1up.com — The Blizzard Pet Store is offering two new virtual pets to World of Warcraft players today, one of which has generated over $2 million in sales in its first four hours. The "Celestial Steed" is "freshly born from the Twisting Nether" and allows players to "travel in style astride wings of pure elemental stardust." It also costs you $25.
Apr 16, 2010 View in Crawl 4
nanobeApr 16, 2010
Blizzard has been against the purchasing (with real money) of *useful* in-game items. They have been fine with selling vanity items that don't actually give you any competitive edge in-game.What makes this current situation unusual is that the mount they're selling is arguably a useful in-game item. Although it isn't any faster or better than the mounts that you can already get in-game within the same riding skill level, it's still a useful item, and someone could pay real money for the equivalent of something that would normally cost in-game money. That's where Blizzard is starting to wander into gray area.I think it would have been a better decision to allow the purchasing of a mount *transformation* of some sort. So, you could pay $25 to change the appearance of a mount you already have. Alternatively, they could make it cost $25 plus the same in-game gold price that you would normally have to pay for an equivalent-speed mount. I think that would eliminate the controversy.
Closed AccountApr 16, 2010
More like "Seriously WoW addicts?"You can't blame blizzard for profiting on a demand. It's not like the horse is any different from any others you can earn for free except for in appearance. It's not forcing people to pay to stay competitive.That said, I'm also glad I got rid of that s**t. WoW is a hell of a drug.
codeblewApr 16, 2010
Dude, just quit. Don't talk about quitting. Just do it. Seriously, you will be happier.
stemninApr 16, 2010
13 Million in the world. Not everyone pays 15$/month. Some countries have pay per time played (minutes).
mercfhApr 17, 2010
I think it's funny that alot of people dont realize they dont actually own their character. They pay Blizz to "use it"So technically your spending 25$'s to rent a Cosmetic Horse for a predetermined amount of time.
korberosApr 28, 2010
1.92 million....Please learn math.
korberosApr 28, 2010
That's a little different. Pre-ordering doesn't cost you money on top of the game. Also, pre-orders are a continuation of what Steam is about, giving power back to developers... they have a very concrete and measurable effect on the company you buy from, and are not a shill to get more money for doing less work. Also, that bunny hat, much like the bat you got in L4D2 for pre-ordering, doesn't affect game-play at all. It has NO stats...Also, Sam and Max is a SINGLE PLAYER game, so even if the item had stats, it wouldn't affect anyone but the buyer, unlike the mount in WoW.
m3mn0nMay 2, 2010
I stopped playing WoW because a game isn't supposed to be work.Why would I want to spend several hours "grinding" and earning cash to buy stuff in a virtual world after I just spent 8 hours doing the same thing in real life?
m3mn0nMay 2, 2010
StarCraft: Ghost failed for several reasons. None of which has anything to do with virtual shop items in WoW.