As if charging $30 for a single, class-restricted portal color in Diablo IV or $80 for a Godzilla x Kong crossover weapon in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III weren’t already egregious enough examples of the company’s corporate greed, Activision Blizzard has introduced a $90 mount to World of Warcraft.
Available for purchase via the in-game item shop until January 6th, 2025, the aptly named Trader’s Gilded Brutosaur allows players to ride a gold armor clad-version of said fictional dinosaur and access the auction house and mailboxes while on the go.
Further, it also moves 1.25x faster than standard mounts, grants a passive defensive buff, and allows players to choose a second piece of vault gear each week, which is automatically upgraded to the maximum item level.
For those unwilling to drop real-world money, Activision Blizzard also offers an in-game route to acquiring the mount -though it demands serious grind.
Players can use in-game gold to buy Tokens from the game’s auction house, which they can then redeem for Battle.net credit, which they can then use in the WoW shop to purchase the Gilded Brutosaur.
While these features might seem appealing to hardcore WoW players, in the eyes of many players, these ‘perks of convenience’ aren’t enough to justify the mount’s price tag.
Unfortunately for despite these criticisms and players’ hopes that this latest microtransaction offering would backfire on Activision Blizzard, according to reports, the mount is selling like hot cakes.
The fact that the Brutosaur mount is overpopulating the world of Azeroth, speaks volumes about how World of Warcraft players are ready to open their wallets wide.
While the Brutosaur’s overpopulation across the world of Azeroth speaks volumes about how ready WoW players are to open their wallets for digital status symbols, their popularity also proves that Activision Blizzard can continue testing fans’ goodwill with little to no consequences in response.
In light of how these status symbols cost extra money on top of the subscription fee required just to play World of Warcraft (as well as access its individual expansions), a sizeable population of the game’s players have found themselves coming to accept that, perhaps more than ever, Activision Blizzard is now focused on monetizing every possible aspect of their titles.
That said, as noted above, despite the game’s currently massive amount of shortcomings, WoW’s player base continues to throw their money at Blizzard whenever the opportunity arises (for instance, the latest The War Within expansion launched with numerous bugs that demanded hotfix, but players have still rushed to both play it and praise it as one of the best new sets of contents to hit the game in years).
Further, it’s clear that the limited availability of The Trader’s Gilded Brutosaur is just another Blizzard strategy to create hype around rare mounts. as by making them restricted, the company is clearly hoping to play on players’ sense of ‘FOMO‘ in order to make a profit.
All in all, such relentless monetization needs to stop, as not only is it taking over the game’s core identity, but it’s pushing many fans away from the once top-of-the-pack MMO (and if Blizzard thought the Shadowlands exodus was bad, they’ll be in for a rude awakening if they don’t course correct).