I’ve seen some monetisation-related disasters in my time, but I think this one might be up there with the worst—NCSoft’s Aion 2, which launched in Korea and Taiwan November 18, has caused no end of problems for the company immediately after launch. Including, potentially, causing its stock price to tank a whopping 15%.
As for why? Well, it has something to do with promising your game wouldn’t be pay-to-win, and then basically making it pay-to-win anyway. Players not entirely up-to-date on the developer’s latest plans logged in to find that power-granting items were available to be purchased through Quna, Aion 2’s in-game currency.
It doesn’t help that, while the game is free-to-play, it also has two tiers of monthly subscriptions available. The cheapest offers basic functionalities like trading and auction house usage, which aren’t available if you’re playing for free. I should note that, in other MMOs, these sorts of limitations are a sign you’re playing a trial, not a free-to-play game.