MMORPG.com's Jon Wood uses his column this week to look at the recent announcement that Blizzard will be offering in-game pets for real life money and the fan reaction, or over-reaction to the news.

Yesterday, Blizzard announced that they would be adding an in-game shop where players could buy vanity pets, and in characteristic fashion, the MMO world went bat dung crazy. Even my Facebook, which is loaded with MMO folks, was taken over by posts about Blizzard moving to microtransactions.

I swear, the way people react to these things you'd think that item stores were Godzilla and Western players were the poor residents of Tokyo just trying to get away from the damned thing, wrecking everything they know and eating everyone they love.

For the record, they're not, but we'll leave my personal opinions about item mall based games for another rant entirely. Instead, we'll focus on this particular announcement. Comparing this announcement, by the way, with microtransaction revenue models games, is like comparing apples and zebras. It just doesn't make any sense.

Read Wood: WoW Pets and Boy Who Cried Wolf.

Charging players 2/3s of the monthly sub fee for a single pet is absolutely ridiculous.

I pretty much agree with the article, but zebras > apples.

Blizzard has just crossed a terrible threshold, and has lost a 10+ year fan today.

Vanity is fine. No one cares about your purple tortoise that has 6 legs and a grumpy face. Actually, knowing the WoW community, the people that get them, unless female, will probably be made fun of.

Great article. I agree completely.

I don't understand how people cannot make the distinction between RMT that has absolutely no affect on gameplay and a full-fledged cash shop.

How exactly is a dancing panda going to affect anyone's gaming experience or imbalance ANYTHING? The answer is: It won't. Not one bit.

And the argument that Blizzard's donations to charity are a smokescreen is completely ridiculous. Many old-school MMO gamers are just so anti-WoW that they are constantly looking for something, anything, to complain about related to it. They just can't stand the idea that WoW is so unbelievably successful while their favorite game of choice fails. And it REALLY pisses them off that Blizzard might actually *gasp* be doing something GOOD in the process.

It is a microtransaction. This is a single zebra for sale at an orange stand to use your metaphor. Your article aims to remove the tag because it's not 'required' in game. Well guess what, every part of a game is not required either.  Blizzard has been slowly introducing more micro-transactions into it's game, and I'm happy to see it's customers telling them what they think of it.

Wow Jon, good job at bringing up points such as how this affects the MMO industry as a whole, or how this decision may be just a way to slowly soften people up so that, in a few years, they can start selling other things like increases to stats or XP or weapons.

On the other side, good job bringing up how this is a great, easy way to get gifts for family/friends that involves the games they play but doesn't involve buying them a new mouse. Or what about the new pet buying system... how it works, how it plays into the recent account mergers. Or how it's a great way for people to meet achievements without shelling out lots of gold on other vanity pets, thus tempting them to the dark side of gold buying?

But no. Instead you spent all that time going "STOP QQING!" by... QQing. No insight into the industry aside from "the more you yell, the less they'll listen to you" (which is only true of companies that honestly don't care about their playerbase). Not actually adding anything to the massive 200+ string. Instead, it was a giant nerdrage where you're right and they're wrong and those against this should shut up.

 There is certainly an element to hysteria to the reaction to the Real Money Pets, but you can't dismiss the concern that this could easily grown into a something less benign.

  Blizzard had to invest in the infrastructure to support the buying of Vanity pets and it would be foolish not to expand it to sell other things and maybe even things to make your character more powerful.

And History has show that in previous experiments like ,SOE did with Everquest 2, it didn't take long to offer things like Xp bonues and such that had a direct impact on the power level of characters in their game.

The Blogger can poke fun all he wants,  but I hope he has the courage to follow up his dismissal with and apology and rant if Blizzard pollutes WOW with microtransactions.

This is designed as way to get people used to RMT , while i m not against them donating to charity in fact i m all for , what they are doing is plainly sugar coating the pill . Its a PR stunt plain and simple .

Not so much the boy who cried wolf but the wolf in sheeps cloathing .

Its a slippery slope and one i myself forcast would happen starting with pets .

Originally posted by rutaq

 There is certainly an element to hysteria to the reaction to the Real Money Pets, but you can't dismiss the concern that this could easily grown into a something less benign.

  Blizzard had to invest in the infrastructure to support the buying of Vanity pets and it would be foolish not to expand it to sell other things and maybe even things to make your character more powerful.

 

And History has show that in previous experiments like ,SOE did with Everquest 2, it didn't take long to offer things like Xp bonues and such that had a direct impact on the power level of characters in their game.

 

The Blogger can poke fun all he wants,  but I hope he has the courage to follow up his dismissal with and apology and rant if Blizzard pollutes WOW with microtransactions.

Yeah, you are too correct. It's the infrastructure and time they spent putting it together that makes you wonder. However, if they can make a profit off of vanity items by putting in the development time, then they should do it. It's really a win win since people get happy when they buy a pet and blizzard gets money.

It might seem like a slippery slope, but I think they can make a huge profit on purely vanity items. They have a big enough subscriber base to make development time worth it just to provide vanity items.

It seems a cash shop is becoming a neccessary evil in MMOs. Dunno if the money really goes into developing the game itself. Well, I should start studying the companys' annual reports. ,)

It would have been possible to introduce a means so players could craft" cosmetic items" for themselves or/and others. Simply by including a editor to make/change the design on your own, without changing item stats.
Or introducing taming skills so players could tame wild animals and train the animals to be used as mounts.

As an "old-school CRPG" player I don't really care about the cash shops. But it just leaves a stale aftertaste.

Originally posted by Euphoryk

Charging players 2/3s of the monthly sub fee for a single pet is absolutely ridiculous.

Then don't buy it.

Originally posted by colddog

Yeah, you are too correct. It's the infrastructure and time they spent putting it together that makes you wonder. However, if they can make a profit off of vanity items by putting in the development time, then they should do it. It's really a win win since people get happy when they buy a pet and blizzard gets money.

It might seem like a slippery slope, but I think they can make a huge profit on purely vanity items. They have a big enough subscriber base to make development time worth it just to provide vanity items.

I would really love to believe this, but I sadly know what happens when marketing/sales is given even the smallest amount of control. They don't care about the people, only about the numbers, and if the numbers show strongly for pets, they will push and push and push until those at the top tell those who are fighting to keep a little bit of morale for the players to shut up or go find a new job.

As another player pointed out, SOE did the exact same thing... slip the frog into the pot and slowly bring it to a boil.

Originally posted by streea

But no. Instead you spent all that time going "STOP QQING!" by... QQing. No insight into the industry aside from "the more you yell, the less they'll listen to you" (which is only true of companies that honestly don't care about their playerbase). Not actually adding anything to the massive 200+ string. Instead, it was a giant nerdrage where you're right and they're wrong and those against this should shut up.

Welcome to the world of columns and opinion pieces.

And for the record, the entire article revolves around the encroachment of a different revenue model into the Western MMO market, and how in some cases people over-react to them. This over-reaction to harmless additions is indeed making it easier and easier for those powers that be to ignore the voices of their players. This, in turn, will make it easier for companies to get away with less scrupulous behavior. Who's going to listen to the boy who cried wolf when a wolf actually appears if they've pointed at every house dog that's walked by and screamed bloody murder?

But yeah, it was probably just an un-thought out nerdrage.

Originally posted by Stradden

Originally posted by streea

But no. Instead you spent all that time going "STOP QQING!" by... QQing. No insight into the industry aside from "the more you yell, the less they'll listen to you" (which is only true of companies that honestly don't care about their playerbase). Not actually adding anything to the massive 200+ string. Instead, it was a giant nerdrage where you're right and they're wrong and those against this should shut up.

Welcome to the world of columns and opinion pieces.

And for the record, the entire article revolves around the encroachment of a different revenue model into the Western MMO market, and how in some cases people over-react to them. This over-reaction to harmless additions is indeed making it easier and easier for those powers that be to ignore the voices of their players. This, in turn, will make it easier for companies to get away with less scrupulous behavior. Who's going to listen to the boy who cried wolf when a wolf actually appears if they've pointed at every house dog that's walked by and screamed bloody murder?

But yeah, it was probably just an un-thought out nerdrage.

 

Whenever I see a blue post, I feel like I just saw a deer. :'D

If the game companies don't listen to the voices of the boys crying wolf, the boys will take their subscription elsewhere - regardless of whether there really is a wolf there or not.

I really don't like item malls if the items purchased in them give advantages in the game.  If they want to charge real life money for fluff items that don't really do anything, I don't really think it's a cause for getting upset.  If they cross the line though down the road, I think people would be justified in being upset.

This column never happened. What did you just do to the conspirator theorists that claim that mmorpg.com is on an anti-Blizzard agenda? What would these poor souls do now?

Actually, I am not aware of a single game that has yet REQUIRED you to buy something to advance in the game off their cash-shop. Sure, many things make it MUCH easier, make your character much more powerful or add a whole new dimension, but they are not REQUIRED.

That is going to be the basic argument for anyone defending their favorite company using double-dip revenue models. So, if Cataclysm (the next WoW expansion) should, just hypothetically, increase the time to level from 80-85 to a whooping 300 hours, but allow you to buy a potion which cuts it to 30 hours, you will still have plenty of reason to claim its not REQUIRED. Its merely a perk.

Of course, that would mean that no game has a real cash shop, which obviously isnt true, thus we get to the problem of where to draw the line and differentiate between cash-shops in the regular sense, and just costly added service in the Blizzard sense.

Which is really why this outrage happened: For a lot of people, that line has been crossed. And that line is completely subjective, anywhere between "you may not be able to invest more than 15 dollar a month into the game" to "if its not absolutely required to log in your char, its not a micro-transaction based model".

Personally, I dont consider this latest move a surprise, nor do I consider it a real cash shop yet. Blizzard is doing it in increments, and so far, they are approaching but have not crossed my line of tolerance. Ultimately, the goal would be to stop JUST short of the point where a sizeable portion of your playerbase leaves, thus making you lose more money than you gain. Its, for example, quite possible that Blizzard can afford losing half their playerbase, if the other half uses their cash shop enough.

In the end, by the time WOW2, or whatever the next game of theirs is going to be, comes around we will have been slowly convinced of the normality of monthly fee + service extra cost + cash shop + expansions, and thus will be paying a LOT more to play these games at the relative level that we are now.

And know what?  I think overall, that may be a good thing. If MMOs stop being such a ridiculously cheap pasttime, maybe the struggling markets of other hobbies, esp. offline, who noticed a serious dent in the available free time (and thus willingness to buy) of many of their customers since WOWs release, will get going a bit again.One thing is for certain though, and I am absolutely serious: The time of being a fully capable, equal player of modern MMOs with just your monthly fee is coming to an end.

oh please are the WoW players so daft that they are only NOW noticing the RTM shop.

1 word

/pizza

Originally posted by rutaq 

And History has show that in previous experiments like ,SOE did with Everquest 2, it didn't take long to offer things like Xp bonues and such that had a direct impact on the power level of characters in their game.

 

It has also shown that when SOE did that, rational people who did not like this change, quit paying for the game.

Should Blizzard ever cross the line into non-trivial RMT then I will probably quit the game.  Until then I am not gonna commit the fallancy of a slippery slope.  A slippery slope only applies when you cross the line from good to bad.  A good or neutral change that in some future scenario might lead to bad things should be considered on its own merits.

Originally posted by Euphoryk

Charging players 2/3s of the monthly sub fee for a single pet is absolutely ridiculous.

I know, because the pet only lasts for a month!

oh, wait....

As with many things in the world, the truth in the argument falls somewhere in the middle.

Two vanity pets for $10 each does not spell doom for World of Warcraft or necessarily indicate that Blizzard has immediate plans to put Legendary Instant Win Trinkets on the store. The pets that they are selling have no impact on gameplay at all, and based on Blizzard's track record, I really don't think they'd put any items on the store that affect gameplay. Someone said that this is the first step to turning WoW into a F2P/Item Mall game, but the subscription model has been and is still working so well for them, I seriously doubt there's any possibility of this for many many years.

On the other hand, this is the first time Blizzard has put an in-game item up for sale directly from their store, and that warrants some scrutiny. It is possible that they're testing out the functionality and the reaction of players with the idea of expanding the store to other things such as mounts and who knows what else. Also, some players like to try to collect all of the vanity pets in the game, and this forces those players to pay out an extra $20 to complete the collection, which isn't very nice.

So I think it's worth discussing and posting to forums with a sort of mild warning to Blizzard to not get any wild ideas about their store, but everyone should also try to keep a level head and not jump to huge conclusions based on these two silly little pets.

Originally posted by Khaunshar

Actually, I am not aware of a single game that has yet REQUIRED you to buy something to advance in the game off their cash-shop. Sure, many things make it MUCH easier, make your character much more powerful or add a whole new dimension, but they are not REQUIRED.

That is going to be the basic argument for anyone defending their favorite company using double-dip revenue models. So, if Cataclysm (the next WoW expansion) should, just hypothetically, increase the time to level from 80-85 to a whooping 300 hours, but allow you to buy a potion which cuts it to 30 hours, you will still have plenty of reason to claim its not REQUIRED. Its merely a perk.

I think that might be a bit of a superficial argument, at best. I'm sorry, but there is a clear distinction between something that helps you in-game and something that simply provides aesthetic value.

In the case of your above example, people probably should complain... and loudly. That was the entire point of the article. If everyone screams at the top of their lungs over aesthetic sale items, it makes it less likely that anyone, game company or casual MMOer who doesn't frequent forums, is going to pay any attention if and when a company double dips in the way that you suggest above.

Look, I'm not giving Blizzard or any other company a free pass to screw people over, or to compromise the integrity of the subscription system in their game. I'm simply saying that context is very very important in this case.