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originally posted in: Did the servers go down???
10/6/2016 3:06:30 PM
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Dropping shittier loot is not going to incentivize anyone to buy an emote nor a t shirt. If they make money off twitch streams then I'll give you that, but I actually still fail to see how they would make more from those streams if people were lower light (ignoring that the top streamers were all 386 the first week)
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  • If it takes people longer to level up then it will take them longer to complete the game. If it takes them longer to complete the game then they will both stream and watch streams for a longer period of time. People are far more likely to buy merchandise and in game micro transactions for a game they are actively playing. This is especially true for micro transactions that speed progression. People are also far more likely to buy cosmetic items if they are actively playing the game. If everyone reaches max level and completes the content a month after release then they are much less likely to continue playing. If they are no longer playing then there is zero chance that they will purchase cosmetic items. Extending the relevant life of a game is a major factor in how much the game will make. This is especially true for MMO ir MMO-lite type game.

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  • Track the earnings. It is unlikely that many players are buying emotes after the first month or 2, unless a particularly demanded emote comes out. Anybody who is in the market for buying an emote after 6 months was also in the market in the first 2 months, and would likely have bought that emote then. There is a fairly large percentage of the player base that does not play other games and played TTK till ROI came out and will continue till D2 comes out. Track the purchases made by those players, I would bet good money that 95% of their purchases come within 2-3 months of new content dropping. So the implication that bungie is "greedy" (as if that's a bad thing) and put effort into purposely extending gameplay in order to capitalize on another 5% of micro transaction earnings from a percentage of the player base that leaves the game, and the percentage of that base that cares about emotes, all of which are minimal compared to the earnings from the base product itself, as well as merch, is silly at best. I can imagine how that meeting went now. "How can we optimize profits this quarter" "Well the hard raid is coming out which will be great for the brand name, but our real source of revenue moving forward will be D2 so our game plan needs to be to market that product" "Forget that logic, let's damage our brand name by extending the grind, so that we can keep some players around that would have left, some of whom may care about emotes, a small % of the remaining haven't bought what they want. I figure we can add about .5% to our Q4 earnings report."

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  • Edited by contra_reality: 10/6/2016 4:15:24 PM
    Who says it's damaging their brand. They're doing nothing new. People who complain will complain about anything. It's a careful balance but the end goal is to remain relevant. If progression is too quick then you lose relevancy. If you lose relevancy then you reduce the chance that people buy the brand in the future. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, I'm just saying it's a common tactic to extend earnings and preserve the brand. Those who would be pissed off enough by loot to leave the brand have long since left, trust me. The large percentage you cite as playing ttk until the drop of RoI were plying to chase that illusive extra 1 or 2 light or that one exotic that wouldn't drop. Plus you are assuming all micro transaction items were available the first 2 months. This us clearly not the case. In fact, Bungie didn't implement the whole micro transactions thing until month 2 of TTK. Bungie releases new emotes and cosmetic items on a regular basis. Nobody would purchase any of these if they are no longer playing the game since they've completed all there is to complete. Yes, most purchases of anything are within the first few weeks of release but not all items release at the same time. It is much easier to market D2 when people are still playing D1.3. Extending play time, either through content or artificial means (slow progression), accomplishes this goal. This and they can easily increase loot later to garner good faith with the many in the community with short memories. They've done it before, there is no reason they won't do it again. Bungie benefits from being pretty much the only game in this genre, there is no true alternative. Nobody else offers the same mix of shooter with rpg elements. Plus, look at the past. Artificially extending play time to remain relevant is a strategy that Bungie commonly employs. In TTK, they time gated exotics. They time gated challenges. They introduced an extra layer of RNG over the previous layers of RNG (randomized light on gear on top of the already in place layers of drop and perks). They got rid of loot caves. They introduced vanguard/crucible marks only obtainable from level up. All of these moves and many more had the same goal in mind, extend play time to retain relevancy.

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