Missing the fun times

Dear CG,

I’m writing this mainly to vent, knowing it’s the very definition of TL-DR and probably won't even reach your eyes—but I don’t care.

I’ve been playing SWGOH since early 2017 and have been a Star Wars fan for as long as I can remember (I stood in line to see Episodes I, II, and III on opening nights, if that says anything). Over the years, I’ve truly enjoyed two core aspects of this game: strategy and community.

The Strategy
Experimenting with kits and figuring out what works has always been a thrill. When GAC and TW were introduced, they added an extra layer of excitement. The best moments I’ve had in this game come from theory crafting and seeing those ideas succeed. That feeling of discovery and reward was the best.

The Community
I’ve only been in three guilds over the past seven—almost eight—years. Spending time with fellow Star Wars fans, working together toward in-game goals, has been a lot of fun. Raids were once genuinely engaging. TB was enjoyable (and still is to some extent), and even Conquest occasionally provided fun collaboration opportunities to achieve feats with outside-the-box strategies.

But here’s the thing—everything I just said is past tense.

Over the last few years, and especially the past two, you’ve steadily turned what was once a fun and rewarding experience into what feels like a relentless cash grab.

• Datacrons: Billed as a way to introduce nuance, from day 1 they have been little more than a glaringly obvious cash grab.
• Character Frequency: The number of new characters released in the past year alone exceeds any prior year, making it nearly impossible to keep up without having to open my wallet.
• Paywalls: New "limited time offers" seem to show up every other day, clearly designed to incentivize spending for faster upgrades, with paywalls becoming increasingly common and insurmountable.
• GAC Rankings: The ranking “squish” arbitrarily pushes players down tiers, even with a winning record. "Congratulations on your win! You've been relegated to Kyber 4!"
• Fleet Meta: There's no other way to put it... You've absolutely trashed the fleet meta, and all from one stupid ship (Punishing One). And then you "fix it"... "Leviathan can be beaten by Executor, so let's nerf Chimera!" How does that even make sense?
• Episodes: This latest system doesn’t even pretend not to be a blatant cash grab. “This feat only available if you buy the pass” is right there surrounded by a bunch of bright and shiny new buttons that I can't even press because I decided to put gas in my car and not in CG's bank account.

There's a lot more, but those are my main pain points.

Now listen, I appreciate capitalism and have the utmost respect for a good business model. But there’s a basic expectation that consumers receive value and quality in proportion to their spending. Right now, the quality of your product doesn't even come close to justifying the costs required to stay competitive in the game. And it's obvious that you could care less about providing value, at least to folks like me who don't have hundreds of dollars laying around every time you make a change to the game.

Yes, pay-to-win is a reality in gaming, but there has to be a reasonable limit. Sure, some of your player base can afford what it takes to stay competitive, but the majority simply can't—especially given the financial strain so many of us are already under. Many of us work long hours just to make ends meet, and we turn to gaming as a source of fun and stress relief. SWGOH used to provide that for me, but now it’s become a daily source of growing disappointment.

If it wasn't for the community in my guild and the various groups I'm in on discord, I would've stopped playing awhile ago. However, I'm pretty close to leaving anyway. I just think it's sad... supposedly you make 10 figures a year on this game. That is WAY more than enough to cover the costs for this game to be fun for everyone, regardless of their bank account. You just need to adjust your business model so it focuses more on caring about your whole player base and less on your end-of-year profits. 

Oh, and Happy Holidays.