SmileGate have made a rather important announcement, revealing some key details behind monetization changes for Lost Ark’s western launch, including changes to the ‘pet rent’ system. 

The changes play a somewhat important role in the game and will have an impact on gameplay for any players that choose to spend real money. There have already been some mixed reactions to the news, so let’s take a look at what all the noise is about.

Lost Ark Monetization Changes

In a Business Model Overview, the Lost Ark team announced some key monetization changes, as well as outlining how the business model for the game works. It’s important to highlight that the game features many different currencies and almost all of them can be purchased by trading gold. 

However, the biggest changes come in the form of Royal Crystals, a currency that can only be obtained through real money, and more specifically, the Crystalline Aura. Lost Ark’s Crystalline Aura is a subscription system in the game, which offers various in-game benefits for players who purchase it. 

The biggest changes of this are tying in pet rent benefits, as well as removing ‘pay to win’ bonuses like increased movement speed and increased combat XP gain. 

Lost Ark Pet Rent Changes

There is also a key change with the pet rent system. Instead of using blue Crystals for pet rent, this feature will now be available exclusively through Crystalline Aura. Pets will still retain benefits like auto-looting, and other purchases will be permanent. 

This can come as a bit of a mixed bag for players – on one hand, it means that pet rent is no longer accessible through trading gold, and real money has to be used. At the same time, it makes Crystalline Aura that much more worth it and combined with other changes, the game looks to be tuned towards a ‘pay for convenience’ model, which is pretty standard nowadays.

Players have some mixed feelings about this and, of course, it’s all subject to change depending on feedback, so we’ll just have to test these changes out in beta and see how it all feels. 

Update: It has now been confirmed that the Crystalline Aura can be purchased with Blue Crystals in Lost Ark’s western version.