A short letter from someone who "never" pays for F2Ps

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
1

Yeah, I’m that guy.

This is probably just pissing in the wind, but since there’s at least one mod reading this forum I wanted to contribute my 2c before I make a decision about quitting.

I’ve played about 50 F2P games in my life, if I were to make a rough estimate.

This is the first F2P that successfully lured me into parting with cash. 2 x $4.99 boosters… yeah, I know, “hey big spender.” But I want to make the point that, as someone who has gamed for 30 years, I considered that a fair trade-off. I used the HP to buy slots for new chars. I was enjoying the game, 7 days gave me a reasonable shot to raise the HP necessary, and I could get by without having ‘as many’ characters if need be. This seemed fair. I could feel like I was paying or contributing to the game without “debasing” myself into the P2W trap. Maybe that’s delusional, but you sold me the idea to pay fro a free game. Kudos.

All this led me to feel I was being treated fairly as a gamer and so i rewarded the company in my own, small way. I’m not the kind of guy that is going to shell out $50-100 on a game like this, but let me reiterate: out of 50 or so F2P games, you were the ones that actually had a model that got money from me.

I also want to point out that I was getting bored of watching everyone spam Thor and Wolverine, and I applaud the changes that were made to rein in these characters and Ragnarok. Yes, you know you’re going to take flak for a decision like that as a developer, especially from the P2W crowd. And maybe rightfully so, to an extent, since no option to respec or compensation was offered. Still, the changes were communicated in advance, and by and large fair, and of a nature that improves the overall strategy of the game. Kudos to the devs for sticking to their guns here and finding a reasonable new balance. Kudos also to the excellent e-mail support I have received from your company. It’s been polite, courteous, and fast. I hope to date you’ guys have been making decent coin off this game.

To date.

The last week has sucked the fun out of the game for me. I’m not going to belabor any of these points, because they’re covered exhaustively elsewhere. I just want to offer perspective from someone you had miraculously convinced to pay, who isn’t going to pay any more.

-Setting up L230 battles for all the PvE fights, effectively making starting any of them boost dependent for anyone less than a high-level player, which in turn sucks away ISO, kills the joy of being able to build up characters over PvE. No HP at the end means we effectively squabble for a few covers–and the ratio is now off. After playing hard to top finishes in every tournament since xmas, I’m not pursuing this tourney any further.

-Compounding that, charging players HP for a boost that is critical under the current tournament structure, not communicating that change, and switching it over to an exorbitant HP cost (which many don’t even SEE at first) is a slap in the face of many of the players here. Doing so mid-tournament is spitting on them afterwards. You could have just removed rainbow boosts entirely, and the player base would have whined a bit and then eventually come to the conclusion that it was better for the overall game. But the HP change is such an evident cash grab it’s insulting. If the devs had consulted with the players, I’m sure there’s a dozen other ways vets would be willing to part with their hard-earned HP. Worse, paying for this boost tilts further towards P2W. Why not just take out the rainbows and improve the other boosts so they’re actually practical/useful?

-The culmination of these two items means that low-mid level players can no longer compete effectively with established players, who can win without boosts (albeit slower) and suck up the tourney cover wins. The alternative is to blow all your ISO on boosts, grind relentlessly, and rarely level characters. Or P2W, of course. Not much fun there.

-Hiding shielded players means the PvP side is also rapidly sliding towards P2W. I won’t even get into the PvP side of things because that ragemachine is already flaring elsewhere on the boards.

There is nothing left for those of us that want to chip in cash casually, rather than handing over our wallets. You’ve lost the balance. You had most of us on a terrific design leash (I admit it!) by releasing ever more new covers, having us chase them, and then putting out a new one, forcing us to upgrade slots and work to level them.

Again, it was a model that actually got me to part with cash.

This time, you’ve gotten greedy. I hope you see the light and reverse direction before your game (and player base) truly suffer.

sincerely,
qtquazar

2

I’ve spent …alot…and I feel the same way…

3

Quite a well put together post!

-Brutus

4

Thanks for writing all this. Too bad those who should will just look and not see, listen but not hear even if spot it. But you talk the position of many people in similar shoes.

And in some future someone else may actually learn and do better.

5

You Sir!

I am following this forum almost everyday just to read what’s happening and checking if there’s some new stuff out there. And today ‘‘YOU’’ made me register an account just to say: YES, you are definitely right and this is exactly how I feel. Nerfing and balancing all those stuff are acceptable but this is just pure greediness and nothing else. Making a critical buff only bought by HP is just … . Even they change this back to iso, I am no longer going to play cause they just made me puke from this game anymore. Thank you all the awesome devs or whoever is in charge of this ‘‘funny’’ decisions. Thanks!

6

Absolutely True

7

It’s funny because I have paid in the past, but over the last month everytime I think about spending money a new update comes out that totally changes my mind. I was more than happy with the Thor and wolverine change, I still think Thor’s yellow might be slightly over powered due to the sheer amount of green it can produce. But the stealth change to boosts is mind boggling, especially during this pve event where things can get out of control fast with mission levels.

8

Well said. I spent a little bit during the beginning because the game felt “honest” about its monetization and still kept a good balance. I think the major breaking point was Ragnarok (Woah, woah! I’m not complaining about the nerf. Don’t jump to conclusions) because for the first time, it caused players to doubt the decision to pay money for the first time. And in my experience, once you let doubt slither into the minds of your player base, it becomes a cancer that eats away at your game until there is nothing left. What once seemed to be slight changes warp into conspiracy theories coming to life before your eyes.

Well, if you want another F2P to try, I suggest Hearthstone. It’s damn good.

9

Well said.

10

Perhaps one of the ways for the dev to stop this from becoming a P2W game is to up the rewards significantly - instead of 20 ISO-8 for reward in PVE (if you repeat a mission and don’t get any of the remaining 3 out of 4 rewards), it becomes 50 ISO-8 and 10 HP, or something similar, just to balance back the game.

11

Gotta say I agree completely, but as I’ve posted elsewhere, the model is based on getting people to pay. The license has GOT to be super expensive. This game has been out for a while now, a pretty long time for the life cycle of a mobile game when you consider that except for a very small percentage, most mobile games come and go very very quickly. This recent move paying gold for boosts, along with the also recent move of adjusting the matchmaking to make shields essential to staying on top of the leaderboard then raising the price of them, and finally the proposed tax on skipping opponents in PVP, says to me that this game is not making enough money and the devs are desperate to get as much as they can from the small but dedicated player base that already exists. If the game becomes unplayable, I’ll be out the door, but I can live without boosts, and I can afford to drop a few bucks every couple of weeks for shields if I need to. I love the game and will support it to a reasonable extent. I’ll stick around and hope they get it right.

12

I just created a forum account for the sake of posting more or less the same content.. BUT YOU SAID IT BETTER. Thank you.