Aria Jenneth
Caldari
Kumiho's Smile
Naraka.
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Posted - 2011.06.24 09:05:00 -
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CCP, the way of the future, micro/macro-transactions may be, but your leaked newsletter is dead freaking on when it says that gameplay-affecting transactions are controversial.
Part of what you sell in Eve is another world, another realm of experience, and it grates on the nerves that, beyond the entry cost of the subscription fee, the economic advantages of one player over another that are present in this world should transfer over to that one.
PLEX is a necessary evil in this, and an "evil" it certainly is. The last thing I, and, I suspect, most players in Eve (competitive game that it is) want, is for the wealthy to be able to turn that little 5% advantage that so often spells the difference between victory and defeat, just by throwing their real-life money at the problem.
I would not play with a chess set that let my opponent "buy" me a penalty, and Eve is much closer in spirit to chess than it is to World of Warcraft.
It's quite true that Eve is unique, and that many of those of us leaving over this will find we have nowhere else to go. That uniqueness makes it more important, not less, that you pay attention to the seriousness of this issue.
I do not find it particularly offensive that you regard me as a source of revenue. That's just how a corporation thinks. But you should pay attention to how your plans will poison your creation; THAT is why we are so opposed to it.
You are unique. What makes you unique is your dedication to a highly-competitive, cutthroat in-game culture. The reason we are generally such fans of this competitive culture is because it is not too-clearly slanted in favor of some players over others.
Giving advantage to one over the other, even slight advantage, is loading the goddamn dice. Think back to the "t2" fiasco a few years back, wherein one of your devs bestowed a couple contraband tech-2 blueprint originals on BoB. Not a big advantage, perhaps, in the scheme of things, but we sure as hell cared, and we sure as hell didn't like it. It was cheating, and not just because it violated your own rules.
Do you seriously think we would have been any happier if BoB had bought that advantage from you?
Even if it is, to some degree, an illusion, leave us at least the sense that player wealth doesn't matter in any substantive way.
CCP has long struck me as the type of company to laugh at popular wisdom among its peers. Didn't one of your people say it during the tournament-- "They already think we're crazy?"
Prove it. Keep real money out of Eve. Keep it out of DUST. Keep it out of WoD. Keep your worlds as pure as you can, even as everybody else is going "freemium."
We'll pay for that courtesy, because it, too, will be unique.
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