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General: Free Zone: An Intriguing Year for F2P
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
MMORPG.com Free Zone Columnist Richard Aihoshi writes this look back at the year 2009 from the perspective of the Free 2 Play side of the MMO business.
With 2009 winding down, it seems only natural to look back at some notable things that have happened in the free to play space since the beginning of the year. Of course, since the topics I've chosen to discuss - note that they're in no particular order - represent a completely personal, non-comprehensive selection, it's a dead certainty other people's lists will differ, quite significantly in some cases.
In this respect, I'm not expecting or aiming for any form of consensus. I look forward to seeing some very interesting and well thought out comments, whether they align closely with mine or not at all.
Continued growth despite the harsh economy
It's abundantly clear that F2P's market share is still growing, although due to the scarcity of empirical data, it's hard to gauge how quickly. My main focus here is dollars, not the grossly inflated and thus essentially useless registrant counts put out by publishers, or the incessantly increasing number of titles.
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
There really is a lot going on with the MMO industry right now, whether we realize it or not. I myself have been largely uninformed of the prominence of F2P games and the Asian market. I'm learning a great deal now, though, and I look forward to seeing more development as time moves on and the industry progresses.
Personally I think Allods online looks the most amazing mmo to be coming out soon from the F2P market, hell it looks better than most P2P mmo's.
The biggest question I have though, and this pertains to the entire industry, not just F2P, is are we going to keep see games built on flashy features, or games that have a solid foundation of built-in mechanics (combat, story/lore, economy, items, skills, etc.). The lack of one or many of these things is a recurring theme I've been seeing lately. They've just felt... hollow.
I don't understand how the F2P stuf continues to grow, most folks I know say they hate the business modle. However there sure seams to be a lot of it going on.
I for one am not into all the strange f2p stuff with the strange graphics and animations that look worse than wow characters.
Oh well like I said somebody must be having fun with them, just not me.
I spent two years playing the non-instanced game Bounty bay Online. It took an act of God to fight any on the high level drop Mobs. Players would camp on them for days, sometime teams would switch off on a popular Boss. That got old fast. Now I am playing DDO and love the instanced quests. No longer do you have a collection of The Lord of the Flies following your party around, just to jump you after you cleared out everything but the final reward, forcing you to PvP just to finish the Quest.
I just wish there was a Free to Play game that didn't suck. I have played quite a number of them, but they are mostly terrible games. I would be inclined to maybe spend some money and buy a few things if the gameplay itself on some of these games were decent. I tried Free Realms and it is a cute game, but it really doesn't hold my interest as I'm almost 40 yrs old. I have played games like Perfect World and that game was just a huge grindfest and later levels you HAD to have things from their cash shop to continue. Make a Fp2 game that has a good concept, good gameplay, and the things they want to see are not required to keep playing, but rather are things one can buy for purely looks.
As my experience F2Ps are ( its easy to find some of my point in any F2P ) :
-Funny looking cute Asian style games... ( personally hate it )
-grind grind grind.. and grind same looking mobs all over. ( why ? its easy to drop lots of mobs every where )
- Customer service problems
-If I'm gonna play it , it gonna cost me more than a P2P game
-Paying players getting the feeling of the wolf in F2P games.
-Community problems ( random trolls and kids every where )
-Anime and hentai design style ( give me a break ...)
-Usually no a deep design and lore with many content
-the worst it gets the more it has more PVP options..
-damn korean market
-Its the best for bimbo player and care bears or kids around 10-17 yrs old .
If you keep telling people the Emperors cloths are cloth of gold I am sure some people will believe it, I am not so sure however. Let us look at the 'facts' Mr Aihoshi presents:
“It's abundantly clear that F2P's market share is still growing, although due to the scarcity of empirical data, it's hard to gauge how quickly.”
This Means: There is no reliable empirical data, but I know its happening.
“We also tend to discount how many people around the world play F2P games. I haven't seen any recent figures I'd be confident quoting, but whatever the actual number may be, it's huge.”
This Means: I have seen no recent figures but somehow I can tell you player numbers are huge.
“Continued growth despite limited visibility”
This means: You can’t see what’s going on, but I know it is going on.
“was budgeted at $12 million. There are others in the same ballpark, just without specific amounts stated for them.”
This Means: I don’t have a clue what their budgets were but I am going hide that by using the word ballpark.
Its a big probability that DDO:U was a last nail in coffin of P2P MMO games.
One thing MMO developers allready understood is that WOW playerbase is untouchable. And when WOW player leaves he does not leave WOW, he leaves the genre completely.
Rest are faced with 2 alternatives - either go with rest of not very good P2P games , or go with same quality game F2P.
Solution is very simple.
All in all. Only game 2010 that can maybe ask for subscription is SWTOR. Rest should learn from DDO or perish
The gaming market overall is extremely dynamic right now. The winds of the economie and sudden technology jumps are twisting everything. Stability is the last word I would use in today's gaming industry hehe.
I'm very curious to see what recipe will win the current race. Specially with Allods that according to the early comments; appears to be a killer game. We might start seeing some extremely well polished F2P MMOs in the next few years.
F2P represents the ultimate gaming experience with no strings attached.
- It's technically Free
- Since it has no monthly fee, who cares if you only play 1 hour a week
- All your friends and clan can play with you, they just need to download the game
- You pay for the features you really want (not exactly working like that yet though...)
If someone does it really right, he can completely swallow a market. Many have found clever solutions but no one has really found the ultimate customer trap yet.
I cannot help but wonder if Turbine's splitting their Siege of Mirkwood expansion into two products is an experiment in--well, not microtransaction--let's call it megatransaction. One product included the actual content update: the new Mirkwood zone, etc. The other product (adventurer's pack) included a number of features that people used to F2P games expect to see in cash shops: a mount, shared bank space, extra character slots, etc.
Because of their marketing (they essentially gave SoM away for free to subscribers and a reduced price on the "Pack") they could feel confident their player base would chip in extra money.
Of course, a lot of people are saying the amount of material provided (even with both products) isn't enough to justify the $50 of most expansions, so Turbine could have just been honest about their pricing.
Still, Turbine sent out a lot of surveys last year about F2P and micro-transactions...
Perhaps more of a hybrid mode is in the offering. Subscription games with large 'packages' of what would normally be seen in cash shops.
-w
I think any growth we see in F2P MMO games in the west is directly proportionate to the general decline of MMO games. DDO and Chronicles of Spellborn are good examples - games that can't stand up as subscription games have to settle with the less appealing F2P business model. The worse the market gets for MMO games, the more F2P games we will see.
You are correct that Richard didnt really give any solid figures. This is clearly a 'from the hip' editorial, put out before vacation. However, lets throw some names out that we CAN identify.
New to the F2P market (and fresh from P2P) this year are DDO and WAR. Clearly this is a change in the market, and these are big names (in the west). I am sure if you dig around you can find some numbers of development cost for both of these.
If you check the earnings for both of these companies (which will be released soon) they will tell thier stockholders how these are doing (profit wise). Most of us already know (from less official statements) that these moves have proved to be good financial choices.
One thing that Richard has left out (because he is old school) is that both F2P and P2P are destined to be niche products. The core of the market is moving towards various forms of hybrids. DDO is just as much F2P as it is P2P, and it is a great example of a hybrid based on its content. Any game that follows this example and builds a business plan that optimizes the strengths of the game to monitize will do significantly better than any game that just says it is F2P or P2P. In the future, the 'winners' will be the games that offer multiple options to its customers.
Actually what that was was trying to get folks who where on the month to month 9.99 plan to go for 3 and 6 month subs. The reason is a lot of folks on 9.99 plan sub for a month then leave. What I think were going to see is LOTRO eventualy move the same dirrection that DDO went with a F2P and a store. Proabably in the next year or so, as I too also got surveys from them about F2P games.
I don't understand why people are facinated with Allods, it is just another gambling game. Hardly something to look forward to. It also does not have the content of any of them either.
I have yet to see a f2p game come even close to the content that you find in the ptp games. Not to say we won't see that as the existing games continue to add such.
Couldn't agree more. Allods feels more like a really polished P2P game, rather than a F2P game. I've heard some people in zone chat who said they would actually pay a monthly fee to play it. Others within the blog community that I'm a part of, have already said that if they can stay hooked till the games launches, they'll most definitely be purchasing Store items (and probably every month up to a $10 to $15 limit). What most interesting of all is that a lot of the people within this community normally hate the F2P business model (myself included). Simply put, Allods is F2P done right. Well at least based upon what we've seen so far in the beta test.
The key is that unlike SP games, a player would NOT subscribe to very many games. The reason is obvious. Most people don't have time to properly play a MMO for it to worth a $15 sub fee.
In SP games, you don't have to be the best to survive. Most will play Modern Warfare 2 .. but after it is done, many players will get other FPS. Obviously this is NOT true in MMO because it is seldom that anyone will "get done".
F2P is a very good model for the lesser MMOs to survive. Take DDO as an example. My main game is WOW and I won't switch to DDO. However, i do want to play something else in between patches when I have consumed most of the wow content. It does NOT make sense for me to sub DDO too but now it is F2P and i can spend some time in it. I may even spend some money, if it is warranted. I highly doubt I am the only one doing this kind of MMO juggling.
I am one of those,i have tried tons of F2P and they are all the same ,they lack a ton of game play.There only premise is to get out a super low poly game that uses very little bandwidth to acommodate those that MUST play for free.
They always lack a ton of features you expect from games,and the few they offer usually cost you more than a P2P game,so they really are a type of game made for those who have no choice.
If you have any money at all,stay away from these games.They are designed so pathetic only a dummy cannot see through them.They are designed to hook you in early on,so that you will eventually spend money,and it will pay at least as much as a normal 15 bucks a month,but usually 2/5/10x more.
You can trust me when i say,if you stay away from all F2P games,you will not be missing out on anything you won't see in P2P games.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Yes and WOW for last 2 years gets contents which were in F2P games for many yrs
. Some ppl need to open their eyes 
...
Btw. U can trust me WoW sucked at the beginning not less than other MMOs. Anyway payment method is not meter of depth...especially since last year. I wonder why guys who left Blizzard are making f2p title now then.
Wow, nice post.
This guy totally owns the article with logic and challenges the entire idea "Is it REALLY growing?"
They say it's growing? Well who are "they" ?
Seeing a lot of replies questioning the validity of the claim of continuos growth of the global F2P market. I could share some industry insite of the Asian market for reference.
I am currently a MMORPG game designer in Taiwan and our studio has shipped three F2P MMORPG's to Japan and Mainland China since 2006. Although non of them made it across the Atlantic ocean to Europe or N-America, and only one currently stayed active and profitable, I can humbly say, I have quite a good picture of the growth of the F2P game market in the overall Asian market.
In Taiwan the whole gaming populaiton is around 4mil, which is dwarfed by China's staggering 50mil players and more surprisingly is that the Chinese market's population accumulated from scratch to 50mil in no more than 10yrs.
But why did F2P business models came to spread in the speed of a virus in the Asian market? I am shamfully to say that the PC game industry pretty much went south after the internet boom from 1999. And during 2002~2003 the whole industry suffered to stay alive because of all the downloading actitvies, and people just stopped paying for games which they can easily keyword on google and download it for free for less than a couple hours.
The whole industry needed something to grasp to stick out their head from the water, and there came MMO's like a shining bright Knight saving everyone else from the downloading.
But if you were just concerning pirating downloads, why F2P and not P2P you might ask.
Another fact to share, WOW and many other P2P MMO's in N-America charges generally around $15~$19 a month, well, the general wage of a worker in China around the age of 18~26 (which pretty much counts at 50% of the overall labor force) is $150~$200 a month. Even in Taiwan, $15 could mean a very decent dinner in Taipei's fancy restuarants', while the same amount is just pocket money in the US or Europe.
So, you could see how F2P swoop into the whole picture, and almost dominated the whole PC game market in no more than 2yrs. WOW actually doesn't play a big role in the pool when competing in subscribers with F2P games in the Asian market. Take Taiwan for instance 4mil players(around 50% are frequent MMOplayers) only 26% acutally play P2P, in China the number is less than 5% of the overall gaming popluation. Summing up, I do see great current/potential growth in the F2P maket.
Each person can only
hold enough knowledge to add one small rung to the
ladder, but together we can climb to the moon.
Giving some more references, in Asia, WOW's success actually is based on it's infamous RTS WarCraft series 1~3(btw. is still widely played by gamers in Asia). Because WarCraft laid down the concept of WOW's world and concept, it took little effort to lure every WarCraft fan into WOW, and due to this fact in Korea and Japan, WOW is the only western game that held a chair on the MMO market.
Each person can only
hold enough knowledge to add one small rung to the
ladder, but together we can climb to the moon.
Wow, and a great response to counter the other great response.
Now the ball is tilted in FAVOR of the booming F2P industry.
This provides plenty of logic and evidence to suggest that yes, the article is correct- the F2P industry IS indeed booming.
Well we do know that making something f2p isn't going to magically make it successful. That's one reason most f2ps are innitially rather limited and support the same old way of doing things... I heard one poster here say that WoW players are untouchable and that if they leave they leave the genre. Not true. My guild in Aion is filled with former WoW players that wish for something more challenging that they're previous game and loving every minute. Aside from any personal opinion of the other games there will be a point when WoW dies. Whether it's 5 or 10 or 20 years from now(that would be wierd) it will happen. Nothing lasts forever and the f2p model has huge resistance to make it into true mainstream. When WoW crumbles the market may become more evened out. True competition would be a very good thing.
I don't think a full on cash shop is the answer. If I were to bet on another model it would be a mixed version aka like DDO. Or perhaps like Guild Wars. Most realize that cash shops will in the end take more than a sub ever could. I don't know one person that actually plays them more than as a break from their "real" game. Show me a F2P that really doesn't require buying anything to be competitive that really is on the cutting edge of mmos(I realize some will point to Allods and DDO here IMO they arn't) and you might have a real birth for the cash shop model. Something that is really better than what we have now.(WoW, Aion, EQII,LoTRO, AoC, ect.) and I might change my opinion... they're just playing catch up right now and I doubt that will change any time soon and because the $15 mo sub is still the best overall deal... I don't see any reason to go to the other side of the coin.
Well, can't expect much unbiased information from a column that usually advertises for a company, a game, or two and has no columnist (Aihoshi's) response to feedback, and oficially labels itself the Free Zone. It's like these PR that say the game is going well, how credible is that when no real numbers are given?
Even World of Warcraft makes its appearance over here, with yet another attempt to reduce its merit, no wonder these forums are full of WoW blind haters.
MMOs fail because they keep trying to mimic previous successes. You can't do that if the previous success is still there, even less if you're trying to charge the same $15/mo, destroying the entry barrier is the key factor here to exposing the possible customer to attachment to the game, be it addiction or whatever, eventually driving him with what I prefer to call "madness" to spend money in virtual items, which have a infinite offer available to meet the demand.
Anyway, F2P has room in a less massively and mature environment, that's why it rules the lobby-based sports/action and children games where people don't see the need to pay a monthly fee (main reason Guild Wars has been such a success and proves that retail price without item malls or monthly fees can indeed be a viable commercial option). DDO is close to that, so it's not impressive that it did pretty well with the switch, it had been in the wrong route for years, be aware that item mall honeymoons are the most dangerous ones, as the real money sinks for virtual items and barriers keep growing and growing, the reason why you have a huge amount of asian F2P MMOs flooding our market and surviving with an insignificant amount of active players is that a few players paying hundreds per month with a very low quality service can result in a huge profit.