SOE station pass going to $29.99

zeedaam

Got this email tonight. I had to cancel, seeing as I only still play Vsoh.

Dear Station Access™ Subscriber,

We want to give you some important information regarding your Station Access subscription. Effective April 2, 2007, the new monthly subscription rate will be US$29.99 per month (not including applicable taxes).

We know that rate adjustments are never popular, but the increase is driven by our desire to provide our Station Access subscribers with a consistently high quality entertainment experience, as evidenced by our most recent addition to the Station Access subscription plan, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes™.

You don't have to do a thing; you will automatically be migrated to the new monthly subscription rate under your existing subscription plan when your current subscription plan comes up for renewal on or after April 2, 2007. We appreciate your support and continued participation in our community.

Station Access subscriptions are recurring, meaning you will continue to be billed at the appropriate subscription interval, until you affirmatively cancel your subscription. Subscription fees are subject to tax and value-added tax, as applicable. The subscription charges are in addition to the cost of the games that are part of the Station Access subscription plan. All game software is sold separately.

Mars505

That is a shame, Sony  Entertainment is going be headed back to do porno in japan if they don't get their shit together....

Anofalye

And...what was the rate prior this increase?

Sornin

Originally posted by Anofalye

And...what was the rate prior this increase?

$24.99. So, it is about a 20% increase in price.

tevans

Sadly this limits my options where SOE and VG are concerned. I cancelled my VG account but actually considered taking the Station Access since VG was included with it. Since I had played SWG and EQ2 in the past it would have been a good deal as I could go back and forth between games. The price hike to $29.99 is too much and sadly VG in it's present state is just not worth the price on it's own. I have a feeling this is going to drive many players of all SOE games including VG to other games. At the very least SOE will still lose money on this as those with Station Access will now only pay for their game of choice at a rate of $14.99 per month instead of the $29.99 Station Access fee. This is another in a long list of brilliant SOE moves under the leadership of John Smedley. WTG SOE you just drove some of your customers away and probably killed any chance VG had.

shamall

Originally posted by Anofalye

And...what was the rate prior this increase?

 

I believe it is around $24 and some change. At least it was when I was sub'ed to EQ2. I was in Vanguard beta up to release and wasn't fool enough to give Sony any more money after quiting EQ2.

As for the price increase........LOL

Deathstiny

heh! Already trying to compensate for the financial disaster that is Vanguard. Can't say I blame them. I'll stick to the market standard of $14.95 thank you -  and please don't start with "but you can play all our games on station pass". If I want to play many bad games I'll buy an old arcade collection from a Walmart discount bin.

gg $ony - here is a song for you...

Kalmenicus

I have to say it's really still a pretty good deal, even with Station Access going up $5 a month.

Where else can you subscribe to that many games, with the additional perqs SOE provides to Station Access members?  Nowhere.

And how much would it cost if you wanted to play V:SoH and EQ, paying each individual monthly subscription?  $30.  And there are many players doing that.  But if you're only playing V:SoH, and there's no additional perqs worth an extra $15 per month, Station Access wouldn't make any sense for you.  Same with any of the other games, although I know people who play EQ2 only, but pay Station Access because of the extra character slots per account, and the other less noticeable perqs.

And, if they were charging $25/mo before V:SoH, why would anyone think they're not going to raise the price after adding a new game to the lineup?  Makes pretty good sense.  And that's the way the business model works, after all.  Works for Cable and Satellite TV, works for "wholesale club" stores, works for all kinds of other businesses.

So, it looks to me like they add V:SoH to their lineup, and only charge Station Access members $5 per month for it.  Right?

Regrettable that they can't give Station Access members that new game for free, after purchasing the software.  Right? 

And they may  lose a bunch of Station Access accounts, lots of people may finally break down and choose one game they want to play, instead of dabbling in 2 or 3.  So maybe SOE finds that this hurts the Station Access program, right?

We'll see.  And this gives all the "SOE haters" something new to bitch and whine about, a new completely irrational reason to flame SOE.  All good.

Kalmenicus the Rational

p.s. I cancelled Station Access also.  I was spreading myself too thin anyway, trying to play hardcore in 2 or 3 big MMORPGs at the same time.  This allows me to focus.  Or, I'll find out I just can't live without all the games, and come back to Station Access next month.  Only time will tell.... 

Shadrak

well Ill be ending my station access plan then. The only games i played were EQ2 and Vanguard. Ill end up taking an individual subscription to one of them not sure which yet, but i think ill pick back up my WoW sub again. Id rather pay 30$ a month for Eq2or VG and WoW than just EQ2 and VG.

Sorry but i could care less for SWG or Matrix Online or Planetside never even played those and have no interest in playing them so having those games in the station access plan was really no value for me.

Lukain

Originally posted by Sornin

Originally posted by Anofalye

And...what was the rate prior this increase?

$24.99. So, it is about a 20% increase in price.

It was allways gonna happen , Its the only way to keep VSOH alive ...

Anofalye

Originally posted by tevans

Sadly this limits my options where SOE and VG are concerned. I cancelled my VG account but actually considered taking the Station Access since VG was included with it. Since I had played SWG and EQ2 in the past it would have been a good deal as I could go back and forth between games. The price hike to $29.99 is too much and sadly VG in it's present state is just not worth the price on it's own. I have a feeling this is going to drive many players of all SOE games including VG to other games. At the very least SOE will still lose money on this as those with Station Access will now only pay for their game of choice at a rate of $14.99 per month instead of the $29.99 Station Access fee. This is another in a long list of brilliant SOE moves under the leadership of John Smedley. WTG SOE you just drove some of your customers away and probably killed any chance VG had.

Well... I am trying to put myself in Johny shoes...

 

Maybe he want to get peoples to cancel the subscribtion to the all-access Pass in a significant amount and see to what game they are going to subscribe individually, EQ?  EQ2?  Vanguard?  I see many reasons as to why he may want to see peoples cancelling and moving to single subscribtions; mostly on the bargaining and decision level...about MAJOR decisions, which may lead to closing some titles althogether (or just to determine who get the budget for expansions).

 

SoE can always lower the price AFTER they close a game or 2...or removed them from the pass.

DeadJester

Originally posted by Deathstiny


heh! Already trying to compensate for the financial disaster that is Vanguard. Can't say I blame them. I'll stick to the market standard of $14.95 thank you -  and please don't start with "but you can play all our games on station pass". If I want to play many bad games I'll buy an old arcade collection from a Walmart discount bin.
gg $ony - here is a song for you...

LoL again some one that does not know what they are talking about SOE is the host of Vsoh and has no real money invested other then server space and CSR witch im sure they have plenty of  because of SWG huge misstake the NGE so dont troll unless you know what you are taking about

Wolfdor

I've been a long term Station Pass subscriber as well.  After today's announcement I have cancelled my Station Pass.  $25 is my personal limit in what I'll pay to play a game.  It's a shame too because I've been having fun in both EQ2 and Vanguard.  Now with the increase in price there is no incentive for me to stay loyal to SOE when it comes to choosing a secondary MMO to play (especially with LOTRO coming out with a $9.99 a month subscription).  So the bottom line is, no matter which game I choose to stay in out of VG or EQ2, SOE now loses $10.00 from me as I become single game subscriber.



Another sad note is that this is the 2nd price increase in the past 6 months they have added on to the Station Pass.  Some white shirt over at SOE really must love losing the company money and just handing over more potential subscribers to the other companies.

severius

Originally posted by Kalmenicus


I have to say it's really still a pretty good deal, even with Station Access going up $5 a month.
Where else can you subscribe to that many games, with the additional perqs SOE provides to Station Access members?  Nowhere.
And how much would it cost if you wanted to play V:SoH and EQ, paying each individual monthly subscription?  $30.  And there are many players doing that.  But if you're only playing V:SoH, and there's no additional perqs worth an extra $15 per month, Station Access wouldn't make any sense for you.  Same with any of the other games, although I know people who play EQ2 only, but pay Station Access because of the extra character slots per account, and the other less noticeable perqs.
And, if they were charging $25/mo before V:SoH, why would anyone think they're not going to raise the price after adding a new game to the lineup?  Makes pretty good sense.  And that's the way the business model works, after all.  Works for Cable and Satellite TV, works for "wholesale club" stores, works for all kinds of other businesses.
So, it looks to me like they add V:SoH to their lineup, and only charge Station Access members $5 per month for it.  Right?
Regrettable that they can't give Station Access members that new game for free, after purchasing the software.  Right? 
And they may  lose a bunch of Station Access accounts, lots of people may finally break down and choose one game they want to play, instead of dabbling in 2 or 3.  So maybe SOE finds that this hurts the Station Access program, right?
We'll see.  And this gives all the "SOE haters" something new to bitch and whine about, a new completely irrational reason to flame SOE.  All good.
Kalmenicus the Rational
p.s. I cancelled Station Access also.  I was spreading myself too thin anyway, trying to play hardcore in 2 or 3 big MMORPGs at the same time.  This allows me to focus.  Or, I'll find out I just can't live without all the games, and come back to Station Access next month.  Only time will tell.... 

Well, seeing as how it originally was (with SWG, EQ, EQ2, MXO etc 21.99) then they bumped it up to 24.99 when they were losing SWG subscriptions faster than the hindenburg lost altitude it isn't hard to see that there MAY be a correlation to the less than stellar reception of vanguard.  Brad McQuaid and Sigil had overhyped this game, and we all know Smedley's track record (just look at the NGE).  In an effort to recoup the costs of bailing out sigil and the relatively poor performance of their game they of course have to boost subscription fees.  Think about it.  For quite some time they had people playing 2 of their games and were recieving a discount for going with Station Access, if the majority of SOE's clients are station access subscribers (I say if, I do not know, no one outside of SOE knows) and if that majority only play 2 games the bonus for station access is now pretty much gone.



Basically they offered a bulk discount but because that wasnt enough for them to be profitable they have to bump prices in order to fund development of their ps3/pc titles.  And the less than stellar performance of the ps3 also probably accounts for this to some extent as well because it is still sony and sony is reeling at present.

Sornin

When you get down to it, the Station Pass has always been a way for Sony to make tons of extra cash off of hosting games.



Consider that whether you play just one game or two, you will probably play the same AMOUNT in terms of time. All SOE is doing, therefore, is charging you extra money to play more games, but for about the same amount of time, total. Considering people playing multiple games also need to buy more expansion packs, etc., and it is a nice source of cash for them.



I bet if you looked at the profit relative to player upkeep, Station Pass players are jewels to have as customers.

Shadrak

id rather them drop a few  of the silly games that noone plays anymore like SWG, Planetside, EQOA,Matrix Online and Keep the price where it was,

Deathstiny

Originally posted by DeadJester

Originally posted by Deathstiny


heh! Already trying to compensate for the financial disaster that is Vanguard. Can't say I blame them. I'll stick to the market standard of $14.95 thank you -  and please don't start with "but you can play all our games on station pass". If I want to play many bad games I'll buy an old arcade collection from a Walmart discount bin.
gg $ony - here is a song for you...

LoL again some one that does not know what they are talking about SOE is the host of Vsoh and has no real money invested other then server space and CSR witch im sure they have plenty of  because of SWG huge misstake the NGE so dont troll unless you know what you are taking about

sorry my bad. I didn't know server hosting and customer service were free.

/sarcasm off

eoweth

---

Originally posted by Sornin
When you get down to it, the Station Pass has always been a way for Sony to make tons of extra cash off of hosting games.Consider that whether you play just one game or two, you will probably play the same AMOUNT in terms of time. All SOE is doing, therefore, is charging you extra money to play more games, but for about the same amount of time, total. Considering people playing multiple games also need to buy more expansion packs, etc., and it is a nice source of cash for them.I bet if you looked at the profit relative to player upkeep, Station Pass players are jewels to have as customers.

---

I'm pretty sure there was a "feature" of the Station Plan where you actually couldn't play one game at the same time you were playing another. So no playing EQ while Entertaining in SWG or whatever. So yeah, it was definitely just more money for the same amount of time.

Effect

Originally posted by Shadrak

id rather them drop a few  of the silly games that noone plays anymore like SWG, Planetside, EQOA,Matrix Online and Keep the price where it was,

Speaking of which I believe they upped EQOA's monthly price to $15 a month now too. How they can honestly try to justify that I don't know. That is a $10 a month game and all they are basically doing is unlocking content they put on the dvd when the game was sold. They aren't adding new content, developing it, releasing major patches. The Frontier version of EQOA came out years ago and this is the second price increase I believe.



I would not be surprised if SOE tried to increase EQ2's price just to see if they could do it and if people will pay. If they do it and people pay, watch how many others try to do it. They keep doing this and this part of gaming is bound to experience a crash.

Kingompa

Canceled my Station Access as well.  EQ will be my only remaining subscription with SOE.  EQ is still my main MMO,  I dable in WOW some each week but EQ is still my main game.  The Station Pass allowed me to play EQ2 some but I just cannot justify paying that much each month for the quality of games they have.



Very bad move on their part.

Torak

Well correct me if I'm wrong but isn't 29.99 about the price you would pay if you just subscribed to TWO different MMO's? How many MMO's do they think one person can play?

Unless you are actively involved and playing 3 or more MMO's, any price savings just flew out the window.

Thats just crazy. All their games are marginal on top of it.

Lionexx

I love how everyone make's  5doller's a big deal but it is bs it went from what 21 to 24 now 30..

Balisidar

Originally posted by zeedaam


Got this email tonight. I had to cancel, seeing as I only still play Vsoh.





Dear Station Access™ Subscriber,
We want to give you some important information regarding your Station Access subscription. Effective April 2, 2007, the new monthly subscription rate will be US$29.99 per month (not including applicable taxes).
We know that rate adjustments are never popular, but the increase is driven by our desire to provide our Station Access subscribers with a consistently high quality entertainment experience, as evidenced by our most recent addition to the Station Access subscription plan, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes™.
You don't have to do a thing; you will automatically be migrated to the new monthly subscription rate under your existing subscription plan when your current subscription plan comes up for renewal on or after April 2, 2007. We appreciate your support and continued participation in our community.
Station Access subscriptions are recurring, meaning you will continue to be billed at the appropriate subscription interval, until you affirmatively cancel your subscription. Subscription fees are subject to tax and value-added tax, as applicable. The subscription charges are in addition to the cost of the games that are part of the Station Access subscription plan. All game software is sold separately.

Lol. A friend and I were talking and predicted this months ago when the announcement that SOE was going to publish VSOH went live.  We also speculated that it was going to be a disastrous move on their part.

Of course that particular prediction will have to wait but if SOE was counting on new VSOH players buying all access passes. I think they were seriously mistaken.

 

Mars505

5 dollar in 1995 could get me about 4.5 gallons of gas

5 dollars in 2007 Gallon and a  half



5 dollars is a huge deal, if you are maybe to rich to see how at least American economy is , then I can't help you .

Lets weight this 5 dollars for Sony , or 5 dollars for gas, tough one. Unreal community for VSoH.

Fariic

Edit:  I'm not sure if this is bogus or not, im inclined to think it is, because I haven't gotten any kind of email from sony saying they're increasing the rate.

 Also nothing about a rate increase at Station.com, in fact they're still advertising the 24.99, and I'm sure there would be legal ramifications if they kept the adverts up for the 24.99 rate then told everyone it would change after they sub.

Something tells me someones up to something.

Mithrandolir

Originally posted by Fariic


Edit:  I'm not sure if this is bogus or not, im inclined to think it is, because I haven't gotten any kind of email from sony saying they're increasing the rate.
 Also nothing about a rate increase at Station.com, in fact they're still advertising the 24.99, and I'm sure there would be legal ramifications if they kept the adverts up for the 24.99 rate then told everyone it would change after they sub.
Something tells me someones up to something.

It's official and it's on Station.com now.

http://station-access.station.sony.com

Look right under the 24.99, there's a footnote now about the 4/2 price increase.