POE 2 early access paywall

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MorsExTenebris#3427 wrote:

Quite a few people here tend to get hung up about certain dollar figures and their appropriateness, however the amounts are irrelevant. Whether the beta entrance fee is $30 or $3 or 3 cents it still doesn't make sense in principle.

Guys, it's very simple: a free-to-play game should have a free public beta.

And probably will have AFTER EA. Just like PoE had in past.

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de99ial#0161 wrote:

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MorsExTenebris#3427 wrote:

Quite a few people here tend to get hung up about certain dollar figures and their appropriateness, however the amounts are irrelevant. Whether the beta entrance fee is $30 or $3 or 3 cents it still doesn't make sense in principle.

Guys, it's very simple: a free-to-play game should have a free public beta.

And probably will have AFTER EA. Just like PoE had in past.

+1

What better way is there to truly test the serverS?

Would you rather them just charge 70$ for the game? It’s in a better state than any other arpg it seems so let’s just be happy it’s open and not a closed beta. They’ve always done this and looking at the work they’ve put in, they deserve to get paid for it. 30$ is nothing, other games charge that for a horse.

OP rather pay 70$ for base game with no endgame content and anotjher 40$ for extra class with once again no new endgame content but paying 30$ where is far more content than triple AAA games is not fine OP trolling

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driza#4601 wrote:

Would you rather them just charge 70$ for the game?

They already charge more than that for those "combined" sets, lmao. They are almost $90. Pandemonium set literally costs 840 points, or $84.

I've probably spent north of maybe 7k Euros since 2013, across 3 different accounts, so it's not a matter of me being greedy or something.

What is really questionable, however, is when people are STILL defending this kind of pricing system and then get mad when we question whether $30 access for an unfinished campaign, for an otherwise free to play game with predatory pricing, is maybe not a good thing in the first place.

$30 access isn't the issue here. It's the context surrounding it that makes it an issue. I paid the $30 for the first Early Access release for 3.0, I think it was, which was still stupid in hindsight.

People in the past would be citing WoW's monthly fee of $12.99 as a barrier of entry, yet if you do the math and divide your precious little Supporter Packs over a year, you are spending way more than that per month. Which is the entire point of the free to play model, and why it's so predatory.

A single $60 Supporter Pack translates into $5 per month, but if you buy them 4x a year, you are paying $20 a month, and that's not even accounting for all the other MTX you buy, let alone those other tiers. I bought the $240 in January or something, so that's so far $24 a month just for the pack, but I've purchased other stuff since. I'm not delusional about it, just providing numbers. It's a hobby, but a fucking expensive one by comparison.

For reference, WoW's most expensive pet costs $90 at time of writing, while PoE's most expensive pet is the Lightning Scorpion, for a whopping 1100 points, or $110.

Then you have this other major issue, where buying a weapon skin for 1H weapons requires you to buy 2 of them for dual wielding, turning a $24 weapon skin into $48. But oh, what's that? Right, you also need to buy the weapon effect twice, so that's another $48. Oh, and you don't like the ugly aura buffs of your character? Pay $5 EACH to turn them off.

Don't get me wrong, I love this game and I love the MTX, but the pricing is absolutely ludicrous and predatory in every way. The whole pricing structure with points is set up in a way where you need to buy more points if you want to buy something else, because you'd be like 5-20 points short each time. THAT'S HOW IT WORKS.

The fact that GGG is making annual profits north of $40M should tell you something.

Edit: Small correction on the last statement. These numbers are a little outdated now. They have dropped in profit in 2023. I can see no 2024 report as of yet.

I doubt this game would exist if they weren’t making money to pay all the artists and developers. I personally have zero problem paying the artists alone for all of this content. They’re massive to whatever pops into my dreams at night haha. I just watched gladiator 2 and thought it felt very close to poes landscape of design.

Oh, yes, an early access fee - nay, PAYWALL - of $30. How dastardly of GGG.

How dare they ask us for our hard-earned money to play the early access sequel to a game that most of us spent a measly few thousand hours in.

A game from which all of our previous purchases, cosmetic and functional, is automatically transferred to the new one. Sick, corporate dogs!

If you can't scrape together $30 for this, it's time to look at your life and choices and get your s**t together. And don't you dare come at me with 3rd world/cost of living issues, I live in a 3rd world cesspool myself, and if you're even able to post on this forum and have the opportunity to play this game, you have nothing to complain about.

These threads are so unnecessary .. Blizzard released an unfinished product for literally 100$ and are asking 40$ for a lackluster expansion, meanwhile GGG gave you 10 years of content for free and all they ask for is 30$ to play their new game early, or wait until full release to be free? AND you also get 300 shop points which you eventually want anyway for stash tabs? Like some people are so spoilt its unbelievable.

They put in 1000s of hours of work into this, they have one of the best track records of delivering fun, high quality content. What other gaming company releases products of this quality for only 30$ and make them free afterwards? And people still complain

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AkaAka#0083 wrote:

meanwhile GGG gave you 10 years of content for free

It's not free, lmao. No company operates on content for free, and nobody would work for free. It's baffling how many people still do not understand how free to play works. Even other "free" stuff you consume, i.e. YouTube content, is backed up by sponsors in some shape or form. It's not free, it never was, and it never will be.

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MorsExTenebris#3427 wrote:

POE 2 will be a free-to-play game at launch.

But you want to charge us for beta-testing your product during early access?..

Did you guys think this through?

Did you think this post through?

Don't buy it, your problem is solved.

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BaumisMagicalWorld#0673 wrote:

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AkaAka#0083 wrote:

meanwhile GGG gave you 10 years of content for free

It's not free, lmao. No company operates on content for free, and nobody would work for free. It's baffling how many people still do not understand how free to play works. Even other "free" stuff you consume, i.e. YouTube content, is backed up by sponsors in some shape or form. It's not free, it never was, and it never will be.

It is absolutely possible to play PoE for free, entirely, without caveat. Not a single part of PoE required you to engage with money, sponsorship, advertising, or any other form of consumer monetisation to play. The vast majority of people choose to pay something to enhance that experience somehow, but unlike nearly every other free to play game, PoE used the original model, where they make an actual good game and people buy things because they like the game.

GGG isn't working for nothing, but everyone who pays them money does so by choice, not because it's necessary to play any part of the game.