Pinball FX fans criticise plans for $150 of microtransactions and $15 monthly sub

videogameschronicle.com:

Pinball FX fans have criticised developer Zen Studios’ newly announced pricing plans for its upcoming fourth game.

The new title, simply called Pinball FX, launches in Early Access tomorrow on the Epic Games Store with $150 of microtransactions and an optional subscription service that costs $15 a month (or $100 a year).

This is causing anger within the Pinball FX community, many of whom have already purchased a number of the 99 tables available in the current version, Pinball FX3. Zen has said that when Pinball FX launches, all these tables will need to be purchased again.

To celebrate the upcoming Early Access release, Zen posted a 23-minute video (which can be viewed below) to its YouTube channel, explaining how the new game’s pricing structure would work.

Pinball FX will be a free download, and will give players access to two ‘free’ tables, which change every day. The free mode won’t give access to all game modes, and won’t allow players to unlock all the collectibles available. In order to get the most out of the game, then, players need to either buy tables or subscribe to the new ‘Pinball Pass’.

Whereas the current release, Pinball FX3, has players purchasing new tables through the Xbox or PlayStation digital stores in the same way most other games handle DLC, the new Pinball FX will instead have its own currency called ‘tickets’.

Players will have to buy tickets and then use these to buy tables. Ticket prices range from 100 tickets for $9.99 to 1200 tickets for $100.

Adding to the confusion, tables will have different prices depending on whether they’re newly added tables or ‘legacy’ ones, and whether they’re licensed tables or original ones created by Zen itself. The full structure is as follows:

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