Serious discussion time, kiddos: for those who have quit or are planning to quit the game

EDIT: This topic was not meant as a question as to why you’re still playing.

As I mention myself, I do still play the game. I don’t care for the pricing model, so I no longer spend on it or worry about where I place in the rankings or whatever, but I’m still very much invested in the game itself.

It was meant to be directed at those who have completely given up on the game specifically.

I want to know why or how they’re able to simply permanently walk away from something after putting so much time and/or money into it.

No, I have no immediate plans to quit the game myself. I’ve put too much time and money into my heroes, training up alliance mates, and making friends here on the forum (some of whom have also become alliance mates). I don’t think I could simply pack my bags and completely walk away for good.

Walk away from the forum? Yeah, maybe, some days I contemplate doing so.

Walk away from spending? Already have. Gave the game more than enough money already.

But for those of you who finally got tired of the game completely for X reason (excessive cash grabbiness, nerfing of your heroes, power creep continuing to make your “old” heroes less and less relevant every day, etc.)…

How are you simply able to walk away?

By that I mean… I have seen videos of people deleting entire rosters of heroes that I assume must have cost them thousands of dollars to acquire and many many hours to ascend… and they’re feeding them all to Aife… :open_mouth:

How… what… why???

Because the game pissed you off? Man, this game finds a way to ■■■■ me off practically every other day at least. That’s part of the game. It’s not a “fun” part of the game, but if you’ve already been playing for X amount of time, you should already know that the RNG is bull :poop: at times.

And yeah, their so-called “new features” are mostly cash grabby bull :poop: that isn’t worth the time to read about it, let alone the money they expect you to spend to buy it…

But how do you go from spending all of that time and money on a roster over the course of X amount of time, to one day just tossing the entire thing into the garbage? All of that time and money… for nothing?

Is that just something you normally do anyway? Get bored, move on, spend thousands of dollars on the next game that comes along, no regrets?

If so, wow. Major kudos to you! I could never do that myself.

Or is this a one-off kind of thing, where you were expecting the dream to last forever, and once SG started disappointing you, you decided “well that was an epic waste of my time and money, not making that mistake ever again”?

I’m kind of still in this game for the long haul. On a completely F2P basis going forward, at least until they start charging me just to log in (which sadly would not surprise me at all). I’m in this because I :heart: my alliance and I already invested way too much into my roster to just give it all up completely without a damn good reason.

Just curious as to how other people - especially those who have spent thousands of dollars on the game - can just get up and walk away so easily. Do you walk away feeling mad and like you were ripped off? Or do you not even care? Was it just “fun while it lasted” and now it’s “okay byeeee”?

I don’t think I could do that myself. I still own video games that I bought 10+ years ago. Even the ones that I thought were mostly awful, I can’t bring myself to just throw them in the trash like that.

Curious to hear thoughts, opinions, rants, etc. here.

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Like many addictions there’s usually a “straw that broke the camel’s back”.
Sure it’s probably the snowball of many things, but most times there’s a seminal moment when “enough is enough”.
This seems to be subjective to the individual. Different attitudes, goals, and expectations will cause these breaking points to vary.
Removing troublesome aspects can also help allay a potential breaking point.
It all depends on the individual. I kinda let stuff roll off me after a while. I dont spend anywhere near what I used to and that keeps me happy.

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Lowering spending certainly does make the game more enjoyable. Which is a bit ironic considering that we’re supposed to be encouraged to spend more, not less.

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It changes expectations.
For me that’s key.
I dont feel owed anything.
When I get cool stuff its awesome.
When I dont get anything its whatever, I’m not sinking money in large amounts anymore.

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Yeah, early on I made the foolish mistake of coming in to the game thinking that if I spent money, that I was owed something good in return.

I didn’t know what a “gacha” game was at the time. LOL durrr me.

Well, now I know, so now I expect nothing. But I’ve already put a lot of time into leveling up my sad roster, and I happen to like them in spite of the fact that they’re not as good as the top shelf heroes. :slightly_smiling_face: Hey, slap enough emblems on a 4* TC20 hero, he or she is good enough to play with the 5*s. Might not win the game, but good enough to put up a fight! And considering how damn freaking long it took me to get them up to that point… to just up and walk away from the game now after all that effort? Ugh! I don’t think I could do it, personally.

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Much like any hobby, I honestly think for many people that it’s just a gradual decline in their enjoyment of the game, leading to boredom, a reduction in play time and eventually moving onto something else. A case of “fun while it lasted” as you put it, they’ve had their enjoyment but are now ready for something new. For some I imagine it will be permanent, others may come and go over time as their interest waxes and wanes. Not so much different from someone who would pay top $ for a AAA game title, play it for a week straight and trade it in for the next new release.

Others may be alienated due to game updates/release they don’t agree with, though I think it’s a minority who leave solely because of this and it’s usually a combination of things with a particular update to the game being the “straw that broke the camel’s back” as OG-Pusha put it.

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I complained for the longest time about little variation in the game, too few things to do besides ‘grind’, and too few ascension mats available from quests and events. Now that all three of those have been addressed with much, much more to do; I am happily playing the game even more often and have no plans of stepping away anytime soon.

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I never do that. I know some people do, but I won’t pay full price for a game with a linear type style of gameplay. $60 for an X hour long storyline, then the game is done? Nope! No thank you. The AAA titles I have bought and paid full price for are the types of games that I can play for hundreds / thousands of hours.

That is of course my own personal preference. There are some hobby / amusement type things that I’ve only dabbled in briefly, but I only put very small amounts of money and very little time into them.

Example: I enjoy billiards. I’m not particular good at it, but it’s fun. Occasionally I’ll go to a game hall / bar etc. and pay a couple dollars to play for an hour or two. Then I leave and maybe don’t go back again until six months later.

Would be completely different if I bought my own billiards table and pool cues and spent hundreds of hours honing my billiard skills. That would not be something I would one day shrug and say, “meh, I’m bored with this now,” and throw all of the equipment out in the garbage. No way in hell would I do that! If I got temporarily bored with it, I might decide to focus on something else for a while. But I’m still keeping all the equipment that I paid good money for!

Oh, there is lots of stuff to do in the game. My question was for people who are planning on or have already stepped away - particularly those who do so permanently. I fully understand taking a break.

Stay cool, lelax, thats how i still enjoy the game, it is never ending :rofl:

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My question was not why people still play the game, it was why people completely quit the game after investing so much time and money into it…

I’m not quitting the game anytime soon either.

EDIT: like for me personally. I’m far from a huge spender. But I’ve put over $100 into this game. And I’ve spent what feels like forever leveling up my heroes to get them to a decent level to where I at least feel like I can be somewhat “competitive-ish”… I’ll never be top rank, and have no delusions of that. For now, I’m content to keep doing my thing, playing at my own level. I’m in way too deep to just give up on everything.

Doesn’t mean I won’t maybe take a temporary break from the game. But I can’t even imagine feeding all of my heroes away, after spending so many months building them up. And I’m not going to completely abandon all of my alliance mates either! Worst case scenario, I’d tell them “hey guys, I need to step away from this for a while…” and pass on leadership to a trusted co-leader in the meantime. Maybe go sit in an inactive alliance if they wanted room for more active players.

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Of course, it might be tough to get ahold of most of those people through this Forum…:rofl:

Some of the “crash and burn” style of leaving, I’m sure, is due to the fact that there is no resale value on your in-game assets. Contrast MTG (guilty!), where you can sell some or all of your cards if you decide to quit. I’m sure there would be fewer instances of force-feeding Afie (what did she ever do?) if there was some way to recover a portion of your cash.

Further to that, the inability to recover some of your costs might be part of the reason why some people go cold turkey instead of scaling back.

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Ha! In that respect we’re alike. As you say, it comes down to a personal preference or philosophy even in regards to resource investment, be it money or time and how you value that and I’d imagine that each of us has a different point in which we feel we’re fulfilled enough to walk away from something.
I know a guy who will bounce from hobby to hobby, committing fully both in terms of time and financial investment on each one before moving on some 6-12 months later to something new. Sometimes sooner! He’s perfectly happy with that where as to me, that just seems to be incredibly exhausting! :joy:

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really? boredom or being better off with a single player, none alliance, game. not sure myself cause maybe it is hard to start all over in a new game, which is why i am not quitting, beside the company in alliance, community etc and not wanting to start all aver again (i know, a repeat, but might be the most important thing) :thinking:

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Also, frankly, @TGW, I want to join your alliance, if only because I too suffer from my OPs being misunderstood or wildy misinterpreted. :rofl:

The ultimate irony, I think, would be if you (correctly) flagged this reply as being off-topic. I dare you?

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True, but I can’t imagine going “cold turkey” after investing so much… unless it was “for my own good”, like those types who get addicted to the gambling aspect… that is a reason I would fully understand for permanently quitting, to just remove the temptation altogether.

Exhausting is right! If I put tons of hours and money into something… no, I don’t expect it to entertain me full time for the rest of my life, but I also can’t see just tossing it all out and walking away permanently either. Take a break, come back to it later. That’s what I’ve done with most of my games, especially those that I invested a lot of time or money into.

I think you are still misunderstanding me and the point of this thread. I am not asking why people still play this game. I am asking the exact opposite of that.

LOL I don’t flag people. Except for myself, and the occasional mod when they violate their own rules.

If you do get flagged, it wasn’t by me.

You don’t already have an alliance? Usually most people here do. And most of theirs are stronger than mine. We don’t fight any 14* titans or anything like that, because 14* titans would kick most of our asses.

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Are you going to play until you die? If not, at some stage you will quit too. And then it would be even more time and potentially more money. So, perhaps the people quitting now are doing the more productive thing.
DISCLAIMER: I am F2P and have no plans of quitting.

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sorry, been a long day, i better shut up :upside_down_face:

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It’s possible. LOL.

I still play games that I bought many many many years ago.

And everyone always told me that E&P is a marathon, not a sprint. So we’re expected to spend a bit of time here. What is the point of leveling up a full roster, just to quit a week later?

EDIT: I might take a break, yes. But I’ve been meaning to go back and play Morrowind again one of these days (if I can ever get it to run correctly on my computer, dang Windows 10 and compatibility issues with older games, etc.; Morrowind came out in what, 2002?)

EDIT #2: In the past couple of years, I have actually pulled the following games out of my old dustbin of games to play again:

Fallout 3
Fallout: NV
TES: Oblivion
TES: Skyrim
GTA 3
GTA: San Andreas
GTA 4

Among others…

Going back even further than that (like way way further back):

Baldur’s Gate
Diablo (the original)
Age of Empires II
Command & Conquer
Populous
The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past

A lot of that was just for the sake of nostalgia. But I got a few more hours of fun out of each of them again. :slightly_smiling_face:

No, you don’t have to shut up. I like hearing opinions as long as they’re not rude.

I feel the same as you, I don’t want to quit all the effort I put into this game and start over somewhere else. That’s what I was wondering. Of the people who do decide to quit and go somewhere else, are they going to go there and spend years and thousands of dollars on the next game too? And then quit that one and move on again? Is that how they regularly operate, or is this their first and last experience with this kind of game?

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Aaah the Sunk Cost Fallacy I must continue in this endeavor just because of all the time/money/ whatever I’ve already invested in it…

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It’s more of a state of mind than an actual fallacy though, yes?

I have my reasons for continuing to enjoy the game myself, but yes, I also worry about sacrificing a bunch of effort in exchange for nothing.

Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve done so IRL though - ahem I have been divorced. So I already know what it’s like to throw away thousands of dollars and years of your life for nothing.

Difference is, I still enjoy playing with E&P :laughing: :rofl:

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