Of course I expected "whataboutism" to minimize this, and it already happened.
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Apex Legends New Timed Event Takes Monetization To A Whole New Level
- Thread starter Nothus
- Start date
Of course I expected "whataboutism" to minimize this, and it already happened.
EA put awful monetization in a full price gold (or whatever name) version of MP games. In a free to play, it couldn't have been well, you all know it. They bait and hooked, no it is time to pay. Is this an heroin / crack dealer way of selling ? Yes it is, happy gaming everyone !!!
I really want to emphasize that heirloom. By its very existence, whales are already in on this regardless of what they do, since it's a guaranteed way to get an item that otherwise has a pity counter of 500 loot boxes. It's an endgame to the spending of this event, which is not common in games like this to begin with.
With that in mind—Respawn/EA would likely make more money selling these skins a la carte anyway. At their usual high price of $18 per skin they would grab a lot of people who just want one single skin. The alternative is the people who would buy one skin now need to buy atleast two of the loot boxes, and it still doesn't come out to as much. The thing is—this STILL gets the whales. They still want that heirloom, and would just buy all the skins anyway. Only now it's a lot more expensive for them.
Let's even imagine they were more generous than usual and made the epic items $5 each, legendaries $10. 12 of each means $120 on legendaries, $60 on epics, $35 for the axe. $215, whereas currently all the loot boxes + axe equal $203. Whales end up spending more, and I highly doubt they would even make the prices that low. They could make the two quests that currently give boxes give a voucher instead. One voucher for an epic, or two for a legendary, that way you get one free legendary or two free epics. Still ends up being more expensive than what it is now. This begs the question...
What is gained from this current system? The people who want one skin but can't directly buy it enter a lottery system. Those people are manipulated and tempted to be pushed into trying to get a few boxes and getting the one item they want, and if they don't, it's a sunk cost fallacy for them. People that might have just spent for one skin now end up spending over.
That is literally the only thing gained from this. Again, whales WILL get that heirloom and could actually have been milked a lot more. This system only gains from the people teetering on the edge already. The fact that this IS how they did things is telling enough, as there must be a whole lot of people that end up being pushed to biting on this where it exceeds some internal number, even at the cost of blatantly pissing off the userbase. That's scummy as absolute fuck.
With that in mind—Respawn/EA would likely make more money selling these skins a la carte anyway. At their usual high price of $18 per skin they would grab a lot of people who just want one single skin. The alternative is the people who would buy one skin now need to buy atleast two of the loot boxes, and it still doesn't come out to as much. The thing is—this STILL gets the whales. They still want that heirloom, and would just buy all the skins anyway. Only now it's a lot more expensive for them.
Let's even imagine they were more generous than usual and made the epic items $5 each, legendaries $10. 12 of each means $120 on legendaries, $60 on epics, $35 for the axe. $215, whereas currently all the loot boxes + axe equal $203. Whales end up spending more, and I highly doubt they would even make the prices that low. They could make the two quests that currently give boxes give a voucher instead. One voucher for an epic, or two for a legendary, that way you get one free legendary or two free epics. Still ends up being more expensive than what it is now. This begs the question...
What is gained from this current system? The people who want one skin but can't directly buy it enter a lottery system. Those people are manipulated and tempted to be pushed into trying to get a few boxes and getting the one item they want, and if they don't, it's a sunk cost fallacy for them. People that might have just spent for one skin now end up spending over.
That is literally the only thing gained from this. Again, whales WILL get that heirloom and could actually have been milked a lot more. This system only gains from the people teetering on the edge already. The fact that this IS how they did things is telling enough, as there must be a whole lot of people that end up being pushed to biting on this where it exceeds some internal number, even at the cost of blatantly pissing off the userbase. That's scummy as absolute fuck.
And not a single person has or will produce even one piece of evidence that EA is singlehandedly forcing this. Devs are the same as pubs. Stop pretending pubs are the bad guys and devs are selfless angels who only care about making games and have no interest in silly things like profit or the job security disgusting amount of whaling cash can provide.
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-08-14-this-apex-legends-axe-costs-about-gbp112-in-loot-boxes
Stuff like this is keeping me from buying any EA games.
A bad value proposition isn't what I'd call scummy.
$180ish for all these things is pretty bad, but that just means I won't pay for them.
The weird thing for me was, I played this a bunch and only after spending money to get the Season 2 Battle Pass did I actually get turned off the game. It felt like after investing in the game I was not where I had hoped to be and would never, ever get there without spending a ludicrous amount of money.
So Respawn got $20 out of me and turned me away, instead of charging me $40 or $60 for a complete game. Guessing they're going to win in the end though. I can't comprehend the spending money some people have.
So Respawn got $20 out of me and turned me away, instead of charging me $40 or $60 for a complete game. Guessing they're going to win in the end though. I can't comprehend the spending money some people have.
I think grindy gaming addiction is almost the same thing.
Both are consuming your time for "useless random things".
You are spending 800 hours on diablo or 800 hours on a casino.
But one is more "destructive" because it is draining your money.
Since gambling, drinking, using drugs, prostitution and other "damaging" things will always exist (in my opinion), I think we are better off just regulation and bringing them to light instead of banning it. We will never be able to "save" everybody and get the world rid of these things.
As we agreed, even games are hard to analyse. When is a game too addictive, harmful, or not? It is hard to tell. The human being will always have to make a choice in the end.
So, regarding lootboxes, I would vote for regulation and making every game with paid lootboxes a 18+ game.
I think Apex is 16+. We could vote to change that.
The costs of these packs and the total to get the heirloom axe are completely ridiculous. I love the game but I cant pay those kind of prizes for some ( still awesome) cosmetic items.
Its a lot of money but I remember that for you to obtain the Wraith heirloom you have to buy like 300-500 apex packs and those cost a lot too ( or be extremely lucky with that 0,5% chance per pack to get it)
Its a lot of money but I remember that for you to obtain the Wraith heirloom you have to buy like 300-500 apex packs and those cost a lot too ( or be extremely lucky with that 0,5% chance per pack to get it)
Wat? It dosent matter who implemented it. EA has built their brand and corporate governance around bilking consumers with micro transactions while making as few games as possible.
So if Respawn did implement this it's because of EA. I am sure they've seen enough companies "papa EA'd" to be fearful.
These loot box prices are absolutely BS.
There were some things listed that are currently regulated (not well if you ask me) and they still cause problems for society. We still have lots of alcoholics, drug addicts, gambling addicts, and people with obesity. I don't believe limiting the purchase of loot boxes to adults or showing the drop rates will actually change much. The only surefire way is to outright ban them, but that just leads to the question of why don't we ban other things that people can get addicted to.
There were some things listed that are currently regulated (not well if you ask me) and they still cause problems for society. We still have lots of alcoholics, drug addicts, gambling addicts, and people with obesity. I don't believe limiting the purchase of loot boxes to adults or showing the drop rates will actually change much. The only surefire way is to outright ban them, but that just leads to the question of why don't we ban other things that people can get addicted to.
I'm not saying we should ban everything that we can be addicted to, because that would be literally everything in existence. But we should definitely try and prevent corporations from exploiting addictions for personal gain, and try and limit peoples exposure things that are inherently addictive.
it's a free game and these are all cosmetic...soooooo.....
I understand more people are upset with the nature of the drops and so on, as it is essentially curating gambling habits, that I understand.
I don't understand why more games just don't go with the Fortnite model. Battlepass is super transparent. The store has a rotation of items, no RNG. Everyone is happy, and Epic seems to be making fistfuls of money any way?
I understand more people are upset with the nature of the drops and so on, as it is essentially curating gambling habits, that I understand.
I don't understand why more games just don't go with the Fortnite model. Battlepass is super transparent. The store has a rotation of items, no RNG. Everyone is happy, and Epic seems to be making fistfuls of money any way?
I know it's a long post but read mine. Maybe it will help out it in perspective.
I'm saying the silly, childish "devs are good and pubs are bad" attitude people always bring to this conversation is overly simplistic and reductive. There's no way to tell who's promoting this shit with Apex. People like to blame publishers so they can absolve devs of any responsibility for their own cynical behavior. Devs can also be greedy, exploitative people.
EA is a dumpster company that singlehandedly pushed the lootbox frenzy into the public consciousness with their Battlefront bedshitting, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're pulling all the strings in this particular situation. People should holds devs accountable in the same way they look at publishers.
I never said devs are good or pubs are bad. I'm saying this is EAs fault. They don't need to pull the strings. They've created the environment that their devs need to survive in.
its our own fault...evbdy wants Titan 3 but nobody bought 2 -_o_-
If they were just selling skins that would be one thing. I'm not averse to all MTX in a f2p game. It does have to make money. What I am averse to is loot boxes because of how it psychologically affects people. And I'm not just talking in theory, I'm talking from experience. If you haven't gone back and read my other post, you should, but here is another example.
I used to play Marvel Heroes. It had characters/skins to unlock via MTX. Which was fine, I didn't mind paying for the character and odd skin here or there. Then one day they added in these cards (Loot boxes) and one of the rewards was a Dr Doom companion. Doom being my favorite comic character ever I started buying them. Took me 120 dollars worth before I got him (this was LONG before he was announced as a playable character). This was in december of 2014, I was almost exactly 8 months into sobriety and I had no clue how still how my addiction worked. But I knew I wanted that Doom, and wouldn't stop until I got it. We won't go into the fact that my water almost got turned off because that money I spent was to pay the bills. See I thought I would be lucky, I would spend maybe 10, 15 dollars and get it, still having plenty of money left over. Then the sunk cost fallacy kicked in, that little guy in the back of my head was screaming that it was Doom! I couldn't not get him! I look back now with such clarity but then, even just a little less than 5 years ago I was so dumb.
Suggestions of regulation for this sort of thing - namely, ones that seek to limit it - are absurd. It doesn't effect public health like smoking. It doesn't provide cover for possible tax manipulation like gambling. It doesn't have the potential for immediate physical danger like a car. It doesn't have the potential for direct internal bodily harm like food.
Forget gambling; people often like buying anything at all to the point of destitution. That's the predation inherent in everything being sold; it's called marketing. There are people who blow their entire life savings on buying action figures, and while they might conceivably be said to have a problem with consumption, it's their prerogative to do so. The law doesn't exist to give personal cover for, and restrict usage based on, every single specific use case problem that might ever possibly arise for anything for anyone. There are not, and should not be, legal restrictions in place just because "some people might spend a lot of money on a thing and no other reason" for anything.
Forget gambling; people often like buying anything at all to the point of destitution. That's the predation inherent in everything being sold; it's called marketing. There are people who blow their entire life savings on buying action figures, and while they might conceivably be said to have a problem with consumption, it's their prerogative to do so. The law doesn't exist to give personal cover for, and restrict usage based on, every single specific use case problem that might ever possibly arise for anything for anyone. There are not, and should not be, legal restrictions in place just because "some people might spend a lot of money on a thing and no other reason" for anything.
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I would love to see the math on this being the most profitable model possible. Surely they ran the numbers for all the different scenarios, it just blows my mind this is the way they decided to make the most money. Why anyone would buy something is beyond me.
I think they should just let you buy the cosmetic stuff for a flat rate price on each item, but this is a really fun game to play so I just play it and have never spent a penny on it. It's free to play. I got some neat stuff here and there from playing, but the act of playing is a blast.
What confuses me most about these sorts of threads is that none of it affects the gameplay. I'm sorry some people struggle with gambling problems. I really am. I have a problem with buying retro games. Nobody is lobbying congress on my behalf. It's just weird that all we ever seem to talk about these days is everything BUT the actual gameplay.
What confuses me most about these sorts of threads is that none of it affects the gameplay. I'm sorry some people struggle with gambling problems. I really am. I have a problem with buying retro games. Nobody is lobbying congress on my behalf. It's just weird that all we ever seem to talk about these days is everything BUT the actual gameplay.
I thought that having a capped limit on how much you can spend was a good way to deter addiction issues.
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Damn, and my friends think I'm crazy for sitting on like 32 unopened crates. (Granted, I only played Apex a lot in the beginning, not so much anymore)
Quick question: Are you guaranteed to get that skin after spending that money (112 + whatever like 35) or that's just the "minimum" you have to spend?
Guaranteed. You must open 24 boxes (700 coins times 22-24) and then buy it for 3500 additional Apex Coins. It is also the minimum you have to spend.
So if you're incredibly lucky, it will cost you the same as
THREE BRAND NEW FULL PRICED GAMES
to get 25 digital knick knacks within this single game. And it will most likely cost way more than that.
Sometimes it feels really good to not care about online gaming.
So if someone actually want that skin and they don't mind paying for it they can essentially buy it, albeit via currency then buy crates for it, and they will get that item after spending a set amount of money which is like $170 USD +/-, correct?
I don't think you necessarily need 22/24. You have a CHANCE of getting more than one of the 24 items in each box. But you also have the CHANCE of getting only 1/24.
So TECHNICALLY if you're REALLY lucky, you might be able to get all of the items in 12 boxes instead of 22/24.
Yes.
No. You only get one item per box. The loot box itself still has the regular box opening animation with 3 drops, but the two other drops are always +15 Crowns. The "50% odds" text refers to the loot box rolling whether you get an item from the Epic pool or the Legendary pool.
So you need 24 boxes, you can only get 2 through playing the game.
Are you certain on this? I got 60 crowns (2 +30s) and a legendary from a single crate. Does it specifically say that you only get 1 actual item per box anywhere?
Not to exploit people. And honestly I don't think that's to much to ask.
Yeah, and we know how the working conditions in Fortnite are to keep the update schedule.
Apex has a normal update cycle, so the game needs to make money with far less content and this is how you do it.
Games need to be profitable after all.
Are there any other F2P games with lootbox/gacha mechanics that actually guarantee buyers with a desired income after spending a certain amount of money?
How is this monetization to a whole new level?
At least there's an upper limit to getting everything? Some MTX games can make you spend thousands with no guarantee of obtaining everything you want.
At least there's an upper limit to getting everything? Some MTX games can make you spend thousands with no guarantee of obtaining everything you want.
It's about time people realize F2P is a way of exploiting people. Workers (Fortnite) and players via gambling.
Keeping someone addicted to something while legal is a capitalist's wet dream.
But it doesn't have to be. And the fact that it does exploit people like myself should be a HUGE red flag. You can sell people cosmetics and things without needing loot boxes.
Fortnite has one "character" so lootbox shit like this would make much more sense. Apex has a lot of heroes, if you let people buy 1-2-3 skins for their favourite characters I'm pretty sure Respawn either won't lose that much money or even will gain more profit. At least in my case, I bought some skins in Fortnite but participating in this "event" is absurd. But maybe there's enough whales I dunno.
People do, and should, complain about possible addiction issues with the Battle Pass, due to time constraints, as well as the high price of cosmetics.
Bemoaning people who care about skins while setting your own goal for the boxes the skins come is a weird ass flex.