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Can P2P survive in the modern mmorpg genre?
Gwendal
Member Posts: 14
MMO's these days are very much a different breed than the ones released in the era of Everquest, EvE, and WoW. Back in 2004 releasing a mmo with attached monthly fees was the norm, and quite a few games became wildly successful because of it (both financially and garnering the respect of customers). The MMO scene currently is a very different beast...
Before I rag on upcoming p2p mmo's, lets take a look at the currently successes. First you have WoW the grandfather of the modern mmo, and probably the last great p2p mmo as well. WoW continues to be a p2p power mainly through Blizzards groundwork laid almost 10 years ago but also because it was the first to bring the mmo genre to the masses. Another continual success for the p2p mmo's is EvE online which has achieved a continuous growth of player subs for over 10 years. CCP managed this, in my opinion, by providing the players an ever change and evolving universe that puts your sub money to good use.
Now lets take a look at what the upcoming p2p mmo wildstar has to go up against. First you have the B2P juggernaut GW2. Whether you like ANet's style of mmo's or not you have to commend them for producing a game that only requires one purchase to play. ANet has been providing content updates that have far out striped or equaled what you usually get in a P2P mmo (for your 15$) all for free.
This brings me to my main point, how can any new p2p mmo possibly come up with a reasonable and defensible answer to why they need a monthly stipend from you, in addition to the base game cost? Now I will digress for a second to say that the only P2P mmo I have encountered that made me feel as if my monthly fee was warranted, was EvE online (mainly because your monthly fee went to server architecture that actually needed maintenance and free expansions). I for one see no way a new P2P mmo can justify the need for having a large $15/month fee, unless they produce content on the scale and size of GW2's or they provide expansion style content packs for free like EvE. Long gone are the myths around needing this $15 for server upkeep and costs (http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=av26nr&s=6).
In conclusion I will be hoping for more innovative and risk taking p2p mmo's in the future, as they are my preferred style of mmo, sadly I do not see any upcoming releases that take into account my worries above but who knows what the future holds.
Comments
So time and again I have said this very thing, to me, P2P games means that the game-creator actually cares for their audience of gamers, Blizzard aside, most P2P games actually don't make that much money, they spend it mostly on updates, SERVER MAINTENANCE which is extremely expensive, hosting thousands-millions of people on a plethora of servers is no cheap task, and they spend it on the company itself to maintain. A lot goes into a P2P game mostly for the community. I plan on someday developing an mmo. That has been my dream, and the payment method i will use? P2P. I have no interest whatsoever in earning some confounded amount of money. I want to use every bit of it to create, and maintain an amazing mmorpg. When/if I have surplus quantities of cash after paying my team they're share? I either expand the team, advertise more, add larger updates etc. In any other model of gaming the developer is not nearly as ambitious as that and will not create a game nearly as fun and enjoyable as a P2P model game. P2P games are in it for the long run, F2P games go into the market for a quick buck and ditch before the costs catch up to them.
Also, think of it this way, you pay $60 bucks for the newest console game, for about 60-100 hours MOST of gameplay. In an mmo within that first one or two months, you've spent about 30 bucks on the base product normally, complete with a 30-day sub, then another $15 for the next, within those two months not only is the experience guaranteed to be far more amazing than some F2P, cash shop, pay to win bullshit, but you've also normally already spent enough hours in that mmo to have used up what you would have gotten out of that F2P game. At this point you've only spent $45, over a two month period. The next two months from that point on will only be $30 per every two months.
In reality, if you have a job, the mmo fee is next to nothing. to complain about that fee is childish because for a single hour of work in a job, you are given a month of amazing memorable gameplay and community. Statistically, unless you dont enjoy mmo's, you are being given soo much more value with that mmo than any F2P games. That is a fact. If you continue to keep playing that mmo, well, it's worth it isn't it?
Never fear, your dream MMO will be here....
just give me a decade or two to finely hone my Game development
and design abilities as well as start a Game Design Studio.
Thank you for your patience.
$15 a month to play a game is nothing, maybe a couple hours of work in minimum wage? And sometimes it's even cheaper than that. A typical 14-21 day trial also gives a good grasp of the game before you purchase.
Let's compare this to most F2P games where you get a handicapped experience if you don't buy a bunch of "convenience" stuff. Or the pay2win ones where people spend hundreds a month to stay competitive. Your money's value does not even compare especially when the P2P tends to be superior in most areas.
A good P2P game will survive and does not need to go anywhere else to keep its playebase. P2P games will be kept to a minimum, because good games are generally kept to a minimum.
As with most things in life, you get what you paid for.
As of now, my gaming time is completely consumed with four games all with no monthly fees. That makes it quite difficult for me to justify paying a sub for any game these days.
It's not so much about the money but about the fact that I can I have a great online experience with my friends without a sub.
Currently playing:
Rift: F2P (I actually sub to this game for the Patron rewards and to support Trion but it's definitely not necessary to enjoy the game)
GW2: B2P
Smite: F2P (bought the God Pack for $30 so it's kind of a B2P for me)
BF3: B2P
Between these four games, I definitely get my fill of PvE and PvP and a good variety of gameplay. I'd rather take any sub money I'd throw at new games and put it towards a new video card (or other upgrades) each year.
Not in western market I think.
In Asia there are more P2P games, and they are more successful than all western games excluding WoW.
NCSoft games are P2P in Asia and beat all western games in popularity-money making except WoW.
There is no western MMO besides WoW that can make more money than a 1998 game called Lineage 1.
"mmorpg.com forum admins are all TROLLS and losers in real life"
My opinion
A good game will be Played and Supported by a sustainable fanbase, regardless of monitization method. There are F2P, B2P, and P2P games that has lasted many years and continue to be successful.
All you need to be successful is provide a product people are willing to pay for.
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That's actually completely wrong. There are is a shitload of F2P titles in Asia. Asia is like the no. 1 market for F2P games.
To topic: The question to ask is: Can F2P survive in the modern mmorpg genre?
Why? Simple: Most F2P games released to date are shit. Name just one succesful F2P title please, because I don't know any. In fact and luckily, F2P is a dying plague already.
P2P is superior, sooner or later you will have to admit it.
A better question is can the modern MMORPG genre survive at all?
The so called MMORPGs that are coming out these days, most under the auspices of "F2P", are cheap, fast, disposable experiences, that most people play for a month and then quit.
Or, they are ported-over Asian imports that are not really meant for the western audience. Or they are underfunded, buggy, indie crap.
There are very few "quality" titles that offer anything more than a very shallow experience and have more than a month or two of content or gameplay.
With so many other choices available these days, if there are no quality MMORPGs, people have other options.
Many people right now are not playing any MMORPG (myself included, I won't play a "meh" game of any kind, even for free), instead they are spending their entertainment dollars elsewhere.
This genre needs a few quality, deep MMOs if the industry is going to remain viable, or else the companies making the parade of lackluster titles are all going to go under.
There are tons of F2P in Asia, but there are more successful P2P games there than here, games that are P2P and successful for years.
I refuse to play crappy game, f2p or p2p, period.
And i found many fun F2P, non-crappy, entertaining games. So i play them.
No. I don't think p2p will survive.
To me, it is moot anyway. I have quit playing sub-games and will only play F2P ones.
It is never about affordability but competition. If i can get the same fun for free, why would i want to pay even a cent?
Can P2P survive in the "modern"/current market? No. P2P is built for longevity and I haven't seen a lot of games lately that offer that. Quite the opposite. The genre has been moving more towards bite-sized gaming like Facebook apps. That market caters far more to F2P and B2P.
I actually prefer P2P for many reasons but I don't see it surviving. Not because of the model type but because of the actual game style the genre has moved towards. If the genre starts to swing more towards actually staying in games again for extended periods of time then my answer will change as well.
Yes. More fun packed into a shorter time, and players can move onto newer experiences after "finishing" a MMO.
And that's the kind of mentality that P2P games don't cater for. Some people like to invest their time into learning a game, and sticking to it for a longer time, and this is why they pay for it.
There are plenty of low budget, low quality games out there for people like you to devour and move on to the next. If that makes you happy then by all means stick to playing f2p.
They can definitely survive, but they need to be worth paying for, FFXIV is getting my sub because they've made a good game in my perspective. I hate F2P games, they spend all their dev time on cash shop garbage and the game goes to crap for it.
F2P games are not about being good, they're about how much money they can squeeze out of you, most of these people that cry for F2P are riding on the coat tails of the whales that spend thousands in the cash shops, when you're not paying a sub you're contributing nothing to the development of the game, so you get what you pay for, nothing but a shallow experience.
But hey! I'm bored of this I'll go hop on that next F2P game because this one sucks now, I'm sure it will be a better experience than this one......
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
Yes. P2P don't cater to me .. and i don't play them. Very logical.
BTW, learning a game is easy. You don't need years to do that. Plus, it is more fun (to me) to learn a new game, rather than sticking to the same one.
Why does it have to be "better"?
I played Bioshock Infinite, than Dishonored. Dishonored is not "better". Just different. I am glad i play two distinctly different, and fun games, instead of one.
The same applies to MMOs.
really?
Tabula Rasa is dead now.
DDO, LOTRO are still running, both f2p. Both made more money after turning into F2P.
Heck, even TOR is saved by going F2P.
I think subscriptions will be around for awhile. Paying $.50 a day for a quality game is nothing. Only problem, nobody has released a game worth a sub for several years. When I was playing EQ and paying $ 9.98 a month, I would have paid twice that. Same with SWG at the beginning. So I really just think it's all on the developers to build a game for the money thats the proper blend of graphics, story, gameplay, and world development (they always seem to focus on 1 or 2 things too much). No more really pretty arcade games called MMO's.
Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor.
Thomas Jefferson
I was asking the same thing back in 2009 (link) and I've been impressed by the outcome.
It seems that it doesn't make a difference if there's 10 or 1,000 free to play games. If a developer can put out a game (content, community and environment) that the players feel is worth15 dollars a month, the model will work, and evidently work well.
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
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap, EVE and FFXI have been running for 11 years now and are still sub, I played FFXI for 7 years and eve for around 4, because they were good games that offered a lot of things to do, being sub based games they can afford to push out more content to keep players busy where as you have to find a new game because all of thier development resources have gone into making items for a cash shop, so now you have nothing to do so you just hop to another crap MMO and repeat the same thing over again.
Pure P2P games? Not sure.
The problem is the market has discovered it can keep subs and also partake in F2P revenue streams.
That is not to say subscriptions are going anywhere, they are not, there are just as many games with subscriptions as there ever were, more in fact. People read F2P and truly believe the days of the monthly sub are ending when the modern use of 'F2P' is simply marketing.
The move away from pure P2P has nothing to do with the betterment of the genre nor the wellbeing of the players of the games. Companies have merely discovered they can make more money this way, and like DRM before it even if people moan and complain they'll eventually nod and dance along while more and more monetisation options are explored.
As someone said, it will be interesting to see just how long until the gaming industry can continue as it is.
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.