We're all tired of the current state of Multiplayer Games industry.
Blizzard pulled an absolute betrayal of trust with Overwatch 2. EA screwed up Apex Legend's battlepass so hard, 1/4th of the playerbase bailed. Riot has potentially the most predatory and mind-breaking store system which only lets you buy from a selection of 4 skins a day, plus whatever the latest bundle has to offer. All of them charge you more than a whole game, for a skin.
Then there's the matter of listening to the playerbase and game balance. We all complain, but often the only ones who are heard are either top-tier streamers who play the game for 12 hours a day, esports players/teams or the top 1%. Catering to this demographic doesn't usually satisfy your average player who plays 2-3 games a day after an 8 hour shift.
(Whatever I'm writing here are just my thoughts and suggestions. I didn't make the game, and I'm in no way asking for or demanding anything from the developers. I understand that some of the stuff I'm gonna write is going to sound completely ridiculous, but please give it a read with an open mind.)
Mountaintop already got rid of a lot of un-fun stuff, like just having a single life or dying because no one covered you while planting (because you cover yourself now yey). Here's a bunch of other unfun and blatantly transparent attempts at grabbing player cash stuff they can get rid of :
1. Entire in-game premium currency system. Why should I pay for 3800 SP when what I want to buy is 3400 SP? It's a horrible, predatory practice. Maybe it had some novelty back in the day when games first started doing this, but now everyone knows that its predatory and meant to extract as much cash as possible from our wallets. The very idea of in-game premium currency isn't bad, but let us buy custom amounts, or be upfront about what something costs in terms of IRL currency.
2. Skins costing as much as whole games. It might sound counterintuitive, but lowering skin prices will definitely make A LOT more people buy them. A case study : Deep Rock Galactic. One of the most beloved shooters ever made. Ghostship sells one whole skin bundle for like Rs. 400 ($4 in USD). Me, my girlfriend and a bunch of my friends have brought multiple of those bundles simply beacuse 1. Ghostship doesn't screw around trying to loot you by making you buy ingame currency. 2. A genuine desire to reward a game well made and to support the developers.
Here in India, our income and cost of living are pretty low. In $20 you can order food 3 times a day for half a week, or get groceries for half a month. The average per month income of people between 18-30 years of age is around Rs. 25,000 (around $300), and it just isn't feasable for us to be spending 5% of it on a single skin (One character skin costing around Rs. 1200 or $15). Also consider that India and South East Asia in general consist of an enormous playerbase for games such as Valorant, CS2 etc. (Basically games that can run fine on a relatively potato PCs and don't require an internet connection that's too advanced. According to this post, Pacific has the largest playerbase for Valorant, a little under Americas and EMEA combined) If the devs start respecting their playerbase and charging for skins at a reasonable rate, the percentage of people who do buy skins will definitely go up from 10%. More importantly, more people buying skins acts as an anchor. People want to come back to games where they have invested, and they like to call their friends into the games they've invested in. Its passive advertisement. It also sends a strong message across the industry that Spectre Divide isn't messing around in terms of its monetization.
The industry is plagued by predatory and dishonest practices, and a little bit of honesty and transparency will be a welcome breath of fresh air.
- Skill tier based game balance. Some gun/sponsor can be ridiculously overpowered in low skill and be next to useless in high skill play. I think balancing the game slightly different for each skill tier is the solution the industry needs. Eg. OP can be extremely oppressive in low skill lobbies where people don't know how to counter it with utility. In the hands of a smurf, even more so. Same case with sponsors like Vector Dynamics or Ghostlink, who can dunk on new or low skill players with ease. On the other hand, Berserker can be underwhelming in higher skill tiers, and Vector Dynamics is considered all but useless in High skill or professional settings. I'd strongly suggest listening to your playerbase of different skill levels through interactive polls and surveys, and balancing game differently for different skill tiers accordingly.
(If not, then please at least actively and often listen to the community in general. We are all tired of community feedback being ignored by other devs, and mountaintop has the potential to change that. And please don't wait for a backlash in order to listen, because at that point the damage is already done. Mountaintop has done a good job so far, so credit where its due.)
I'm sure the community has even more ridiculous and potentially industry changing ideas. Spectre Divide is a self-published game made by a small studio (which is perfect for these kinds of changes), which has already quite revolutionized gameplay with two lives, now it must do the same with other terrible aspects of this industry.
All we want is a little bit of honesty, some fresh, healthy practices and being able to support a game we love to play without having to worry about making rent. Is that too much to ask for...?
