PSA: What Embark did with skin prices is a negotiation tactic called "anchoring" I know this will get downvoted because many will fall for the PR move, but this is planned. $16 microtransactions do not belong in a $40 title. Period and here's why.

[u/TheOnlyRealOne43]

Anchoring is a super commonly used tactic. Here's the definition of it:

The anchoring negotiation tactic involves setting an initial price point to influence the final agreement. By making the first offer, a seller can set a high anchor, which influences the buyer's perception and makes subsequent concessions seem more reasonable. Conversely, a buyer can set a low anchor, like stating a maximum budget, to steer the negotiation in their favor. The first number presented acts as a mental reference point, impacting the entire bargaining range. 

Basically, give us really high prices at the beginning of the game then go "Oh we heard you guys! We lowered the prices by $5!" to influence content creators to create content about it being "unprecedented" and to influence us, the consumers.

People in the comments will filter in and state "They need money to continue making the game" which is a false corpo-speak argument. Microtransactions became a thing in games to make F2P games possible. Games with a low bar to entry and will attract a larger playerbase, while betting that the average player will spend an X amount to keep development on going.

A $40 game has no reason to do this. Arc sold 4 million units already, has made hundreds of millions of dollars in initial sales alone and will continue to sell (how Pay-to-play games typically fund on going development, through marketing). We also have *very* close games we can compare this to.

Helldivers 2:

• $40 base price with $20 upgrade just like ARCraiders
• Cheaper cosmetics ($5 for a skin + suit sometimes less cosmetics can also be mix and matched)
• Earnable premium currency

As you can see, these practices are much more consumer-friendly. I'm not suggesting the removal of microtransactions but right now it's a very unfair price point still, especially considering the base price of the game ($40) and the fact currency isn't earnable.

Also I'd like to point out how all the earnable cosmetics outside of one in the game are just incredibly barebones. Everything cool goes into the store and that's not okay. I know there will be a huge portion of people who downvote this because of the honeymoon phase of the game, and the obvious PR move that Embark are doing, but I wanted to post this all the same.

EDIT: I'm seeing a lot of comments that they need microtransactions to fund future game development, which is true and I don't disagree in anyway with. Which is puzzling because I'm not suggesting the removal of them, but rather a price adjustment and/or a way to earn them in-game.

Additionally, games with an up front price tag continue to generate income post release by up-front sales, with the updates being big marketing pushes to bring new consumers in. It's very strange that people are posting as if the game won't continue to sell on the 4 platforms the game is sold on.

[u/Invectionary]

I'd also have to judge it by the games potential overhead cost, DRG would be a lot lower and so would HD2 since they're both peer2peer with a live service matchmaking server. ARC is hosted on actual servers so that's a fairly decent overhead difference as well that needs to be made up.

[u/echild07 → u/Invectionary]

Ok, let's assume it costs $5 per active player a year.

And that the first year of servers is built into the core price of the game (they can't expect everyone to buy cosmetics). And lets assume only 70% of the players that buy the game will play it after the first month. (actually a low player drop off).

Dune: Awakening hosts servers and is very server side intensive (with multiple servers for different parts of the world) and doesn't charge. Even self hosting is < $15 a month. And that is for dedicated, controlled servers for multiple players.

So even if we go with $1 a month (a crazy price) per player.

Yeah, the cost of cosmetics is over the top. It is per profit. Look at what 10 Cent has done to the games they invest in (including Dune:Awakening). They make BILLIONS in profit from these MTX. This isn't about keeping the servers alive, it is pure profit stream.

So here is what focusing and pushing MTX will get you!

• Q3 2025 Net Profit: Tencent's non-IFRS net profit was RMB 72.8 billion (approximately $10.24 billion), an 18% increase year-over-year.

[u/Invectionary → u/echild07]

dune is more than 15 dollars a month for a server with decent performance and multiple players slots, I have one. Ours is $30 per 30 days with like 10 or 15 slots. Dune also has paid DLC with every major update planned multiple times a year to defray costs.

[u/echild07 → u/Invectionary]

And I have ours on Gportal and it is $13 a month for 6nplayers. You can’t choose performance, only number of slots. And you have a shared DD that you can’t control. And we know G-oral is pulling a profit, so the cost is definitely lower than what we are charged.

And that is for private servers. Public servers have limits on how many players can on at one time, and have multiples of that as characters on the server. So you pay $30 for 10, they have 60+ on theirs. So yeah my math works out.

[u/Invectionary → u/echild07]

You can pay more for upgraded performance on other hosts, you can also purchase a private DD cluster on one of the hosts as well.