Oh right... The Cash Grab Aspect

Unknown

Making X Force viable is pretty much the anti-thesis of cash grab because his covers have been widely available for a long time, and even fairly accessible to the masses because X Force is just so weak nobody really tries to hard to get him. Sure there are guys who want to put up crazy scores in PvP/PvE that always makes thing difficult, but it's still far more likely to sneak your way to a X Force cover than Nick Fury. Honestly I thought they're going to just leave X Force for dead and start a new 4* character that'd have the power of what X Force has right now (top tier, but not broken).

NorthernPolarity

Phantron wrote:

Making X Force viable is pretty much the anti-thesis of cash grab because his covers have been widely available for a long time, and even fairly accessible to the masses because X Force is just so weak nobody really tries to hard to get him. Sure there are guys who want to put up crazy scores in PvP/PvE that always makes thing difficult, but it's still far more likely to sneak your way to a X Force cover than Nick Fury. Honestly I thought they're going to just leave X Force for dead and start a new 4* character that'd have the power of what X Force has right now (top tier, but not broken).

Nono, you've got it all wrong Phantron. Buffing X-Force is clearly a cash grab as well: now the players will spend money on hp/iso to level him up!

Unknown

NorthernPolarity wrote:

Phantron wrote:

Making X Force viable is pretty much the anti-thesis of cash grab because his covers have been widely available for a long time, and even fairly accessible to the masses because X Force is just so weak nobody really tries to hard to get him. Sure there are guys who want to put up crazy scores in PvP/PvE that always makes thing difficult, but it's still far more likely to sneak your way to a X Force cover than Nick Fury. Honestly I thought they're going to just leave X Force for dead and start a new 4* character that'd have the power of what X Force has right now (top tier, but not broken).

Nono, you've got it all wrong Phantron. Buffing X-Force is clearly a cash grab as well: now the players will spend money on hp/iso to level him up!

It all makes sense now. They give some covers for X Force easy so it's like a gateway drug to get people to spend more money, because a new 4* most people won't have the covers to waste money on!

I can see this scenario play out:

Mysterious leader: "Okay, we'll do this Operation Cash Grab by the book. Make a powerful, seemingly ridiculously 4* new character, sell covers and iso for $$$, but make sure he's still weaker than Sentry so we continue to collect a relatively small amount of our total revenue from shields + boosts."

Dev A: "Well the character itself is easy, but it'd take at least 5 months before this character can reach the masses."

Mysterious leader: "I don't get it. Just introduce a hero pack with the new guy as the only 4* and put him out for PvP/PvE top placement award? How hard can that be?"

Dev A: "Took us 5 months to put Nick Fury in the packs last time."

Mysterious leader: "Isn't that a trick to keep masses killing themselves on seasons reward and then to keep them waiting?"

Dev A: "Oh no, it took 5 months for the token guy to figure out how to put Nick Fury in cover packs, so we had to stall for time. The cover pack guy said he'd have to figure out how to put Deadpool in the token pack first before adding a 4*, so 5 months is being generous."

Mysterious leader: "Okay, time for plan B. What existing hero can be buff up to get people to spend? Invisible Woman?"

Dev A: "Nobody fell for it the first time so I don't think will work. Players are dumb but not that dumb."

Mysterious leader: "Then that leaves us with only X Force. Get to work!"

Raffoon

They could have kept Magneto filling the same roles, but weaker. Instead, they rearranged his roles and his colors, effectively swapping out a part of people's roster with an entirely new and different character. It serves to reason an uptick in covers bought would follow as people try to fill the gap.

Look, I've spent a large chunk of money on this game (well, a fair bit more than just one chunk to be honest). I want to give them my money because I like the game and enjoy playing it. But there's something about the transactions in this game that just feel slimy at times. When I fork over cash for League of Legends or Marvel Heroes, I feel happy to be supporting the developers. When I spend it on this game, it just feels like I've been taken advantage of.

Maybe it has to do with that article that was floating around a few months ago where the developers discussed their revenue and how they were constantly looking at their metrics to determine what would make them the most money. Surprise, somehow removing guaranteed featured characters from 10 packs makes them more money, so they went ahead and did that. That's not the only thing though, and the general impression that seems to come through is that they're more concerned with cashing in and extracting profit than making the best game that they can.

Call it a conspiracy theory if you want, and maybe the color swap on Magneto alone isn't superb evidence on it's own, but when I look at the developers' actions over time, that's the impression I get.

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

Health packs aren't a big money maker for MPQ. I have no idea why people keep declaring that health pack purchases are some grand pillar of MPQ revenue. First, it was "True Healing is CLEARLY a health-pack cash grab," and then it's "Sentry's very existence is CLEARLY a health-pack cash grab," and now "the CMags nerf is CLEARLY a health-pack cash grab."

You might be correct and health packs still make up the relatively small chunk of the pie chart we saw six months ago. To me this represents unrealized earning potential and it makes total sense to come up with methods to try to unlock this stream. Especially if the other pieces of the pie chart have plateaued.

Personally, I am using more health packs now compared to before. I wouldn't call any individual change a cash grab, but to me it seems every change has had at least an additive effect on health pack usage. It's probably more like, "Hey, I think this change will improve gameplay, and there's an added benefit of it potentially increasing sales in area that is lacking."

I don't blame them for trying to generate short-term revenue streams. Their main source of IAP income - cover packs - keeps losing value over time (both due to % decreases and players' growing collections), and they have no long-term vision for the game.

Unknown

Last time I got a heroic cover pack, I got 10x 2* covers. Perhaps, if the odds of getting something useful weren't so abysmal, they could make some money. From here on in tho I'll never buy another cover pack. I can get 10 useless 2* covers in an afternoon for no money and little effort.