You can buy weapons and prime frames, so I guess it depends on your definition of “win” but I’d argue that yes, technically it does. The larger issue of WF however are the layers of FOMO they have that turn the entire game into a job / chore that you have to attend daily, which is ultimately why I left it, even though the core gameplay itself is definitely fun. Frankly why I probably won’t play their other game either because it is almost certainly going to follow the same live service formula as WF.
It would be nice if games didn’t maliciously try to put hooks into players at every turn. But you can learn to balance it.
I have a Dojo with just my group of friends. We build it out with just what we need to progress. We play for like a month every few years, when the itch hits.
I agree with most of the stuff you’ve said expect the FOMO bit - there are three very specific items that are never coming back for obvious reasons, which are irrelevant to the overall story and hardly affect anyone’s enjoyment of the game. Every other item has eventually come back.
Edit: on a second read, you mentioned the game is P2W. That’s definitely a way to say you’ve not played the game, so now I’m angry I spent half a minute writing my comment.
My playtime for WF is in the 4 digits and I was at a fairly high rank at the time, but thanks for the attempt to dismiss my points. Yes, being able to directly buy equipment is the very definition of pay to win. And yes, the game is several layers of FOMO, regardless of your denial. One being artifacts / vaulting, which is a way to keep you log in and grind specific garbage missions. If you don’t, or if you’re plain unlucky, you miss your chance for many months (unless you pay of course). Another are the various faction caps, which there are many, again to keep you logging in to grind it up. If you don’t, you won’t be able to keep up with the reputation that is needed to progress through various gear to progress through various content. This was all already bad enough, but the fucking cherry on top of that was adding their form of a FrEe battle pass, as if that’s somehow a good thing. Yes, now the game dictates even more what you have to do (and where), instead of letting you do what you want to do. Because if you don’t, you won’t progress through the tedious, grindy and completely brain dead battle pass journey, missing all the rewards. “BuT DaRkThOuGhTs, ThOsE ReWaRdS cAn Be EaRnEd EvEn In LaTeR sEaSoNs!” No. Just no. You’re just adding more chores to the already way too long list of completely pointless and dumb chores. That’s not making it better, it’s making it even worse, because you’re just increasing the list of shit you can’t get. Luring people in artificially like this, by triggering their FOMO, are predatory dark patterns. If you want me to keep coming back to play your game, then just provide a fucking enjoyable experience. All those things do exactly the opposite of that, and thus I quit.
Also 4 digits playtime here, but that is irrelevant.
You’re not wrong, but you are confusing dark patterns with p2w. Sadly they all do dark patterns now. Even Deep Rock Galactic is loaded with them.
you miss your chance for many months (unless you pay of course).
Which is absolutely different from the actual predatory FOMO mechanics that are in place in many other MMOs. You seem to be overlooking the fact that, again, all those items are coming back eventually to the game.
If anything, you could have made a case for vaulting well before relics were introduced into the game and I’d have completely agreed. This is not the case for many years now.
You also mention “faction caps”, which have absolutely nothing to do with FOMO, as their rewards don’t rotate, again, except for relic packs.
FrEe battle pass […]. Yes, now the game dictates even more what you have to do (and where), instead of letting you do what you want to do.
You are pointing out generalities that are defeated by a cursory play through. For starters, Nora Night does not stop your progress whatsoever nor does it add any impressive improvements to your play through. Furthermore, some of the tasks are done automatically (bullet jumping, killing enemies, completing missions). Finally, most of the rewards are alternative (cosmetic) helmets, and again other cosmetic goodies.
You could have made a point of the arcane Warframe helmets, which modified some stats of your Warframe and were taken back in favor of streamlining the Arcane system. I could have maybe agreed that that’s a form of FOMO, if you really wanted to min-max your strategy.
Finally, the “cherry on top”, as you’d put it, is the fact that you talk of yourself as having been “fairly high rank”. Everyone and their mother knows that mastery rank provides little to no insights as to your skills, just the fact that you spent time leveling weapons.
For all these reasons, especially your failure to acknowledge the fact that there were FOMO mechanics that are no more for many years, allow me again to dismiss your alleged game experience. It clearly is not showing in the way you write any of your arguments.
A lot of people struggle to understand that a lot of the fun of warframe is in the progression. There really isn’t a lot to do that’s interesting when you get into the endgame, so paying to progress faster ultimately takes away some of that fun.
Now, there is plenty of fun to be had building and trying out new weapons, but that does get old without a goal to reach for while using them.
Also, very few people actually play the PVP mode. I’ve never touched it myself and I’m in the endgame.
So from an outsider who doesn’t understand this, they see that players can pay to progress faster and think it’s pay to win - because in most games it is.
FOMO is damn near gone from Warframe now, aside from Baro. I’ve been playing for over 8 years.
Since Prime Resurgence, Nightwave rework, Baro Tennocon relay and cyclic event schedules. The only way to truly miss something in this game is to willfully ignore it.