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[Editorial] World of Warcraft: Free-to-Play Fatigue: Are Micro-transactions Losing Their Appeal?
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
This week, Blizzard announced that its subscription base for World of Warcraft rose by more than 100,000. Since all logic says that a near-decade-old MMO should be tailing off, that's something of a surprise—especially since game industry augurs have spent the last year or so predicting the death of subscription-based games. For some time now, the free-to-play model's been rolling over the games business like some kind of evil Katamari, getting bigger and bigger as it sucks up developers, publishers and game projects alike. So what's up with WoW's upward trend? Is the turnaround just a fluke, or could it mean gamers aren't as gung-ho about free-to-play as business analysts say they are?
Read more of Neilie Johnson's Free-to-Play Fatigue: Are Micro-transactions Losing Their Appeal?
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Comments
I couldn't of expressed my opinion on the "Free to Play" Dilemma any better. Anyone could see what is coming, and it's only going to get worse as more companies dive into the notion of "free" gaming. I'm so tired of having every game beg me for money, even though it is "free". I'm tired of my experience being throttled down to a crawl because I am playing a "free" game, but I need to pay money to play. Explain to me why people prefer the notion of being gouged and denied the ability to freely play a game. Nothing is ever free.
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Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
Biggest issue I have with the F2P model is the fact that more and more effort and revenue goes into the "shop" than actually developing in game content. After all the shop is where the moneys at the game itself becomes less and less relevant as for the developer its nothing but a money sink.
The coolest looking items will always end up being available as a purchase because that is how they make their money.
As opposed to a subscription base where the game itself is important as in order to keep people playing they need to keep them invested in the game itself.
Excellent post
I think people are becoming more educated on the matter.
Now how soon until the whales spend themselves extinct?
Warcraft has subs and still made almost a quarter billion dollars in micro-transactions. I don't think micro-transactions are dying. I think it shows there are people that are willing to spend tons of money a month on a game they enjoy.
But of course, if that game isn't Warcraft it is a "cash grab" and "gouging".
I'll never play free to play games. I've tried a lot of them, but in the end they're all exactly the same. They attract younger players, they cost more, and they rarely add any real content. The first two I can deal with. However, 99.9% of free to play games are not free to play. I have no clue where this term was coined, but you will spend money if you play long enough. My biggest gripe is that free to play games never add any content. Every patch that comes out adds some new wings or a new pet or something new for your character. I'll buy that sure, but I want something to do while I'm in the game as well.
Lotro is really the only exception I've found to this. They release content regularly, even though it's still slower than subscription titles like WoW. There might be some free to play games that release new content, however, it always just feels like old content rehashed, not in Lotro though. Also the community in Lotro is probably the most mature I've found in all of gaming. Just thinking back of my closest friends from lotro, I can't think of a single one that was under 25.
Then there's the whole nickel and diming feeling you get from free to play games. A lot of them have pop ups in their games "buy this here" "buy this if you want to continue" "it's only $1!". It's one thing I can't stand at all. I can remember back in the 90s and early 2000s, pop ups were rampant on the internet. There's a reason why you hardly ever see them anymore, and it's not pop-up blockers. It's because it was so annoying people would outright refuse to buy from the advertiser, even if they needed it. And this is the main reason I'll never play free to play games.
I don't know how to say it but there's a little mistake in your arguement: Blizzard defines "subscriber" as anyone who payed in the last month - be it a "real" subscription or an asian f2p-payment.
So we actually really don't know if the "subscriptions" (as in paying 15 bucks a month) really went up or if there were simply more asians paying for WoW last month.
Quote from the financial review:
Subscriber Definition: World of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees' territories are defined along the same rules.
Ok like always, if we could see just NA subs, it would be far more telling. I literally know no one who even has WoW on their radar anymore. They'd laugh if I asked them if they played it.
Katamari... the craziest game I've ever played on PSP
Sub number pike, I don't wow, but on one hand what Lorimar wrote above, on the other (based on the 5+ folks I know who does playing wow), they went back not because of "sub is so great, f2p is just a diminishing fad, it's losing the appeal" like the title... It's much simpler: Draenor and lvl90 jumpstart. Have to add, most of them didn't even looked at MoP, so they were absent from Azeroth since years.
Why this specific month, I have no idea. Maybe the new year, the videos, dunno. I admit it was a bit strange to see them falling one by one: "Yep, I've subbed back. I know, I know... but maybe it will be good this time".
There are so many games that are F2P that it is no longer enough to attract people on that alone. Instead of asking "if this game worth my money?" We are now asking, "is this game worth my time?"
Despite being free, most F2P games are not worth our time, and the experience can be made worse by their use of paywalls and the throttling of XP, inventory space and dungeon lock-outs as well as the constant badgering for your cash.
However, some companies do f2p very well. Tera may have a awful community, but it has a very good f2p model. I have also been lucky enough not to encounter many P2W games. There is no golden ammo being sold and the gear being sold is usually worse than u can get through playing the game.
I would also point out that whatever model you prefer, it in no way guarantees what the quality of the game will be. Personally I prefer the sub model, it gits rid of the adverts, the cash shops and xp pots and all the other restrictions and just lets you get on with playing the game.
Your last paragraph takes me back to 2005-2006 when I tried a lot of Asian f2p titles, and they can indeed be as obnoxious as you describe. None of the more recent (and Western) f2p games I've tried did stuff like that. Your main reason thus seems to be based on dated experiences.
What a worthless article.
It only takes into account WoW. The only counterpoint needed is one single F2P game that saw a rise in its playerbase and micro transaction revenue and suddenly everything said in the article is meaningless.
And there are plenty of those examples to use.
"People who tell you youre awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is." ~Raph Koster
http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/
+1
A rise of 100k is not a trend in an industry of an estimated 400 million users. This is just people predicting the future based on what they want to happen.
Wow's number are going up because it's a great game and their expansion is hinting at going back to what was the most popular time in wows history.
The only consistent argument in favor of subs is that you get everything for one fee. Yet that no longer exists, every game nowadays has numerous layers of extras to pay for and WoW is as bad as any game when you look at everything they are selling.
The days of one fee to play it all are gone, no matter how much people want it companies are either unwilling or unable to provide that kind of game any more.
As much as I would love to see a shift away from the F2P model back to subs I have to agree with the two above at least for now.
I don't believe a less than 2% swing in WoW's subs for a quarter is enough to draw any conclusions one way or anther when looking at the genre as a whole ,even in just the U.S market.
+1 as well, that's why I didn't even address it and just wrote my thoughts on what could be behind the raise.
This whole "wow got some new subscribers, -> f2p fatigue, microtransactions losing their appeal?" is... just lol.
FFARR, ESO and Wildstar - three major titles that have been released or are about to be released in the next few months have had subs attached to them. I take your point that they also have fee paying services or items attached to them and that WoW has a cash shop. But Subs are far from dead.
If your game is good enough, people will pay for it. I don't think being free to play will save a game that is struggling - maybe in the past when it was a novelty, but not anymore.
"By all means, reach for the stars but you need to build the spaceship first"
What a ridiculous article. Gee, would I rather have a box fee and a sub with my cash shop or just the cash shop on its own? Cash shops, the thing the writer is railing against with such vehemence, are here to stay. You can either pay a box price and sub free and have a cash shop, or pay nothing and have a cash shop. Same diff.
Whatever. She can enjoy ESO (and its cash shop) and WoW (and its cash shop) and pay out the nose. I will enjoy Rift (and its cash shop) and Tera (and its cash shop) and pay nothing whatsoever.
Nope what that tells me is there are a 100,000 players who left old games and came back to WoW most in anticipation of the new expansion.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
I dont think you understand the concept of Free to play. I would much rather pay 50 dollars to goto Six flags then goto a local faire and buy 40 dollars worth of tickets to use on subpar rides and then be haggled to pay more money to play some of the side games
I'll gladly pay my 15 dollar admission fee to have the freedom to play without imposing restrictions and constant reminders to buy their product.
~ ~
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.