New World Addresses Cash Shop Concerns, Stresses Launch Shop Will Only Have Cosmetics, States AGS Is

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New World Addresses Cash Shop Concerns, Stresses Launch Shop Will Only Have Cosmetics, States AGS Is Looking At A Battle Pass-Style System | MMORPG.com

New World's cash shop is still a concern for players who were hoping for a shopless MMO to hit the market. The team at Amazon Game Studios released a statement Friday evening addressing the concerns as well as broadening on their plans for microtransactions in New World.

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Slapshot1188

First it was B2P.
Then it was B2P + Cash Shop
Now it's B2P + Cash Shop + Battlepass

Didn't even launch yet. This is just the ice breaker.

Dhampir

no different than eso in game store.

Doesnt bother me.

But a battle pass??

dont really see the need if you have a store.

Celcius

Even mentioning a battlepass is a deal breaker for me

BruceYee

They step in it with one foot then decide that whatever they stepped in smells pretty good so step in it with the other foot too..

Did that NDA breaker go into hiding yet? cause of them + what KiraTV said seems to have completely shattered whatever tiny sliver of reality/sense AGS had in their possession..

Saying you won't have one thing gamers dislike but then immediately announce that you plan to add something else they don't like isn't exactly the best PR strategy IMO...

RexKushman

Sounds good. Since I get the game for free this seems like a great way to kick in a few bucks towards the future development of the game, contingent on me actually enjoying the game of course.  I don't have any issues with cash shops or battle passes. 

foppotee

I'm ignorant of the appeal, by concept & practice, of cash shops in games during testing phases. If whatever is bought in the cash shop during testing remains applied to the account then that makes a bit more sense. To me having a cash shop seems like a cash grab before the game is even properly completed &/or released. A bit of the cart before the horse, but for most games it seems to be the trend nowadays.

Iselin

foppotee said:

I'm ignorant of the appeal, by concept & practice, of cash shops in games during testing phases. If whatever is bought in the cash shop during testing remains applied to the account then that makes a bit more sense. To me having a cash shop seems like a cash grab before the game is even properly completed &/or released. A bit of the cart before the horse, but for most games it seems to be the trend nowadays.

No. There's a full wipe of test servers so nothing that happens there carries over to the live servers. It's a real test not what Cryptic and New World call beta but isn't.

Players in the test don't use their own money to buy things in the cash shop. They give testers the currency to test the shop.

Kumapon

I am really confused as to why Amazon are in such a rush to get people to play end game. If anything in an MMO, you want to draw out the leveling as long as possible. Players will devour your end game faster than you can ever make it and get bored.

Casuals are your bread and butter, as they slowly progress and do content at a glacial place compared to the min/maxer. You don't want them going faster.

Its more laughable they think its the casual player with little time that will pay for the majority of any kind of exp boost. Its the hardcore that will devour it to get everything done asap. The casual guy playing maybe 5-10 hours a week doesn't care and is just trotting along at his own pace.

Also it should be something for months if not years down the line, as others have said. This just makes it seem like they have no confidence they will be around then, so they want to get as much influx of cash as possible right away.

Like I said before, I have a feeling Lost Ark will be the amazon game I am playing(they are publishing) in the end, instead of this.

kilun

Kumapon said:

I am really confused as to why Amazon are in such a rush to get people to play end game. If anything in an MMO, you want to draw out the leveling as long as possible. Players will devour your end game faster than you can ever make it and get bored.

Casuals are your bread and butter, as they slowly progress and do content at a glacial place compared to the min/maxer. You don't want them going faster.

Its more laughable they think its the casual player with little time that will pay for the majority of any kind of exp boost. Its the hardcore that will devour it to get everything done asap. The casual guy playing maybe 5-10 hours a week doesn't care and is just trotting along at his own pace.

Also it should be something for months if not years down the line, as others have said. This just makes it seem like they have no confidence they will be around then, so they want to get as much influx of cash as possible right away.

Like I said before, I have a feeling Lost Ark will be the amazon game I am playing(they are publishing) in the end, instead of this.

Casuals maybe the bread and butter, but they still want end-game goods. This is super evident by WOWs success in making endgame viable for all players. Gone are the days of players exploring.

Us old-school players who like to enjoy the game and the journey are not the target audience of an MMO anymore, hell even games in general unless those games are single player in nature.

Albatroes

Its really amazing that something can fall off of my grind by mentioning certain words, like boosts and battle-passes before something even releases. You continue to impress me Amazon. BRB before the knights in white start attacking, saying "YOU GUYS JUST WANT EVERYTHING FOR FREE DON'T YOU?!?!?" "THEY SAID ITS JUST GOING TO BE A COSMETIC ONLY CASH SHOP!!!" "BATTLE PASSES AREN'T A BIG DEAL, MANY GAMES HAVE THEM NOW!!!!"

Kratier

eh, as b2p its forgivable, i plan to buy this game 1x and have it forever and never pay monthly fees or anything mandatory, like ffxiv where you need to pay 15 bucks just to boot up the game and play

everyone acting like they have other options when literally nothing else coming out for years
I will give it a chance

Hefaistos

Nilden

Same old song and dance...

Kyleran

I lost interest when they mentioned driving players towards their exciting "end game" content, definitely was hoping for a more interesting design than "same old, same old."

Wizardry

He can say whatever he wants,it is a cash shop and once it is in it gets more volatile over time.

How about you get nothing for your greed.
Sometimes i will buy a game that is half assed "see Valheim/Atlas so long as there is no cash shop.I'll pay for what i get and try and enjoy the game as long as possible.

However with a cash shop there is NO WAY you'll get a single dime.

Cosmetics is a nice term for devs to use but what they are really doing is ripping out assets from the game to sell them,so it like saying here is 90% of the game,you can't have the WHOLE game unless you pay another 200+ dollars to get everything in the cash shop.

Later on boosts +++ and then after that +++ more more >>GREEDY SOB's.

Kyleran

Kratier said:

eh, as b2p its forgivable, i plan to buy this game 1x and have it forever and never pay monthly fees or anything mandatory, like ffxiv where you need to pay 15 bucks just to boot up the game and play

everyone acting like they have other options when literally nothing else coming out for years
I will give it a chance

Stockholm Syndrome is a real thing I guess. 

Tiller

Battle pass? It's almost like they have never build an mmo before. xD

theGnade

This is going to be really big turn off. It is not like it wasn't already bad. The game was in bad shape and now it got even worse. Simple minded people be like "It is just cosmetics, no harm made". In reality it is not like that. The problem is that game directors rather let designer design good stuff to shop than to game. Look at Fallout 76- Instead of making great content that would reward you cool looking armor. They make no content and just put armor to shop. For them it is win-win situation. They don't have to make content and they get money. And now Fallout 76 whole endgame isn't about beating challenging dungeons/raid/bosses, instead you do boring daily quests that rewards you premium currency so that you can buy the skins. Fallout 76 isn't only one. Old games like WoW are suffering from it too. WoW doesn't have massive cash shop, but everytime cash shop get items it actually unique mount. Meanwhile game get just reskinned/textured mounts.
I'd say if Amazon wants to add cash shop then they actually should prove that their game is actually so good that it deserves extra reward from players. I don't mind tipping extra into game that is actually good, but look what New World was and seen so far what they have added, I am fairly sure they don't deserve extra money and I am in doubts that they even deserve the price tag that game has.

Iselin

Tiller said:

Battle pass? It's almost like they have never build an mmo before. xD

Exactly. Many things in this game scream amateur hour.

MaxBacon

Well they are saying what they are planning to do ahead of time, unlike most MMOs that hide specifics of monetization after people start playing sometime past a launch.

A Pass does work on an MMO that plans stuff like expansions at least, ESO does it but behind its subscription instead. As for cash-store-like drops included in a pass... Depends on specifics of what.

If New World goes more into this monetization like a pass and expansions, then I think they might end up rethinking the entry cost, would doubt going back to F2P but something more on the lines of being a cheap entry.

btw if you did sign up on the waiting list on the game's amazon list early on, you're set to get it for free anyway.


In short, if you still stuck on the view that an MMO is a race to the end-game to get triggered that others can buy in stuff like boosts to speed up what otherwise you get as well with time investment, it's a rather pointless waste of energy. If the game rewards your time investment to start with, and those low on time investment fall more to the monetized alternative, its a balance that works because it broadens its inclusivity.

Scot

"Looking towards the future, we will also test ideas on how to offer players quality of life items for mechanics like rested XP and fast travel, both obtainable in-game and purchaseable in the store. "

So despite the attempt at calming concerns, there is little change. The cash shop will start cosmetic and within a year become somewhat P2W. I have changed my guesstimate from two to one year based on the fact they are talking about putting in such items after launch way before launch even happens.

Also this is the second misspelling I have seen in two articles from them, do they spell purchasable "purchaseable" in the US?

Scot

Dhampir said:

no different than eso in game store.

Doesnt bother me.

But a battle pass??

dont really see the need if you have a store.

The difference is ESO did not start with a "store". The way a MMO launches in regards to its cash shop tells you a lot about how quickly it will go P2W. I base this on seeing so many of these launches; the more of an up and running cash shop at launch you have and the prevalence of any P2W items tells you how abusive the cash shop will be. On that basis PW will be somewhat P2W by a year after launch and fully P2W a year after that.

Mensur

Yeah.. not buying a Word of what he is saying

Gobstopper3D

I have zero interest in this, but "all store items at launch" sounds like they are leaving wiggle room for adding things that won't be so popular after launch. I understand they already mentioned that, but this sends up red flags.

cheyane

This is a PvP game so they will add stuff that PvPers who want to get ahead will buy to make them money. They will buy it and Amazon will make money. There is nothing else for all these PvPers to play so they will buy the game. It will do well. Good for them I guess. They must have hired a team to check other games and see what they sell and what players accept.

People who are upset about this will not buy but they will market and spend enough to attract players who will think this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Glad I won't play this game because it never interested me in the least. The action combat is too hard for me to play. I suppose being old and less spry has its advantages.