I’ve been a tenacious Home user since it was a pre-public Beta, being drawn to its innovative designs, thinking & ingenuity, and to the amazing community that formed… a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing and testing and demonstrating new concepts and creativity.

However, Sony’s recent practices & attitudes appear more concerned with making a profit at the expense of the Home experience — much of what made Home so unique is becoming diluted by the ceaseless barrage of rampant microtransaction pressuring, which is slowly transforming Home into just another MMORPG wannabee nickel-and-diming us to death.

Someone save us before all is lost…

• Freemium? Newer Home spaces (Dragon’s Green, Novus Prime, Conspiracy) now have limited interaction unless an entrance fee is paid and/or additional items are purchased. Even our “free” Darla’s Den space cost a pretty penny to completely unlock (key + cost of winning 1000 pts).

• The majority of virtual items/spaces being pandered to consumers are already overpriced, and prices continue to rise at a rate higher than our real-world national inflation. Not to mention that after the initial development/design cost, there is NO materials cost; each item can be mass replicated for free ad infinitum. LOOT seems to be one of the few to utilize a realistic price-point for their items – NO $10 outfits or $15 Mansions (~$35 with “expansions”). At 49¢-99¢, LOOT will sell FAR more units of a item than if they’d charged $1.49-$2.99 (or more), which in turn provides a higher profit margin. What makes more business sense… to sell 20 units of a item @ 99¢, or only sell 1 @ $2.99?

[Cont. @ #59]

“As for Conspiracy, it is a freemium game where you can earn upgrades through gameplay as well as purchase various hacking devices to enhance the game play (or purchase the All Access Pass for $3.49).

And for Slap Happy Sam, everyone will get to check it out in Central Plaza this week, and if you want to gain entrance to the entire slap-happy show, you may purchase a Phonograph Music Box (that plays music) which grants access to the main event—priced at $2.49.”

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What is happening to Home? Innovation and experimentation were originally the key elements, but “commercialism” appears to be the new focus. Over the past few months, microtransactions have invaded all aspects of Home, and we consumers are now continually confronted by SCEA’s “buy or die!” mantras within both the blog & Home itself.

• Home’s once-informative “Message of the Day” is now generally nothing more than an extended written ad telling us to buy/purchase/pick-up/grab/get all the latest clothing, furniture, personal spaces, companions & other items.

[Cont. @ #58]

And I don`t get what was so great about Xi? The puzzles are fun, I guess, but the rewards aren`t. They`re all the same, just some little useless statue with a diff number on it. Waste of inventory space, so I stopped trying to win them. If they were parts to a cool costume THEN I would continue struggling for the rewards. As it is, I wish there was a Trash feature so I can dump the useless things, along with anything else I don`t use, to save space for other, better things I can get on Home.