My humble opinion on Nexon's path.

[Polantaris]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but back in the day (see: circa 2007), Nexon predominately offered visual enhancements in the Cash Shop, with some non-game-breaking perks (pets, etc.). As far as I know, they made enough money back then to keep the game afloat.

Why the polarized change? It seems as though, as others have said, the Cash Shop is now full of power-enhancing items.

They didn't have a pool of money. Who doesn't want a pool of money?

[Curtiss]

They didn't have a pool of money. Who doesn't want a pool of money?

I want a mountain of it.

As for the actual quote at hand it could have been a change in management, they might not have had enough to keep afloat for longer or they just wanted more money. The second one is quite plausible given that a much smaller game I know of had servers that took $500,000 a month to maintain and as optimistic as we'd like to be on our cosmetic investments that really wouldn't have been enough.

[Polantaris]

I want a mountain of it.

As for the actual quote at hand it could have been a change in management, they might not have had enough to keep afloat for longer or they just wanted more money. The second one is quite plausible given that a much smaller game I know of had servers that took $500,000 a month to maintain and as optimistic as we'd like to be on our cosmetic investments that really wouldn't have been enough.

I find it interesting to note that games like Guild Wars 1/2, which is essentially F2P (It's B2P, but that's pretty close to F2P in my opinion, with just an initial payment) can keep their servers up with a mostly Cosmetic Cash Shop. Sure, they have that initial payment from each player, but I doubt that goes very far in the long run.

Really, I think it all has to do with population, player interest, and overall view of the host from the players. When I payed for items in the GW2 Cash Shop, I did it mostly to support the developers. Most of the items in the Cash Shop are obtainable in the game with some grinding, I have no need or real reason to buy unless I want to.

But here, on MapleStory, you are REQUIRED to pay. You will get no where unless you do. Hell, even after paying much more on MS over my lifetime on the game than I ever have or ever will on GW, I still can't even do HALF of the game's bosses.

If MS was having issues with keeping monthly payments up, they were doing something wrong. I do have to say that they were smart in then appealing to the thing most players want, to be stronger, but they did it in such a massive amount that it ruined the integrity of the game.

I have no issue with paying for power, if it's a power you can obtain in the game normally through some effort. I don't mind EXP, Gold/Meso, Drop, etc. increases. Time is money, after all. The most serious issue with cubes is that, before Unlimited, you can not get them without paying, and they're not cheap. Even after Unlimited, you cannot get past a certain level of Potential and you can also be punished for using them. It's paying for power in the worst possible way. It's not built so that you can choose to pay, but you have to pay, and when you hit that point you were better off either dying with dignity or just making the game Pay to Play, because that's essentially what it is in a much more massive, expensive way.

[Curtiss]

I would prefer that model too where the Cash Shop only makes your progress faster and slightly more powerful instead of making you a veritable god. In a sense, this game's popularity might have ruined it since such a rip off model would have had difficulty surviving for long in Korea and if players had voted with their feet then we might have seen a very different game today.

[SaptaZapta]

It does seem kind of dumb that they make us pay for more character slots when we already have all these limitations in place to earn them more money when people create new characters. The most obvious being the lack of shared CS inventories, and Sharing Tags + SoKs. For Kanna I suppose they were hoping people would spend money to buff up their mains using her link skill. Still a pretty narrow target demographic, though...unless I'm sorely underestimating the population of hardcore spenders and damage mongers playing, heh.

Actually, if one is willing to pay for damage at all (not just "hardcore"), $5.5 for a guaranteed 10% damage increase is absolutely the best deal going. $5.5 worth of cubes is unlikely to get you even a 3% mainstat boost.

As for this "new policy" of no free slots, I refer you all to my signature:

When NexonNA import a class from KMS, they import the free slot, as well as the Unique 3rd-tier hat and level 80 weapon, and the event shop with books, just as KMS had it. Kanna and Hayato were imported from JMS, complete with no free slot (but a max slot increase to 24), unpotted level 50 hat and no weapon, and event shop without books.
It's not a new money-grabbing scheme, it's just NexonNA being NexonNA and copy-pasta'ing everything. Did you notice that since Kanna patch, our Root Abyss bosses started dropping Silent Crusade coins? (Maybe other bosses too, idk) Not that that has anything to do with Kanna, it just got copied in willy-nilly.

So, I believe that when we get Demon Avenger and Xenon, things will go back to KMS style, with free slots and Unique gear. (But do feel free to congratulate yourselves when that happens, and believe it wouldn't have if we hadn't protested).

[Polantaris]

Actually, if one is willing to pay for damage at all (not just "hardcore"), $5.5 for a guaranteed 10% damage increase is absolutely the best deal going. $5.5 worth of cubes is unlikely to get you even a 3% mainstat boost.

As for this "new policy" of no free slots, I refer you all to my signature:

When NexonNA import a class from KMS, they import the free slot, as well as the Unique 3rd-tier hat and level 80 weapon, and the event shop with books, just as KMS had it. Kanna and Hayato were imported from JMS, complete with no free slot (but a max slot increase to 24), unpotted level 50 hat and no weapon, and event shop without books.
It's not a new money-grabbing scheme, it's just NexonNA being NexonNA and copy-pasta'ing everything. Did you notice that since Kanna patch, our Root Abyss bosses started dropping Silent Crusade coins? (Maybe other bosses too, idk) Not that that has anything to do with Kanna, it just got copied in willy-nilly.

So, I believe that when we get Demon Avenger and Xenon, things will go back to KMS style, with free slots and Unique gear. (But do feel free to congratulate yourselves when that happens, and believe it wouldn't have if we hadn't protested).

Uhm, JMS gave character slots when they released Hayato and Kanna. I wouldn't have been able to make either without them myself.

[SaptaZapta]

Uhm, JMS gave character slots when they released Hayato and Kanna. I wouldn't have been able to make either without them myself.

I stand corrected.

[IImaplers]

I stand corrected.

Maybe GMS "forgot". It could be either stupidity, lazyness, a money-making scheme or a combination of all 3.

[AltCtrlDlt]

Maybe GMS "forgot". [...] a money-making scheme [...]

I agree. They conveniently "left it out", and coincidentally made a sale on character slot expansions in the Cash Shop. I believe it speaks for itself.

[Killed]

You all felt Nexon was changing, now that another year passes you're all back to where you were 3 years ago. As long as their are rich 12 year old asian/israeli children (not a stereotype when you know it's true) out there spending money on this game, or 20+ year olds with money that don't use forums out there, this game will never change.

You can tell how much Nexon truly does not care about the players anymore when over half of the active population are hackers, whether they're open or closet hackers. You know how easy it would be to get rid of every individual person who's hacking? Take a look at what they did to those S'mega exploit abusers. All because they were starting to harass Nexon via their own item that's normally supposed to be paid for, they went all out and tracked users down by more means than just a useless IP address. The only other time GMS has done that is for specific individuals that have consistently abused their game (pretty obvious who I'm talking about).

Catch a hacker? Wipe all their accounts they're linked too. See if they keep doing it.

It's just too bad they finally upped the cap to 250 so late, as that was probably the only thing that could have truly kept the game interesting 2 years ago and not just starting to throw in new OP classes with flashy skills.

[案山子]

Maybe GMS "forgot".

They've done this stuff before.

They don't release something that should be common sense to attach with a certain update, like a slot upgrade or such, then the playerbase yells at them until they give out a hot-time or something with one.

[IImaplers]

You all felt Nexon was changing, now that another year passes you're all back to where you were 3 years ago. As long as their are rich 12 year old asian/israeli children (not a stereotype when you know it's true) out there spending money on this game, or 20+ year olds with money that don't use forums out there, this game will never change.

Why the need to mention "Asian/Israeli"? Your point would have more validity if it didn't have racial implications. Honestly, it just makes a lot more sense to say: "As long as there are spoiled/addicted/gullible rich people willing to spend thousands...".

You can tell how much Nexon truly does not care about the players anymore when over half of the active population are hackers, whether they're open or closet hackers. You know how easy it would be to get rid of every individual person who's hacking? Take a look at what they did to those S'mega exploit abusers. All because they were starting to harass Nexon via their own item that's normally supposed to be paid for, they went all out and tracked users down by more means than just a useless IP address. The only other time GMS has done that is for specific individuals that have consistently abused their game (pretty obvious who I'm talking about).

"over half the population are hackers". Wrong. Of course it's a good portion but I'd estimate about 1/3 instead of over half.

@above Yes they have, but waiting for a hot time is not an option for those with no more free slots and deleting a character just to free a slot is a major pain in the ass. They might do something like "here's 5 free slots" when the anniversary comes though. But too little too late.

[Killed]

Why the need to mention "Asian/Israeli"? Your point would have more validity if it didn't have racial implications. Honestly, it just makes a lot more sense to say: "As long as there are spoiled/addicted/gullible rich people willing to spend thousands...". You're right about this one, but the way you said it was offensive.

"over half the population are hackers". Wrong. Of course it's a good portion but I'd estimate about 1/3 instead of over half.

You see, I can back up my statements with evidence. Of course I'd be banned or infracted for posting that evidence since this is a NO MENTION OF SITES NOT TO BE NAMED NEXON IS WATCHING site.

I haven't played MapleStory in over a year, yet I'm still making actual real life money off of it. I talk everybody who buys "stuff" off me, so I can tell you from experience that I guarantee 90% of the people who spend loads of money on this game are indeed Asian or Israeli, whether it's from their name or the country they send money to me from. (Paypal doesn't allow people in Israel to use the "Gift" option to send payments) I mean in the last two weeks, one single person (who is Asian), has spent over $1,100 on buying items and NX through me. I am in no way racist, it's like saying Mexicans have dark hair.

As for the population, once again I have more stats/proof than you think, I just wouldn't be allowed to give you them for the sake of being banned or my post deleted anyways. When a single program makes 6-digit profits in less than a year, and at one point in a span of 2 months, one (without even actual knowledge of how many people are buying it) could assume it's a damn good amount of users paying for it. Now, I actually have knowledge of exactly how many people pay for it. Half is a much more reasonable approximation than 1/3.

Believe what I say or don't, doesn't matter to me as I barely come to this site anymore anyways since I don't play the game anymore, but you're lying to yourself if you think it's not the truth.

[SaptaZapta]

@Killed; the people who buy from you are not the people Nexon makes money off, so you can't say that as long as they're paying Nexon thinks everything is ok.
I can't speak for Asia, but Israel is on Nexon's "high risk" list and people there can't use Paypal or credit cards to buy NX on Nexon's website, and Karma Koin or other game cards are not sold there.

As for half vs 1/3rd, I see way too many people being miserable (getting dc'ed, getting ks'ed, selling worthless crap in permit stores, begging for parties, etc) to believe half the population hacks. Maybe they buy the product but don't use it, or maybe your estimate of how many total players there are is wrong.

[KhainiWest]

@Killed; the people who buy from you are not the people Nexon makes money off, so you can't say that as long as they're paying Nexon thinks everything is ok.
I can't speak for Asia, but Israel is on Nexon's "high risk" list and people there can't use Paypal or credit cards to buy NX on Nexon's website, and Karma Koin or other game cards are not sold there.

As for half vs 1/3rd, I see way too many people being miserable (getting dc'ed, getting ks'ed, selling worthless crap in permit stores, begging for parties, etc) to believe half the population hacks. Maybe they buy the product but don't use it, or maybe your estimate of how many total players there are is wrong.

He tends to exaggerate on a lot of things a lot of the times.

[IImaplers]

I haven't played MapleStory in over a year, yet I'm still making actual real life money off of it. I talk everybody who buys "stuff" off me, so I can tell you from experience that I guarantee 90% of the people who spend loads of money on this game are indeed Asian or Israeli, whether it's from their name or the country they send money to me from. (Paypal doesn't allow people in Israel to use the "Gift" option to send payments) I mean in the last two weeks, one single person (who is Asian), has spent over $1,100 on buying items and NX through me. I am in no way racist, it's like saying Mexicans have dark hair.

Just because you deal with Asian/Israeli people does not mean that they are the majority of those who spend thousands on NX on maple. And just because they may buy thousands from you doesn't mean they'd buy thousands from Nexon. I see no link there. But anyway, that's not the point I was trying to make. The point is not where they are from but that their money is being spent unwisely.

As for the population, once again I have more stats/proof than you think, I just wouldn't be allowed to give you them for the sake of being banned or my post deleted anyways. When a single program makes 6-digit profits in less than a year, and at one point in a span of 2 months, one (without even actual knowledge of how many people are buying it) could assume it's a damn good amount of users paying for it. Now, I actually have knowledge of exactly how many people pay for it. Half is a much more reasonable approximation than 1/3.

You sure you know how many people pay for it or is it how many purchases are made? Because one person can make x amount of purchases unless I'm mistaken.

Believe what I say or don't, doesn't matter to me as I barely come to this site anymore anyways since I don't play the game anymore, but you're lying to yourself if you think it's not the truth.

I see you trying to justify what you're doing by putting what you think is the majority into the same boat through flawed or coincidental evidence or lack thereof. That's what I see. Otherwise, I think you probably wouldn't feel the need to post, since you say you don't play/care anymore. Regardless of how Nexon "doesn't care", hacking has a negative affect on those actually making an honest living (and this includes most Nexon employees, let alone the millions of players who choose not to cheat). That much is obvious and even if 90% of the population was hackers, that wouldn't change.

[MountLag]

Half the playerbase being hackers sounds a little high. Wouldn't be surprising if we're already at that figure though, with how terrible the customer support is and how bad Nexon is at dealing with hackers.

[Niernen]

As long as their are rich 12 year old asian/israeli children (not a stereotype when you know it's true)

Actually, it is still a stereotype as stereotypes can be true. you forget to mention that it is raciest and serves no purpose to the overall argument. Besides the fact that you have absolutely no proof whatsoever that it is true. Seems more like you are making a false stereotype than a true one, then claiming its okay because you think it is true.

[Curtiss]

But guys, he's right about Asian kids giving Nexon a lot of cash!

The only catch: A vast majority of them are probably at other versions of Maple Story because last I checked a lot more of Asians play at Maple SEA, Taiwan, China and Korea.

[Killed]

He tends to exaggerate on a lot of things a lot of the times.

But it's so fun to do, because everyone gets so riled up ;-)

I could give you all an exact # of those bot licenses that have been sold over any time span, but you'd all like that too much! Enjoy MapleStory!