If they can create an effect f2p business model in which the developers make a enough money to support their online servers, create smalle content upgrades and patches, with some funds set aside to be later invested into sequels/expansions WHILE still having a great game I'm all for it. It'll be hard achieve but purhaps through a combination of exist business models like micro payment, premium subscription, in game advertisement etc it can be done. Guild Wars has done this reasonably well and I believe Ncsoft and Areanet can set a new standard for online games. Have a nice day.

Originally posted by boognish75

Originally posted by KatzuAion

 

Originally posted by Sparkie24

 

Originally posted by Ephimero

Originally posted by Sparkie24

 

Originally posted by zereelist

It is P2P roughly $15 per month

 

How come you know this? There is nothing for sure at the moment of writing this! It wil not be free that's for sure. Who wants to make a game on the crytek engine for free. nobody i think? Wel I sure hope it wil be like Guild Wars. Just buy the game and play then after a while buy the expansion packs to get some new things. I also hope there will be some option that you can buy stuff with real money to support the dev people. With this money they can fix bugs that are in the game.

It is official in Korea, Aion follows a classic model of buy box+pay monthly fees, 15$ is the standard so zereelist's post will probably be accurate whenever we get our bussiness model confirmed, anyways, guild wars is another kind of game totally different from Aion, GW can afford to loose a bit of money monthly on that model cause they don't pay for a lot of servers, they put almost all the load on your computer through instances, and that's not possible on a persistant world such as Aion's.

 

Wel i think it sucks if there is an montly fee.. but on the other hand if the game is as good as the promise then it is worth it i think.

 

It would suck  more if it was like Guild Wars. P2P monthly is the way to go for Good MMORPGS :) . For example Guild Wars 2 will problably be P2P.

GW's is a really great game buying all 4 campaighns is still cheaper than a year sub to most mmo's and most of them are not as immersive and story driven as gw's with a nice skill based pvp system to boot. Yer a troll with your post there sire and i fed ya and i hope yer troll teeth rot out, i doubt you even tried to play gw's or the other 3 expansions for it.

I did Play Guild Wards, However Guild wars cannot even be described as an MMORPG, you simply go  out into the world and... you are alone! :S .. honestly it sucks, it could be much better if it had the propper fundings. and well, i like a good dosage of pvp and pve, and guild wars is mostly pvp.

And no, im not gonna insult you, like you did to me, my pre-teen times are long gone, have a nice day!

I think Guild Wars has the potential to slowly gain momentum and become a greater game as Guild Wars 2. Since everytime they make a new expansion/campaign they learn more skills and tricks while still stockpiling some income on the side each release in order to make a better game. Everytime they find out how to do something well they don't have to invest time or money into repeating it. It may not rake in cash as fast as p2p game but I think It has abetter chance of establishing a solid online gaming experience with a strong community. Have a nice day.

I think it's comical that anyone would even compare GW to any other REAL MMOrpg.  It's basically a micro MMOrpg (light on the rpg, heavier on the guild PvP, and light on content in comparison to any MASSIVE moRPG).  And yes....I've played it.

GW is an entirely different sort of game than the classic MMOrpg.  Not a bad game....just different.  Personally, I'd rather pay a monthly fee and get the sort of game I'm actually interested in becoming immersed in, for me, that's more of a draw to spend my hard earned money.

Originally posted by girlgeek

I think it's comical that anyone would even compare GW to any other REAL MMOrpg.  It's basically a micro MMOrpg (light on the rpg, heavier on the guild PvP, and light on content in comparison to any MASSIVE moRPG).  And yes....I've played it.

 

GW is an entirely different sort of game than the classic MMOrpg.  Not a bad game....just different.  Personally, I'd rather pay a monthly fee and get the sort of game I'm actually interested in becoming immersed in, for me, that's more of a draw to spend my hard earned money.

Guild Wars may not be like any traditional mmorpg or any modern one for that matter but it does have the prospect of becoming a game with all the features regular mmorpgs have without the monthly subscription and the need for creating filler content such as non optional travel times between vital locations. I think if Guild Wars 2 succesfully pulls off what it claims to be then it will most definetly suceed and purhaps re-vamp what we think of mmorpgs. However I'm still happy with what Aion looks like and will gladly p2p it for awhile.

WOw i didnt know it was such a big thing to have a game with a subscription and one with out one, or with a cash shop. whats the difference if its a good game? is that really something your gonna bash on a game because you arent required to pay for it the rest of the games life?

Originally posted by tokarus

WOw i didnt know it was such a big thing to have a game with a subscription and one with out one, or with a cash shop. whats the difference if its a good game? is that really something your gonna bash on a game because you arent required to pay for it the rest of the games life?

The difference whether it's a good game or not the money you give to company has to be justified. If a good game can be made without a subscription why is there one? If there are two schools and both are in general the same but one requires payment does that make the one you have to pay for any better?

sorry i didnt put it very well. i saw someone dismissing a game because it didnt have a subscription fee, that just goes to show that the developer would rather you play and enjoy the game for the initial cost instead of maximizing profit. if wow was free im sure a lot more people would play, but then the quality of the patches may drop. i just dont understand why it would matter either way. if the game rocks who cares if its pay to play or not. you shouldnt stop playing just because of that. ehh people are wiered

I'm not a firm believer in the fact that mmorpgs actually need that much money to maintain the game and give content updates. I think games that are free online and only make money from selling just the game can't make enough money to make a proper mmorpg and games that you buy and subscribed to make way more money than they actually need to do that. From what I've seen from World of Warcraft from playing every once in awhile is that it really doesn't get enough to show me that they want to do more then collect their paycheck. Gamers like me may be over cautious in spending our money but not without reason.

I understand totally. I'm pretty much done with subscribing to games unless one completely blows me off my chair. but so far no developers really caught my interest even with the new engines,  why cant it be a little more oblivion meets wow like ? i'm stoked for the release of Aion, but i'm not sure if it will be the game that makes the change for me.

Only thing I don't like about monthly fee's is the feeling of "must play" to get your money's worth.

Have 2 options for casual and hardcore gamers.  hardcore is the regular $15/month.  casual would be something like $15/ 60 hours (rough estimate).  A lot of people only play a couple hours a week.  it's hardly fair for them to be paying the same price as someone who's playing 14 hours a day. 

I wish companies would think about that serious problem of addiction that comes with monthly fee's.  

If anyone was referring to ME as bashing a game because it's free to play....I wasn't.    I wouldn't care if GW  PAID me to play it, I personally think it sucks.  It's not the type/style of game that I, personally, enjoy.  It has nothing to do with the fact that it's free.  As a matter of fact....if a game was released that didn't have a monthly fee that was actually a high quality MMOrpg with quality customer service, good updates, etc, etc.....I would DEFINITELY have to check that out.  However....Guild Wars is NOT such a beast.  I don't even think the company refers to their game as an MMOrpg, but for some reason, the player base seems to think it is....go figure.  It has about as much in common with WoW, EQ2, AoC, and oh, I don't know....ANY other TRUE MMOrpg as frogs have in common with horses.  They really just can't be discussed honestly in the same category.

I would rather PAY and get the type of game I WANT, than play a free game, just because it's free.  To me, that is senseless. 

Meh.. in the end, i assume most of ppl want p2p (u can see a voting on this forum with 70% wanting aion to be p2p rather than free) because p2p games, normally deliver in terms of quality. Developers will justify the money you actually pay.

There's allready alot of  crappy f2p games out there, we dont need aion to be one more in the basket.

Originally posted by SinzOfMan

Only thing I don't like about monthly fee's is the feeling of "must play" to get your money's worth.

 

Have 2 options for casual and hardcore gamers.  hardcore is the regular $15/month.  casual would be something like $15/ 60 hours (rough estimate).  A lot of people only play a couple hours a week.  it's hardly fair for them to be paying the same price as someone who's playing 14 hours a day. 

 

I wish companies would think about that serious problem of addiction that comes with monthly fee's.  

I agree.  I am a casual gamer.  I play only 1-2 hours a day because i have work.  Sometimes i don't play at all because i'm tired at the end of the day.  That $15 is not worth it for me.

I wish NCSoft will come up with a different payment scheme aside from the standard monthly fee.  I'm ok with prepaid.  For example, $15 for 240 hours (equivalent to 10 days) would be fine.  It's an hourly consumption so if i don't play then the time is not wasted.  And the credit would be valid for 2 months, after which it expires.

I'm just wondering, it's been years and no one has implemented a different scheme like this.  This will attract many casual players.

Originally posted by shadowrunxt

 

Originally posted by SinzOfMan

Only thing I don't like about monthly fee's is the feeling of "must play" to get your money's worth.

 

Have 2 options for casual and hardcore gamers.  hardcore is the regular $15/month.  casual would be something like $15/ 60 hours (rough estimate).  A lot of people only play a couple hours a week.  it's hardly fair for them to be paying the same price as someone who's playing 14 hours a day. 

 

I wish companies would think about that serious problem of addiction that comes with monthly fee's.  

 

I agree.  I am a casual gamer.  I play only 1-2 hours a day because i have work.  Sometimes i don't play at all because i'm tired at the end of the day.  That $15 is not worth it for me.

I wish NCSoft will come up with a different payment scheme aside from the standard monthly fee.  I'm ok with prepaid.  For example, $15 for 240 hours (equivalent to 10 days) would be fine.  It's an hourly consumption so if i don't play then the time is not wasted.  And the credit would be valid for 2 months, after which it expires.

I'm just wondering, it's been years and no one has implemented a different scheme like this.  This will attract many casual players.

Hmmm... i dont know. It seems too much rewarding such type of payement, if something like that was allowed it would meab that would you be around 200 days playing with only 15$? . i really dont think so, most of peeps would choose that payement, and would hurt alot the socializing part of it.

"oh gtg, my 10 minutes allready passed -.-"

maybe something like 15$ - 50 hours would make some sense :).

However, i also think that companies dont include this for obvious reasons.. and hey... its a MMORPG, you're supposed to invest many hours in it!

How about $15 for 120 hours, or maybe 100 hours.

And oh, 2 months expiry is 60 days only.  The problem is that not all players can invest all the time in their life playing.

I hope that could be more cheap for casual players but the politic of ncsoft isn't like blizzard for example,nothing is ofc atm ,lineage II continue with the same payment for many years ago.

Don't think in GW payment cuz this game mainly is a mmorpg and ambitious project with many $ spent

Lets seei, P2P means montly, if not weekly updates, tons of new content, bugs and glitches fixed fast and easily, constant support, and more security and anti cheat/hacker stuff.

Micro management- maybe a short list a bugs fixed every 2 months. Horribel service. Gold sellers and hackers take over. barely any IF any new content. Eventually will turn into developer neglect and eventual server crashes, ans unwanted sestruction of a perfectly good game.

Personnally I prefer p2p because of many personnal reason. I do agree that for certain situations it would be practical ro some players to pay for a certain amount of hours but the matter is, the industry does not work quite that way.

For anyone that knows how they work, you all well know that yes like any other company they are out there to make profit. But what is 15$ a month??? Nothing.

Let's pretend you are a smoker that smokes 1 pack a day, 1 pack is 8$ (can$), so that makes 240$ a month for scraping your lungs and reducing the amount of years you'll live. Than 15$ a month for playing a game you like and that takes a load of stress off your shoulders is not so bad after all!!!

And if it ever comes to the point where you can't pay for it anymore?? QUIT smoking lol!

At first i thought Aion would be a subscription based MMO but on the advent of ncsoft implementing their NCcoin micropayment system http://www.plaync.com/us/nccoin/  with only one game currently using the system http://www.exteel.com/us/  and with none of NCsofts current titles like COX , Lineage, Tabula Rasa Guild wars and Dungeon runners showing any sign at all of implimenting the NCcoin micropayment system I'd say its a sure thing to expect NCsofts titles in development to have the NCcoin micropayment system. 

Then there's NCsofts announcement on how they wish to "Diversify how customers can pay and play" http://www.plaync.com/us/news/2008/04/ncsoft_rolls_ou_1.html also within the statement made by Chris Chung - NCsoft's America's President - there's this little snippet of insight into the direction NCsoft are currently wishing to take with future game developments

  "Micro-transactions are a growing part of the online gaming industry and NCcoin will allow us to support micro-transaction based games efficiently, allowing developers and players to quickly enjoy the benefits of those systems. We will soon be rolling out more contents that leverage the flexibility of NCcoin.”