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Its been a long time since I wrote a good post or recorded a good video and I wanted to talk about the main reason why which is game known as Lost Ark. First of all to make things clear I need to tell you guys when I started playing Lost Ark. I don't remember the exact date, but I'm sure it was at the end of March, 1 month after global release. At the beginning my goal was to play PvP only but I quickly realised that I don't like PvP in Lost Ark. My first class I made was a "Deathblade". After I noticed that PvP is not for me, I decided to finish the main story so I can start playing PvE. It took me couple days to finish it and I could start my journey with PvE. First thing I started caring about was my "Item Level". In Lost Ark there is a system that locks a content upon a specific Item Level. It means for example: To do raid "A" you need to be atleast "800 Item Level" or to do raid "B" you need to reach atleast "1370 Item Level". I hope you guys understand what I mean. But how does it impact me and many of my friends? We all wanted to get the higher Item Level, which was required for a higher difficulty content. I think you might already guess how it impacted players in future, on a new content release patche's. Yes... It creates a HUGE FOMO. For those who aren't familiar with the shortcut (FOMO = Fear of missing out).
First example of FOMO that happened to all the players was the release of a new Abyssal Raid "Argos".
The requirements to enter this raid was 1370 Item Level do try Phase 1, 1385 Item Level to try Phase 2 and 1400 Item Level to try Phase 3. At that point many players were not even 1300 Item Level, including myself. The upgrade rates between 1340-1400 were about ~2-5% chances for a succseful upgrade. Many players felt FOMO, prices of upgrade materials went up. Many players swiped their credit card to get the required item level. I remember this feeling... I was so stressed about getting my item level to atleast 1370 so I can do the raid. At this point I had no knowledge how to earn the gold and I'm not that rich to spend money on this game. I found out a method which was pretty good at this point of game and I farmed this method for about ~12 hrs every day, including a couple of days without sleeping at all to get to 1370 Item Level before Argos release. It was terrible, I was so tired and so stressed. Probably If I had money I would spend it to get my item level. Thats what the FOMO did to me and most players. Imagine when Argos is out and you are not able to do it, while others are. You feel like a loser. Those who are able to do it can profit out of it while you can't do shit. It was the first time in my life where a real FOMO hit me and I hated it.
Once I learned more about the Lost Ark , playing it became more like a homework or some kind of job.
What the reason behind this feeling? Let me explain. First of all to play this game efficent you need alt characters. I didn't know that but once I figured out how important is this factor I was forced to make alternate characters. So why actually its so important. It all comes to a weekly/daily activities. Its not like in WoW or other MMO games where u can grind your ass off, killing monsters whole day. In Lost Ark you basically log-in and you have your dailies and weeklies that grant you gold or materials upon completing. The thing is, you can do 3 raids per character, same with other activities, for example: Chaos Dungeon 2 times per character, Guardian Raid also 2 times per character daily. So having a 6 characters is basically 6x profit. You are going to progress 6 times faster than someone who have plays with only 1 character. If you miss the dailies tho its not a huge deal, you get a Rest Bonus, so u can do them some other day( You still lose 25% of loot by doing it on a Rested Bonus). The real issue is weekly activities, daily events, islands and a lot of stuff like that. Here comes the FOMO again. This time its eternal FOMO. Its not only "before new content release". Its on players mind all the time. Imagine you go on a vacation and you can't do your weeklies, dailies, events and stuff like that. You gonna fall behind, and possibly after new content release is announced you're not gonna have required Item Level because of those skipped days/weeks so your only chance to catch up will be to spend real money. I play this game since 6 months and I still can't get rid of this FOMO. Skipping a daily/weekly is the worst sin. It feels so bad. I can't believe that a computer game can develop such a feeling. Of course there are days when I don't feel like playing, but its not an option. If I want to progress as a Free2Play player I need to force myself otherwise I'm gonna be screwed in future. You wake up, do your dailies first, then afterwards you can do whatever you want. Thats the rule of a Lost Ark player.
Lost Ark vs Real Life Casino & Free2Play vs Pay2win
Believe me its basically the same thing and I know people in KR server who spends tons of money on this game, because they are addicted to gambling, they even rather to spend it on Lost Ark than play real casino, because the game is giving them a lot more gamble opportunities than a real casino. This game is a huge gamble, everything you do is basically casino-style. 1% to get this... 0,5% to get this.... 0,004% to get this.... Thats Lost Ark. Now imagine you play on 6 characters for couple months, you hold all your gold, and then you decide to open a "card packs". What could happen is you get nothing , and all the time you put into the game went to shit. As a F2P player you are completly screwed. Thats why I stopped with opening a card packs in Lost Ark. Even tho I did it, I still keep losing all my earned gold due to bad luck in every action I make. What happens to Pay2win players? They are called "Whales" just like in crypto world. Those people spend a tons of money on the game and its never enough. In Europe we don't have it yet, but imagine on Korean server there is a weapon called "Esther" the cost of getting this weapon is about 50.0000$. Do I have any chance to get this as a free2play player? Obviously not. The conclusion is, this game is addicting people so hard. If you want to play it, you need to be aware of the FOMO, gamble and all that stuff, otherwise its gonna sink your wallet.
How much I've spent on the game? Am I free2play?
I'm not completly free2play. So far I've spent 80$ for skins, character slots, name changes and one "Ark Pass".
Would I spend more if I had? Probably yes. The thing is I don't have money so I'm not in a danger of spending it. What makes me spend the money most of the time is that 99,9% skins are limited. So if I like something and don't get it at time I'm pretty much screwed. I'm trying to be smart about spending, but sometimes I lose my brain.
My conclusions about Lost Ark and thoughts about upcomming September update.
We are going to get a new Legion Raid called "Kakul-Saydon" at the end of September. It requires 1475 Item level, 5x3 engravings, level 7 gems, and +21 weapon. Obviously I have all of this so I can try to beat this raid when its out, but to get there I played 10+ hours every day, 8 characters every day, doing the same things over and over. I got almost 2.000 hours played in 6 months.
For those who play this game and are not ready for Kakul-Saydon raid yet. I will tell you something.. FUCK FOMO. Don't rush. You don't need to do the raid at the release. You can do it later. Play at your pace. If you still wish to ignore my advice, say "bye" to your wallet, time and mental health. My goal for this post was to talk about FOMO in Lost Ark, gambling and spending on the game to prevent people from getting trapped into this. Good luck to everyone who's playing Lost Ark, and for those who are not, be aware of what this game can do to you before you decide to play it.
