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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBreakfast Topic: Will you buy the new in-game pets?
by Adam Holisky 
Nov 5th 2009 at 8:00AM
This firmly brings WoW into the arena of microtransactions -- purchasing in-game items for real life money. Some games, not WoW, allow you purchase items which make you stronger in the game. Other games, like WoW, allow the purchase of vanity items, such as these pets, which do nothing other than look cool or count towards vanity achievements. Some people really don't like this model of gaming, others are indifferent, and others are in love with it.
I'm personally in love with it. I think the items are cheap enough to be affordable to a large portion of the player base, and are cool enough to warrant the purchase. Further, since the items don't provide in-game power ups for people, they are essentially meaningless toys. This makes it an ideal luxury item for the virtual-nerd to spend $10 on. So will I buy the new in-game pets? Absolutely, I already have.
But what will you do? Are you going to go out and buy them? Vote in the poll and leave a comment, we want to know.
| Yes. | |
|---|---|
| No. | |
| This is the third sign of the apocalypse. |
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Breakfast Topics
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 10)
Bionic Radd Nov 5th 2009 8:20AM
not gonna say I won't buy them, but I don't know that I actually will, either. Are the pets BoA? That might be a bit more acceptable, to me. I hate the fact that the TCG items are tied to one character. If I ever get sick of my main, my Nether-Rocket Extreme is wasted.
Vitos Nov 5th 2009 8:38AM
You get them on all characters on the account and any new characters you may create on that same account.
Koukalaka Nov 5th 2009 8:21AM
Buying them as a christmas present for an irl friend, personally I think it's nice as they are cheaper than trading card game vanity items and people like them so.
If it came to the point where the store was selling 50+ pets/mounts/tabards etc then I think it would become a problem but if they keep the stock small and focus on pets mostly then I think its perfectly fine and its a cheap birthday/christmas present :D.
Andrew R. Nov 5th 2009 8:23AM
It costs no extra money to make these pets. The money from BOTH pets should be going to charity. At the very least donate 100% of the proceeds to charity until say Cataclysm comes out or into 2010. If you can't do that then donate half the profit of the pets to charity.
I'll donate to make a wish directly.
peagle Nov 5th 2009 8:48AM
Yep you're right. No programming time, or artists time, animators time, QA time, installation time or implementation time at all. Their developers merely yell "pandaren" at the screen and science does the rest.
JR Nov 5th 2009 10:06AM
I don't understand why people distort this argument like this. Yes, the item cost money to be created, but after the model and animations are ready ADDITIONAL COPIES can be created for virtually no cost. And the pets are already sitting in your hard drive anyway, whether you bought them or not. Blizzard only needs to write in some data file that you can now use them. Don't pretend you don't understand this in order to use your sarcasm.
(I'm not saying that I agree with this argument, I'm just trying to make people see that it's a valid argument.)
Jon Do Nov 5th 2009 10:49AM
Yeah, it cost development time.
But I was under the obviously mistaken impression that my subscription fee paid for development and gave me access to in-game content.
Silly me.
emberdione Nov 5th 2009 2:41PM
You honestly think they have the same people working on pets as they do bosses for ICC?
Your sub pays the PUBLISHER, Activision. They pay a CUT (not the entire thing by many measure) to Blizzard to keep working. Blizzard has to hire *someone* at 80-100K a year to model, texture, rig, animate, effect, sound, engineer these little guys. Probably several someones.
Also as far as "content"... you paid for dungeons, talents, dailies, gear, professions, zones, effects, etc etc etc. If they started charging for that, I would agree. Otherwise, they are just selling a bonus, that ISN'T needed to play or adds anything other than a critter following you around, and you can get 100 of those free.
Carver Nov 5th 2009 8:23AM
I will, once the Blizzard store starts working again. They are "unable to process your transaction at this time," which I assume is because there was too much demand for the store to handle.
Keveline Nov 5th 2009 9:01AM
Not only no, but hell no.
If they offered something useful, like a BoA Dagger of Ultimate Warlock Slaying, that I might consider, but not a pet.
Zodiac Nov 5th 2009 8:27AM
I find myself with a dilemma on my hands. On the one side, "Lil' K.T. has a diabolical laugh and wields true power at his bony fingertips, randomly wreaking icy havoc on critters who dare to cross his path." That could lead to hours of fun, just watching my pet messing with critters. And the Panderan Monk benefitting the Make-A-Wish foundation is just great. But $10 is really quite steep, even for something that will be a pet on your FUTURE characters. Then again, I did shell out the $25 to move my main character to the realm I was playing on more. And again for my wife's character. Hmm, Blizzard just knows what we're willing to do for the game, don't they? Damn, evil geniuses and their moneymaking tactics. (sigh) and we'll probably get them anyway too. Too bad 'Lil K.T. doesn't support a charity, since that's the one I'm more certain to purchase.
DarkChaotix Nov 5th 2009 9:03AM
I probably would have bought both of the pets by now, if it wasn't for the cost. $10 is a bit steep, but then y'know, I live in the UK, so would have to pay £9. It's a bit of a jip that the people in the EU have to pay more, despite it only being a few pounds, I mean, it's an online transaction, there is no reason for us to have pay more...
Sinnh Nov 5th 2009 8:29AM
i just wish all the proceeds went to charity, then i would definitely buy them, no questions asked.
but paying to inflate blizz salaries even more? lame
i'm debating whether to at least get the panda one, for the make a wish foundation. but it does feel like a waste of money otherwise.
Kittens Nov 5th 2009 8:31AM
As a pet collector I couldn't help myself and purchased both of them. And they are both absolutely AWESOME..! :D
However, I really hope that not all the recently datamined pets (like the corehound pup, gryphon hatchling etc) will end up coming from this store.. I don't mind buying, one, two or even three of them, but at €10 each it's gonna be overly expensive to spend more imo. I would rather see them purchasable ingame through achievements or gold.
Genom359 Nov 5th 2009 8:31AM
Yay! Only 2 comments with the phrase "slippery slope" so far... Everyone's opinion is valuable, but it's not valued as much if you just end up spouting the same exact thing, with same exact phrase as everyone else.
The pets are nice, scary implications for WoW's future, unprecedented etc. etc. etc.
EpsilonDXIII Nov 5th 2009 8:55AM
Bought both! Lil' K.T is definitely one of the most detailed pets i've seen in the game so far.
Plus for the Pandaren Monk you donate to charity which is a nice gesture for the holidays! :)
Vagrant Nov 5th 2009 8:31AM
bought em both, i am a sucker for these kind of things, and bought em from work so can't wait to get home and pop them out as we gather for a raid.
I agree though that they should just made both of them offer 50% of the money to charity. Though they DO cost blizzard money, maybe not directly per copy of the pet but at some point you payed the guy who designed and animated these pets, whom could have been doing other stuff, but still, I reckon they can pay a guy for a week or two and not go bankrupt. SO give those charities some cash! Makes me feel better for buying a bunch of pixels and i get to clear my conscience again towards all the lesser fortunate folks!
espercrusader Nov 5th 2009 8:34AM
I don't see why people are heralding this as the end of the world (of Warcraft). It's not like Blizzard hasn't sold in-game pets for real-life money before. Look at Blizzcon. Look at the arena pet Murkimus. Heck, look at the TRADING CARD GAME LOOT CARDS. This is nothing new and I find great amusement in seeing people herald it as the apocalypse especially when they have TCG or Blizzcon items... that they often brag about.
Linden Nov 5th 2009 9:20AM
The difference is in those cases the vanity items were extras from something else. You go to blizzcon wouldn't it be cool to show it off in game, you play the TCG hey look you've got something for the game from it. In this case it's more: "here's something a designer knocked up over lunch time, we gave it some dev time now let's sell it".
And I really would be surprised if this is something they spent a lot of time on, once you have the models (both pandarian and KT are existing models) its a few hours of sound design and a few hours of animation. I wouldn't be surprised if this is something one of the designers made between actual work that someone picked up on and liked.
Ironbender Nov 5th 2009 8:35AM
Hi,
I would too buy a pet. But I have a problem with the microtransactions this way. Character customisation is one thing, but nobody thinks about the kids or even adults that don't have $10 left to spend on a in-game pet. I mean sure $10 isn't that much, but if you are a 10 year old kid you are already happy you can pay the monthly fea to play the game.
How unfair is this for players that just don't have the money for it. WoW and other MMORPG's also always have been about a fantasy world. Somewhere the normal world rules don't apply.
With this bridge of microtransactions, this will come to an end. The people with lots of money (real money) to spare will be the cool ones as for the people that can't spend those dollars, they are left behind. A capitalit way of saying thanks to al those players that scraped the monthly fea together for the last couple of years.
Wat's next? Mounts yeah, but what then, after al the non vanity stuf is in store. The real gear will be added. So people can just buy a nice teer-set. Right, then it's even more easy then it's already is for the easy rider to come to end-game raids and just tank and spank their way through the game. All tactics will go down the drain even more so then they already go with the easy to get gear from the tournament-event.
Well my two cents.... hope the "make-a-wish" foundation gets a lot of donations with this. They deserve it.
Iron