I was thinking about it the other day, and Elite Dangerous was the first game in which I ever noticed the "microtransaction heII" phenomenon. Admittedly, I don't play a whole wide variety of different games or a lot of multiplayer games.
But I distinctly remember when FDEV rolled out their (hilariously named) digital ARX currency. And yeah, I've bought some stuff with real money...
I do like the ability to earn ARX while playing the game. But we need to talk about some things...
- ARX store is a great way for FDEV to passively make money but it's underutilized. With some balancing, it could be a great thing for players and for FDEV to make more money.
- Having time limited stuff just makes no sense, as there are things players would like to buy but forget about or miss while they are taking a hiatus. ARX store items should be always available, but maybe with seasonal/holiday special pricing. But players should always be able to buy what they want, unless it's a limited edition for some very, very special reason.
- The pricing of ARX store items is ridiculous. FDEV simply hasn't optimized the equations on this. There are two philosophies (probably more) when selling a product; sell it very expensively to the very few who will buy it (FDEV's current model) or sell it reasonably to many more people who will buy it at that price. You've got to find the sweet spot to optimize earnings. FDEV's pricing is currently outrageous. Has anyone calculated how much it would cost to buy all ARX store items? I bet it's (heh heh) astronomical. I'm sure some will say that's okay because Star Scamizen does it. Well.... whatever
- FDEV should consider offering more ARX store items. I think many ED players would like to see camouflage paints and dazzle paints that are inspired by modern military craft. I think just that arena alone opens up probably hundreds of styles of digicam, etc. Another vein of paint styles would be styles inspired by muscle/performance cars. I'd love to see more mirrored/metallic/candy finishes for some of the luxury/performance ships. And of course, I think there could be more ship kit items as well. Players love this stuff... if it's quality and if it's priced affordably.
- I'd love to see more paints that you just get as a reasonably priced pack for all your ships or bundled for a lot of ships that it fits. That makes a lot more sense to me than buying paints one by one per ship. Maybe that's just me.
o7
Fly economically