I did not really pay much attention to Star Wars: The Old Republic’s booth when I was at Gamescom 2012, with a feeling that the game is on a rapid downfall after failing to live up to expectations. However, fan site SWTOR Life held an interview with Jeff Hickman, the new Executive Producer of the game. And he mentioned what was in this post’s title…Q: The major question about F2P; when any F2P project is announced or talked about is what’s gonna be in the cash shop? Lets just put this question out there in as plain and as simple form as possible. What’s your stance on Pay to Win?
A: Pay to win is not something that we like. I don’t want to unbalance the game by putting things out on the store that somebody can walk in on day one, buy and be the winner. Having said that, there will be some things that we put out in the store that do enhance power value in some way, but not at the top end. Trying to think of a good example. We may put a medium level blue piece of armor on the cash shop for example.
We might do that. We haven’t decided and we’re still talking about this, but it’s one of those things it is like … most players will have something better than this anyway, but if you don’t here’s the way that you can get a leg up to at least make you equal with the normal players. That is kind of where our thinking is at, but we are still discussing it. But we do not believe in Pay to Win.
I am not sure if this is a good choice, since even Asian games are mostly against selling items with stats in recent years. Yes, Dragon Nest may have costumes with stats, but they did not have the popularity or budget like Star Wars: The Old Republic had.
Lord of the Rings Online is doing the same thing and supposedly earning big bucks, but who else is talking about the game other than the hardcore fans? From a supposed World of Warcraft killer to selling items with stats for pure cash? I wouldn’t be surprised if EA Bioware decided to have a real cash option house soon, like what Diablo III is having.
