Rogoo Posted August 31, 2012 Share Posted August 31, 2012 "Do you think you'll make more money converting to this model? I don't know." What the hell ?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandicus Posted August 31, 2012 Share Posted August 31, 2012 (edited) "Do you think you'll make more money converting to this model? I don't know." What the hell ?! He's not a financial analyst. He's not qualified to answer that question. If he did make such a statement it would either be a complete guess, or fed to him by marketing handlers. That question is the rough equivalent to asking a celebrity what they think should be done about an economic recession. Edited August 31, 2012 by Vandicus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andryah Posted August 31, 2012 Share Posted August 31, 2012 He's not a financial analyst. He's not qualified to answer that question. If he did make such a statement it would either be a complete guess, or fed to him by marketing handlers. That question is the rough equivalent to asking a celebrity what they think should be done about an economic recession. Correct statement. Clearly they believe they will increase the revenue, as there is no other reason to convert to Freemium for an MMO. He would be fired if he made ANY statements about the financial aspects of the change, as he would expose the company to shareholder liability. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andryah Posted August 31, 2012 Share Posted August 31, 2012 I think my favorite line is: Do you think you'll make more money converting to this model? "I don't know." see my comment above. You folks really need to gain at least a modest understanding of shareholder liability as it pertains to questions like the one posed to him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andryah Posted August 31, 2012 Share Posted August 31, 2012 (edited) I believe 40% of the people cited the monthly fee as the reason they left. However, the correct interpretation of that is that the game is not worth the sub fee, not that the player would refuse to pay it regardless. Once you have the correct interpretation, you then can make the right adjustment. One adjustment would be to implement content and features that would make the game worth it. Another adjustment is to lower the subscription fee. Let's be honest here, nobody on this forum has the data needed to make ANY interpretations as to what/why with any degree of accuracy. That leaves you, once again, with opinion, presented as fact. Which, puts you on equal footing with the entire forum membership, myself included. The difference in our posts being, some of us enjoy the game and don't share your need for what is IMO an ongoing series of non-constructive (and sometimes hyperbolic) criticsims of the game and the game producer. Besides, this entire thread is largely a rehash of a developer bash fest from last week, isn't it? Edited September 1, 2012 by Andryah Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hestis Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 It wasn't large, and there's no guarantee as to how many of those attendees were even interested in video games. GamesCom was literally 11 times larger in population, with a far greater spread of media personnel there to report on the attendees (and thus provide press coverage for the games represented). The press attendance alone at GamesCom was estimated to be approximately equivalent to a full ONE SIXTH of the attendance at Celebration. You actually had a terrible analysis. Well, I've actually been to a couple of Celebrations before. Yeah, they're not the size of the larger conventions, but once again, this is the core target demographic in one place. Read the article, he specifically talks about targeting Star Wars fans. Whether they are gamers isn't only irrelevant, but it gives you the chance to grab the attention of those who wouldn't be at a gaming con. I never said they shouldn't go to Gamescon, it would be just as much of a poor decision for them to ignore that. It's really not a hard concept to grasp. When a large number of your targeted demographic (once again, read the article, every single mention of who they're going after is Star Wars fans, not gamers), gathers in one place, you do everything you can to have a presence there. Yes, Celebration may not be the largest con around, but it is the largest Star Wars con (at least in the U.S.). You actually made a terrible comparison, and would seem to have terrible business sense. And anyway, my complaint is moot, as from another thread on here, they did have at least a small presence at Celebration, with a display for the game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandicus Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Well, I've actually been to a couple of Celebrations before. Yeah, they're not the size of the larger conventions, but once again, this is the core target demographic in one place. Read the article, he specifically talks about targeting Star Wars fans. Whether they are gamers isn't only irrelevant, but it gives you the chance to grab the attention of those who wouldn't be at a gaming con. I never said they shouldn't go to Gamescon, it would be just as much of a poor decision for them to ignore that. Very few Star Wars fans who aren't gamers will start playing an MMO just because its Star Wars. It didn't work for SWG, it won't work for SWTOR. The target demographic can only realistically be stated as gamers who are also Star Wars fans. Not simply Star Wars fans in general. If the goal were to bring in people who weren't gamers to an MMO simply on the basis that its Star Wars, the target demographic would be people who weren't interested in SWG but are interested in Star Wars. This is probably a very small group of people. If "Star Wars MMO" was enough to get them to play, they would've been playing SWG and continued on to this game already, leaving very few potential customers to acquire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MbaxterBeau Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Let's be honest here, nobody on this forum has the data needed to make ANY interpretations as to what/why with any degree of accuracy. That leaves you, once again, with opinion, presented as fact. Which, puts you on equal footing with the entire forum membership, myself included. The difference in our posts being, some of us enjoy the game and don't share your need for what is IMO an ongoing series of non-constructive (and sometimes hyperbolic) criticsims of the game and the game producer. Besides, this entire thread is largely a rehash of a developer bash fest from last week, isn't it? No it's a discussion on things that frustrate some of the people that play and played this game. What is a rehash is your presence in threads speaking to the OP and commenters like you are the CEO of Blizzard and the only person who is educated enough to form an opinion about this game or any other mmo is you and if others disagree with you then they are obviously wrong or uneducated. On a positive note if the devs keep on the current path they have been on you might be one of the few people playing this game. If that happens you can post and respond to your own posts and nobody could be "hyperbolic". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soluss Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No it's a discussion on things that frustrate some of the people that play and played this game. What is a rehash is your presence in threads speaking to the OP and commenters like you are the CEO of Blizzard and the only person who is educated enough to form an opinion about this game or any other mmo is you and if others disagree with you then they are obviously wrong or uneducated. On a positive note if the devs keep on the current path they have been on you might be one of the few people playing this game. If that happens you can post and respond to your own posts and nobody could be "hyperbolic". Well said... but she would still have Urael and jarajarloves too. Maybe the 3 of them can save this game with all their superior knowledge as to why it failed.... oh wait, I forgot, it didnt fail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandicus Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No it's a discussion on things that frustrate some of the people that play and played this game. What is a rehash is your presence in threads speaking to the OP and commenters like you are the CEO of Blizzard and the only person who is educated enough to form an opinion about this game or any other mmo is you and if others disagree with you then they are obviously wrong or uneducated. On a positive note if the devs keep on the current path they have been on you might be one of the few people playing this game. If that happens you can post and respond to your own posts and nobody could be "hyperbolic". No this is a bashing thread. Read the OP and the first page of posts. Also read the post Andryah was responding to. Her response logically replied that DarthTHC had nothing to back his claims whatsoever about the survey data that Bioware has collected. Before you start accusing people of having a sense of superiority, please at least read what they're saying and why they're saying it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soluss Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No this is a bashing thread. Read the OP and the first page of posts. Also read the post Andryah was responding to. Her response logically replied that DarthTHC had nothing to back his claims whatsoever about the survey data that Bioware has collected. Before you start accusing people of having a sense of superiority, please at least read what they're saying and why they're saying it. Ive seen enough of her posts to see that she clearly thinks she is superior to everyone else on the forums. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skoobie Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No this is a bashing thread. Read the OP and the first page of posts. So, how can a fellow player share a interview link without it being a "bashing" thread, in your opinion? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkSaberMaster Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No it's a discussion on things that frustrate some of the people that play and played this game. What is a rehash is your presence in threads speaking to the OP and commenters like you are the CEO of Blizzard and the only person who is educated enough to form an opinion about this game or any other mmo is you and if others disagree with you then they are obviously wrong or uneducated. On a positive note if the devs keep on the current path they have been on you might be one of the few people playing this game. If that happens you can post and respond to your own posts and nobody could be "hyperbolic". Well said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandicus Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 So, how can a fellow player share a interview link without it being a "bashing" thread, in your opinion? Perhaps I misinterpreted the OPs intent. Given the nature of their previous posts and that this does indeed seem to be a revival of the previous bashing thread, I assumed the OP's intent was to start a bashing thread. My apologies to him if that was not his intent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kubernetic Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 I wouldnt call their limited question survey a good interview. The questions lacked the depth for them to understand why people left. When you say "I left because of the sub" That could mean... they left because they couldnt afford 15 bucks a month OR they left because they didnt feel the game was worth 15 bucks a month. Which is more likely. If your answer is they couldnt afford 15 bucks a month .... then how do you think they are going to afford a cash shop? You guys always try to find excuses but you dont think them through. If a player cant afford 15 bucks a month then he cant afford to spend 15 bucks in the cash shop every month either. IOW ... that player is still dead weight to the company. What we know for sure was that their limited survey was 100% more than you accomplished with more than a small handful of players at best. You guys always try to come up with anecdotal information but you never follow through with sources or legitimate substance to back the anecdotes up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kubernetic Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Well, I've actually been to a couple of Celebrations before. Yeah, they're not the size of the larger conventions, but once again, this is the core target demographic in one place. Read the article, he specifically talks about targeting Star Wars fans. Whether they are gamers isn't only irrelevant, but it gives you the chance to grab the attention of those who wouldn't be at a gaming con. I never said they shouldn't go to Gamescon, it would be just as much of a poor decision for them to ignore that. It's really not a hard concept to grasp. When a large number of your targeted demographic (once again, read the article, every single mention of who they're going after is Star Wars fans, not gamers), gathers in one place, you do everything you can to have a presence there. Yes, Celebration may not be the largest con around, but it is the largest Star Wars con (at least in the U.S.). You actually made a terrible comparison, and would seem to have terrible business sense. And anyway, my complaint is moot, as from another thread on here, they did have at least a small presence at Celebration, with a display for the game. Sorry, a limited fan gathering of 30,000+ people, even if they were to ALL buy the game and play it for months, isn't enough to carry this game. Celebration VI would have been a poor investment of marketing dollars. They apparently agreed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MbaxterBeau Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 No this is a bashing thread. Read the OP and the first page of posts. Also read the post Andryah was responding to. Her response logically replied that DarthTHC had nothing to back his claims whatsoever about the survey data that Bioware has collected. Before you start accusing people of having a sense of superiority, please at least read what they're saying and why they're saying it. Bashing thread = you disagree. Also starting off a comment with "Let's be honest" is just a tad condescending but that is my opinion and would only be factual if I was a financial analyst in the gaming industry. If you have a degree in finance you can just throw out a number on sub population regardless if you actually play the game and see the amount of people on planets and fleet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FourTwent Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 I think my favorite line is: Do you think you'll make more money converting to this model? "I don't know." I gotta agree. It really shows what kind of geniuses they have running this game Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skoobie Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Sorry, a limited fan gathering of 30,000+ people, even if they were to ALL buy the game and play it for months, isn't enough to carry this game. Celebration VI would have been a poor investment of marketing dollars. They apparently agreed. Will you feel the same if they decided to go next year? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SOULCASTER Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 I gotta agree. It really shows what kind of geniuses they have running this game Hahahah right. They basically had a convo like this: "Look we are bleeding subscriptions what can we do to stop this?" "we can go f2p, and keep the subscription model at the same time!!! our content updates will continue to be mediocre at best" "that sounds great, will that really work?" "i just don't know..." hahahahahaha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vandicus Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 (edited) Bashing thread = you disagree. Also starting off a comment with "Let's be honest" is just a tad condescending but that is my opinion and would only be factual if I was a financial analyst in the gaming industry. If you have a degree in finance you can just throw out a number on sub population regardless if you actually play the game and see the amount of people on planets and fleet. *SPACING FOR DIFFERNTIATION Wow. If that dude worked for me, I'd fire him immediately. He came off as absolutely incompetent. He would make a great politician, he definitely knows how to answer a question without actually answering the question.... Bottom Line is they made a game with a horrible end game, thats why they lost over a million subscribers after they hit 50.... I like how there trying to spin it by saying it's the subscription model that caused this and not the lack of end game content... Doesn't help they just took MMO mechanics from 10 years ago and slapped Biowares story telling on top of it... If they would of took some risks and created something more original it might of been a different story... If they would of just added better end game content more dynamic / sandbox designs they probably would of kept most of those subscribers who left.... This I consider bashing. Your sarcasm is noted. Andryah has not thrown out any numbers about sub populations, nor did the person being interviewed. He's not a financial analyst. He's not qualified to answer that question. If he did make such a statement it would either be a complete guess, or fed to him by marketing handlers. That question is the rough equivalent to asking a celebrity what they think should be done about an economic recession. And here I quote myself. Clearly from your sarcasm, you disagree, and believe that the man knows whether or not f2p will make more profit. Forgive me for saying so, but you sound a bit crazy when you maintain that a developer is the go to man for whether or not a business model will make money. Edited September 1, 2012 by Vandicus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MbaxterBeau Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 I gotta agree. It really shows what kind of geniuses they have running this game They are so smart that I was reading an article about how they used the hero engine so multiple people could add objects and change the environment and those changes would be seen by the other people instantly. Well it didn't work that way and so it ended up being a dev mess and that might shed a little light on why content release is at a snail's pace. I need to post the article where I read that because I was shocked that they kept trying to develop this game with a problem like that. I'll try to find it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MbaxterBeau Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Let's be honest here, nobody on this forum has the data needed to make ANY interpretations as to what/why with any degree of accuracy. That leaves you, once again, with opinion, presented as fact. Which, puts you on equal footing with the entire forum membership, myself included. The difference in our posts being, some of us enjoy the game and don't share your need for what is IMO an ongoing series of non-constructive (and sometimes hyperbolic) criticsims of the game and the game producer. Besides, this entire thread is largely a rehash of a developer bash fest from last week, isn't it? Let's be honest here...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soluss Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 What we know for sure was that their limited survey was 100% more than you accomplished with more than a small handful of players at best. You guys always try to come up with anecdotal information but you never follow through with sources or legitimate substance to back the anecdotes up. Have you seen the thread "Unsubscribers please tell us a few things"? None of those posts say "I left because I cant afford 15 bucks" Its called common sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hestis Posted September 1, 2012 Share Posted September 1, 2012 Very few Star Wars fans who aren't gamers will start playing an MMO just because its Star Wars. It didn't work for SWG, it won't work for SWTOR. The target demographic can only realistically be stated as gamers who are also Star Wars fans. Not simply Star Wars fans in general. If the goal were to bring in people who weren't gamers to an MMO simply on the basis that its Star Wars, the target demographic would be people who weren't interested in SWG but are interested in Star Wars. This is probably a very small group of people. If "Star Wars MMO" was enough to get them to play, they would've been playing SWG and continued on to this game already, leaving very few potential customers to acquire. I'll say it again, read the article. EVERY single mention of who they want to target is specifically Star Wars fans. Not gamers, not Star Wars fans that are gamers. Their words, not mine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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