It is, without a doubt, interesting to me that the pricing of MMOs is always and forever will be a big debate for people. It’s insane to me! Not really, we all need something to whine about. It’s good to sit back and complain about something.

Up for discussion today is the pricing of ESO. Its retail box will be $59.99 followed up by a $15 a month subscription and day one DLC at I think about $20.00 (I could be wrong, it could be more or less, but whatever). We’re looking a grand total of something in the area of ten billion dollars to play a game. Let's throw in EQ: Next Landmark with the alpha packs too in the discussion or just any MMO in general.

It should just be free, you know, in a lot of ways just they should hand this game that has taken millions of dollars to produce and just hand it out to people for free. Then, give them everything else for free and also run the servers perfectly. On top of all of that, if anyone at all every feels sad while playing the game they should get something in return for free like why just Skyrim Steam Keys and if you already have Skyrim just why not like $10 in PayPal.

I can keep going with this discussion line, but no one ever understands how an economy works. They’re offering something, don’t like it don’t buy it. I was in Costco yesterday and like any other marketplace they sit there and shove tons and tons of free samples in your face. This dude let me try an angus burger and I was like oh cool yum, thing was dry as the desert and almost felt like there was some sand in it to boot. I spit it out (because it isn’t up to me to force myself to prostrate to the sample man and take his dry sandy burger in my mouth and swallow) because it tasted bad, then using the power of freedom, I didn’t buy them.

Later on, someone let me try some Lentil soup. It was freaking awesome and as such, I got a box of it. Now the box might have contained 1,400 more packages of Lentil soup then I needed, but whatever I will eat it and eat it and eat it until I’m sick and tired of it AND THEN I will buy no more.

People who complain about the pricing of video games act as if there is some massive entitlement in this world to provide entertainment within their budget. I’m not talking about people who are like I wish I could afford to pay that price because I really want to play. I’m talking about the raging crazy commenting people who are like Zenimax should burn in the fiery pits of Hades for pricing their game this way, this is total heresy to the order of the world!

Really, I have no justification or non-justification of the pricing of ESO. I can make comparisons to how much this entertainment costs vs. this entertainment but everyone has different tastes. There may be a $30 cover fee to join a club for 3 hours and that might be super boring or you could get a coupon off of Groupon for a $5 movie that’s 2 hours of entertainment and that could be boring as well. Maybe MMOs are the only form of entertainment that sates someone’s appetite, but at the same time MMOs are a backburner in the portfolio of things to do to pass the time, sitting behind Netflix and watching Vin Diesel movies.

What’s interesting is that everyone forgets about inflation too. MMO prices haven’t changed, but boy sure has our money stopped going so far. At a grocery store trip, it is almost impossible to make $200 go a week for two people at any level of enjoyment. Sure yes there are the grocery store warriors who can walk in and make each and every employee bow before their might as they purchase a years supply of groceries at $10, but eating ramen every day and forgoing meat doesn’t still justify how ten or even twenty years ago that same grocery store trip would be half the price.

With that rambling aside, if you ever do feel the need to whine that a game costs too much and the game hasn’t changed the price on you mid-flight then please stop yourself and think if the comments you’re about to make are going to contribute to society. If at any point there is some failure of your words to provide value, halt yourself and maybe reconsider. If you want to keep posting, then sure whatever freedom of speech and that’s your prerogative, but I’m just going to glaze over it and I’m sure a lot of other people are too.

Again, as just a final consideration of fact here, people who complain because the pricing isn’t within their budget are different then the trolls who utilize pricing as a method of aggressive attack against a game.