Subscriptions were the Golden Age of gaming monetization. At least from a customer perspective.
Im not so sure about that....Really we didnt have any other option....It was sub or not play any of them...The only one I can remember that had any free option was Anarchy Online but you had to watch ads (this is in its f2p infancy, they removed them later).......I played EQ from 2000-05 and spent more on its subs than I have on all other games combined since.....If you do the math long term, subs are not a great way to play for the customer.
They objectively were the golden age of monetization. Ever since people like you embraced the ultra expensive F2P (P2W) model we have lost so much in the MMORPG genre. No longer do we have fair gameplay. No longer are cosmetics a part of world building by way of showing your achievements. People can pay to "skip" or get more powerful in todays games. Content isn't nearly as in-depth or curated as it once was. They've learned that quality isn't as important as just pushing FOMO. Hence the immense amount of "dailies" we see in MMO's. F2P is literally and inarguably a virtual world killer. You should never see a shopping cart or store icon in a game. Your wallet should affect a damn thing in a virtual world outside of allowing you to access it.
F2P killed the genre. And while you may have spent more paying EQ for 5 years, I doubt you've been invested time wise, or even emotionally in a game since.
I don't mind it. However renting stuff is annoying.
What do you mean by "renting" it? If you lose your stuff because you stopped paying the sub? What a game could do about that is, when the sub isn't paid, and after a waiting period, just "box it all up" and store it for the player's return, within say, a year or so. Their house location may be lost, but they could still drop it somewhere new. The game would have to have a large enough world, though. Box up housing, bank accounts, characters, and everything so they have it if they return in a reasonable time period.
Which is how housing worked in DOAC. If a player quit paying a sub after a certain time, 30 or 60 days their house would be taken down and stored in a box with everything that was on the property.
You did lose your land claim but they also stopped charging the player monthly rent on the property.
Upon return you get went to any housing area and started retreiving you stored gear at your leisure.
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
B2p with cosmetics only shop B2P to give initial fund to the game and keep the bots out they can make additional cash by selling costumes or mounts or waht have you Pay for expansions is also ok with me as long as there is actual content in them A game would have to be amazing to consider a sub nowadays I prefer to pay when I want and how much I want
I am OK with subscription in F2P game (and that's me, freeloader). My beloved Lotro has free accounts, premium accounts and VIPa ccounts [i.e.: did not pay, paid once, is subbing]. And there is one "if" - everything is ok, if it fits and is not too heavy burden. Example: riding skill in Lotro. Quest object for vips, purchasable from store for in-game earned poins to others; quick ride - free for vips if discovered and unavailable/paid by premium currency for others; post box wherever you are - vips only. And I am absolutely ok with that. They are vips, they support game, they deserve.
If I was to design game, mentioned by OP: I would offer all basic things for free. But then, there would be premium housing styles or decoration objects - store items, for cash only. There would be, say, extra land/houses available for subscribers as long as they subscribe. Examples: there are house types 1-500 that are free to everyone (cost in-game currency); there are hosue types 501-550 available to vips only (for in-game currency). You can own 100 acres of land as f2p and you can own 200 acres of land as long as you are vip; your imperial Maggot hole generates 100 gold as f2p, but it gives 120 gold as long as you are vip. You can have 750 inventory slots as f2p, but entire 1000 as logn as you are vip. City founding costs 1000 gold for f2p. but only 700 gold for vips.
Subscriptions were the Golden Age of gaming monetization. At least from a customer perspective.
Im not so sure about that....Really we didnt have any other option....It was sub or not play any of them...The only one I can remember that had any free option was Anarchy Online but you had to watch ads (this is in its f2p infancy, they removed them later).......I played EQ from 2000-05 and spent more on its subs than I have on all other games combined since.....If you do the math long term, subs are not a great way to play for the customer.
They objectively were the golden age of monetization. Ever since people like you embraced the ultra expensive F2P (P2W) model we have lost so much in the MMORPG genre. No longer do we have fair gameplay. No longer are cosmetics a part of world building by way of showing your achievements. People can pay to "skip" or get more powerful in todays games. Content isn't nearly as in-depth or curated as it once was. They've learned that quality isn't as important as just pushing FOMO. Hence the immense amount of "dailies" we see in MMO's. F2P is literally and inarguably a virtual world killer. You should never see a shopping cart or store icon in a game. Your wallet should affect a damn thing in a virtual world outside of allowing you to access it.
F2P killed the genre. And while you may have spent more paying EQ for 5 years, I doubt you've been invested time wise, or even emotionally in a game since.
Ultra expensive F2P? Maybe for a handful of whales but not for most of us...We could pick and choose what we paid for instead of 15 bucks no matter what....Also the "we were all on a fair playing field" was not true.....I knew many in EQ that sold and bought accounts on Ebay.....Characters that were far stronger than mine could be bought....Wow, DAoC, and many other MMOs had similar issues.....There were gold sellers in these games too, not just the f2p games.
As for your "you should never see a shopping cart or store icon" well that was in most sub games too.....THe King of them all (WoW) probably made more money in the cash shop than any of the f2ps.....People dont seem to understand that these companies will try to make money in whatever way they can.....Most businesses outside of gaming do that too.
Subscriptions were the Golden Age of gaming monetization. At least from a customer perspective.
er.
People dont seem to understand that these companies will try to make money in whatever way they can.....Most businesses outside of gaming do that too.
Somewhat true, but gaming is one of the rarer exceptions where developers took away functionality from the core game / sub and started selling it piecemeal back to us.
They also came up with novel ways to hide the true cost behind a multitide of currencies / conversions, adding gambling mechanics, and then have the audacity to still try to get players to sub for very limited benefits.
Arguably most of what is sold outside of pure cosmetics is PFA / P2W and guess what usually sells the most? It isn't the cute outfits.
While it's true back in the early days players would upset the balance by illegally trading accounts, gold or what have you, but I would have preferred devs continued the fight to hold the line against bad behaviors than cross over to the dark side which is the state of online gaming currently.
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
If the level of monetization provides a value. Then break it up however you want. SWTOR was pretty fun when I played it after it went to the F2P/Sub model. I subbed. And I bought from the shop. It worked for me. Warframe has multi-tiered monetization. Last I checked, there were 3 forms of RMT. Yet I don't think anyone thinks the game is P2W.
So as far as I'm concerned, I'll pay if there is a value. I get my money's worth from the entertainment. But don't try to sell me your garbage BS crap that is passed off as content (Yeah, you Bethesda) Let's try to keep P2W to a minimum, At least to the point where RMTers aren't farming the FTPers as their content. And if it's fair, and the game is good. I'm cool with it.
Not at all, if the designers are making the right decisions and focus on casual/solo player content rather than pander to raidloggers/social types I am always happy to support them with more money.
Just as easily I am able to ditch a game i might have been playing for years if i see the design direction is going to hell by pandering to raidlogging crowd.
So if best rewards are gated behind raids and other high end manually made group content, i aint supporting that.
Comments
They objectively were the golden age of monetization. Ever since people like you embraced the ultra expensive F2P (P2W) model we have lost so much in the MMORPG genre. No longer do we have fair gameplay. No longer are cosmetics a part of world building by way of showing your achievements. People can pay to "skip" or get more powerful in todays games. Content isn't nearly as in-depth or curated as it once was. They've learned that quality isn't as important as just pushing FOMO. Hence the immense amount of "dailies" we see in MMO's. F2P is literally and inarguably a virtual world killer. You should never see a shopping cart or store icon in a game. Your wallet should affect a damn thing in a virtual world outside of allowing you to access it.
F2P killed the genre. And while you may have spent more paying EQ for 5 years, I doubt you've been invested time wise, or even emotionally in a game since.
You did lose your land claim but they also stopped charging the player monthly rent on the property.
Upon return you get went to any housing area and started retreiving you stored gear at your leisure.
"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
And there is one "if" - everything is ok, if it fits and is not too heavy burden.
Example: riding skill in Lotro. Quest object for vips, purchasable from store for in-game earned poins to others; quick ride - free for vips if discovered and unavailable/paid by premium currency for others; post box wherever you are - vips only. And I am absolutely ok with that. They are vips, they support game, they deserve.
If I was to design game, mentioned by OP: I would offer all basic things for free. But then, there would be premium housing styles or decoration objects - store items, for cash only. There would be, say, extra land/houses available for subscribers as long as they subscribe.
Examples: there are house types 1-500 that are free to everyone (cost in-game currency); there are hosue types 501-550 available to vips only (for in-game currency). You can own 100 acres of land as f2p and you can own 200 acres of land as long as you are vip; your imperial Maggot hole generates 100 gold as f2p, but it gives 120 gold as long as you are vip. You can have 750 inventory slots as f2p, but entire 1000 as logn as you are vip. City founding costs 1000 gold for f2p. but only 700 gold for vips.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
They also came up with novel ways to hide the true cost behind a multitide of currencies / conversions, adding gambling mechanics, and then have the audacity to still try to get players to sub for very limited benefits.
Arguably most of what is sold outside of pure cosmetics is PFA / P2W and guess what usually sells the most? It isn't the cute outfits.
While it's true back in the early days players would upset the balance by illegally trading accounts, gold or what have you, but I would have preferred devs continued the fight to hold the line against bad behaviors than cross over to the dark side which is the state of online gaming currently.
"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
How so? Neither of WoW or FFXIV provide their full experience without both purchase and subscription.