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Ugh... overpriced skins


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The problem with charging $25 for a mount skin is:

a.) it's just a skinb.) all the new skins so far are through the gem shopc.) we have five types of mounts that often need to be swapped between.

O'Brien defended this as industry standard, but even if this was a good argument (it isn't), it actually isn't really true. In other games, $25 skins are only released occasionally as premium skins to supplement what can be found in the game, and they are usually entirely new creatures with special effects that can be used exclusively if desired by the player.

I can't help but think things like this drive players away in the long run even if some people are paying for it now. Getting ahead of "it's optional, and they have to make money from somewhere" arguments, yes, and I'm happy to support them by buying things through the gem store (mostly gold and reasonably priced skins), but I think there's a strong argument to be made that they're trying to monetize too many things in too many ways simultaneously, which starts to make the whole game reek of desperate cash grab schemes. IMO, that's not the right way to do things.

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The 1st and only mount 2000 gem skin I reaaaaally want because it's so adorable is that Skimmer one but it has so many problems with it.

  1. The price
  2. Just one skin that looks like that. Would want a Raptor and Griffon of this too.
  3. I saw the Dulfy video... that thing is a block of floating wood. The fins, the tails, everything.. it doesn't move. IT's not flowing or flexible. It's stiff as all hell. Why? For 2000 gems why is it so stiff?

But he's soooo cute. Just look at its face:gtlcuyz.png

You can't not want to cuddle this thing.

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I tend to disagree to an extent. In most games, you get skins for one character only, which also often cost more than 10 EUR/USD, whereas in GW2, you unlock them for the entire account and use them with every character you have. Bearing that in mind, the pricing for armor-skins and costumes is really fair, though I'd agree that mount-skins are too expensive, especially if they're just reskins or retextures. We already had a "premium-costume" with the wedding dress for 1.000 gems. I think, the standalone mount-skins should also cost that much. That would be fair. Packages are fine as they are.

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@"Einlanzer.1627" said:The problem with charging $25 for a mount skin is:

a.) it's just a skinb.) all the new skins so far are through the gem shopc.) we have five types of mounts that often need to be swapped between.

O'Brien defended this as industry standard, but it actually isn't - that was a disingenuous comment. In other games, $25 skins are only released occasionally as premium skins to supplement what can be found in the game, and they are usually entirely new creatures with special effects that can be used exclusively if desired by the player.

a) There are "just skins" in this game that easily beat the $25 mark for gem to gold conversion, some of them came exclusively from the gem store. 2000 gems with in game gold is 528g... no one would even blink if they saw that cost for one of these skins on the TP... in fact it would be almost expected. I honestly don't see the big deal... want the skin badly enough, farm it up. It's not as hard as you think to make that kind of gold, I guarantee it.

b) it took six months for a single glider skin to be obtainable in game (Ad Infinitum)... there even now are exactly three, and they are all just a bonus feature of Legendary Back Items, tacked on as an afterthought. There was NO way they were ever going to release in game attainable mount skins on an earlier timetable than this, and even if they do, they likely will require about as much time and in game gold expense as these three glider skins do.

c) Okay, sure...

Also it's not really disingenuous. For account wide mount skin unlocks, actually yeah this is close to the industry standard (compare to ESO where the extra exclusive skins are $40 and the normal ones are 20-25, if they are ever even obtainable outside a loot box.) Games that charge less for mount skins tend to only give that skin on a single character as someone stated above

Do I want to pay that for a mount skin? Not really... so I won't... unless the skin is 100% perfect. But I also won't be upset at ANet for being "disingenuous" or for not putting the skins as attainable in game, especially after they have demonstrated in the past that they really just don't do that, at all, ever.

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@Einlanzer.1627 said:The problem with charging $25 for a mount skin is:

a.) it's just a skinb.) all the new skins so far are through the gem shopc.) we have five types of mounts that often need to be swapped between.

O'Brien defended this as industry standard, but it actually isn't - that was a disingenuous comment. In other games, $25 skins are only released occasionally as premium skins to supplement what can be found in the game, and they are usually entirely new creatures with special effects that can be used exclusively if desired by the player.

Seriously, pull your head out. If you're going to have the audacity to do this, at least release make them entirely new creatures instead of just reskins, AND release a few that can be obtained in-game. This kind of behavior will just drive players away from the game. A skin should pretty much never be more than $10, and most players can see there's an attempt at exploitation by charging them $25 for a single skin for a single mount.

There isn't a problem .. you don't need them.

Besides, we already know Anet will adjust pricing if it doesn't work for them. Crying over the price of skins is just sour grapes.

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Griffon mount is 250 gold and translates to about 1000 gems and that is around 12$. So I would have to pay 12$ for something that I should already have access to when I bought the expansion. Outrageous.

And why is no one complaining that legendary weapons are expensive? With gold to gems those 2500 gold get you 10000 gems that would cost 125$ to buy. And if you were to buy gems and convert them to 2500 gold it would cost around 180$. And even that is cheap when you consider the time spent farming for those 2500 gold or doing collections and crafting yourself. You realize that if you spent that time working even for 10$/hour, I bet you would be better off buying with real money, unless you enjoy farming that is.

Time is money. If you don't enjoy grinding, it is cheaper to buy with real money.

And those skins are expensive as long as ppl keep buying them, that is how supply and demand work. If 25$ is the sweet spot that generates the most revenue, there is literally no reason to lower it (from business standpoint).

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@Oglaf.1074 said:Whales keep on buyin', Anet keep on overpricin'.

Simple as that.

You and me were never the target demographic for these mount skins.

That's the gist of it, although I'm not actually convinced they wouldn't make more money if they charged a more reasonable price for them. I'm also very convinced that, even if some people buy it, setting an artificially high price point for something is terrible for your business in the long run.

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I don't agree with the OP. I have no issue with the prices or the gem-shop-only nature of Mountfits. I do think ANet bungled the implementation and unthinkingly set our expectations for much, much lower prices. Plus I don't like the aesthetics enough to spend 2k on a single skin or 400 gems on an unknown.

Of course, I'm not their target audience: I'm conservative about my budget for gaming. They aren't going to get US$25 out of me for hardly anything.

That said, I got two licenses as gifts this year and I'm very pleased even though both are jackal skins, with one being simply a four-dye-channel version of the default and the second being a seemingly-minor reskin. That is, even though they are much the same as each other and what I already have, I am really enjoying them both as much as any cosmetics I've bought for myself.

Mind you, it hasn't convinced me to spend another 400 gems to try to get skins for the other mounts; that's still too rich for my taste without any control over which mount. I absolutely would have been pleased to spend 2k gems to get a four-dye version of each mount, otherwise identical to default. Since that wasn't an option, I haven't spent any gems on Mountfits.


Other thoughts:

The problem with charging $25 for a mount skin ...O'Brien defended this as industry standard, but it actually isn't - that was a disingenuous comment. In other games, $25 skins are only released occasionally as premium skins to supplement what can be found in the game, and they are usually entirely new creatures with special effects that can be used exclusively if desired by the player.

I don't have a conceptual problem with US$25 for cosmetics of any sort. If people will pay that much (and ANet's data shows that enough do), then that's great for the long-term health of the game. I also don't have a problem with the comparison to other games: Even the "reskins" in this game are richly detailed, although I can't say I'm a fan of the aesthetics. In other games, you get MS Paint levels of detail and pay US$5-10 for components (like saddle skins) and/or get charged for things that are included in the price of GW2 (e.g. autolooting or using mounts in the first place).

a.) it's just a skinExactly, it is just a skin. I don't care if they are US$5 or US$50; it's a skin and I don't need to spend anything on skins.

b.) all the new skins so far are through the gem shopI also don't have a problem with new skins being gem store only, for now: that's still the case for gliders, although a few are available for completing extremely expensive legendary collections. It's still predominately the case for outfits, with all but two exceptions being recycled town clothes that are currently available on the TP for more gold than most outfits have ever cost.


Even though I don't have a problem with the theory, I have two concerns about the actual implementation.

  • The comparative costs of Mountfits to Outfits
  • The implementation of ANet's pricing.

Cost: Without ANet taking the time to explain their thinking, the cost difference seems arbitrary, capricious, and abrupt.

I don't know the development costs for outfits versus mountfits, but they don't seem all that different to me. If anything, I'd think designing single outifts for 5 races is trickier than rendering 5 similar mountfits for 5 different mounts. Plus, given that the two seasonal sets have a retail cost (at most) 2000 gems for five, it seems like even ANet thinks the resources required to produce them are comparable. Thus, I'd think it was in ANet's interest to explain to us the difference.

Implementation: Which brings us to how they rolled it out. Let's assume Mike O'Brien means what he said: that Mountfits really are costly to develop Let's also presume that he's right that, to sustain the game in the manner to which we are accustomed, ANet needs to find a smaller number of high-price-point items. According to him, that is more attractive to those willing and able to spend more RL cash on the game. (That sounds plausible, similar to a boat company making more money from selling a tiny number of yachts compared to selling lots of more economical vessels.)

If all that is the case, why didn't they first rollout the fancy skins, to set our expectations about high prices? Imagine if the Warmount and Raptor of Paradise were released first at 2k each. Then the Halloween bundle of 5 skins at 1.6k looks like a crazy bargain... and the mount licenses would have been amazing at "only" 400 gems each. Instead, they did the opposite: show us the bundle first and get us used to the idea that Mountfits would be priced similarly to (and perhaps less than) Outfits.

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25$ is nothing.

Have you tried working in real life? you could easily rack in 100+ dollars a day with part time jobs alone. While if you're under-aged. You could try to farm in game gold, that's only about 500 gold if i remember correctly. If you could flip in trading post, it won't take more than a few days to get you that much.

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Honestly, they can put w/e price tag they want on this mount skins as long as its not a) loot box as the mount adaption license was, and b) pay2win ~ faster than normal mounts/has special attacks as long as those 2 things don't get broken its fair game. I will vote with my wallet, and thus far i have not bought a single mount skin in the gem store since none of them are skins that i cant live without- (yes i can afford it) but i guess i just have higher willpower than most.

But a f2p game like gw2 has to make money elsewhere (micro-transactions) so i have no problems with the price tag that anet set for these unique mount skins as it helps continue to support the devs to make more content.

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I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

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@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

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@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:

@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

Really.. How?

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@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:

@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

You can get every gemstore item in the game too by making gold. No need to spend real moneys. 400-500g is not even much.

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Game is F2P or less than 50 bucks to get core and two xpacs....um... They gotta make money somewhere. I personally won't buy them and ANET knows that not a lot will buy them but those that do help feed us new content and keep the monthly fees away...oh and new skins rofl. Oh and they gotta pay the people who design them.

I don't think this drives players away and this is exactly the type of market for this type of additions. People are so used to $5 outfits, gliders and such that they want everything cheap but do not take into account on how this game succeeds on gem store items for cash. Gold to Gems can hurt them and pricing higher people will pay cash because they do not have the gold to get the gems needed to buy. ANET I think knows this so there ya go... just my two cents

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@STIHL.2489 said:

@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

Really.. How?

Same way I got my Ghastly Grinning Shield Skin that sells for over 2300g... BLC Wardrobe unlock. Weekly key farm. Didn't cost me a dime or gold :open_mouth:

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@Ameepa.6793 said:

@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

You can get every gemstore item in the game too by making gold. No need to spend real moneys. 400-500g is not even much.

Seeing how I've only ever had 500 gold on me ever in GW2 and struggling to get that 500 gold back, I'm going to call braham on that.

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You could just, not buy what you don’t want.WoW shop mounts are £19/ea and last I played you couldn’t dye them either. But they charge a subscription to fund their game, so alls we’ll that ends well.Anet has to pull in money from somewhere, mounts we’re going to be heavily monetised. That was incredibly obvious.

I seem to recall a merged and remerged thread on the old forum about mounts, a lot of players saying “take my money Anet we want mounts”. Where have they gone now? Or are these guys now complaining that Anet is taking their advice and charging for mountfits. They willingly dangled their money in front of Anet at the prospect of having mounts. Be careful what you wish for.

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@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:

@STIHL.2489 said:I don't see the problem. In other games, they really are just skins (that run faster), and 25 for a skin, well, that's a matter of personal choice.

Just to put this in perspective.. a Scythe Skin (staff) sells for 2898 gold.. that's 10,986 Gems.. or put another way.. $137 cash.

$137 for a weapon skin.. and you all are fussing about $25 for a Mount?

Scythe Skin you can get in the game without gems so that is a very idiotic comparison.

You can get every gemstore item in the game too by making gold. No need to spend real moneys. 400-500g is not even much.

Seeing how I've only ever had 500 gold on me ever in GW2 and struggling to get that 500 gold back, I'm going to call braham on that.

If getting it in game is not your thing, then you luckily have the option to use real moneys instead! Good to have options :)

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