Spiral Knights is an experiment. OOO guesses as to the outcomes of their actions. These forums are full of people speculating, yet most of it is empty without knowing a few things. Ultimately, we can talk about our experiences as players, but we cannot really evaluate the real effects or value of changes. Me, I would be very happy if OOO shared some answers, because then at least the speculation might be more interesting to read :)

Here are some good questions:

1. Have profits for OOO lowered or risen as a result of recent changes?

2. What real changes have occurred in player population?

3. How have various forms of advertising and marketing effected player pop?

4. What % of players buy CE at all, and what do they do with it?

5. How much CE is sitting in player accounts atm?

6. Of the players who have quit, how many of them ever spent $ on CE?

7. If they would have kept playing, would they have spent any more $ on CE?

Here is a though. Picture an amusement park. Customers arrive and they have X $ to spend. The goal of a park is for them to leave with as little as possible. If everything works right, you have a revolving door with people with money coming in and a people who have been cleaned out leaving. Ultimately, you want people to leave, as you only have so much room.

Now take WOW. Ultimately, WOW just rents space. People go to the show, get hooked, and pay to keep going to the show. Even gold farmers ultimately make the house money. WOW wins based on keeping players in the "park" for as long as possible.

Now take SK. SK will let you in the park for free and even give you some "chips" to use in the "slots". If you want more "chips", you have to pay for them. The key here is SK wins if you want more chips bad enough to pay for them. If you aren't paying for chips, you cost SK something. Not much but .... something. SK wins if you steadily play and buy some CE as you go, but they win big if you binge. Ultimately, this is a trade off.

The thing that makes SK a little wonky is players are actually granted a lot of freedom to effect the game. This is a mixed blessing. In WOW, try as you might, it is about impossible for a player to significantly effect how much fun someone else has. This is good, because people suck, and if they can people will do anything that makes them feel important, especially if it involves being a jerk. All hail the internet. In SK, players do have the ability to effect other players fun, and I know for a fact some of them have tried. How much it has worked ... well, its hard to tell.

Here is a scenario. A new player arrives to the game. Maybe they buy a starter pack, maybe not. Either way, they play long enough to start to see the game ahead of them. They realize they will have to pay 100's of $ to see the rest of the show. They quit, leaving the park with cash in their pocket.

Does this happen yet? At what point will this happen? If players intentionally increasing the price of CE causes this, will the "House" step in?

Ultimately, we will see.