The F2P Problem - Bungie's Inexperience compared to other companies

This title might sound harsh, but it's an idea I wanted to push out there and maybe get a discussion around. Hate it or not.

Initially my theory around the hate for the F2P model came from veterans who felt betrayed they paid for a 'full' game and are being treated like *commoners* (for lack of a better term). Now I started looking at it differently.

# tl:dr; Bungie is having issues turning the game F2P because Bungie has zero prior experience developing and managing a F2P game - it's going to be a long road before we're shown anything attractive, if ever.

I've got this theory that Bungie's issue is that they don't know what they're doing. I mean that in the most sincere way; Bungie has no F2P experience.

Other games we use as comparisons for how we feel things like the season pass, eververse, bright dust economy, transmog, end-game rewards, etc all come from well established games made by developers that either spent years building up that single game to where it is today, or making F2P games for years.

In this regard, Bungie is a child trying to play an adults game; and is trying to still develop with a mentality of being an off-the-shelf one-and-done game while integrating F2P elements. Another poster described this well - Bungie wants their cake and eat it too.

Bungie seems to, in part, still be running is game like it's a non f2p game, while getting the benefits of a F2P game.

What does this mean? I don't know to be honest. I think it's going to be a while before we see a real change, because the core game designers making the directional decisions have a **lot** of leaning to do - it's clear by the complaints; but I didn't make this post to get too deep into detail about what isn't working, more about ***why*** I think these problems are happening.

That said, I do enjoy playing - but it doesn't feel the same, and doesn't feel as engaging. I find that a little depressing.