I’m glad to have found this thread. I also completely agree with how egregious the cosmetic sales have been thus far. I was already upset over the prices of the direct purchase SG items, lack of previews of the items in the Fresh Finds and weekend “sales”, and the fact that all items except for emotes bind to just one character. I had no idea PSO2 NA has less ways to earn SG than JP does; that’s even more insulting.
The game is already so heavily monetized elsewhere (Premium Set, storage additions and storage spaces, scapedolls, etc) that the SG stuff really burns on top of it all. And its not that I don’t want to spend money; I’m happy to support the game and have bought my fair share of Arks Cash for the scratches.
But this stuff is discouraging. It feels like someone is testing to see how far the game can go in getting people to spend money and that tells me that there is little respect for the consumer. Because of this stuff I’ve started curtailing my spending on the game and will continue to do so. I’m skipping the insane 400+ SG item and item sets on Fresh Finds and will continue skipping SG item bundles like the PSU stuff.
It’s one thing to ask for money for cosmetics to support the game and cover the costs of the servers, website, and support teams at Sega NA. But the game has gone way too far with the SG monetization. (And I would even argue that stuff like Scapedolls and item expansions should be a be cheaper; don’t charge me more than $0.50 or a $1.00 for that stuff).