The abusive prices of the battle pass and bazar

Please Funcom team, reduce the prices of the Bazaar and Battle Pass, these are extremely abusive prices in my country (Brazil), the bazaar items converting to our reality are practically the value of buying 2 to 3 games on Steam… .be a little aware of the community in other countries, I’m sure there are other players who agree with me. The cosmetic items in the bazaar should be more affordable, since in the past the complete dlcs were worth more due to the quantity of items. We players not only want a good, bug-free game, but one that is fair to the community, which is currently not the case. Review the values, and you will see that we will support you, it is not fair to pay 500 crom coins for a floor cleaning brush LOL.

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I am Brazilian, that is crap. Completely wrong.
Games in “Brazilian steam” are not that cheaper in their prices more than any other country that charges less than USA.
The Bazaar prices are not any different from what they represent in other countries.

There are things which are cheaper in Brazil, and those have nothing to do with gaming. While you might pay what for us is BRL 5 or BRL 7 for a loaf of sourdough bread, while in Brazil you can by 10 loafs for the same price, games, computer equipment, and other things are not even that much cheaper to call for it.

And people should also understand that despite having different “economies”, the people who work making the stuff are not living in Brazil to be paid Brazilian work money. That IF Brazilian games were any cheaper to begin with.

As a Brazilian I feel ashamed people use our nationality as “excuse” to make points it doesnt support. You can say the prices are high if you think they are, because you think so, but claiming that is because in Brazil they are high is crap.

I recognize that compared to OTHER THINGS, as I said, prices in gaming in general are high, even discounded regionally by steam itself, but doesnt support the point in any way.

Things like “discord nitro” which is half the price in Brazil for example are “another thing”. Each one defines their price scales as they want, and discord might do what they do because they know their public and they find that doing it increases their sales without enhancing their costs. That has to do with public, not region.

Conan Exiles has a lot of Brazilians playing, but I can guarantee, not enough so that making something “exceedingly cheap” will earn them more money. That is the thing.

And, the “value of buying 2 or 3 games” ? What games ?
For our reality, one says:
image
7800 coins is BRL 131, which is 25 USD roughly.

Lets see some game prices for us in Steam:
DarkSouls 3 on sale: 114 BRL.
Helldivers: 199 BRL
Elden Ring: 229 BRL
Bauldur’s Gate 3: 199 BRL

To put it into perspective:
Stardew -freaking- Village: 25 BRL

Your average NVidia “minimal decent GPU”: 2700 BRL.

However, your average “upper middle class restaurant meal”: 250 BRL per person, or 49 USD roughly. In the USA over 60 USD per person.

We do have things that are in Brazil very cheap, food, clothing, rent (in some places), etc.

Games, IT stuff, consumer electronics, are not among them. Dont make points that make us look bad just because you think your individual case is “our nation” case.

Wait so you’re saying that we can get the same work done in Brazil but cheaper? I would much rather fuel Brazil’s economy over that of some others. I need to talk to our Operations.

Well, depending on the country you live, you already do.
ABC, the “Agencia Brasileira de Cooperação” or “Brazilian Cooperation Agency” does a wonderful job in mediating international cooperation with several countries as Brazilian professionals are sent to teach and learn about all kinds of stuff.

Working along some of those projects, one knows what is and what isnt “Brazilian reality”, and we are far from being a “poor country that no one has money for anything”. Brazil is the chief economic power in South America, which is a point of contention if here in Uruguay while they were actually the presiding nation on Mercosur. We are in many ways the mediator of investment in South America because our economy is more forgiving than almost any other in here (arguably Chile might be named as one contender, but not really when it comes to numbers).

But that wont change certain contries mindsets, because as most people are aware, Brazil is the B in BRICS, which C represents China. Our relationship in terms of economy with China is very tight. So if you are favoring Brazilian economy over China, India or Russia, you essentially still doing almost the same “favoring”.

People in some African countries earn something equal to USD 40 a month. So, AAA video games should cost about one dollar there, right?

Only, they don’t. Because the video game developers don’t work for USD 40 a month.

As unfortunate as it is, internationally available luxury commodities cannot be priced according to the country’s average income per capita. (And I do feel bad about being able to buy a bundle of bananas for less than a Euro in Finland because I can guess how much the South American banana farmer gets from that bundle.)

That is true.
I remember back in the 90’s when PC games in my currency were 450.
And police officer salary was 360 per month :laughing:

Let me tell you of the days of high adventure!

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Man, all the arguments you gave to defend funcom’s abusive prices are valid for your reality. But yes, they are abusive prices, players from other nationalities with better savings are complaining, do you really think it’s worth paying 30 BRL for 4 cosmetic items, which are purely decorative? That’s exactly what I don’t agree with, these items aren’t worth a game, you should defend reducing prices to something fair, and not support the perpetuation of this…


What I’m trying to say is that funcom is selling packages of loose items like in the bazaar and in the battle pass, which are the same value as games on sale… that’s the problem, they’re loose items and cost more. I’m not disqualifying my country, I know the reality here…

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But the market allows this. Yes they are expensive but how is it any more expensive than Fortnite microtransactions? Or PUBG?

It’s not fair to compare these with sale priced items as those are promotional with the intent of gaining player bases. If that is the case then the logic dictates I can use Conan sales as the reason they have to have these bazaar prices the way they are because they are literally losing money during their promotional sales of the game and have to make up the revenue elsewhere.

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Just noticed Ubisoft’s AC Valhalla in that image. Their Helix store is worse than Funcom’s BLB for prices

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Also if they dropped prices for each economy, could i not just use a vpn to buy the game for the cheapest region and then buy dlc like i am in that “economy”?

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There is no reason to lower the price as long as people keep paying.
Most software is artificially high in some regard because supply is essentially infinite.
Transistor states, or bits are being copied from one computer to another.

I mean pick a random file on your computer… Select it and press ctr+c and ctr+v. You have successfully created a copy of that file. You can keep doing this until your computer runs out of hard-drive space. How much effort was put into this? How much electricity was used to create 1,000 copies? Effectively 0.

There used to be a big effort to copy information from one computer to another. They had to transfer the information to a disk…millions of disks. Box it. Put it on a truck and deliver it to a store front. Big logistical cost. Yes, this still applies today too ( i.e.) console games. But much of software deliveries are handled digitally.

Yes there is the cost to produce those bits, and yes there are cost associated with running a store front or some sort of server that people are connecting to to copy the information. But a game that cost say $60 on a disk also cost $60 digitally. The digital version does no share the same physical copy logistical costs.

If you want prices to go down… There is only one thing the people who support these prices understands. Money. Stop giving them money. Yet, this is wishful thinking because you would have to have a lot of people stop giving them money.

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Couple that with steam exploits and you can get the entire Conan Exiles experience for less than a movie ticket with popcorn and drink.

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But thats just regular price nowadays

I agree that the price of the Bazaar items is prohibitive, but honestly nothing on there is really necessary. If you want more cosmetic content then buy the older DLCs, which give you at least three armor sets, weapons, a complete building set and other decorations for $5-10 (depending where you buy them).

The Battlepass is also a great deal (especially if you bought it 7 chapters ago), since you get a bunch of new content each chapter and enough crom coins to buy the next Battlepass.

Elevator skins for $10? You don’t need them. I just ignore the Bazaar for the most part.

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So, because old and small games on sale are cheap, everything should be ?
It is like advocating a Olive Garden should charge 5 bucks for a meal because bananas are cheap. Seems another ignore for arguments that go no where.

Again:

It does not matter what “other games” cost one way or another, it does not matter how other games monetize themselves one way or another, but if it did had some connection, it would not be by the “bargain bin”.

I dont need to “demand” abusurd thing from a publisher or developer because I am player. I dont like when people devalue or insult my work by comparing it to cheap and lazy work, so I dont do it to others either.

Take the work put into making that Japanese themed bath. Has any “American Truck Simulator” or even “Assassin Creed” that level of work in which you not only have a nice looking thing that works, but build it your own way ? You are delirious if you think those are comparisons.

Also, if I am paying around 25 bucks for 7800 crom coins, you must be really bad at math to say you paying 10 bucks for the elevator. But it would not be an argument if you did.

Like other things, if you dont like it, dont buy it. If you think it is expensive, dont buy it. Get a mod. It is free.

It does not matter what “one” thinks is worth or not. Vanity items are priced by the vanity factor, not what they worth. Anything that doesnt perform a function or have exchange value has an inherent value of 0. It is really literally “it cost this much, if you want to buy it, if not, ok”.
If they charge it, it is because it is deemed a work rewarded. If I pay it, it is because I deemed it a work rewarded. If you dont want to pay, that is your problem, not mine, not the designer’s.

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Not really true. There have been a few things sold that are considered P2W. They give an advantage to players. They were probably not designed that way, over sight.

Anyways. The hardcore pvp players know. Certain building pieces are super op.
That twitch drop for the blood crystal charms are making me 2400 eld bars a day. I could easily ramp that up. That’s good enough. Don’t want to run vaults, so I’m good.

So ya, I like to buy everything. Never know what gem you’ll find :face_with_hand_over_mouth::kissing_heart:

I wonder what in the Bazaar is super op to tip the scales of PvP that is different from anything which is already in the game for the same materials, with the same specs, but “uglier”.

The only thing that might “mean” something is the hidden door, if they were not so obvious anyone knows they are hidden doors.

Every single DLC item, be it from the old DLCs or the Bazaar has a “uglier” version on the regular game which is made from the same materials, and at the same time. Even if they do not require the actual achievement to be made, they still require the same materials which come from the same base achievement. So if you cant craft a metal bar, you cant craft a wheel of pain, or a gibbet. If you cant craft a regular hardened metal sword, you cant craft the “hardened metal sword of snucklebuckler pirate” for 1.99.

The void arguments about what is “pay to win” becomes stupid when you put any thought into it.

People just find an excuse to complain, and most of the time, about something that they will never face, if possible at all.

I do agree with the don’t like don’t buy, but it seems people use this as an excuse. Whatever one does in their life or economically does not live in a vaccum. There is some responsibility for both parties. Otherwise crack dealers should be able to sell crack and lace it with rat poison, because hey if you don’t like it don’t buy it.

That has nothing to do with the case.

You are mixing legality of the product with price markup. Two completely different issues.

There is nothing inherently bad on buying or not items from the Bazaar. If one wanted to make this argument “fly”, it would be required to at least involve the “loot box”, aka “gambling”, so that would then make SOME sense.

Ofcourse it applies. The logical proposition is don’t like don’t buy. This is a false proposition. Lets remove legal restrictions on everything. All problems will go away because you dont like it dont buy it.