Over a year ago I predicted that with the enter of Magneto and Lockboxes in Marvel Avengers Alliance the game would stop being F2P as it was to hard to get lockboxes.
Playdom did change that, I mean with Magneto the drop rate of boxes were just to low so it truly was forced system were the player had to use gold to get him. Unless the player was ridiculous lucky.
With Omega Sentinel, Playdom missed the mark even more. This might sound wrong as everyone got her easy right, well. I had 400 boxes left when I had her! That's huge a miss, Magneto was a little to hard Omega Sentinel was way,way to easy. Don't get me wrong I hate F2P Models were its not possible to farm to anything, meaning the payer has advantage(which is how PvP is in MAA....) but this second attempt of random unlock chance for a hero was so over the top filled with boxes.
As a game developer obviously it was a huge blunder the meaning is to get people to pay to get a faster access to the characters or less time spent etc - Note that in MAA I would say there is difference in time and time played. The player can for example pay to skip the research task which the player otherwise just has to wait out, to me this is the time I would argue is worth paying for the otehr time to for example farm lockboxes for Omega Sentinel in this case could easily be done and was never worth paying for.
While the Free user of course want stuff, and should appreciate the easy going way at this point I think it was far too easy. Making there be no effort getting her. This leads to that the non payer but player user. The user who plays hte game a lot or not even a lot but regurlady is better word for it. They want to feel entitled to better/more characters/items then the casual user who only plays once a week.
Omega Sentinel was easily farmable by just playing once a week. Playdom introduce the Group Boss system were the player could fight Ultron and get boxes(+ other loot) and the number of dropped boxes per battle was clearly to high. This + they still had the drop from all battles to etc.
To easy, making most people unhappy, the payer dont want to pay and the regular use dont feel need to play regulardy.
The next was as one could predict a hard nerf on the numbers. With Constrictor it become to hard I would say. The user now had to really do everything, max all tasks etc to have a chance to get him. But I would say it was just a little to hard.
Pretty much on the same time, Playdom also rolled the PvP lockbox system which is an much easier simpler loot system. The player wins a battle get a box repeat 5 time per day. A very typical Daily system. However, I would definitely say that the number of loot in the PvP system is a little to low.
Especially as it is based on the user getting lucky when loot drops(after 5 battle the user get the roulette for potentially more boxes). This + its more luck to get the right cover made teh PvP system not very good either.
Then the next try of Specal Operation, I think got it down pretty good. To get Satanna the user had to do most stuff and regularly farm the Group Boss. But it left the user with some boxes over so it was not impossible if the user had to much bad luck.
I was happy with this system it only had one fault, the orignal fualt of the whole game system. LUCK!!!.
If the user was still unlucky he/she could get 1 comic out of 8 after opening 200+ boxes. That is of course very unlikely but many people still didetn get the characters and was forced to use gold(yes the user get some gold by playing(not farmable!) but anything that requries gold = game not bieng F2P anymore).
But now Finally Playdom made a system that actually is really good. So I wanna say Kudos to Playdom, sure it took like a year and I am paranoid to expect that they changed the decrease the chance to get new comics...but giving them the benefit of the doubt this system is much, much better.
In this latest incarnation of the Lockbox hunt to get Loki. Playdom has introduced a Bonus Bar. When getting a duplicate now the user get 1 point in the bar and when it reach max its a guaranteed new cover. So this of course goes back to title of this article. Now I could pay for gold in this game. Before I flat refused as bad luck would mean it just wasted. Now its a 100% chance to eventually get Loki.
This is a simple bonus system but has a huge impact.
Now the player who is a plays the game at a regular base is almost sure to get Loki and the payer is sure to get something for his/her money.
Definitely a lesson learned here. In how to design F2P systems in a game.
