cash-shop-comparison
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Free for All: Three trends that need to go away in 2011
You know what? I hate geek memes. Heck, I hate the word meme. I generally will not support any term or phrase that was made popular in the last 10 years and mainly through the use of the internet. If it was made popular in programming circles in the early days of BBS (whatever that means) or if it was lovingly crafted during the great internet bubble of the '90s, I will avoid its use. Most of the time, I do not want to use someone else's words to support my own. You will never see the following sentence coming out of my virtual mouth: "Oh, hai! >.< All your base are belong to pedo bear! O.o Angry writer is angry!" The worst of the worst has got to be "die in a fire." Yes, I know you are a geek. I get it -- you are using a term that, I am sure, qualifies you as a socially awkward individual, as someone who simply must say the most inappropriate thing at the most inappropriate times (such as during a developer chat with developers who had almost lost their lives to recent wildfires -- I am not kidding). But I will not wear that badge of geek cred. Until now. These practices that I am about to list to you after the cut can, you know, die in a fire.
Massively's holiday guide to cash shop prices
I've been asked by readers, many times, to put together a comparison of cash-shop prices. I have always avoided the topic for one glaring reason: There is no constant. Sure, I can tell you how much you get for a dollar, but a wonderful mount in one game might not even be recognized as a mount in another! Quality is subjective, so how would I attempt to measure that? Also, if we wanted to compare the hundreds of cash-shop games out there, we would simply not have enough room. Yes, there are hundreds -- with more coming all the time. Let's be really conservative, though. I broke it down into 10 games that Massively readers will probably recognize or care about. Not all Massively readers, granted, but many, I am sure. It would do me no good to compare some tiny, indie game to Lord of the Rings Online, simply because I would be met with the equivalent of a blank stare. Such is the unfortunate state of gaming right now. After I marked up the list of 10, I lost two straightaway because -- while they have a cash shop in the technical sense -- those cash shops aren't something that can be put up against the others, or they have many items that just wouldn't make much sense. For example, I can tell you how much you can get for 10 dollars in Mabinogi and that you can sell some of those items to possibly purchase a house, but then we have to discuss the variable cost of the house, the upkeep -- on and on. I will definitely have to do a much larger list at some point. Anyway, read on, and I will put notes where needed. Let this serve one main purpose: to prove that there is no constant in cash shops and no generalities -- it's all up to the individual to decide on the quality and value of the items.
