Feb
22

$10 for a horse…$20 for six slots…

11 Comments

…well, it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest.

More information here:

As you may have noticed the Cash Shop has recently been implemented in Allods Online.

I wanted to make a poll on the prices to see what peoples thoughts were in regards to them.

Here are the prices, which are converted from Gpotato > USD:

Perfume x 1 = 75c
Perfume x 20 = $13.50
24 Slot Bag x 1 = $20.00
Holy Relic x 1 = $15.00
Myrh x 1000 = $1.00
Steel Chest x 1 = $1.00
Key x 1 = 10c
Crystal Chips x 10 = $2.50
Crystal Chips x 50 = $12.00
36 Slot Bank Bag x 1 = $15.00

I think they are ridiculous. There is no way in hell i’m paying nearly a dollar for half an hour of PvP. Why not pay $15 and play a P2P MMO and get all the features and as much PvP as I want? As many instances as I want without fatigue… and much more.

Please vote so we can try to persuede gPotato they’re making yet another mistake to add onto FOD, Flagging and Fatigue.

I’m tellin ya people…if you don’t make some noise here, it will continue. Fortunately, the gamer crowd is starting to get it.

We took it up the ass with the horse, now we’re just providing them with the lube.

D out.

Posted in Editorial
11 Comments Posted by Darren

11 Responses to "$10 for a horse…$20 for six slots…"

  • Ravious says:
    February 22, 2010 at 9:22 am

    How do you feel about DDO or W101, which are generally perceived as decent F2P models? Clearly Allods has failed…. no question about that. But, what about those surviving.

  • Pitrelli says:
    February 22, 2010 at 9:30 am

    Whilst i’ve had a laugh at some of the ‘hardcore’ Allods Online fans I do think this could have serious implications for the industry in general if people actually stump up the money. Lets hope gPotato realise the error of their way. That will teach people to get over excited on a beta when everything hasnt been announced though. Oh and it gave me a chuckle reading keens post…… it usually takes a couple of months for him to turn on whatever he is playing :)

  • Andrew says:
    February 22, 2010 at 10:02 am

    Trying to state anything about RMT/microtransactions while simultaneously using Allods’ recent debacle as an example is an exercise in bad reasoning.

    A $10 horse is not unreasonable – I bought myself on in Wizard101 just recently, and am considering a second. Allods’ pricing scheme is something altogether different, and people should and will vote with their wallets.

  • Pitrelli says:
    February 22, 2010 at 11:02 am

    @ Andrew I fail to see why it is bad reasoning.

    Whom is it who decides what is reasonable or not? The fact of the matter is RMT is dangerous in the respect they have no markers set on what is acceptable. Some people will think 10 bucks for a horse is good value others wont, my pixelated items hold very little value to me personally so I would be mortified having to pay for anything much less a horse.

    What Allods has thrown into the mix is somewhat inflated prices…. will people pay them? or more to the point will ENOUGH people pay them to warrant it being used by other devs. For me it is very worrying and as gamers we should hope noone is fooled into spending money this way.

    Anyway the whole RMT mess is why I play subscription games exclusively, perhaps if Allods had a ‘premium membership’ they would have more success however going by their crazy pricing scheme you would probably be charged around $100 for the pleasure.

  • Webmaster says:
    February 22, 2010 at 12:00 pm

    Basically GPotato is about to price themselves out of the market. And as expensive as I am sure the game was to make, they might not be making any more games unless things change and change quickly. Customers, like trust, are easy to lose, and once lost are hard to get back.

  • Tesh says:
    February 22, 2010 at 12:03 pm

    That’s capitalism, Pitrelli. The market isn’t set; that’s the whole point. There is no government mandate that MMOs have to be sub games. If Allods Online crashes because of this, it’s their own fault, and the next game who wants to try a microtransaction model will have to look at how DDO, W101 and Puzzle Pirates do it right.

    I still find it funny that a $10 horse is blasted, but players pay $15 for a chunk of time. The former works for me, the latter is never good value for me. To each their own; that’s the point of a market that isn’t set. It’s healthy, even if some businesses immolate themselves in the process.

  • Hunter says:
    February 22, 2010 at 6:10 pm

    the 10 dollar horse is the least of RoM’s transgressions.

  • Brian Inman says:
    February 22, 2010 at 8:38 pm

    Allods is going to experience the same thing as the banking industry in the U.S. If you don’t make people pay something up front it is easier for them to let go. Do you think people would of let there homes foreclose if they were actually required to put down 20% downpayment like the old days? If they would of put their life savings into their down payment they would of taken a second job, stopped drinking starbucks twice a day, but when you could move into a house with no money down your only loss is your payments.

    The same goes for Allods. It didn’t cost anyone a dime to download it, and to play it. Keep the cash shop prices like they are, and you will see how fast Allods is stuck holding the bag as everyone cuts their ties because they have nothing to lose.

    I explained on my blog it is better to have one million happy customers buying $5 bags than 75,000 left after the cash shop fiasco buying $20 bags. Do the math. Would you rather make 5 mil or 1.5 mil. It doesn’t include all the future earnings you could make off those 1 million players.

  • Jeremy S. says:
    February 23, 2010 at 5:33 pm

    Capitalism is Capitalism.

    One of the best analogies would be Abstinence or protection. If you partake, you partake and take on all that is included within a persons responsibilities. Sure, some will still try and sue Trojan or other companies, but by and large, it’s a persons responsibility to know what they are deciding to get into.

    If you play for free fine, but if you pay, then you are paying, and you take on all personal responsibilities there in.

    Many people will join this band wagon because they just want things cheaper. Heck who wouldn’t? But the people just “using the system” can be seen apart from those that have honest disagreements with a business price or practice. There are legitimate and not-so-legitimate ways of going about it. It’s been all too common in my short MMORPG career, that I’ve talked to dozens of people who claim to think theirs wrong doing with a cash shop only to find, after having a conversation, they contradict themselves between not empathizing with a company and using an excuse. In the end, most of the people I’ve talked to ended up smiling sheepishly saying “You caught me”. You need to know whether you are one of those people, or if you have integrity. If you have integrity, then the next steps are quite easy. You simply don’t pay. That’s the loudest, ugliest red-faced screaming and ranting you can do. Trust me, screaming and crying and ranting on blogs and forums will do very, very little compared to just not opening your wallet.

    If you think prices are unholy, then start a blog, and do your best to inform people why you feel that way, but I’d suggest looking up healthy successful ways of protest. But really mostly, you speak with your wallet. If you complain the price is too high, then pay anyway, well then you’ve lost all credibility.

    RMT within the gaming world is no more good or evil than any other business. There’s no hidden fees, or slight of hand going on. Everything is as up front as the groceries you are choosing from, at your local shopping center.

    As for my own personal feeling on Allods cash shop. I don’t think it’s outrageous. Just because 20 is a higher number than 10, doesn’t mean games are starting to charge more. Games have their own microcosm that, in many ways, can not be compared to the prices and values on those items in other games. Gala-net may have tried to create their own value-based system, where they create and balance how something is valued based on how their game is played. A 6-slot bag in one game world could be much more valuable than some of their potions, while in another game, the values wouldn’t be the same.

    In the end:
    Vote with your wallet, it’s the noisiest, craziest, loudest ranting that is possible.

    Business is business

    Don’t try to sweep your own ethics under the rug, while shining a spot light on someone elses, you’ll lose all credibility. Take full responsibility for yourself and your actions.

  • Common Sense Aggro « says:
    February 23, 2010 at 11:44 pm

    [...] I did note was Darren’s post from Common Sense Gamer. Was it the fact that his soap box was so appealing that I wanted to jump on board too? Nope. It [...]

  • Carson63000 says:
    February 25, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    I bought a charity horse in RoM, half of my ten bucks went to Save The Children. :)

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