Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes may require players to spend between $4,000-5,000 a year to gain access to the highest tier of rewards in the game. The lead producer of the game made the declaration in response to complaints about certain new characters only being accessible to higher spenders in the free-to-play title.
The lead producer of Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes‘ comments were shared in a Reddit thread, now modified and migrated by r/games due to its editorializing of the comments. In response to the question, “Do you expect people to pay $4-5k to catch up?” lead producer Carrie Gouskos answered via Twitter. “Expect? Yeah, I’d say to some degree. Want? Not for anybody for whom it was unpalatable. What I want is for the people at the tip of the spear to get him, and for most of the next wave of people to get him when he next comes around. More like Traya (without the raid).” Gouskos replied to several other comments and criticisms, indicating past examples as reasons why the studio’s current practices for making certain content available to high spenders first in its F2P game are now in place.
The lead producer’s comments received a wide-range of comments across Reddit and Twitter. Some users pointed to industry practices regarding loot boxes and game addiction. While another commenter indicated that they believed the characters at the center of the recent complaints can be earned without spending cash.
Carrie Gouskos also spoke about receiving complaints from the other side of the argument:
I’m talking about getting yelled at by whales for the weeks around Darth Revan. “You are disrespecting your paying customers”. Then a week or two passed “You only do this for whales.” It’s a cycle. (And it’s exhausting.)
— Carrie Gouskos (@cgouskos) April 17, 2019
As well as the up and downs of maintaining an open dialogue with the community:
I agree it’s gotten worse. I have theories about why that is, but it’s not because we’ve suddenly changed. It reminds me a lot of this time last year. The catalyst was something we did, but that was the tipping point reflecting bigger issues. This year it was the refresh change.
— Carrie Gouskos (@cgouskos) April 17, 2019
Really good input from both you. Would be open to that dialogue. I think the challenges are when it is drowned out in noise, there’s almost no way to do it. The refresh outrage really clogged up the discussion channels. It became impossible to find an avenue. But this is good.
— Carrie Gouskos (@cgouskos) April 17, 2019
Star Wars games and microtransactions have been at the forefront of gaming conversation this week. Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order was announced at the weekend, and Respawn head Vince Zampella was quick to point out the game would have “no microtransactions.”
Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order is slated to be released on November 15 on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.
