Originally posted by VengeSunsoar Access to a game i want to play. That's it.
That really is all it's buying. There isn't anything a sub game has that a free game isn't giving away. I guess you could try and argue quality but...in the last 5 years I don't really see how.
Future development is another story. Giving them money in any form under any payment model is paying for development but it doesn't have to take the form of a sub.
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.
I did a comparison a while ago with single player games and their cost to some mmo's.
So, for example, Skyrim cost $85 million to make but sold $450 million in the first week.
Now compare that to the "average" mmo that might sell 800k in the first week. And cost well above 100 million to make.
So let's say there wasn't a sub, and the game cost $100 million to make (which seems low these days but we'll use it). They sell 800k copies at 60.00 per pop (not including sales or perhaps "special editions").
That's only $48 million dollars. We won't break down what they get out of it after costs are considered (meaning "profit") because we don't have that for the above mentioned skyrim.
So they "might" make a few more sales over time but they still haven't covered the cost of making the game let alone continuing the studio to support the game AND create updates.
So what does the sub pay for? If you are any game other than WoW? It pays to cover the costs for making the game, supporting the game/studio to continue and further updates.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I did a comparison a while ago with single player games and their cost to some mmo's.
So, for example, Skyrim cost $85 million to make but sold $450 million in the first week.
Now compare that to the "average" mmo that might sell 800k in the first week. And cost well above 100 million to make.
So let's say there wasn't a sub, and the game cost $100 million to make (which seems low these days but we'll use it). They sell 800k copies at 60.00 per pop (not including sales or perhaps "special editions").
That's only $48 million dollars. We won't break down what they get out of it after costs are considered (meaning "profit") because we don't have that for the above mentioned skyrim.
So they "might" make a few more sales over time but they still haven't covered the cost of making the game let alone continuing the studio to support the game AND create updates.
So what does the sub pay for? If you are any game other than WoW? It pays to cover the costs for making the game, supporting the game/studio to continue and further updates.
I did a comparison a while ago with single player games and their cost to some mmo's.
So, for example, Skyrim cost $85 million to make but sold $450 million in the first week.
Now compare that to the "average" mmo that might sell 800k in the first week. And cost well above 100 million to make.
So let's say there wasn't a sub, and the game cost $100 million to make (which seems low these days but we'll use it). They sell 800k copies at 60.00 per pop (not including sales or perhaps "special editions").
That's only $48 million dollars. We won't break down what they get out of it after costs are considered (meaning "profit") because we don't have that for the above mentioned skyrim.
So they "might" make a few more sales over time but they still haven't covered the cost of making the game let alone continuing the studio to support the game AND create updates.
So what does the sub pay for? If you are any game other than WoW? It pays to cover the costs for making the game, supporting the game/studio to continue and further updates.
GW2
Ok go ahead with your argument. How much did it cost to develop Guild Wars 2 in comparison to what they sold.
In addition, I believe they still have a cash shop and have no plans for any expansions at this time.
Otherwise, saying "guild wars 2" means nothing.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
This thread is crazy full of low expectations. This is why MMO's are in the state they are in (boring and overpriced). My first MMO was Asheron's Call 2 and the monthly update was the thing to subscribe for. Every month there was a new patch with new quests, new lore, a nice little story to read about online. The server knew it as "patch day" and it was a huge event.
Sadly turbine eventually let one month slip by without an update, then another, then they promised bi-monthly updates, then they wanted us to pay for an expansion separate from the monthly updates, and at that point I had to cancel.
I expect MMOs to provide monthly content updates. Access to play on the server is NOT worth $15 a month.
What subs should give is a more stable and predictable income for the game developer/publisher therefore they should be able to plan further ahead and be able to tell the community exactly what new content they are building and when it will land.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Lineage grew significantly in Korea while GW2 remained solid in US/EU.
Royalty revenues surged with Blade and Soul China kicking in.
GW2 was strong on the back of end of year sales promotions.
Contribution from Korea increased with Lineage reaching a new all time high
Guild Wars 2 became the 2nd biggest revenue sources along with well settled in-game item sales model
Guild Wars 2 earned 33.6 Billion Won = 31.58 Million USD up from Q3s 22.94 Million USD and exceeding sales expectations for Q4
Next step for GW2 China will be announced in the near future
Wildstar is expected to launch some time in Mid 2014
No decision has been made for GW2 expansion for now the focus is provide the LW updates and bring GW2 to China they will update when they have more visibility on the issue of an expansion
For 2013 GW2 Made in toal revenue 123.3 Billion Won = 115.9 Million USD also exceeding sales expectations
What they made in one year exceeds your average MMO production cost (~100m).
Agreed as I already said.. Free to Play games take more effort to get a return on investment (ROI).. However, I good B2P game such as GW2 will return their entire 3-5 development cost in the first year.. Anything past that is profit.. For games to charge you a game cost + subscription is pure greed.. In my opinion..
The real trick is making sure your game has enough content to keep players active.. Make sure the cash shop is well designed. I"m surprised that GW2 hasn't started work on an expansion pack yet, but then their cash shop must still profitable to keep things going without the need for that expansion..
Originally posted by zzax Originally posted by SovrathOk go ahead with your argument. How much did it cost to develop Guild Wars 2 in comparison to what they sold.In addition, I believe they still have a cash shop and have no plans for any expansions at this time.Otherwise, saying "guild wars 2" means nothing.
Source (Q4 report): http://global.ncsoft.com/global/ir/earnings.aspx [*] Lineage grew significantly in Korea while GW2 remained solid in US/EU. [*] Royalty revenues surged with Blade and Soul China kicking in. [*] GW2 was strong on the back of end of year sales promotions. [*] Contribution from Korea increased with Lineage reaching a new all time high [*] Guild Wars 2 became the 2nd biggest revenue sources along with well settled in-game item sales model Guild Wars 2 earned 33.6 Billion Won = 31.58 Million USD up from Q3s 22.94 Million USD and exceeding sales expectations for Q4 Next step for GW2 China will be announced in the near future Wildstar is expected to launch some time in Mid 2014 No decision has been made for GW2 expansion for now the focus is provide the LW updates and bring GW2 to China they will update when they have more visibility on the issue of an expansion For 2013 GW2 Made in toal revenue 123.3 Billion Won = 115.9 Million USD also exceeding sales expectations What they made in one year exceeds your average MMO production cost (~100m). SUBSCRIPTION = MONEY GRAB
Those numbers comes mostly from Korea sales, thus not really applicapable - different markets.
There is no way to tell how much GW2 made in EU and US but if you go with raw ratio of regional sales, you are looking at...6M USD in GW2 sales in EU and US. Just to get somewhat a picture how skewed your interpretation is.
Then, you are not accounting any costs, ie. cost of sales is reported around 29%.
GW2 is jus a single game that, apparently, does not work as proof of concept.
Originally posted by 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.
Except with Kickstarter I wouldnt use the term, borrow. I am sure there are those devs out there funding their project solely through donations. They will see profit fast and I doubt this will matter as far as pricing goes. I mean seriously, didnt brad mcquaid take a bunch of so called, funding, and spend it on his own personal shit. Heh
Originally posted by 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.
False.
You are not paying for company expenses, you are paying for what you purchased - access to service, virtual goods.
The money you give away are no longer yours, you are no longer involved how those money are handeled.
When you get an investor, you either sell part of company share or you get a loan. With Kickstarter though, there is no loan, there is no borrowing. You give no money back, Kickstarter is donation - free money.
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.
A company who has invested millions into a game are entitled to use whatever cash model they feel that will get the best return for their investment. If it's free to play and a whole bunch of cash shops, fine. If it's a sub model that everyone pays. Fine. Nobody is forcing anyone to pay, you as a consumer have a wide range of choice of MMOs and you can choose to spend your time doing something else entirely.
There are basic things that I expect from a sub. Customer support, unlimited access to the game, good servers, certain standard of polish, freedom from cash shops and regular content update, including seasonal events etc and a least and measure to fight hacks and bots. Whether I get these things is another matter but when I do pay, I'm also entitled to complain very loudly on their forums and take my sub elsewhere.
Originally posted by zzaxWoWs earnings and 12m (currenty 6) of subs came from China. Are they not applicapable as well?GW2 paid for itself and is generating awesome profit, its the only thing that matters.
The sale comparison is applicapable within same regions only, something you cannot do with GW2.
Fact is, vast majority of Korean/Asian games do not dabble onto western markets and vice versa thus they are not comparable. And when they do, history and even this very report shows that eastern games do not do well in west, why should GW2 be the exception?
GW2 is profitable in Korea for sure, but other regions is entirely different matter - only about 17% of Anet revenue comes from western sales.
I think people are losing the basic crux of the matter. Some people will leave ESO the moment it goes f2p, they just don't like cash shops or the business model. They feel the community suffers and the game suffers as a result. Having witnessed a few games go f2p I would have to say it depends largely on the game. Rift and TSW benefited from going f2p but Tera now has an awful community but a fairly decent payment model. Star Wars has a ok community but awful f2p model. LotR f2p model seemed to of made it a worse game.
There are obnoxious games out there that are designed from the ground up to squeeze the most money out you. ArcheAge's LP system has obviously been designed for LP pots. There is no other reason for LP to exist other than to put a pay wall up. That I do find objectionable. I suppose people will white knight archeage, but that game is a borderline f2w whatever anyone says.
Comments
That really is all it's buying. There isn't anything a sub game has that a free game isn't giving away. I guess you could try and argue quality but...in the last 5 years I don't really see how.
Future development is another story. Giving them money in any form under any payment model is paying for development but it doesn't have to take the form of a sub.
I did a comparison a while ago with single player games and their cost to some mmo's.
So, for example, Skyrim cost $85 million to make but sold $450 million in the first week.
Now compare that to the "average" mmo that might sell 800k in the first week. And cost well above 100 million to make.
So let's say there wasn't a sub, and the game cost $100 million to make (which seems low these days but we'll use it). They sell 800k copies at 60.00 per pop (not including sales or perhaps "special editions").
That's only $48 million dollars. We won't break down what they get out of it after costs are considered (meaning "profit") because we don't have that for the above mentioned skyrim.
So they "might" make a few more sales over time but they still haven't covered the cost of making the game let alone continuing the studio to support the game AND create updates.
So what does the sub pay for? If you are any game other than WoW? It pays to cover the costs for making the game, supporting the game/studio to continue and further updates.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
GW2
Ok go ahead with your argument. How much did it cost to develop Guild Wars 2 in comparison to what they sold.
In addition, I believe they still have a cash shop and have no plans for any expansions at this time.
Otherwise, saying "guild wars 2" means nothing.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
This thread is crazy full of low expectations. This is why MMO's are in the state they are in (boring and overpriced). My first MMO was Asheron's Call 2 and the monthly update was the thing to subscribe for. Every month there was a new patch with new quests, new lore, a nice little story to read about online. The server knew it as "patch day" and it was a huge event.
Sadly turbine eventually let one month slip by without an update, then another, then they promised bi-monthly updates, then they wanted us to pay for an expansion separate from the monthly updates, and at that point I had to cancel.
I expect MMOs to provide monthly content updates. Access to play on the server is NOT worth $15 a month.
I ignored all other posts cause the answer is easy.
You pay for what they offer. That's it. If you don't like it....you don't pay. You aren't entitled to anything more or less than what they offer.
"This may hurt a little, but it's something you'll get used to. Relax....."
People mention expansions but ffxiv has no expansion yet but we still got a crap load of stuff since it was released.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D
Source (Q4 report): http://global.ncsoft.com/global/ir/earnings.aspx
The sub buys you access to the game, that is for P2P game.
Obvious...?
Agreed as I already said.. Free to Play games take more effort to get a return on investment (ROI).. However, I good B2P game such as GW2 will return their entire 3-5 development cost in the first year.. Anything past that is profit.. For games to charge you a game cost + subscription is pure greed.. In my opinion..
The real trick is making sure your game has enough content to keep players active.. Make sure the cash shop is well designed. I"m surprised that GW2 hasn't started work on an expansion pack yet, but then their cash shop must still profitable to keep things going without the need for that expansion..
Next step for GW2 China will be announced in the near future
Wildstar is expected to launch some time in Mid 2014
No decision has been made for GW2 expansion for now the focus is provide the LW updates and bring GW2 to China they will update when they have more visibility on the issue of an expansion
For 2013 GW2 Made in toal revenue 123.3 Billion Won = 115.9 Million USD also exceeding sales expectations
What they made in one year exceeds your average MMO production cost (~100m). SUBSCRIPTION = MONEY GRAB
Those numbers comes mostly from Korea sales, thus not really applicapable - different markets.
There is no way to tell how much GW2 made in EU and US but if you go with raw ratio of regional sales, you are looking at...6M USD in GW2 sales in EU and US. Just to get somewhat a picture how skewed your interpretation is.
Then, you are not accounting any costs, ie. cost of sales is reported around 29%.
GW2 is jus a single game that, apparently, does not work as proof of concept.
Except with Kickstarter I wouldnt use the term, borrow. I am sure there are those devs out there funding their project solely through donations. They will see profit fast and I doubt this will matter as far as pricing goes. I mean seriously, didnt brad mcquaid take a bunch of so called, funding, and spend it on his own personal shit. Heh
False.
You are not paying for company expenses, you are paying for what you purchased - access to service, virtual goods.
The money you give away are no longer yours, you are no longer involved how those money are handeled.
When you get an investor, you either sell part of company share or you get a loan. With Kickstarter though, there is no loan, there is no borrowing. You give no money back, Kickstarter is donation - free money.
What does your subscription actually buy?
Shiny new vehicles for the devs c:
A company who has invested millions into a game are entitled to use whatever cash model they feel that will get the best return for their investment. If it's free to play and a whole bunch of cash shops, fine. If it's a sub model that everyone pays. Fine. Nobody is forcing anyone to pay, you as a consumer have a wide range of choice of MMOs and you can choose to spend your time doing something else entirely.
There are basic things that I expect from a sub. Customer support, unlimited access to the game, good servers, certain standard of polish, freedom from cash shops and regular content update, including seasonal events etc and a least and measure to fight hacks and bots. Whether I get these things is another matter but when I do pay, I'm also entitled to complain very loudly on their forums and take my sub elsewhere.
WoWs earnings and 12m (currenty 6) of subs came from China. Are they not applicapable as well?
GW2 paid for itself and is generating awesome profit, its the only thing that matters.
The sale comparison is applicapable within same regions only, something you cannot do with GW2.
Fact is, vast majority of Korean/Asian games do not dabble onto western markets and vice versa thus they are not comparable. And when they do, history and even this very report shows that eastern games do not do well in west, why should GW2 be the exception?
GW2 is profitable in Korea for sure, but other regions is entirely different matter - only about 17% of Anet revenue comes from western sales.
I think people are losing the basic crux of the matter. Some people will leave ESO the moment it goes f2p, they just don't like cash shops or the business model. They feel the community suffers and the game suffers as a result. Having witnessed a few games go f2p I would have to say it depends largely on the game. Rift and TSW benefited from going f2p but Tera now has an awful community but a fairly decent payment model. Star Wars has a ok community but awful f2p model. LotR f2p model seemed to of made it a worse game.
There are obnoxious games out there that are designed from the ground up to squeeze the most money out you. ArcheAge's LP system has obviously been designed for LP pots. There is no other reason for LP to exist other than to put a pay wall up. That I do find objectionable. I suppose people will white knight archeage, but that game is a borderline f2w whatever anyone says.