In a press conference late on Saturday, Lead Producer J. Allen Brack confirmed what some data file combers had surmised: WoW will feature paid character customization:
"I don't mind stating that there will be paid character customization at some point. I can't really go into detail."
Details such as when this feature will be added and the extent of customizable features for hire are unknown at this point, but its safe to surmise that any kind of paid changes will be purely cosmetic.
Emerging business models for online games like microtransactions and tiered subscriptions have long met with skepticism from the average MMO enthusiast, who's viewed Blizzard and its standard subscription model for World of Warcraft as a bastion against new monetization strategies.
But it seems possible that Blizzard might soon explore the pay-for-goods arena after a press conference at its BlizzCon event -- though specifics are still being ironed out.
I see that selling micro transactions has become T3H thing, the buzzword that foretells of a rather bleak future.
First they wanted to sell you a half finished product (which in itself is a big no-no), then they are too lazy to finish/fix it in due time (like - in a period of a few YEARS), then you had to cough out moneys once again to get the larger upgrades which are actually not newly coded content but are instead made from the material that was supposed to be included with the original game at the moment when it hit the shelves (but, quite understandably, wasn't finished in time).
Then they went one step further, they wanted you to buy USB keys that guarantee your acc. safety in, lets say public internet coffee shops, then they wanted to dress you up in nerd gear - WoW caps, T-shirts and stuff.
The story doesn't end here, they started selling special pets to go with the collectors edition which kinda suggested the things to come.
In addition we had (and still have as a matter of fact) paid character transfers, so if your character ever got stuck on a dead server (which died due to low population of players who had already quit the game) - you had to cough up some more cash (in real cash) in order to reclaim your lost right to enjoy the bloody game.
After all this they came up with yet another way to sell something (a privilege if you will) that should have been included (for free) into the game content, but has instead become a novelty - one that you have to pay for in addition to the game (and expansions) and monthly fees.
Now they want to take your money and in return they shall customize your character. Instead of packing more textures to choose from into the game and/or giving the players some kind of painting/logo tools which would enable you to design unique armor/weapons for your character (as in Age of Conan) they decided to sell this service to those who can afford it.
Nowadays it seems to me that we (the customers) are actually not getting a finished and polished product, instead we are kind of subscribing to, in a way, pay the developers to code the game on the fly.
We pay their meals/cars/condos up front as they (still) code the game.
No one can guarantee that you will ever get what you paid for - in terms of both content quality and quantity!
This is a bad thing due to several reasons, one of which is - the inevitable loss of quality!
Quality will become a thing that you have to pay for in addition to the normal content (which is devoid of quality) - this means that they are now selling the same product to us several times over.
Perhaps in the future the game will come with but a few available instances/battlegrounds and you will have to lease an additional (high quality) map that you want to play?!
Anyhow, there is an underlying conflict of interest at work here; if they can have you pay more cash provided they sell quality content separately from the default content - this inevitably means that they will strive to make the default (but not free) game content as bland and dull as possible - as to "motivate" you to pay more!
That is not the road I would want the gaming industry to take. If it does - then we will have to forsake it and return to playing board games with our (real life) friends. Maybe it would it best, if that indeed were the case?
Has gaming become akin to democracy - tainted by pure-capitalist needs and wants?
Create demand and then offer a solution to satisfy demand?
Create low quality game content and then sell high quality content as a solution to the problem?
Disgusting, that's what it is.
|