Instead of trailing off with a ..., perhaps you should say why you think the video's argument is invalid.
Oh, I thought that pointing out to obvious and fundamental flaw is self-explanatory... Okey.
You pay subscription fee to access the game as it is.
Simple as it that, no more no less. Statement that you pay subscription fee to pay for the servers running is as invalid as argument that the server costs do not justify the fee.
Do you like the game and fee is acceptable? Yes? You subscribe. Take or leave, anything else is irrelevant and nonsense.
What you are saying is irrelevant nonsense.
The argument is and has been that the subscription is necessary to pay for server costs and content development. That that has long been the explanation is common knowledge. And while it may once have been true, it no longer is, and that fact is the point of the video.
Of course when you pay a subscription you are paying to access as is. But companies have used the aforementioned argument to justify making players pay subscriptions. If companies had said "you pay to access the game, simple as that," people would have baulked at the idea. Companies needed something to explain the cost.
It pays for the service all around. From manpower to continued advertisment.
Single player games have those costs too you know. They seem to be doing pretty damn fine without subscription fees.
What do you think DLC is for? It pays for itself just like any service.... Why do they only advertise New vegas when they have new DLC? Why do they only advertise Borderlands when they have DLC? Why do they stop advertising when they no longer offer DLC? Why do they only pick advertising back up when they release a compilation version?
In multi-play why do they sell continued map packs? Why do they let players themselves handle most of the hosting? WHy do most players who have servers take donations? It's because all of this stuff costs money, they only do it if it pays for itself and they make money from it. They stop, when it starts costing them money.
I also hate comparing these things because in single-player land most companies turn out games at a much higher rate compared to MMO land. Take CCP and compare them to a typical Single-player studio, it's completely apples to oranges.
Lets not forget GW2 is partly being funded on the backs of Sub model games. GW1 was as well....
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
p.s. Here's some hypothetical (sketchy) maths to think about:
GW2 & Swtor : Both 4 million players, one year in:
Revenue:
GW2:
boxes 4m x $60 = 240 mil - 30% operating, maintainance, shipping and distribution = 168m
1st expansion or a couple of mini-expansions: 4 m x $50 = 200 m (not subtracting anything because they might be downloadable only).
vanity shop / payed services: ??? let's say 4 dollars average spending = 16 m
Total revenue after year one: 384 mil
Swtor:
boxes 4m x $60 = 240 m - 30% operating, maintainance, shipping and distribution, - 20% lucasarts = 120 m
subs: 11 (12 - free month) x $15 x 4 m = 600 mil - 20% lucasarts = 480 mil
payed services: maybe 0.40 ct average spending = 1.6 mil
Total revenue after year one: 606.6 mil
Now if you look at that difference and value in development costs perhaps it is meritted. It's clear that Swtor players will pay a lot of their sub dollars to finance voice overs and George Lucas' wallet. Stuff like that make it a more expensive game for sure (instead of owning your own IP) so I'm not so very certain if the sub model is such a rip-off in all cases.
My subsciption simulation differs. I'll simplify this.
GW2:
-10 customers
-60$ Box price
-Expansions every 6 months
That's 600 internet dollars flat
SWTOR (or any sub game):
-10 customers
-60$ Box price
-Expansion every year +
-15$ recurring fee
Again, 600 internet dollars flat.
At the end of the six month period, estimate 50-75% of the original base move on to buy the expansion. This is hard to pinpoint without having access to their internal information because of so many circumstances, it could even be over 100% with the introduction of new customers. Arenanet, however, will probably have a good idea of what to expect. I'll give it six recurring customers, at minimum. That's another 360.
GW2=960 in profit. We don't look at down costs with production because that is more dependent on other factors mostly within the company. IE, the amount of game content is not always relative to cost. It just doesn't work like that with virtual products. The potential for GW2 to have more net customers is also likely because of the cheaper model.
With SWTOR(or generic sub game), of the 10 original buyers, 25-50% will quit by the end of the free month. I'll leave that with 7 paying customers. Of that, half or more will quit within the next two paying months. The other (3) will stay on for the rest of the 6 month period. That's generous.
So, 7 x 2 x 15 = 210. 3 x 3 x 15 = 135. 345 profit.
SWTOR=945 in profit.
The sub model obviously still has more potential for total profit, but it is far riskier than the B2P expansion model. Not to mention, having a progressive based profit model like sub games do allow them to sell a half assed product and develop the game in a less than desirable fashion, from a customer perspective.
What do you think DLC is for? It pays for itself just like any service.... Why do they only advertise New vegas when they have new DLC? Why do they only advertise Borderlands when they have DLC? Why do they stop advertising when they no longer offer DLC? Why do they only pick advertising back up when they release a compilation version?
In multi-play why do they sell continued map packs? Why do they let players themselves handle most of the hosting? WHy do most players who have servers take donations? It's because all of this stuff costs money, they only do it if it pays for itself and they make money from it. They stop, when it starts costing them money.
I also hate comparing these things because in single-player land most companies turn out games at a much higher rate compared to MMO land. Take CCP and compare them to a typical Single-player studio, it's completely apples to oranges.
Lets not forget GW2 is partly being funded on the backs of Sub model games. GW1 was as well....
Following the same logic, SWTOR is partly being funded by Single Player Games.
But that logic doesn't hold true to very many business models. I think games have to support themselves or they die.
Why do so many people complain about P2P? How many people are paying Microsoft every month/year for Xbox Live... and they don't offer any game updates or content for free!
You're paying for server usage and security. 15 bucks a month (50 cents a day) to know that my characters are safe and hopefully the game is as cheat/hack free as possible is well worth it IMO.
Then again I have a real job and 15 bucks a month is nothing to me.
Why do so many people complain about P2P? How many people are paying Microsoft every month/year for Xbox Live... and they don't offer any game updates or content for free!
You're paying for server usage and security. 15 bucks a month (50 cents a day) to know that my characters are safe and hopefully the game is as cheat/hack free as possible is well worth it IMO.
Then again I have a real job and 15 bucks a month is nothing to me.
So what's the problem with B2P? If a developer can build a better game or a comparable game and not charge a subscription are you going to pay the $15.00 to the one that charges just because you can.
When i play a mmorpg, I want to play it with other players. The business model has a huge influence on the type of players the game will attract. When I play a game with subscribtion, I am guaranteed that those I play with are dedicated to the game and those are more likely to have their own name on a credit card.
To put it short and provoking, less pissants to deal with and more time to enjoy the game with real gamers.
When i play a mmorpg, I want to play it with other players. The business model has a huge influence on the type of players the game will attract. When I play a game with subscribtion, I am guaranteed that those I play with are dedicated to the game and those are more likely to have their own name on a credit card.
To put it short and provoking, less pissants to deal with and more time to enjoy the game with real gamers.
Can you bear with me? I'm going to try to put a stop to a persisting fallacy right now. I'm going to do it in a short post, and I want you to pay attention.
The fallacy: DLC is exactly equivalent to a subscription.
Logical response: Utter nonsense.
Why? I'm disappointed that I have to explain this but let's see how many can keep up. And since someone brought up New Vegas as part of the fallacy, well, let's go with that, shall we? I bought New Vegas, but I didn't buy Dead Money. I did, however, buy Old World Blues. So what's going on there?
In the case of DLC I'm making a payment and getting a product. In the case of a subscription I'm making a payment for continued access to a product I already owned. (With possible, potential 'free' content added in.) These two are not the same, and they are not the same for a number of very important reasons.
With DLC, I can see the content and I can decide whether I want to buy it.
Now if DLC was like a subscription then it would work like this: I'd buy New Vegas, and then to continue playing New Vegas I'd have to pay on a monthly basis. At some point down the road they may deliver Dead Money, but they have no obligation to do so. Dead Money isn't content that I like, so I skip over it, but I continue to pay on a monthly basis for New Vegas. Now, eventually they may release content that I do want to play, but that'll be... what, perhaps eight months subscription fees?
So I would have essentially paid one-hundred and twenty bloody dollars (8 * $15) for a new piece of content.
Wow. That would be so financially intelligent of me.
Now then, what I did do is skip all the NV content except the one I really wanted. I got Old World Blues for $10, that's $110 less. So how, how by any logical standards, can someone say that a subscription works in the same way as DLC? It's ridiculous. It's a fallacy. People who're supporting this are talking out of their rears, they're being billious dialectics and not thinking about what they're saying, because there's no way in hell a subscription is the same as DLC if one costs $110 more than the other.
Yes, the GW2 system is the same as DLC. It'll have silly cosmetic stuff (which I will probably buy some of, just because i like that, and I enjoy showing my support), and it'll have content, but what it won't have is a payment that is forced in order to retain access to a product.
How is DLC different from a subscription?
All together, now!
Bcause a product doesn't have a continued subscription cost in order to retain access to the product.
Herp. Derp. Truly. Because if anyone continues to propagate this argument now then we're just being trolled.
I am not forced to pay in order to retain access to New Vegas, I am not forced to pay to retain access to Guild Wars 2, I amforced to pay to retain access to a game like World of Warcraft. And if that's an important difference between DLC and subscriptions, I'd think. That's exactly why I prefer the Guild Wars 2 model. With the Guild Wars 2 model it is a purchase system. I see a product, there is a product, right in front of me, and I can either choose to buy the product or not. If I choose not to buy the product then that choice will in no way affect my ability to access previous products that I bought.
This fallacy is driving me insane because it's clearly fallacious and it's being propagated by people who're just throwing down chaff to destroy the discussion. It's not a valid point. From this post on I would suggest that we all just ignore any posts about this, and delegate anyone who still believes this to the status of 'Village Idiot.' DLC is the same as subscriptions indeed... good grief. What are they teaching kids these days?
When i play a mmorpg, I want to play it with other players. The business model has a huge influence on the type of players the game will attract. When I play a game with subscribtion, I am guaranteed that those I play with are dedicated to the game and those are more likely to have their own name on a credit card.
To put it short and provoking, less pissants to deal with and more time to enjoy the game with real gamers.
WoW has proved you wrong.
Hehe got me there, and yet not completely. WoW players are a thousand times nicer than diablo2 for example. I can only speak for myself but my experience is not bad with WoW players, my problem is more the game itself (or what it has become). On top of that, I don't consider a bad player (noob) a pissant, it takes bad behaviour to get into that category.
If WoW was free to play, I promise you it would be a haven for pissants. Also I didnt say they wont be there, I said there will be fewer.. uhm well, lets call it a rule of thumb with variations and exceptions.
mmorpg games have a much bigger budget after a game releases than a single player game
mmorpg has to account for web-site / team staff for updates / support billing
single player is just a box sale..no support to fund no servers to fund no team to fund no site to keep up
the responsablity of mmorpg is much greater than a single player game
Single players games have all of that stuff as well. Nearly all top shelf titles have detailed websites complete with forums. Every mainstream video game company has a support team, and, thanks to the rise of DLC, ALL VIDEO GAMES HAVE A STAFF FOR UPDATES.
Servers, and associated bandwidth, are not a concern. As a matter of fact, someone here recently even posted a video which went through a budget report, something available to anyone in a publically traded company, to show Blizzard, (I think, and could be wrong) spent only 4.5K or so a month in upkeep costs related to the game being online. People pay that in mortgage in some places.
The responsibility of a single player game is actually greater than that of an MMO. They spend just as much upfront, (40 million for heavy hitters like Mass Effect and Modern Warfare last I looked) and must IMMEDIATELY reinvest again to quickly produce DLC for the game. They don't rely on massive time sinks to extend the life of the initial purchase, and so must be quick to develop more content if they intend to draw continued profit from the game as an MMO does.
The only REAL difference is in GM staff, and those people aren't making a very high wage anyway. For a company drawing 160 million a month, I assure you, a few nearly minimum wage workers on the budget isn't even noticed. Yes, MMO's are bigger games. But the costs are not as astronomically different as you would suggest. They are actually very similar, and the monthly price we pay is doing very little in regard to seperating them in terms of content. What we PERCEIVE as content in an MMO is generally just the same caliber of content slowed down heavily to ensure to play that extra month.
Granted, in the case of Guild Wars, in order to be successful for their employees they will need constant expansion material to offset the loss of easy money that others are making off of the ill-informed masses. This doesn't just mean paying their salary, but also creating an environment of advancement to ensure they retain as many quality employees as they can. Things such as better benefits and raises, new advanced employment opporotunities and such. Running a business isn't as simple as making more than you spend. Its also making enough to bring greater success each year to those that serve you.
But that success does not require a monthly fee. It requires a more dedicated team, and a better financial plan, not to mention an overall higher expectation for what you can achieve. ANet has this, I believe. They have shown it in the past, and continue to show it now. They will not break the giants in this genre directly, but their success here WILL break down the foundation upon which we realize how our money is being used inside a company. Its gonna change what we expect from MMO companies, and that expectation is going to grow. This is a good thing.
Hehe got me there, and yet not completely. WoW players are a thousand times nicer than diablo2 for example. I can only speak for myself but my experience is not bad with WoW players, my problem is more the game itself (or what it has become). On top of that, I don't consider a bad player (noob) a pissant, it takes bad behaviour to get into that category.
If WoW was free to play, I promise you it would be a haven for pissants. Also I didnt say they wont be there, I said there will be fewer.. uhm well, lets call it a rule of thumb with variations and exceptions.
I dunno that, Wow players doesn't seem better to me than LOTRO players and Guildwars community are better than both those games.
Sure, F2P tends to attract more idiots initially but they usually falls off after the fist 2 days.
Diablo on the other hand have an entirely different type of player, just like any FPS or RTS game have. MMOs attracts certain types of people, but what really makes the MMO players differs from other genres is not that they are willing to pay more but time spent in the game (hopefully together with some social skills).
I dunno that, Wow players doesn't seem better to me than LOTRO players and Guildwars community are better than both those games.
Sure, F2P tends to attract more idiots initially but they usually falls off after the fist 2 days.
Diablo on the other hand have an entirely different type of player, just like any FPS or RTS game have. MMOs attracts certain types of people, but what really makes the MMO players differs from other genres is not that they are willing to pay more but time spent in the game (hopefully together with some social skills).
I hear you, but I can only say what my experiences are, and conclude from that. When that is the case, only proof can change ones mind. Besides it is only a part of what I consider when getting a game, I have much more fundamental issues with item shops... and thus not really something to discuss here. I got sidetracked to put a little point in.
I dunno that, Wow players doesn't seem better to me than LOTRO players and Guildwars community are better than both those games.
Sure, F2P tends to attract more idiots initially but they usually falls off after the first 2 days.
I have to agree with this part of your post. It isn't at all the pricing model that has encouraged or discouraged a positive community in games so much as how much you wind up having to rely on other players (from my experience). Games with more solo-ability I have found to have more asshats- not to say all that prefer soloing are but it's certainly what I've seen.
How about looking at it from another angle, forget it is a computer game for a moment.
All games are based on a common set of rules, that the player(s) must follow. Within that set of rules you can play and compete on equal terms. You can come up with numerous excuses for loosing or winning a game, but the rules count equally for you aswell as any other player.
With a mmorpg it is not about winning or loosing, but the competition is still there, also outside pvp. Competition can be anything from respect to bragging, having a nice house to having achievements, and many other mroe subtle things.
If someone buys something RMT and you didnt, then that person is not playing by the same rules you do. It is fundamental to any game including mmorpgs to have same rules for players, it can be very complicated rules but they are still there to ensure equal competition. Take any kind of sport and there is an ongoing battle to remove all kinds of cheats and advantages that makes the competition unequal - Because if it does become unequal then the competition is pointless.
I have heard some say stuff like "no one can take your accomplishments away from you, who cares if the others cheat", and that is frankly pure bull. Imagine that in real life. It has nothing to do with beeing competetive, it has nothing to do with pvp, it is playing by the same rules in a game - That is the essense of all games.
How about looking at it from another angle, forget it is a computer game for a moment.
All games are based on a common set of rules, that the player(s) must follow. Within that set of rules you can play and compete on equal terms. You can come up with numerous excuses for loosing or winning a game, but the rules count equally for you aswell as any other player.
With a mmorpg it is not about winning or loosing, but the competition is still there, also outside pvp. Competition can be anything from respect to bragging, having a nice house to having achievements, and many other mroe subtle things.
If someone buys something RMT and you didnt, then that person is not playing by the same rules you do. It is fundamental to any game including mmorpgs to have same rules for players, it can be very complicated rules but they are still there to ensure equal competition. Take any kind of sport and there is an ongoing battle to remove all kinds of cheats and advantages that makes the competition unequal - Because if it does become unequal then the competition is pointless.
I have heard some say stuff like "no one can take your accomplishments away from you, who cares if the others cheat", and that is frankly pure bull. Imagine that in real life. It has nothing to do with beeing competetive, it has nothing to do with pvp, it is playing by the same rules in a game - That is the essense of all games.
This is where your argument fails, as both players have the choice of using the cash shop. There is nothing within the game that would prohibit either player from using the cash shop. If you'd care to argue about one player being unable or unwilling to pay for the cash shop item then you open an entirely different can of worms. It would be akin to making all players in a game use the exact same spec of computer because someone couldn't pay to compete versus players with a higher end machine or better internet.
It would be akin to making all players in a game use the exact same spec of computer because someone couldn't pay to compete versus players with a higher end machine or better internet.
So a CS tournament you are allowed to bring your own pc... oh wait you are not, those are the exact same because its a competition. Yes I could just go buy the same things in the item shop (along with everyone else) and you could derail the point by saying that is just another rule.
Servers, and associated bandwidth, are not a concern. As a matter of fact, someone here recently even posted a video which went through a budget report, something available to anyone in a publically traded company, to show Blizzard, (I think, and could be wrong) spent only 4.5K or so a month in upkeep costs related to the game being online. People pay that in mortgage in some places.
Just to clarify...The video that showed bandwidth as 4500 or whatever was NCSoft's quarterly report. NCSoft's report is in millions of Korean Won, so 4500 would be ~4.2 million dollars. That's per quarter and for all five of their games (Lineage 1&2, Aion, GW, and CoH). That was actually an anomalous quarter for some reason, and that in a lot of their other reports it's in the 2800 range. I know I've made the argument in other threads that the 2-3 million dollars GW1 brings in every quarter (despite having not put out paid content since 2007) would alone be enough to pay for the bandwidth.
Also, just wanted to point out that same report would say something like NCSoft's profit for the quarter is in the 40 million dollar range.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Monthly fee being a good or a bad thing for the customer depends entirely on what the money is used for. If all of it goes to dev's + IP's pockets then it's a bad thing obviously, cashing for nothing is always a bad thing yes? If a good portion of it goes in constant development of the game, frequent updates, development of features and services then it's a good thing, if the customer is happy with this. It can also harm the game if people feel it's too much compared to what they get and leave because of that, but to my experience people do pay and stay if the game is good, and people leave even if the game is free if it's crap, not including some marginal bums who simply cant afford anything.
No monthly fee can be a good thing or a bad thing too. Obviously it's a good thing for the customer since they save a bit pocket money every month, saving is always nice yes? It can also be a bad thing if it means that the dev team has to be smaller since there is no constant revenue, and content coming in at slower pace, unless the company is very *charitable and settles for less income (people need to get paid after the initial sales ofcourse too, who pumps out free content updates), or if the customer ofcourse is fine how things are because of no monthly fee.
*If this is the case with GW2 I'm very happy to see there's still someone in this world that does something without having to get paid for it, it's hard to believe though since our world today is only about profit.
No monthly fee can be a good thing or a bad thing too. Obviously it's a good thing for the customer since they save a bit pocket money every month, saving is always nice yes? It can also be a bad thing if it means that the dev team has to be smaller since there is no constant revenue, and content coming in at slower pace, unless the company is very *charitable and settles for less income (people need to get paid after the initial sales ofcourse too, who pumps out free content updates), or if the customer ofcourse is fine how things are because of no monthly fee.
*If this is the case with GW2 I'm very happy to see there's still someone in this world that does something without having to get paid for it, it's hard to believe though since our world today is only about profit.
Arenanet is no charity and the first Guildwars earned in many times it's production and running costs. You don't really think Wow uses all it's astronomical monthly fees for running costs (box sales are to cover the development cost)?
They are dumping the prices to get more players. Just a few years ago all games have the same monthly fees but with this and the F2P method prices wil go down for the average players.
I wouldn't never concern about a sub i have to pay for a game..
Why? cus you already pay of lot of other things in live, everyone has got a hobbys and some of them costs even more money then playing video games and upgrading your PC after 2 years orso...
And Serieously what is 15 bucks a month? dude thats even not even a hour working for most of the people on the planet..
where do you work $15 an hr thats like £9 in uk no job gives that . on toppic im not that botherd about the no sub i like gw format just pick up and play when you want
I can't remember who posted this thought, but it's a good one. The 'no-sub-fee' model has one considerable advantage for GAMERS (besides cost): The developer is always motivated to produce new, relevant' content to keep the revenue stream going. Now, I specifically said "relevant" content because it must merit another box purchase. Many developers push out content, but it's just a reskin of the same models and a renaming of the mechanics.
No monthly fee can be a good thing or a bad thing too. Obviously it's a good thing for the customer since they save a bit pocket money every month, saving is always nice yes? It can also be a bad thing if it means that the dev team has to be smaller since there is no constant revenue, and content coming in at slower pace, unless the company is very *charitable and settles for less income (people need to get paid after the initial sales ofcourse too, who pumps out free content updates), or if the customer ofcourse is fine how things are because of no monthly fee.
*If this is the case with GW2 I'm very happy to see there's still someone in this world that does something without having to get paid for it, it's hard to believe though since our world today is only about profit.
Arenanet is no charity and the first Guildwars earned in many times it's production and running costs. You don't really think Wow uses all it's astronomical monthly fees for running costs (box sales are to cover the development cost)?
They are dumping the prices to get more players. Just a few years ago all games have the same monthly fees but with this and the F2P method prices wil go down for the average players.
Competition is a good thing.
I completely agree.
GW1 vastly outearned the P2P City of Heroes during the period when it was putting out content. GW1 was always intended to be a B2P game but even if it hadn't, it would have been a brilliant business decision in the face of WoW coming out four months earlier. Instead of being a game that we've all never played and limped along or perhaps even died with a hundred thousand subs, it's a game that 7 million units were sold of 4 boxes. That's 1.75 million people playing it at the bare minimum.
Being P2P is fantastic if your game is the big dog and still pretty great even if it isn't, but it's not necessarily a license to print money. The majority of people won't pay two subscriptions so a P2P game has to be better than WoW for people to want to switch over permanently, otherwise they might switch for a few months and then switch back.
People need to get past their initial assumption that P2P and B2P will have the same number of players. B2P sells more copies because it's cheaper, because people are going to buy it maybe in addition to a sub game, people can buy it as a gift or feel a lot better about buying a copy for each one of their kids. If you have a larger and more stable playerbase (people don't have to decide each month to go back to subscribing to some other game), then not everybody needs to buy expansions to earn the same amount of money.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Can you bear with me? I'm going to try to put a stop to a persisting fallacy right now. I'm going to do it in a short post, and I want you to pay attention.
The fallacy: DLC is exactly equivalent to a subscription.
Logical response: Utter nonsense.
Why? I'm disappointed that I have to explain this but let's see how many can keep up. And since someone brought up New Vegas as part of the fallacy, well, let's go with that, shall we? I bought New Vegas, but I didn't buy Dead Money. I did, however, buy Old World Blues. So what's going on there?
In the case of DLC I'm making a payment and getting a product. In the case of a subscription I'm making a payment for continued access to a product I already owned. (With possible, potential 'free' content added in.) These two are not the same, and they are not the same for a number of very important reasons.
With DLC, I can see the content and I can decide whether I want to buy it.
Now if DLC was like a subscription then it would work like this: I'd buy New Vegas, and then to continue playing New Vegas I'd have to pay on a monthly basis. At some point down the road they may deliver Dead Money, but they have no obligation to do so. Dead Money isn't content that I like, so I skip over it, but I continue to pay on a monthly basis for New Vegas. Now, eventually they may release content that I do want to play, but that'll be... what, perhaps eight months subscription fees?
So I would have essentially paid one-hundred and twenty bloody dollars (8 * $15) for a new piece of content.
Wow. That would be so financially intelligent of me.
Now then, what I did do is skip all the NV content except the one I really wanted. I got Old World Blues for $10, that's $110 less. So how, how by any logical standards, can someone say that a subscription works in the same way as DLC? It's ridiculous. It's a fallacy. People who're supporting this are talking out of their rears, they're being billious dialectics and not thinking about what they're saying, because there's no way in hell a subscription is the same as DLC if one costs $110 more than the other.
Yes, the GW2 system is the same as DLC. It'll have silly cosmetic stuff (which I will probably buy some of, just because i like that, and I enjoy showing my support), and it'll have content, but what it won't have is a payment that is forced in order to retain access to a product.
How is DLC different from a subscription?
All together, now!
Bcause a product doesn't have a continued subscription cost in order to retain access to the product.
Herp. Derp. Truly. Because if anyone continues to propagate this argument now then we're just being trolled.
I am not forced to pay in order to retain access to New Vegas, I am not forced to pay to retain access to Guild Wars 2, I amforced to pay to retain access to a game like World of Warcraft. And if that's an important difference between DLC and subscriptions, I'd think. That's exactly why I prefer the Guild Wars 2 model. With the Guild Wars 2 model it is a purchase system. I see a product, there is a product, right in front of me, and I can either choose to buy the product or not. If I choose not to buy the product then that choice will in no way affect my ability to access previous products that I bought.
This fallacy is driving me insane because it's clearly fallacious and it's being propagated by people who're just throwing down chaff to destroy the discussion. It's not a valid point. From this post on I would suggest that we all just ignore any posts about this, and delegate anyone who still believes this to the status of 'Village Idiot.' DLC is the same as subscriptions indeed... good grief. What are they teaching kids these days?
Tldr; What's the difference between a monthly fee and frequently released DLC packs? They are coloured differently.
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What do you think DLC is for? It pays for itself just like any service.... Why do they only advertise New vegas when they have new DLC? Why do they only advertise Borderlands when they have DLC? Why do they stop advertising when they no longer offer DLC? Why do they only pick advertising back up when they release a compilation version?
In multi-play why do they sell continued map packs? Why do they let players themselves handle most of the hosting? WHy do most players who have servers take donations? It's because all of this stuff costs money, they only do it if it pays for itself and they make money from it. They stop, when it starts costing them money.
I also hate comparing these things because in single-player land most companies turn out games at a much higher rate compared to MMO land. Take CCP and compare them to a typical Single-player studio, it's completely apples to oranges.
Lets not forget GW2 is partly being funded on the backs of Sub model games. GW1 was as well....
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
mmorpg games have a much bigger budget after a game releases than a single player game
mmorpg has to account for web-site / team staff for updates / support billing
single player is just a box sale..no support to fund no servers to fund no team to fund no site to keep up
the responsablity of mmorpg is much greater than a single player game
My subsciption simulation differs. I'll simplify this.
GW2:
-10 customers
-60$ Box price
-Expansions every 6 months
That's 600 internet dollars flat
SWTOR (or any sub game):
-10 customers
-60$ Box price
-Expansion every year +
-15$ recurring fee
Again, 600 internet dollars flat.
At the end of the six month period, estimate 50-75% of the original base move on to buy the expansion. This is hard to pinpoint without having access to their internal information because of so many circumstances, it could even be over 100% with the introduction of new customers. Arenanet, however, will probably have a good idea of what to expect. I'll give it six recurring customers, at minimum. That's another 360.
GW2=960 in profit. We don't look at down costs with production because that is more dependent on other factors mostly within the company. IE, the amount of game content is not always relative to cost. It just doesn't work like that with virtual products. The potential for GW2 to have more net customers is also likely because of the cheaper model.
With SWTOR(or generic sub game), of the 10 original buyers, 25-50% will quit by the end of the free month. I'll leave that with 7 paying customers. Of that, half or more will quit within the next two paying months. The other (3) will stay on for the rest of the 6 month period. That's generous.
So, 7 x 2 x 15 = 210. 3 x 3 x 15 = 135. 345 profit.
SWTOR=945 in profit.
The sub model obviously still has more potential for total profit, but it is far riskier than the B2P expansion model. Not to mention, having a progressive based profit model like sub games do allow them to sell a half assed product and develop the game in a less than desirable fashion, from a customer perspective.
Following the same logic, SWTOR is partly being funded by Single Player Games.
But that logic doesn't hold true to very many business models. I think games have to support themselves or they die.
Nah. The game will be funded through the same way the first one did: Box sales & vanity shop.
Last thing I need is to make another decision as to which sub based game I want to play.
Why do so many people complain about P2P? How many people are paying Microsoft every month/year for Xbox Live... and they don't offer any game updates or content for free!
You're paying for server usage and security. 15 bucks a month (50 cents a day) to know that my characters are safe and hopefully the game is as cheat/hack free as possible is well worth it IMO.
Then again I have a real job and 15 bucks a month is nothing to me.
So what's the problem with B2P? If a developer can build a better game or a comparable game and not charge a subscription are you going to pay the $15.00 to the one that charges just because you can.
When i play a mmorpg, I want to play it with other players. The business model has a huge influence on the type of players the game will attract. When I play a game with subscribtion, I am guaranteed that those I play with are dedicated to the game and those are more likely to have their own name on a credit card.
To put it short and provoking, less pissants to deal with and more time to enjoy the game with real gamers.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
WoW has proved you wrong.
Oh for the love of all kittens everywhere...
Can you bear with me? I'm going to try to put a stop to a persisting fallacy right now. I'm going to do it in a short post, and I want you to pay attention.
The fallacy: DLC is exactly equivalent to a subscription.
Logical response: Utter nonsense.
Why? I'm disappointed that I have to explain this but let's see how many can keep up. And since someone brought up New Vegas as part of the fallacy, well, let's go with that, shall we? I bought New Vegas, but I didn't buy Dead Money. I did, however, buy Old World Blues. So what's going on there?
In the case of DLC I'm making a payment and getting a product. In the case of a subscription I'm making a payment for continued access to a product I already owned. (With possible, potential 'free' content added in.) These two are not the same, and they are not the same for a number of very important reasons.
With DLC, I can see the content and I can decide whether I want to buy it.
Now if DLC was like a subscription then it would work like this: I'd buy New Vegas, and then to continue playing New Vegas I'd have to pay on a monthly basis. At some point down the road they may deliver Dead Money, but they have no obligation to do so. Dead Money isn't content that I like, so I skip over it, but I continue to pay on a monthly basis for New Vegas. Now, eventually they may release content that I do want to play, but that'll be... what, perhaps eight months subscription fees?
So I would have essentially paid one-hundred and twenty bloody dollars (8 * $15) for a new piece of content.
Wow. That would be so financially intelligent of me.
Now then, what I did do is skip all the NV content except the one I really wanted. I got Old World Blues for $10, that's $110 less. So how, how by any logical standards, can someone say that a subscription works in the same way as DLC? It's ridiculous. It's a fallacy. People who're supporting this are talking out of their rears, they're being billious dialectics and not thinking about what they're saying, because there's no way in hell a subscription is the same as DLC if one costs $110 more than the other.
Yes, the GW2 system is the same as DLC. It'll have silly cosmetic stuff (which I will probably buy some of, just because i like that, and I enjoy showing my support), and it'll have content, but what it won't have is a payment that is forced in order to retain access to a product.
How is DLC different from a subscription?
All together, now!
Bcause a product doesn't have a continued subscription cost in order to retain access to the product.
Herp. Derp. Truly. Because if anyone continues to propagate this argument now then we're just being trolled.
I am not forced to pay in order to retain access to New Vegas, I am not forced to pay to retain access to Guild Wars 2, I amforced to pay to retain access to a game like World of Warcraft. And if that's an important difference between DLC and subscriptions, I'd think. That's exactly why I prefer the Guild Wars 2 model. With the Guild Wars 2 model it is a purchase system. I see a product, there is a product, right in front of me, and I can either choose to buy the product or not. If I choose not to buy the product then that choice will in no way affect my ability to access previous products that I bought.
This fallacy is driving me insane because it's clearly fallacious and it's being propagated by people who're just throwing down chaff to destroy the discussion. It's not a valid point. From this post on I would suggest that we all just ignore any posts about this, and delegate anyone who still believes this to the status of 'Village Idiot.' DLC is the same as subscriptions indeed... good grief. What are they teaching kids these days?
Hehe got me there, and yet not completely. WoW players are a thousand times nicer than diablo2 for example. I can only speak for myself but my experience is not bad with WoW players, my problem is more the game itself (or what it has become). On top of that, I don't consider a bad player (noob) a pissant, it takes bad behaviour to get into that category.
If WoW was free to play, I promise you it would be a haven for pissants. Also I didnt say they wont be there, I said there will be fewer.. uhm well, lets call it a rule of thumb with variations and exceptions.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
Single players games have all of that stuff as well. Nearly all top shelf titles have detailed websites complete with forums. Every mainstream video game company has a support team, and, thanks to the rise of DLC, ALL VIDEO GAMES HAVE A STAFF FOR UPDATES.
Servers, and associated bandwidth, are not a concern. As a matter of fact, someone here recently even posted a video which went through a budget report, something available to anyone in a publically traded company, to show Blizzard, (I think, and could be wrong) spent only 4.5K or so a month in upkeep costs related to the game being online. People pay that in mortgage in some places.
The responsibility of a single player game is actually greater than that of an MMO. They spend just as much upfront, (40 million for heavy hitters like Mass Effect and Modern Warfare last I looked) and must IMMEDIATELY reinvest again to quickly produce DLC for the game. They don't rely on massive time sinks to extend the life of the initial purchase, and so must be quick to develop more content if they intend to draw continued profit from the game as an MMO does.
The only REAL difference is in GM staff, and those people aren't making a very high wage anyway. For a company drawing 160 million a month, I assure you, a few nearly minimum wage workers on the budget isn't even noticed. Yes, MMO's are bigger games. But the costs are not as astronomically different as you would suggest. They are actually very similar, and the monthly price we pay is doing very little in regard to seperating them in terms of content. What we PERCEIVE as content in an MMO is generally just the same caliber of content slowed down heavily to ensure to play that extra month.
Granted, in the case of Guild Wars, in order to be successful for their employees they will need constant expansion material to offset the loss of easy money that others are making off of the ill-informed masses. This doesn't just mean paying their salary, but also creating an environment of advancement to ensure they retain as many quality employees as they can. Things such as better benefits and raises, new advanced employment opporotunities and such. Running a business isn't as simple as making more than you spend. Its also making enough to bring greater success each year to those that serve you.
But that success does not require a monthly fee. It requires a more dedicated team, and a better financial plan, not to mention an overall higher expectation for what you can achieve. ANet has this, I believe. They have shown it in the past, and continue to show it now. They will not break the giants in this genre directly, but their success here WILL break down the foundation upon which we realize how our money is being used inside a company. Its gonna change what we expect from MMO companies, and that expectation is going to grow. This is a good thing.
I dunno that, Wow players doesn't seem better to me than LOTRO players and Guildwars community are better than both those games.
Sure, F2P tends to attract more idiots initially but they usually falls off after the fist 2 days.
Diablo on the other hand have an entirely different type of player, just like any FPS or RTS game have. MMOs attracts certain types of people, but what really makes the MMO players differs from other genres is not that they are willing to pay more but time spent in the game (hopefully together with some social skills).
I hear you, but I can only say what my experiences are, and conclude from that. When that is the case, only proof can change ones mind. Besides it is only a part of what I consider when getting a game, I have much more fundamental issues with item shops... and thus not really something to discuss here. I got sidetracked to put a little point in.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
I have to agree with this part of your post. It isn't at all the pricing model that has encouraged or discouraged a positive community in games so much as how much you wind up having to rely on other players (from my experience). Games with more solo-ability I have found to have more asshats- not to say all that prefer soloing are but it's certainly what I've seen.
How about looking at it from another angle, forget it is a computer game for a moment.
All games are based on a common set of rules, that the player(s) must follow. Within that set of rules you can play and compete on equal terms. You can come up with numerous excuses for loosing or winning a game, but the rules count equally for you aswell as any other player.
With a mmorpg it is not about winning or loosing, but the competition is still there, also outside pvp. Competition can be anything from respect to bragging, having a nice house to having achievements, and many other mroe subtle things.
If someone buys something RMT and you didnt, then that person is not playing by the same rules you do. It is fundamental to any game including mmorpgs to have same rules for players, it can be very complicated rules but they are still there to ensure equal competition. Take any kind of sport and there is an ongoing battle to remove all kinds of cheats and advantages that makes the competition unequal - Because if it does become unequal then the competition is pointless.
I have heard some say stuff like "no one can take your accomplishments away from you, who cares if the others cheat", and that is frankly pure bull. Imagine that in real life. It has nothing to do with beeing competetive, it has nothing to do with pvp, it is playing by the same rules in a game - That is the essense of all games.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
This is where your argument fails, as both players have the choice of using the cash shop. There is nothing within the game that would prohibit either player from using the cash shop. If you'd care to argue about one player being unable or unwilling to pay for the cash shop item then you open an entirely different can of worms. It would be akin to making all players in a game use the exact same spec of computer because someone couldn't pay to compete versus players with a higher end machine or better internet.
So a CS tournament you are allowed to bring your own pc... oh wait you are not, those are the exact same because its a competition. Yes I could just go buy the same things in the item shop (along with everyone else) and you could derail the point by saying that is just another rule.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
Just to clarify...The video that showed bandwidth as 4500 or whatever was NCSoft's quarterly report. NCSoft's report is in millions of Korean Won, so 4500 would be ~4.2 million dollars. That's per quarter and for all five of their games (Lineage 1&2, Aion, GW, and CoH). That was actually an anomalous quarter for some reason, and that in a lot of their other reports it's in the 2800 range. I know I've made the argument in other threads that the 2-3 million dollars GW1 brings in every quarter (despite having not put out paid content since 2007) would alone be enough to pay for the bandwidth.
Also, just wanted to point out that same report would say something like NCSoft's profit for the quarter is in the 40 million dollar range.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Monthly fee being a good or a bad thing for the customer depends entirely on what the money is used for. If all of it goes to dev's + IP's pockets then it's a bad thing obviously, cashing for nothing is always a bad thing yes? If a good portion of it goes in constant development of the game, frequent updates, development of features and services then it's a good thing, if the customer is happy with this. It can also harm the game if people feel it's too much compared to what they get and leave because of that, but to my experience people do pay and stay if the game is good, and people leave even if the game is free if it's crap, not including some marginal bums who simply cant afford anything.
No monthly fee can be a good thing or a bad thing too. Obviously it's a good thing for the customer since they save a bit pocket money every month, saving is always nice yes? It can also be a bad thing if it means that the dev team has to be smaller since there is no constant revenue, and content coming in at slower pace, unless the company is very *charitable and settles for less income (people need to get paid after the initial sales ofcourse too, who pumps out free content updates), or if the customer ofcourse is fine how things are because of no monthly fee.
*If this is the case with GW2 I'm very happy to see there's still someone in this world that does something without having to get paid for it, it's hard to believe though since our world today is only about profit.
Arenanet is no charity and the first Guildwars earned in many times it's production and running costs. You don't really think Wow uses all it's astronomical monthly fees for running costs (box sales are to cover the development cost)?
They are dumping the prices to get more players. Just a few years ago all games have the same monthly fees but with this and the F2P method prices wil go down for the average players.
Competition is a good thing.
where do you work $15 an hr thats like £9 in uk no job gives that . on toppic im not that botherd about the no sub i like gw format just pick up and play when you want
I can't remember who posted this thought, but it's a good one. The 'no-sub-fee' model has one considerable advantage for GAMERS (besides cost): The developer is always motivated to produce new, relevant' content to keep the revenue stream going. Now, I specifically said "relevant" content because it must merit another box purchase. Many developers push out content, but it's just a reskin of the same models and a renaming of the mechanics.
I completely agree.
GW1 vastly outearned the P2P City of Heroes during the period when it was putting out content. GW1 was always intended to be a B2P game but even if it hadn't, it would have been a brilliant business decision in the face of WoW coming out four months earlier. Instead of being a game that we've all never played and limped along or perhaps even died with a hundred thousand subs, it's a game that 7 million units were sold of 4 boxes. That's 1.75 million people playing it at the bare minimum.
Being P2P is fantastic if your game is the big dog and still pretty great even if it isn't, but it's not necessarily a license to print money. The majority of people won't pay two subscriptions so a P2P game has to be better than WoW for people to want to switch over permanently, otherwise they might switch for a few months and then switch back.
People need to get past their initial assumption that P2P and B2P will have the same number of players. B2P sells more copies because it's cheaper, because people are going to buy it maybe in addition to a sub game, people can buy it as a gift or feel a lot better about buying a copy for each one of their kids. If you have a larger and more stable playerbase (people don't have to decide each month to go back to subscribing to some other game), then not everybody needs to buy expansions to earn the same amount of money.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
Tldr; What's the difference between a monthly fee and frequently released DLC packs? They are coloured differently.