I have observed in several games that some players get attention more rapidly than others. Myself for example often get helped within a few minutes while others at the same time are waiting hours. The interesting thing is that I notice that often it makes no difference if you pay or not. Many paying players wait longer than another paying player, which suggests another reason is behind it.
Personally i often am waiting only a very short time, however I am also very detailed in my description of the problem, even when just stuck, I have therefore attributed this to the action. If you consider that a customer service person is dealing with thousands of people a day, they would prefer to just read and fix rather than tediously talk to you about what is wrong, therefore is it any surprise they pick mine over another person's?
The other concept is maybe I am just a popular guy... or not.
Well, I suppose you have to ask your self, are players more likely to be driven away if they don't get decent support when they aren't paying anything vs the 'lure" of better support if they'll only just fork over the cash.
I think most companies go for the latter, they think the promise of better support is more likely to get people to join up, and aren't worried about any they might lose otherwise.
Are they correct in their thinking? Hard to prove either way I guess.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
You get what you paid for. If the game offers better "whatever" if you support the game, so be it. Its spelled out.
Besides, the guy waits 5 minutes and isnt even paying? So what? I have payed $16/month for games and waited 20-30 minutes only to be told to email Cust Service. Its the way it is. They cant handle every thing all at once, sometimes there are lines.
If you wanted to be treated like a customer.. behave like one. That includes the piddly $5 that most feemium games charge. Even if its more, same principle.
Reminded me of those mmos that were good games, designed by people with understanding of the 'mmo' mindset needed to keep hold of players, which subsequently plummeted in subscribers when taken over by a games company used to the model of 'sell them the shiny new game we have, don't worry about too much bug fixing, development or support, just do enough to keep them quiet until the next shiny new game we can sell them comes out and we're fine'....
I agree with the article. A subscription to a freemium mmorpg shouldn't involve prioritised customer support. Why? Because a game's customer support should already be good! That's just basic customer service!
Plus, if a game is offering me prioritised customer support, I'm thinking that I'm going to need it. I don't want to need it. I want to play the game.
Personally, I've been playing MMORPGs since early UO and in my 10+ years of MMORPGs, I've used customer support twice. Prioritised customer support makes me feel like part of my monthly subscription is paying for services I don't really need. I want value for money.
Some people here don't understand the concept of customer service. A game's support should be good regardless of the player's profile. I hate to use an analogy but when we all walk into the same store, we expect the same level of customer service as the next guy, regardless of whether we're buying or browsing without intent to buy. We should be dealt with on a first come, first serve basis. It works.
If I'm treated poorly when I'm browsing, do you think I'm going to buy? If I'm treated poorly when I'm buying, will anyone else buy? No, there should be good customer service always and there should be no need to pay for it! If we're treated equally, we cannot complain. Why? First come, first serve.
My subscription fee should be buying me other things.
Some people here don't understand the concept of customer service. A game's support should be good regardless of the player's profile. I hate to use an analogy but when we all walk into the same store, we expect the same level of customer service as the next guy, regardless of whether we're buying or browsing without intent to buy. We should be dealt with on a first come, first serve basis. It works. If I'm treated poorly when I'm browsing, do you think I'm going to buy? If I'm treated poorly when I'm buying, will anyone else buy? No, there should be good customer service always and there should be no need to pay for it! If we're treated equally, we cannot complain. Why? First come, first serve. My subscription fee should be buying me other things.
Actually, that exact thing has happened to me. I was in a Brookstone (I think, I can't remember). In there, they have those recliner massaging chairs. When me and my friend walked in, someone from the store said "Don't demo the chairs, we want people who will actually buy them to demo them." And in fact, I was looking into one. I walked right out the door giving them the finger.
If you treat potential customers like crap, you get it in return. That's why every person should be treated the same, regardless of who they are. Just because I was a younger customer, and MAY NOT have been buying from them, it doesn't mean I'm not interested, and because you treat potential customers like crap, you get treated in same.
And even if I wasn't buying that chair from that store, the simple fact that they treated me like a piece of shit made me never want to enter that store again. I may not have bought that chair, but I could have bought other products that I was going to browse, but due to the rude customer service, I never will. I'd rather buy the same chair, online, for $150 in shipping than buy it from that store.
Plain and simple, when your customer service treats customers differently simply because of a certain factor, you lose business.
Maybe the stereotypical car salesmen have it all right -- Be friendly to the customer until you find out their credit score is poor XD To be serious, though, and this is my opinion, feel free to disagree, someone who pays for something in a microtransation F2P game, and gets what they payed for, shouldn't expect more. If there's a specific item relative to "better customer service" then I say you're entitled to better customer service. If you payed for an item that gives you extra XP for a few hours, you're entitled to that extra XP, but you didn't buy better customer service. You literally get what you pay for. But, in subscription games, well, if it was included in the package that you'd get better customer service, then you get it XD Why make things complicated?
But I do agree that good customer service will win converts. I would much readily spend money on a game that had such. Blizzard is a good example of this, they have one of the best support staffs in the business and it helps maintain their popularity.
NCSoft on the other hand is well known for not supporting their games with adequate support staffs, hence my reluctance to try out Aion.
*boggle*. Blizztard have 'good' customer service because they rake in a billion $$$s of your money every year lol! Not to mention the legions of volunteer muppet GMs who do it for love, not because they're on the payroll. Anyone remember how they treated paying D2 customers in the final days leading up to WoW's launch...? That's right, weve already got yer money so either fork our more you 2nd class BNet citizen or we'll mangle the game you love & have played for the last 4-5 years! Pfft!
Also, NC make great, bug free games that don't need nearly as much customer service & they don't pander to the idiotic non-PC-literate wannabe-gamers, the kind that's never played anything on a PC before, has no idea what 'mmorpg' even stands for & still logs dozens of hours a week. Like 75%+ of the WoW population lol!
I'm no hardcore gamer any longer, haven't been for years (RL can be a bitch), but what Blizz has done to the face of online gaming should have the justice dept over there raising eyebrows. And all you got for those billions was a couple pissy expansions with more of the same & another well-crafted 12-step program in the making. Wake up & smell the shit ppl!
But I'm not bitter about it, no way...
--
The 3 Bs of the PC gaming apocalypse: Blizzard, Bethesda & Bioware (among others of course). Then again, maybe I'm just a jaded old fart of a gamer who can't wait for retirement so he can play 16 hrs a day like he used to in his teens/20s.
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
The author seems to like comparing MMO’s to real life.
F2P games do mimic real life, in RL we have a lot of people working, these are the ones paying for RL if you will. We have a lot of kids, students and unemployed who are not contributing to the engine of society. But they may one day contribute, or have in the past.
These people and players deserve a fair service from society but do they deserve the same level of service as someone who is powering the engine that feeds and clothes us? This is where people start to split based on political and moral ethos about how society should be run and what all people/players deserve.
My point to you is that it is purely a set of choices as to what those who don’t contribute deserve. There is no right or wrong, no clear cut set of human or player rights, we as a society or forum community create what we think people or players deserve.
Do people deserve free health care in the US? That’s a hot topic for you over the pond at the moment. But take a step back, try to see the wider picture that society frames these questions in. You don’t deserve a free health service, and neither do you not deserve one, it is a choice, which the US is now making. Your answer to this question, much like your answer to whether paying customers should be in the front of the service queue, reflects your moral and political stand point more than a detailed analyses of the issue at hand.
For me the answer to these questions is quite simple. We as a society, or a company running a MMO can afford to be socially fair up to a point. Any burden we put on the engine that runs society it a detriment to its smooth running and you won’t know exactly how much fairness will cost in the future. The real problem is that fairness always seems to end up as an inalienable right, one which cannot be turned back no matter how much it later costs the economy or MMO revenue. In the UK currently, even though we need to make drasttic public service cuts the NHS has been 'ring-fenced'. This is the danger of seeing fairness as a right, rather than a choice.
Oh and as a person who is part of GB’s NHS system I still have to pay for the odd micro transaction like dental fees. But I worked out that it would be six times as expensive to get the work done privately. So as you can see, the concept of a free health service is as blurred as the concept of free customer support in a F2P game.
Not to sound callous, I do agree with the idea that paying players should be afforded better service. That reason alone is why people who can afford it stay at the Wynn in Las Vegas rather than Circus Circus, you pay for better treatment.
That pretty much sums it up...
I agree with this but there are exceptions. Being stuck is one.
In CO i manged to get stuck in the map and /stuck didnt work if they left me hanging for a hour and it it was freemium that would be a lost costomer and a rant on my blog. But fives minutes? Hell i get stuck for half a hour in p2p
That said becamse CO lets you switch shards but it boots you back to the loading in point i was able to unstick myself, but not all games let you switch shards on the fly.
If the game is so poorly written that I can get stuck something is wrong with the game. No "/stuck" or way to go back to where I started, my next question is why am I beta testing this game?
To me a game (reguardless of type) is just a piece of software. If it does not work I report bugs, as I see it the issue the freetard was complaining about was a bug. The fact he needed a GM is distrubing and tell me that is not a game I would play for long unless paid to beta test it. I don't want to have to use support, ever. I want the tools to get myself out of the situation and a build in help feature.
At first I thought you were going somewhere when you brought up the analogy of the theme park. Something about all individuals regardless of weather they were allowed entrance for free or had to pay for it, getting the same rights. Then I thought about it and aside from the basic sanitary and safety issues nothing in a theme park is the same for a paying customer and a free customer. There is such a thing on theme parks like Six Flag and others that allows fast pass costumers to cut in line right to the entrance of the ride no matter how long that line may be. The fact is that paying customers will always get the better treatment no matter how much "potential" spending may reside with the free customers. I don't see any of these game companies doing anything different with their games then Six Flags and other theme parks do with their customers. When you play or enter such a game/park you agree to certain neglect and discrimination depending if you are paying for it or if it is free.
When you enter Six Flags you know very well that you will have to wait in long lines for certain rides and that others with fast passes will cut in front of you laughing and playing with their friends. They pretty much shoving it in your face, and while you may not like it, you know that you have that option and you just choose not to take it, so you have to deal with the rest that comes with it. That is the difference between a paying and a potentially paying customer.
Personally I think it really depends on the buisness of model of the game and the community of the game. Personally I play RO right now which added a free server awhile back. Paying users have access to all the servers, premium servers have higher exp/drop rates and are relatively bot free due to the need to pay for access. Thing is though that RO also has a microtransaction shop where you can buy various items. Both free and paying users make good use of this so they have the same "potential" income while the paying users also have the definite income. So when it comes to who should get support first, in the case of this game in particular, each premium user is worth more then each free user. While of course there are free users who spend rediculous amounts on the item shop, there are also premium users that do as well.
That said there are also games where "paying" users have no reason to use the microtransaction features because they get most of the bonuses by paying the "subscription". In most of those ames the free users actually make the company more then the "paying" users so why should the paying users have any kind of special treatment.
It's different for every game imo and there's no real right or wrong way to do it.
The player mentioned is an idiot. A 5 min wait and he cries? He should quit then. He was too stupid to get that in a free to play or even a pay to play game GMs don't exist in a vaccum. They are helping other people too. The punchline to this article doesnt make much sense. It doesn't matter if he was paying or not. You do not have your own personal GM to help you whenever you need it. The player is stupid. If he was paying to play or not is beside the point. It takes time to get help in an MMO. Deal with it or quit.
Free players are like for any other place of business an open house, pull the welcome mat, let them look around, ask question, try the rides. Staff be in your best behaviour, you are part of the sale effort, after all they are potential customer.
Anyone remember that one, because that is why the free trail is all about.
The main point is: There is already a line. You can let down a paying customer or non-paying. Why in the world would you let down the guy who's ALREADY paying? So tomorrow the other guy starts paying and next week he gets pissed off when someone give preference to a free player?
As in the park example,is the park public?I mean,your city pays for it?if so,you're a paying customer with your taxes. If not,why in the world would the people own you anything in that park? They don't NEED neither SHOULD fix it for you. It belongs to someone else who is letting you play. Same on the mmorpg here. You can use the non-paid content as a trial,but that's it. You knew that from the beggining when downloaded and installed the game. You don't pay taxes for that game,you're not the publisher's best friend. You're a potential customer,and that's it. I played Voyage century as a full customer,and quit after i asked myself: I'm paying and i'm not seeing any upogrades in this game. No bug fixes,nothing. Now,if aside all that,the customer service let me down EVEN IF I'M PAYING...Man,i would be pissed off. Real bad. Of course,no problem waiting 50 minutes. Imagine 5 minutes. BTW,good luck losing your client to a paying wannabe that cries when don't get support after 5 minutes
The main point is: There is already a line. You can let down a paying customer or non-paying.
And just like I pointed out before... In Vegas there are different lines to check in, cash in chips all types of lines. There is a VIP line that gets you serviced right away, and the line everyone else has to use which usually takes 5-10 minutes. If you spend enough money, you get to become a VIP...nothing wrong with that ideology.
I would have to say that I agree with the editorial. Customer Service is the face of your company: the image that you wish to convey outside of your product. If you have a high-quality product that does not have faults, then perhaps a higher-level of customer service is required. Unfortunately, most MMOs are generally not well-tested products. Furthermore ANYTHING can break, no matter well built. It ends up a simple case of let the buyer beware. No matter how pretty the purchase is, if it's going to not work, and there's no way to fix it, then any wise person will not purchase.
In this case, without basic customer service to ensure a quality product, there's less of a need to really fix problems that plague the entirety of a playerbase. Consider this: most people paying for good customer service already like the game. You aren't paying for anything, in reality, and many problems that are inherent in the game will most likely, be ignored. This is counter productive to developing a good, high quality product. I cannot trust a company that refuses to service it's customers, regardless of the excuse. I will never give a company that does this money.
As far as premium-versus-basic customer service, it's vital that the differences between the two must be spelled out. Expected wait time for both premium and basic customers, for instance. The quality of this service should be blind, with only the priority being purchased, so that customers are more apt to purchase a better service feature. 'Hey! If I pay $10 a month, I don't have to wait an hour more for assistance' is certainly a viable option, but 'You can't request any help or include any comments if you don't' is not only poor service, but a detriment to the company.
In conclusion, free is free, yes, but to provide such a limited face for a company puts a spotlight on it. It brings into question the ethical characteristics of the business, as well as their financial model and brings to question whether the company actually cares about clients, or the client's money. While it can't be argued that a company wishes to make money, it can be argued on whether or not it does so with consideration towards it's clients, free or otherwise, and whether or not the product is worth the cost. Since they are selling something that should be free to consumers, the company's own image, the real question is..
As far as premium-versus-basic customer service, it's vital that the differences between the two must be spelled out. Expected wait time for both premium and basic customers, for instance. The quality of this service should be blind, with only the priority being purchased, so that customers are more apt to purchase a better service feature. 'Hey! If I pay $10 a month, I don't have to wait an hour more for assistance' is certainly a viable option, but 'You can't request any help or include any comments if you don't' is not only poor service, but a detriment to the company.
Were that it were so/true Khorax. Most mmo trials are crippled in some way, for example. Either limited levels, grouping, chat/email usage, trading or other key features, generally make you feel like a 2nd class citizen until you decide to cough up. Not really the best way to get a potential customer onside. CoH was a classic example which I've played for many years & decided to start 2 new trial accounts with my wife recently to give her a go see if she liked it. We couldn't even make a team ourselves or see the new architect missions, big bleh, no subs, good going NCSoft! (yes, I know they do it to prevent spammers/farmers in some cases, but really, that's just a lazy-arse excuse not to have to police these violations more stringently)
F2p mmos are starting to do this as a kind of reverse discrimination, by giving you the minimum or base set of features & then trying to suck you into micro-transactions for the really nice 'extra' features, a lot of which are fast becoming less & less 'extra' & more & more 'must have', especially if you want to be competitive in the PvP arena (not my cuppa thankfully).
So, bottom line, treat us potential customer like gold (at least as good as existing ones) & we may give you some of our hard earnt money. If anything, we are the fresh set of eyes on your cash cow, which you may not get from your devs or regular subs who only have an inside perspective & may not always see the forest for the trees. We are also much better word-of-mouth initially than the die-hards, as our enthusiasm comes across as just that - a newb's fresh perspective, even if we may only pay to play for a month or two, not an addict's high-end/raid content views. Who would listen to more if you were just thinking about starting out a new mmo - the relative newcomer who's played for a week or two, or someone who's made it a major part of their life for years...?
I know which is more relevant to me as a newbie & I don't want to hear about crippleware issues & someone not being able to get superior customer service (among other features being unusable), just because they're part of a free trial or not shelling out the big bucks in a f2p mmo. That leaves a sour taste in your mouth before you even start, no matter how good the experience is after that. And as far as mid-high level content goes, I'll make up my own mind by then what it means & how important it is to me. Nuff said?
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
I know which is more relevant to me as a newbie & I don't want to hear about crippleware issues & someone not being able to get superior customer service (among other features being unusable), just because they're part of a free trial or not shelling out the big bucks in a f2p mmo. That leaves a sour taste in your mouth before you even start, no matter how good the experience is after that. And as far as mid-high level content goes, I'll make up my own mind by then what it means & how important it is to me. Nuff said?
I agree 90% with that. The statement I made was a concession. If they were so hard-up on premium customer service, then it's important that people know what they are paying for.. or not paying for as it were. In many cases with 'free' services, the company keeps many of the details vague until the person is playing the game. This comes across as being dishonest and is a little unfair to the player, whom wants to see where his dollar is going. Yes, this will cause some people to turn away, but they'll certainly not stick around once they really find out from the game itself.
I know which is more relevant to me as a newbie & I don't want to hear about crippleware issues & someone not being able to get superior customer service (among other features being unusable), just because they're part of a free trial or not shelling out the big bucks in a f2p mmo. That leaves a sour taste in your mouth before you even start, no matter how good the experience is after that. And as far as mid-high level content goes, I'll make up my own mind by then what it means & how important it is to me. Nuff said?
I agree 90% with that. The statement I made was a concession. If they were so hard-up on premium customer service, then it's important that people know what they are paying for.. or not paying for as it were. In many cases with 'free' services, the company keeps many of the details vague until the person is playing the game. This comes across as being dishonest and is a little unfair to the player, whom wants to see where his dollar is going. Yes, this will cause some people to turn away, but they'll certainly not stick around once they really find out from the game itself.
I hear ya dude. It's an odd industry. In any other one the prospective customer would be getting showered with even better deals/offers than regular customers, just to come join the party. Oh well, I guess $0-15/mth really isn't worth any more than $15/mth lol!
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
The reason treating potential customers as good or even better than paying customers is there is no incentive to actually become a customer. If you can get everything for free, there is no incentive to pay. Some of you may boast that YOU would certainly be willing to support and pay and blah blah blah but the reality is that 99.99% would not.
Subscription or micro-transactions or some other form, the company has to gather money for their efforts or they cannot stay in business and we will get no new games.
As I have heard my grandparents generations say: "Why buy the cow when the milk is free?"
Lack of customer service for free members and plentiful for premium members somewhat encourages people to pay for the service. If you let free members get excellent customer support you are lessening the gap between premium and free members making free members unwilling to pay because they are satisfied with what they get and premium members wondering if they got their money's worth and believing their money is being spent to help these free people.
Also the difference between paying $50 in the cable analogy and paying $200 is far different than free and $15. If you cater to the free crowd you are catering to 12 yr old kids without access to their mothers credit card. There are probably 100 players to each paying customer and only 10 of those will even think of spending money. At least if they are paying $50 the company has something to lose and there is $500 vs $200 (5:2) ratio but when someone is paying $0, there could be 1,000,000 customers but the paying ones come first. Appeasing free customers and getting them to try your game is called Advertising, it's too expensive in most cases to do that through 1on1 customer support.
Great article, i will add free players bring a whole lot more to the table than just potential sales and thus their value to the company should not be measured only in terms of revenue.
Just to make things clear... I speak for myself and no one else, unless i state otherwise mine is just an opinion. A fact is something that can be independently verified, you may challenge such but with proof. You have every right to disagree with me through sound argument, i believe in constructive debate, but baseless aggression will warrant an unkind response.
Keep your Free Games in those....................other countrys, or go to there servers to play them. For me if the devs would like my money, make it P2P.
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.
Comments
I have observed in several games that some players get attention more rapidly than others. Myself for example often get helped within a few minutes while others at the same time are waiting hours. The interesting thing is that I notice that often it makes no difference if you pay or not. Many paying players wait longer than another paying player, which suggests another reason is behind it.
Personally i often am waiting only a very short time, however I am also very detailed in my description of the problem, even when just stuck, I have therefore attributed this to the action. If you consider that a customer service person is dealing with thousands of people a day, they would prefer to just read and fix rather than tediously talk to you about what is wrong, therefore is it any surprise they pick mine over another person's?
The other concept is maybe I am just a popular guy... or not.
Well, I suppose you have to ask your self, are players more likely to be driven away if they don't get decent support when they aren't paying anything vs the 'lure" of better support if they'll only just fork over the cash.
I think most companies go for the latter, they think the promise of better support is more likely to get people to join up, and aren't worried about any they might lose otherwise.
Are they correct in their thinking? Hard to prove either way I guess.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Oh please.
You get what you paid for. If the game offers better "whatever" if you support the game, so be it. Its spelled out.
Besides, the guy waits 5 minutes and isnt even paying? So what? I have payed $16/month for games and waited 20-30 minutes only to be told to email Cust Service. Its the way it is. They cant handle every thing all at once, sometimes there are lines.
If you wanted to be treated like a customer.. behave like one. That includes the piddly $5 that most feemium games charge. Even if its more, same principle.
Interesting...
Reminded me of those mmos that were good games, designed by people with understanding of the 'mmo' mindset needed to keep hold of players, which subsequently plummeted in subscribers when taken over by a games company used to the model of 'sell them the shiny new game we have, don't worry about too much bug fixing, development or support, just do enough to keep them quiet until the next shiny new game we can sell them comes out and we're fine'....
I agree with the article. A subscription to a freemium mmorpg shouldn't involve prioritised customer support. Why? Because a game's customer support should already be good! That's just basic customer service!
Plus, if a game is offering me prioritised customer support, I'm thinking that I'm going to need it. I don't want to need it. I want to play the game.
Personally, I've been playing MMORPGs since early UO and in my 10+ years of MMORPGs, I've used customer support twice. Prioritised customer support makes me feel like part of my monthly subscription is paying for services I don't really need. I want value for money.
Some people here don't understand the concept of customer service. A game's support should be good regardless of the player's profile. I hate to use an analogy but when we all walk into the same store, we expect the same level of customer service as the next guy, regardless of whether we're buying or browsing without intent to buy. We should be dealt with on a first come, first serve basis. It works.
If I'm treated poorly when I'm browsing, do you think I'm going to buy? If I'm treated poorly when I'm buying, will anyone else buy? No, there should be good customer service always and there should be no need to pay for it! If we're treated equally, we cannot complain. Why? First come, first serve.
My subscription fee should be buying me other things.
Actually, that exact thing has happened to me. I was in a Brookstone (I think, I can't remember). In there, they have those recliner massaging chairs. When me and my friend walked in, someone from the store said "Don't demo the chairs, we want people who will actually buy them to demo them." And in fact, I was looking into one. I walked right out the door giving them the finger.
If you treat potential customers like crap, you get it in return. That's why every person should be treated the same, regardless of who they are. Just because I was a younger customer, and MAY NOT have been buying from them, it doesn't mean I'm not interested, and because you treat potential customers like crap, you get treated in same.
And even if I wasn't buying that chair from that store, the simple fact that they treated me like a piece of shit made me never want to enter that store again. I may not have bought that chair, but I could have bought other products that I was going to browse, but due to the rude customer service, I never will. I'd rather buy the same chair, online, for $150 in shipping than buy it from that store.
Plain and simple, when your customer service treats customers differently simply because of a certain factor, you lose business.
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This is but a brief parting.
Maybe the stereotypical car salesmen have it all right -- Be friendly to the customer until you find out their credit score is poor XD To be serious, though, and this is my opinion, feel free to disagree, someone who pays for something in a microtransation F2P game, and gets what they payed for, shouldn't expect more. If there's a specific item relative to "better customer service" then I say you're entitled to better customer service. If you payed for an item that gives you extra XP for a few hours, you're entitled to that extra XP, but you didn't buy better customer service. You literally get what you pay for. But, in subscription games, well, if it was included in the package that you'd get better customer service, then you get it XD Why make things complicated?
*boggle*. Blizztard have 'good' customer service because they rake in a billion $$$s of your money every year lol! Not to mention the legions of volunteer muppet GMs who do it for love, not because they're on the payroll. Anyone remember how they treated paying D2 customers in the final days leading up to WoW's launch...? That's right, weve already got yer money so either fork our more you 2nd class BNet citizen or we'll mangle the game you love & have played for the last 4-5 years! Pfft!
Also, NC make great, bug free games that don't need nearly as much customer service & they don't pander to the idiotic non-PC-literate wannabe-gamers, the kind that's never played anything on a PC before, has no idea what 'mmorpg' even stands for & still logs dozens of hours a week. Like 75%+ of the WoW population lol!
I'm no hardcore gamer any longer, haven't been for years (RL can be a bitch), but what Blizz has done to the face of online gaming should have the justice dept over there raising eyebrows. And all you got for those billions was a couple pissy expansions with more of the same & another well-crafted 12-step program in the making. Wake up & smell the shit ppl!
But I'm not bitter about it, no way...
--
The 3 Bs of the PC gaming apocalypse: Blizzard, Bethesda & Bioware (among others of course). Then again, maybe I'm just a jaded old fart of a gamer who can't wait for retirement so he can play 16 hrs a day like he used to in his teens/20s.
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
The author seems to like comparing MMO’s to real life.
F2P games do mimic real life, in RL we have a lot of people working, these are the ones paying for RL if you will. We have a lot of kids, students and unemployed who are not contributing to the engine of society. But they may one day contribute, or have in the past.
These people and players deserve a fair service from society but do they deserve the same level of service as someone who is powering the engine that feeds and clothes us? This is where people start to split based on political and moral ethos about how society should be run and what all people/players deserve.
My point to you is that it is purely a set of choices as to what those who don’t contribute deserve. There is no right or wrong, no clear cut set of human or player rights, we as a society or forum community create what we think people or players deserve.
Do people deserve free health care in the US? That’s a hot topic for you over the pond at the moment. But take a step back, try to see the wider picture that society frames these questions in. You don’t deserve a free health service, and neither do you not deserve one, it is a choice, which the US is now making. Your answer to this question, much like your answer to whether paying customers should be in the front of the service queue, reflects your moral and political stand point more than a detailed analyses of the issue at hand.
For me the answer to these questions is quite simple. We as a society, or a company running a MMO can afford to be socially fair up to a point. Any burden we put on the engine that runs society it a detriment to its smooth running and you won’t know exactly how much fairness will cost in the future. The real problem is that fairness always seems to end up as an inalienable right, one which cannot be turned back no matter how much it later costs the economy or MMO revenue. In the UK currently, even though we need to make drasttic public service cuts the NHS has been 'ring-fenced'. This is the danger of seeing fairness as a right, rather than a choice.
Oh and as a person who is part of GB’s NHS system I still have to pay for the odd micro transaction like dental fees. But I worked out that it would be six times as expensive to get the work done privately. So as you can see, the concept of a free health service is as blurred as the concept of free customer support in a F2P game.
My solution...play a subscription game.
That pretty much sums it up...
I agree with this but there are exceptions. Being stuck is one.
In CO i manged to get stuck in the map and /stuck didnt work if they left me hanging for a hour and it it was freemium that would be a lost costomer and a rant on my blog. But fives minutes? Hell i get stuck for half a hour in p2p
That said becamse CO lets you switch shards but it boots you back to the loading in point i was able to unstick myself, but not all games let you switch shards on the fly.
If the game is so poorly written that I can get stuck something is wrong with the game. No "/stuck" or way to go back to where I started, my next question is why am I beta testing this game?
To me a game (reguardless of type) is just a piece of software. If it does not work I report bugs, as I see it the issue the freetard was complaining about was a bug. The fact he needed a GM is distrubing and tell me that is not a game I would play for long unless paid to beta test it. I don't want to have to use support, ever. I want the tools to get myself out of the situation and a build in help feature.
At first I thought you were going somewhere when you brought up the analogy of the theme park. Something about all individuals regardless of weather they were allowed entrance for free or had to pay for it, getting the same rights. Then I thought about it and aside from the basic sanitary and safety issues nothing in a theme park is the same for a paying customer and a free customer. There is such a thing on theme parks like Six Flag and others that allows fast pass costumers to cut in line right to the entrance of the ride no matter how long that line may be. The fact is that paying customers will always get the better treatment no matter how much "potential" spending may reside with the free customers. I don't see any of these game companies doing anything different with their games then Six Flags and other theme parks do with their customers. When you play or enter such a game/park you agree to certain neglect and discrimination depending if you are paying for it or if it is free.
When you enter Six Flags you know very well that you will have to wait in long lines for certain rides and that others with fast passes will cut in front of you laughing and playing with their friends. They pretty much shoving it in your face, and while you may not like it, you know that you have that option and you just choose not to take it, so you have to deal with the rest that comes with it. That is the difference between a paying and a potentially paying customer.
Simple as that.
Personally I think it really depends on the buisness of model of the game and the community of the game. Personally I play RO right now which added a free server awhile back. Paying users have access to all the servers, premium servers have higher exp/drop rates and are relatively bot free due to the need to pay for access. Thing is though that RO also has a microtransaction shop where you can buy various items. Both free and paying users make good use of this so they have the same "potential" income while the paying users also have the definite income. So when it comes to who should get support first, in the case of this game in particular, each premium user is worth more then each free user. While of course there are free users who spend rediculous amounts on the item shop, there are also premium users that do as well.
That said there are also games where "paying" users have no reason to use the microtransaction features because they get most of the bonuses by paying the "subscription". In most of those ames the free users actually make the company more then the "paying" users so why should the paying users have any kind of special treatment.
It's different for every game imo and there's no real right or wrong way to do it.
The player mentioned is an idiot. A 5 min wait and he cries? He should quit then. He was too stupid to get that in a free to play or even a pay to play game GMs don't exist in a vaccum. They are helping other people too. The punchline to this article doesnt make much sense. It doesn't matter if he was paying or not. You do not have your own personal GM to help you whenever you need it. The player is stupid. If he was paying to play or not is beside the point. It takes time to get help in an MMO. Deal with it or quit.
Free players are like for any other place of business an open house, pull the welcome mat, let them look around, ask question, try the rides. Staff be in your best behaviour, you are part of the sale effort, after all they are potential customer.
Anyone remember that one, because that is why the free trail is all about.
The main point is: There is already a line. You can let down a paying customer or non-paying. Why in the world would you let down the guy who's ALREADY paying? So tomorrow the other guy starts paying and next week he gets pissed off when someone give preference to a free player?
As in the park example,is the park public?I mean,your city pays for it?if so,you're a paying customer with your taxes. If not,why in the world would the people own you anything in that park? They don't NEED neither SHOULD fix it for you. It belongs to someone else who is letting you play. Same on the mmorpg here. You can use the non-paid content as a trial,but that's it. You knew that from the beggining when downloaded and installed the game. You don't pay taxes for that game,you're not the publisher's best friend. You're a potential customer,and that's it. I played Voyage century as a full customer,and quit after i asked myself: I'm paying and i'm not seeing any upogrades in this game. No bug fixes,nothing. Now,if aside all that,the customer service let me down EVEN IF I'M PAYING...Man,i would be pissed off. Real bad. Of course,no problem waiting 50 minutes. Imagine 5 minutes. BTW,good luck losing your client to a paying wannabe that cries when don't get support after 5 minutes
And just like I pointed out before... In Vegas there are different lines to check in, cash in chips all types of lines. There is a VIP line that gets you serviced right away, and the line everyone else has to use which usually takes 5-10 minutes. If you spend enough money, you get to become a VIP...nothing wrong with that ideology.
Customer service.. a tricky, tricky subject.
I would have to say that I agree with the editorial. Customer Service is the face of your company: the image that you wish to convey outside of your product. If you have a high-quality product that does not have faults, then perhaps a higher-level of customer service is required. Unfortunately, most MMOs are generally not well-tested products. Furthermore ANYTHING can break, no matter well built. It ends up a simple case of let the buyer beware. No matter how pretty the purchase is, if it's going to not work, and there's no way to fix it, then any wise person will not purchase.
In this case, without basic customer service to ensure a quality product, there's less of a need to really fix problems that plague the entirety of a playerbase. Consider this: most people paying for good customer service already like the game. You aren't paying for anything, in reality, and many problems that are inherent in the game will most likely, be ignored. This is counter productive to developing a good, high quality product. I cannot trust a company that refuses to service it's customers, regardless of the excuse. I will never give a company that does this money.
As far as premium-versus-basic customer service, it's vital that the differences between the two must be spelled out. Expected wait time for both premium and basic customers, for instance. The quality of this service should be blind, with only the priority being purchased, so that customers are more apt to purchase a better service feature. 'Hey! If I pay $10 a month, I don't have to wait an hour more for assistance' is certainly a viable option, but 'You can't request any help or include any comments if you don't' is not only poor service, but a detriment to the company.
In conclusion, free is free, yes, but to provide such a limited face for a company puts a spotlight on it. It brings into question the ethical characteristics of the business, as well as their financial model and brings to question whether the company actually cares about clients, or the client's money. While it can't be argued that a company wishes to make money, it can be argued on whether or not it does so with consideration towards it's clients, free or otherwise, and whether or not the product is worth the cost. Since they are selling something that should be free to consumers, the company's own image, the real question is..
Just how much does it really cost them?
Were that it were so/true Khorax. Most mmo trials are crippled in some way, for example. Either limited levels, grouping, chat/email usage, trading or other key features, generally make you feel like a 2nd class citizen until you decide to cough up. Not really the best way to get a potential customer onside. CoH was a classic example which I've played for many years & decided to start 2 new trial accounts with my wife recently to give her a go see if she liked it. We couldn't even make a team ourselves or see the new architect missions, big bleh, no subs, good going NCSoft! (yes, I know they do it to prevent spammers/farmers in some cases, but really, that's just a lazy-arse excuse not to have to police these violations more stringently)
F2p mmos are starting to do this as a kind of reverse discrimination, by giving you the minimum or base set of features & then trying to suck you into micro-transactions for the really nice 'extra' features, a lot of which are fast becoming less & less 'extra' & more & more 'must have', especially if you want to be competitive in the PvP arena (not my cuppa thankfully).
So, bottom line, treat us potential customer like gold (at least as good as existing ones) & we may give you some of our hard earnt money. If anything, we are the fresh set of eyes on your cash cow, which you may not get from your devs or regular subs who only have an inside perspective & may not always see the forest for the trees. We are also much better word-of-mouth initially than the die-hards, as our enthusiasm comes across as just that - a newb's fresh perspective, even if we may only pay to play for a month or two, not an addict's high-end/raid content views. Who would listen to more if you were just thinking about starting out a new mmo - the relative newcomer who's played for a week or two, or someone who's made it a major part of their life for years...?
I know which is more relevant to me as a newbie & I don't want to hear about crippleware issues & someone not being able to get superior customer service (among other features being unusable), just because they're part of a free trial or not shelling out the big bucks in a f2p mmo. That leaves a sour taste in your mouth before you even start, no matter how good the experience is after that. And as far as mid-high level content goes, I'll make up my own mind by then what it means & how important it is to me. Nuff said?
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
I agree 90% with that. The statement I made was a concession. If they were so hard-up on premium customer service, then it's important that people know what they are paying for.. or not paying for as it were. In many cases with 'free' services, the company keeps many of the details vague until the person is playing the game. This comes across as being dishonest and is a little unfair to the player, whom wants to see where his dollar is going. Yes, this will cause some people to turn away, but they'll certainly not stick around once they really find out from the game itself.
I agree 90% with that. The statement I made was a concession. If they were so hard-up on premium customer service, then it's important that people know what they are paying for.. or not paying for as it were. In many cases with 'free' services, the company keeps many of the details vague until the person is playing the game. This comes across as being dishonest and is a little unfair to the player, whom wants to see where his dollar is going. Yes, this will cause some people to turn away, but they'll certainly not stick around once they really find out from the game itself.
I hear ya dude. It's an odd industry. In any other one the prospective customer would be getting showered with even better deals/offers than regular customers, just to come join the party. Oh well, I guess $0-15/mth really isn't worth any more than $15/mth lol!
They say that right before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That's true, even for a blind man. ^DareDevil^
The reason treating potential customers as good or even better than paying customers is there is no incentive to actually become a customer. If you can get everything for free, there is no incentive to pay. Some of you may boast that YOU would certainly be willing to support and pay and blah blah blah but the reality is that 99.99% would not.
Subscription or micro-transactions or some other form, the company has to gather money for their efforts or they cannot stay in business and we will get no new games.
As I have heard my grandparents generations say: "Why buy the cow when the milk is free?"
Some people in this thread got it spot on.
Lack of customer service for free members and plentiful for premium members somewhat encourages people to pay for the service. If you let free members get excellent customer support you are lessening the gap between premium and free members making free members unwilling to pay because they are satisfied with what they get and premium members wondering if they got their money's worth and believing their money is being spent to help these free people.
Also the difference between paying $50 in the cable analogy and paying $200 is far different than free and $15. If you cater to the free crowd you are catering to 12 yr old kids without access to their mothers credit card. There are probably 100 players to each paying customer and only 10 of those will even think of spending money. At least if they are paying $50 the company has something to lose and there is $500 vs $200 (5:2) ratio but when someone is paying $0, there could be 1,000,000 customers but the paying ones come first. Appeasing free customers and getting them to try your game is called Advertising, it's too expensive in most cases to do that through 1on1 customer support.
Great article, i will add free players bring a whole lot more to the table than just potential sales and thus their value to the company should not be measured only in terms of revenue.
Just to make things clear...
I speak for myself and no one else, unless i state otherwise mine is just an opinion. A fact is something that can be independently verified, you may challenge such but with proof. You have every right to disagree with me through sound argument, i believe in constructive debate, but baseless aggression will warrant an unkind response.
LOL
Keep your Free Games in those....................other countrys, or go to there servers to play them. For me if the devs would like my money, make it P2P.
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.