The Bastardization Of Toribash

[Boa]

Seriously? Premium currency and charging for cosmetic items? I remember when I first purchased Toribash and they were selling keys for the game for 19.95$ each. It was well worth it for me because I actually enjoyed the content Toribash had to offer and the mechanics therein that were available to me. But for some reason they released the title as a free to play game and then subsequently (Like other free to play titles but worse.) paywalled a majority of content for seemingly no reason at all.

Toribash had a gigantic hit of popularity during late 2007 and early 2008. That collectively started amassing Nabi Studios their own community in which they could start using to even more so boost the popularity of their title. Instead Nabi Studios took a different route and decided that they no longer thought purchasing the game was garnering them enough profit and like all greedy gaming studios do, in 2014 they released Toribash for free on steam and decided to introduce premium currency called Toricredits (God awful name.) that could be used to purchase items in the Torishop (Seriously? That's the best you could come up with?)

And with this came the epoch of the bastardization of Toribash. Toribash then garnered a massive audience when featured in a video hosted by popular youtuber Markiplier who enjoyed the game quite a bit and promoted the game to a wider consumerbase for Nabi Studios. This introduced an entire generation of Toribash newcomers to create a normalcy of Toribash's environment that from the beginning (In the newcomers perspective) Toribash had always had premium currency and microtransactions.

But as someone who has always been here, I know the truth. It's that Nabi Studios couldn't stop their greed from spreading like a cancerous tumor across it's entire playerbase and it subjected thousands to greedy tactics and impure idiocracy amongst every player.

Toribash isn't a bad game by any means... But the fact of the matter is that it hasn't always been a cesspool of greed. That it was once a small indie title and the original masterpiece from a hard working set of developers. Coming from a studio that NEEDED funding to keep development going to then being a studio that WANTED MORE than they should ever NEED.

I went to install this game and play it to regain a sense of the old times in my life where fun was had, but then I was immediately slapped in the face with my not so distant reality in which gaming studios want to empty your wallets and leave you gasping for air under the weight of their pure avarice.

That in my mind is the story of The Bastardization Of Toribash.

[ZAToM]

still love this video
https://youtu.be/rZ2TYFuaSak

i played long time ago before it was available on steam. i think i have spent some currency and bought colors and stuff, what can you buy now besides cosmetics?

[NOSTRIL ZODD]

The game seems pretty dead. Every game is 40+ frames per turn, online is almost nonexistent.

[Late2Sleep]

god forbid somebody tries to make a living off of their passion...

[Boa]

Originally posted by Noah:

god forbid somebody tries to make a living off of their passion...

Misrepresenting the point of my post to make some simple ignorant comment is indicative of a strawman argument. You're the point.

[ZAToM]

what can u buy now besides cosmetics?

[Kippy]

i sure hope this is satire

[Stin]

I haven't played Toribash for years and, after recently downloading it again, find that I have to hand over my e-mail address (and possibly more) to this company.

I really don't remember the registration screen on Toribash when I first started paying it. Whilst I don't mind paying a few pennies for cosmetic trinkets, I really don't want to hand over my details just to play a game. It's just plain scummy to store personal details to sell.

Modern web sites do this far too much for no good reason other than to secure their databases with Sellotape and subsequently leak my details to hackers. I should just post my details on a web public site and have done with all this data harvesting nonsense.

I suppose the devs have got their expensive new suits, now.

RIP Toribash.

Noah: If you're making money from your "passion", then it has become your job; your "passion" is now making money.

[sir]

...ok, this is going too far. Wasn't initially going to respond due to how misleading the OP was but data mining allegations?

Seriously? Premium currency and charging for cosmetic items? I remember when I first purchased Toribash and they were selling keys for the game for 19.95$ each. It was well worth it for me because I actually enjoyed the content Toribash had to offer and the mechanics therein that were available to me. But for some reason they released the title as a free to play game and then subsequently (Like other free to play titles but worse.) paywalled a majority of content for seemingly no reason at all.

Toribash went F2P with cosmetic microtransactions back in 2007 with the release of 3.0: https://forum.toribash.com/showthread.php?t=15546
Until 2019, we've had Toricredits as the main in-game currency and USD-only items that you couldn't get any other way. Since March 2019, we've added Shiai Tokens that serve as a replacement to USD payments - main difference is that ST can be acquired just by playing the game thus allowing players to get limited customizations without paying anything: https://forum.toribash.com/showthread.php?t=625907

Toribash had a gigantic hit of popularity during late 2007 and early 2008. That collectively started amassing Nabi Studios their own community in which they could start using to even more so boost the popularity of their title. Instead Nabi Studios took a different route and decided that they no longer thought purchasing the game was garnering them enough profit and like all greedy gaming studios do, in 2014 they released Toribash for free on steam and decided to introduce premium currency called Toricredits (God awful name.) that could be used to purchase items in the Torishop (Seriously? That's the best you could come up with?)

Toribash did grow in 2007-2009 when it was still a a new game, yeah. That's also when it became free to play with Toricredits as in-game currency and Torishop as in-game store name. Steam release in 2014 didn't change the model in any way.

That it was once a small indie title and the original masterpiece from a hard working set of developers. Coming from a studio that NEEDED funding to keep development going to then being a studio that WANTED MORE than they should ever NEED.

Nabi Studios currently consists of 2 people (hampa and me), with me being the solo dev for Toribash. We also have a staff team that consists of player volunteers who help out with market, manage events, sort out reports and so on. You may have noticed that the vast majority of recent updates aren't focused at squeezing the last buck out of players - it's new gameplay features, quality of life improvements and so on. So it's a weird assumption to make that we want more money than we should ever need, considering Toribash hardly makes enough money to pay for servers and dev work time.

I haven't played Toribash for years and, after recently downloading it again, find that I have to hand over my e-mail address (and possibly more) to this company.

I really don't remember the registration screen on Toribash when I first started paying it. Whilst I don't mind paying a few pennies for cosmetic trinkets, I really don't want to hand over my details just to play a game. It's just plain scummy to store personal details to sell.

Email is only required when you make an account on the website, when making one in game client it's optional (it even says so in password input field). The only reason we ask for your email is for you to be able to recover your password later in case you forget it - this has been the case in 2009, this is the case in 2021. We don't use any of your data to sell to third party companies (which would also be illegal considering Toribash TOS doesn't mention it) or to make profit out of it in any other way. If you're concerned about how your data is used, you could've contacted [e-mail] or asked around in Toribash Discord first instead of spreading straight-up lies.



Now I get your possible complaints about the existence of Toricredits, in-game store or any other features that you dislike after returning to the game, but I'd really appreciate if you didn't present lies as proof of "how Toribash became bad" and instead said what exactly you don't like and whether you have ideas how it can be improved. If you've had a registration key purchased for 2.x versions of Toribash, you should have access to some perks on your account - the "oldschooler" status, some free items that were getting added over the years and some forum upgrades.

We try to listen to player suggestions and/or concerns when working on Toribash updates, and despite what you may think about job being the opposite of passion, I am pretty passionate about Toribash as someone who just played the game over a decade ago and then started working for Nabi Studios.

[Broke]

♥♥♥♥♥♥ rekt lmfao. OP on suicide watch.

[Exandria]

Originally posted by sir:

...ok, this is going too far. Wasn't initially going to respond due to how misleading the OP was but data mining allegations?

Seriously? Premium currency and charging for cosmetic items? I remember when I first purchased Toribash and they were selling keys for the game for 19.95$ each. It was well worth it for me because I actually enjoyed the content Toribash had to offer and the mechanics therein that were available to me. But for some reason they released the title as a free to play game and then subsequently (Like other free to play titles but worse.) paywalled a majority of content for seemingly no reason at all.

Toribash went F2P with cosmetic microtransactions back in 2007 with the release of 3.0: https://forum.toribash.com/showthread.php?t=15546
Until 2019, we've had Toricredits as the main in-game currency and USD-only items that you couldn't get any other way. Since March 2019, we've added Shiai Tokens that serve as a replacement to USD payments - main difference is that ST can be acquired just by playing the game thus allowing players to get limited customizations without paying anything: https://forum.toribash.com/showthread.php?t=625907

Toribash had a gigantic hit of popularity during late 2007 and early 2008. That collectively started amassing Nabi Studios their own community in which they could start using to even more so boost the popularity of their title. Instead Nabi Studios took a different route and decided that they no longer thought purchasing the game was garnering them enough profit and like all greedy gaming studios do, in 2014 they released Toribash for free on steam and decided to introduce premium currency called Toricredits (God awful name.) that could be used to purchase items in the Torishop (Seriously? That's the best you could come up with?)

Toribash did grow in 2007-2009 when it was still a a new game, yeah. That's also when it became free to play with Toricredits as in-game currency and Torishop as in-game store name. Steam release in 2014 didn't change the model in any way.

That it was once a small indie title and the original masterpiece from a hard working set of developers. Coming from a studio that NEEDED funding to keep development going to then being a studio that WANTED MORE than they should ever NEED.

Nabi Studios currently consists of 2 people (hampa and me), with me being the solo dev for Toribash. We also have a staff team that consists of player volunteers who help out with market, manage events, sort out reports and so on. You may have noticed that the vast majority of recent updates aren't focused at squeezing the last buck out of players - it's new gameplay features, quality of life improvements and so on. So it's a weird assumption to make that we want more money than we should ever need, considering Toribash hardly makes enough money to pay for servers and dev work time.

I haven't played Toribash for years and, after recently downloading it again, find that I have to hand over my e-mail address (and possibly more) to this company.

I really don't remember the registration screen on Toribash when I first started paying it. Whilst I don't mind paying a few pennies for cosmetic trinkets, I really don't want to hand over my details just to play a game. It's just plain scummy to store personal details to sell.

Email is only required when you make an account on the website, when making one in game client it's optional (it even says so in password input field). The only reason we ask for your email is for you to be able to recover your password later in case you forget it - this has been the case in 2009, this is the case in 2021. We don't use any of your data to sell to third party companies (which would also be illegal considering Toribash TOS doesn't mention it) or to make profit out of it in any other way. If you're concerned about how your data is used, you could've contacted [e-mail] or asked around in Toribash Discord first instead of spreading straight-up lies.



Now I get your possible complaints about the existence of Toricredits, in-game store or any other features that you dislike after returning to the game, but I'd really appreciate if you didn't present lies as proof of "how Toribash became bad" and instead said what exactly you don't like and whether you have ideas how it can be improved. If you've had a registration key purchased for 2.x versions of Toribash, you should have access to some perks on your account - the "oldschooler" status, some free items that were getting added over the years and some forum upgrades.

We try to listen to player suggestions and/or concerns when working on Toribash updates, and despite what you may think about job being the opposite of passion, I am pretty passionate about Toribash as someone who just played the game over a decade ago and then started working for Nabi Studios.

very well said and thank you. my only concern for hte game is that one flame effect alone costs a minimum of 25 USD and goes up to 100 USD. i think that pricing can be ridiculous tbh. love the work you have done, and you will still see my support, i would just like to see some of these prices come down

[Stickyboi299]

Originally posted by Stin:

I haven't played Toribash for years and, after recently downloading it again, find that I have to hand over my e-mail address (and possibly more) to this company.

I really don't remember the registration screen on Toribash when I first started paying it. Whilst I don't mind paying a few pennies for cosmetic trinkets, I really don't want to hand over my details just to play a game. It's just plain scummy to store personal details to sell.

Modern web sites do this far too much for no good reason other than to secure their databases with Sellotape and subsequently leak my details to hackers. I should just post my details on a web public site and have done with all this data harvesting nonsense.

I suppose the devs have got their expensive new suits, now.

RIP Toribash.

Noah: If you're making money from your "passion", then it has become your job; your "passion" is now making money.

This has to be satire bruh youre literally just making an account with just an email address how is that handing over your information😭😭😭

[Stickyboi299]

the "mechanics" that were available to you are still the same ones today? except you dont have to pay 20 dollars for it first? its the same gameplay as before except free? youre delusional?