The fatal flaw with the current business model.

[xparasite9]

At the same time, you don't deny that it is the truth.

Didn't I? I thought I did.
Either I'm really terrible at getting my point across or you have bad reading comprehension.

[Zerard]

Didn't I? I thought I did.
Either I'm really terrible at getting my point across or you have bad reading comprehension.

I read through your post. I really did. But I could not find where you said MapleStory isn't kept afloat by pumping money into cubes and the like. And even if you did, it's laughable.

[xparasite9]

I read through your post. I really did. But I could not find where you said MapleStory isn't kept alive by pumping money into cubes and the like.

Oh that's where the problem happened. See, look again. I mentioned people thinking they are the only reason MapleStory is still running, and that their exorbitant spending is a altruistic favor to us all.

[Zerard]

Oh that's where the problem happened. See, look again. I mentioned people thinking they are the only reason MapleStory is still running, and that their exorbitant spending is a altruistic favor to us all.

You think that it isn't the bulk of the money? Really? There are players literally spending thousands on this game.

If you want to think that Maple is magically kept afloat by advertisements alone... Go ahead?

[xparasite9]

You think that it isn't the bulk of the money? Really?

Yeah it is now that thousands of small spenders quit.
but I'd even hazard to say that Nexon's making less money now because of it.

You think that it isn't the bulk of the money? Really? There are players literally spending thousands on this game.

and there are literally tens of thousands of people who got fed up with Nexon's bullpomegranate and stopped spending.

If you want to think that Maple is magically kept afloat by advertisements alone... Go ahead?

If you want to just cherrypick through the things I say and single out supplemental revenue as an argument for the only source of revenue (an argument I never made), and ignore all the aesthetic "virtual goods" as a legitimate, ethical business model that has had no problems being successful for MapleStory.....Go ahead?

[Zerard]

Yeah it is now that thousands of small spenders quit.
but I'd even hazard to say that Nexon's making less money now because of it.


and there are literally tens of thousands of people who got fed up with Nexon's bullpomegranate and stopped spending.

And at the same time, what's to say that new ones don't come to take their place? Who's to say people aren't spending more? Population doesn't really indicate much.

I really don't feel like arguing, especially with someone who isn't willing to see the other's point of view. I honestly regret even saying anything.

[xparasite9]

I really don't feel like arguing, especially with someone who isn't willing to see the other's point of view. I honestly regret even saying anything.

But that's exactly what you've been doing. Arguing with me, unwilling to see my point of view.

[Zerard]

But that's exactly what you've been doing. Arguing with me, unwilling to see my point of view.

Have I? I don't think I have. I've been listening to you, but just because I don't agree with you, doesn't mean I'm unwilling to hear you out. Your thesis does not really convince me, and well... your attitude really isn't helping. You claim that I 'cherrypick', and then you proceed to pick out the one or two statements at the end that aren't even really relevant in the post above. I will admit that I have thrown that one remark in, but at this point, I already just really don't feel like going on.

Your typical argument on the internet. Two sides argue their points. Neither side complies. In the end, nothing is accomplished (other than wasting time).

What little interest I had in this thread has come and went. You're free to reply, but I honestly don't care to respond. Though I will be mindful in the future. There are many ways to use my time, and I would prefer not to spend it playing a verbal game of tennis.

[xparasite9]

My point isn't that people spending thousands of dollars on this game is killing it. MapleStory did just fine without all its pay-to-win crap, and more players spent money then. There was also nothing stopping anyone from dropping thousands of dollars on the game back then anyway.

The point I have been trying to make is Nexon is not wisely monetizing the game. There's been a lot of missed and wasted opportunities (in the form of selling aesthetic enhancements) because they only know cubes.

[ZeekFox]

Unfortunately, I guess we can't really know Nexon's full balance sheet. I would think that thousands of players spending $25 each to look cooler would be better than a dozen of players spending thousands to be #1, but there's no real way to know exactly how many "I'd pay $25 if it weren't for Nexon's horrible pay2win system" players actually exist. Obviously, the cube system has brought them some profit (at least in the short term) because they stuck with it and kept expanding on and pushing it.

But Nexon is really stretching it. We know that the more the system becomes pay2win, the fewer people are willing to invest at all. And theoretically, they're past the tipping point where they need to back it off and reach out to the "I just want to pay a little bit to look cute" crowd who otherwise gets turned off by BUY CUBES BUY CUBES OMG BETTER STATS HIGHER ODDS SALE BUY NOW (but still $10 worth of cubing most likely doesn't get you any higher than the 6% stat you could possibly achieve without cubing).

And I honestly do think the mild spending, anti-pay2win crowd counts a lot more than people realize. Why? Because when someone leaves and/or swears off NX, nobody notices. Even if the person makes a big deal out of it and tries to start a boycott (which will get deleted from all the popular Maple Story sites, especially Nexon's own site), people laugh them off and be like "yeah it won't work lol noob". Yet, whenever someone posts 400% stat, 15-star's a tyrant equip, or +10's a weapon with Pinnacle Scrolls, suddenly it's a big deal. Then people make 10 page topics filled with a mixture of disgust at the spending, defending of "they can use their money however they want", complaints about Nexon's pay2win, "omg u jelly bro?", etc. The result? We constantly see and hear about the, oh, thirty people who have nearly limitless wallets and a drive to be #1 at any cost, but then the thousands of people who quit and don't spend ten bucks on the game are totally overlooked and not given a second thought.

[iSeeTheLightsDimmingToo]

I completely agree with xparasite9's original post. This game in just the past year has become increasingly pay2win. The nearly non-stop release of newer and better superior gear that is basically only obtainable via Cash Shop purchases, the DRAMATIC increase in damage required to participate in higher end bosses (who needs Dojo Gloves if you can actually complete Dojo at this point?), and with the huge increase in availability of Unique tier we should expect another tier for cubing to be added soon enough. The issue is they are trying to create an unending race to be better, fueling competition over community. To those of you that argue "it's a Free2Play game" you are entirely correct. You are there to buy the scraps, fuel an economy for the Pay2Win crowd, and take up space and provide more people to show off to. You can compete in this game without spending a dime, but it will take either a LOT of time, a LOT of merching, or a LOT of exploiting (events, hacking, etc.). With regard to merching, the more cut-throat you are the better off you will be. If you have the time, patience, and selfishness to stand outside in the FM and yell "B> [A] Nebs 20m - Chaos 2m - AEE 5m" etc all day, god bless you.

There is a growing distance from top tier players, middle tier, and lower tier. We are losing our middle class. More and more people are walking away from this game than joining. Casual gamers are great, but they are limited in how much they can contribute to the community as a whole. The game needs diversity, in all respects, and I feel that is disappearing. Nexon treats customers like numbers, taking ridiculous amounts of time to correct issues or declaring issues as intended to avoid the hassle of fixing it.

The problem I find personally is this. If I want to even keep pace with people, you must play constantly and/or spend NX. If I want to get further ahead, I need to exploit events, the more the better and/or spending a lot of NX. Frankly, it gets exhausting. I truly hope things change for the better. For everyone's sake.

[Words]

There is a growing distance from top tier players, middle tier, and lower tier. We are losing our middle class. More and more people are walking away from this game than joining. Casual gamers are great, but they are limited in how much they can contribute to the community as a whole. The game needs diversity, in all respects, and I feel that is disappearing. Nexon treats customers like numbers, taking ridiculous amounts of time to correct issues or declaring issues as intended to avoid the hassle of fixing it.

That's the exact reason why I quit a couple months back. I didn't mind spending a bit every now and then in order to get better range, but I had set myself a limit. I reached my limit and a range that most people can't get. I was able to solo some bosses, up to normal HT which took me about 1hour or so. And you see where this is going, despite being above average spender I couldn't even dream of CHT, PB or even Empress. Most of my friends had range lower than me, and unless you're close to heavy spenders, they are usually pineappleing morons.

What's the point then? I could solo Zak and 1 or 2 RA bosses to help friends get stuff, but other than I had to solo everything (because no one but me could survive czak or stuff like that) or... nothing because you can't do much else unless you're a heavy spender. It's not only the middle class disappearing, but the abysmal gap between the people who plays for free and those who spend. If only people who don't spend could at least survive bosses, the game would be much more entertaining.

Oh, and skill books. Those things piss the pineapple out of me and makes me want to kill every person in the world. How can anyone believe that skill system is reasonable? Game being retarded =/= game being hard.


EDIT: I don't even know why I'm posting here . Such a pointless thread.

[Jamesie]

We also recently received an update to our chat messenger system, and one of the included features are little icons you can include in your messages. A wise and profitable decision would have been to have all or most of these icons as Cash Shop exclusives, but once again, Nexon is not wise, and knows only one thing:

Spoiler

Nexon may have people spending thousands of dollars cubing items, but how many people actually do that? Fifty? How many people has Nexon driven away that would spend ten dollars every three months? How much less ad revenue does Nexon collect because fewer people are around to see the ads?

I don't think Guild BBS emoticons or the other general emoticons are big profit-drivers (I don't think I've ever seen anyone use a Guild BBS thing that wasn't free) for Nexon so I doubt that it would actually be a very good decision to have integrated them into the Cash Shop.

[iSeeTheLightsDimmingToo]

I don't think Guild BBS emoticons or the other general emoticons are big profit-drivers (I don't think I've ever seen anyone use a Guild BBS thing that wasn't free) for Nexon so I doubt that it would actually be a very good decision to have integrated them into the Cash Shop.

I totally agree with what you are saying regarding the guild BBS emoticons. Maybe xparasite9 simply had not expanded upon their thought completely, for example charging a mere 300nx instead of 1800nx or whatever guild emoticons cost (I don't even use the ones I got for free to be honest lol). Sometimes I feel Nexon places unrealistic prices on items like the 15,000 NX for a White Awakening Stamp found in some of the cube packages.

My idea for Nexon to raise revenue would be to generally lower the cost of most items, increase the chances of tier upgrades via cubes while eliminating some of the nonsense pot lines, increase the diversity of perm NX and do so on a more frequent basis (how about a star ring that is something other than Lemon and Peach?), have less 90%off massive abuse sales and more 40% off sales instead, have a more efficient and reliable NX survey system for those without access or desire to spend real money (if company's will give you things for a "like" on Facebook, I'm sure they could give you something for Maplestory that doesn't involve spyware, bugs, non-payment, and other BS).

I also feel the rewards should be better in general for those spending NX on random reward systems like Gach, vials, Marvel, etc. When I see "Some lucky person just received [C] % Critical Nebulite from Marvel, i just shake my head. And one final improvement, make sets like the Japanese sets more enticing. The set is entirely too top-heavy and untradeable until PSoK'd (even if you win it, which is borderline stupid). They should at least give you a coupon that allows you to pick the set you receive (a random piece from that set even) so you have a higher probability of being able to use it without further spending (because you can't even trade it within the account without NX).

[VirgilDiablo]

as far as business is concerned, there is no flaw. idk if you've noticed, but nexon is a multi-billion dollar corporation. that's billions. pineappleing BILLIONS of dollars. aka when numbers start to get so big they start sounding made up. the hardcore players buy cubes and other item upgrades. casual players buy 2x, gacha, pets, and other quality of life improvements. and a large percentage of the overall player base loves to buy cosmetic items. nexon doesn't just make their money off a gamble offered to the player, a lot of what is offered are digitally tangible goods where you know exactly what you're going to get. sure, they make a lot of money off of lottery items. but compare that to everything else in the cash shop that players buy, and it's hardly enough to cause enough of a backlash to kill the game/nexon/whatever you're insinuating. the only issue with maplestory is that it's free to play. everything else is a symptom

[ZeekFox]

What's the point then? I could solo Zak and 1 or 2 RA bosses to help friends get stuff, but other than I had to solo everything (because no one but me could survive czak or stuff like that) or... nothing because you can't do much else unless you're a heavy spender. It's not only the middle class disappearing, but the abysmal gap between the people who plays for free and those who spend. If only people who don't spend could at least survive bosses, the game would be much more entertaining

The pay2win model really destroyed the whole "teamwork" thing, which took a big chunk out of the game. It used to be that regular Zakum was fun because you needed manpower. The people who were driven to be the best would set up and run bossing groups that other people could join. So as long as you put some effort into your character, you might be good enough to get in on that. After all, you still did 50-70% of the damage that those super motivated top players were doing if you leveled up at least enough to max your 3rd job skills.

But now, rather than just enlist the help of a dozen other players, people just pay to gear up. And if $10,000 players still need help, they seek out other super-funded people to help out. Because, you know, if 20m a line only kills half a boss within the time limit, what good is some "middle of the road" player's 400K a line going to do? And as for bosses that are hard but not extreme, those funded people can kill them easily and sell the drops at a low enough price so it isn't worth the time and effort to get a group of 15-20 people and spend half an hour killing it as a group. Plus, who would bother organizing a large "Czak for players with 99K or less max range" run when all the motivated players have a higher range?

[KhainiWest]

as far as business is concerned, there is no flaw. idk if you've noticed, but nexon is a multi-billion dollar corporation. that's billions. pineappleing BILLIONS of dollars. aka when numbers start to get so big they start sounding made up. the hardcore players buy cubes and other item upgrades. casual players buy 2x, gacha, pets, and other quality of life improvements. and a large percentage of the overall player base loves to buy cosmetic items. nexon doesn't just make their money off a gamble offered to the player, a lot of what is offered are digitally tangible goods where you know exactly what you're going to get. sure, they make a lot of money off of lottery items. but compare that to everything else in the cash shop that players buy, and it's hardly enough to cause enough of a backlash to kill the game/nexon/whatever you're insinuating. the only issue with maplestory is that it's free to play. everything else is a symptom

You need to learn the difference between net income and profit.

[xparasite9]

I don't think Guild BBS emoticons or the other general emoticons are big profit-drivers (I don't think I've ever seen anyone use a Guild BBS thing that wasn't free) for Nexon so I doubt that it would actually be a very good decision to have integrated them into the Cash Shop.

Of course, hardly anyone buys the Guild BBS icons because they are what, 16x16 pixels? They are largely unnoticed, hardly influential, and certainly not worth the price for which they are offered. Maybe if it was a permanent thing or something you could buy for the whole guild, but not individually for 90 days.

I'm pretty sure people would buy aesthetic changes to their Evolution Systems (maybe not for the BGM since they can just substitute their own music with windows media player).
I'm also pretty sure there are people who would pay for the privilege of being able to spam this in the new chat function.

[Jamesie]

Of course, hardly anyone buys the Guild BBS icons because they are what, 16x16 pixels? They are largely unnoticed, hardly influential, and certainly not worth the price for which they are offered. Maybe if it was a permanent thing or something you could buy for the whole guild, but not individually for 90 days.

I'm pretty sure people would buy aesthetic changes to their Evolution Systems (maybe not for the BGM since they can just substitute their own music with windows media player).
I'm also pretty sure there are people who would pay for the privilege of being able to spam this in the new chat function.

I've only seen people afk for Likeability in the new messenger. And while there may be people who pay for it, it doesn't mean it's sustainable. Plenty of people I know, and probably the majority of players, would opt out of buying the little emote things, or whatever you'd want to call them.

[Zerard]

Oh, and skill books. Those things piss the pineapple out of me and makes me want to kill every person in the world. How can anyone believe that skill system is reasonable? Game being retarded =/= game being hard.

It makes me glad they're getting rid of that retarded system when RED hits. No one thought they were a good idea, and I'm surprised it stuck around for as long as it did.