Crowded Pound

[psyco_chick32]

To those complaining that paint brushes should "stay" expensive:

You haven't played very long, have you?

I don't know if you read my post or not, but I stated already that I've played for 5 years... and actually HAD the faerie paint brush that I want... and sold it, back when it actually was buyable. And I have to agree with ria... WHY does everyone automatically point and shout "NEW MEMBER!" whenever somebody can logically say that they like the way neopets is now?

I have to agree... a few more of the paintbrushes that are really expensive might help the cost go down if TNT tossed them in the market. Then again, maybe not. Did you think that if more paintbrushes were on the market, more pets would simply be painted those colors? Then there could actually be more of a demand with people wanting faerie paint brushes, seeing that other people can get them, and the cost would go up even more. (please let me know if this doesn't make sense... it does in my head but my brain is not passing information onward today)

[Medusa]

No, my point is that income from reselling goes up in price naturally as the price of the items you resell goes up. You don't have to work harder to make more money. Income from playing games doesn't go up with inflation. You do have to work harder to make more money. And, I expect your real (ie, taking inflation into account) income from games has gone up less than you think. Back when it was harder to earn 1k, you could buy a lot more with that 1k, too.

I don't recall saying that the increases in neopoints from games matched inflation... I never did. All I said was neopoints were easier to make which then lead to my statement about inflation having an influence on the increases in paint brush prices.

I do know how inflation works and I do know that what I can get now for 1k is substantially less than what I would have received 5 years ago for the same 1k. My point however is that prices have gone up, yes but I'm also earning more than I was.

I just think it is a one-sided argument to complain about increases in prices without pointing out that these prices are a result of inflation and that incomes have also increased compared to what they were in the past.

It doesn't give a true reflection of the figures to say that Faerie Paint Brushes have increased 1250% over the last 5 years without some sort of clarification about the fact that incomes have increased a certain percent as well. In my case it would be 500-1000% (sometimes more) depending on what I can be bothered to do each day. Yes 500-1000% is less than 1250% but at least it is a more accurate reflection than arguing (and getting emotional as some people do, this comment isn't directed at anyone particular, in fact its more directed at those on the Neoboards and such) as though the Paint Brush has increased 1250% while incomes have increased 0% which is untrue.

And if people are going to complain about Paint Brushes why not complain about everything? Codestones have increased 1000-2500%, grooming items (which are totally useless) have increased approximately 1000%, most of the items that were around 5 years ago have been affected in similar ways. You could be right bgryph about inflation doing Neo in as newer Neopians and the younger (age-wise) users can't do the required work but the Paint Brushes aren't the only culprits. As a result, simply increasing the supply of Paint Brushes/colours (as some people have suggested) I don't see as having any real positive effect so why punish those that have already saved and invested for it.

I also believe I spend less time playing games now than what I did 5 years ago. A good chunk of time playing non-flash games for very few neopoints each turn is what I used to have to do. Now I can play a flash games getting 300-1000nps each turn and the flash games are faster. Not to mention sponsor flash games which seem to be neopoints for nothing but I won't get into that because there's another thread about the sponsor games and advertising already being discussed.

[bgryph]

And if people are going to complain about Paint Brushes why not complain about everything? Codestones have increased 1000-2500%, grooming items (which are totally useless) have increased approximately 1000%, most of the items that were around 5 years ago have been affected in similar ways.

Well, you've answered your own question about grooming items. No one complains because few people want them. :-)

Are codestones really increasing that much? I've only been playing Neopets for 2.5 years but I don't recall codestones having increased by that much in the absence of wars... IIRC most were 3k then and 4k now, as opposed to PBs, many of which have doubled (or more) in price in the same time period.

However, I was training with dubloons back then so I could be mistaken.

I think the reason people are up in arms over PBs in particular:

1) My guess is, nearly everyone on the site (with the exception of some battlers) will want to paint a pet at some time during the game. Codestones are really only useful to battlers and I susupect a lot fewer people care about training and battling than many battlers think. :-) Neohome items are only useful to people who want a Neohome, which isn't really a large percentage of the site. Food is important only to people who don't know how to find the free omelette... and so on and so forth. PBs are wanted by nearly everyone.

2) PBs are expensive enough to begin with that doubling the price may push that must-have color into a price range high enough that many people who want them can't afford them. Doubling the price of codestones still lets people train, just not as much as they could have trained previously. A lot of people don't want lots of training and pushing a single item from "can afford" to "no way in heck" attracts a lot more attention than simply lowering the number of an item you can afford to buy does.

3) Neopets is is NeoPETs and many people on the site are pet-oriented. How your pet looks is one of the most salient aspects of said pet. Thus, the pet-oriented care a lot more about that then about whether Short Hair Brushes are more expensive than they were this time last year.

4) Because of avatars, PBs are far more prone to increasing astronomically in price overnight than other items. Yes, there are a lot of other items that increase in price because of avatars, but taken as a percentage of total items available it affects PBs more: a higher percentage of PBs are inflated due to avatars than the percentage of Spooky Foods or even petpets inflated due to avatars. And while your pet doesn't HAVE to eat a snorkle snout if it's hungry -- there's really no reason EXCEPT the avatar to feed one to your pet -- if you want an orange pet you need an orange PB, end of story.

You could be right bgryph about inflation doing Neo in as newer Neopians and the younger (age-wise) users can't do the required work but the Paint Brushes aren't the only culprits. As a result, simply increasing the supply of Paint Brushes/colours (as some people have suggested) I don't see as having any real positive effect so why punish those that have already saved and invested for it.

It would lower the price of PBs, which I would consider a major positive effect. For that matter, I would like to see the supply of all the most "useful" items on the site increased, including codestones. Yes, even though I'm in the process of spending far more on codestones right now than I've ever spend on a PB. I don't see that every other user on the site needs to be punished just so that I don't feel like I've spent too much on codestones.

I'd also like to see TNT come through on its promise to give every species a species healer, something that IIRC they once said they'd do in an Editorial and quickly stopped. I sure as heck can't afford a Jade SS and I'm not morphing my lovely Eyrie into a Kacheek, so I'm sort of stuck. But that's another story.

Not to mention sponsor flash games which seem to be neopoints for nothing but I won't get into that because there's another thread about the sponsor games and advertising already being discussed.

And I still think it's interesting that so many people feel that way: I encounter very few sponsor games which I feel have a payout worth the time or (sometime) the sheer boredom involved in playing. :shrug:

[Yumei]

Um... Pardon, but when I played most (late 2001-September 2002), codestones easily fetched upwards of 10k. ALL codestones. Nowadays, you're lucky to get 4-5k out of them.

And, Psyco? You're quoting a post I made BEFORE you stated how long you played. It was purely rhetoric, and I didn't expect anyone to take it seriously.

As for making NP... well, I never did much but scurry around the site, and sell things I got from random events, and play kacheek seek and such. Back then, painting pets didn't MEAN anything to me- I liked my blue Uni, and my red Peophin, and my blue Usul and yellow Kacheek. But I got a lab ray because my friend told me it was useful- that's where 75k of the 300k (yes, 300k) I made from liquidating the codestones I'd squirreled away in my SDB went.

And then that account was frozen for being logged into from a library computer, and I quit for a year. When I came back, the site had... well, changed. So had I, really- though painting pets still meant very little to me, and I had a friend's lab ray at my beck and call to paint them anyway. (Last count, three ghost, one halloween, two desert, a darigan, a skunk, and multiple others that I've adopted out.)

I think I understand why a lot of things are expensive. Two words: Avatar inflation. Bgryph covered this subject in plenty of detail, so I'm simply going to direct you to his post.

As for the new pet releases: They used to be special- new pets were only released very rarely. Anyone remember the release of the Kougra? I didn't go on the Neoboards at the time, but I was certainly both surprised and delighted to see a new species. Same with the release of the Hissi, earlier last year- it was special because it didn't happen very often.

But now, they've released three pet species in as many months. Call me crazy, but I'm not excited anymore. It's too much.

And what happened to the Lutari, anyway? >.<

[psyco_chick32]

And, Psyco? You're quoting a post I made BEFORE you stated how long you played. It was purely rhetoric, and I didn't expect anyone to take it seriously.

I wasn't trying to invoke a fight or arguement... I was interested in if you could explain why so many people scream and point "NEW MEMBER" if they say that they like the way things are now. I'm not saying that that's what you do, I was stating it because you had done that, and I was curious if you could give a reason. I had been on the neoboards the night before and was wondering the exact same thing, and nobody could give me a reason.

I dunno, I figured there's more room/time here to explain it?

But honestly, it doesn't even matter, as this isn't the subject at hand.

But I must agree:
GIVE US THE LUTARI!

But I'd like them to wait now, I guess... maybe a time when they release less pets?

Last edited by psyco_chick32 on Mon Jan 09, 2006 9:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Runevalkyrie]

And what happened to the Lutari, anyway? >.<

Lutaris are connected to the (paid) mobile service that's going to be released whenever (it's been delayed a few time last year despite being overly hyped onsite and through the magazine.) Hopefully there will be news about them in the next few months.

[Trick]

I'm not sure that mobile phone deal is going ahead, there are rumours that the company is fed up with neopets moving the goalposts so to speak - but as ever with neopets nothing concrete is known ^^;

Either way I hope the Lutari will be released properly in the near future - we're coming up to its 1 year anniversary of existance soon

[Yumei]

Oh, Psyco? I didn't think you were trying to provoke anything. XD And I wasn't screaming and pointing anything... I was just saying I recalled how it was a couple of years ago, and liked it better.

That's all.

I didn't think anyone would like the less random events, larger proportion of bad > good, lag, and ads. o.o And avatar inflation. But, eh. XD I'm weird like that. Kthx.

Edit: Eheh, forgot to mention the good things. Lots more games, lots more shops to restock in, new pets (a glut of them >.>), and the occasional new plot.

[abandonedcouch]

they need to make morphing potions for the new species...es. so that users with four pets who really want one of the new pets can have one without abandoning their old pets and without having to rely on nothing but the random luck of the lab ray.

besides, who thinks the mutant xweetok is going to be really neat? I do. I hope they don't fudge it up, because that species has a lot of potential in some of the darker colors.

I hope they make it a big mutant rat with a fat tail.

[psyco_chick32]

I didn't think anyone would like the less random events, larger proportion of bad > good, lag, and ads. o.o And avatar inflation. But, eh. XD I'm weird like that.

Edit: Eheh, forgot to mention the good things. Lots more games, lots more shops to restock in, new pets (a glut of them >.>), and the occasional new plot.

Once again, I was just wondering... why would I have to be a New Member to enjoy things the way they are? Just curious, seriously. No one has ever been able to tell me.

Yes, there's lag. Yes, there's avatar inflation. Actually, I've had a lot more random events than from when I started, but then again, I play more often now, so that arguement can be stricken from the records. The ad's I didn't like, but I signed up with Premium and not only don't deal with the ads, but enjoy the SSW and other Premiums. That wasn't around a few years ago.

You list other positive things, and maybe I just look toward the positive more than the negative, but I see Neopets as a growing company. There's ads, but with the money they make from that, they manufacture notebooks, doorhangers, t-shirts... there's also plushies (I plushies.) and other fun things. With the money from that, they can get more servers and more workers, and allow Neopia to expand even larger. There's more pets to choose from than ever before, even if they do seem to be on the cutesy side. Plots are more complex and fun than ever (I loved the puzzle-ness of the LDP and how it was a bit different for everybody, because that meant there was less cheating. Sure, I was told how to decipher my tablet, but I had to truck to read scrolls just like everybody else). A few years ago, there weren't collectable avatars to give me a goal. In fact, 3 years ago, I stopped playing for 6 months. I seriously had nothing to do. I had painted pets, I had a huge shop and millions of neopoints. There was literally NOTHING that kept me there. The few plots were all battle-based, and that simply got boring. My pets had great stats because I simply did quests all the time (who here remembers when you could just sign up for a quest and cancel it if it were expensive, and do another in about 30 min?) and books never disappeared, so they were uber-cheap, and my pets had read them all.

Then I came back when I came to college. To me, this was a super easy deal. So I donated my old pets to the pound, donated my money and stuff to the tree, including an awesome battle set (for the times). I froze my main account afterwards and started up on one that I had created simply for Wiz Searching for all of those faerie quests.

So imagine my surprise when suddenly, I was floundering! Sure, I had bunches of games to play, but I had never been good at restocking (being on dial-up... actually, I'm still bad at restocking) and suddenly paint brushes were COSTLY! I thought starting over, I'd be back to where I was in about 4 months with my new super-speedy internet.

It's been a few years, and I'm STILL not back to where I was at. Only for me, it's only partly because of inflation, etc. It's because there's so much to DO now! I have a pet I want painted a specific color and I'm saving up... then suddenly, OH There's a new weapon out that I want! Oh, I that avatar... I need to spend a couple thousand on that! I'm making money FAR faster than I ever did before (I suddenly discovered the Igloo Garage Sale... made SO much money off of buying and selling!) but I'm just pulled in so many different directions! Go back, look at my goals for the upcoming year: There's SO many, and I have even more, but didn't want to be laughed at.

This is really long and I doubt anybody read all of it, because it's just basically my opinion. But inflation, pets up the wazoo, and ads have done more for me than the first few years ever did... it's kept me interested. It made me a paying member to avoid the ads and play even faster, it's made me make 4 side accounts to have all the pets I adore. And it's given me a reason to keep coming back each day to play games and interact with my pets and Neofriends... so I can buy what I like. It's a challenge... and what's the point of a game without it?

There's my $5 in why Neopia is better than it used to be... take it or leave it, but it's that's my story (literally, hehe) and I'm stickin' to it.

Edited: billions of times because I can't type!