We chat about videogames and videogame accessories.

I can kind of get why they made this free-to-play, even a "reasonable" retail price like 20 bucks or what have you (considering the amount of content in this game, more than reasonable) would've discouraged folks from dropping that much money at once on it.

Mechanics clarification:

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SpoilerThe game is divided into zones with ~5 puzzles in each, each new zone costs 10 more Picrites (game currency) to unlock. Each puzzle nets you ~5 Picrites if you complete all the missions (like using a particular skill or having a particular loadout). Re-completing missions does not earn Picrites. You can also earn Picrites by completing a daily minigame mission, and obviously by buying them with Realbux. Once you've spent Realbux on 5,000 Picrites (~3000 yen if you buy them at once?), you get unlimited Picrites, letting you unlock all the in-game content.

As well as Picrites, you have Energy. You spend one Energy every time you color in a square in a puzzle, and Energy recharges at a rate of 1/minute. You can make your Energy gauge bigger by spending Picrites, a Level 5 gauge (cost: 1000 Picrites total) has unlimited Energy.

Picrites can also be spent to hasten the recharging of assist skills, and to unlock additional game modes and side content.

Microtransactions do suck yeah, but by technically making the game completable without spending realbux (even if it means being stuck with a limited Energy bar, and having to resort to doing dailies for pocket change for a span until you've saved enough to unlock the next area), it'll appeal to some folks. For people who would've bought the game at "retail price", they can just buy the required Picrites to get unlimited in-game currency.

They definitely should've been more upfront about where practical free-to-play ends, because the prospect of unlimited Energy is definitely alluring enough that a lot of people dropped their Picrites on that and got stuck with the first five zones.

A "full price upfront" option in the store (i.e. the cost of 5,000 Picrites) would honestly be the best way to go?