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Subscription system broken - You can still play for free after the end - any comment from NQ?


PuPpEt

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It was happening for some time now  (like from late december?) and not kept as secret  -- openly discussed in several places. Yet I can't remember any official reaction/comment from NQ (while they obviously know at this point).

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1 hour ago, blazemonger said:

 

I get why NQ tries to keep people playing, hoping they will resub on 0.24

I also understand people wil get upset when they learn that they're paying a sub which means nothing

 

NQ stays quiet on the matter.. unsurprisingly

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This makes no sense, ppl might rage quit over this kind of things, the risk of losing players (and reputation) is higher than the benefit of having an handful of ppl logging for the lulz.

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1 hour ago, blazemonger said:

I get why NQ tries to keep people playing, hoping they will resub on 0.24

I also understand people wil get upset when they learn that they're paying a sub which means nothing.

Its not big deal people kinda playing for free (considering state of affairs its hardly divine boon), but its completly non-ethical towards people who actualy paying sub for exactly same thing. 

 

I honestly not understand why to use such... trickery? It was more honest just to give everyone another bonus month as NY present or some made up stuff (company birthday, day when JC born this ideas -- who cares) and thats it. Everyone with some critical thinking process understands, that 0.23 was rough spot and some damage control is ok, especialy if its gives something positive to players (like more playtime).

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Xsolla supports a grace period field...has anyone tried logging in to an account that's been expired for months? 

 

Xsolla handles subscription status with webhooks -- it's always possible for there to be a bug on the receiving end that doesn't properly update the user's account, but it isn't a complex system. 

 

If you can log into an account that's been expired for a while, they might have temporarily stripped out the logic that checks for a valid sub on login (e.g. the webhook still works, but they aren't requiring a sub for now). Otherwise, it means the either the webhook is no longer working or there's now a grace period on failed subs. 

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4 minutes ago, michaelk said:

Xsolla supports a grace period field...

From Xsolla site:

Quote
  • A grace period is supported only by subscriptions with the one-time payment type. Payment for auto-renewing subscriptions is processed automatically.
  • You can change the length of the grace period in Publisher Account.
  • The system sends payment reminders every day until the user pays for the subscription or the grace period ends.
  • The user pays the full subscription price. The number of days the user spends in the grace period is removed from the main billing period, as these days are included in the main subscription.
  • If the value in the Grace period field in the plan settings is 0, the plan has no grace period.

 

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15 minutes ago, michaelk said:

it's always possible for there to be a bug on the receiving end that doesn't properly update the user's account, but it isn't a complex system. 

True.. And a developer with a sense of ownership of their responsibility to their subscribing player base would communicate such big.. But hen again, this is NQ we're talking about so who knows..

 

 

15 minutes ago, michaelk said:

If you can log into an account that's been expired for a while, they might have temporarily stripped out the logic that checks for a valid sub on login (e.g. the webhook still works, but they aren't requiring a sub for now). Otherwise, it means the either the webhook is no longer working or there's now a grace period on failed subs. 

I have a working account that expired 02 January.. quite the grace period and quite the duration of any issues in the backend..

Not complaining obviously as the account made me nearly 6M for free so far ;)

 

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Look Ma! I'm being featured featuring someone else! 

 

I mean I am hardly surprised anymore, I kind of knew something like this was going to happen as they don't have a proper control over this project. The game code alone takes everything they have to keep running, and it does not even run that well with all the bugs. Lets not even talk about the game direction decisions. I guess it might as well be free, and even then I don't feel like playing it.

 

This just really sucks for the fanbois still shelling out money to play though. But even they won't care I imagine because if you were OK with everything thus far, you're probably would be OK with paying for it still lol nothing can change your mind at this point.

 

Edit: Boy do I wish I had a copy of the feedback I wrote for them when they were doing the poll pre 0.23, it's like I hit every nail right on the head, I warned them about all this and all they had to do was hire more people and keep content coming out at a steady stream, keep your happy customers happy and your game will succeed, instead they tore off all bandaids lmao

Edited by Shulace
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Tried it on a whim and I managed to log in, much to my surprise.

Unfortunately, I last logged out looking at an unfinished ship prototype, and the thought of not being able to put any work into it any time soon (without having to mine my life away or having to become an in-game corporate employee) took the wind right out of my sails, so I shut it down pretty quick.  

 

It still boggles the mind how, with the plethora of choices that can drive human interaction in an online game to chose from, someone actually thought the best way to get people to work together was to emulate the worst aspect of daily life: working for the man!

 

Go figure.

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8 hours ago, StaticAstraeus said:

It still boggles the mind how, with the plethora of choices that can drive human interaction in an online game to chose from, someone actually thought the best way to get people to work together was to emulate the worst aspect of daily life: working for the man!

 

Seriously, I felt like I was having an aneurism when they released that update. You genuinely get the feeling that there are some really clueless people in charge of these decisions.

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As far as i know NQ hasn't implemented any kind of system to handle what happens when an account is canceled.

 

Where does your stuff go?  Do you get any of it back, if you re-sub?  What actually becomes salvageable?

 

Doing nothing at all may just be the safest, easiest thing they can do, until those systems are in place.

 

Right now with the game only partially finished i think it's pretty important for NQ to make people feel comfortable walking away for a while, and coming back later when the parts of the game that might interest them are working.

 

Even if that's the case.  Being straightforward with currently paying customers should also be a priority.

 

 

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28 minutes ago, Atmosph3rik said:

As far as i know NQ hasn't implemented any kind of system to handle what happens when an account is canceled.

 

Where does your stuff go?  Do you get any of it back, if you re-sub?  What actually becomes salvageable?

 

Doing nothing at all may just be the safest, easiest thing they can do, until those systems are in place.

 

Right now with the game only partially finished i think it's pretty important for NQ to make people feel comfortable walking away for a while, and coming back later when the parts of the game that might interest them are working.

 

Even if that's the case.  Being straightforward with currently paying customers should also be a priority.

 

 

All of that has nothing to do with ppl being able to still play the game while unsubbed tho. 

 

What you talk about is what comes after ppl unsub, which is a major part too. But not related to this thread 

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Yes dealing with desubs will have to be dealt with, but all they needed to do at this point in the “Balpha” as I like to call it, is lock players’ accounts. 
 

mid be mighty pissed off if I found someone was playing for free even though they unsubscribed after the first month and I had a paid for a year’s sub. 
 

parity is often more important to customers than absolute cost. 

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