Well, in my opinion, I believe that OOO have to still sell energy at high prices because it's somewhat a source of income. Advertisements on this site and the wiki would just ruin the overall feel of Spiral Knights; some ads maybe luring their current roster of players to migrate to other games more easily.

Focusing on the game content as well, I'm quite sure that you won't need more than 42.5kce ($99 worth of energy) to get to 5*. If people are willing to pay $99 to easily become a 5* Vanguard within a couple of days, fine by me. However, they are others that do not wish to pay and want to work to become the best they can be. You can relate this scenario to life.

Sure, snooty kids with money might as well just be sent to independent schools and be able to attend college / university because of it + they have the money. Me and others as well, work hard in order to make it through school, even if you don't like it. But you learn through the educational process and be able to know more to be able to do more. And whilst college / university, you may be working part-time jobs, it's the experience that you get that is very different from those rich kids; you meet friends, become a part of groups and clubs.

In my opinion, I'd say that OOO should still be allowing people to buy an easy trip to Vanguard however make the length of the journey longer (which they're somewhat doing now), so that the experience and the incentive is better, just like the OCH DLC missions. I had fun (sometimes downs) playing with my friends to beat the levels without using sparks. I managed to get my WRH and DR on the first day I got it. The only problem was that some people see this as just another mission that needs to be done.

I actually really dislike Nintendo. Their business strategy of abusing a few established titles while limiting them to consoles does not appeal to me. The work they do produce is fairly incredible on a number of fronts, but I can't help but think they could do more at the same time- the shear amount of money they make off of the combined nostalgia of several nations is just staggering.

As for the OP's speech (I thank the academy), I would have to agree with the overall message but not the execution of that message. The money producing aspects of the free game go against the nature of the game being free and should be more carefully dealt with than they have been. The money producing aspects of the free game do not have anything to do with the OP's background as a philosopher, and the OP did not directly state anything other than to watch extra credits. I'm sure the developers have by now heard of extra credits and I am sure that this issue is quite a bit deeper than them deciding on the spot to just fix everything. But again, should they fix everything? Yeah. Of course I think so; it wouldn't make sense for me not to.

I don't believe this will be noticed by OOO considering how small the amount of forum lurkers has become. I appreciate that there are still players concerned about the game's heading and I hope you are going to ignore the ridiculous replies.

ha-ha-ha-HA

As a long-time supporter and player of Artix Entertainment games, they have their stuff together. I wouldn't consider it more poorly made than SK, but them sticking to 2D graphics and having a ton of designers has led to their success. They release design notes practically daily with sneak peaks and images of their progress in all 9 of their games, and are commited to releasing a new event every single Friday. They also actively consider player suggestions, basing most of their updates on them and even having "Player Suggestion" shops where staff go through art posted by members and turn them into in-game items. [[A lesson OOO might be able to learn from.]]

I don't feel the comparison is fair, considering they have a huge team and it's a lot easier for them to get events designed because it's all 2D (well, except for their 3D-game-in-progress). They are not rolling in money, which is a common misconception from people who might play one of their games but not realize they have 9, each with their own teams (some members jumping back and forth). All the revenue they earn goes towards paying their staff, and some of their team members *ahem* Cysero *ahem* have told people they earn right around the same thing as a teacher's salary.

As for this thread, it's something we've heard before and OOO has heard before. I do agree there should be more interaction, and I definitely think player suggestions need to be given a higher priority (nobody knows the game like the player does!).

I'm a player, and yes, I can see room for improvement for the game. But sometimes I do feel like some of us forget that making a game does take up multiple roles with multiple steps that is needed before something changes. Not only do they have to worry about us players. There are policies, management, bugs, motivation, game economy, artwork, money, coding, communication, time schedules, and the team roster that may be affecting their development process. From experience in working on a small scale online fan-game, I did caught a glimpse on how different staff members and players can perceive that same game.

No, I don't know what they say about those opinions. Is it that some are formed with more basis than others?

Not really sure what you want to achieve with this post. There are plenty of posts highlighting the problems with SK. It would be more productive to offer possible solutions.

Go to SEGA. They are moving to the PC/App marketplace. ASK them for HELP. For more DEVELOPERS/Programers. Advertise yourself more.

^I take it you are not familiar with how real world business management work. OOO is not a group of high school students working on a project supervised by SEGA. They don't simply ask for more resources. There is a system in place, and that system does not react to "business advice" from some random guy on the forums for one of the various games the company owns.
The best thing you can do is offer suggestions for how they can change Spiral Knights to improve things. The truth is they don't care about our business advice; they only care about what we want to see in Spiral Knights.

FYI:
OOO is currently hiring. You can check out their website for details. When you're done being a philosopher, master Java and apply for the position, assuming you're still this passionate about the cause. Since the game is intellectual property, they wouldn't allow anyone to touch the code without a legal contract, so you really need to get an official job with them to help. The game engine, however, is open source so you can contribute to that if you wish. I think Skepticraven had a link to the Git repository in some other thread. Forgot which one...