Talk:Jack's Tower/@comment-51.6.22.142-20181101223804/@comment-138.197.222.13-20181102021238

Country Gal,

Thank you for your reply. This message has turned out to be longer than courtesy would dictate. I do ask that read it, though, since my personal analysis of the finance is turning frustration at being completely blocked into outright rage. None of that rage is aimed at you personally – indeed you should probably be getting danger money from G5 as this is IN NO WAY anything I am blaming you for. I suppose I should send this as “feedback” to G5 – but you honestly think they would care?

You recommend that I ask others for the things that I lack. This I have done, but what I need for Jack's Tower is more Love Nets and at this stage I can't ask others for them, since there is no mechanism for putting them on my wants list. There is also no place to get them except for Jack's Tower. When I found that I was going to have to keep playing and hope that the Illusions mode turns up, I thought that at least I could use this opportunity to stock up on Love Nets. However, since I started trying for the Illusions mode without success, I have also had no Love Nets - not one - from my excursions into Jack's Tower.

There is, I think, one other place where you can get Love Nets without spending rubies - in a Zombie's Lair. In order to fight zombies, however, you have to have Party Poppers. And the place where you get Party Poppers is - ta-da - Jack's Tower. And since I started trying for Illusions mode I haven't had any party poppers either. I can't see how to ask others for them.

And even if I manage to get into a Zombie's Lair, I need to open as many chests as possible - which mean that each visit costs 45 rubies, since you usually have to open 3 chests to confirm that you aren't getting what you need. Reckon on maybe getting 1 Love Net for every 3-5 visits and it soon becomes obvious that you are better off buying them, even at 16 rubies a pop. I currently have 4 Love Nets (and I hoard them carefully, never using a rare assembler when I don't need it to progress) and will need a total of 13 if I ever get to the end of this quest. If I can't find them, and am unable to ask for them, then that's 171 rubies.

Here in the UK each ruby has a baseline cost of about 10p. At basic rate that means that 171 rubies cost £17.10. Reckon to buy in some quantity and only when you have the Philosopher's Stone and you can get that for less than half the price. Suppose that's just £7 - about $10.

So keeping those Love Nets as essential to the quest and impossible to find or receive them, G5 is ensuring that I have to fork out $10. And that's for this one item in this one quest. You find similar blockages in any quest and if you need further items then that's more money still. You may begin to see why I feel that G5 are playing me for a fool. and if there are enough others like me, then their "glitch" becomes a very profitable enterprise.

Even if I can manage to find a few Love Nets in Jack's Tower, I have to pay the extra "entrance fee" of the special baubles required - by now that means 25 of these things per visit. Start requiring enough visits waiting for the illusions or trying to find the Love Nets and you get through the baubles (sorry, can't remember their name) very quickly. You can go through other locations to get them, but that takes time which you may not have or you can buy them for real money.

I appreciate that G5 are a commercial enterprise and that their financial model is providing a "free" game and then relying on players making in-game purchases. When I was new to the Hidden City I was startled and appalled at the thought that I might want to spend top-side of £80 to stock up on rubies. I now wish I had summoned up enough courage to spend £80 (think $100US) a time, since it would have been cheaper than what I have actually spent. I don't know how much that is because I haven't the courage to add it up - but several hundred dollars.

This game is proving to be the most expensive PC game I have ever played, by a very long chalk. And now it's not even fun.

I really must break out of the “one more event/location/quest.” This is beginning to seem perilously close to an addiction and there are cheaper ones.