Originally posted by afoaa

 RMT for some items in a MMO actually battles gold farmers and rampant inflation on the AH's.

If you buy cool clothes, houses, mounts and other things that usually cost a LOT of in-game money for real money instead then people wont be that desperate to generate a large amount of in-game cash.

Then you can go into a serious campaign of undercutting prices massively and by doing that press prices down (since there wont be a need for the huge cash elements anymore). And the more you press prices down, the more the in-game money you already have is worth and so by dumping prices you become wealthier and the gold farmers will lose their business since everyone can get enough in-game money to buy things they need.

It just that some intelligent RMTs and some dedicated players to kill the gold farming business.

There is nothing intelligent about RMT in P2P games other than the intelligence of the developer to suck more money from their player base. Players like me will jump ship quickly when this garbage is added though to a game I am paying monthly for. There are better ways to handle gold sellers than join them. The can't beat them, join them attitude doesn't work.

I could name a few ways off the top of my head to help against gold farming. I personally would like to see in game commerce taken out of the hands of the players. Everything should be bought and sold to NPCs. That right there would remove the issue. Everything could be bind on pick up or only tradeable between characters on the same account, never an other account. There are ways to combat gold farming and I would rather remove the player economy before RMT "fixes" the issue for us.

F2P Fast Food

You have to applaud Richard, he keeps writing these articles even when we keep burning them to toast. Oh he is paid for them, a salve to his charred fingers. :)

It is so fortunate that in Richards world something that is ‘inevitable’ is also ‘good’ for our hobby. Yes our hobby, our pursuit, our pastime, for which F2P is not inevitable nor good.

This bit of faulty logic about the beneficial effects of RMT revenue models particularly stuck out:

“In fact, it's a way of promoting growth; it helps to reach new consumers by providing alternatives that better fit their preferences. In a way, it's kind of like marketing changes we see all the time in other areas, such as adding a new package size, another color or a different combination of burger toppings.”

No its not Richard, you are confusing product with revenue. Gamers are not getting a choice ‘that fits their preferences’ in your version of a MMO which I will call ‘Burger Online’. We all have to play the same game, even with RMT’s. A few extra RMT outfits will not change the game to fit someone’s preferences but RMT’s that distort game balance will leave a bad taste in the mouth for the rest of us playing Burger Online. All gamers will get is a choice of which revenue model they dip into, nothing more.

It is perhaps revealing that you choose to think of MMO’s as burgers in which the most important element is ‘fun’. A good MMO is a three course meal, not F2P Fast Food. The dessert is fun but the main meal is teamwork, community and being part of a story.
 

OP can post this kind of articles everyday. That won't change my mind. I don't want to be forced to spend all my money and live in parents basement only to be competitive with players that do it. The day when last mmorpg with monthly subscription will close is the day I will stop playing mmorpgs. You can say anything you want but 'west' have more common sense than 'east'.

I'm confused.  The article asks "if" and "when" we will see games with both a subscription fee and microtransactions.  What about EQ2? Surely there are others? Also: just because some (or at least one) exist already doesn't make it a good idea. Quite the opposite.

Originally posted by stine96

How many F2P articles does he need to write ?

The more, the better. They're great .

Oh, and DDO isn't a fast food game. If you think F2P can change such game to being a fastfood, be prepared for trouble once you take this approach while playing. DDO was always a game demanding some maturity, quests, traps and this whole system isn't your Free Realms nor Warrior Epic. Nor WoW.

Is this article about paying the $5 / mo subscription to FreeRealms to open up all of the classes only to find that you still have to buy virtual your pet with real money? If so then I totally agree with your outrage.

I'd like to see an article that delves into the unknown area of making a MMO that has both PvE and PvP. Can it be done and if so will players one day reject the killing of innocent NPCs due to the lifelikiness of players? There is a grey line that makes me think some people should avoid crossing, but each the own is.

Originally posted by MarL

Originally posted by markt50

Question: When a game has both micro-transactions and an optional subscription fee, is it still considered free to play?

 

Answer: No. (So stop being a cheapskate and just pay for a sub to a decent game  )

 

Hope that helps

 

Ya because not wanting to pay 180 a year and being locked into one game, makes you a cheapskate. Even if you do pay for the game doesnt mean all your friends want to pay for it too.

NEWS FLASH: The average cash shop player spends MORE than $300/year.

Google your information next time before degrading your "mortal standpoint" even further in a community (Real MMO players) that despise the sub-par gameplay F2P induces.

Seriously, I'm starting to believe Richard is getting paid commission per article he writes trying to "Hype" the crappy F2P market. Getting the "word" out won't make us all mindless zombies and play crappy F2P games.

Richard makes some great points here. There are definitely big shifts occuring with the payment/revenue models of online, traditionally subscription based games. I for one, think these changes are an extremely good thing. It means the MMO industry is exploring its flexibility and price elasticity. There are plenty of games, Like EVE Online for example, which I do not think merit $15 a month every month. Sometimes,, I just want to set a timed training that takes many days and I won't be playing. What an excellent candidate for a non-subscription, single microtransaction that is reduced from the full subscription cost. EVE Online is a good example of what I would say is artificially inelastic for no good reason.

Thanks for this look into things, Richard! Keep it up :)

The basic issue I have with all these pricing/revenue models is that they just seem to try to 'trick' me into paying more then I want to.  As a consumer I want to know what I pay for and what I can expect if I can keep playing. 

With a P2P there is a set monthly fee and the decision for me is whether the content I am playing through each month is worth that fee. 

With all these F2P models it becomes harder to figure out what exactly I am paying for.  Some of them are straightforward and say you 'pay this much and ou get this'.  Those I respect.  Others are getting too convoluted and seem like a lot of bait-and-switch where I never know if what I come it to buy is actually what I am gonna get.

This is nothing but greed plain and simple. I refuse to play any game that supports both subscription and RMT at the same time. I prefere to stick with B2P then P2P MMO's because I pay a flat fee every month and have access to everything in that game I don't have to spend an extra $20 or more except for expansion releases. Seriously what are MMO's coming to these days? These companys want to be greedy but they will end up seeing that their greed will destroy the MMO as they scam their players.

So if this is the start of what I have to look forward to for future MMO's then I will just throw my PC out and stick with my console games. To even have an edge in a F2P MMO you must use the cashshop and the way these companys work most of thier cashshops you only keep the item for a set amount of time in which case you end up spending money over and over and it adds up over time.

Like I said I will stick with B2P then P2P till they decide to screw those up also by adding RMT crap. Right now I don't see me playing MMO's in 5 years at the rate this industry is going.

I think we are a little hard on Richard here.  I may not agree with the guy, but I don't think he's a plant for the asian grinders or anything like that.

The industry is changing, and Richard is only discussing the changes, as we are here.  Personally, I think the changes in the industry are for the worse, because the focus from the MMO publishers is so different today than what it once was.

I remember when MMOs first went mainstream back in the early '90s with UO.  The game wasn't designed to extract money from the players.  It was designed to be a great game, and sold on the shelves alongside other games.  To tell you the truth, if those guys at Origin had it their way, they wouldn't charge the monthly at all, because the monthly kept the game out of many hands (my own included).

The monthly wasn't about making uber-cash back then.  The monthly was about paying the bills.  And I remember the whole way they tried to sell the monthly to us in the FAQs of that time.  Specifically, the monthly would be used to make the game better.  The way they made money was through the boxes, not the monthly.  And as a result, we got a lot of nice staff to solve CS issues, run live events, and create content during that era.  We paid more, but we also got more.

Somewhere along the line, the publishers stopped thinking about the monthly as a way to pay the bills, and started to think about the monthly as the thing they sold.  The monthly was no longer justified to players as a thing that made the game better, but more like a player's "membership dues."  Anything extra was an extra charge, most commonly in the form of expansion packs you'd get off the shelf.  We pay a lot more now, but we get so much less today.  Staff has been cut, development is funneled into $30 and $15 expansion packs, and the games are no longer a synergy between developers and players like it once was.  The only thing a box buys us these days is an opportunity to buy a sub.  And the only thing a sub buys us is server access.

Buying into a subscription-based MMO today makes a whole lot less sense today than it did back then...and even then it didn't make much sense.  We've gotten used to the idea, but the whole mindset of the publishers today is about giving us the least amount of game possible for the most amount of money possible.

And that's the real thing that stinks about the microtransaction games.  It's not about financing a well-designed game, like in the old days.  It's about designing a game around a finance model, which means that the game is purposely designed to be a disappointment unless you throw more money into it.

The only reason I picked up SWG in 2003 was that it gave me more game for less money than I would otherwise spend.  Since that time, so many other games have stepped up their operations to include all the things that made MMOs such a good value...like frequent content updates and online play over common servers...and get this...all for one single payment of $50 or less that you spend at the counter at your local Best Buy!  Compared with that, WoW looks like a scam.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm all about what Richard is trying to say when he wants to take down the "entry costs" to this form of internet entertainment.  However, I'm not sure that microtransactions are the way to make this genre appealing.  And the reason is this: offering "more game for more money" isn't the thing that made MMOs appealing in the early days.  It was the fact that MMOs gave a person "more game for less money" that made MMOs better than online peer-to-peer and single player.  But it seems today that this whole concept is better met by the new peer-to-peer and single player games; games that offer a whole lot more game for a much lower cost to the consumer than a similar experience in an MMO.

Honestly, I'm sick of the F2P discussions.  I wish there was a way to disable viewing F2P games, add's, and content on this site. 

I have tried F2P games and this is how they have all broken down for me:

1)  They look and feel cheap or like cheap knock-off's of other titles.  I would liken F2P games to 'swapmeet louis (vuitton)'.  Sure, nearly every game on the market takes ideas from the games that came before it... but for me, F2P's all seem like generic, gub'ment cheese versions. 

2)  F2P games = bait and switch, imho.  Free to play, pay to win. 

3)  Grinders.  Maybe in other regions of this planet 'group grinding' is cool.  For me, however, it's not.  No, I'm not looking for instant gratification, but I'm not looking to spend 2-3 hours a night in a region with 3-4 other people killing the same mobs.  That's not fun and it's not the type of experience that will keep me playing a game.  

Again, I wish MMORPG.COM were able to offer 2 sections... a F2P game section and another for subscription based games.  When I want to look over the fence and check out the F2P games, I can.  Just sick of having them in my face everytime I come to this site.

More articles about new F2P system in coming DDO:U

www.massively.com/2009/06/30/massivelys-ddo-unlimited-developer-tour/

www.tentonhammer.com/node/69960

www.tentonhammer.com/node/70586

I don’t think Richard is a plant for Asian grinders, but on his own admission he seems to have never played a subscription game. And as certain fact, if he has he did not get past the first few levels as that’s all he ever plays.

He is then far more in touch with the people who make and run MMO’s than he is with the players, hence his reception here. What goes down well at the company water cooler will often get short shrift from the players.

Originally posted by Beatnik59

I think we are a little hard on Richard here.  I may not agree with the guy, but I don't think he's a plant for the asian grinders or anything like that.

The industry is changing, and Richard is only discussing the changes, as we are here.  Personally, I think the changes in the industry are for the worse, because the focus from the MMO publishers is so different today than what it once was.

I remember when MMOs first went mainstream back in the early '90s with UO.  The game wasn't designed to extract money from the players.  It was designed to be a great game, and sold on the shelves alongside other games.  To tell you the truth, if those guys at Origin had it their way, they wouldn't charge the monthly at all, because the monthly kept the game out of many hands (my own included).

The monthly wasn't about making uber-cash back then.  The monthly was about paying the bills.  And I remember the whole way they tried to sell the monthly to us in the FAQs of that time.  Specifically, the monthly would be used to make the game better.  The way they made money was through the boxes, not the monthly.  And as a result, we got a lot of nice staff to solve CS issues, run live events, and create content during that era.  We paid more, but we also got more.

Somewhere along the line, the publishers stopped thinking about the monthly as a way to pay the bills, and started to think about the monthly as the thing they sold.  The monthly was no longer justified to players as a thing that made the game better, but more like a player's "membership dues."  Anything extra was an extra charge, most commonly in the form of expansion packs you'd get off the shelf.  We pay a lot more now, but we get so much less today.  Staff has been cut, development is funneled into $30 and $15 expansion packs, and the games are no longer a synergy between developers and players like it once was.  The only thing a box buys us these days is an opportunity to buy a sub.  And the only thing a sub buys us is server access.

Buying into a subscription-based MMO today makes a whole lot less sense today than it did back then...and even then it didn't make much sense.  We've gotten used to the idea, but the whole mindset of the publishers today is about giving us the least amount of game possible for the most amount of money possible.

And that's the real thing that stinks about the microtransaction games.  It's not about financing a well-designed game, like in the old days.  It's about designing a game around a finance model, which means that the game is purposely designed to be a disappointment unless you throw more money into it.

The only reason I picked up SWG in 2003 was that it gave me more game for less money than I would otherwise spend.  Since that time, so many other games have stepped up their operations to include all the things that made MMOs such a good value...like frequent content updates and online play over common servers...and get this...all for one single payment of $50 or less that you spend at the counter at your local Best Buy!  Compared with that, WoW looks like a scam.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm all about what Richard is trying to say when he wants to take down the "entry costs" to this form of internet entertainment.  However, I'm not sure that microtransactions are the way to make this genre appealing.  And the reason is this: offering "more game for more money" isn't the thing that made MMOs appealing in the early days.  It was the fact that MMOs gave a person "more game for less money" that made MMOs better than online peer-to-peer and single player.  But it seems today that this whole concept is better met by the new peer-to-peer and single player games; games that offer a whole lot more game for a much lower cost to the consumer than a similar experience in an MMO.

Agreed, most mmos really dont gie you much, i mean look at wow theirs a content what once every 2 years? and it cost you 30 bucks?

But a few got it right.

Look at LoTRO Book 8 is free, the mines of Moria cost and is really only for max level character. Then theres city of heroes.

16 free issues in 5 years: which added inventions (customizing power effects), lots of nerfs, new classes and powers, Mission creation, power customization, weapon customization, PVP zones, and much more all for free. The only Add on? City of Villians whick let you make well Villians, and going Rogur which lets you explore a new zone (pretoria) and switch sides

Any form of micro transaction is just no go.... not ethical ...

The games aren't F2P either because the game constitutes the elements you have to pay for  which means you are just playing a taster.

 I think a lot of people are being a little naive about the whole F2P cash shop system. I don't blame people for forming a negative opinion of it, because the MMO market is flooded with sub-par titles and asian grindfest MMOs. The flaw isn't in the cash shop system, it's in the games themselves, or the developers of the games.

Does cash shop have anything to do with a completely unimaginative world, recycled gameplay mechanics, and poor polish? I don't necessarily believe that. For instance, Atlantica Online, while it may not be a STELLAR game, still has it's good points and was indeed inventive with the turn-based battle system.

Does cash shop have anything to do with people spending extra money on their MMO? Far from the truth. It's obvious that PLENTY of people each day spend money for WoW gold, EVE ISK, and GW platinum. In fact, from the latest headline about the end of Chinese gold farming, it was a multi-billion yuan a year industry! Plenty of people get online and spend real money on in game currency so they can twink characters, craft the new epic pieces, buy the new cool mount, etc. It's a fact of life, people WANT to spend the money to get the items. 

The REAL problems with F2P games is that they are cookie-cutter and unimaginative. I don't know how many F2P games I've tried and thought, "Wow, this again?" or, "Gee, warrior, priest, or mage, Oh My!" I also hate to see the same whack-a-mole style gameplay, but even that is reiterated in P2P games. 

Granted, plenty of the F2P games have the unfair advantages of XP potions, no Death Penalty potions, extra damage, etc etc etc. But there are a few F2P games out there that don't have these items. That the cash shop is for cosmetics, access to new zones, etc. And, in the end, this is not so far off from a P2P game. You pay a monthly fee that funds the developers to create that new content for you to visit, and in these F2P titles, you're doing the very same thing, only at your own pace, not at the pace the developer chooses for you.

I think F2P has a ways to come before being a solid investment or worth mentioning next to a P2P title, but the fact is MMOs are migrating in this direction. I hope to see better management of a cash shop, and peope spending money on that cash shop so the developers make the money they need to put out quality games and content. Just not in the fashion that past Asian MMO grinders have portrayed them to be.

I've played a few web-based online games that are F2P but with 'currency' you buy with real cash to get stuff-- all kinds of stuff! I can see how that is cool for the people who buy the coinage and reap the rewards, but a lot of people who play F2P games are playing them because, well, they are Free to Play. If they could pay, they'd play something else. I know it doesn't cost *too* much, but for people with moths flapping out of their wallets, spending a few bucks on game-coinage is sure to cause guilt, as that money could have gone to bills, food, clothes, or some RL entertainment that lasts longer than five minutes. Sure, most of those games offer ways to acquire the 'currency' through somewhat normal gameplay, but in the games I have played, it is very difficult and a very small amount. I don't knock the people who pay-- that is the point! That is what the creators want you to do, and it keeps the game/site running (and perhaps funds further development). So if you can and want to, go for it and have a blast!
I played DDO a couple years ago and I enjoyed it greatly. I only stopped playing because of LOTRO's release. I find it hard to picture it as a F2P game and to buy something like access to the zone of Waterworks, when said zone was always there, but it is their game and if they think they will get more players and money that way, go right ahead! Like I said, I play LOTRO now, so it doesn't affect me.

Anyhow, my rambles are explanatory and my point is this: Subscription AND F2P in one game? I take it you meant you pay monthly and then pay more for extras. I am absolutely horrified at this idea. You are shelling out fifty bucks or more to get the game, then fifteen a month for however long. Are you telling me that you want the company to then charge us additional money to get some cool stuff? So all the richer folk are bedecked and bedazzled from all their bought gear/items/points/whatever, and the normal folk have to suffer with unbalance and crappier things, because you can bet everything will be nerfed so that the truly good items are in the store and everything else is garbage. Isn't it bad enough to deal with that situation in the real world, without having it spill over into the virtual worlds we escape to precisely to forget such troubles for a while?

Subscription + Store = Worst thing that could happen to any game, let alone my precious MMOs. You just leave them alone!

My only thought is that if you are calling it "free to play" then make sure it is truly free to play. No hidden you need to buy x or y in order to go here or do this or that.  That is not free. That is restricted play unless you play. Be honest and upfront about in your advertising.

If you're going to be free to play, make sure you have sponsors and advertisers to cover your costs. Don't build in a bunch of hidden crap that you find out after the fact costs you real world dollars to gain acess to.

That's as close to false advertising as I think you can get and I'm surprised no one has sued over it yet (other than the fact that it is games)

Originally posted by Unibrow

 I think a lot of people are being a little naive about the whole F2P cash shop system. I don't blame people for forming a negative opinion of it, because the MMO market is flooded with sub-par titles and asian grindfest MMOs. The flaw isn't in the cash shop system, it's in the games themselves, or the developers of the games.

Does cash shop have anything to do with a completely unimaginative world, recycled gameplay mechanics, and poor polish? I don't necessarily believe that. For instance, Atlantica Online, while it may not be a STELLAR game, still has it's good points and was indeed inventive with the turn-based battle system.

Does cash shop have anything to do with people spending extra money on their MMO? Far from the truth. It's obvious that PLENTY of people each day spend money for WoW gold, EVE ISK, and GW platinum. In fact, from the latest headline about the end of Chinese gold farming, it was a multi-billion yuan a year industry! Plenty of people get online and spend real money on in game currency so they can twink characters, craft the new epic pieces, buy the new cool mount, etc. It's a fact of life, people WANT to spend the money to get the items. 

The REAL problems with F2P games is that they are cookie-cutter and unimaginative. I don't know how many F2P games I've tried and thought, "Wow, this again?" or, "Gee, warrior, priest, or mage, Oh My!" I also hate to see the same whack-a-mole style gameplay, but even that is reiterated in P2P games. 

Granted, plenty of the F2P games have the unfair advantages of XP potions, no Death Penalty potions, extra damage, etc etc etc. But there are a few F2P games out there that don't have these items. That the cash shop is for cosmetics, access to new zones, etc. And, in the end, this is not so far off from a P2P game. You pay a monthly fee that funds the developers to create that new content for you to visit, and in these F2P titles, you're doing the very same thing, only at your own pace, not at the pace the developer chooses for you.

I think F2P has a ways to come before being a solid investment or worth mentioning next to a P2P title, but the fact is MMOs are migrating in this direction. I hope to see better management of a cash shop, and peope spending money on that cash shop so the developers make the money they need to put out quality games and content. Just not in the fashion that past Asian MMO grinders have portrayed them to be.

The RMT in these games is around in-game money for these vanity mounts/pets, that anyone can also get without spending a single damn extra cent than your subscription fee. These people who spend with RMTs are merely accelerating their growth to reach a point the ones that spend more time efficiently have already reached. The best equipments in these subscription games are bind on pickup or bind on equip. Again, not a single damn extra cent than your subscription fee.

When you add an item mall though, you are adding things that only those that spend money will acquire. That epic mount in WoW? Only those that spend money would get it in the F2P counterpart, they would be exclusive for them, you don't even get the rough option between TIME and MONEY to achieve it. Or sometimes you can commercialize these items in the game, but then you will see holycraphigh costs for these item mall items for in-game money (much higher than in the relative P2P version of this mount). Plus, the enchanting/upgrading of items will be much easier (and sometimes the only way possible to get a high number) with the resources these item mall offer for the players.

The subscription games can and usually are developed around so that RMTs don't bring too much of an advantage. And who said F2P games also don't include illegal RMTs? After all, they don't include selling in-game currency and powerleveling in the item mall, only tools for that.

Again, my only major negative for the P2P genre in the West is because they still do not offer the hour plans for those that don't want to play only one MMO a month, don't want to be bound to a 30-day period service or don't want to feel that MMO is their life. Paying too many subscriptions in the same month will add into a not-so-nice price.