I have been waiting for the battle to arrive for quite some time hopping that will help me and other new/returning players to help lvl up and catch up to the game. Hoping that with a bit of excitement i started to read the announcement and holy cow i have never seen such a greedy and distasteful announcement in a looooong time.
Battle passes in general are a type of monetization that companies put in free to play games in other to provide value and rewards to players an to reward their activity with unique rewards as they complete different challenges. Majority if not all provide cosmetics, different of boosts to level up,gear and some even unique obtainable items that can obtained only for a limited time.In order to entice people to buy it they give some decent rewards to free to play players an amazing for the premium ones. Now lets check l2 battle pass :
As a free to play player you get 330 ( 5.5 hours) minutes of vitality maintaining toggle switch and some random 30 minute buff attempts that its laughable at what it provides(increases EXP/SP by 5%, Attack/Magic Atk./Defense/Magic Defense 5%, Vitality Bonus 5%, All Stats +1, Attack/Defense attribute +30).
So what is your grand reward for farming over 600.000 monsters you say? a freaking lvl 3 jewelry box. Your reward for nearly killing double the monster of Exalted 7 quest amount is a freaking jewelry box that you can easily craft and compound to level 3 from the in game crafting not to mention that you get FREE set of lvl 3 jewels as youl level up as player an finish some quests......
Now that we established that the f2p rewards are insulting joke to say the least lets say what the 1400 nc coins ( 17.5 euros) a month get you, must be something good right?
WRONG.
You get 1200 ( 20 hours) minutes of vitality maintaining and some items that are hilariously bad for the 90% of the time.
0 items to help through progression, not even temporary gear or something to level you up nothing(remember shadow gear?). No buffs that give you some exp bonus or help level up quicker or help your progress, no cosmetic rewards nothing.... not even bloody soulshots to throw in to help you get pass the bloody grind, nothing.
Who even thought this is a good idea, who even remotely agreed that this is acceptable effort (and im generous here) spent on understanding about the games needs and how to help it either revitalize it or help the remaining players stay around.
This is one of the worst if not worst monetization ive seen in ages and i have played a lot of different crappy games.I haven't seen such a terribly overpriced and useless battlepass, ever.
I am seriously baffled as i type this at 4 am, the level of incompetence or indifference by the people designing this is outstanding.
It is summer and you ( nc soft) haven't put a bloody sale for years now? Heck you cant even afford to put a bloody exp event to give player to think about spending time in the game . Bravo.
This game used to offer you one of the best experiences for 15 bucks a month and now with the same amount you cant even buy enough to keep you interested at all.
Im done.
P.S You cant even buy 1400 nc coins directly you have to buy the 20 euro one