I'm curious to know how long people feel like they have to play a subscription game before they feel the purchase was "worth" it.  The thought really came to mind when I put up a poll for Age of Conan and several people posted that they enjoyed the game but would not subscribe (i.e., paid 50 dollars and were satisfied with the 1 month of free time.)  When I think back to the mmo's I've played....

• Dark Age of Camelot -- first mmo, got a at least 1year out of it, including the SI expansion.  Definitely a great introduction to mmo's and definitely worth its cost. ($80 for both games + subtime)
• Star Wars Galaxies -- pre-ordered, cancelled during month two.  Extremely disappointed, felt I did not get value out of it. ($50 + 1 month subtime)
• City of Heroes -- playing on and off since beta, 23 months paid time/34 months vet time, Full version of CoH, CoV, and got the CoH collector's edition for 10 dollars.  Absolutely worth it. ($80 dollars + subtime.)
• World of Warcraft  -- only bought the original game, played for 6-8 months.  Probably worth it as all of my friends were congregated on there at the time. ($40 + subtime)
• Auto Assault -- bought CE for 7 dollars when Compusa was going shuttering their B&Ms.  It was a meh game, indifferent to the value, I guess I'd say it was worth the price to play for a month.
• Vanguard -- just ordered a copy of the CE online for 9.99 and therefore have not played it yet.  My speculation is that I can get my value from it.

Now, I've listed 2 games (okie 3) where I've scored reasonably good deals on the game for 10 dollars or less.  But, in the interest of discussion, I'd like to focus on game bought brand new for 39.99+ as that "feels" like a more significant outlay of cash (probably because it exceeds the cost of a single month of subscription time.)

Please discuss! ( ' :

I say at least 4-6. Hopefully more.

I didn't choose an answer because If I purchased a video game to play and it has a fee to play online so be it.

I look at it from a totally different perspective. Basically,  I live on video games( with the exception of a job) so it's not a question of is the purchase "worth it". Of course it's worth it , I bought it. 

The question is How much cash are you saving by playing them? To focus in a bit , If I spend 50 bucks on a game and 14.99(example) a month to play is that worth it? 

Hand someone 65.00 and tell them "that is what your allowed to spend in recreation this month. During that month you must have 2-5 hours of fun on weekdays and 4-6 hours of fun on the weekends."

With Gas being over 4 dollar a gallon on a national average he wont get too far with that 65.00.

Playing video games is always worth it. Just dont forget about family and friends.

in 2004 I payed Anarchy Online for 5 months.  Basically, that's all I did.  I purchased the game and expansion online for a deal, $35.  There was then 4 extra months of playtime (15/m) equaling $60.  So I spent $95 on a game that I played for more then 3 hours on weekdays and more then 6 on weekends.

Later that year (and into 2005) I played World of Warcraft for 6 months.  That was $50 + (6*15) = $140.  But got the same enjoyment out time out of it daily.

To put that in perspective, I went out drinking for St Patrick's Day this year.  The place we went to was less then 2 miles away, so it's not that bad as far as gas, almost negligible.

To get into the festivities it was $10.
Each beer was $8 (I had 5).
The funny green foam hat was $20.
The shots of Jager were $10. (I had 2)
And the parking was validated, but I lost the slip (or couldn't find it drunk) and paid $5.

So... 10+8+8+8+8+20+10+10+5=95.  We were there for roughly 4-5 hours.

So do I feel I get my money out of gaming?  Yes.

Do I feel like that'll stop me from going out with friends?  No.

But those 2 things are not mutually exclusive luckily...

I definitely agree with both of you that gaming has an excellent return on value -- best bang for the buck entertainment-wise, especially with prices going up everywhere else. 

On the flipside though, I still have a certain expectation for the games that I play, whether the adventure takes a certain amount of time and delivers a quality story or if it has immense replay value.   From that perspective then, I weigh the acquisition of a new game versus my existing pool of games.  Not that I get all theoretical and perform some calculations but I can turn around say..."well, this is pretty good value" as opposed to me ignoring the new game and spending a chunk of time playing something else.

There is nothing as satisfied for me in MMORPG. When I start a new MMORPG I expect it lasts forever (in theory), and quit when I get bored of it.

My big thing is being able to build up a character in a persistant, long-standing world. I'm not there for burn my way to max level and for the most part could care less about the end game. It is the journey and the fun I have just playing that is important. For those reasons, I am careful to chose games that are going to take me a fair chunk of time.

I'm still playing the same character in Everquest, even after all these years. He still has many places to go and many things he has not accomplished as yet. That is a good thing, I still have places to go, I still have fun playing him, I still have goals to strive for.

What I cannot understand is a game like AoC. From everything I am hearing, levels in that game are flowing like water. In the next month or two everyone is going to be at the end game stage, with all the prior content burned though far to rapidly to enjoy any of it. I may be in the minority, but if I ever designed a game I would make sure it took a hardcore player a minimum of 9 months - 1 year to reach max level, with a ton of content available on the journey upwards.

I voted happy with the free month and not minding paying the initial cost for the game. Still quite new to MMO's and have yet to last up to over a month with any of them. The first month I think im in love and play for many hours for most of the week, until some new game comes along,  then I just seem to forget about the oldies. But I always consider re-subbing to all of them a few months later though. Who knows, maybe I will soon discover MMO's may not be for me :( Just wanted to add that I think this is an excellent thread. Very nice work OP. Threads like this  I do not see very often, it's a unique one, as far as I know. Look forward to discussing further topics in the future,

I would rate the subscription to a game more like a cable subscription.  You pay a fee to be hooked up and after that you pay a monthly subscription fee (just like in MMOs) to stay hooked up and enjoy the offerings.

So - do you get more fun out of the MMO than you do your TV (with movies)?  I think that's a closer comparison.  I actually watch more TV than I do gaming, but that may be because my first love is card games not MMOs and I tend not to socialize as much in the games due to my inability to play well.  (So I don't really like grouping.)

Generally as long as I have at least SOME fun with it, I'd consider it worth the purchase. There have been few MMOs that kept me for over that first months subscription... I played The Realm for 3 years, AO for about a year, and WoW off and on for 2 years.

The only time I'll consider a game not worth the purchase is when I install it and find a huge steaming pile of shit installed on my PC.

I see it in a diferent way.

If i buy a game means i know i will enjoy it. Never happend buying anything and droping it on 2 weeks, since i dont just buy something without knowing what it is/isnt.

All those people buying a game, and droping in on the 1st month, or dont know what they want, or are sheep following the hypes, or plain just have too mutch money and dont know the value of it.

I cant answer the poll, none of the choices fit to me, not even the last one.