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Despite the fact that microtransactions were barely functional when The First Descendant launched, players have been comparing the game to one of its closest competitors – Warframe – and found that Nexon’s title is nearly 20 times more expensive for equivalent upgrades.
As noted by Reddit user goompas who has highlighted the disparity in cost between Warframe and The First Descendant in order to “double the character mod capacity,” an Orokin Reactor costs roughly $1.50, whereas the equivalent item in The First Descendant is $30.
Comments have responded with just responses: “[Digital Extremes] is generous and kind. Nexon is greedy and cruel,” responds one, while another notes that “browsing the store on the first hour the game came out and seeing over half the items showing ‘popular’ showed just how scandalous this is.”
Other examples TFD’s equivalent of Forma costing “15-20x as expensive,” while it costs between $200 – $300 to pay for full unlock of the External Components menu slots.
It highlights a few pretty damning issues with the gameplay loop behind The First Descendant. Loot is dropped incredibly infrequently, and you’re going to need so many components to eventually make these worth it. Nexon’s latest game is designed to make expensive features easily accessible through microtransactions, whereas grinding and farming will yield nothing of the same rewards. I know it’s a free-to-play title, but the business model is concerning.
There’s going to be plenty of players out there who will crumble under the pressure of these microtransactions. All I can say is look out for yourself here.
It’s still in its early days, and there’s still time to balance the pricing structure. Something tells me that’s unlikely to happen though. There’s a good argument that nobody is making anyone pay for these microtransactions, which is entirely fair. The thing is that The First Descendant’s cosmetics and upgrades are so unfairly priced that it’s hard to see how this is both sustainable and realistic. Are people even going to be splashing out $20 to enhance their character’s mod capacity?
There’s a reason Warframe has been such a dominant player in the looter-shooter sphere for so long, and most of that is thanks to the reasonable and fair approach to monetisation. The game might have seen 230,000 players at its peak yesterday, but we’ll see how
