Palia

L paywalls for storage that should have been only obtainable through grinding the game

Pay to win game, ♥♥♥♥ that ♥♥♥♥. $100 American dollars for storage. L Devs.

After many hours in this game I can no longer support it. Preying on players after promises of not monetizing anything outside of cosmetics. Incredibly disappointed with the direction the studio is taking the game. Anyone just getting into or coming back to the game will be riddled by the same unfixed bugs, and a storefront pushing basic quality of life improvements for real money.

They claimed they wanted it to be "non pay to win" and technically it isn't, but it is ''pay to play the game as it's supposed to be played''. They started slowly with horses, then moved to furniture, and now storage space. Who knows? Maybe in the future, they'll start charging real money for basic tools or items. Storage is a huge deal in this game. Before the "pay to get more storage" update, they used to give free storage space to all players with every major update (meaning a new map with new items). They would just bump up the limit, for example, from 5,000 to 7,000. Now, you have to spend real money if you want more space. Since every new map brings a flood of new items, I doubt they're going to keep giving out enough free storage to keep up. Players were asking like crazy for more storage, and with every new map, the devs would say, "We hear our players, so we're upgrading the storage." -_- They HAD! to upgrade it anyway because of the new maps and new items! These devs give off the exact same vibe as the old Overwatch devs: "Oh look, we hear you guys!" (if you played Overwatch back in the day). If you just want a simple game to relax and play without thinking much, you either have to pay real money for basic storage (or idk maybe basic mechanics in the future?) or find something else. And it's not cheap either for the price of extra storage, you could easily buy 2 or 3 other full games. I really liked the game and even spent money on skins A LOT of money (stupid me), because back then, it was genuinely fun, even as a solo player. But after all this? Nah, I will never support a free to play game with my money again. One more thing: even if you do spend money to buy skins and other items, expect to deal with bugs and glitches sometimes, and good luck dealing with their support team. From love to hate. Thanks Singularity 6, Palia WAS a good game.

the game is fun, cozy, pretty and peaceful. it's actively maintained with kind and thoughtful community staff, with an active and collaborative community, i enjoy it and continue playing it, there is a lot of freedom in how you can play. but its current direction is trending towards increasing prioritisation of monetization, slowly pushing the line further and further. every patch, every new feature - and multiple existing features - don't work for up to weeks or months, including premium ones that people pay RLC for (not an exaggeration). these often render large parts of the game completely unplayable or ruined. they do not prioritise bug fixes or remediation of these issues even if they break entire skills, such as ranching, which has been released for a year now and is still broken in almost every aspect, despite diligent reports from the community. the community are left to figure things out for the rest of the playerbase via rigorous testing that anything communicated by the game is even accurate. they prioritise churning out new premium content onto these non-functional mechanics. to emphasize, they routinely release and sell products at price tags in excess of $30-70, that do not work, and if they do fix them, it's rare and never quick. original game mechanics do not get fleshed out, i.e. villager relationships. this latest patch they explained they are releasing $72 of purchasable storage upgrades (which are also broken) in exchange for the content drop of the ability to have eyebrows for free, which is egregious. it's not a good time to pick up the game, but i post this in the hopes that it changes course!

Love Palia, but the bait+switch on monetization has left a sour taste in my mouth. They lured in players YEARS ago saying they would ONLY have cosmetic monetization, guess that was a complete lie. Singularity 6 has become less trustworthy imo

I played Palia when it first launched years ago both on their launcher and Nintendo Switch. The game was fun and most of the monetization was focused on cosmetics. I decided it was time to return and see what new stuff had been added and was immediately turned off by the aggressive monetization. What was once a market full of outfits is now the bulk of the game. Animals, outfits, skins... just about anything you'd want earn through play and progression is now hidden behind some form of a paywall. This isn't inherently a bad thing but the price of entry for a single outfit can often start at around $15. Honestly at that price I can buy a different farm sim style game and have all the fun I want. I even tried to get my friend to play with me and we both were like "this feels like a single player game that is online" so it's not even a good multiplayer game.

They Promised not adding any paid gameplay advantages and they still say this on their official site. (https://palia.com/news/palia-business-model) "Palia will be free-to-play Palia will monetize cosmetic items Palia will not monetize things you earn through gameplay You won’t need to buy loot boxes or get content through a rotating store We commit to being open and honest in communicating decisions or changes we make in this space" The latest update introduced paid Storage for your Chest. They already charge quite alot for the good outfits (around 35 €) and for their "battlepass" aswell as pets. So not sure why they feel like they need to monetize Gameplay aswell. (Upgrading can be done i nsteeps but upgrading your storage to the max is around 70€) (I only play on the Launcher version and only use the Steam version to leave this review that's why my playtime is so low)