5 Logical Rebuttals To Illogical Criticisms Of Elder Scrolls Online

2. "I Shouldn't Have To Pay The Subscription Fee" - It's Worth It

This is mostly a problem for casual fans or others who aren't sure about buying. Yes, the Elder Scrolls Online requires a subscription fee in order to play on the PC. Is $15/£8.99 a bit high? Probably. It seems that after World of Warcraft began charging players in order to play, a lot of subsequent MMOs basically figured that these amounts were a nice round number that wouldn't shock anyone. Also, if you're going to play it on the Xbox One when it comes out this summer, not only will you have to buy the game and pay the subscription fee, but you also need to have an Xbox Live Gold account, which is another yearly fee on top of that. So yes, it's a little steeper than it should be, but let me tell you why you shouldn't worry about it. First, $15/£8.99 is not that much. In your entertainment budget, how much do you spend on movies, beer, music, or junk food? Like most people, you probably spend more than you should on things like that. All you need to do is refrain from ordering a single pizza once a month and bam, you've got an extra cash you can use to pay off your fee and spend another hundred hours playing an awesome video game. Second, the money isn't being sucked out of your wallet and into an empty void; you're making an investment. You're helping the developers accrue enough capital so they can put out quality content for the players and you're providing an avenue for paid moderators to ban those ubiquitous 12-year-olds from saying offensive belligerent nonsense and ruining the experience for others. Basically, you're helping them help you.

We're living in the free-to-play age, where players can access the base game for free and choose to spend real money at in-game stores, however after seeing several games get clusterfruitcake'd after the introduction of micro-transactions, a large demographic of gamers want nothing to do with them. Honestly, it seems more reasonable to shell out a monthly fee to play an enjoyable game and allow the developer to keep working than play for free and have everyone in the chat barking about items or gold sellers and having to deal with micro-transactions. So while the argument against the subscription fee isn't necessarily illogical, people need to get past the sticker shock of having to pay monthly to play an MMO. It's not an obscene amount, and it will guarantee developer involvement.