
While many games have attempted factions (most famously World of Warcraft), ArcheAge has taken it a step further by making faction life meaningful from Hero (ruler) elections to the formation of a player-run judicial system, the developers handed players the ability to shape the world to their liking. Unfortunately, in 2023, while this would still be possible, a decrease in demand for goods, and a 15x hike in the price of APEX, countered only by a meagre 2x increase in the value of ingots, ensures that maintaining patron access is well beyond the reach of most players, and being able to acquire the tens of thousands of gold required to be competitive at endgame PvP is impossible for all but the most dedicated of players who are willing to sink in over 70 hours of gold making each week, time that could be better spent at even the most mediocre minimum wage job. While I left the game shortly after, I could do all this by converting iron ore to iron ingots semi-AFK a few times a week. On paper, the Archeage should work with each player being limited by a daily labour pool and resources having meaningful endgame uses, there should be a healthy supply and demand, ensuring that crafters, gathers and warriors each have their place in the ecosystem, back in 2016-2017, when I played daily, this was the case.Īnd after just 15 days of patron (paid), I had earned enough gold to purchase three months of patron access with APEX tokens, and within those three months, I had acquired enough Apex tokens to play comfortably for over two years. ArcheAge is the perfect example of why short terms profits at the expense of long-term profitability and customer satisfaction is a recipe for disaster.
