If people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If enough people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If barely enough people pay into the shop, the game suffers. Something tells me that F2P games aren't looking for gamers like you, but the ones more prone to impulse buying, hence the entire setup for impulse / gambling enticements.
But devs don't know who is a whale, and who is not .. in new comers. Hence they have to attract as many as possible, and hope like hell that some whales are in the mix.
Originally posted by Popori It seems to me that most F2P devs are aware of the outrage and anger caused by nickle and dime mechanics which is why they design the games to be short lived, shallow experiences. Between the player mill (old out, new in, in rapid succession) and the cheap development, running a game into the ground and replacing it with another cheap thrill is much easier than a 300mil behemoth title....Free to play is simply a trending cash grab that is establishing its own market...
QFT
Originally posted by Burntvet ...That said, it is only so games that are not considered to be good enough to warrant a box price or sub fee, or it wouldn't be considered a barrier to entry. So, in the end F2P is all about marketing and based on the premise that gamers are too stupid to know they are being ripped off.
QFT
Look at ten "F2P" games and you will see ten different payment models. The system is meant to confuse consumers and let them think, in retrospect, the hours they spent downloading, installing, and playing the game was for naught unless they increasingly throw $ at it to continue.
Luckily, i don't need you to like me to enjoy video games. -nariusseldon. In F2P I think it's more a case of the game's trying to play the player's. -laserit
Look at ten "F2P" games and you will see ten different payment models. The system is meant to confuse consumers and let them think, in retrospect, the hours they spent downloading, installing, and playing the game was for naught unless they increasingly throw $ at it to continue.
hmm .. you stare at the monitor when you game download?
I don't. I only spend like 5 min to start the download, and do something else. So i don't spend hours downloading anything.
And why would any time spent playing the game for naught? It is for fun. If it is not fun, i won't be playing it. If it is .. then it is not "for naught".
Originally posted by Quizzical I prefer to know a game's business model up front before deciding whether to play it. When a company advertises a game as "free to play", they're trying to hide the business model, as they're never going to truly give away everything for free. Do you think "free to play" will eventually become a derogatory term that marketers avoid for that reason?
"F2P" will never become a derogatory term, because peeps love "free".
Here is a tip from a skeptic, me, "Nothing is free".
Take for example this: I am heading back to college, and recently went through an oreintation. During a campus tour we were told a list of "free" services we get. Including, "Free tickest to sporting events.", "Free access to the fitness center". Now I am an avid capitalist and have an accountant for a wife, so I inspect every bill I get and keep recipts for everything. Sooooo, I know that those tickes and access arent "Free" at all. In fact there is even an "athletic fee" right on the bill. But here we are on a tour hearing about all the freebies. HA.
The reality is it cost money to do stuff, like develope, publish, and operate a game. As consumers it is our responsibility to understand ALL the costs and be aware. Yes I know some marketing is designed to "sucker" many, with a focus on youth. But, I also am aware that "youths" are not adults and even the law doesnt grant them full sets of rights. So I put that on their parents.
Well yes, it's obvious that a game isn't going to be completely free. What I don't like about "free to play" is that it doesn't tell you the costs up front.
There have been many situations where positive-sounding things ended up being used and quoted derisively. I could give many examples from recent politics, but don't want to derail the thread that way, so I'll just give an older one that should be widely recognizable but isn't so politically charged anymore:
Neville Chamberlain: "Peace in our time."
As you seem fairly "learn-ed", based on the countless totaly positive posts I see you make in the tech forum, I can assume that you know of "weasel words"? In short, if you are unaware, these are words used most often by advertisers and politians, to skew meaning. A prime example would be a generic product claiming to be "virutally" like its name brand counterpart. SImply put, we all know that "virtually" means, not the same. Yet countless consumers grab the generic and proclaim "It is the SAME as its name brand counterpart!". Total win for the advertiser. I have come to see "F2P" as the same kind of situation. Sure, you can download, install, and "play" for free...but as you point out, they make it very inconvienant, creating artificial "need" for cash shop items.
Is it "evil", "lies", "trickery"? Maybe. Who knows? For me it is another example of the reasons I try to be an "educated skeptic consumer". Sometimes it is hard to do since they want to "hook" you into playing before you know all the facts. Lucky for us there are countless forums and such to fill our heads with all the info we need. (A discussion for another thread on the quality of this info).
I do however support discussions of this sort. When I see them I try to participate in a positive manner. I do this in the hopes of spreading knowledge. SInce many of these topics bleed into everyday life and do not just pertain to gaming. My hats off to you sir for starting this thread.
Weasel words don't work forever. Use the same positive-sounding description to mean something negative too many times and eventually people catch on. There are already a lot of gamers for which "free to play" is a negative description, albeit not enough for advertisers to eschew it. Yet.
Anyway, I've yet to see a free to play title that encouraged long term time investment, and while they may be replacing sub models in popularity, I don't think they're intended to replace sub-games in playstyle.
Sure. And the playstyle is increasingly short-term, without commitment, so players can experience more titles.
I think subs still have a chance and a community but has lost a lot of steam from the corporate side. Free to play is simply a trending cash grab that is establishing its own market and will hopefully take a chunk of the 'business ethic' out of the sub based genre and set us back toward the days when a sub carried weight in the eyes of the devs.
I doubt it. In the beginning, p2p is dominant. The fact that it is now shifted to f2p means that players are flocking to f2p because of their own choice. Think about it. Now there may be fewer choice for p2p .. but not a few years. The reason why more f2p games are built .. is because they are successful .. because players are flocking to them.
It is very clear the market trend is going from p2p to f2p. There is always a niche with some who don't like f2p .. but this is no more special than the niche who want to play text games, or whatever their preference is.
It's not so much players flocking to them as it is games making money. Well, players who would never be willing to pay anything for any online game do, indeed, flock to "free to play" games, but that's not what drives the model. Rather, it's a tiny handful of people willing to pay enormous amounts of money.
Rift is a good example of a sub-locked game that has dramatically changed some core mechanics over the last two years. It's not the same game I bought into and paid a bunch of money for. The alternate advancement system has been radically altered. All falling damage has been removed. Gear progression has been altered since Storm Legion. Faction interaction has dramatically changed since launch.
That's all pretty tepid compared to the business model changes that many "free to play" games have undergone simply by changing what's in the random boxes.
free to play is what is says it is.. i have played many free to play games without spending a dime. im not ocd, adhd. i dont need to dominiate pvp. i dont need to sit in town to show off my uber armor/weps/mounts.
if everyone would wake up and realize mmo companies are not non-profit organizations. they are only making these games for one reason, and its not to make the player base happy
^This^
As long as you're not treating MMOs like personal dick-waving machines, you can play for free. It's the hyper-competitive assholes who have to be #1 and live to show off that have issues, and they should.
If it's so easy to play for free forever, then how do the games make any money? Remember that the only reason that a game will ever be "free to play" is if they think that they'll make more money that way than any other business model.
It's not so much players flocking to them as it is games making money. Well, players who would never be willing to pay anything for any online game do, indeed, flock to "free to play" games, but that's not what drives the model. Rather, it's a tiny handful of people willing to pay enormous amounts of money.
I think it is both. Those handful of people probably are less prone to spend enormous amount of money if there is no other free players who act as content (either for them to pvp against, or show off their gear in pve).
Secondly, people who are willing to pay enormous amount probably will flock to these games which allow their money to have influence.
Originally posted by Quizzical I prefer to know a game's business model up front before deciding whether to play it. When a company advertises a game as "free to play", they're trying to hide the business model, as they're never going to truly give away everything for free. Do you think "free to play" will eventually become a derogatory term that marketers avoid for that reason?
This is why I don't like F2P or B2P? Even with games like GW2, you never know what changes might be made to the cash shop and the items available in it. All it takes is a bad quarter or two financially, and a company will do most anything to increase revenue.....
ArenaNet knows that if they go over the top with a pay-to-win item mall, they could lose a lot of future box purchases--which likely includes future expansions. Subscription games feel this pressure more strongly, as if they go too far with an item mall, they lose a bunch of subscribers. But "free to play" with just an item mall? If people who weren't paying anything get mad that you're trying to gouge them and quit, that's no loss to the company.
The thing I hate most about "F2P with Cash Shop" models is that the "good" ones will carefully analyse their player metrics and design the gameplay in such a way that it's just irritating enough to push a significant % of players to spend.
That means that the game design starts being dictated by which "threshold values" are needed to make 50% of players buy item or service X in the Cash Shop. Everything you do ingame becomes a target of monetization.
Most people can resist spending too much on Cash Shop items, but that denial is always a conscious decision. And the decision to forego those "quality of life" expenditures will always leave a slightly bitter taste.
Are sub-locked game designers stupid and just design their games willy nilly? Are you going to posit that they don't analyze metrics and design games around gear treadmills, time sinks, and mechanics to make you sub longer?
Again, I notice that sub-locked proponents like to use really vague references to un-named sub-free games to make their arguments. If a game has a bad model and mechanic then name it. Stop saying all games do this when one game does that. If there is a horrible setup then lets discuss that.
If I get to the point in a game, it doesn't matter whether the game is sub-locked or sub-free, where progression stops or becomes "unfun" then I will probably stop playing. If I start to play a sub-free game and I look in the cash shop and experience the game mechanics and decide that I don't like them, then I move on. If I get to a place in a sub-locked game where I have to do things I don't like to progress then I move on.
It's really really simple. If a game has bad mechanics then don't play it. Play fun games. If you like to rent your games then play fun sub-locked games. If you don't then play fun sub-free games.
Yours is a popular "rebuttal" against the argument of F2P Cash Shop manipulation.
But it's flawed.
It's flawed because both P2P and F2P game designs need to keep people playing. Regardless of the design, if the player is not playing the game, there is no chance at all that he will be spending money on it.
In fact, the "grind-by-design" in most F2P games is far, far worse than in P2P games, because the grind has to be made unpalatable enough so that most people will opt for straight-out purchases. A P2P design cannot do that, because there's no "easy-way-out" in a P2P game.
If your P2P grind is more than the average player can bear, you will lose the player.
If your F2P grind is more than the average player can bear, you have a huge group of potential Cash Shop customers !
I never claimed that sub-free games don't need to keep people interested in playing.
You need to make specific examples to support your claim that grind by design is worse in sub-free than sub-locked. There is grind in both Tera and Rift. I don't really see the difference between the two. I can pay for xp boosts in Tera to help me level faster but I can't pay for something to get me better gear faster. I have xp boosts in Rift too.
I would say if the P2P grind is more than I find fun then they will lose my subscription because I'm not going to pay them $15/mo to just play around in the game world.
If the F2P grind is more than I can bear then I probably won't play that content either. Although I still have the option of logging in and playing around with my character.
Just like both F2P and P2P need to keep people playing they also need to provide incentive for people to login. A cash shop item isn't an incentive to login and play. Enjoyable content and gameplay is, regardless of the model.
The anti-grinding model is buy to play, which is far more common for single-player games. If you buy the game, play through it in a week, and then quit, that's fine with the company. They've got your money.
Yeah f2p means we are going to pick your pockets later.
But recently we've seen some fairer free play models like gw2 and ps2.
So where,as once I was vehemently anti f2p, now I recognise there are a handful of games that do f2p right.
How do they pick your pockets, you have to decide to enter your credit card number, they can't do it without your permission.
It's not them picking your pockets, it's you having no self-control.
If people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If enough people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If barely enough people pay into the shop, the game suffers. Something tells me that F2P games aren't looking for gamers like you, but the ones more prone to impulse buying, hence the entire setup for impulse / gambling enticements.
That plus also rich people who don't mind spending $100/month on a game they like.
It is definately a balancing act. Just like p2p, if a f2p game is not fun no one will play it, no one will use the shop and the game will close. Just like p2p it needs to be fun first.
However if there is nothing in the shop that either a: looks good, or b: is usefull no one will use the shop either.
That was my issue with the TSW and FE shop. There was nothing in them that looked usefull or to me anyone, looked good. They had nothing I wanted.
I'm personally more content with a F2P game releasing cash shop items in between their content updates and paying for those occasionally. Rather than have to hand over money up front. It just doesn't click as to why I'm handing over money if they aren't updating anything at all. I understand buying a game first then paying for the cash shop features occasionally. That gets rid of the "free" concept. However I don't like that I need to feel obligated and or forced into a subscription for these subscription titles which obviously aren't worth my time in investing into when they fail the subscription model and go free-to-play a 2-3 months later.
So basically your argument is that free to play games are worth paying for because they update their item mall periodically?
If people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If enough people don't pay into the shop, the game closes. If barely enough people pay into the shop, the game suffers. Something tells me that F2P games aren't looking for gamers like you, but the ones more prone to impulse buying, hence the entire setup for impulse / gambling enticements.
But devs don't know who is a whale, and who is not .. in new comers. Hence they have to attract as many as possible, and hope like hell that some whales are in the mix.
The problem is, whales tend to like flagrantly pay-to-win games. No one wants to pay $100+ per month to be average; if you're going to pay that kind of money, you expect a big return for it. So if you want to attract a lot of whales, you have to make your game pretty aggressively pay-to-win.
Not every sub-free game model works off the whale principle. That very much has been a hallmark of Asian publishers. I think it's also one that will eventually become niche or go the way of the dodo.
Why? didn't you see that now in the US, F2P MMOs are making more than twice the amount of money than P2P MMOs?
I think the whale principle is alive and well in the western world too. Do you have any evidence to the contrary?
If it's so easy to play for free forever, then how do the games make any money? Remember that the only reason that a game will ever be "free to play" is if they think that they'll make more money that way than any other business model.
By tapping into the small number of whales.
Easy to play for free for most players ... but for a minority, they want to spend a lot of money because of the epleen, without self-control, or just that they are rich and they don't care. The reason does not matter.
The point is that you don't need a majority of paying players to make any money.
If it's so easy to play for free forever, then how do the games make any money? Remember that the only reason that a game will ever be "free to play" is if they think that they'll make more money that way than any other business model.
Perhaps you should ask Turbine, since LOTRO gained 400% revenue increase the month they went from SUB only to SUB / F2P. Problem is, companies think cash shops should make their job easier, which is their fault for having lazy thinking. If they want to make money from a F2P game, then they need to have enticing products, not P2W products in their cash shop.
And do you think that that increased revenue came from a bunch of people playing the game completely for free? Or do you think it came from people paying to play?
Even today, LotRO is a subscription game with a free trial. What used to be called a free trial, they now call "free to play". If you don't pay, you only get access to a handful of low-level content.
Not every sub-free game model works off the whale principle. That very much has been a hallmark of Asian publishers. I think it's also one that will eventually become niche or go the way of the dodo.
Why? didn't you see that now in the US, F2P MMOs are making more than twice the amount of money than P2P MMOs?
I think the whale principle is alive and well in the western world too. Do you have any evidence to the contrary?
And games with a name that doesn't start with J make vastly more money (in total, not per game) than games with a name that does start with J. Your claim is a statement about what business model games are calling themselves, not about what works well.
If it's so easy to play for free forever, then how do the games make any money? Remember that the only reason that a game will ever be "free to play" is if they think that they'll make more money that way than any other business model.
Perhaps you should ask Turbine, since LOTRO gained 400% revenue increase the month they went from SUB only to SUB / F2P. Problem is, companies think cash shops should make their job easier, which is their fault for having lazy thinking. If they want to make money from a F2P game, then they need to have enticing products, not P2W products in their cash shop.
And do you think that that increased revenue came from a bunch of people playing the game completely for free? Or do you think it came from people paying to play?
Even today, LotRO is a subscription game with a free trial. What used to be called a free trial, they now call "free to play". If you don't pay, you only get access to a handful of low-level content.
The increase in revenue most likely came from the cash shop or maybe even returning players that subbed again. Point is, there was an increase and thats all that mattered to Turbine.
Ok, LOTRO is not a SUB only game with a free trial. It's had a F2P model, the best F2P model out there and thats why they can put out an expansion every year. I've paid for the expansions, but you can still reach max level with the "free" portion of the content. You don't have to pay for anything, there at least is an option for that, but it requires dedicated grinding of content.
A free trial that lets you grind your way all the way to the cap while being locked out of most of the content is still a free trial. Even so, I don't have any problem with that model; it's a subscription game, not a flagrant pay-to-win item mall.
Not every sub-free game model works off the whale principle. That very much has been a hallmark of Asian publishers. I think it's also one that will eventually become niche or go the way of the dodo.
Why? didn't you see that now in the US, F2P MMOs are making more than twice the amount of money than P2P MMOs?
I think the whale principle is alive and well in the western world too. Do you have any evidence to the contrary?
I wish free to play would go to hell. FTP is like going to Mcdonalds with a coupon for a free Big Mac and only getting the bun. Then it's $2 for a piece of meat, $1 for cheese, .50 each for ketchup and mustard, $3 for Special Sauce. Piss on that. Not when I can get a non free whopper for 3 bucks.
Originally posted by JRRNeiklot I wish free to play would go to hell. FTP is like going to Mcdonalds with a coupon for a free Big Mac and only getting the bun. Then it's $2 for a piece of meat, $1 for cheese, .50 each for ketchup and mustard, $3 for Special Sauce. Piss on that. Not when I can get a non free whopper for 3 bucks.
actually it is more like going to McD's for a free big mac and getting it. If you want something to drink, pay. If you want fries with that, pay. You want fruit pies, pay.
I wish attitudes like yours would go away. especially since you are not even close to correct about a f2p model
Play what you Like. I like SWOTR, Have a referral to get you going! --> http://www.swtor.com/r/nBndbs <-- Several Unlocks and a few days game time to make the F2P considerably easier
Originally posted by JRRNeiklot I wish free to play would go to hell. FTP is like going to Mcdonalds with a coupon for a free Big Mac and only getting the bun. Then it's $2 for a piece of meat, $1 for cheese, .50 each for ketchup and mustard, $3 for Special Sauce. Piss on that. Not when I can get a non free whopper for 3 bucks.
actually it is more like going to McD's for a free big mac and getting it. If you want something to drink, pay. If you want fries with that, pay. You want fruit pies, pay.
I wish attitudes like yours would go away. especially since you are not even close to correct about a f2p model
No it's not. Not when they advertise the game or the food as "free." Free means free. But hell, I'll give you a brand new porsche free, if you like. Of course, al you'll get is a floor mat and a valve stem.
I know what the ftp model is. It's a marketing ploy to suck money out of people. But the one thing it is NOT is free to play.
Originally posted by JRRNeiklot I wish free to play would go to hell. FTP is like going to Mcdonalds with a coupon for a free Big Mac and only getting the bun. Then it's $2 for a piece of meat, $1 for cheese, .50 each for ketchup and mustard, $3 for Special Sauce. Piss on that. Not when I can get a non free whopper for 3 bucks.
actually it is more like going to McD's for a free big mac and getting it. If you want something to drink, pay. If you want fries with that, pay. You want fruit pies, pay.
I wish attitudes like yours would go away. especially since you are not even close to correct about a f2p model
No it's not. Not when they advertise the game or the food as "free." Free means free. But hell, I'll give you a brand new porsche free, if you like. Of course, al you'll get is a floor mat and a valve stem.
I know what the ftp model is. It's a marketing ploy to suck money out of people. But the one thing it is NOT is free to play.
Careful, there's some people around here that should already be knocking on your door expecting their free floor mat and valve stem. Then, next week, they'll just move on to the next free porche, floor mat valve stem dealer guy... wait what?
Comments
But devs don't know who is a whale, and who is not .. in new comers. Hence they have to attract as many as possible, and hope like hell that some whales are in the mix.
QFT
QFT
Look at ten "F2P" games and you will see ten different payment models. The system is meant to confuse consumers and let them think, in retrospect, the hours they spent downloading, installing, and playing the game was for naught unless they increasingly throw $ at it to continue.
Luckily, i don't need you to like me to enjoy video games. -nariusseldon.
In F2P I think it's more a case of the game's trying to play the player's. -laserit
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes.
That way, if they get angry, they'll be a mile away... and barefoot.
hmm .. you stare at the monitor when you game download?
I don't. I only spend like 5 min to start the download, and do something else. So i don't spend hours downloading anything.
And why would any time spent playing the game for naught? It is for fun. If it is not fun, i won't be playing it. If it is .. then it is not "for naught".
Weasel words don't work forever. Use the same positive-sounding description to mean something negative too many times and eventually people catch on. There are already a lot of gamers for which "free to play" is a negative description, albeit not enough for advertisers to eschew it. Yet.
It's not so much players flocking to them as it is games making money. Well, players who would never be willing to pay anything for any online game do, indeed, flock to "free to play" games, but that's not what drives the model. Rather, it's a tiny handful of people willing to pay enormous amounts of money.
That's all pretty tepid compared to the business model changes that many "free to play" games have undergone simply by changing what's in the random boxes.
If it's so easy to play for free forever, then how do the games make any money? Remember that the only reason that a game will ever be "free to play" is if they think that they'll make more money that way than any other business model.
I think it is both. Those handful of people probably are less prone to spend enormous amount of money if there is no other free players who act as content (either for them to pvp against, or show off their gear in pve).
Secondly, people who are willing to pay enormous amount probably will flock to these games which allow their money to have influence.
ArenaNet knows that if they go over the top with a pay-to-win item mall, they could lose a lot of future box purchases--which likely includes future expansions. Subscription games feel this pressure more strongly, as if they go too far with an item mall, they lose a bunch of subscribers. But "free to play" with just an item mall? If people who weren't paying anything get mad that you're trying to gouge them and quit, that's no loss to the company.
The anti-grinding model is buy to play, which is far more common for single-player games. If you buy the game, play through it in a week, and then quit, that's fine with the company. They've got your money.
That plus also rich people who don't mind spending $100/month on a game they like.
So basically your argument is that free to play games are worth paying for because they update their item mall periodically?
The problem is, whales tend to like flagrantly pay-to-win games. No one wants to pay $100+ per month to be average; if you're going to pay that kind of money, you expect a big return for it. So if you want to attract a lot of whales, you have to make your game pretty aggressively pay-to-win.
Why? didn't you see that now in the US, F2P MMOs are making more than twice the amount of money than P2P MMOs?
I think the whale principle is alive and well in the western world too. Do you have any evidence to the contrary?
By tapping into the small number of whales.
Easy to play for free for most players ... but for a minority, they want to spend a lot of money because of the epleen, without self-control, or just that they are rich and they don't care. The reason does not matter.
The point is that you don't need a majority of paying players to make any money.
And do you think that that increased revenue came from a bunch of people playing the game completely for free? Or do you think it came from people paying to play?
Even today, LotRO is a subscription game with a free trial. What used to be called a free trial, they now call "free to play". If you don't pay, you only get access to a handful of low-level content.
And games with a name that doesn't start with J make vastly more money (in total, not per game) than games with a name that does start with J. Your claim is a statement about what business model games are calling themselves, not about what works well.
A free trial that lets you grind your way all the way to the cap while being locked out of most of the content is still a free trial. Even so, I don't have any problem with that model; it's a subscription game, not a flagrant pay-to-win item mall.
f2p mmo's vastly outnumber p2p mmo's.
Longer titles tend to get more replies, since some people will reply to just the title and not actually read the thread.
actually it is more like going to McD's for a free big mac and getting it. If you want something to drink, pay. If you want fries with that, pay. You want fruit pies, pay.
I wish attitudes like yours would go away. especially since you are not even close to correct about a f2p model
--> http://www.swtor.com/r/nBndbs <--
Several Unlocks and a few days game time to make the F2P considerably easier
No it's not. Not when they advertise the game or the food as "free." Free means free. But hell, I'll give you a brand new porsche free, if you like. Of course, al you'll get is a floor mat and a valve stem.
I know what the ftp model is. It's a marketing ploy to suck money out of people. But the one thing it is NOT is free to play.
Careful, there's some people around here that should already be knocking on your door expecting their free floor mat and valve stem. Then, next week, they'll just move on to the next free porche, floor mat valve stem dealer guy... wait what?