"Vraie;c-16276145" wrote:
Ok, so UK person here.
First the general confusion over what currencies are what and what they're worth kind of boggles my mind.
I'm so sorry, UK Simmers, but your currency really has reached an all-time low..
Sorry to the person who said this, I'm not picking on you, but I fail to see how that has any relevance to any of the Euro discussion. The Euro is a bigger unit of currency than the $US but a SMALLER unit of currency than the £UK EVEN following the post-brexit currency crash. Moreover, the value of the £ dropped in June 2016. It's been down to $1.33ish for almost two years. In recent weeks it's gone back up to $1.37 which is still low but HIGHER than its lowest point which was $1.29, back in 2016.
In reality, UK people have done well out of EA. In real terms we have actually had content cheaper than the US because of the difference in relative costs of living between the countries. Although $1 doesn't = £1, if you look at general costs, wages (theoretically) etc, where a person in the US might earn $7, a person in the UK might get £7. So I have always been surprised that we didn't have a £10 price tag on the stuff pack when the US had a $10 one. In my experience in other things it's normal for them to sell a $10 item in the Uk for £10 and absolutely nobody blinks an eyelid at it. I imagine most of the people on here already do this without knowing they do because they don't look at the comparison on a regular basis.
I'm not too fussed by the price rise - not because I have super cash to spend on games all of a sudden, actually in my case it's the opposite. But I don't ever buy packs when they're on full price anyway. Everything I buy is when there's a sale on and so I get the discount and it's fine. Of course, if they stopped running discount on these things then that would be a problem.
Going back to the currency, and the £ and the €, it's currently €1.13 to the £. So even if the value of the £ has dropped, the value of the Euro is still less than it, and so any argument that the UK should have a price hike but Europe shouldn't makes no sense in the context of currency size.
The thing I don't understand about this is that when the £ was 1.6$, that would mean that $10 was the same as £6.25. We've actually been paying more for the packs since 2016 in the UK BECAUSE the value of the £ dropped, even though the price didn't change. Our economy changed so in context with inflation, more of our money was going on the game than previously. That had nothing to do with EA, it had to do with the value of the £, and most of all, the Brexit vote, which killed our currency and IS a reason to be angry. But I would have thought that EA would have taken more money (being a US company) since the value of the £ dropped against the $...unless the problem is with the regional branches not making enough profit to feed back to the mother company.
In which case, if the UK deserve to get price hiked because of the dropped currency, I suggest getting angry with people who voted Brexit rather than EA. As for the other European countries, if it were all of them, I would hazard a guess that maybe the reason Europe is also affected may connect with the EU itself and how product is traded within that zone. But it's more complicated than just about the Euro. Denmark and Sweden also don't use the Euro, and Norway isn't in the EU although does have similar custom rules...those are three other currencies to take into consideration in this. I am pretty sure Poland don't use the Euro either. So we don't have a situation where it's all about Eurozone countries. It's specific countries in the Eurozone plus some not in the Eurozone. Which suggests this is more to do with individual countries and their specific economies and trading than it is the collective. And just because all these countries (even ours at present) are in or trade with the EU, it doesn't mean that they don't have their own individual economies and circumstances.
tl;dr - It;s not just about currencies. That doesn't make sense, and nor do any of the arguments about the weak pound, because half the listed European countries don't use the Euro and the Euro is still smaller than the £ anyway.
I was defending Simmers from countries whose prices increased, especially Italy and Spain because they are Euro countries. I wrote that particular sentence because we all know that the Pound DID drop in overall value compared to game launch value in
2014. The fact that it rose back up between 2016 and 2017 doesn't really matter in that discussion - I was not saying that it was FAIR that your prices increased. What I was saying, and I'm also fairly sure I used "kind of", is that I
kind of, in a way, understand why EA would up prices if the Pound lowered in value compared to
launch. I used the Pound as an example as that seems to be the only currency from all that have had price increases that has indeed lowered in value. This was not between the Euro and the Pound, by the way, but between the Pound and the USD. Since the Pound has lowered in overall value compared to 2014, there
might have been a certain degree of reasoning behind this one - which there isn't at all for most of the other countries, whose currency has not decreased in value at all. Again, might have been, because there's still so many other factors that make this EA decision very, very questionable to say the least. That's what I was saying. I still don't agree, but there's at least something to this. Again,
still don't agree. But please, read and maybe quote my entire post as I DID not agree with EA's decision at all.
ETA: Would also like to add that why would the Euro even have a price increase when we already pay €10,- for stuff packs and our currency has actually risen since the game's launch? Like you, I never saw this as a problem because even though we technically pay more, with earnings and everything €1,- pretty much equals $1,-. But I don't understand the logic behind that argument at all. All I was saying, in that
one sentence, is that since the Pound's value decreased EA's argument of currency changing KIND OF does apply to it - which it doesn't to the other currencies.
So again, as I find it hard to word myself correctly here: I DO NOT agree with EA's decision as my post in its ENTIRETY makes clear. I think that if this is indeed about currency values, then why only TS4 DLC, why
now, and why for countries whose currency hasn't even decreased (by much) since launch in 2014? What I meant with THAT sentence is that EA's argument could only kind of be applied to the Pound - but then again, why not up all prices when the pound really hit the ground back in 2016? That's what I was saying.
