No more AmEx for AC

[Crystal_Shard]

I was taking to someone about how we wouldn't know when Sega would stop taking cards until they did. Looks to be more or less the way it worked.

Whoops, looks like my decision was made for me after all. Guess it's time to find more webmoney sources.

[Mystil]

AmEx was founded as a way for Americans to use their own money abroad, and a major part of their business model is still in the travelers check or the ability to use AmEx cards over seas, they maintain a global network that various banks connect to, allowing the balance to be immediately deducted with a purchase without the banks having to negotiate with each other, another aspect of AmEx is foreign transaction fees are always constant regardless of country and they guarantee the money no matter what (i still think it odd that i live in the Midwest, and only 2 businesses, Walgreen's and Wal-Mart, are the only ones that accept AmEx)+^_^+ that's why i don't really understand SEGAC's removal of AmEx, i can understand Visa and MC due to fraud and other issues, but they had AmEx support for how long now?? they already obviously had it set up+^_^+ i can only conclude 2 things from this, SEGAC is going into the red as a company and are making cuts to stay afloat, or their trying to deliberately cut all direct foreign transactions out to try and get us to play the defunct at launch US/EU servers+^_^+ with help translating from Mike ima send them an e-mail and while i don't expect to get a response, maybe, just maybe they may reconsider+^_^+
ima send them the following, maybe if others do the same・・・・・・・・・

Spoiler!

こんにちは

アメックスの取り扱いはなぜやめるんですか？　考え直していただけませんか？　近い将来にアメ ックスを再度 取り扱うことを考えてますか？

よろしくお願いします

<your name here>

(should mean "Hello Sega,
Why are you ending support for American Express cards as a payment method for AC on JP-PSO2?? I would like to know if you would reconsider keeping support for AmEx for AC purchase, or reimplementing AmEx in the future, thank you." or something close to it anyway)

Oh you're so bold and sharp. However at this point, I feel now that US version will be a lot better.

To the people asking why, it might be more of an annoyance to them than you realize.

<snip>

This is all well and good and make sense, but for SEGA, this is an excuse to cut us out.

[Sierhiet]

Oh you're so bold and sharp. However at this point, I feel now that US version will be a lot better.

Personally has been my stance for months now. To predetermine the US versions defunct due to past issues, while simultaneously basically down-playing or ignoring the blatant complications one deals with on the JP servers now is just asinine.

[freyt]

I'd rather have problematic content rather than a lack of content.

[Chik'Tikka]

I'd rather have problematic content rather than a lack of content.

not to mention the US community we will see, with the F2P model i expect this x10+^_^+



at least JP servers are more polite+^_^+

[Mystil]

Personally has been my stance for months now. To predetermine the US versions defunct due to past issues, while simultaneously basically down-playing or ignoring the blatant complications one deals with on the JP servers now is just asinine.

Or both could suck. There's always a chance for that!

[Renvalt]

Personally speaking, I want to know how many players on the NA side will be playing it simply to associate it with PS1-4/PSO1/PSU and how many will be playing it without any prior exposure to the Phantasy Star "universe".

I mean, I only played PSO1 for about a few weeks prior to its demise on the NA servers (this is Blue Burst we're talking about here, iirc), and what time I did spend in PSU was prior to the release of AoTI, which I never got to experience (and surely envy those who did).

But since we as gamers and people have grown up, there's been a newer generation to take its place. My concern/curiosity is how many of those will be:


A)Coming from the Western shithole-communes of WoW/GoW/CoD/LoL that apparently try to meme-ify anything and everything they find in the most immature of ways (think immature little "punks", for lack of a better word)
B)Coming into this game from the Korean MMO hives of MapleStory/Ragnarok Online/Elsword/etc. that are looking for an escape from the corporatist tactics of the groups that host said games (specifically Nexon)
C)Coming into this game with no prior MMO experience but having experience in single player action games. Specifically those who are console junkies but never felt the desire to go from solo to netplay.


Of these groups, I'd love for Group A to kindly get a maturity check before they step into this game, Group B to wind down from the massive hate for hosting companies that they've had prior (these guys tend to expect the most outlandish of phenomena to occur), and for Group C to speak up and seek out others of their kind (not just within THEIR group but within OURS as well).

Group C has me the most interested, whilst Group A has me the most disgusted. Group B is meh.


That said though, I'm definitely playing the NA version once it gets here - being able to experience ALL the content in a language that I'm familiar with (although the transition will definitely be weird at first) is probably the biggest factor in me making the jump. Being heavily unable to understand the Japanese players gives me a serious amount of unexplainable paranoid discomfort (which I attribute to a culture shock - won't go into that here as it would veer heavily off-topic and possibly cause a flame war).

Don't get me wrong - I've enjoyed my time here. It's just that I have this feeling of.... suppression and fear that I can't shake. Maybe it stems from how small the EN community is on the JP servers and how large their community is. I honestly don't know. But whatever.

Y'all are free to berate and praise my opinions however the hell you want. But please allow me to have them. In turn, I'll respect your opinions.