important.


The illusion that it's fair and entirely optional will crumble instantly if they ever add the store to the game client... which could happen if some Square Enix executive decides they want more money.

I don't see a store showing up in game. Even if they did that, it would just redirect to the real thing because they're not about to handle payment info directly through the game. Adding the store would require all the security and such that's already loaded on the site.

This has always been a poor defense to me.
Think about it, what are you playing the game for? What is the constant carrot on the stick reward that the devs put in front of you so you'll do all the content? It's cosmetics. Whether they be mounts, hairstyles or proper glamour, that's always the constant incentive across all types of content in the game, from crafting related stuff like the Ishgard Restoration to hardcore combat challenges like Savage and Ultimate. There's always a cosmetic waiting for you at the end.
So, in this way, I'd argue that locking certain cosmetics behind a paywall IS predatory, since, whether we want to admit it or not, it's literally what the focus of the game is at the end of the day.
Glamour is endgame after all.

You wanna talk predatory? Let's talk about the mobile games that start off free, but they run limited time events and offer all kinds of boosts and special sales for currency and special items to use in-game. Some MMOs are like that as well, FFXIV is not. It's 100% playable with full features for the price of sub and expacs only. This is just good business.