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Pay-to-Play MMO's have no business costing more than 40$
DarkVagabond
Member UncommonPosts: 340
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My entire stance on MMO pricing is that the company is offering a commitment.
By its very nature they are PROMISING you, the customer, that you will want to stick around for months or years and that you will sing their praises in that time. They should not be trying to break even on release day and they should not be proclaiming their commercial successes just because they fooled a million or two human beings into picking up the box.
But this brave new world of sixty dollar hyper-hyped MMO's with pay-to-ride rainbow unicorns and 30 dollar expansions every six months just makes me sad.
The sixty dollar pricepoint is for static products with incredibly limited post release support.
These finished and plished product releasing groups put out maybe a balance patch, some bug fixes, those things are quite acceptable. The company makes all of its revenue from the one and only purchase users make, granted a sad number of those products are diving into the habit of releasing two thirds of the finished product and then charging again for the rest.
So, as far as I have figured, any company that thinks their product can realistically maintain a profitable subscriber count has no business charging more than 40 USD, and those that do charge more are fairly likely to just be trying to pull a quick profit out of their rear end.
And beware ye who purchases a "Lifetime Subscription"
Comments
Developers found out that we will give them our money in any way THEY want us to pay them. They control our pockets until we gamers rebel against this bullcrap nickel and diming in general and stop paying for garbage.
I can only see that happening in the next leg of the console wars.
Nobody is gonna buy the new systems if they can no longer have physical copies of their games, and the 300-400 barrier to entry that is simply *buying* the new systems is going to help that along.
All hail the new golden age of PC! Perhaps we'll no longer get console exclusive games... and I for one am NOT shilling out hundreds of dollars just to play The Last of Us (but am dying to get my hands on Persona 5 eventually).
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
Pay-to-play MMOs - like any other product or service - will cost whatever people are willing to spend on them and not a penny less. The next time you see your economics teacher, tell him he failed.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Last I checked, a lot of people are more than willing to pay $60 for a game.
If a business can charge $60 and make a bigger profit than charging $40, why should they charge $40?
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
It's funny because it's true.
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Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Its only kinda true how many mmos died because people didnt want to spend that much..... you could argue if they were cheaper they might still be around.
I can see game companies trying to get you to buy a box copy, but after a few years you should no longer need to buy a box imo.
Own, Mine, Defend, Attack, 24/7
Honestly I don't think a cheaper sub matters, look at Lotro before it went f2p. It used to cost 10/month and was essentially the best substitute for wow for a long time and it still held about 200k subs. Wow on the other hand also costs you a fortune in all those expansion packs yet that doesn't seem to deter people too much.
You could also argue that if an MMO was cheaper, the perception would be that it's sub-par and less people would try/buy it. This can already been seen in how the falling sky posts show up whenever an MMO box price gets discounted or drops after release.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
The problem isn't what the MMO companies are charging...The problem is the gamers who drop 50+ bucks blindly on games they have no clue about.....As long as people are going to spend, they are going to be charging outrageous prices... Until the playerbase shows at least a little restraint, these companies wont back down..... We will continue to see pre orders, lifetime subs, and collectors editions because too many naive gamers are buying them.
I agree with this. Imagine if all of the people that left ToR never bought it in the first place. Thats a lot of revenue (if people are right about the amount of people that left) that EA would have never received. Makes you wonder if they didn't get a ton of pre orders if the development of the game would have taken a different direction before launch.
There is no problem.
If a company can entice a customer to pay $50 for a game .. more power to them. It is a free world. Companies are free to charge whatever they like for their product. Don't like it .. don't buy it.
If i have a good game and people find it fun enough to pay $60 for it .. why would it charge $40?
arent there rumors that they may also include Used-games drm, basically making used games null andvoid without buying a online access or passcode.
Well typically these days it comes out being full price and then only weeks later (a month or two at most) it does end up being 40 bucks. Or 30, or 20.
So.....just wait and pick it up then I guess. Its kind of sad really.
I just looked on Amazon and Swtor is going for around 35 bucks, Rift is under $20. Tera seems to still cost 50 or 60 though. Maybe that says something good about Tera I guess.
But like I said, yea most try charging $50 or $60 and then only a month or two later its usually far less than $40.
If so, then it would be for this generation of consoles, not the next.
Word on the grapevine is that the new consoles won't even have the hardware to read discs (cost-saving) and will *require* internet access.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
Your 'grapevine' is faulty.
Michael Pachter did a 'business and financial reasons why this doesn't make sense'
Basically MS/Sony will lose money since their profits come from licensing and they can't charge licensing cost if their console doesn't sell well.
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/why-all-pach-attack/730185
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
This is why you never by a game, especially an MMO, as soon as it is launched, or preorder it. I usually wait a month or two, for my friends, who I trust more than any critic, to play it first. I'll ask them what they like and dislike about it. Alot of my friends like to do the same things as me (usually RP PvE content), that they're almost never wrong. If they like it, I'll try it. Very few games have I ever bought or pre-orders. SWTOR was the last game I pre-ordered, and I like it. I knew I would like it. I played the beta, and heck it's starwars...I'll play just about anything with star wars on it. Lucas...TAKE MY MONEY! lol Before that, I think the last game I pre-ordered was World of Warcraft, and I played that for 4 years.
Moral of the story is don't go getting caught up in the hype. Unless you're sure about a game, don't buy it. Let your friends be your "Do I like this?" Beta tester
Edit: As for the next gen consoles...I hate to tell this to everyone, but consoles are dying...They have too much overhead, can't be upgraded, and after 2-3 years the graphics look old. Have you seen the difference between BF3 on PC and PS3 (and 360 is just horrid!). BF3 on my desktop looks so realistic, I duck sometimes when an rpg goes over my head lol. There's rumors that the next gen consoles will cost over $800, and games cost $60-70. I'd much rather have a PC. I'll never understand why people like the iPad, it's an insanely over-priced, underpowered laptop. The price it costs for an iPad you can buy a laptop with 5x the power.
Social games (esp MMOs) has an opposite effect to the 'let my friends try it first' as people want to play with their friends on Day1.
Just look at the multiplayer/MMO games like COD / BF3 / SWTOR / WoW expansions / Diablo3. Day 1 is all about getting online to play with your friends. I think that's why hype works so well, people don't want to be 'THAT GUY' who isn't playing while everyone they know is.
The cost is $60 most of the time and as far as I can tell, millions are okay with that.
I think lower initial price can entice people but for multiplayer with your friends, I can't see the $20 making that much of a difference.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
How many? care to name all these mmos which died due to sub price?
I have no problem paying $60 for an MMO initially. Think of that money for a P2P MMO has funding to make up for its costs. The game costs a lot to manage so it needs that funding to make up for its initial costs and hopefully pull them out of the red. After that though, it should be their place to try and bring constant new content, using subscription costs to keep releasing content and make some profit.
Expansions on the other hand really shouldn't be that costly. I really disagree with them costing over $40 ever. If anything it helps to bring the game to light giving a box copy. MMOs are a very costly thing to do and take more funding then other games to create (needing servers and all that good stuff to run)
$60 SHOULD be fine for you to pay for. That being said they should give you at least a month free to really play the game. My biggest gripe comes expansions, cause claim all you want but its far cheaper to work on an expansion then to build a game from the ground up.
While MMORPGs certainly would be better off F2P (with Tribes/LoL-style non-gameplay-compromising item shop design), I feel obligated to point out SNES games were $60 twenty years ago.
So it feels like there's little reason to criticize the specific price point used, even while I feel there are strong reasons to drop the initial game fee entirely.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Cups of coffee have no business costing more than $1.
My prediction is that games will eventually come on USB drives with an exchange -- kind of the way blue rhino does propane. You bring your old drive, trade it for the new one and then the new data gets loaded onto the old drive for someone else down the road. You will have the choice of that or of downloading the program. Games on discs would end.
Ineed. SNES and Genesis games would also routinely be above $60. I've an old Sears catalog from the 90's which lists Phantasy Star 3 at a bargain basement price of $90, while most other Genesis games are hovering at about $70. When taking inflation into account, games have actually gotten quite a bit cheaper over the years.
I do think that either the box cost or subscription fee should be done away with though. After TERA, I don't think I'll be paying MSRP for an MMO again.
Edit: To be clear, I like TERA. Just using it as a point of reference.
Problem is not only pricing but what we get from it.
With mmorpg's beign basically short linear-railed solo questing + lobby-like instanced gameplay at the end - they are not providing differentiated gameplay experience.
Mmorpg's had competetive advantage over normal lobby multiplayer games such as mutliplayer FPS (CS, Quake, UT) or rts (warcarf, startcraft) - by provoiding very diffent gameplay experience, by creating virtual worlds and then putting many small "games" into those virtual worlds.
Nowadays most of AAA productions are like single player games while levelling and like lobby games at end game.
Design shift was to make mmorpg's attractive for more broad playerbase, but result was they lost differentiation and competetive advantage over them.
That's why MOBA, FPS (also mmofps) and other co-op or lobby games and also facebook / browser games will win with mmorpg's.
Only way to have subscription still viable is to make mmorpg games within a virtual worlds.
Of course that mean smaller playerbase and less titles with slightly smaller budgets. (think 30-50 mln $ for biggest productions instead of 50 mln $ + , with behemoths like Swtor rumoring over 200 mln $).
Which is fine actually.
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Which model I find most 'retarded' and greedy is so called "freemium" one.
Lotro and many of SOE games have so greedy and pricey model especially if you want to commit long-term and play so called end game that it is stunning.
Serious gamer there pays - sub + big expansions + mini expansions + big cash shops frequently bigger than in most pure F2P games.
Attractive on first sight and paper, but is insane once you play it longer.
As cheap as USB drives are, discs are still much cheaper. There's really no market forces at work which would shift things in the direction you describe.
Meanwhile there are significant market forces moving sales away from brick-and-mortar and towards downloads. Developers reduce their production overhead and consumers get the convenience of a download.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver