No trade Subscriber Rewards. Sorry, that's a deal breaker.

That wasn't the 'silly' part, the game was built by sales, if we had 10k actual players, all of that competition would be mostly gone because the demand would have long surpassed the supply held by players and from that point on, the majority of the sales would be through Portalarium anyway. Even if someone with a hoard did quit, the demand, with that player base , would sweep it up so fast it would be negligible.

The fact that that should be their focus now is the 'silly' part. That should of been their focus long long ago and just from the original backers we had, we would be fine. When you are down to several thousand (to be generous), from 50,000+, little late to care then isn't it?

 

Chris is just as much a part of the reason we are where we are as anyone else, I don't put much stock in what he thinks the problem is.

 

Honestly, I think I am completely done... I have lost all hope and faith...

 

Well I have to admit he's kind of right. I've only spent my money on the secondary market since it's cheaper, rather then with Portalarium.

 

Login rewards have always been account bound, release rewards not so and since only one of the release items is I assumed it was in error and bugged it as such though no response yet.

 

I feel bad for the amount of money I and other have sank into a project that was thought to have direction and gave us a glimpse of what we thought could be, but flat lined a long time ago. I have been clinging to hope for a turn around as it has yet to come to pass and bad decisions both from a business stand point and development standpoint seem to keep happening. Hell I even bought into the whole Seedvest idea... you can see where that got us right?

 

Into a black hole where the seedinvest investors never found out what their money was used for and no longer get financial reporting or updates of any kind (can you tell I was foolish enough to do seedinvest too?)?

 

Same but thank god I sold all the perks im break even on seed invest. However I’ve still got a huge chunk still in the game, I hope this HUGE announcement is really good and not some hype to say we’ve started penciling esp2 or something.

 

Yes, but that's because you are entering the market where we are now, we are talking about where we started and where we should be, and then your experience would be different because the secondary market would be much smaller. The items held by players are limited in number, it's not like they sell something cheaper than port, and then create another one themselves to sell again. It was bought from portalarium originally.

The problem is, that portalarium sold so many items to customers, and didn't build a game population, and now can't compete in such a tiny market with the items that they already sold to people.

So now, they are going to compound the problem by alienating even more people. It's a non stop mission they have.

 

He also said these moves are related to the 'big announcement'. Maybe they've found some publisher or something that is willing to work with them if they phase out the prevalence of RMT.

 

Here's a thought. If the no-trade items are supposed to be much cheaper, and the subscription rewards are now no-trade, doesn't that cheapen the rewards too? Shouldn't people either be getting more rewards, either in variety, or quantity? Like 10 of each (not that having 10 masks that can't be given to other accounts makes sense)?

Chris condescendingly said that "gamers don't like change". No, we don't like nerfs. We're not only having the fundamental basis of item ownership being nerfed going forward, but the monthly rewards are worth far less. It's like ordering a plate of food at a restaurant, and then the waiter comes back and scoops 2/3 of the food off your plate saying "sorry, gotta take some of that back", but the meal still cost the same. Yeah, I dislike "change".

 

Are they trying to get us to stop paying them???

 

Yup, that is Chris reasoning. However I think it is flawed given their current business model.

This since one of the driving forces of their current business model is crowns. Where crowns are driven by players trading crowns for gold. Where one of the major reasons to buy crowns to get gold is to buy tradeable rares from player vendors.
If there is less stuff in the player economy with a high price tag (rares) then there is less reasons to buy crowns.

Another thing is the discouraging concept of not being able to get that cool thing X leading to peopl quitting the title.
If almost all the cool rares that people wear/use/show can no longer be got playing the game, and you cannot trade them for them, then in effect you have created an environment with TFOMO built in. That always leads to players having less reason to stay. (Unless you go the way with each expansion having cooler stuff than the last, in which case all old stuff is useless).
While the opposite of that with the cool thing X being tradeable if you just get enough stuff to trade it for leads to players trying to earn it.
Imagine yourself looking around the game on all cool stuff and everyone goes, can't have that, can't earn that, unless you have been here for years. That is not a good feeling.

Not to mention that they want you to have the rewards program (best value and all of that), however with the no-trade there is no reason to have multiple rewards programs on the same account. *sigh*
Then in the rewards program it is not just gear and wearables, instead a lot of it is deco, where you naturally often want more than one of it. Like a bunch of spiders. If they are no-trade then the only way to get that is a huge hassle of alts and/or permissions.

I could list other stuff but I don't think that the reasoning is sound given the context and the current business model. (Unless thy change the business model of course).

 

Damage control way too late on the wrong stuff. I can appreciate the realization, but this is a great example of why this game is in the shape that it is. By the time community concerns really get any attention, the damage has already been done.

In my opinion, this shouldn't be a priority. Fixing quest lines, core mechanics and gameplay, loot tables, and making the game actually rewarding should be.

People want to invest their time in games that make them feel like they've accomplished something. Purpose generates effort, effort generates reward, rewards generate interest, and interest generates players.

The point I'm trying to make here is that the focus should be on figuring out how to create new and fix old content to be more rewarding, interesting, and fluid. RMT isn't the biggest problem here, it's the quality of the game as a whole that's the problem.

I've seen so many great ideas and suggestions just dissipate into the void over the years that probably should have been addressed immediately. But that aside, there are still glaringly obvious issues with the core story and gameplay that have been completely neglected. That's the main reason why this game is struggling. Does the appearance of a paywall have some to do with it? Yes. But the bottom line is that if it's interesting and people want it, they will pay for it.

And honestly, i feel that trying to play around with RMT now after the majority of people that are left are people that have invested a lot of time and money over the years is a death wish. Unless that's the plan, I'd focus on what's not retaining players instead of what they can and can't trade.

 

"Lets cannibalize the people who stuck with us through the hard times."

Seems like a good plan, right?

 

Am not personally a fan of RMT though am not naive to think it doesn't exist in many games other than SOTA.

That said I certainly agree that as usual the Devs are barking up the wrong tree here. What has left the game in its current state are the many flaws and omissions within the game itself which never get fixed or added while what's left of the Dev team plough on along the same failed priorities and design decisions.

Fix the game and then if you must look into RMT but just FIX THE DAMN GAME.

 

It's possible it's a mistake, but he specifically mentioned increasing things like heritage items going forward and getting rid of RMT over the long term. I think this specific issue (bug or not) has brought out a negative response.

 

I agree. No no trade stuff for the sub please. That's all there is to say in this topic. Just don't do stuff like that Port. Thanks for your understanding.

 

I do agree with what you are saying
But to mark things mentioned in this thread now tradeable doesn't seem to be a huge thing to do and imo it should be done immediately so we can move on because as you mentioned and I will every chance I get this game is suffering from lack of focus on the systems in this game. It drives me crazy about how much distracted focus has gone into making this game. Refusal to improve the core systems of this game has been the biggest killer.

As I say it's not about content as much as the quality, the depth, and details of the core systems of this game. Starting out mistakes were made. One in particular is leaving out an achievement system. To go in to add this now is major. The game has to track and react to a players progress. They can't just add this now as I've been told. It is really major to do.

So it is missing very much to not have this crucial aspect in the game. It shows progress for every single thing we do and also rewards.

Also not having a raid system and daily things to do gives a huge missing in the amount of options for players that we don't have.

Such missing and so sad too. I am sad about it. Many core systems such as cooking, brewing, fishing in the game with lack of details they should have had.

Ok we just keep hoping and for how many more years and then we get another system that has the same thing happen to it?

Will it be mounts, treasure hunting, boating, or what? Will they be Complete systems with lots of interesting fun features full of details. Also will scenes of the game become rich with lore, quests and more reasons to visit them ? anyway I could go on and on in my soapbox but I'll stop for now.

 

RMT topic aside I as well can't trade this stuff for IGG. And that is a major dealbreaker for me. I want to be able to trade EVERYTHING for IGG. That's part of it if you want a vibrant economy.