Yeah this ^^
Request: Cobra Wireframe Paintjob another sell window ?
- Thread starter Systrom
- Start date
Yeah this ^^
Since when did that stop them?
Not like it would be the first time they put a limited skin for sale again either.
Aha! Yes, as you say, "life happens" and if you're doled a dud deck, that not everyone else's problem is it? I'm alright, as i've still got mine. Not just the Model B cassette version, but also the 5.25" disc. With manuals, keyboard overlay and boxed. Plus my original save files, too!
The fact is, mine simply weren't destroyed in a flood, and yours were. For all we know, it was an act of God, and you were living in sin at the time, in which case, being holier than thou, i'm more deserving of a wireframe paintjob. Probably. Either way, why should the rest of us suffer just because yours was in the wrong place at the wrong time? It's just the luck of the draw, right?
LOL so commemorating the anniversary of the M128 version with a cyan wireframe will destroy the company? Sounds like whatever you've done in the past, God's back on your side eh?
Why should they apologise when it was a blatant marketing ploy anyway, coupled as it was with the in-game Cobra discount? They were after a short term cash-in, but messed up by selling an asset that would have broad and long term appeal as part of a short-term promotion.
Elite was on sale for more than 10 days in 1984. Hell, i began playing the cassette version, and didn't buy the disc version until '87 IIRC.
10 days just seems an arbitrarily short anniversary, considering. It's still 2014, the 20th anniversary year. Why not limit the edition to a reasonable corresponding period? Will you feel cheated for buying it earlier than you'd otherwise have needed to? Will FD lose more credibility by denying it to genuine old timers while selling it to fakers, than by extending the anniversary celebrations?
How would a Master 128 skinset devalue the plain white Model B skin? And what if a mod becomes available to switch the view to wireframe anyway - a kind of 'retro view' mod that makes everything look oldskool anyway?
Sorry but none of your arguments pan out - just seems like a bunch of excuses to rationalise an entitlement while denying it to anyone else..
MorkFromOrk
Banned
Since it was just a blatant marketing ploy, in your mind that would justify them ignoring the limited availability promise so that they could do another blatant marketing ploy? Just wondering if you allow blatant marketing ploys as long as you get what you want.
It's Monday, no changes to the store.
It's a shame though. I mean you're offering paint jobs for a fee that are limited, which means there will be thousands of players out there who won't get the opportunity to own them.
If you want rarity I would suggest making them rare in-game rewards and then implementing a player trading system so players can exchange these items for real $, like you can with Team Fortress hats. You don't put them in the shop, you put them in game then take a cut when they're traded.
Personally I want a Union Jack paint job for all of my ships. Or even better an England flag even though I don't drive a white van.
If you want rarity I would suggest making them rare in-game rewards and then implementing a player trading system so players can exchange these items for real $, like you can with Team Fortress hats. You don't put them in the shop, you put them in game then take a cut when they're traded.
Personally I want a Union Jack paint job for all of my ships. Or even better an England flag even though I don't drive a white van.
Not luck of the draw, timing and sense. Being in the right place at the right time, and using enough sense to not expect it to be sold after the specified end date. If I'd have missed out, I'd be more upset with myself, and certainly wouldn't whine because of it.
Perhaps not destroy the company, but certainly lose the respect of their valued customers. Besides, it was white on black, not white on any other color that is the trademark symbol.
Face it, you missed out, time to move on and stop whining because your can't get one.
You'll never convince the people who want to feel 'special' that limited does not mean one time only Pyelot - you'll have more success banging your head against the wall. There are those people in this life who will cry over something as silly as an imaginary design on a pixellated ship if they think it threatens their deluded image of being somehow better than everyone else. Sad but true
But that's exactly why I got it, so I could look better than everybody else, isn't that how fashion works. I'm wearing £250 monkey boots today that had a limited production run by a well know designer. They'd be worth less to me if everybody was wearing them. Its is sad but true, but that's the materialistic world we live in. Help me
I love first world problems!
It wasn't a criticism on my part - i'm a dyed-in-the-wool capitalist, not one of your crusty tree-hugging "save the Lavian grub & ban military drives!" crew. But IIRC the consensus at the time was that it was a promotional tie-in with the Cobra discount.
Speaking of which, since then there's been a wipe; anyone who took advantage of the super-special limited one-time-only offer of an anniversary-celebration discount Cobra has lost it and ended up back in a Sidewinder... yet no one's complaining, because it was applied evenly across the board, ie. fairly.
Nobody got to keep a discount Cobra via some pay-to-play exploit, but if they had, others would be unfairly left out.
I'm not gonna lose any sleep over this nor carry on discussing it much further - i hadn't realised there was another thread already on this issue, and only resurrected this one after being unable to find the skin on the online store, since it was the only one that appealed to me. It was clearly a poor choice of exclusive content, but i hold out hope that there might be an M128 skin or a classic HUD mod at some point in the future.. being able to activate a global wire-frame view would provide a nice historic consistency since i always rationalised the 8-bit graphics that way regardless (after all there were no windows or canopies back in the day, so i envisaged the view as being generated by my ship's computer).
At any rate, the reason i didn't take advantage of the Cobra discount is that i've only clocked up a few hours in-game since beta, so had neither the credits nor time to join in the MP campaign that was being orchestrated in conjunction with these skins... and one reason i hadn't clocked up more hours is precisely because of the mounting frustrations each time i tried to play the thing.. of which this is just another.
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+1. Something like this would be far more equitable all round..
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Ah so i'm whiney and insensible. Gotcha.
My loss of respect being clearly less 'valuable' than yours.
Umm cyan on black was the "trademark" M128 "symbol", not cyan on white. But then you'd know that, being the dedicated old-skool scurvy dog that you undoubtedly are, eh.
So a Master 128 cyan-on-black skin wouldn't bother you, since this was my trademark look! In '84 i was playing using the trainer, and didn't start a proper save file until '86. So long as i don't have to wait until 2016 that wouldn't bother me either..
Ah so i'm whiney and insensible. Gotcha.
Didn't get it, jealous, whining about wanting it after it closed, so yes.
I didn't say it, you did.
On paper and the box, white on black, not on the screen of an old computer, besides I had a C64. The trademark symbol for Elite is white on black, not cyan on black.
Actually, I feel it's you who is twisting words. Did they say "1-time limited edition"? If not, how do you know that was their intent? Did it say "30th Anniversary Limited Edition"? Or perhaps "Limited 30th Anniversary Edition"? Did it signify whether the limitation was time, duration of sale, number of times it's available for sale, or a limit on the number of copies that would be sold?
Each of these carry a slightly different meaning, without which "Limited" is a rather vague term. So unless you know it was explicitly stated as jusr a 1-time deal, sooner or later you might be in for a disappointment.
Caveat emptor.
Particularly with this retailer, for whom "clear, unambiguous communication" is just not a strong point.
I am guessing you weren't here towards the end of Alpha. If not, please don't shoot the messenger. FD has a track record of dangling carrots with a "last chance to buy" label. For example...
In Newsletter 20, FD promised 2 things as a reason to opt into the last chance to buy a £100 upgrade to Alpha: 50% off in-game insurance (which we now know is actually worth 25% off, because Betas also got the 1st 25%), and exclusive pre-release access to all Beta builds.
I doubt anyone bought into the early-access spin, but I didn't see any Alpha ever saying they got those pre-release builds, and the timing of releases indicated it didn't happen. But I also didn't see FD officially withdraw the offer, so it was always part of the Alpha deal.
All anyone with such a late buy-in really got was 25% off in-game insurance. If you think your skin was horribly overpriced (and I don't disagree), a 25% discount on in-game insurance seems a huge premium at 10x that price.
So don't be surprised if the Cobra wireframe doesn't get sold again. Neither history nor price support that premise. Looking at the comparative track-record, I think it was significantly underpriced if it was really going to have such exclusivity as a once-only deal.
No... I was not here for Alpha. And no... I wouldn't be surprised to see the Wireframe offered again. The problem is that offering it again devalues it. Yes... Its purely digital so its only value is an emotional one which is precisely why everyone on both sides in this thread is arguing the point. My point is that I paid $15 for it on the basis that FD said they would no longer sell it after the 30th of September. If they do offer it again then those of us who bought it at the 30th anniversary price should get something in return... Like a $15 voucher to purchase additional skins. That costs FD nothing and serves as an apology to those of us who thought it would be a one time deal. Not a perfect solution by any means and whatever FD decides... Either to offer it again or not... Someone is going to feel cheated.
I wouldn't mind seeing it come up once a year to celebrate Elite's anniversary along with some other wire-frame skins. I'd have thought that was exclusive enough, but I can imagine some never wanting to see it for sale again. As the Cobra one was created specifically to mark the 30th anniversary, maybe existing owners could receive an extra special version (such as gold, silver or illuminated lines and/or an exclusive 30th Anniversary decal - This version of the skin + decals would never be available again and subsequent ships could be covered in the same way each 5-10 years, assuming the game's still alive and well).
I quite like the idea that the wire-frame skins would only be released as anniversary celebrations as it makes them feel a bit more special. If we just start seeing a lot of them crop up 'for no reason' I think that'd reduce the appeal and after a while they'd just be regular expensive paints (like the metal ones).
I quite like the idea that the wire-frame skins would only be released as anniversary celebrations as it makes them feel a bit more special. If we just start seeing a lot of them crop up 'for no reason' I think that'd reduce the appeal and after a while they'd just be regular expensive paints (like the metal ones).