Yesterday saw what basically is meant to be WotC’s flagship digital version of MtG, MtG: Arena go into Open Beta. Which is great news for PC players. But those of us with say Mac’s or prefer to use tablets or phones for this type of game then you are still a long way off from being able to try/play the game. This is the last I’m saying about this in this post, I’d sound like a broken record complaining about the decision otherwise.
However in a post about the Open Beta on the WotC site they talk about the redeemable codes from physical products that can be used to get digital stuff in Arena. I’ve screen grabbed the relevant part of the post for you to read below.
Talk about nickel and diming MtG players.
This weekend is Prerelease weekend for Guilds of Ravnica. I know for a fact that a lot of players actually sign up and play more than one Prerelease event. Which means multiple Prerelease kits. And they are only allowed to redeem a single code?
I don’t have an issue with the Planeswalker decks, most people usually only buy one of each deck anyway. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable restriction. So why not do a similar thing for Prerelease kits?
Then the booster pack restriction is such a slap in the face. 36 booster packs in a box, so using their figures you should see approximately 4 codes. You have just forked out over £80 for a box, you have 4 codes and can only claim one of them! That’s pretty pathetic fromWotC. I believe there is a redeem code in every Pokemon booster pack with no restriction on how many can be claimed online. So even if WotC are not going to be that generous, why the limitation? That’s a whole 12 boosters you could claim. Not exactly going to break the virtual bank is it? They have already got the money for the physical product. It’s not as if they are going to have to print more stuff, just flip some bits. Plus it would help get people playing Arena who also play the physical side.
I seriously can’t see any reasonable argument to justify this model. I’m scared to revisit the model they are using within Arena itself. Maybe it’s for the best that they aren’t on iOS. I’ll stick with the Epic Closed Beta on my iPad (dark draft is awesome) for my MtG like experience.
I love playing MtG, but I find WotC so frustrating.