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It's hardly the end of the subscription model.
Humphrie
Member Posts: 123
No, the fall of TOR is NOT the harbinger of things to come. Sorry -- you're going to need to back up the carriage on that one.
The root problem in all of this (everything -- from the moment the game was first spun into development) was that Bioware believed their own hype. They believed that everything they touched turned to gold, and that the 'magic' of their storylines would infect the MMORPG genre with some kind of mass hysteria (the good kind for players, and the bad kind for developers). Bioware fully expected that they would light the digital world on fire with their creativity, and that explains much of why they were absolutely resolute in resisting suggestions for changes made by beta testers. They -- and only they -- knew best.
The problem with that is, their stories in TOR might have been decent (as an author, I'd argue they were barely passable, but whatever, it's academic now), but the rest of the game was a shameless clone of a 7-year-old product, with little to none of the changes made to enhance said product over that timeframe. TOR is, foundationally, a wreck, beginning with the hero engine, and then moving upwards into the clunky combat and ridiculous world design. There were elements that were good, but all of them were consumed and blown away by the immense enormity of the flaws. It's like somebody decided to build a gleaming castle on top of a volcano, KNOWING THE ENTIRE TIME that said mountain was a volcano, and then popped their pinky into their mouth when the thing exploded and went 'whoops!'
I imagine that at some point last summer, a few of the higher-up types began to realize that there were serious issues. I got the sensation throughout the season -- based on just the general tone and tenor of the talk about the game -- that something was wrong. So I'm giving Bioware a bit of credit here: I think they figured it out slightly before zero hour that this puppy was going to flop, and flop big. It was just way too late to change anything substantial at that point. They could either launch, or announce a sizable delay to make changes.
They chose the former, and in doing so, decided to assume we were dumb. [mod edit] And thus, in the span of less than a year, TOR has surpassed SWG as the most epic MMORPG failure in the history of gaming. I didn't think it could be done, but when you look at the numbers of people involved; at the money that was spent in development -- money that is NEVER coming back for EA/Bioware[mod edit]
But that is no reason to make wide-ranging conclusions about MMORPGs. No sir.
The industry hasn't 'evolved.'
The F2P model is not 'the future.'
This is not 'where the genre is going.'
SWTOR sank to the bottom because it was a bad game; because it was a game that not only was living in the dark ages of the first year of WoW, but also refused to acknowledge that the way people approach these games is beginning to shift yet again. It didn't fail because people were 'looking for that F2P experience.' Anyone who eats up a line like that from EA is a sad and sorry individual.
The fact is, F2P is where bad games go to die, and that hasn't changed just because a few poor 16-year-olds run around the internet screaming about how it's 'the future.' F2P is the glue factory for Kentucky Derby horses that break their legs. The big money is in the subscription model, and will continue to be in the subscription model. WoW proves this (and, make no mistake, WoW isn't losing subs because it's P2P either -- it's losing subs because the game is closing in on a decade of age and people are tired of it. White knight? Hello! SOMEBODY SWEEP ME OFF MY FEET!).
Rather, what has changed are player expectations.
While I'm not by any means claiming the sandbox is the future, I think players are increasingly looking for the following: challenges, comradery and individuality. The Facebook fad is already passing us by; those worthless souls who polluted this genre with their lack of any skill have moved onto Angry Birds and Farmville. What's left is a larger crowd composed of basically the same people MMORPGs started with -- diehards looking for action. And the game that's going to unseat WoW; the game that's going to be 'the next' game (my 'white knight) will cater to those people, and less to the 'GIMME IT RIGHT NOW' crowd.
This theoretical game will give players the tools to be heroes rather than shoving their unearned majesty down their collective throats. It will give them the ability to do what they want (within reason); play how they want; slay how they want. The sandbox might be dead, but the message people should take away from TOR isn't that the subscription model is finished, but that the time of the half-***ed themepark is over. From now on, you either do it different, you do it spectacularly, or you don't do it at all.
In closing, I'd like to once again praise EA for being such AMAZING and UPSTANDING citizens of the gaming world. There's nothing like seeing a company claim that 40% of the 700k(ish) or so people who had quit since launch stated that the 'subscription model' was the primary reason for canceling. First of all, that's an outright lie. Second of all, yeah, we all had an issue paying money for crap.[mod edit] So, in that sense, yes, of course all of us who quit had an 'issue' with the subscription model. I don't like subscriptions for bad games. Voila.
Comments
I completely agree.
The failiure of the latest batch of MMO's to keep their subscribers is because;
1) Not enough grinding (you CAN make grinding fun)
2) Not enough social sidegames to keep people busy over time
3) Not complex enough character-development with a long timeframe
I agree with you on this, but this comes across as a reply to people believing the opposite and I don't see these people. Most replies on the SWTOR f2p topic are people saying that f2p wont solve tors problems and that subs still work for games that are actually good and not fail.
A little too much attack in this post for me really
If you continue to make sweeping statements like you know what everyone everywhere thinks about a certain topic then I am going to shout at you.
It easy to type 'I think this is the worst game ever'
Rather than the 'This is the worst game ever'
Heh. That's fair.
There are a lot of people over on the TOR forums claiming that this is 'where MMORPGs are heading.' I guess this is to refute them. I cannot do so directly, because I cancelled my TOR subscription in March. However, when I saw the headline on this website, I promptly went over there, only to be reminded for the thousandth time of how incredibly short-sighted people are. The hangers on are desperate... how desperate, I didn't fully appreciate until today.
Ah, I see. Yeh I'm not going anywhere near that forum.
Yeh I can imagine people over there predicting the end of days due to this.
If you continue to make sweeping statements like you know what everyone everywhere thinks about a certain topic then I am going to shout at you.
It easy to type 'I think this is the worst game ever'
Rather than the 'This is the worst game ever'
LOTRO, GW(B2P though), Aion, Vanguard (going F2P), DDO, AoC unchained and numerous other games which have become more thriving in players then before when they were P2P would like to have a word with you about how F2P is horrible. i dont mind paying a sub, i'm currently subbed to TERA, TSW and WoW, but i also enjoy the shit out of Aion F2P and guild wars 1 (doing my unlocks).
the problem there isnt so much that people are predicting the end of days.. the people who can post on the forums (current subscribers only) are still in denial that the game is a flourishing success and seem to refuse to believe it's doing as bad as it really is.
the demand for mmorpg is decreasing and the market is becoming satuarted .so the only way is to steal some wow subscribers .that is why everyone is trying a wow clone
.
None of the F2P games are setting the bar high. None of them are 'tearing up the marketplace.' A few are trucking along -- barely. All of the ones you listed (with the exception of GW, which isn't fair to include in this discussion since the B2P model is completely different, considering that the game was designed, from the ground up, to be such) only switched to F2P as a last, desperate gasp.
Yes, LOTRO continues to chug along (although, I would argue, at the expense of its soul). Yes, AoC has experienced a dramatic uptick (when you go from basically 'zero' subscriptions to 'some,' the rise can seem meteroric). But to argue that these examples auger well for the future of the F2P model is silly. These are failed games, some of which have come back from the brink of being shut down. I expect, given its astronomical cost to design and pitiful returns, that at some point in the future we'll learn that Bioware and TOR were issued a similar ultimatum by EA: go F2P or we're closing it down.
The problem with MMORPGs is that they're a one-shot business. The MMORPG 'global community' is a largely insular crowd. Though we don't all play the same games, we constantly whisper to each other about what else is out there. We tend to be hard to get moving, but roll downhill like a dislodged boulder when the time to go comes at last. Thus, we are always on the lookout for 'the next thing,' and that keeps other MMORPGs in the conversation a lot of the time. Unfortunately, this means that when a bad game gets 'the taint,' we know about it right away... we ALL know about it right away. And that's why you don't see F2Ps rising up and becoming P2P again; that's why you never see the 'full' recovery -- because they are forever marked.
F2P is associated, for most of us, with failure. I know, personally, I can never see it is as anything but such... and that's going to be a huge roadblock to ever making it more mainstream than the elephant graveyard of MMOs.
i still think and i am going to bring it up because although it's still unreleased i find it to be relevant, that guild wars 2 even though being made from the ground up to be a buy to play game with no subscription fee, if successful could bring in a new dimension of subscription model to the MMO genre, I also read somewhere that regardless of no sub fee they are planning on monthly content updates etc.. like what TSW is doing with the "issues" they plan on releasing once a month. You're right though some of these games that probably should have been shut down are now chugging along but there are the exceptions. i know you didnt bring it up but Aion was a dying game in the west anyway, but the new free to play model has bought in a lot of players new and old and is actually rather successful at the moment compared to what it was... sometimes if done right free to play can breathe life into a dying product, but i also believe the saturated freemuim model that swtor is trying to adopt will hurt them more then anything.
locking players out from so much of the game with such heavy restrictions basically force them into a $15 a month sub is not the right way to go about it i mean i have my level 50 guardian with basically full rakata from before i quit, now if i go back to play for whatever reason under the free to play model... all of my achievements i have earned and my gear that i worked a little bit for will be locked out until such time as i did sub to the game, thats a bit overboard. 1 flashpoint a day, no operations at all... credits locked to 100k etc... such heavy restrictions are basically forcing you to keep subbing if you want to play rather then really having an option at all.
It's the illusion of choice that some of these games try to provide with there "free to play" model, which isnt really at all and why it gets such a bad rap.. not because the model is broken or a failure but because some developers try to exploit it to something it shouldnt have to be.
An MMO with a subscription is only feasible if you structure the game and keep it fun enough to give customers/players a reason to feel good about spending that sub fee every month. It's that easy. And that complex.
All those games that went F2P like mentioned above carried that structural flaw in that they didnt offer the players enough to keep them subscribed.
I believe that an MMO which can capture an FPS type of adrenalinerush combat and at the same time carry a lot of depth in character development and social sidegames (tradeskills etc) can be a solid success (not necessarily WoW type, but still a good earner). One game that comes to mind is Asheron's Call 1 which had limited hp (around 150-200 on a decent level character) on your character while at the same time throwing you into battles with multiple opponents (Swarm hives anyone?).
By capturing the right style of combat you can make a grind fun. If you alse manage to do something similar to the Asheron's Call 1 loot generator you would effectively combine the crazy combat with lotto-style loot.
I'm not saying Asheron's Call 1 was perfect in any way. I'm just saying it had elements of gameplay that keeps players addicted to this day (13 years now?) playing and paying.
The big problem with the gamecompanies involved with MMO's today is that they dont seem to get what actually makes a P2P MMO feasible. SW:TOR was a big miss in my opinion. And very unfortunately I also believe The Secret World did the same. TSW is actually a much better game than TOR, but it carries much the same flaws in not delivering content and sidegames that makes the game worthwhile subscribing to over time.
Personally, i find the F2P model has reached a tipping point. There are enough fun F2P games out there that i am not very likely to consider to sub based game. The only one left is WOW which i will unsub after my annual pass is up.
The common view on these forums is that a subscription game that converts to F2P has "failed". I agree with that view.
All the current AAA games using F2P models started out as subscription based games. They mostly benefitted from at least a year of subscription revenue, so they had an opportunity to make a fair bit of cash (over and above box sales) before they went F2P.
If the F2P model was truly more profitable, WoW would have been F2P years ago. Blizzard may be many things, but they know how to make a buck. F2P is only more profitable if sub revenue has dropped so low that the game is breaking even or taking a loss. That's why subscription games generally only convert to F2P once their subs have dropped dramatically.
But what would we say if a new AAA MMO launched as F2P ?
That is essentially what GW2 is doing with the B2P + Cash Shop. Unless Anet sell an incredible amount of boxes at launch, they will not be covering development costs AND making a healthy profit off of box sales alone. GW2 is not GW1, the development, maintenance and expansion of GW2 is going to be substantially higher than GW1. So Anet will be looking to the Cash Shop to generate a healthy sum. They did not appoint a "Monetization Producer" for nothing.
I don't think the majority of people on these forums or in games generally agree with tthe notion that, "f2p games are for games that failed."
There are several games that are currently f2p, that had stable and sizable populations before the conversion to f2p and were not in danger of lessening subs. Lotro, CoX and Eq2 all had stable populations in the 100-200k range. They were making lots of profit, had decent number of subs, and were not shrinking.
For these games the f2p conversion was not because they "failed" but because the company thought they could do even better.
There is no evidence that f2p = failed, that is a an assumption made by only SOME of the posters on this board.
Some games that did poorly have surely gone f2p, others that have done reasonably well have also gone f2p. Therefore f2p has very little do with success or failure and is just an alternative business model.
See thats the problem. the game has so many glaring issues not even free to play could fix it. they needed to fix it's most glaring issues (Hero engine) long before it went to beta testing.
If They couldn't see the problems with fans screaming at them in beta then i'm afraid, no amount of trying to save it with free to play will solve that.
I feel it's over for BW, it's all about making back whatever they can to payback investors now.
OP great post
WOW shows that Subscription model is where the money is.
F2P is just a lifeboat for a dieing MMOs.
EVE has now 500K subscribers and they are not thinking of going F2P, because those 500K subscribers a month means 5 Million dollars per month or 60 Million Dollars a year of revenues
No Western F2P MMO can make a similar amount of money, not even close.
Only some Asian MMOs can make better...............but that's because they know how to make F2P games which are basically Pay to Win games (but that's the only way F2P could work commercially)
WOW shows that Subscription model is where the money is.
No. This may show that subs model brings in more than f2p when the number of subscribers goes beyond a certain point.
F2P is just a lifeboat for a dieing MMOs.
No. See above post.
EVE has now 500K subscribers and they are not thinking of going F2P, because those 500K subscribers a month means 5 Million dollars per month or 60 Million Dollars a year of revenues
Eve doesn't have 500k but it is doing very well. It actually has a method of f2p in there (pay for sub with plex). http://www.ccpgames.com/en/public-relations/press-releases/article/9086/ccp-names-tiancity-exclusive-eve-online-publisher-for
No Western F2P MMO can make a similar amount of money, not even close.
Sources please. I don't have any clue at all, not even a glimmer as to how much money EQ2, EQ, CoH, Lotro... is making with their f2p model. So if you have numbers please share them.
Also eve is played on a world market, 200 countries. If you are going to compare Eve's world numbers, then you cannot just look at western MMO subs, you need to compare world subs. Compare like to like.
The truly wonderful thing about EVE is that the game was essentially designed from the outset to be niche, and thus the following that they have developed over the years is nothing short of a massive windfall, because I am sure that their operating costs have remained relatively low, even as growth has taken hold.
I wish we'd see more games like that, TBH -- games with a sub model designed to cater to a small audience; games that acknowledge that the market is flooded at the moment, and whose designers realize that, if you do it right, 500k subs a year can be a very profitable business.
Part of the problem with MMOs right now is that everyone big is trying to be THE GUY. Eventually, it's true, someone else will be THE GUY. However, it'd be interesting and nice if fewer people tried to be THE GUY, and instead were content with being A GUY.
F2P is the future. Indicators began pointing that direction like 4+ years ago.
F2P is better for gamers. Developers must either provide a fun product, or make no money.
Whereas in B2P (and the B2P part of subscription games), players are paying money completely based on trust and advertising. And clearly being able to experience a product firsthand before handing over your money is a safer setup for players, leaving them less at risk of being hype-trapped into a bad game.
The end will come as suddenly and abruptly as EQ1's end and WOW's end. (Which is to say, it won't be sudden and abrupt at all.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I'm sorry bro but your logic is flawed.
Lets look at the current mmo's (western) with the highest number of players:
WOW, Rift. Both are subscription models.
Also, You say EVE doesnt count b/c its worldwide. Well as of july of 2011, the EU/US/UK server Tranquility hosted over 350k players. So, EVE's non western playerbase is less than 1/8th of their playerbase and as such i think we can safely count EVE as a western, sub based MMO in the list as well.
Now, lets look at historic AAA games that started with subscription models, failed (miserably i might add) and converted to a F2P model:
Age of Conan (sold over a million boxes, lost 70% of those in 3 months)
Warhammer Online (also sold close to a million boxes, also lost 60+% in less than 6 months)
Star Trek Online
Dungeons and Dragons Online
Aion
I'm sure im missing some major ones, but those are just the ones off the top of my head.
The reality is, in the western mmo market, F2P is associated with dying or old games. EQ1 and EQ2 only converted because mmo's tend to lose subs slowly over time after they reach a certain break point.
F2P is popular option for these old mmo's or mmo's that bled subs to a low number quickly because the average F2P player spends $27/mo on the game vs $15 for a sub. People think that F2p is great because its "free" but they dont realize the games and cash shops in the games are set up specifically to make them spend money, and due to the way human psychology works, we dont realize we're spending the money because we do it in big goes. You might spend 60 one month and then go 3 months without and think you're ahead, but when you average out how much you spent, its more than if you had just paid a sub.
This is just my personal opinion, but i think F2P games are for A. Young people who have no concept of cost vs value. and B. Older people who are too dumb to see the forest for the trees and thus get caught up in the scam.
F2P games simply ARE NOT good for consumers, they are only good for developers.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
And only good for developers when they realize that the 100 million (or, in the case of TOR, way more than that) they invested in the product is never going to be recouped by subscriptions alone. That's why you didn't see TOR simply transition to F2P and everyone got to keep their jobs -- dozens and dozens of people were fired in this hailstorm because the amount of content that Bioware hoped to produce (and the number of developers required to produce said content) could not be reconciliated with the cost/benefit model of F2P games.
TOR will never be the game it might have been. Now, it's safe to say, it was never going to be that game anyway because it was badly put together. But the same can be said for most western, 'fallen' AAA F2P games -- their potential was stomped on by the transition. They now float along, bailing water -- but nobody is building anything major (and that includes LOTRO's laughable 'expansions' since going F2P).
I'm sorry bro but your logic is flawed
Please point out where I'm flawed. I did not state nor imply that f2p is the future, nor that p2p is dead. I stated that all WoW shows is that p2p brings in more when subs go beyond a certain point. That is not flawed at all. WoW is beyond that point, Rift may be as well, likely Eve is too. Nothing you have stated contradcits what I said.
I also did not state that Eve doesn't count. I stated you cannot look at Eve and then only compare to western subs. You have to look at both. Eve may very well have more in the west compared to anything else, however it is still played in 200 countries therefore I think we can safely count eve has a global MMO. Compare like to like, global to global, not global to just western, or just western to just western.
Aion still is doing well, just not in the west.
And I never stated or implied that some of the games that have gone f2p did not fail. I said some games that have gone f2p had very sizable and stable playerbases. The conversion to f2p was not because they failed. You cannot make the generalized assumption that a p2p game going to f2p has done so because it failed because that would be false. At least 3 haven't. Yes some have, but not all have so the statementt is false.
"The reality is, in the western mmo market, F2P is associated with dying or old games. EQ1 and EQ2 only converted because mmo's tend to lose subs slowly over time after they reach a certain break point."
That is not the reality, that is your belief and a false one. Again at least 3 have not done that EQ2, CoH and Lotro, had stable and sizable populations. The f2p wsa not because of low subs or profits it was becasue they thought they could od even better with f2p.
"This is just my personal opinion, but i think F2P games are for A. Young people who have no concept of cost vs value. and B. Older people who are too dumb to see the forest for the trees and thus get caught up in the scam."
That is your opinion, and IMO is false. Many many many people see and understand the concept of cost vs value, most people do not pay for f2p and still have a very good time.
IMO F2P are better for consumers. They allow consumers to buy only what they want, in an a la carte method. It also means the developer has to have a fun game or they won't get any money from the consumer. No fun means no money. B2P or p2p they have the box fee and a months sub before you even know if you like it or not. F2P is much better for consumers. B2P and P2p seem morel ike scams in that sense.
As someone has stated, in general subs make more money, but there comes a point where you'll make even more money than sub with F2P, which is the point many games switch methods.
SWTOR is viewed as a 'failure' with the F2P conversion due to how quickly it switched from p2p to f2p (less than a year, basically took them 3 months to think about it). This only shows one thing, the developers were wrong with what they thought would work with their game, and that in itself is a huge failure, because if the game was developed with the 'correct' method from the get go, it would save the company tons of money since they wouldn't have to redevelopment the game for a different method.
Do I think this is the end of subscriptions? No. Do I think SWTOR change to F2P because of some type of large error by the company? Yes.
This point has been brought up in multiple threads and it bugs me because most of you don't understand how surveys work. I of course do not have access to their survey or to the results, but what I can say is that in all likelihood the 40% number quoted is not a lie.
I don't know what TOR's exit survey said, but let's use some hypothetical examples that are probably not far off. They probably asked: What was your primary reason for cancelling your subscription to TOR?
A) Don't want to pay a subscription fee
C) Performance is lacking
D) Classes are unbalanced
E) Can't play with my friends easily
F) System requirements are too high
G) Combat and questing are not fun
Now they probably only allowed people to pick 1 answer so let's assume these are the results:
A) 40%
C) 5%
D) 10%
E) 5%
F) 5%
G) 25%
As you can see, EA would not be innacurate in stating that according to their survey 40% of respondendts said that the subscription fee is the main reason they quit. They aren't going to release a statement saying that 60% of people said that they quit because the performance was lacking, they didn't like the graphics, they felt the classes were unbalanced, that the combat and questing was not fun and that they couldn't play easily with their friends.
I totally agree that the main reason that most probably stated the sub fee is why they quit is because overall they didn't feel the game was good enough to warrant a montly fee, but I'd also say that's pretty obvious and I'm sure EA got the message.
I am in no way a fan of TOR and in fact am happy it's tanking because I believe it does send the message that you can't just creat a new WoW clone and expect people to fall for it. At the same time though people do need to understand that EA is probably not lying at all about the results of the survey.
Here is the most basic truth of it.
There are high quality F2P games out there.
F2P is a viable revenue model.
The most anticipated game on the horizon is B2P.
B2P is a viable revenue model.
There are people that will realize they can play an enjoyable game without paying a subscription.
There are people that will feel a subscription is the best model, and continue to pay to play.
Here is the assumption.
I think the number of people that choose B2P or F2P will continue to be an increasing percentage of the market.
All of my posts are either intelligent, thought provoking, funny, satirical, sarcastic or intentionally disrespectful. Take your pick.
I get banned in the forums for games I love, so lets see if I do better in the forums for games I hate.
I enjoy the serenity of not caring what your opinion is.
I don't hate much, but I hate Apple© with a passion. If Steve Jobs was alive, I would punch him in the face.
I don't. I believe it has topped out. Why? Because the crowd who doesn't want F2P isn't going to magically fall into line with it. I know that, personally, I have never had a quality experience with a F2P MMORPG -- not one. Every single one has either been a dog from the start (TOR), or became a dog after the transition (LOTRO).
The P2P model works, and the reason it works is because -- when it functions -- it manages to turn out the highest quality content at the highest rate for the lowest overall buck. It's the model utilized by the highest caliber games in the genre for this very reason.