I was writing a, "recommendation" for this game on steam but found that I couldn't fit all of my observations into the box.
So don't get me wrong, this game is fairly okay considering that it's completely free-to-play on steam, but the way the developers make revenue ruins the competitive aspect of the game. The cash currency of AVA is called G-Coins. The dollar to coin ratio is about a dollar per every 10 G-Coins.
Before I start ranting about how catastrophically bad that is for competitive gameplay and how the developers are exploiting the frustration of players for money, let me give you a brief crash course in the pricing of items in AVA.
Armor ranges from 5-10 Gcoins per item. Unlike ANY other item in the entire in-game shop, the only useful set of armor can only be purchased with G-Coins. All others can be purchased for a hefty pile of earned supplies.
Armor benefits how well you are protected against bullets, yet additionally the G-Coin variety increases your chance of gaining a lucky shot. A lucky shot is basically a kill that doubles the amount of Experience and Supply points for that kill. A full set of armor for 150 G Coins will make your chance for a lucky shot increase by %10. This means that with at least that set of armor on (Other items benefit this too, so keep in mind you can get even more lucky shots depending on how much money you want to pour into the game) every 10 kills, you'll get 1 lucky shot.
So to get the full experience of the game, you are required at LEAST to dump $15 into the game already. There is no other way to get this set of armor with in-game currency. So we'll update the pricetag so far to $15.
TOTAL CASH SPENT IN GAME TO PERFORM WELL COMPETITIVELY: $15
Now I have to explain how classes work in AVA. There are three main classes, ignoring the rifleman's shotgun sets, which are pointman, rifleman, and sniper. The weapons for each different class cost about 150 G Coins or 50,000 supply credits. I'll go ahead and address supply credits first and how they are broken.
The amount of supply credits you get is completely proportional to how well you perform in game which is represented by your score. Someone performing fairly well during a game can expect to get about 500 of these supply credits from a single 10 minute battle. Using this estimate, it will take you an average of 16.6 hours of gameplay to be able to purchase a g-coin weapon with regular credits. Now considering you're up against players who ALREADY HAVE BETTER WEAPONS. You can't always expect to get the average 500 credits from a single annihilation battle and you're highly more likely to get killed in gamemodes where you are unable to respawn.
So here's where the big flaw comes in. Someone who has played 16 hours and bought the weapon will naturally play better because they have better gear. They could be literally just as good at aiming as a completely new player, but they will win in a fight because they bought a gun. This is even worse if the player purchased it with cash because then the whole argument that, "They earned it" flies out the loving window because they just poured money out of their steam wallet to win.
So assuming you buy 1 of every class weapon using G-Coins. You have now spent 450 G Coins on top of the 150 you spent on armor. That totals out to 600 G Coins or 60 dollars.
TOTAL CASH SPENT IN GAME TO PERFORM WELL COMPETITIVELY: $60
But hey, that's about the amount of money you'd spend on a game in retail! Why are you complaining about people buying weapons, Sev? BECAUSE I'M NOT DONE YET. YES THERE IS MORE. You also have to purchase a handgun, which is about 60 G coin. Also you can purchase a knife upgrade which is 34 G Coin. That's about 100 G Coin already from just those additions. Top that off which a month's worth of Marksman upgrade which heavily (%3) increases your chance of a lucky shot, and you have 170 more G Coins to spend before you get the full paid privileges of the game. This isn't even counting accessories which to be fair I should have included considering unfortunately that's all anyone cares about nowadays. Add a 15 G Coin grenade to that and you have the total.
TOTAL CASH SPENT IN GAME TO PERFORM WELL COMPETITIVELY: $80
In total, you need to pay 785 G coins to get the full paid experience of AVA. That's almost an $80 game!. What seems to be happening here is that Redduck is exploiting the competitiveness of it's playerbase to get more money than they normally would from selling the game for the average $60 pricetag.
Don't get me wrong, paid upgrades CAN be done well in a game. Here's the catch though, gear needs to have a rating that summarizes how powerful a player is purely based on their guns and armor. This rating would be used to sort players into rooms that only have players of a certain gear threshold so that even if you pay, you are getting farther in the game but you aren't gaining advantage.
Ever heard of this before? It's called LEVELS. World of Warcraft made it so that battlegrounds were sorted into level intervals of 5 for this exact reason. It's so that players who progress farther into the game get to enjoy new content but not exploit their more powerful armor to bully newcomers.
Discuss.
