What does your subscription actually buy?

bubaka70

Needless to say I have tried my fair share of MMO's over the years in all economic forms they came in and I have recently dumped  ESO mainly because I got bored but also because I was dissatisfied with what I actually received for my 15$ that I so willingly spent every month. Back in the days subscription was justified not necessarily through regular content updates (WoW-LoL) but mainly because we had somewhat live access to GM's at least with a bit of a delay. Nobody questioned subscriptions then because we all agreed these people were important ( please return my epic mace to me now!!) and they needed to be paid. 

In 2014 subscriptions are all about content and somewhat of a mixed bag (and customer service is almost non existent). There are two ways to look at a subscription: on one hand a 15$ fee seems to be fair almost less than an hours wage for most of us. Or you look back and add it up and ask yourself how much game did I really get for 4 months subs plus retail price. I personally don't care for PvP at all, but  most of the content updates for ESO were PvP related and I basically got a dye station - great. I don't mind paying a sub if I know there would be content coming my way that I can actually enjoy. I believe the "one for all" subscription system needs to be revised. PvP and PvE should be handled as seperate and individual subscription models because they are in fact two different parts of the same game. Not a developer friendly solution because they would have to cater content  to more than one crowd but certainly a more selective model that could meet every ones expectations.

So what do you guys think? Is it time to break up the subscription model into different parts to make it more attractive or is this just a means to milk people for a time with B2P and F2P being the projected long term solutions anyway? 

bcbully

What does my sub buy me? Freedom from cash shops and cash to gold conversion systems. 

 

edit - All of ESO's updates have been PvE updates.. Zones, raids, expanded dungeons, you name it. No pvp updates yet, and it's time.

 

edit - Next to WoW, ESO might have the best in-game support out there.  It takes about 20 mins for a GM to respond. Hell, they even respond to forum post. I complained about crashing one saturday night and got a email saying that a ticket was opened from me by a forum admin.

fearu

TLDR: He dumped ESO cause he didn't like paying the sub for it.

 

/thread

psiic

Honestly until recently I thought a subscription was paying for tech support and customer service.

 

Dr_Shivinski

MMOs are a constant work in progress, there is a dev team constantly working on the game in some form or another, and they have mortgages to pay. Whether the subscription is worth it or not is dependant on the game in question and your tastes.

someforumguy

Originally posted by Dr_Shivinski
MMOs are a constant work in progress, there is a dev team constantly working on the game in some form or another, and they have mortgages to pay. Whether the subscription is worth it or not is dependant on the game in question and your tastes.

That is almost a childish way of looking at paying for a sub. You are purchasing a sub from a company and have no clue how much of that is pure profit and how much are costs (of which only a part ends up being dev salary). Most of the times you also have no clue whether devs are laid off because maybe that company wants to cut costs and earn more profit. Especially with the big game companies.

So stop acting as if you are putting food on the table for MMO game devs with your sub There is no such direct link. As customer only your second sentence matters, because that is the only part you control.

EDIT: Your sub buys you nothing permanent and no guarantees. Only thing that for you as customer works, is determining if you want to keep playing that game coming month. Cash shops. immature community, devs keeping promises, these kind of things are not controlled by a sub.

psiic

Originally posted by someforumguy

Originally posted by Dr_Shivinski
MMOs are a constant work in progress, there is a dev team constantly working on the game in some form or another, and they have mortgages to pay. Whether the subscription is worth it or not is dependant on the game in question and your tastes.

That is almost a childish way of looking at paying for a sub. You are purchasing a sub from a company and have no clue how much of that is pure profit and how much are costs (of which only a part ends up being dev salary). Most of the times you also have no clue whether devs are laid off because maybe that company wants to cut costs and earn more profit. Especially with the big game companies.

So stop acting as if you are putting food on the table for MMO game devs with your sub There is no such direct link. As customer only your second sentence matters, because that is the only part you control.

EDIT: Your sub buys you nothing permanent and no guarantees. Only thing that for you as customer works, is determining if you want to keep playing that game coming month. Cash shops. immature community, devs keeping promises, these kind of things are not controlled by a sub.

It has almost become the rule not the exception that pretty much every studio has the big parking lot pink slip meeting upon new game release. 

 

 

Dibdabs

It buys me freedom from the lowing herds of F2P players that clutter games up to no real purpose.

Channce

To me, sub means a much better community, no P2W.  I was one who thought F2P was the way to go, but now im back to the Sub model is better.

Jabas

I pay to get acess to a product/service.

 

Note: You mentioned WoW as a example of paying a monthly fee for update content, isnt this game charging for that update content, on the top of the monthly fee?

Caldrin

A sub is you paying for a service... so that money goes into helpnig run the said service..

Server costs

Bandwidth costs

Energy costs

Programmer Wages

Artists Wages

Sound peoples Wages

Other company Wages

Advertising

Game content

 

I think the list could go on and on really.. also if its a f2p game with a cash shop then that cash also goes into the same thing at the end of the day but instead of producing extra game content it goes into maknig new items to sell in the cash shop

 

 

 

zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

Server costs

Bandwidth costs

Energy costs

Programmer Wages

Artists Wages

Sound peoples Wages

Other company Wages

Advertising

Game content

Lol, someone is very naive I see. In games such as WoW, all of that is covered in games/expansions initial cost (they charge for them separately). Everything else is pure profit and money grab.

 

PioneerStew

Originally posted by zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

Server costs

Bandwidth costs

Energy costs

Programmer Wages

Artists Wages

Sound peoples Wages

Other company Wages

Advertising

Game content

Lol, someone is very naive I see. In games such as WoW, all of that is covered in games/expansions initial cost (they charge for them separately). Everything else is pure profit and money grab.

 

But WOW is the anomaly rather than the norm.  Many games do not enter into profit until some time after release.  

Hyanmen

Originally posted by bubaka70

Needless to say I have tried my fair share of MMO's over the years in all economic forms they came in and I have recently dumped  ESO mainly because I got bored but also because I was dissatisfied with what I actually received for my 15$ that I so willingly spent every month. Back in the days subscription was justified not necessarily through regular content updates (WoW-LoL) but mainly because we had somewhat live access to GM's at least with a bit of a delay. Nobody questioned subscriptions then because we all agreed these people were important ( please return my epic mace to me now!!) and they needed to be paid. 

In 2014 subscriptions are all about content and somewhat of a mixed bag (and customer service is almost non existent). There are two ways to look at a subscription: on one hand a 15$ fee seems to be fair almost less than an hours wage for most of us. Or you look back and add it up and ask yourself how much game did I really get for 4 months subs plus retail price. I personally don't care for PvP at all, but  most of the content updates for ESO were PvP related and I basically got a dye station - great. I don't mind paying a sub if I know there would be content coming my way that I can actually enjoy. I believe the "one for all" subscription system needs to be revised. PvP and PvE should be handled as seperate and individual subscription models because they are in fact two different parts of the same game. Not a developer friendly solution because they would have to cater content  to more than one crowd but certainly a more selective model that could meet every ones expectations.

So what do you guys think? Is it time to break up the subscription model into different parts to make it more attractive or is this just a means to milk people for a time with B2P and F2P being the projected long term solutions anyway? 

What you're saying isn't the case for every P2P MMO out there. The pressure is huge for F2P transition in the most cases though, yes.

FFXIV was developed with in-house funding so they are not in any rush to go F2P anytime soon unlike with MMO's that were funded by outside investors. Moreover, and more importantly, the game receives huge updates every 3 months with expansions on the pipeline. It is almost as much content as WoW was able to put out back in the day.

So, in most cases P2P is not worth it for both devs and players. However, if the profit numbers justify it then P2P is the best possible option for both the devs and the players. Most content additions out there, a flat fee to experience 99% of it, and flexibility to pay pretty much what you want for the content (you can wait a year and then sub for a month for 12 months of content updates, or you can stay subbed for the whole year... or anything in-between). It's a good trade-off as long as the content keeps coming (which isn't the case for most P2P MMO's).

Caldrin

Originally posted by zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

Server costs

Bandwidth costs

Energy costs

Programmer Wages

Artists Wages

Sound peoples Wages

Other company Wages

Advertising

Game content

Lol, someone is very naive I see. In games such as WoW, all of that is covered in games/expansions initial cost (they charge for them separately). Everything else is pure profit and money grab.

 

You what.. you do realise that WOW is a blip when it comes to western MMOs no mmo has had those player numbers before or after. Plus all of that is still not covered by selling the game and exp packs I bet a shit ton of the monthly subs still goes into paying for what i posted. So sure WOW has massive numbers and brings in massive amounts of cash.. but with those massive numbers comes the need for massive amounts of servers and bandwidth that brings with it shit tons of energy costs and so on.

So yes I am sure a lot of it is profit as well... but this might come as a shock to you but companies are out to make a profit..

zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

massive amounts of servers and bandwidth that brings with it shit tons of energy costs and so on.

Shit tons of energy and bandwidth costs, lol dude you are so 1990.

Rydeson

Originally posted by zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

Server costs

Bandwidth costs

Energy costs

Programmer Wages

Artists Wages

Sound peoples Wages

Other company Wages

Advertising

Game content

Lol, someone is very naive I see. In games such as WoW, all of that is covered in games/expansions initial cost (they charge for them separately). Everything else is pure profit and money grab.

 

     Indeed..  Expansions is always at an additional COST paid for itself..  The sub?  I agree, most of that fee is PURE CASH COW droppings...  Trust me, the companies that can get away with a monthly sub are laughing ALL the way to the bank.. 

Caldrin

Originally posted by zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

massive amounts of servers and bandwidth that brings with it shit tons of energy costs and so on.

Shit tons of energy and bandwidth costs, lol dude you are so 1990.

Look sure its cheaper than it used to be back then but its expensive to run those servers.

 

Anyway at the end of the day the company is out to make money.

 

TheLizardbones

Originally posted by Caldrin

Originally posted by zzax

Originally posted by Caldrin

massive amounts of servers and bandwidth that brings with it shit tons of energy costs and so on.

Shit tons of energy and bandwidth costs, lol dude you are so 1990.

Look sure its cheaper than it used to be back then but its expensive to run those servers.

 

Anyway at the end of the day the company is out to make money.

 

 

Bandwidth is actually one of the more expensive aspects of running a large number of servers.  If large internet service providers get their way, it's going to get more expensive, not less.

 

**

 

When I do pay for a month of game time, that's what I'm getting.  A month of game time.

 

fivoroth

Originally posted by bubaka70

Needless to say I have tried my fair share of MMO's over the years in all economic forms they came in and I have recently dumped  ESO mainly because I got bored but also because I was dissatisfied with what I actually received for my 15$ that I so willingly spent every month. Back in the days subscription was justified not necessarily through regular content updates (WoW-LoL) but mainly because we had somewhat live access to GM's at least with a bit of a delay. Nobody questioned subscriptions then because we all agreed these people were important ( please return my epic mace to me now!!) and they needed to be paid. 

In 2014 subscriptions are all about content and somewhat of a mixed bag (and customer service is almost non existent). There are two ways to look at a subscription: on one hand a 15$ fee seems to be fair almost less than an hours wage for most of us. Or you look back and add it up and ask yourself how much game did I really get for 4 months subs plus retail price. I personally don't care for PvP at all, but  most of the content updates for ESO were PvP related and I basically got a dye station - great. I don't mind paying a sub if I know there would be content coming my way that I can actually enjoy. I believe the "one for all" subscription system needs to be revised. PvP and PvE should be handled as seperate and individual subscription models because they are in fact two different parts of the same game. Not a developer friendly solution because they would have to cater content  to more than one crowd but certainly a more selective model that could meet every ones expectations.

So what do you guys think? Is it time to break up the subscription model into different parts to make it more attractive or is this just a means to milk people for a time with B2P and F2P being the projected long term solutions anyway? 

Haha, that's a good one. Ooh wait, you were serious and this was not supposed to be a joke?

As you said $15 is next to nothing for most of us. But some games like FFXIV and YES ESO provide good chunks of content on a regular basis (almost monthly). Now I don't know how you can say that ESO only added a dye station for PvE players. Almost all their major updates were about new PvE content - new quests, zones, raid like dungeons, trials, veteran dungeons, Arena and god knows what else.

F2P games suck. They are usually disposable garbage or failed P2P MMOs. 

B2P is okay and it works for GW2. But that game seriously needs expansion like they had in GW1. The content in that game is not enough if you are not into vanity item grinding and stupid achievement hunting.

fivoroth

Originally posted by someforumguy

Originally posted by Dr_Shivinski
MMOs are a constant work in progress, there is a dev team constantly working on the game in some form or another, and they have mortgages to pay. Whether the subscription is worth it or not is dependant on the game in question and your tastes.

That is almost a childish way of looking at paying for a sub. You are purchasing a sub from a company and have no clue how much of that is pure profit and how much are costs (of which only a part ends up being dev salary). Most of the times you also have no clue whether devs are laid off because maybe that company wants to cut costs and earn more profit. Especially with the big game companies.

So stop acting as if you are putting food on the table for MMO game devs with your sub There is no such direct link. As customer only your second sentence matters, because that is the only part you control.

EDIT: Your sub buys you nothing permanent and no guarantees. Only thing that for you as customer works, is determining if you want to keep playing that game coming month. Cash shops. immature community, devs keeping promises, these kind of things are not controlled by a sub.

You are looking at it in a naive way. It just shows how much you understand about how businesses run. 

Why would you as a customer be able to tell what their cost base is or how much profit margin are they making? You don't appear to be very knowledgeable when it comes to finances and how businesses run. But it's okay you are not alone. So many people who lack basic business knowledge (a business degree, MBA, finance qualifications would have helped if they wanted to actually understand how businesses operate) think that they know how businesses run when in reality most of the stuff they are saying are just wrong.

CrazKanuk

Are we talking about what your subscription buys in WoW or in most every other subscription game? Let's not forget that the life of a subscription game relative to WoW is extremely short, but the development cost doesn't really change that much. So I'm sure it's generally a scramble and gamble just to re-coop the money that was invested in the development. I think that anything after that is pretty gravy if you can maintain a good number of subscribers. However, there is still a great number of salaries that are required to update and maintain a game too.

Sulaa

For me subscription payment was a payment for :

First and foremost:

1. Fast Exploit&bug fixing

2. Catching&banning cheaters and botters

3. Fighting RMT and effects of other types of cheating

 

Additionally it was a payment for:

4. In-game GM support

5. Out of game account & billing support

6. Bandwidth

 

It never was a payment for content.   Payment for content was via origimnal box sale & expansion sales.

 

 

Thing is companies as time passed failed more and more to provide points 1-3 and subscription does not make much sense without all those points.

rodingo

Originally posted by Caldrin

Anyway at the end of the day the company is out to make money.

 Some people or more willing than others to help make that happen.

VengeSunsoar

Access to a game i want to play. That's it.

Quizzical

When you pay for a game, whether it's a subscription, cash shop, pre-order, or anything else, you're primarily paying for expenses that the company has already incurred, not for future stuff that they will do.  The basic business model is to borrow money to fund a game, use that to create a game, then sell it to players and hope to get back more than you spent.  That "borrow" could easily mean from investors, from kickstarter, or from previous projects that were profitable; it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with going to a bank and taking out a loan.