Any1 else wanna know what were paying for?

[ChimaeraUK]

As has been mentioned several times, GW is paid for by micro transactions, it is not free, plus the game uses P2P for most content, the central servers only manage the player hubs, not the whole world like SWTOR, not sure how many times this has to be mentioned.

 

But lets be honest here we're trying to rationally debate with a kid who bought an mmo without checking to see if it was sub based, or reading the box.

[darthrevo]

 

Before u all sit there going troll.. troll.. troll, think about it... what is that £9 a month ur paying actually buying you that the £45 you paid to get the game didnt.... ur not getting any benifits, any added content or anything like that just teh ability to play the game you already bought

 

you are getting benefits. your getting constant updates to the game. in a years time the game will be much larger with more features and content than it is now. that £9 a month pays for that future development.

 

in a single player game gets an update, say mass effect you pay for the extra content in one go. ie £5 for a set of mission. in an mmo you get these missions an features added all the time so they charge people a monthly fee instead. the money also covers sever fees.

[pewny]

found this link from another thread, seems people in this thread may benefit from reading it.

 

How to Create a Successful MMO

 

Don't count on subscriptions

 

In the early years of the MMO industry, from roughly 1997 to 2001, there were a few big MMOs that had active player populations. By the time we started ArenaNet in the summer of 2000, we knew of at least eighty MMOs that were in development. Based on the success of UO and EQ, publishers were reviewing their portfolios and planning to migrate their existing game franchises to the online world, where they believed they could adopt a subscription model and "make bank". Clearly, it did not work out that way. As more MMOs came into the market, two things changed. First, players now had a choice about which game they would play, and as a result their expectations for polish, content quantity, and service increased substantially. Second, and perhaps more telling for the future of the industry, it became clear that the subscription model forced players to choose a single game, rather than playing many different games.

 

Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true – you know it, and they know it. Gamers may buy the argument that your MMO requires a subscription fee, if you can tell them what they are getting for their money. This is the legacy of games like Guild Wars, Maple Story, and Silkroad Online, all of which introduced new business models into the MMO genre and were quite successful. The subscription model is still perfectly viable, but the pain threshold is very low now. It's no secret that gamers don't want to pay a subscription fee. If you can convince them that your game offers enough value to justify it, more power to you! But be prepared to defend your decision, often and loudly, and back it up over the lifetime of your game.

 

Be very aware of the choice you are asking players to make, and the frequency of that choice. In a subscription model you are asking players to make a choice every month, and it is a fairly drastic choice: Stay married, or get divorced? It is certainly the case that if every player decides to stay married every month, you can make more money from each player in the subscription model. But that will rarely be the case, and not something that you should count on. Every month, some percentage of your player base will decide on divorce, and as with marriage in the real word, once you are divorced you rarely get married to the same person again. If you go the subscription route, you'll need to have the confidence that your marriage rate will exceed your divorce rate.

 

With Guild Wars we ask players to make a choice only one time, and that choice is whether to buy the game, or not to buy the game. While we don't enjoy a recurring revenue stream each month, we do benefit from the fact that most Guild Wars players come back to the game when we release new content, so we are less concerned about players putting the game down for a few months. Players don't have to decide whether to stay married or get divorced, they just have to decide whether they want to play today or not. Beyond the benefit of a lower pain threshold to get into the game, this is the core strength of the Guild Wars business model, and one of the reasons it continues to thrive when many other subscription-based MMOs are struggling.

 

Innovate with your game play, and innovate with your business model! The two go hand in hand, and are mutually dependent on each other. Decide on your business model first, and then build your game around it. Guild Wars can be successful with its business model because we decided that we would not charge a subscription fee before we wrote the first line of code, and every design and technology decision we made served that purpose. We could never turn Guild Wars into a subscription-based game, just as Turbine could not suddenly decide to eliminate the subscription model for Lord of the Rings Online. If you decide to require players to subscribe to your game, be prepared to build a game that thoroughly justifies it.

Edited December 28, 2011 by pewny

[AdakiasX]

This thread summed up in one (long, but with a semi-colon!) sentence.

 

"I have no idea what an MMO is, nor do I understad that my $15 a month goes toward new content, server maintenance, and progression; Guild Wars was 'free' even though i had to buy a $50 expansion pack every few months so figure it out".

 

Seriously people, 15 pages of garbage...Why are all forums so full of QQers? I have yet to see a video game board that isn't more than 90% immature children. Seriously quit crying or go back to call of duty, or whatever ****** $60 console game you want to buy and beat in 8 hours so long as you don't have to pay monthly!

[Laxhack]

I'm paying to be entertained, same as I'd pay for cable tv, a movie, or a stripper.

 

So far, great job EA/ BW- really fun time well worth the $.50/ day.

[MVPddark]

As has been mentioned several times, GW is paid for by micro transactions, it is not free, plus the game uses P2P for most content, the central servers only manage the player hubs, not the whole world like SWTOR, not sure how many times this has to be mentioned.

 

But lets be honest here we're trying to rationally debate with a kid who bought an mmo without checking to see if it was sub based, or reading the box.

 

And u obviously keep missing the point. you dont NEED to pay for anythign to play guildwars... you can buy the game install it and play as much as you like without spending any more money. the fact that people CHOOSE to buy extra bank space, character slots and costumes, does not make it a p2p game. SWTOR REQUIRES you to pay a monthly subscription to play the game. THEREFORE you cannot play swtor without PAYING MORE MONEY. Stop sitting there saying guildwars is pay to play when u obviously dont understand teh difference between buying a game and not paying more to PLAY it, and games which REQUIRE you to pay more IN ORDER TO PLAY.

[Qoojo]

My payment is going towards keeping the cantinas stocked full of twi'lek dancing women.

[Chrisamcnicholas]

And u obviously keep missing the point. you dont NEED to pay for anythign to play guildwars... you can buy the game install it and play as much as you like without spending any more money. the fact that people CHOOSE to buy extra bank space, character slots and costumes, does not make it a p2p game. SWTOR REQUIRES you to pay a monthly subscription to play the game. THEREFORE you cannot play swtor without PAYING MORE MONEY. Stop sitting there saying guildwars is pay to play when u obviously dont understand teh difference between buying a game and not paying more to PLAY it, and games which REQUIRE you to pay more IN ORDER TO PLAY.

 

And YOU obviously miss the bigger point, NO ONE IS MAKING YOU PLAY THIS GAME.

 

Go back to guild wars.

[Stonedsoul]

F2P dont exist, they are an illusion. Some games rely on microtransactions, some games rely on cross-project funding and expention pack sells, some games try to hybridize by having both a F2P section, and a part of the content reserved for paying subscibers.

 

Yes, GW has no subscription fee. It also sells Xpack boxes like I sell tickets (and I work in a box office), and relies on cross-project funding from one of the oldest and most established P2P MMO producers (NCSoft).

 

Nothing is free. When you have constant costs associated with running a business, you need constant income. Your box paid for the software, but not the hosting, nor the maintenance, nor the customer service they have to maintain, nor etc etc etc.

 

Since you love shaky analogies, let me offer you a couple:

- If you buy the house, do you expect to never have to pay for gaz/electricity?

- If you buy an Xbox, do you expect to never have to pay for games?

- If you buy a cat, do you expect to never have to pay for food?

- If you buy a TV, do you expect free cable?

 

EDIT: inbefore the "you dont HAVE to pay anything in microtransaction modeled games!". If you want to remain competitive you do. That is why people call them "Pay to Win" games. If the cash shop offers only non-combat-related items (cosmetics, character slots, etc), it is because it relies on another source of income.

Edited December 28, 2011 by Stonedsoul

[Durt]

Here is a legit question.... *** am i paying for...

 

i go into gamestation to get this game coz my mate says its quite a fun mmo, to find that i am being asked to pay £45 for the game. Ok fine i can deal with that, new release title ect you expect to be paying £30 and up. However i then notice that you need to have an online subscription to play.... of £9 a month. So what have i paid £45 for?

 

This game is made by a bunch of greedy *****s just like that of WoW. They arnt happy enough to make the millions out of you by selling the game alone, they have to go that 1 bit further and squeeze as much out of you as they possibly can. Think of games like Guildwars. Im sure most of you MMO fans will have played guildwars, and found that after paying your £20 for the game you dont have to pay any more and you get all content and updates absolutely free.. Why is it that they can do it and SWTOR cant? and its all down to greed. Tbh if your gunna expect people to pay to play the game then make the game itself free.. how can you charge some1 so much for a bunch of discs they cant use untill they pay you more.

 

Before u all sit there going troll.. troll.. troll, think about it... what is that £9 a month ur paying actually buying you that the £45 you paid to get the game didnt.... ur not getting any benifits, any added content or anything like that just teh ability to play the game you already bought

 

You get new content which is the equal of paying for a DLC on Steam.

 

You get server maintenence which is a massive plus. Keeping up servers for a million or more people is not a simple task. Nor is it cheap.

 

Also think of things in money/enjoyment hours. I paid 90 bucks for the pre-order standard and 2 more months of game time. I've already played over 24 hours (I had a 25 IA and deleted it to swap servers). For a movie I pay 10/hour for entertainment usually (since I pay for my GF). For this I paid 3.75/hour and I'm barely a fraction into the play time yet.

 

This was a solid investment.

[MVPddark]

And YOU obviously miss the bigger point, NO ONE IS MAKING YOU PLAY THIS GAME.

 

Go back to guild wars.

 

im not playing this game lol its in the bin along with the £45 i wasted on it =]

[Durt]

As has been mentioned several times, GW is paid for by micro transactions, it is not free, plus the game uses P2P for most content, the central servers only manage the player hubs, not the whole world like SWTOR, not sure how many times this has to be mentioned.

 

But lets be honest here we're trying to rationally debate with a kid who bought an mmo without checking to see if it was sub based, or reading the box.

 

F2P games make much more money on average than P2P. Most users pay a ton for content - the little "oh it's only $2" things add up fast.

[Chrisamcnicholas]

im not playing this game lol its in the bin along with the £45 i wasted on it =]

 

Oh, cool. Can I have your stuff?

 

Also, stop posting here if you're not playing the game. That'd be like going to the DMV and screaming about how you don't have a drivers license because you can ride your bike for free and calling everyone idiots.

[Eswopikafa]

This thread summed up in one (long, but with a semi-colon!) sentence.

 

"I have no idea what an MMO is, nor do I understad that my $15 a month goes toward new content, server maintenance, and progression; Guild Wars was 'free' even though i had to buy a $50 expansion pack every few months so figure it out".

 

Actually, that's two sentences.

[Napalmbrain]

This thread summed up in one (long, but with a semi-colon!) sentence.

 

"I have no idea what an MMO is, nor do I understad that my $15 a month goes toward new content, server maintenance, and progression; Guild Wars was 'free' even though i had to buy a $50 expansion pack every few months so figure it out".

 

Seriously people, 15 pages of garbage...Why are all forums so full of QQers? I have yet to see a video game board that isn't more than 90% immature children. Seriously quit crying or go back to call of duty, or whatever ****** $60 console game you want to buy and beat in 8 hours so long as you don't have to pay monthly!

 

They come in droves and the cycle is everlasting.

 

As soon as the current flock of spoiled crybabies moves on, another one moves in its place.

 

I wish we could have it the way you describe...but come on lets be realistic. There will ALWAYS be critics, haters and crybabies.

[TUXs]

First MMO? This is common with ALL MMOs I've ever played.

[Chrisamcnicholas]

I bet activation fees get this guy real mad.

[Dymensia]

I'm paying $60 for account activation and a month of game time and $13 for continued access to their servers after that month. Considering a frequently pay $60 for a game I'll play less often and still finish in less than a month I'm getting my money's worth and the cost per game time only goes down the longer it's out.

 

It's up to each consumer to decide whether the product is worth the cost. This game is worth the cost to me.

[LizardSF]

im not playing this game lol its in the bin along with the £45 i wasted on it =]

 

Well, I'm sure you feel much, much, smarter than all of us still using the 30 days included in that original purchase price. You got zero days for the same cost! You are a true genius, an independant man of action, much more daring and bold (and smart and handsome, I'm sure) than the rest of us lowly peons.

 

So far, I've had about 20-odd hours of entertainment for my 50 dollars; if I never play again, that's 2.50 an hour, much better than going to the movies (11.00 for two hours, or 5.50 an hour). Assuming I play as much in the next three weeks as I have so far, I will get a total of 80 hours out of my included one month of play, or a total cost of 0.62/hour. That's a pretty good deal by anyone's measure, and if the game is still fun by the end of the first month, I'll likely re-sub. At 15.00/month, if I play 40 hours in a month (slightly more than an hour a day, not unreasonable given my other commitments), that will be 0.37/hour of play time.

 

Since I began my online life with Compuserve which charged 12.00/hour for access at 1200 baud, this strikes me as a very good bargain indeed. (PS:You might want to look up "baud". It's a bit before your time. At least, I hope it is, because anyone old enough to remember baud rates, and who acts like you do, no longer has the excuse of youthful folly.)

 

PS: You might want to spend less time playing video games and more time taking night courses in English. I mean, you're in ENGLAND, it's where the bloody language comes from, eh wot?

[kesayo]

GW is not an MMO. If you can't tell the difference, then you're right, this game is not going to be worth it for you. Don't play it.

[Qishari]

Hello all,

 

We ask that threads on the General Discussion forum promote constructive discussion. Since the thread has devolved into a discussion of subscription vs f2p models instead of discussion of Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ we are going to go ahead and close the thread as it has run its course and is now off topic.