Aeria's Senior Product Lead In Charge Of Bless: "I'd Like To Focus On Retention"

In an effort to be more open with the community, Bless, Chris, led an AMA in which all of the Bless team's answered questions. There's a lot said, but the following quote really stuck out to me. When questioned about the possibility of pay-to-win in Bless, this is the response Chris gave.

Well, I understand your concerns and I share them. As a player, I really understand where you´re coming from. As a guy working on games, my stance is: fair F2P is good for retention, P2W is not (maybe for the spenders, but not for the entire population of a game). In my role as a Product Lead, I´d like to focus on retention.

A number of other questions were answered, but, as the publishing contract was just signed, there weren't many specifics to be given. Chris did promise, however, that he will share more details with the community when he has them.

Answers that he could give include the fact that the team is "in constant communication with Neowiz" regarding the game. Internal Alpha testing will begin soon, but Beta could be months off. Certain regions will be IP blocked due to contracts. Aeria is focusing on "Europe (ex-Russia) and North America (incl. Mexico)" for Bless.

On the topic of censorship, Chris said "if required, we will change game content." There are elements the team saw that "will need to revisit because they appear questionable." He follows up by asking "do you think the 'sex scene' adds significant benefit to the game? You meet this chick in church, then she´s hooking up with your mate and then she´s betraying him... dunno, didn´t give me much.."

You can find the full AMA here. Two information-heavy Q&As can be found here and here.