ayyezajac wrote:
Just throwing this out there, without premium players like myself, Josh, and many others, there would be no game (it would have ended by now.) We keep this game running for you freemium players. The cash flow keeps this game running as long as EA is making a profit. In the process, EA is continually smacking us premium players in the face. I have seven trains. I didn't need another one. 2.5% to me doesn't mean much either. I'm making thousands per day. Or the casual five donut giveaway when things cost 150-300 to begin with. I'm sorry if most of you can't understand this, but the day that we stop paying for things is the day the game ends and you'll fully understand.
I don't spend my money on this game for anyone else but me. Why would I? This is a game app. There are things I do subsidize (some of them unwillingly). But again, this isn't one of them. It's a game app. I have no delusions about where my money goes (a for-profit corp., as if this were a bad thing) and I understand that I am paying for a more-or-less frivolous entertainment. I am a completionist, and I have to tell you I love chasing my leprechaun and making my overpriced whale splash. I still haven't decided if I want a second whale; one seems lonely and three crowded. If I have a problem with a particular item, I will complain (like the twins paying out as only one character instead of two, which was fixed) but I'm not interested in gratitude for an economic transaction.
The only valid point I've seen so far has been the one Josh made, in that often EA will award a premium item (like the wailing wall) at the end of an event when premium players would have already purchased it. But, on the other hand, since it was awarded at the end of the event, premium players had the benefit of all the extra Goo (remember Goo?) afforded by their purchased wall during the length of the event while freemium players did not.