Where is that 9 bucks going?!

[Durandal37]

No, really, I want to know. People getting banned for having legitimate S-Ranks and God Shields, glitches in the C-Modes... and hardly any of the so-called "extras" you're supposed to get.

So can someone please tell me... where is that 9 bucks a month going? I really want to know... cuz I don't see how Sega can justify 9 bucks a month extra in addition to the X-Box Live fee for PSOX, which I was really looking forward to (key word being WAS).



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Durandal37 on 2003-02-12 10:11 ]</font>

[Buuyon]

Hmmm good point...well sence they are spending money on there servers and stuff it goes there. They dont deserve it but they would end up paying money and we get online for free.

[DemiPlat]

* Lobby Themes
* Famitsu Quests and special events
* Halloween Event
* Christmas Rappies
* Valentine's Day event
* Online quest (Heat Sword, Ice Spinner, Warehouse, Gallon's Shop)
* Paganini's sub-quest (photon drops for items)
* Ability to play with players globally
* C-mode

That's what I can think of off the top of my head.

Yeah, they're not perfect, but this is still one of the best games ever, imho, and this is clearly the superior version.

[kagero]

ill tell you where its going. Its going to the tech support when you call st to report a problem. Its going to there hourly wage that they get paid to tell you that theyre really sorry, and that they havent had many reports on the issue, or they don't know how long it will be until the problem is fixed. You know, it doesnt get fixed by posting in this forum. It gets fixed when people call st and report problems. If you have a problem, call them...the more calls they get the better your 9 bucks a month will serve everyone!

[Wewt]

On 2003-02-12 10:19, DemiPlat wrote:
Yeah, they're not perfect, but this is still one of the best games ever, imho, and this is clearly the superior version.


Strange how opinions can be so different...

The GameCube version, in my opinion, is by far the worst version to date.

[Durandal37]

On 2003-02-12 10:19, DemiPlat wrote:
* Lobby Themes
* Famitsu Quests and special events
* Halloween Event
* Christmas Rappies
* Valentine's Day event
* Online quest (Heat Sword, Ice Spinner, Warehouse, Gallon's Shop)
* Paganini's sub-quest (photon drops for items)
* Ability to play with players globally
* C-mode

That's what I can think of off the top of my head.

Yeah, they're not perfect, but this is still one of the best games ever, imho, and this is clearly the superior version.

Lobby Themes: Wow... count me excited. =/ That's sure worth 9 bucks a month.

Famitsu Quests/Special Events: As far as special events go... I've seen like ONE. The Famitsu Quest was nice though, I'll admit. But considering how much money they must get from every single PSO player paying 9 bucks a month... I still don't see where the money's going.

Halloween/Valentine's Day Events: LAME. Horribly done. They should pay us to put up with crap like that.

Christmas Rappies: ANOTHER variety of Rappy? Can't they make a different damn rare monster?

Online Quests: Heat Sword? Sucks. The others... are okay. Nothing great though. Still not worth 108 dollars a year.

Photon Drops: One of the two things that were actually decent. But again... you're supposed to be paying 9 bucks a month for CONSISTENT extras. And by consistent I mean consistently good, not consistently crappy with some okays scattered around.

Ability to play with player globally: One, so what? SO MANY other online games let you do that... with NO fee. Two, PSOX with NOT have that feature.

C-Mode: .......can someone say, GLITCHY?

Don't get me wrong... I LOVE PSO. But that doesn't mean I'm blind to the horrible crappiness of Sonic Team with regards to server maitainance/extras.

[DemiPlat]

If you don't think it's worth 9$ a month here's some shocking advice: don't pay it.

I'm certain no one is holding a gun to your head and making any of you play this game. I presume you play because you have fun playing it.

I am hard-pressed to think of single game I have ever played that I've enjoyed more.

To the person that doesn't like the Hallowen quest, I'm guessing you deleted your special mag? No? Hmmm....

Sorry, but no one's forcing any of you to play. If you think $9 is a waste, and your opinion is totally valid if it is how you really feel, then don't pay.

Personally, I think they are glitchy at times, but overall provide a great product.

And to the person who thinks THIS is the worst version yet, I am stunned.

3 new characters, 4 new areas (two if you battled in v2), tons of new items, mags, animations, lobbies, some new quests already, sharper graphics, real-time shadows, ability to block annoying people online, more costumes, new types of weapons for each class, the list goes on and on. This is one opinion I truly DO disagree with. I can't see how anyone who is objective cannot agree that this version is the best.

Laters, all!

[Durandal37]

I DID mention I love PSO right? Because if I didn't... well, I do. I think there's some kind of subliminal message in PSO... gets people hopelessly addicted so they're forced to pay 9 bucks a month for no real reason...

Bah, special mag blah blah blah. Many many better mags than the one you get for the Halloween quest. But I was referring to the quest itself, not the reward. Both it and the valentine quest were very poorly done.

[DemiPlat]

Well, after the near total dearth of updates in v1, and the spotty support, AT BEST, for v2 (NA version), I find the support in GC NA version is pretty darn good, and in step with the JP version, which amazes me (I have the import also, and played it until the NA version came out).

But, yeah, of COURSE I have to agree: it could be better.

But, the bottomline is: I think it IS worth $9 a month, or I wouldn't pay it.

[KodiaX987]

Blame the cheaters. If there wasn't any codebreaking idiots, there wouldn't be any bugs to fix.

[SnAPPUrU-nyan-ko]

Vending machines need to be restocked with bean drinks.

[kagero]

i tend to disagree with that comment about blaming the cheaters. I don't cheat and don't beleive in it either, but as with any advance technology, there are going to be bugs that have to be corrected. Look at aol or any microsoft program for instance. How many versions do they come out with. Everytime a problem is corrected, they release an updated version. I do agree however that if you dont like paying the nine bucks, then don't. no one is forcing you to. We do it because its fun and addicting!

[Celes152]

Except the cheaters did NOT cause the C-mode glitches, or the trade window glitches...see, all they can do is dupe. It's not like people are using 1337 hax or anything. =l

[Sasarai]

Rather than questioning where Sonic Team invests your, oh so precious, $9 monthly fee, ask Sega Corp.

If you don't have the sense to realize the monthly fee is determined by the Execs and other "higher-ups," you should be shot.

Where do you think your money goes?

Into their pockets, damnit! This is a CORPORATION, they don't give a damn about you. If you have a problem with that--stop purchasing their products.

Some people are posting that the fee is used to cover the expenses of maintaining servers, etc. Sure, that may be a FRACTION of the cost, but I guarantee most of that money lines the silk pockets of some trendy Japanese suit.

It seems no one can grasp the concet of capitalism anymore.

[Grifta]

Ok, I have a solution for you.....be poor. Personally I can't afford the 9 bucs a month.

If you can afford it go for it, you you can't don't. They're providing a service, that's their fee, if you don't like it protest by not paying for it.

And, I've seen that stupid petition to MS to not charge at all. *hangs head*
What you need to do is get a petition to see if they can reduce their fees. If they see that a couple hundred or thousand more people are gonna sign up if they drop a $ or two off of the fee I'm sure they will.

People need to think through these things before they start talking, it prolly works out to something like this:

$2 profit (tell me you didn't forget about profit)
$3 server maintainance (hardware and personal)
$2 support (mainly personal)
$2 misc (personal for planning events, making new quests, etc.)
^ This is just off the top of my head but prolly simlar to their break down.

Lesson for today, everything costs money.

[TerribleDeliMeat]

you cant say on whether these problems will spill over to the XBOX version...so I doubt complaining about what could happen is really helping anyone

And I dont blame people for getting angry over the Gamecube version. On the DC version, Sega had the scapegoat of cheaters screwing up the game and couldn't do anything about the problem since it wasnt their fault.

Whats the excuse now? Sega cant fix their errors? If ST did a sloppy job about putting up c-mode, they should disable it till they have time to work on it.

[Tye]

I don't think the Gamecube is the worst version to date that Title belongs to the PC version. It's a joke.

I have The GC version and I agree I haven't seen my 9$ put to much use but i don't really care. I'm ENJOYING THE GAME!!

I can't say who gets the number 2 spot for worst PSO version cause XBOX version hasn't came out yet.

I already cancelled my GC HL so it ends at the end of FEB.

I'm only going to Xbox due to it's better Security and More organized servers. Heck i already have XBl for Ghost recon, Unreal championship and MEch assault. Might aswell give it a try.

I been happy with GC PSO so far! Expect being FSO'd a few times All has been good. I'm impressed how quickly they stomped out Duping.

So if XBL has the Same problems I might go back to my platinum cube lol.

But I don't think they will have the same problems.

[Wewt]

DemiPlat: Leveling got pretty boring for me during V2, and the actual game engine for the GC version is pretty much the same. So after leveling up got boring, I turned to Battle and Challenge modes.

That's where I truly got hooked.

Battle mode AND Challenge modes on the GC version, compared to the DC, is inferior. Inferior by far.

Magic knocking you down has really killed the pace of the battle games for me, and Challenge mode is too easy now.

Oh, and with all the bugs and such occuring, I stand by what I said: The GC version is the worst one so far. Of course, it's my opinion.

[EDarkness]

I can see where everyone is coming from. I can even understand the expectation of wanting cool things to do in order to justify the monthly fee. I do think everyone should relax a bit. People are imperfect as are the programs they write. Things happen, a can case come up that you didn't get while debugging. If you've played any game online you'd know that problems arise. The key is how fast do they get around to at least acknowledging a problem exists and then fixing it. So far I've been rather impressed. Compared to the DC versions they're handling things much better.

This isn't to say that there haven't been problems in other areas. Their attention to quests has been spotty at best. The Valentines day quest is a good example. Why even bother releasing something like that? I did not have a chance to try the Halloween quest, but I can believe it was crappy. At least the reward was better. Lack of creative quests is really what I want out of the game. And in that area they're falling behind.


-EDarkness

[Grifta]

On 2003-02-12 12:07, Tye wrote:

I'm only going to Xbox due to it's better Security...

BAHAHAHA!!...thanks that's the best thing I've heard in a while....excuse me *goes and gets this weeks updates to fix the security holes in WinXP* ooh, look only 3 this week.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Grifta on 2003-02-12 13:19 ]</font>

[Mirth]

personally i was hpoing for really cool quests like in ver.2. they had towards the future and all that stuff like that. But appearntly ST wants to give us really crappy quests even though we are paying alot more then we were in ver.2 . And some1 said photon drops and themed lobbies were extras in this topic, well they arent really. they are part of the actual game, extras are stuff that add too the game. I have yet to see sega put the money to good use. They could have at least used our money to realese a keyboard here dammit. But its not like our complaining on this forum is gonna do anything....we should be complaining on sega's boards instead, then we might get a response.

[IronKnight]

Um... Windows XP is one of the most stable and secure OS' on the market :/ the only reason we haveta get updates for it all the time is that since it is the MAIN OS USED EVERYWHERE... people are familiar with it and can find work arounds more easily. But we aren't talking about PC Operating systems... Windows servers are reliable, secure and fairly cost efficient. Anyways, the one thing I really hate about most PSO players is their hypocrisy. I've been saying this since PSO GC was anounced to have high fees; Don't buy the game! It's a P2P (Peer to Peer) game meaning there is very little to no data being routed through the server. Think Diablo 2 (a fee-less game on PC). If everyone just canceled their hunters license and wrote an email to SEGA explaining they did so cause the fees were too high we wouldn't be paying $9 a month. But, people have been telling me PSO GC only has around 3000 players on during the weekends so obviously SEGA would rather lose alot of players and keep charging more on the niche gamers. I wouldn't be surprised if PSO 2 charged $15 a month.

[DemiPlat]

But, people have been telling me PSO GC only has around 3000 players on during the weekends


Just wanted to chime in on this one: last weekend, during the day on Saturday, I counted just under 2000 in the USA ships and almost 5000 in the JP ships. Its getting to be as big as v1 again. Really.

I think everyone has great points, btw. Not to be "PC" but I really do. I also wish more great quests arrived, and faster, of course! But I also recognize what we have: a really, really fun game. So, as a result, I just don't have much to complain about.

Basically, all I've had with this game is more fun over more time than any other game I've ever played. Hard for me to complain about that, so I don't.

[Scan_Man]

I pay about $4.12 a month for my HL.

[Bloodberry]

Eh? How?

[IronKnight]

Only 2000 in the US? That's kind of sad... And proves my point that long time fans are leaving the series. SEGA needs to think about long term sales rather than making money now and having no players who will pay their absurb fees later.

[Scan_Man]

I have japanese version.

[Tye]

Grifta.


Since when is WINDOWS security = Xbox Security

Oh and even if xbox Security has "holes" in it.

I'm still correct I said "XBOX HAS BETTER SECURITY"

GC has none so anything is better.Now thats something to laugh about! Bahahahaah.
See I have GC ,XBOX and ps2 so i can bash any system!! DO YOU!!?

[Mirth]

just under 2000 ppl is alot of players, on the old game the us servers had a ton of players on them, much more then 2000, i think i saw 2000 on obreon once. the fee isnt to high, its cheapers then some games, but the fact that i havent seen any good quests besides famistu is waht pisses me off, and wheres that kb sega promised would be out when the game was realesed. sega just isnt as good as they used to be . but im sure if those who really like pso(like me) stay on the game and let all the ppl who cant stand the service at all quit the game, then sega might actually realize that they need to make some changes

[thewiredknight]

The money is mostly going to the servers updates and just keeping them running. Think about how much bandwith a single PSO server uses within a day, it's murder, so that's pretty mcuh what they need the money for most of all.

[BlazingTiger]

If PSO had a way to give online credit (more online time for the hunter's licence) through completing online quests and activities, the PSO market would double. Charge 4.50 a month with the option to earn more online time for playing online more than the norm would increase the popularity of PSO greatly. The #1 reason why people are not playing PSO online is the price. If that is the issue, than it should be solved. If you decrease the price, and add an option to earn online time bonuses, this could triple the pso market. Let's be honest, PSO has not gotten the claim to fame like titles like Diablo and Quake III. If PSO would bring the price down bit and focus on a stronger marketing strategy, it could rule the gaming market.

[Jkid]

I got an idea,why not sega hire a real online team.How come Sonic Team is doing it's projects and at the same time maintaing the servers.I think hiring a online team,one for each region (US,JP,EU) would be great.Think about it:Just send a e-mail to them at the region you've served,and then they're going to contact each team to make a patch and at the same time,ST would be doing their project much faster two-fold.

And make that US website a bit better.

[Kurosawa]

That's exactly what they need to do. They need a team to maintain servers and another team to bug test. The $9 a month fee is a joke, especially when the JP fee is less than half that. I love Sega and PSo but it's got horrible online service and the price is disgusting at best, racist at worst.

[IronKnight]

On 2003-02-12 15:53, Mirth wrote:
just under 2000 ppl is alot of players, on the old game the us servers had a ton of players on them, much more then 2000, i think i saw 2000 on obreon once.


2000 players divided by 50 states = 40 players. FORTY PLAYERS PER STATE?! That is pitiful. SEGA needs to wise up and soon. Either by allowing huge updates (new levels, monsters) on Xbox or SIGNIFICANTLY lowering their fee. Alot of people here are saying the SEGA Tech Support Line is what contributes to the fee... This has been in effect way b4 PSO came out and their tech support team is still comprised of a buncha macro-using morons (Cept for Sarah! Much Love XD).

[Ruby-chan]

On 2003-02-12 16:08, BlazingTiger wrote:
Let's be honest, PSO has not gotten the claim to fame like titles like Diablo and Quake III.

That's because they're both free to play after you buy the game. Heck Diablo and PSO are almost identical in the way they play. http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_razz.gif And Quake 3 raised the bar on games, of course id has the reputation that they can make anything they want and require you have insane system specs and people will conform.

[Klakalou]

On 2003-02-12 11:50, Sasarai wrote:
Rather than questioning where Sonic Team invests your, oh so precious, $9 monthly fee, ask Sega Corp.

If you don't have the sense to realize the monthly fee is determined by the Execs and other "higher-ups," you should be shot.

Where do you think your money goes?

Into their pockets, damnit! This is a CORPORATION, they don't give a damn about you. If you have a problem with that--stop purchasing their products.

Some people are posting that the fee is used to cover the expenses of maintaining servers, etc. Sure, that may be a FRACTION of the cost, but I guarantee most of that money lines the silk pockets of some trendy Japanese suit.

It seems no one can grasp the concet of capitalism anymore.



YOU are my hero!

[MonoxideChild]

I only see myself signing up for a month after I use my free month up. I'm not happy with the glitches in the game right now, and I don't see me handing over much money to Sega.

[pixelate]

http://www.globalarte.it/storia/immdada/fontana1.jpg

[rbf2000]

How about paying for the v1.1 replacement program (they still won't sell the v1.1 disk, you have to buy the v1.0 disk and exchange it). The prizes the JP players get for the fumitsu cup prizes.

I mean, sega was too cheap to even get an 800 number for their tech support.

Putting up the challanges costs next to nothing, the lobby decorations, next to nothing. THe only thing that really costs them anything is actually making the new quests.

Server costs are minimal because the only time you go through ST's servers are when you are in the lobby. Otherwise, each gamecube communicates with each other.

[Saladwood]

9 bucks to buy sonic all those damn golden rings he desperately chases after!

[Mirth]

On 2003-02-13 00:14, PSOSaladWood wrote:
9 bucks to buy sonic all those damn golden rings he desperately chases after!



indeed lol. and some1 said it was to pay for server maintance, well i have news for you. V2 was only 15 dollars for 3 months and its servers ran very well, the original pso was free, it had ok servers(minus the cheating and such) the money is supposed to be going to online exclusive content which we have barely gotten any of. the original pso has more online quests then the cube one(i think, im pretty sure it does). Sega has not lived up to there promises, they could at least bring some quests from the DC over to the GC(endless nightmare anyone? towards the future maybe? todays rate? how bout mop up operation? tinkerbell's dog by chance?) they have a ton of quests already made yet they dont let us have them on this version. and download quest! now where are those.... hmm i dont see them anywhere. when sega makes some they better be good and not some crappy letter to lionel like quest.

[Jkid]

On 2003-02-12 19:03, Kurosawa wrote:
That's exactly what they need to do. They need a team to maintain servers and another team to bug test. The $9 a month fee is a joke, especially when the JP fee is less than half that. I love Sega and PSo but it's got horrible online service and the price is disgusting at best, racist at worst.



I agree with Kurosawa,I mean Japan has all that they need to make PSO the Japan's Everquest.While here we get the ame itelf.Oh yes,remember Peter Morre? He swiched jobs with Microsoft,and with the new president coming from Japan,no one seems to take advantage of the suituation.

[Grifta]

Ok, IronKnight and Tye
.......

For IronKnight

http://www.thugserver.com/?module=newsdetails&newsid=38

If you don't have time to check that out I'll just give you the headline

News: MS SQL Server Worm Cripples Internet
Posted: (2003-01-25 10:14:42)

there's your server security



For Tye

Having all the systems doesn't give you the right to bash all of them...and the fact the I don't have any systems doesn't mean that I don't have the right to bash them. However, that little "freedom of speech" thing gives both of us the right to bitch and moan about anything we dam well want to. So please leave the "rich boy" attitude at home.


For Everyone

MS is notorious for releasing products with large amounts of security holes and bugs. I don't have much faith in there work, be it an OS or the Xbox, because of what they've put out in the past. I would LOVE to be proven wrong..but so far from everything I've seen the Xbox security doesn't look any better than any of the other systems.

[Kupi]

The character corruptions and item loss and that sort of thing still existed back in the V1/2 days, but it was in the form of PKers/CKers/NOLers. Then, when I lost a beloved rare or character, it was some idiot player's fault. Now, when I lose a character or item, it's the game's fault. That's what's pushing me to cancel my Hunter's Lisence, I think. =/



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Kupi on 2003-02-13 18:03 ]</font>

[Wewt]

On 2003-02-13 17:59, Kupi wrote:
The character corruptions and item loss and that sort of thing still existed back in the V1/2 days, but it was in the form of PKers/CKers/NOLers. Then, when I lost a beloved rare or character, it was some idiot player's fault. Now, when I lose a character or item, it's the game's fault. That's what's pushing me to cancel my Hunter's Lisence, I think. =/

Remember the days when people were annoyed at lobby FSOD, NOL, etc? Blame the cheaters they all said. Now, it's the game's fault, and the servers.

Funny how talk of duping has died out so much.

These kind of things are destined to appear on the Xbox, too. Wait, it already has! The S Rank weapons counting as illegal items already proves it.

[ALPHAM0F0]

On 2003-02-12 16:04, thewiredknight wrote:
The money is mostly going to the servers updates and just keeping them running. Think about how much bandwith a single PSO server uses within a day, it's murder, so that's pretty mcuh what they need the money for most of all.


yep the Hl fee is for the most part used for that... the only ohther thing it's used for it to pay for the suits, lapdances while there at there favorite titty-bar

[Grifta]

On 2003-02-13 18:30, ALPHAM0F0 wrote:

yep the Hl fee is for the most part used for that... the only ohther thing it's used for it to pay for the suits, lapdances while there at there favorite titty-bar


OH NO! STOP THE PRESSES!

This just in, people are making a profit by charging for a service, what has the world come to.....

[Phobos-X]

MS is notorious for releasing products with large amounts of security holes and bugs. I don't have much faith in there work, be it an OS or the Xbox, because of what they've put out in the past. I would LOVE to be proven wrong..but so far from everything I've seen the Xbox security doesn't look any better than any of the other systems

um as of rignt now, to the best of my knowledge, eversince XBL has come out, there havent been any cases or cheating, duping, hacking, or any of the other BS that goes on in sega's servers. and yest i know about the dipstick from MIT that hacked the 'Box. Just face it, your MS bashing

[Grifta]

All I'm saying is that it isn't this impenetrable super console which some people are making it out to be. It can be hacked, crack, and exploited like anything else.

And there hasn't been any "cheating, duping, or hacking" because there hasn't been anything worth doing it on. PSO would be the first RPG, and thus the first thing worth hacking.

Again, I'm not saying that the xbox is a horrible system, just that, like any of the systems, it's not impenetrable. It will be hacked at some point.

[IronKnight]

MS is notorious for releasing products with large amounts of security holes and bugs. I don't have much faith in there work, be it an OS or the Xbox, because of what they've put out in the past. I would LOVE to be proven wrong..but so far from everything I've seen the Xbox security doesn't look any better than any of the other systems.



What OS are you using now? Linux? Go back to hugging ur penguin.

[IronKnight]

I admit it's not infallable but the Xbox is the most secure console on the market. I don't know why people bash MS so much... They are a great company and if they sucked so much they wouldn't have a chokehold on the market. XB Live isn't perfect but it is growing and MS is actually trying to make it a better service day after day. Compare this to SEGAs passive (We'll fix it when enough people bitch) approach; I think you'll see MS pressuring SEGA to get stuff done.

[TerribleDeliMeat]

Grifta is right. There's no doubt in my mind that PSOX will be hacked at some point (Because, lets face it..ST's past track record on programming isn't the greatest ever). However...and this is where I think Microsoft will differ from Sega...is that since it will be played on Live! servers that if someone can use some interesting practices on PSOX, it would very well spread to all Live! games. I figure Microsoft has a little bit more to protect than Sega has in the past and will make a greater effort to keep cheating (in any form) down to as little as possible.

[UMMON]

Well ST has at least one satisfied customer in me.
It takes a lot of work to maintain a world wide online game.
Ya, ya, I know I sound like a "sucker", but I haven't been banned, FSOD-X or any of that crap. I've meet a lot of people from all over too. My 9 whole dollars a month just for this, feel lucky, most other online games cost about $5 more a month, with many more bugs than this one.
If your not satisfied, please stop playing online so we don't have to keep seeing these topics on boards. People wanting to get the game do read these boards and they think that everyone gets corrupted and FSOD-X all the time, when in actaulity, the people that are not having problems aren't even posting, because they are having too much fun playing the game.

[Grifta]

As much as I'd like to have a bitch-fest with IronKnight, UMMON has brought us back to the actual point. $9 is a perfectly justified price due to the obvious cost of server maint. and support personal. And, if you don't want to pay the price you don't have to.

I think we should just start this conversation again once it's come out, so we can get some facts instead of all this speculation

[Wewt]

On 2003-02-14 16:06, Grifta wrote:
As much as I'd like to have a bitch-fest with IronKnight, UMMON has brought us back to the actual point. $9 is a perfectly justified price due to the obvious cost of server maint. and support personal. And, if you don't want to pay the price you don't have to.

I think we should just start this conversation again once it's come out, so we can get some facts instead of all this speculation


Care to give your opinion on why SEGA charge US users more than double what the Japanese users pay, and get less for paying more?

I can't really think of a fair reason why US users have to pay more, and get FAR less. They don't even get a 3rd-party keyboard.

[Grifta]

well the simple reason is that they can...they charge that much and people pay for it so they don't see anything wrong with it.

And, another reason, they are based in Japan, to set up servers there costs them less money because (A)they're already established there so they don't need to rent/build anything and (B) they pay in Yen.

To explain this...
In Japan:
All the personal are paid in Yen
All the server maint. is paid for in Yen
The players pay in Yen

In America:
All the personal are paid in Dollars
All the server maint. is paid for in Dollars
The players pay in Dollars


The best way I've found to explain this whole thing would be like this.

I come from South Africa, and now I've moved to Canada....
In Canada a loaf of bread costs about $1, now, if you convert that directally into the South African currency a loaf of bread in SA should cost about 6 bucs. But it doesn't, it costs about 2 bucs. Why?

Because person who milled the grain was paid in SA currency, so the flour is cheaper than it would be in the US. The baker is paid in SA currency, so the labour is cheaper than it would be in the US. Hell, the cashier that sold you the bread was paid in SA currency, so their wages are lower than it would be in the US.

I mean for you guys in the states...You've been to Canada atleast once haven't you? Haven't you noticed just about everything is just a little cheaper than it is in the US. That's caus everyone is paid in Canadian dollars...back to the bread analogy.


If you still don't get it, I urge you to take any kind of economics course.

The Lesson for today, buy stuff that's made in South Africa or Canada....it's hella cheap

[IronKnight]

I don't like bread... Earth and Beyond support/maintenance specialist get paid with $12/month and that's a MMORPG. They put in new content regulary and the game is fairly bug-free. Hell Blizzard runs it's Battle.net servers free of charge and provides much better support than SEGA. I have yet to see a massive glitch fest as I've seen on PSO. But, I will play PSOX for 3 months (2 free months plus one paid) and give SEGA a 2nd chance. If they fail to satisfy me I will unsubscribe. I say everyone does the same... Don't hold the HL for 6 months hoping it will get better. If it starts to go into the shitter just cut your losses.

[the_af]

IronKnight, and similarly, all of you who are complaining about fees. It's very simple. This is the fee they've decided to charge. Your options are to pay it or not, very simply. Nobody is stupid enough to assume they aren't taking a nice chunk as profit, but so what? Say you have a 12-star ultra rare weapon. Do you want 1 or 2 good things for it, or as many as you can get? You either do the trade or not. In the same way, you either pay the fee or not. if it was completely unjustified, say every other online game in the world was free, bandwidth was free, servers were free, and tech support was free, then i'd say yeah, raise a stink until it gets changed. But this is a service, plain and simple. You either pay for the use of the service, or you don't. Thanks for reading my thoughts. http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif

[Grifta]

ok, 2 things

Battle.net for the most part is a matching service, every game except Diablo "Closed" is run by one person being a server and the rest, clients

Now, as for Diablo "Closed", they don't hafta factor in as much support and such because they have that in place for all their other products. The system is nothing like PSO, because there is no way to take "Closed" characters offline. And as for their money, they bring out incredably popular and well selling products very frequently. For example

4.4 Million copies of Warcraft 3 sold so far
And they're currently working on 2 Warcraft Games and a Starcraft FPS
Those are only solid numbers I have but I know their other games have hit similar sales.

That's how they can not charge for Battle.net


*note to IronKnight*
Does the "I don't like bread." actually mean "You have a valid point, but I'm choosing to ignore it."?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Grifta on 2003-02-15 10:57 ]</font>

[Sasarai]

On 2003-02-14 19:30, Grifta wrote:
well the simple reason is that they can...they charge that much and people pay for it so they don't see anything wrong with it.

And, another reason, they are based in Japan, to set up servers there costs them less money because (A)they're already established there so they don't need to rent/build anything and (B) they pay in Yen.

To explain this...
In Japan:
All the personal are paid in Yen
All the server maint. is paid for in Yen
The players pay in Yen

In America:
All the personal are paid in Dollars
All the server maint. is paid for in Dollars
The players pay in Dollars


The best way I've found to explain this whole thing would be like this.

I come from South Africa, and now I've moved to Canada....
In Canada a loaf of bread costs about $1, now, if you convert that directally into the South African currency a loaf of bread in SA should cost about 6 bucs. But it doesn't, it costs about 2 bucs. Why?

Because person who milled the grain was paid in SA currency, so the flour is cheaper than it would be in the US. The baker is paid in SA currency, so the labour is cheaper than it would be in the US. Hell, the cashier that sold you the bread was paid in SA currency, so their wages are lower than it would be in the US.

I mean for you guys in the states...You've been to Canada atleast once haven't you? Haven't you noticed just about everything is just a little cheaper than it is in the US. That's caus everyone is paid in Canadian dollars...back to the bread analogy.


If you still don't get it, I urge you to take any kind of economics course.

The Lesson for today, buy stuff that's made in South Africa or Canada....it's hella cheap



Thank God for foreigners, America would be screwed without people with proper education from other countries.

I used a similar economic analogy in the Cheating Forum (you may have read it). Unfortunately a lot of people just don't understand, even when you break down into such simple terms, Grifta.

(Yes, I am a product of public education in Florida, but some of us aren't complete imbeciles.)

It all goes back to the fact the Sega is a Corporation and is more interested in keeping its profits up. Also, Japan's economy is a Provision-based one. They rely on their exports heavily.

What does that mean? If the US economy goes into a slump, or any other country that Japan produces goods and services for, their economy does too. If you think our economy is fucked, you have no idea. I'm quite certain they'd like to have jobs in coming years, so they'll continue to provide a service at whatever fee they choose. The simple fact is if you want to play, you'll pay.

Supply and Demand...Supply and Demand.

[Grifta]

Hehe, don't worry it's not just America, Canada would be screwed up with out foreigners aswell. Wait a second, Canada is screwed up even with foreigners, oh well.

And thank you Sasarai, you made my day. http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif

[IronKnight]

On 2003-02-15 00:43, Grifta wrote:
*note to IronKnight*
Does the "I don't like bread." actually mean "You have a valid point, but I'm choosing to ignore it."?


I find your "point" absurb... But I won't rip it apart. As a great gif once said: "Arguing on the internet is like running in the special olympics, even if you win, you're still a retard."

[Grifta]

Ok, did you even READ the bread analogy?!?!?!?

There is nothing absurd about it, I lived in both countries, I know how it works, there is really nothing to argue about!

And IronKnight, You shouldn't of started something you're not willing to finish. Coming in here, starting an arguement, and then when you're out of ideas you "take the high road" is just incredably stupid and annoying. Please try not to do it again.. http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_nono.gif

And please, go ahead, I want you to rip it apart...

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Grifta on 2003-02-15 11:39 ]</font>

[Mirth]

ok i already knew why it costed more here, but can you explain segas lack of making good quests online and can you explain how they promise to bring a kb here yet they havent?

[Grifta]

...actually, I can try. They've promised stuff, and haven't delivered, and yet everyone keeps giving them money. So, they can't be doing anything wrong, so why change it?