Guild Wars

I'm probably sure I'm not the only gamer who was interested in seeing how well two companies founded by former Blizzard elites - ArenaNet and Flagship Studios - would do. I still play GW every now and then, and was excited when Flagship Studios came out with Hellgate London.

What I wasn't excited about though was Hellgate's subscription fees for all new content and even basic conveniences that GW players get by buying the box. So now that Flagship is closing its doors this week, all I've got to say is I'm grateful that ArenaNet has backed the no subscription model.

http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/news/39866/Flagship-Studios-Closure-Confirmed-All-Staff-Fired-All-I-P-Lost-Updated 

Anyone else feel the same way? Without subscription fees I can buy the content I want, when I want. I'm happily willing to buy an expansion pack, but Flagship seemed to be leading a trend of charging for content that wasn't worth the price. So, cheers to ArenaNet for sticking to their guns and showing that you don't have to charge $10-15/month to offer a highly successful, great game.

I'm glad ArenaNet are doing well too. Guild Wars 2 will up the bar with regards to persistent worlds too.

ArenaNet was smart and realized the profit potential of selling the game and then having the multiplayer hosted free, same as Battle.net with Diablo.

Bill Roper was just a greedy bastard who killed his company because he thought he could charge more for less by simply calling it an mmo.

Battlefelon, you make a great point.  You look at ANet's business model and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but then you look at it years later and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but they have yet to do so and don't appear they will.  The business model of no monthly sub doesn't seem to make any logical sense but regardless, it's worked out apparently.  It was such a novel idea when they introduced the concept of no monthly fees but I think the limited appeal of the game, absence of having a grand scale of a world (so to speak) makes it easier.  Even more so now then when I played with being able to purchases skills, extra character slots and other stuff. 

What i don't get though is, why has noone tried to match this?  It seems everyone thinks bigger is better. More content. Bigger worlds. Make everything HUGE!!  But Guild Wars and the fact it seems to still be going strong doesn't influence more companies to follow suit, boggles my mind. 

Originally posted by Suplyndmnd

Battlefelon, you make a great point.  You look at ANet's business model and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but then you look at it years later and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but they have yet to do so and don't appear they will.  The business model of no monthly sub doesn't seem to make any logical sense but regardless, it's worked out apparently.  It was such a novel idea when they introduced the concept of no monthly fees but I think the limited appeal of the game, absence of having a grand scale of a world (so to speak) makes it easier.  Even more so now then when I played with being able to purchases skills, extra character slots and other stuff. 

What i don't get though is, why has noone tried to match this?  It seems everyone thinks bigger is better. More content. Bigger worlds. Make everything HUGE!!  But Guild Wars and the fact it seems to still be going strong doesn't influence more companies to follow suit, boggles my mind. 

 

Simple math really...

ANet makes $200 000 000 if they sell 5 million copies

Blizzard makes $400 000 000 initially by selling 10 000 000 copies and continues to make $150 000 000 per month

Everyone is aiming to beat WoW.

Originally posted by Lydon

Originally posted by Suplyndmnd

Battlefelon, you make a great point.  You look at ANet's business model and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but then you look at it years later and you scream "BUT YOU'LL FAIL!" but they have yet to do so and don't appear they will.  The business model of no monthly sub doesn't seem to make any logical sense but regardless, it's worked out apparently.  It was such a novel idea when they introduced the concept of no monthly fees but I think the limited appeal of the game, absence of having a grand scale of a world (so to speak) makes it easier.  Even more so now then when I played with being able to purchases skills, extra character slots and other stuff. 

What i don't get though is, why has noone tried to match this?  It seems everyone thinks bigger is better. More content. Bigger worlds. Make everything HUGE!!  But Guild Wars and the fact it seems to still be going strong doesn't influence more companies to follow suit, boggles my mind. 

 

Simple math really...

ANet makes $200 000 000 if they sell 5 million copies

Blizzard makes $400 000 000 initially by selling 10 000 000 copies and continues to make $150 000 000 per month

Everyone is aiming to beat WoW.

What i don't get though is why. Blizzard makes 400 million and 150 million per month but they have a much much much larger overhead than ANet does.  So overall ANet is closer to Blizzard than one would think.  

Originally posted by BattleFelon

What I wasn't excited about though was Hellgate's subscription fees for all new content and even basic conveniences that GW players get by buying the box.

This was the sole reason i didn't even look twice at Hellgate.  They had tiered subscription models which always fail. 

Mhm, GW is still an MMO I'll play, even though I play WoW.

When you think about it, GW is closer to the subscription model for the variosu F2P Grindfest MMOs with market places. Thing is, is that the people behind GW perfected it. They balanced the entire game out so that those who pay for things arent OP, and that there is little 'grinding' in it. People may laugh at the game, but its actually very deep. You may scoff at the amount of classes there is, but wait till you start combining them. Besides, I like the skill system, instead of paying for different ranks, when you level you gain points to throw into the category that spell is in, and it is improved in doing so.

Warr/Necro FTW :D

fp2 model is nothing new, it existed before mmo's. Its how every game was made before mmo's the only difference is that the games werent updated, but at the same time the games were finished and bug free.

I dont find it surprising that you can make a good game charge a flat fee for it and make lots of money. What really suprised me was the pay 2 play model and how successful it was. But i think those days are over or are ending soon. They could get away with monthly fees when there were no other games like them out on the market but just look to your left and see how much junk is out there asking for $15. The golden age of getting rich quick off 3d chatrooms is over thanks to guild wars who can do the same thing without a monthly fee, and do it better.

Eventually they're going to have to make more innovative games to justify charging $15 a month. I know myself, I havent even looked at any p2p fantasy mmo since Guild Wars came out. and now that Im satified it can be done and done well I dont see any reason why other games cant do the same. Unfortunately they still think they can make worse games than guild wars and charge $15. That will change soon, GW was a pioneer and GW2 should be the nail in the coffin for these crap games.