@Rod Hungwell  
Really? I thought they used to be called “marks” or “suckers”.

Because she is the cutest.  

@Wiimeiser  
They don’t expect everyone to spend that much. This one time I heard that all they need for games like this in general to be successful is less than like 1% of their users to spend alot. The people that do are called whales.

@runesorcerer  
How is this even legal?

Alright.
 
Let’s trust pic related over here.
 

 
Now let’s do some math. That calculation is estimated for the MAIN storyline. It doesn’t include the Canterlot storyline,and the Tree of Harmony storyline.
 
Since I haven’t played the game in a long time, we can always suppose there will soon be another storyline. But we won’t count that.
 
Let’s suppose each storyline costs the same amount of money. Since the Tree of Harmony is a really short storyline, we’ll suppose it’s 0.5 times the main storyline. That’s 2.5 times the main storyline, or in dollars, $650.
 
Now, for the ponies that cost gems. Prices can be as low as 15 gems, and can go as high as 200 (as far as I remember, I’m not using actual data).
 
According to the wiki , 36 characters can be purchased via gems. For my convenience, I’ll round the prices to 70 gems each character, give or take. That’s approximately 2520 gems total.
 
Now, also according to the wiki, that doesn’t count characters exclusively obtainable via the balloon game. There are 18 characters that are exclusively obtained via the balloon game. Give or take one or two. Again, I’m estimating a lot of stuff.
 
According to this page, you have, on average, 1 chance out of 100 of obtaining a pony in said game.
 
Let’s imagine the easiest of scenarios. You get a pony according to that number, and the uncertainty is not cumulative. You would have to play 1800 times to get every character there is in the balloon game. That’s equivalent to investing at least 45000 gems in the game.
 
According to pic related
 

 
770 gems cost 79.99 dollars.
 
For 45000 gems, you’d have to pay $4675, rounded. Plus those 2520 gems I mentioned earlier, that’s about $4936.5.
 
Now, the decoration. Since nobody cares about decoration, we’ll just round the number “nobody cares about decoration” to 205 gems. Which is $24.99.
 
And finally, according to EQD , the infamous VIP reward system has added at least $1140 worth of microtransactions.
 
And that yields the astounding amount of $6751.49 to get EVERY PONY and finish EVERY STORYLINE.
 
That’s the equivalent of selling approximately 4.5 coronary arteries in the black market, or a bit less of half a kidney in what I think is either India or Niger, according to pic related.
 

 
“Got a box of lies, gotta get you high with the words of wisdom that you need to hear. Got a big ass book and I’m not a crook, but I’ll take your guilt in the form of dollars”
 
You truly are assholes, Gameloft.

I like how it says “costs real money”.

Sorry sweetie give me some gems and then we’ll talk

How much does it cost to buy 1. all the required stuff and 2. everything?
 
If you pay nothing, how long will it take to get enough gems for 1 and 2 above?

@Dustcan  
Don’t forget Town Hall and bunch of quest gem items, that you can’t skip.

@Jarkes
 
IIRC Rainbow Dash was once worth like $30 worth of gems and Celestia was like $100. Oh and Dash was mandatory for completing the game’s story, such as it is.
 
Yeah.

…$10 is after the 75% off.
 
$10 is AFTER the 75% off.

Flurry Heart is so cute~ <3 <3 <3

$40 real money for a townie and a sculpture… I’m done with the non-Nintendo AAA industry. Except LittleBigPlanet level packs.

The Spike statue is swank, but “five big red crystals” is a thing. A thing that you should pay for?

@Joshua  

 
@Joshua  
I know that those dumb quests

@shaynelle rigby  
Don’t judge me.

@Joshua  
oh god why

I already have Flurry Heart.

Costs real money  
The fact they actually had to put that there. XD