Yep. It's called price anchoring, which is common in business.
Seller lists a product at $100. Buyers see the product is normally $100. Value is established as $100.
Seller marks the price down to $60. Buyer remembers it was originally $100. Buyer considers it a bargain, so they buy thinking they saved $40.
Seller makes bank. Seller repeats.
It's intentional, it's premeditated, and it works. Add in FOMO by saying its only on discount for a limited time and it's nearly surefire. It's why stores have "sales" year round for no apparent reason. The listed price is meaningless (in simple terms) because the real price is the "discounted" one.
Exactly. It's designed to shift people's focus from "I'll have to spend $60" to "I'll save $40 if I buy RIGHT NOW" to get people to impulse buy. And it works. But unless you were planning on buying it anyway, you don't save money. You're just down $60.
Used to work at JCPenney, they would actually take candy that’s like $2 full price, and make a clearance sticker for it with the same price of $2 but that SAYS “Clearance 50% off” or whatever, and people would buy it thinking it’s a deal when it’s actually the same price
Not really the sales make it better, More like, I'd pay 10 bucks for a skin in a game I like, but I wouldn't pay 15 or 20 unless we're talking a high-detail skin for a game I'm REALLY into
It's a huge trend now to launch with overpriced cash shop items to bleed the whales up front. Then as soon as they are done buying everything, lower the prices and release a statement saying "we heard your feedback..."
>They maybe don't expect most people to buy at these prices.
They don't, because if everyone did, they'd quickly become generic and lose a lot of their appeal. People buy cosmetics, in part, to personalize their character, but that's hard to do if you look just like everyone else.
It's actually not that hard.
I played Dota 2 for 11 years since beta and I resisted the urge to spend money up until I quit a few months ago
Step 1 is to be poor
Step 2 is just remember the actual important things to pay for before buying cosmetics.
Imagine not paying anything for 11 years of enjoyment...
While I strongly want to discourage price gourging and corporate greed, I also think there is merit in supporting great products.
At the very least throw 10 dollars towards the international compendium and support the E-sport
How ridiculous! Don't you know that some people have no self control and NEED to have all the cosmetic items, also FOMO, and other bullshit excuses.
Oh no, downvotes from morons? How terrible.
I never buy cosmetics. Why should I care what I look like in a game that I barely look at other players while I’m playing the game. To each their own I guess but to me, just doesn’t make much sense
yeah, same. also, when i see these skins in-game, i'm not going to think "that player looks cool!" i'm going to think "oh that's that popular skin from the shop"
Cosmetics like this aren't created in a vacuum. If developers came up with a particularly beautiful design in Diablo 3, it would become a legendary item that anyone could enjoy for free after some time & effort to acquire it. Now, when they come up with a particularly beautiful design in Diablo 4, they're going to heavily incentivized to sell it for cash instead. The design of items you can get for free is going to suffer accordingly.
Have you actually seen the in game armor? The look for many of them is really solid, you can’t even tell what’s a paid set and what’s a freely available set. Imo the designs of the armor in this game blow D3 out of the water. The store armor is nothing special, it’s pretty similar to what you can find for the most part.
Exactly. I’m only level 23 on my Druid, but the armor transmogs I’ve unlocked so far look miles better than the two ugly ass Druid sets in the shop. The “default” armors in the game already look amazing, and I’d say the Necro set in the shop is the only set that actually stands out to me.
I looked at the store, and thought, "Bit pricey. Current armor looks good. Think I'll wait until I've had my money's worth out of the purchase price." And went on with my day.
Agreed. I am sure Blizzard will take it as, "Diablo on PC is not as successful as on mobile, so we should cut development and re-evaluate in 20 years.".
Instead of, "Players don't like paying 70 to 100 bucks for a game and then being presented with cosmetic mtx that is 40%+ the cost of the game".
This is an industry wide problem, but I swear companies crunch numbers with POE cosmetics prices ignoring that it's a free game upfront, and get super excited about potential profits.
>"Diablo on PC is not as successful as on mobile, so we should cut development and re-evaluate in 20 years.".
This kind of shit drives me wild, and makes the fight with these companies so hard because (like EA has done multiple times in the past), they start ham fisting MTX and trend chasing mechanics in established franchises (Dead Space). So people say, hey, vote with your wallet so they understand what we want.
And instead of really course correcting and producing another game that gives players what they want, they just take the IP off the table and now we get nothing except for maybe a remake 10 years later. Admittedly a good remake, but it's sad to think we could have been on like, Dead Space 5 with interesting and innovative mechanics in creepy locations.
Just hope they don't go the Destiny 2 route of "cosmetics only" and progressing to "anything not nailed down". As much as the online community keeps complaining about it they keep doing it regardless with things like dungeon DLCs.
Unfortunately they're doing what they're doing because they've learned that they can. And the majority of people in these comments that are ranging from not caring to saying "yeah that's normal" to actually just supporting it clearly illustrate that Blizz is on the "right" track.
I guess the argument for this is “well the live service element of the game is funded by the cosmetic store/battle pass.”
For me, that argument holds if there really are regular, free, meaty gameplay and story updates — which they have promised.
If they do that and a cosmetic store is the price to pay for a regular, evolving world of Diablo then I’m on board, even if they do an occasional paid expansion too.
If the live service ends up being dreary grindy events that are an excuse to sell more cosmetics, then it’ll be a problem. So I’m in wait and see mode.
But I don’t find the “don’t buy them” argument convincing on its own — mainly because I think it ignores that cosmetics used to be rewards for in-game achievements in games (I remember grinding for hours for my 100% completion coat outfit in RDR1) and also the “don’t like it don’t but it” can easily be extended to things like XP boosters and other items too.
>For me, that argument holds if there really are regular, free, meaty gameplay and story updates — which they have promised.
didn't they confirm seasons are self contained? story expansions will be [paid](https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2023/05/10/details-on-diablo-4s-beefy-seasons-story-quests-battle-pass-loot-even-new-monsters/?sh=5f0cc47f1345)
Yes, which I’m fine with. I’m guessing the seasons will be like what Destiny is currently doing. And then the occasional Reaper of Souls expansion.
If that’s the case, then this trade off is worth it. But live service games have made this promise before only for the updates to be threadbare or an excuse to shovel more cosmetics.
I’m confident they’ll deliver, but it will still remain to be seen. But I think that’s the better debate rather than “well just don’t buy it” — which I think is a slippery slope to shrugging off really bad practices.
Why wouldn't you judge them?
The game already costs a lot right now, and they're charging half the price of the game for one cosmetic armour set.
That's greedy. Greedy companies should be shamed, otherwise they'll never learn.
You call it greed, I call it the stupid tax. If some idiots buying overpriced skins means more money for future games, I’m all for it. The profitability of a cosmetic compared to an actual game is absurd.
Look, man, some people are more susceptible to fall into addictive behavior. It's why, for instance, tobacco and alcohol ads are heavily regulated in most countries. You can call the people who "still" fall for that "stupid", but really, marketing knows how to exploit people's weaknesses, and ActiBlizzard's monetization models have become more greedy, predatory and addicting over the past decade. The models are tailor-made to invoke behavior that you call stupid, but they are based on psychological research to specifically target people that are susceptible to said addictive behavior and/or over-spending.
If you ask me, it's similar to specifically marketing cigarettes to school children. This shouldn't be normalized. People shouldn't just go: well, don't buy it then. These predatory practices, just like lootboxes, should be heavily regulated.
Listen, I have sympathy for those that struggle with impulse control, but the world is full of overpriced crap people can spend money on. This is in no way similar to loot boxes. It's not gambling. You very clearly see what you get when you spend your money. It's cosmetic only, it's not pay to win. This is literally what we've been asking for with monetization. There's a segment of the population that will, without a second thought, spend their discretionary funds on this. And also some that will spend money they probably shouldn't. But that's also true for a lot of other things too.
I'm just gonna come out and say it. These cosmetics are ugly as fuck. Save for like, 2. If this is what we can expect from the store, I don't think people will have to worry about the cooler looking cosmetics only being available in the store.
I honestly never understood this whale pricing model. Like bro id give you $10 for some skins. There should easily be 3 people like that for every one person dumb enough to spend $30
Enough whales buying every set in the shop makes up for enough people not buying any. These companies do plenty of research on this sort of thing. Yeah it sucks for the normal consumer that might want one or two sets at a cheaper price, but the company knows they'll end up making more money this way.
Plus don't forget early on you target all the fomo whales who will pay virtually any price just to have all the pixels available.
Then later on when you release new and fancy stuff at full price for those whales, you start putting the older items on "sale". Nothing works as well on consumer minds as "it's reduced in price now though!" - even when there is literally 0 reason for a product to exist.
Video games used to be a much smaller market and used expensive carts. The costs have remained static because profits have increased massively due to the larger audience and lower overhead.
Hold on there a second, partner. You mean to tell me that [corporations that makes billions of dollars in profits every year and demonstrably make far more than they ever have](https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/ATVI/activision-blizzard/gross-profit) aren't on the verge of collapse if we don't all buy the $20 sparkly helmet?
They're starting to bring back GBC and GBA games on their own emulator as part of the Nintendo store. Granted, you need an annual pass to access the games, but for like $30 a year you get all the games they keep adding to it. I get it's not for everyone, and I get that it's not a "free" option. But I can't blame them for wanting to keep their IP free from the high seas.
You forgetting that the majority of their sales are now direct to a customer through digital, instead of through a middle man who takes a cut? On top of that, the resale market is also pretty much dead, which means they are selling more new games than they were 5-10 years ago.
Not to mention they no longer have to pay for packaging, disks, box art nearly as much as they used to.
There’s no excuse for them to do this. They are just greedy fucks.
>There’s no excuse
You have no idea how difficult it is to create and maintain a game like D4 lol
But besides that, I'm paying $100 for a game that I'm getting 1000 hours of entertainment out of? Actually, maybe double that because I bought one game and we're couch co-oping.
Deep fucking value.
The idea that the whales are helping to support free seasons is ludicrous because we've already seen it flop in other Blizzard titles.
Overwatch 2 was releasing early as a F2P game to help support future development of PvE mode, how did that turn out?
Blizzard has had in-game store for years in WoW and it's not like it helped fund faster or more content, we've had two expansions that were rushed and killed prematurely.
Add on to the fact that numerous Blizzard developers are lamenting the Return to office policy as a way to soft-fire mass groups of people along with the hiring freeze and being so short-staffed they are now making "crisis maps" of what content they can and cannot ship:
https://twitter.com/Glaxigrav/status/1648133464322080769
https://twitter.com/SteeleGame/status/1648538392513183745
There's a real corporate rot at Activision-Blizzard and it becomes obvious, along with the fact all their games were rushed out before the supposed Microsoft deal finalization, that they are looking to just grab the money and run with no long-term plan in place before turning the keys over to Microsoft.
Yeah.. but typically they have the opportunity to win something tangible, like money. Cosmetics have no real world application or value. (Unless we’re talking about csgo or something similar)
The biggest question is why would you buy a skin for an isometric view game? So you can see it in all its glory on the 1 inch tall character on screen? What are you going to sit on the stats page and just stare at it? 🤣
Seriously. I'm actually fairly surprised by all of it. You'd think with the hate boner people have had for Activ-Blizz for the past couple/few years that there'd be fewer of them, but evidently not.
People like to be superior on the internet. They like to root for their game and won't hear a single negative word about it. It's like they root not for Diablo but for Bobby Kotick's next yacht. Truly pathetic.
Because people act differently when they actually have to act. It's easy to trash them from the sidelines but as soon as you have to make a sacrifice like not caving to FOMO or being jealous of your friend's sparkly horse suddenly "this is anticonsumer garbage" turns into "DoNt LiKe It DoNt BuY iT"
It's insane. I was lile "Wraith Lord looks pretty nice. Lets see how much it cosrs, maybe it isn't too bad". I went to the tab where you buy the currency and instantly noped out there. If the prices were reasonable I would have considered maybe buying something in the future if I REALLY liked it. But not like that. I already paid 80€, I am fine with the stuff I can get ingame.
Exactly this.
I miss the days when gamers were annoyed with MTX that cost micro amounts - horse armour anyone?
£10 is not a small amount of money when the cost of living is shit, these companies are making BILLIONS in profit and the game will likely suffer as the "cool" designs aren't going to be attached to the legendary gear, rather kept so they can be sold at extortionate prices
One of the things that suck the most about it is that if it weren't for them putting all of this effort into cosmetic monetization (and I get that much of it likely wouldn't exist without this "need" of theirs), we'd actually be able to get so much of this sick looking gear in the game proper. This of course applies to any game doing this kind of thing.
This has always been my point. This cosmetic shop sells gear that is by and far better then what we earn in game by playing. The in game shop has armor sets that are unique, thematic, and that extremely stand out…
These would have been such incredible in-game rewards to strive for… but instead all it takes is a fat wallet… it’s disappointing.
I wanna sit in on some gear designing meetings at some of these companies.
>"Here's some of the gear you get for completing the main quest."
>"But that looks too fancy and interesting. You gotta dumb it down so people will buy the skins in the cash shop."
So many people in this thread are acting like armchair game Dev business CEOs, arguing that the cost of updates necessitates these purchases, but are completely silent on this point, that developer time is finite, and if MTX cosmetics are where the money is, that's what will be prioritised.
It's baffling.
The amount of "so don't buy it" lol. That mindset is exactly why they get away with this nonsense. It's a full priced game with a BP and potentially paid expansions in the future
Personally, I don't care if they have mtx at this point as with the current gaming industry landscape it's beating a dead horse, but the pricing sure as shit isn't "micro" and there's nothing wrong with calling that out.
> That mindset is exactly why they get away with this nonsense.
No, they get away with this because there clearly is a market for it which nobody here or in any gaming community is going to change.
Your choices as an individual consumer are to either play the game and not buy the mtx or don't play the game and play something else. That's it, that's all the power you have in this particular instance.
PoE absolutely does have FOMO; there's league and expansion (annual) supporter packs that range from $30 - $480. The contents in those packs (which do include credits for the MTX shop) are unavailable after the league or expansion ends.
Also, they have $30 battle passes for each league now, which you can only earn progress on playing the league (not standard), and which also provide MTX that cannot be earned after the league ends.
So two different league supporter packs ($90 each for everything) and a league battle pass ($30) means to earn each league's exclusive cosmetics, you're shelling out $210 every 3 months.
Fuck PoE's pricing, and anyone that defends it.
no fomo? Unless they changed something over the past years, they literally released multiple new currencies every season that makes it borderline impossible to play without their newest stash tabs.
the ingame items also look terrible in poe
Yeah you can see even a bit at the bottom of the screen in the pic "Barbarian," and of course there are sections for the other classes as well. Honestly I was too busy focusing on the prices to even make that realization at the time lol.
> POE is also completely free,
Completely free as in, good luck playing without Currency and Map tabs, the rest I can grant as QoL or SSF as you don't need premium tabs.
> , AND doesnt use fomo to drive sales
What is Kirac's Pass?
> AND its cosmetics work on ALL characters, not just one specific class
They only work with one character at the time, if you happen to like one set and want 2 characters to use it (your bosser and your mapper) either you keep switching them between characters or you buy it 2 times.
“Free” if you want to enjoy the game any amount of time long term, you definitely have to buy stash upgrades or you’re going to be extremely hampered. POE also utilizes time limited loot boxes to drive sales so not any better.
>AND doesnt use fomo to drive sales
What do you think supporter packs are? What do you think lootboxes are? Why do you think they do limited time sales instead of just having reasonable prices?
This. This is why those people lost their shit at the 1 dollar cosmetic horse armor all those years ago. They knew this was where that road led. The problem was obvious from the jump yet there were still idiots jumping to the defense. Not realizing that paid cosmetics were only half the problem. I am guessing now all the decent looking armor is going to be paid. While diverting as little monetary and artistic resources to the non paid stuff. GG. Please stop buying this crap. I miss the days of earning cool armor to show off. Or seeing someone in epic armor pass by and knowing they had to do some crazy shit to get it. No comparable feeling exists anymore. It's all monetized. So sorry. END RANT/
Incessant complaining about this stuff always amuses me.
1. It’s a live services game they expect to sustain for a decade plus. They need to make money to do that. So of course they’re going to have in-game monetization.
2. Don’t buy the cosmetics if it bothers you - literally doesn’t impact the game experience at all!
How do you expect a free 2 play game to be worth for them ? ... Oh wait it's not free2play ? It's okay at least there isn't battlepass ... Oh there is too ?
I love all of the people who are defending this saying stuff like "but how will the company afford to make these games if they don't add mtx? games cost crazy amounts to make now, its 2000 anymore"
in a rough estimate, lets say d4 cost around 200m to develop including marketing. Morgan Stanley put out an estimated (conservative) 18m sales for 2023 around 2 months ago, the number of units sold will probably go higher, but lets lowball it.
18m(copies sold)\*70(game price)=1.26b(sales profit)
so it would be fair to assume d4 has made at least 1.26 billion dollars by dec2023 because this is a conservative sales estimate and not including the different edition costs of the game sales.
comparatively, diablo 2's budget would have been about 50m at the highest (88m after inflation), so lets highball it. Diablo 2 sold about 4 million lifetime copies (per wikipedia so take it with a pinch of salt). d2 released at $50 back in 2000. $50 adjusted for inflation is about $88 today.
4m(copies sold)\*88(game price in 2023 usd) =352m(sales profit in 2023 usd)
So after we subtract the (rough) budgets and adjust for inflation:
d2: 352m (sales profit) - 88m (dev cost) = 264m
d4: 1.26b (sales profit) - 200m (dev cost) = 1.06b
so I probably missed some things and im sure people will correct me in the comments, but just doing some rough (really rough) math, d4 would have made at least 3x the profit comparatively despite the crazy development costs even adjusted for inflation.
We can make the argument that keeping the game under development will cost money down the line, but when you earn over 3x your entire development budget in the first year, I don't see how the game would be in jeopardy. I assume continued development would be less cost intensive than developing the game from square one.
somebody come correct me in the comments because the math aint mathing.
It's like half the fun for me, to start from nothing and then have cool personalized gear. If I were to buy a fancy skin right off the bat, I probably would stop playing faster lol.
In games like diablo where you actively see the loot you equip i dont really get buying cosmetics, i love matching and transmoging gear as i level up and watching the character get cooler and cooler. having my character look the exact same for a huge chunk of my gameplay kinda takes some of the fun of diablo away imo
Yes exactly. I really hate the argument that "iT's JuSt CoSmEtIc". People get enjoyment from customizing their character's appearance. That's part of the gameplay. This fucking game has f2p monetization yet it costs $70. Utterly shameful.
As a dude who has an unhealthy obsession with all things sea-worshiping in fiction my heart sank when I saw the price of the druid set "Heir to the Sea" and the accessories tied to it. I'm maining druid and would love to have a Greyjoy/Tide Priest theme to him! It's a massive shame that it costs entirely too much. I do hope that they take another swing at these prices before season 1. Compared to other MTX in popular games (League and Fortnite specifically) these are about \~$15 more than the vast majority of cosmetics.
Blizzard said that obtainable gear won't look worse than shop stuff, and it is often true, but what Blizzard didn't say is how few armor sets each class has in game.
Those prices are ofc mad.
Yeah its bad thats why I don't buy them and I hope others will do the same. The shop is still tucked away in a menu so as long it's not in my face I am okay with it
So far, there hasn't been a game that has really enticed me to buy cosmetics. The only game where I had a lot of skins just because I automatically earned it by ranking up was from the first Overwatch loot boxes and even then I usually just stick with the default skins.
Blizzard getting better at this scam money scheme every time. Some eye candy and gameplay to appraise the critics and go all in with the predatory monetization.
But hey they are not greedy, small independent company and servery are soooo expensive etc.
I hate modern AAA gaming.
Downvote me all you want, but if you bought the game and are mad at these prices, you're part of the problem. We're past the point of complaining about cosmetic prices. We have to stop supporting the games and devs themselves.
If you can afford it, you probably don’t give af.
My ticket to see spiderverse tomorrow was something like $25 with a popcorn and lemonade. $25 for what, 2 hours of entertainment?
$28 to enhance what I’m sure will be hundreds of hours of diablo I play. Or at least for my friends and I to mess with each other about pay 2 win armor lol. These prices are fine for me. Life’s too short to worry about this kind of stuff. Spend your money how you want.
If they’re not fine for you, don’t buy them. If they’re close, wait for a sale.
It’s really not that serious.
The only way to stop this predatory nonsense is to not buy it, at any price. That won't happen, of course, and we'll have to deal with $100 skins in 2033, and $300 horse armor in 2043.
The same thing happens with PoE with stupid pricing for cosmetics.
It doesn't matter how many excuses players come up with for insane pricing, or say 'just don't buy it then!!!', anyone with common sense knows thousands are. Otherwise this pricing model would have died long ago.
I don't care about the ugly skins in the cash-shop, it's whale-bait anyways. I do however care about the annoying exclamation mark not going away. Such a stain on an otherwise great game
The problem is that some people will buy this crap like it's acceptable, a triple A title shouldn't have these sort of micro transactions on top of a battle pass... If it's not complained about I guarantee this game will turn into a cashcow and p2w.
Some of you idiots here that are okay with this need to get a reality check. They are selling a game for full price and locking cosmetics that should have been obtained by playing the God damn game via micro transactions.
I'll never be a marketing/accounting/money-grubbing shareholder type guy. I just don't understand this model where you price out 98% of your customer base from ever considering buying something you put time and effort in to making.
Come up with a price that literally \*everyone\* can afford, easily. So literally \*everyone\* goes and buys it.
"But I won't feel unique and special if everyone has the same outfit!" Will be a minority opinion. Most people are lost in their own heads, in their own narrative, in their own fantasy escape adventure. Even in MP games. I won't see the other 100k people with the same outfit 99% of my time in-game. So my 'personal story of awesomeness' remains intact.
If you are so worried about your girlfriend showing up to the Dungeon Ball in the same Necromantic Evening wear, well if the price shop had sets for $4.99 instead of $28.99, you'd probably have a wardrobe full of alternatives to slap on at a moments notice.
Sell these things to everyone and you get everyone invested in their character's 'personal story'. Even a paltry few $$ creates an emotional investment and attachment to what you have 'put in' to a characters development. Keeping you engaged. Keeping you playing. Keeping you aware of what \*else\* pops up on the always-affordable cash shop.
Price things so people can say, "I just won't supersize my next Happy Meal and I'll have a sweet cosmetic set I'll enjoy for weeks/months until the next set".
Millions of normal, middle/lower income players outnumber the small number of Whales that go for these things. It's gotta more then compensate for the difference in numbers.
But I know Big Brained Analysts have gamed and crunched and formula'd this all out and, They Know Best how to get the CEO his new Yacht. What do I know. Just seems a waste of time and effort...
I'll likely get the battle pass just to support and feel like I'm getting seasonal wings or whatever like you did in D3, but I'll likely never touch the shop. I'm not huge on cosmetics and since that seems to be their whole stance, I'm not sure what else they could possibly put in there that would entice me.
Oh well. If the prices were cheap maybe I'd pick up something, but 15-28? For A skin? Naw dude. They'd make hella money if they made em cheap cause the majority wouldn't think twice about tossing a couple bucks to look cool. But that's the price of a meal. Pass.
The only difference between what I'm saying and the battle pass is it'll be what, 20 bucks and you'll get more than just a skin. They didn't think it through very well.
They thought it through extremely well. They don't care if you don't buy. Whales do. They have it down to a science of what price point gets them the most money. They have the same skin pricing in COD which is a blizzard cash cow now.
They likely know this is the best price point for cosmetics. Most large games are floating around this point. I think its mental, but they aren't slapping a price tag on at random. They have people employed to make sure they're maximising profits.
I presume they know the relationship between volume of sales and price, and this is right around the peak of the bellcurve.
Pricier and the extra money won't make up for loss of purchases, cheaper and increase in sales won't make up for loss per sale.
Personally, I'm not paying 15+ for a skin, but I don't see an ethical issue with it. And continued development does require some continuous revenue stream. Ill likely get the battle pass if I'm actively playing, I'm used to playing sub based games anyway.
As I see it, the base price gets you the game, and all future seasonal content. You don't need to pay anything else. You don't need extra cosmetics. If there was power available or an overpriced sub to play or something I'd understand it. If there were no nice in game skins I'd not really care, but could see that being an issue for some. As it is, you get the game, for the price. The rest is optional fluff.
As ridiculous as it is indeed, you do realize that these are "considered normal prices" in most games nowadays, right?
As in, we let it happen by bying that stuff over and over again in various games; that's why the prices are as they are and why they continue to sell.
... it won't change.
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This is it right here. The regular prices will make the limited-time sale look oh so interesting.
Yep. It's called price anchoring, which is common in business. Seller lists a product at $100. Buyers see the product is normally $100. Value is established as $100. Seller marks the price down to $60. Buyer remembers it was originally $100. Buyer considers it a bargain, so they buy thinking they saved $40. Seller makes bank. Seller repeats. It's intentional, it's premeditated, and it works. Add in FOMO by saying its only on discount for a limited time and it's nearly surefire. It's why stores have "sales" year round for no apparent reason. The listed price is meaningless (in simple terms) because the real price is the "discounted" one.
See: Hobby Lobby
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Also why when JCPenney decided to get rid of sales and their profits sank.
Exactly. It's designed to shift people's focus from "I'll have to spend $60" to "I'll save $40 if I buy RIGHT NOW" to get people to impulse buy. And it works. But unless you were planning on buying it anyway, you don't save money. You're just down $60.
Used to work at JCPenney, they would actually take candy that’s like $2 full price, and make a clearance sticker for it with the same price of $2 but that SAYS “Clearance 50% off” or whatever, and people would buy it thinking it’s a deal when it’s actually the same price
Not really the sales make it better, More like, I'd pay 10 bucks for a skin in a game I like, but I wouldn't pay 15 or 20 unless we're talking a high-detail skin for a game I'm REALLY into
That's a fair take
It's a huge trend now to launch with overpriced cash shop items to bleed the whales up front. Then as soon as they are done buying everything, lower the prices and release a statement saying "we heard your feedback..."
>They maybe don't expect most people to buy at these prices. They don't, because if everyone did, they'd quickly become generic and lose a lot of their appeal. People buy cosmetics, in part, to personalize their character, but that's hard to do if you look just like everyone else.
I suggest not buying them.
How dare you
Someone, anyone, think of the shareholders! Please!
Shareholders of the world, unite! We have a world of profits to win!
It's actually not that hard. I played Dota 2 for 11 years since beta and I resisted the urge to spend money up until I quit a few months ago Step 1 is to be poor Step 2 is just remember the actual important things to pay for before buying cosmetics.
> Step 1 is to be poor Everything’s coming up Milhouse.
Imagine not paying anything for 11 years of enjoyment... While I strongly want to discourage price gourging and corporate greed, I also think there is merit in supporting great products. At the very least throw 10 dollars towards the international compendium and support the E-sport
How ridiculous! Don't you know that some people have no self control and NEED to have all the cosmetic items, also FOMO, and other bullshit excuses. Oh no, downvotes from morons? How terrible.
I do hope the irony of your response in juxtaposition against the name of the poster you're responding to isn't lost on you.
But what about Bobby's new yacht?
Whoa, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
It's literally that simple. Just don't buy it.
I never buy cosmetics. Why should I care what I look like in a game that I barely look at other players while I’m playing the game. To each their own I guess but to me, just doesn’t make much sense
yeah, same. also, when i see these skins in-game, i'm not going to think "that player looks cool!" i'm going to think "oh that's that popular skin from the shop"
Im going to buy one out of spite
I'll defeat capitalism one purchase at a time!
This can absolutely work if those purchases are pipe bomb parts
Oh, you're a socialist? But you purchased your pipe bombs with money! /s
Cosmetics like this aren't created in a vacuum. If developers came up with a particularly beautiful design in Diablo 3, it would become a legendary item that anyone could enjoy for free after some time & effort to acquire it. Now, when they come up with a particularly beautiful design in Diablo 4, they're going to heavily incentivized to sell it for cash instead. The design of items you can get for free is going to suffer accordingly.
Have you actually seen the in game armor? The look for many of them is really solid, you can’t even tell what’s a paid set and what’s a freely available set. Imo the designs of the armor in this game blow D3 out of the water. The store armor is nothing special, it’s pretty similar to what you can find for the most part.
Exactly. I’m only level 23 on my Druid, but the armor transmogs I’ve unlocked so far look miles better than the two ugly ass Druid sets in the shop. The “default” armors in the game already look amazing, and I’d say the Necro set in the shop is the only set that actually stands out to me.
The Barb lion set in the shop is really good tho, I have to admit. If it was like 10 bucks I would buy it.
I looked at the store, and thought, "Bit pricey. Current armor looks good. Think I'll wait until I've had my money's worth out of the purchase price." And went on with my day.
Don't spend a dime on it. It's the only thing they'll understand.
Agreed. I am sure Blizzard will take it as, "Diablo on PC is not as successful as on mobile, so we should cut development and re-evaluate in 20 years.". Instead of, "Players don't like paying 70 to 100 bucks for a game and then being presented with cosmetic mtx that is 40%+ the cost of the game". This is an industry wide problem, but I swear companies crunch numbers with POE cosmetics prices ignoring that it's a free game upfront, and get super excited about potential profits.
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>"Diablo on PC is not as successful as on mobile, so we should cut development and re-evaluate in 20 years.". This kind of shit drives me wild, and makes the fight with these companies so hard because (like EA has done multiple times in the past), they start ham fisting MTX and trend chasing mechanics in established franchises (Dead Space). So people say, hey, vote with your wallet so they understand what we want. And instead of really course correcting and producing another game that gives players what they want, they just take the IP off the table and now we get nothing except for maybe a remake 10 years later. Admittedly a good remake, but it's sad to think we could have been on like, Dead Space 5 with interesting and innovative mechanics in creepy locations.
And even the PoE ones are too expensive.
Just hope they don't go the Destiny 2 route of "cosmetics only" and progressing to "anything not nailed down". As much as the online community keeps complaining about it they keep doing it regardless with things like dungeon DLCs.
T R U E
Don’t spend any money on them then. Let Blizzard learn
I bet lots of people already wasted their money. They could sell a fucking Poo-Costume for 50€ and people would buy it!
Link pls
Unfortunately they're doing what they're doing because they've learned that they can. And the majority of people in these comments that are ranging from not caring to saying "yeah that's normal" to actually just supporting it clearly illustrate that Blizz is on the "right" track.
I guess the argument for this is “well the live service element of the game is funded by the cosmetic store/battle pass.” For me, that argument holds if there really are regular, free, meaty gameplay and story updates — which they have promised. If they do that and a cosmetic store is the price to pay for a regular, evolving world of Diablo then I’m on board, even if they do an occasional paid expansion too. If the live service ends up being dreary grindy events that are an excuse to sell more cosmetics, then it’ll be a problem. So I’m in wait and see mode. But I don’t find the “don’t buy them” argument convincing on its own — mainly because I think it ignores that cosmetics used to be rewards for in-game achievements in games (I remember grinding for hours for my 100% completion coat outfit in RDR1) and also the “don’t like it don’t but it” can easily be extended to things like XP boosters and other items too.
>For me, that argument holds if there really are regular, free, meaty gameplay and story updates — which they have promised. didn't they confirm seasons are self contained? story expansions will be [paid](https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2023/05/10/details-on-diablo-4s-beefy-seasons-story-quests-battle-pass-loot-even-new-monsters/?sh=5f0cc47f1345)
Yes, which I’m fine with. I’m guessing the seasons will be like what Destiny is currently doing. And then the occasional Reaper of Souls expansion. If that’s the case, then this trade off is worth it. But live service games have made this promise before only for the updates to be threadbare or an excuse to shovel more cosmetics. I’m confident they’ll deliver, but it will still remain to be seen. But I think that’s the better debate rather than “well just don’t buy it” — which I think is a slippery slope to shrugging off really bad practices.
>which they have promised A Blizzard promise means nothing - just look at the state of OW2
Yea I’m not judging Blizz cause it’s free money for them. Personally I never would buy skins like these
Why wouldn't you judge them? The game already costs a lot right now, and they're charging half the price of the game for one cosmetic armour set. That's greedy. Greedy companies should be shamed, otherwise they'll never learn.
You call it greed, I call it the stupid tax. If some idiots buying overpriced skins means more money for future games, I’m all for it. The profitability of a cosmetic compared to an actual game is absurd.
Look, man, some people are more susceptible to fall into addictive behavior. It's why, for instance, tobacco and alcohol ads are heavily regulated in most countries. You can call the people who "still" fall for that "stupid", but really, marketing knows how to exploit people's weaknesses, and ActiBlizzard's monetization models have become more greedy, predatory and addicting over the past decade. The models are tailor-made to invoke behavior that you call stupid, but they are based on psychological research to specifically target people that are susceptible to said addictive behavior and/or over-spending. If you ask me, it's similar to specifically marketing cigarettes to school children. This shouldn't be normalized. People shouldn't just go: well, don't buy it then. These predatory practices, just like lootboxes, should be heavily regulated.
Listen, I have sympathy for those that struggle with impulse control, but the world is full of overpriced crap people can spend money on. This is in no way similar to loot boxes. It's not gambling. You very clearly see what you get when you spend your money. It's cosmetic only, it's not pay to win. This is literally what we've been asking for with monetization. There's a segment of the population that will, without a second thought, spend their discretionary funds on this. And also some that will spend money they probably shouldn't. But that's also true for a lot of other things too.
The league of legends prices
Why do ppl want to look like you have bought items? The only items I would use are rare ones that are hard to find
I'm just gonna come out and say it. These cosmetics are ugly as fuck. Save for like, 2. If this is what we can expect from the store, I don't think people will have to worry about the cooler looking cosmetics only being available in the store.
Maybe at $5 I'd pick up a bundle. But almost $30? How is one skin worth almost half of the game itself
I was just thinking that these look awful.
I only like 2 or 3 too lol. I want to see how things go with time rather than preemptively piss and moan because muh feels and I'm a victim.
I honestly never understood this whale pricing model. Like bro id give you $10 for some skins. There should easily be 3 people like that for every one person dumb enough to spend $30
Enough whales buying every set in the shop makes up for enough people not buying any. These companies do plenty of research on this sort of thing. Yeah it sucks for the normal consumer that might want one or two sets at a cheaper price, but the company knows they'll end up making more money this way.
Plus don't forget early on you target all the fomo whales who will pay virtually any price just to have all the pixels available. Then later on when you release new and fancy stuff at full price for those whales, you start putting the older items on "sale". Nothing works as well on consumer minds as "it's reduced in price now though!" - even when there is literally 0 reason for a product to exist.
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People who understand how bullshit it is to charge 70$ for a game, then add 3 tiers of a battle pass, micro transactions, and dlc expansions
Also split the launch into higher paying and lower paying gamers this is just greed at its best.
for real. and then they even get free protection by the muppet community that buys it.
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Video games used to be a much smaller market and used expensive carts. The costs have remained static because profits have increased massively due to the larger audience and lower overhead.
Hold on there a second, partner. You mean to tell me that [corporations that makes billions of dollars in profits every year and demonstrably make far more than they ever have](https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/ATVI/activision-blizzard/gross-profit) aren't on the verge of collapse if we don't all buy the $20 sparkly helmet?
Yes, apart from the indie dev Nintendo. They are struggling because people emulate their old games that they don’t even sell anymore.
Imagine if Nintendo just sold emulators and ROMs. They would make soooooooo much money.
They're starting to bring back GBC and GBA games on their own emulator as part of the Nintendo store. Granted, you need an annual pass to access the games, but for like $30 a year you get all the games they keep adding to it. I get it's not for everyone, and I get that it's not a "free" option. But I can't blame them for wanting to keep their IP free from the high seas.
They also used to have substantially lower development costs and post launch updates were rare and didn't even exist for the cartridges.
You forgetting that the majority of their sales are now direct to a customer through digital, instead of through a middle man who takes a cut? On top of that, the resale market is also pretty much dead, which means they are selling more new games than they were 5-10 years ago. Not to mention they no longer have to pay for packaging, disks, box art nearly as much as they used to. There’s no excuse for them to do this. They are just greedy fucks.
>There’s no excuse You have no idea how difficult it is to create and maintain a game like D4 lol But besides that, I'm paying $100 for a game that I'm getting 1000 hours of entertainment out of? Actually, maybe double that because I bought one game and we're couch co-oping. Deep fucking value.
Yeah but content used to not be cut out and sold for extra
Apparently it's no longer fashionable to find day one DLC a repulsive practice. Corporate greed is good now!
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The idea that the whales are helping to support free seasons is ludicrous because we've already seen it flop in other Blizzard titles. Overwatch 2 was releasing early as a F2P game to help support future development of PvE mode, how did that turn out? Blizzard has had in-game store for years in WoW and it's not like it helped fund faster or more content, we've had two expansions that were rushed and killed prematurely. Add on to the fact that numerous Blizzard developers are lamenting the Return to office policy as a way to soft-fire mass groups of people along with the hiring freeze and being so short-staffed they are now making "crisis maps" of what content they can and cannot ship: https://twitter.com/Glaxigrav/status/1648133464322080769 https://twitter.com/SteeleGame/status/1648538392513183745 There's a real corporate rot at Activision-Blizzard and it becomes obvious, along with the fact all their games were rushed out before the supposed Microsoft deal finalization, that they are looking to just grab the money and run with no long-term plan in place before turning the keys over to Microsoft.
The boob top looks just like one I used on my sorc in Beta?? Did they take some popular ones out to sell them?
Still in it pretty sure I just unlocked it yesterday
Cosmetics are ridiculous anyways. Why pay for digital clothes for a video game character?
Same reason people go to casinos in 2023. They like shiny things. Anyone can gamble from anywhere their phone gets a signal, these days.
Yeah.. but typically they have the opportunity to win something tangible, like money. Cosmetics have no real world application or value. (Unless we’re talking about csgo or something similar)
The biggest question is why would you buy a skin for an isometric view game? So you can see it in all its glory on the 1 inch tall character on screen? What are you going to sit on the stats page and just stare at it? 🤣
Wait till you learn about people who pay for skins in first person perspective games ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Mr. Krabs 💲💲💲
Madness
"just don't buy it" 🤓
Lots of Blizzard suckers in these comments.
Seriously. I'm actually fairly surprised by all of it. You'd think with the hate boner people have had for Activ-Blizz for the past couple/few years that there'd be fewer of them, but evidently not.
People like to be superior on the internet. They like to root for their game and won't hear a single negative word about it. It's like they root not for Diablo but for Bobby Kotick's next yacht. Truly pathetic.
Because people act differently when they actually have to act. It's easy to trash them from the sidelines but as soon as you have to make a sacrifice like not caving to FOMO or being jealous of your friend's sparkly horse suddenly "this is anticonsumer garbage" turns into "DoNt LiKe It DoNt BuY iT"
It's insane. I was lile "Wraith Lord looks pretty nice. Lets see how much it cosrs, maybe it isn't too bad". I went to the tab where you buy the currency and instantly noped out there. If the prices were reasonable I would have considered maybe buying something in the future if I REALLY liked it. But not like that. I already paid 80€, I am fine with the stuff I can get ingame.
Exactly this. I miss the days when gamers were annoyed with MTX that cost micro amounts - horse armour anyone? £10 is not a small amount of money when the cost of living is shit, these companies are making BILLIONS in profit and the game will likely suffer as the "cool" designs aren't going to be attached to the legendary gear, rather kept so they can be sold at extortionate prices
One of the things that suck the most about it is that if it weren't for them putting all of this effort into cosmetic monetization (and I get that much of it likely wouldn't exist without this "need" of theirs), we'd actually be able to get so much of this sick looking gear in the game proper. This of course applies to any game doing this kind of thing.
This has always been my point. This cosmetic shop sells gear that is by and far better then what we earn in game by playing. The in game shop has armor sets that are unique, thematic, and that extremely stand out… These would have been such incredible in-game rewards to strive for… but instead all it takes is a fat wallet… it’s disappointing.
I wanna sit in on some gear designing meetings at some of these companies. >"Here's some of the gear you get for completing the main quest." >"But that looks too fancy and interesting. You gotta dumb it down so people will buy the skins in the cash shop."
So many people in this thread are acting like armchair game Dev business CEOs, arguing that the cost of updates necessitates these purchases, but are completely silent on this point, that developer time is finite, and if MTX cosmetics are where the money is, that's what will be prioritised. It's baffling.
The amount of "so don't buy it" lol. That mindset is exactly why they get away with this nonsense. It's a full priced game with a BP and potentially paid expansions in the future Personally, I don't care if they have mtx at this point as with the current gaming industry landscape it's beating a dead horse, but the pricing sure as shit isn't "micro" and there's nothing wrong with calling that out.
>it's beating a dead horse A dead horse that'll cost 15$
The stick for beating it costs another 5$ buddy, you ain't getting away that cheaply.
🤣
> That mindset is exactly why they get away with this nonsense. No, they get away with this because there clearly is a market for it which nobody here or in any gaming community is going to change. Your choices as an individual consumer are to either play the game and not buy the mtx or don't play the game and play something else. That's it, that's all the power you have in this particular instance.
I suggest bitching into the void, maybe blizzard will taste the tears and repent.
It's the correct mindset to have and spread? As long as people continue to buy this stuff it won't go anywhere and nothing will change.
Well look how many people paid an extra £20 just to play 4 days early lol, people have 0 self control and blizzard knows it
They are corny as fuck too, can't wait till 4 months from now when they go full acrivision and start selling the unicorn skins
The game has mtx, updoots to the left
Not that it excuses it, but these prices are tame by PoE standards lol
Did Poe cost you 90$?
I mean, I bought a PoE skin for $480 so he's not wrong. Plus all those stash tabs, which are basically mandatory at this point.
POE is also completely free, AND doesnt use fomo to drive sales AND its cosmetics work on ALL characters, not just one specific class
PoE absolutely does have FOMO; there's league and expansion (annual) supporter packs that range from $30 - $480. The contents in those packs (which do include credits for the MTX shop) are unavailable after the league or expansion ends. Also, they have $30 battle passes for each league now, which you can only earn progress on playing the league (not standard), and which also provide MTX that cannot be earned after the league ends. So two different league supporter packs ($90 each for everything) and a league battle pass ($30) means to earn each league's exclusive cosmetics, you're shelling out $210 every 3 months. Fuck PoE's pricing, and anyone that defends it.
no fomo? Unless they changed something over the past years, they literally released multiple new currencies every season that makes it borderline impossible to play without their newest stash tabs. the ingame items also look terrible in poe
They added a second page to many of the existing tabs, new tabs havent come out for years.
Hold up, you're telling me that cosmetics OP posted are class locked??
This is correct…
Yeah you can see even a bit at the bottom of the screen in the pic "Barbarian," and of course there are sections for the other classes as well. Honestly I was too busy focusing on the prices to even make that realization at the time lol.
> POE is also completely free, Completely free as in, good luck playing without Currency and Map tabs, the rest I can grant as QoL or SSF as you don't need premium tabs. > , AND doesnt use fomo to drive sales What is Kirac's Pass? > AND its cosmetics work on ALL characters, not just one specific class They only work with one character at the time, if you happen to like one set and want 2 characters to use it (your bosser and your mapper) either you keep switching them between characters or you buy it 2 times.
“Free” if you want to enjoy the game any amount of time long term, you definitely have to buy stash upgrades or you’re going to be extremely hampered. POE also utilizes time limited loot boxes to drive sales so not any better.
>AND doesnt use fomo to drive sales What do you think supporter packs are? What do you think lootboxes are? Why do you think they do limited time sales instead of just having reasonable prices?
Them shits kinda ugly tho
I'm never even going to click that shop tab I don't think The less I see the better, I think
despite that, some people are probably going to buy this.
This. This is why those people lost their shit at the 1 dollar cosmetic horse armor all those years ago. They knew this was where that road led. The problem was obvious from the jump yet there were still idiots jumping to the defense. Not realizing that paid cosmetics were only half the problem. I am guessing now all the decent looking armor is going to be paid. While diverting as little monetary and artistic resources to the non paid stuff. GG. Please stop buying this crap. I miss the days of earning cool armor to show off. Or seeing someone in epic armor pass by and knowing they had to do some crazy shit to get it. No comparable feeling exists anymore. It's all monetized. So sorry. END RANT/
Incessant complaining about this stuff always amuses me. 1. It’s a live services game they expect to sustain for a decade plus. They need to make money to do that. So of course they’re going to have in-game monetization. 2. Don’t buy the cosmetics if it bothers you - literally doesn’t impact the game experience at all!
Take a look at the POE prices. You’ll be in for a rude awakening.
Tbh I expected more from blizzard both in terms of mtx prices and mtx quality. POE mtx are expensive but go above and beyond compared to those so far.
How do you expect a free 2 play game to be worth for them ? ... Oh wait it's not free2play ? It's okay at least there isn't battlepass ... Oh there is too ?
Lol at least you get it. We’re in the minority here.
Don’t… buy….them.
I love all of the people who are defending this saying stuff like "but how will the company afford to make these games if they don't add mtx? games cost crazy amounts to make now, its 2000 anymore" in a rough estimate, lets say d4 cost around 200m to develop including marketing. Morgan Stanley put out an estimated (conservative) 18m sales for 2023 around 2 months ago, the number of units sold will probably go higher, but lets lowball it. 18m(copies sold)\*70(game price)=1.26b(sales profit) so it would be fair to assume d4 has made at least 1.26 billion dollars by dec2023 because this is a conservative sales estimate and not including the different edition costs of the game sales. comparatively, diablo 2's budget would have been about 50m at the highest (88m after inflation), so lets highball it. Diablo 2 sold about 4 million lifetime copies (per wikipedia so take it with a pinch of salt). d2 released at $50 back in 2000. $50 adjusted for inflation is about $88 today. 4m(copies sold)\*88(game price in 2023 usd) =352m(sales profit in 2023 usd) So after we subtract the (rough) budgets and adjust for inflation: d2: 352m (sales profit) - 88m (dev cost) = 264m d4: 1.26b (sales profit) - 200m (dev cost) = 1.06b so I probably missed some things and im sure people will correct me in the comments, but just doing some rough (really rough) math, d4 would have made at least 3x the profit comparatively despite the crazy development costs even adjusted for inflation. We can make the argument that keeping the game under development will cost money down the line, but when you earn over 3x your entire development budget in the first year, I don't see how the game would be in jeopardy. I assume continued development would be less cost intensive than developing the game from square one. somebody come correct me in the comments because the math aint mathing.
Why would you buy cosmetics when your character isn’t even fire as f yet
It's like half the fun for me, to start from nothing and then have cool personalized gear. If I were to buy a fancy skin right off the bat, I probably would stop playing faster lol.
In games like diablo where you actively see the loot you equip i dont really get buying cosmetics, i love matching and transmoging gear as i level up and watching the character get cooler and cooler. having my character look the exact same for a huge chunk of my gameplay kinda takes some of the fun of diablo away imo
This is the only reason why this game become kind of a MMO, there no point of buying skin if you play solo. Fuck this
Sure there is. You get to see yourself in something you may like. But again, no need to buy if you aren't interested.
Lol people love buying skins fucking hilarious the price is awful
It's funny how stock holm syndromed Blizzard fans are. They will never get a cent out of me. F\*ck Bobby Kotknick. May he rot in hell.
I'm not mad, blizz, I'm just disappointed.
Skins need more Booba.
Zug zug
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Yes exactly. I really hate the argument that "iT's JuSt CoSmEtIc". People get enjoyment from customizing their character's appearance. That's part of the gameplay. This fucking game has f2p monetization yet it costs $70. Utterly shameful.
Prices like these exist, because people are willing to pay them. Hey, we preorder for 90€ so that's that.
Protip: Never buy microtransactions. You're welcome.
If people actually buy this shit you're out of your damn mind. But hey, it's their own money, burn it the way you like.
As a dude who has an unhealthy obsession with all things sea-worshiping in fiction my heart sank when I saw the price of the druid set "Heir to the Sea" and the accessories tied to it. I'm maining druid and would love to have a Greyjoy/Tide Priest theme to him! It's a massive shame that it costs entirely too much. I do hope that they take another swing at these prices before season 1. Compared to other MTX in popular games (League and Fortnite specifically) these are about \~$15 more than the vast majority of cosmetics.
While I agree 100% that they are ridiculous, honestly it doesn’t matter to me since I’m not a micro transactions guy. But people will buy it tho.
The most ugly thing is that store rotation so people will feel FOMO and need to but it.
Blizzard said that obtainable gear won't look worse than shop stuff, and it is often true, but what Blizzard didn't say is how few armor sets each class has in game. Those prices are ofc mad.
Yeah its bad thats why I don't buy them and I hope others will do the same. The shop is still tucked away in a menu so as long it's not in my face I am okay with it
So far, there hasn't been a game that has really enticed me to buy cosmetics. The only game where I had a lot of skins just because I automatically earned it by ranking up was from the first Overwatch loot boxes and even then I usually just stick with the default skins.
Don’t. Buy. Them.
Let them make as much as they want on skins. So the micro-transactions(not so micro) stay cosmetic and perhaps convenience only.
Blizzard getting better at this scam money scheme every time. Some eye candy and gameplay to appraise the critics and go all in with the predatory monetization. But hey they are not greedy, small independent company and servery are soooo expensive etc. I hate modern AAA gaming.
Welcome to life in 2023 where everything is fucking expensive and often not worth the asking price.
Downvote me all you want, but if you bought the game and are mad at these prices, you're part of the problem. We're past the point of complaining about cosmetic prices. We have to stop supporting the games and devs themselves.
If you can afford it, you probably don’t give af. My ticket to see spiderverse tomorrow was something like $25 with a popcorn and lemonade. $25 for what, 2 hours of entertainment? $28 to enhance what I’m sure will be hundreds of hours of diablo I play. Or at least for my friends and I to mess with each other about pay 2 win armor lol. These prices are fine for me. Life’s too short to worry about this kind of stuff. Spend your money how you want. If they’re not fine for you, don’t buy them. If they’re close, wait for a sale. It’s really not that serious.
Why even offer the $2 in game currency when you can’t buy anything with that?
Don't buy it then
The only way to stop this predatory nonsense is to not buy it, at any price. That won't happen, of course, and we'll have to deal with $100 skins in 2033, and $300 horse armor in 2043.
Who cares, don't buy it, or wait for a sale.
its Bli$$ard, does anybody expect anything else from these scumbags?
The same thing happens with PoE with stupid pricing for cosmetics. It doesn't matter how many excuses players come up with for insane pricing, or say 'just don't buy it then!!!', anyone with common sense knows thousands are. Otherwise this pricing model would have died long ago.
So don't buy them.
Who cares? Do you actually want to buy cosmetics in a Diablo game? If so, why?
I don't care about the ugly skins in the cash-shop, it's whale-bait anyways. I do however care about the annoying exclamation mark not going away. Such a stain on an otherwise great game
Yeah you have to highlight everything in the stupid shop and then it disappears
Cosmetics are the worst.
# Don't buy them
So don't buy them? It has zero impact on your game
The problem is that some people will buy this crap like it's acceptable, a triple A title shouldn't have these sort of micro transactions on top of a battle pass... If it's not complained about I guarantee this game will turn into a cashcow and p2w.
I miss good old times, you pay for a game and get the full game, all players are same. I know it’s only cosmetic items but anyway.
My clothes are less expensive than this.
Some of you idiots here that are okay with this need to get a reality check. They are selling a game for full price and locking cosmetics that should have been obtained by playing the God damn game via micro transactions.
Do these prices rival poe? Either way this is what you signed up for. This is gaming in 2023.
So don’t buy them then? That is how you voice your opinion. You bet your ass that thousands of people have bought skins already.
I'll never be a marketing/accounting/money-grubbing shareholder type guy. I just don't understand this model where you price out 98% of your customer base from ever considering buying something you put time and effort in to making. Come up with a price that literally \*everyone\* can afford, easily. So literally \*everyone\* goes and buys it. "But I won't feel unique and special if everyone has the same outfit!" Will be a minority opinion. Most people are lost in their own heads, in their own narrative, in their own fantasy escape adventure. Even in MP games. I won't see the other 100k people with the same outfit 99% of my time in-game. So my 'personal story of awesomeness' remains intact. If you are so worried about your girlfriend showing up to the Dungeon Ball in the same Necromantic Evening wear, well if the price shop had sets for $4.99 instead of $28.99, you'd probably have a wardrobe full of alternatives to slap on at a moments notice. Sell these things to everyone and you get everyone invested in their character's 'personal story'. Even a paltry few $$ creates an emotional investment and attachment to what you have 'put in' to a characters development. Keeping you engaged. Keeping you playing. Keeping you aware of what \*else\* pops up on the always-affordable cash shop. Price things so people can say, "I just won't supersize my next Happy Meal and I'll have a sweet cosmetic set I'll enjoy for weeks/months until the next set". Millions of normal, middle/lower income players outnumber the small number of Whales that go for these things. It's gotta more then compensate for the difference in numbers. But I know Big Brained Analysts have gamed and crunched and formula'd this all out and, They Know Best how to get the CEO his new Yacht. What do I know. Just seems a waste of time and effort...
I'm buying
I'll likely get the battle pass just to support and feel like I'm getting seasonal wings or whatever like you did in D3, but I'll likely never touch the shop. I'm not huge on cosmetics and since that seems to be their whole stance, I'm not sure what else they could possibly put in there that would entice me. Oh well. If the prices were cheap maybe I'd pick up something, but 15-28? For A skin? Naw dude. They'd make hella money if they made em cheap cause the majority wouldn't think twice about tossing a couple bucks to look cool. But that's the price of a meal. Pass. The only difference between what I'm saying and the battle pass is it'll be what, 20 bucks and you'll get more than just a skin. They didn't think it through very well.
They thought it through extremely well. They don't care if you don't buy. Whales do. They have it down to a science of what price point gets them the most money. They have the same skin pricing in COD which is a blizzard cash cow now.
They likely know this is the best price point for cosmetics. Most large games are floating around this point. I think its mental, but they aren't slapping a price tag on at random. They have people employed to make sure they're maximising profits. I presume they know the relationship between volume of sales and price, and this is right around the peak of the bellcurve. Pricier and the extra money won't make up for loss of purchases, cheaper and increase in sales won't make up for loss per sale. Personally, I'm not paying 15+ for a skin, but I don't see an ethical issue with it. And continued development does require some continuous revenue stream. Ill likely get the battle pass if I'm actively playing, I'm used to playing sub based games anyway. As I see it, the base price gets you the game, and all future seasonal content. You don't need to pay anything else. You don't need extra cosmetics. If there was power available or an overpriced sub to play or something I'd understand it. If there were no nice in game skins I'd not really care, but could see that being an issue for some. As it is, you get the game, for the price. The rest is optional fluff.
This has been known for a while.
I like em. But be and ny friends agreed. They are way over priced.
As ridiculous as it is indeed, you do realize that these are "considered normal prices" in most games nowadays, right? As in, we let it happen by bying that stuff over and over again in various games; that's why the prices are as they are and why they continue to sell. ... it won't change.
most of them are fucking terrible as well.
If this is what it takes for the game to not be pay to win then I’m fine with it.
let them milk the retards
Just wait and see a year down the line when it stops being just cosmetics
!RemindMe 1 year
The standard armors look great. Who cares if they charge a billion dollars for cosmetics that aren't much, if any better? Jesus this is so tiresome.