Guild Wars 2 will be launching completely subscription free this year, and one of the points that I didn't get to talk about in my review was how micro-transactions work within the game.
I'm normally in support of subscription based MMOs, because I have always lived by my '£ an hour' philosophy when it comes to games. To sum it up; if a game costs me £30 I expect it to last me at least 30 hours worth of playtime. This doesn't necessarily mean that the main story has to last that long. But that the game needs to be engaging enough to hold my attention, or has enough additional content to keep my playing. (This philosophy works out pretty well as far as Steam deals are concerned.)
So when it comes to MMOs, paying £8 a month for something I enjoy playing on a daily basis and getting hours and hours worth of playtime from, meant that the subscription never really bothered me. In fact, I was getting a lot for more game time for my money, especially when compared to other games.
Now the main issue I've been having lately is with MMOs like SWTOR. I currently have no drive whatsoever to pay my subscription (I'll spare you the reasons why). But at the same time, I would still like the option to be able to jump on and play with the friends that are currently sticking with it. It would be nice to be able to join them on occasion for 'dailies' or just to help out, even though in the long run I don't feel like I can commit fully to the game.
In this case the subscription plan just does not work in my favour. So I feel barred from a game that I have already paid for because I don't want to fork out the extra money to receive game-time I won't utilise. Now on the flip side we have Free 2 Play / Sub free MMOs. Originally I was very wary of these. I had always worried that all they did was allow players who were spending the most money 'overwhelming godliness' over their gaming space, creating extremely unbalanced play for others who wouldn't want to spend as much.
True many games have done this in the past, but these days it seems that the use of micro-transactions are that much more of a viable solution. It was my experience with GW2 that really enforced my opinion on this.
“… it’s never OK for players who spend money to have an unfair advantage over players who spend time.” (Mike O’Brien, president of ArenaNet)
Mike O'Brien pretty much cleared up all my worries back in March when I first read that quote on the GW2 blog. But when I got to see it for myself, I was glad that this wasn't just going to be another empty promise from a game developer. Micro-transactions in GW2 work in a way that opens the game up just that little bit more to make it worthwhile, but not enough to ruin another players experience.
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| Pimp cat. |
Mike O'Brien pretty much cleared up all my worries back in March when I first read that quote on the GW2 blog. But when I got to see it for myself, I was glad that this wasn't just going to be another empty promise from a game developer. Micro-transactions in GW2 work in a way that opens the game up just that little bit more to make it worthwhile, but not enough to ruin another players experience.
Gems are the currency used for micro-transactions and they can be bought for real funds or in-game gold. So if you're somebody who is pretty handy with your auctions or just likes farming gold, you will never have to pay another penny. You can also do this in the reverse, so goodbye to gold sellers in GW2 (I hope.)
All you have to do is open a window in game, add gems to your account and choose from the many unique, quirky or helpful items that will then be granted instantly to your character. They range from one hour experience, damage or karma boosts to funny civilian gear to wear around town, extra dyes for your gear or pots that can turn you into any random creature.
Among my favourite items you could buy, were packs of Minis. These were pets you could collect for your character that weren't account bound and the packs could even contain doubles. Well... I was hooked on them almost immediately, I like pets anyway in MMOs but being able to swap doubles and show off rares with my guild over the beta weekend just made things worse (MUST COLLECT THEM ALL!). These could even be sold on the auction house to avid collectors, which would normally go for a tidy profit for the rarer ones.
Lastly there where items such as the Box o'fun. You could place this in a highly populated area of the world and every player could click on it. They would then receive a random transformation ranging from huge, turning invisible, being able to shoot off fireworks to just exploding and flying backwards. It created such a simple yet fun break from the game, and made for some interesting chat among the players who were brought together by it.
I had a great time messing around with the Gem store. So if this is what the future of micro-transactions in MMOs will be, then I happily welcome them with open arms.
All you have to do is open a window in game, add gems to your account and choose from the many unique, quirky or helpful items that will then be granted instantly to your character. They range from one hour experience, damage or karma boosts to funny civilian gear to wear around town, extra dyes for your gear or pots that can turn you into any random creature.
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| My Mini wasn't so mini... |
Lastly there where items such as the Box o'fun. You could place this in a highly populated area of the world and every player could click on it. They would then receive a random transformation ranging from huge, turning invisible, being able to shoot off fireworks to just exploding and flying backwards. It created such a simple yet fun break from the game, and made for some interesting chat among the players who were brought together by it.
I had a great time messing around with the Gem store. So if this is what the future of micro-transactions in MMOs will be, then I happily welcome them with open arms.
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