Cost

As others have said, by that point in UO you could "lockdown" items so that no one else but the homeowners could pickup or move an item. So I actually hired two ladies who made money in game doing interior design for houses to make it presentable to the public. I also have several players who "lived" at my house as I added them as "friends" of the house and gave them certain chests/containers to put their belongings, but they didn't have access to my belongings. Of course it was a matter of trust on their end that I wouldn't touch their stuff.

Beyond that though, what further made it magical is I and we started to give reason for the public to even come to my house...which was out in the middle of nowhere basically. I started having RP and PvP events at my houses like "Last Man Standing" where I would lock everyone inside and everyone would fight to the death and whoever was standing last got to loot everyone (everyone knew this before hand). I would go to message boards and submit news to UO fan sites announcing those events to get the word out...I would also go to the NPC towns to bark about the events as well. Then I started recruiting crafters/merchants to place vendors in my tower to make to offer weapons/items/gears for those events and those who lived nearby to give a place to shop in an area that would otherwise be dead.

It wasn't long before many other players joined in and placed houses to be apart of what I had the intention of creating all along which was a player run town. It did just that. It wasn't "I" anymore with my house but "we" with a player run town with it's own player run government, elections, diplomacy, laws, guards, and of course commerce and events of all kinds.

So for me as a player, I spent most my time playing in the area around my house with my roommates and friends which grew into something much much more. We created a "hot spot" within the game that players flocked to. To me that is part of the magic that seems to be missed in a lot of these conversations on housing.

 

Before Trammel came out my bro made me a friend to his house. Once trammel came out I was finally able to place my own house. One of my friends had a house early on, little tiny thing.. he used it to duplicate gold. House was rare in UO and I'm looking forward to another great game with real property value.

 

So another P2W perk for the house buyer.
If everyone doesn't see mine in the (persistent instance ) Towns I don't expect to see any of the house owned vendors either.

 

No and they shouldn't be sold in shops.

 

Not pay to win, pay to have a game at all.

Why not? In a Kickstarter game, I think it was an excellent business decision on the part of Richard Garriott to do exactly that. The fundraising so far as raised over $3 million as a result of steps like this, so one could say selling houses in shops has been an overwhelming success.

 

Selling 350 plots (when they manage to sell them) for around $135000 was worth all the bad feeling among the community.

Kickstarter asked for $1m they got $1.2 from lower tier backers, $700k from those that got a Plot. So the sale of the Plots in the shop was not required. Because
They raised $1.9 from kickstarter so double what they asked. I have Pledged to make Shroud of the Avatar, not EP 2,3,4 and 5 if they don't get the sales they don't get developed.
Since the end of Kickstarter they have raised another $1m dollars so only about 12% from housing plots.
They have changed the Rule that only one Plot may be placed per account.
They have changed the rule to allowing owning Multi plots ownership an placing them.

SO for the sake of $135000 (may need a sale to shift them like the village Plots) so could be less.
They need to answer these Questions.
So 700 kickstarter backers with Land deeds 21,600 without.

 

So which one is it? Multiple lots or not? I'm confused...

 

If u wait till launch youll be waiting a lot longer for one to open up. For all we know portalarium could be purposely giving us small housing numbers to keep the price hugh so they get more donations. And the op is right it is oout of hand i already deal with socioeconomic problems in life now its being brought into a game

 

So in what way does one exclude the other?

Selling housing in shops had nothing to do with 2.85 out of 3 million and wasteland 2 had not a single element like it and had a successful kickstarter campaign.
It is not even clear that those who bought the lots could not have been enticed to buy other things with less of a gaming impact =)

 

See it positively. If for some reason people will not like parts 1 and 2 when they come out and they run out of funds before part 5 declaring bankruptcy, you are at least not out of any pledge cause part 1 will definitely happen =)
Of course we all want the game to be a great success.

 

Every little bit helps. I figure Richard Garriott knows more about this business than anyone here, so count me as unconvinced that there is a serious problem. A few whiners on the forums don't count for much.

 

Having instanced houses and selling them cheap to the masses would give developers even more money to develop a even better game.

So i don't believe it is about the money cause if it was interesting getting more money for developing the game then they should allow cheaper houses, gypsy wagons or boats.

I believe it is all about boosting house prices to the top. Giving today house owners a real estate market seems to be more important then getting more money from the masses.

 

Neither do a few whiners on the forums that like the multi plot option and high priced lots convince me that there isn't a serious problem.

 

You can now get a village lot at a low price if you really want one.

I also agree with Owain, a few whiners don't count for much. I'm yet to see where there is any problem at all.

 

I'm pretty sure were more then you think.

The numbers of active pledgers on the forums are very few compared to the total numbers of pledgers so even if we are a minority (which i doubt) i believe this is a problem.

Getting all pleased should be important to game developers.

 

No Dev in history has pleased all its fanbase in any game

 

I kind of take the view that you were aware of how the system works over limited housing prior to pledging anyway. You also forget the offline game where your not even in competition for housing. You are also forgetting that there are plenty of plots available when the game launches. You are also conveniently forgetting that you can purchase plots off other players.

I see no problem other than those people who are very absent minded with regards to what they have already been told and how the housing system will work.

 

I deleted it because I've decided that I enjoy PKing people for being wrong on the internet because it is more productive than trying to reason with them. See you in the game.

 

Having read several threads about housing and the concern amongst a subset of the community about whether or not all players will be able to get one, in my view it all comes down to what the moderators are saying - time vs money. I suspect that once the game launches we will be able to break-down players into the following categories, which are those who:

-1- Want a house but may not have the time to dedicate to the game; they will pledge up-front with cash to secure what they want. I fall under this category.​

-2- Want a house but would rather have the satisfaction of earning their house in-game. An admirable attitude to take. These players will be the life-and-soul of SoTA and provide it with a strong sense of community as they'll be in-game most and their dedication will ultimately see them rewarded with a deed and a house through their hard work in-game.​

-3- Those who want a house but neither have the time or the money to dedicate to the game; ultimately they may still be able to get what they want but it will over a longer time-scale (i.e. later episodes) then what they would prefer. In the interim they will likely make friends well and share a property if that feature is in the end-game.​

-4- Those who are unconcerned about housing.​

To those who believe that not everybody will be able to have a house a game I agree with you and I personally don't see an issue with that, but what I will wager anybody is this, those who actually want a house in game will be able to get one during their lifetime playing the game.

In terms of the add-on store with the basements and such then I suspect that you can rinse-and-repeat the above 4 points.

I would add that the idea of selling things through a store to support development is far from a unique to SoTA, but I can see why the thought of a finite limit on land has raised concern. Ultimately though it boils down to the 4 points above and in addition concerns are likely to be mitigated by:

-5- Additional land / plots become available as more episodes are released​

​

-6- Additional features becoming available as the developers react to player demand.​

​

Whether or not any of the above is correct of course we'll just have to wait-and-see but as with anything in life there's often a bigger picture and this one is going to span a good 5 to 10 years.

Merely my opinion, of course

 

Haha, couldnt help but laugh , Thank you for that

Now, with your logic, how is it more productive?