I've thought a lot about whether to give this game a bad review or not. I almost did, but it would be unfair to the game. The largest and most painful issue I have with this game is the in-game shop and the way that this game has been monetized. It is so terribly monetized, that I almost gave this game a negative review. ZOS claim to only sell cosmetics and conveniences, however both of these things clash with the core gameplay of ESO.

There are a number of rewards which are only obtainable through purchasing crowns with money, and with extremely expensive costs too. The game is objectively worse off by the existence of these things. I can count on one hand the number of mounts you can collect in game, but the number of mounts you can buy or obtain through ZOS's loot boxes is closer to 100. This gives players less things to actually play for, less things to collect and fewer targets to set for themselves.

In addition, you can buy time-savers which grant you ability points (if you've collected them on other characters), experience scrolls, mount training and the research scrolls for professions. The issue I take with the existence of these items is indicative of the fact that ZOS are aware that these grinds are a slug. They are literally time-gated; you can learn one mount training skill every 24 hours, of which there are 180 skills to spend. That is half a year of spending points to max out your mount training. This grind must be done on each character. The research scrolls speed up the rate at which you research a trait in a weapon. When researching a trait, you must wait an increasing amount of actual time before unlocking it and researching another. My main character has gotten to the point that she must wait 20+ days to learn a new trait in some professions. Or I can throw my wallet at ZOS and get it done instantly. ZOS, I want to play your game, but you're making it so hard.

The largest houses you can buy typically sell for around 14,000 crowns (€85) and are unobtainable otherwise. On the other hand the housing system in the game is phenomenal. It suffers a lot though when considering how expensive furnishings actually are, especially when compared to how little gold you actually get for just playing the game. While players can obtain some furniture pieces through playing the game, these are extremely few and far between when considering just how many furniture pieces there actually are in the game. The nicer furniture pieces are often priced at 10,000 gold, up to 100,000 for the fanciest pieces. When you only get 300 gold for completing a quest, as a player, you must look to get money through other systems if you want to engage fully with housing and furnishing. ZOS, PLEASE increase the amount of gold you get from quests. This leads me to the auction house in game, and ESO plus.

The best way to obtain money in this game, is by engaging in the auction house. I love the auction house system in the game, and the way it forces players to be a part of a guild(s). One thing to help you make gold is the use of the extra bank storage and (literally infinite) crafting bag you get when subscribing to ESO plus. If you plan to sell any crafting materials and you don't have the crafting bag, be prepared to have a full inventory every 10 minutes. It's like ZOS are aware that not playing with the crafting bag is a handicap, and so they move it to a pay-wall. There are other ways to make money in the game, such as farming for rare item drops for hours on end, hoping that one will eventually drop which you can sell for a lottery cash out

ZOS are masters at creating problems and selling you the solution. The in-game store and the monetization is in direct conflict with the soul of this game, and I never feel satisfied playing this game. I want to engage in the housing, but the rate at which I can actually buy furniture, if I just do quests is extraordinarily slow. The crowns I get with the ESO plus subscription make it a bit better, as they allow me to buy furniture and housing with crowns instead of gold, but I can't help but feel like this doesn't have to be a problem at all.

ZOS, fix your monetization. I paid for this game, let me play it without locking features behind time-gates and pay-walls. If you want this game to be subscription based, make it subscription based, put everything from the store into the game, and remove the store. You can't have it both ways. I want to love this game, but with the way this game is monetized, I can't.

If you enjoy questing and story-telling, you will probably enjoy the game if you don't engage with any of the things above. But you might get frustrated at always having a full backpack and having to walk past all of the mining and herb nodes because you don't have the space to pick them up. And then not having any money because you can't trade the materials you don't have.