ESO is on sale for 50% off on Steam this weekend

[Hero in a half shell]

They implemented a new (apparently untested because they were never in beta) race that was locked behind a pay-wall, and implemented the much requested feature of being able to play any race in any faction...also locked behind a pay-wall.

Wait... I knew they had microtransactioned the prebuy bonuses of horse and Imperial, but have they really put the ability to unlock any race for any faction behind the microtransaction paywall as well?!?

Pay the cost of an up front AAA title, pay a WOW MMO subscription fee to continue playing past the first month, then pay to access paywalled options like a F2P microtransaction game.

Screw that. Screw that completely.

 

[DEAD34345]

I'll just wait for the other 50% to be chopped off the price, thanks.
[sub]And for the subscription fee to be dropped.[/sub]
[sub]Then I'll see if I can be bothered downloading a file that large...[/sub]

Never has a MMO failed quite so predictably. I honestly can't imagine what was going through the heads of the people who made the decision to create it, and to create it like this. They had so many examples of people doing the exact same thing and crashing hard, but they went and did it anyway. I just hope this will be the last one, but somehow I doubt it.

 

[Silvanus]

An MMO's subscription fee is typically on the order of a fancy sandwich and a cup of coffee per month.

If that's a significant portion of your paycheque, the reason you shouldn't be playing an MMO has a lot less to do with money and more to do with the fact that you should probably dedicate that time to job hunting instead.

$14.99 is a pretty hefty sandwich.

Admittedly, I should have gone longer-term for a better illustration. Play the game for a year, and you'll have spent $239.88 on playing a single game. I can imagine it encouraging commitment, though mostly because players will feel they've invested too much to quit. It strikes me as a particularly depressing model.

 

[plus2exp]

If somebody is willing to spend a significant portion of their paycheque every damn month in order to keep playing a game, then the initial pricetag is not going to be their primary barrier.

The initial price actually was my primary barrier. The monthly subscription doesn't bother me at all. I've been playing MMOs since the launch of Everquest, so I accepted the monthly payments long ago. Plopping down $60 dollars, or more for the Imperial Edition, for an MMO that doesn't even offer a free trial to see if I'll enjoy it though? I won't do that. In that situation, I'll always wait for a sale.

 

[Maxtro]

Eh, I'd say that ESO is at least worth checking out for a month at the $30 price point. Don't forget that you do get 30 days free.

If one is curious, my suggestion is to immediately cancel the recurring payment and then just play the game for a month. That's what I did when the game first came out.

I may resub again for one month when the next content pack comes out in August.

 

[duwenbasden]

I'll comeback when the 50% off also applies to the sub. I am not demanding everything be F2P, but $15/month for maybe 68 hours max playtime per month is asking too much.