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The repopulation should be subb based and not F2p
Snoepie
Member UncommonPosts: 485
to counter the limitless accounts and alt harvesters ingame..
With this featurelist and when they can pull this off.. i would be happy to pay a monthly sub..
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with F2P though they could have Harvestor maintenance, a harvestor maintenance token could be purchased in the cash shop for real money
F2P means they can, and probably will, monetize just about anything and everything.
Agree 100%. This should definitely be a sub based game. Sub just helps in a lot of ways, and I hope more trip A MMO's go back to it.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
There are some lengthy threads on this subject already, I'd suggest reading those for more details. But the easiest way to understand why this game will be shipping F2P is to simply examine the MMO market. How many games in the past three years have launched as subscription? And of those how many are still subscription? There's a reason for that.
As a player, a game launching as subscription and then trying to conver to F2P a year later should be a larger concern. During that time you pay the boxed price, followed by a monthly subscription, probably with a cash shop the entire time. And then the game converts to F2P. Your paying a lot more money to get where you could have been from square one.
https://www.therepopulation.com - Sci Fi Sandbox.
well it wasn't that i was saying you would do that, hence the devilish grin, but more a suggestion of what could be done to prevent people exploiting.
But F2P does mean that there is the inevitable monetisation, how much though, remains to be seen, good intentions aside, business is business. So i know i'll be giving it a 'wait and see' treatment when it comes to the cash shop, my own preference would have been a sub hybrid, but that may not fit in with the F2P model.
I agree that sandbox games should be P2P. Hacking and exploiting have a much bigger consequence in these games and not being able to get rid of the hackers is going to be a very real problem with FTP. I'm not usually a P2P purist, but I am in this case.
Your game so your choice. However, the concerns many have brought up in this thread and in other threads are valid. How do we know: cause we have been there, done that, bought the t-shirt when it comes to F2P and what it does to games... in particular sandbox/pvp heavy games. I realize that most companies take the F2P route to maximize players (and in theory, profits) but for a niche market game such as this, not sure if it was the best route. I would gladly pay a monthly sub to play but not really interested in playing any more F2P games.
However, your game, your choice and I'm sure it makes sense to you guys. Just wanted to give my 2 cents.
A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true...
I'm glad to have found this thread. If the game plans on going down the F2P path I can quit wasting my time waiting for it.
Games go F2P because most people won't spend money on games they don't like, for whatever reason.
How can repop inspire players to build communities and dependencies if every player can be self sustained with 10 alts?
And for the issue with harvester, just go back and recall all the fields of harvesters In SWG.
We do appreciate everyone's input. One thing that should be stressed though is that even if we were swayed into believing that a subscription would be the right choice, we would be unable to make that switch after the game has already been marketed and sold as a F2P game. We couldn't change that after many players had already backed the game under the F2P pretense. It wouldn't be fair to our backers.
That having been said, while I understand some of the arguments for subscription, I don't feel it's a good route for MMOs in this day and age. There are certainly fair arguments that can be made on the other side of that. But it's not about failed games. It's about a barrier of entry, and the fact that there are so many free to play options out there. It isn't the same market that many of us started with 15 years ago. Nowadays players can hop to any of dozens of quality free to play games on the market at any time. They can easily swap between multiple games in this scenario without having to pay any fees, which makes it more difficult to justify a subscription. They may want to try a new game that is coming out, etc. F2P allows those players to try new games, and keep playing yours, which benefits the community.
It also makes it easier for them to bring in their friends or family members. Whether those players ever pay or not, they help make paying customers happy. You see many games convert to free to play, but how many companies do you see that have already done free to play titles which convert to subscription? F2P is simply a healthier business plan in today's market. But that doesn't mean that all F2P titles are Pay To Win either. There are different philosophies. Just as there are different philosophies in titles that convert to F2P and those that are designed as F2P, with converts generally going the freemium route which works much differently.
The best answer that I can give here though is that we thought long and hard about F2P. When the game was still in the concept stages F2P was not very popular and we were looking at a boxed price and maybe a small subscription fee. By the time it moved into full scale development F2P was a valid option but like many players we had concerns about it. Many of the titles we saw at that time were Pay To Win, though others were very much cosmetic only and we couldn't see how those titles could possibly exist on that. There's a lot more information out there now. And it's a lot easier to learn from the mistakes of the earlier titles. You can see what worked for them and what didn't work, and you can see what players accepted and what they rejected.
Once we were sold on F2P we began designing gameplay elements around that fact. For example our armor and weapon shells allow us to sell cosmetic items because they only determine your basic weapon or armor type and have no extra stats. It allows players to still have an idea of what people are wearing without being a pure cosmetic slot item. And it allows us to sell those items in the shop without concern of being a way to buy to power. We've spent a lot of time discussing these things, and we are happy with those decisions. All we can really ask of players is to try the game when it's released, it will be free. Then make your decisions on the payment model or the game itself.
https://www.therepopulation.com - Sci Fi Sandbox.
You certainly make a logical point regarding F2P, however I think that most games that have been released over the past 3 years simply haven't offered players enough to keep them subbing.
As a player who's been following The Repopulation for years, I was definitely disappointed when I learned it was going to be F2P. My concern is that when a developer's revenue model relies solely on micro-transactions / cash shop, there's a significant risk that they will need to cross certain boundaries in order to entice players to keep purchasing items. There's also the unknown affect on the in-game economy.
I also think that a lot of players, particularly old school players find comfort in paying a pre-determined price and knowing that all content, features, functionality, etc are included.
Bringer of Eternal Darkness and Despair, but also a Nutritious way to start your Morning.
Games Played: Too Many
None at the moment. But - I'm not playing a MMO right now. When ESO comes out, I'll be subbing to that. I like subs - mostly when the cash shop on top of it isn't ridiculous however.
That said, I completely understand why The Repop couldn't move to a sub-based game at this point even if they wanted to. Perhaps they could go with an either-or scenario, but that may even seem like a betrayal to some of the backers so I can understand why that wouldn't be possible either.
Personally, I don't enjoy the "F2P" games that cost more than a sub if you want what was offered when that game was sub before, or when a game launches F2P and the general cost to not be limited is more than a sub.. But that's just me.
People say a sub makes them feel like they have to play every day or they are wasting money. Really? I mean... Really? That 50 cents a day bothers you so much you feel inclined to play or else you're wasting money? I'll stop here before this becomes a rant.
I am merely making my personal stance known regarding P2P vs F2P. While at the same time I understand why The Repop is launching F2P out of the gate. It's a wait and see game for me as well. And the monetization methods are as much a factor as the game itself regarding whether I will play or not.
I wish nothing but luck for the game in either case.
Generally speaking, in most cases you will get what you pay for.
As an example:
Here in Scandinavia people emailed and begged HBO to be able to pay for a proper service with subtitles and good video quality instead of pirating and file sharing popular series like Game Of Thrones etc.
Now everyone can get access to HBO's series one hour after they originally aired, and for a very modest fee.
Even if free, people got tired of getting crap, in this case ripped files with low quality, and tired of waiting for proper subtitles.
The same goes for videogames and mmo's. Give players a quality game and they will come.
This mass production of crap mmo's by crap development teams has to stop. Todays creativity is more about business models and how to create new ways to maximize the short term profit with the least amount of commitment than to the product itself.
Whoah, Nelly. Because I started before the F2P Madness, and I am used to and see the wisdom in such things..
I'm hypocrite because I don't want to spend more than what used to be the standard payment model? Okay. It's true, I'd rather not pay more than before for the SAME EXACT GAME. If that makes me some kind of hypocrite, so be it.
Good day
I think you missed his point: He is stating he doesn't like being nickled-and-dimed and asked to pay more for options/content included in the monthly sub before the game went F2P. How is not liking to be gouged = cheap? if anything, the F2P crowd that wants full access to a game without ever having to pay a dime are the true cheap gamers.
A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true...
I think the million dollar question there is can a game support itself on cosmetics and convenience items? I think the answer to that question is yes, but it certainly will cut into the profit margin. You'll make a lot less money per player than if you are selling items of power. But you'll also appeal to more players by not doing so.
We'd rather sacrifice the amount of revenue generated per player in exchange for a higher number of players. Even if that winds up being less money, if it keeps the game healthy then the longer-term projections should improve. Because word of mouth and healthy servers will bring in additional players long-term.
We're certainly aware of some of the monetization techniques that other games have tried over the years. I do think it's telling though when you look at companies that have been doing F2P for a while, that over time the games have become less and less pay to win. I know I personally can't stand games that give you a harsh death penalty that is there solely to encourage you to buy an experience debt reducing potions, for example. You get the feeling the death penalty was invented in this case for monetization purposes, even if it hurt gameplay. We don't have anything like that in our microtransaction docs. Our standpoint is that players like myself simply won't play those games, so while it increases your revenue per player, it hurts your game.
https://www.therepopulation.com - Sci Fi Sandbox.
Thank you. I knew the point wouldn't be lost on everyone here.
I get so tired of the argument that F2P is for games that suck, because people won't spend money to play games they don't like. Guess what? Almost everyone who plays games won't play a game they actually don't like even if it is free. Generally speaking, if people are playing a game, it's because they like it. If a game makes enough money to keep it's doors open, regardless of which revenue model it uses, it is a successful product.
The market seems to be showing us that the model which tends to generate the most revenue per player is games which offer both a subscription option and a free option. People can argue until they are blue in the face about what is "better" for the player experience, but it seems pretty unarguable what is better for the bottom line at this point. Games which don't even have an option to sub seem, to me at least, to be categorically mid to low range games in terms of their level of features and polish. Which isn't to say that what they offer is "bad," they just tend to offer less.
Launching with a hybrid model may be the most "honest" approach, but again looking just at the numbers, the smart approach still seems to be launching as a sub only game then converting to freemium somewhere down the line.
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.
If they don't the game will not play the way it should. Player driven economy will not work properly either.
This is obviously a pointless debate as we are clearly in different parts of our own reality. I will say that neither of us are wrong, as a peace offering, and leave it at that. I don't enjoy debates where I can see your point but mine is being ignored.
Just to clarify (I can't help it, I apologize), I am not too cheap to pay more than 50 cents a day. I am just disgruntled over the fact that many games that have gone F2P cost more per month with the cash shop to get what you used to get for the standard sub fee. I'm from that era. There are a sub option in many of these games, and while it's still a good deal, it still does not include everything that it used to. This tells me they are nickel and diming *subscribers* on top of the F2P crowd. That's my personal logic and not meant to argue semantics with you. There I went and continued the conversation anyway. I have low willpower in this regard I guess.
Call it what you will, I just don't think you are understanding his argument. Why pay more now that it is "F2P" than I was paying when it was sub based? That is crux of his argument,.
Personally, I don't like F2P games in general because usually it = P2W, nickle-and-dimed for things that should be part of the basic content and that it usually ends up with a crappy community. Notice how there is nothing about being cheap in the reasons. As to this game (or any game) that is supposed to be a niche sand-box/pvp heavy game, I think F2P is a bad idea because of what it does to the in game economy (crafters get shafted) and allows for easy griefing/exploiting. Again, my opinions but they have nothing to do with being cheap. Hell: create a great sandbox game with great crafting and PvP and I'll gladly pay $50 a month. Small change for a great gaming experience.
A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true...
Very well put. Eventually, those boundaries will get crossed and then those that have actually been paying will see their investment of time and cash devalued in a vain attempt at trying to sustain revenue before the game eventually collapses and is shuttered. The model is already showing in the almost weekly announcements of game closures that while it has worked on a short term limited basis, it has no long term viability and is destined to eventually fail.
Please, give us this list of AAA games that have gone freemium and then "collapsed." I'll even start it for you. WAR. Anything else?
On the other hand, you have TOR, TSW, LotRO, DDO, STO, Rift, EQ2... the list goes on. For the most part, AAA games that go freemium have become more profitable, and show no sign of shutting down any time in the forseeable future. The only model which is being shown to have no long term viablility for new games is the model of relying solely on subscriptions for revenue.
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.