Originally posted by jaxsundane

Originally posted by Emotep

It's like saying "We don't have confidence that our game will have high subscription retention".   Every game I can think of that has a lifetime subscription has been a failure.  (EG. WW2 Online)

I thought about getting Champions since Cryptic made City of Heroes which was a decent game, but then I saw the lifetime subscription thing, coupled with the game being published by Atari of all companies....

Well LOTRO has a lifetime sub and that is far from a failure, I'm not interested in CO really but this post is really grasping for straws really, I don't see how this makes the game a failure in anyway.

It's really quite simple.

MMO developers get funding from investors or loans. They expect to sell X number of boxes at launch and maintain Y number of subscriptions after that. There's projected profits and an expectation that a big chunk of the loan/returns will be repaid soon after launch.

If they approach the launch date and realise that they're not going to sell as many boxes as they'd planned, there's still an expectation that they pay up what they'd promised. The way to do that is to sell lifetime subscriptions. They offer a fast injection of cash potentially at the expense of long-term subscriptions.

The only mmos to have done this have been Hellgate London (widely regarded as a failure) and LOTRO, which while alive and kicking, spectacularly failed to meet their own expectations. They publicly announced they were expecting 1 million subscribers and they had 1 million beta players, i.e. they had server resources ready for 1 million subscribers. At best they achieved about a quarter of that.

So from experience gamers look at the offer of a lifetime subscription and associate it not necessarily with failure as the OP put it, but the developer predicting that they will fail to meet their own targets. Jack Emmert has said anything past 100k subscribers and they'd be profitable - so it looks like expect to net fewer subscribers than that.

Originally posted by green13

So from experience gamers look at the offer of a lifetime subscription and associate it not necessarily with failure as the OP put it, but the developer predicting that they will fail to meet their own targets. Jack Emmert has said anything past 100k subscribers and they'd be profitable - so it looks like expect to net fewer subscribers than that.

So assumed customer perception + probably realistic sub prediction = expected failure ..... no that's like saying Lion + Purple = Space Exploration.

No producer, especially in a climate of ressesion, is going to over estimate their subs prediction, the last 15 releases have done that and they have been proved epically wrong, i mean he might as well hand in his resignation with the press release.

If anything there going to underestimate and be the producer who is seen to finally break the mould and produce a game that exceeds expectations.

Originally posted by Ozryk

Originally posted by Legato89

Bill Roper, the same man behind Starcraft, Warcraft, and Diablo.

 

I second that.

People need to stop being tards.

A man who changed this industry forever.....makes one mistake, and he has to live with the stain of it eternally.

Why is human nature so predicated on negativity?

Bill Roper...the man behing HELLGATE: LONDON too.  So sure he had three hit universes, and a failed one.  Not to mention he wasn't involved from the start of champions:online, so really he has nothing to do other than newly elected PR guy. 

Putting him in front of PR has people worried.  His last game failed.  Flagships nice little game, Mythos got sucked with Travis Baldtree(or whatever his last name) was a fantastic little game that got lost as well.  So in my opinion that is 2 games trashed by him, 3 success. (Not including older console/gameboy titles of course)  So people have every right to be concerned about Champions chance of success.

Originally posted by kilun

Originally posted by Ozryk

Originally posted by Legato89

Bill Roper, the same man behind Starcraft, Warcraft, and Diablo.

 

I second that.

People need to stop being tards.

A man who changed this industry forever.....makes one mistake, and he has to live with the stain of it eternally.

Why is human nature so predicated on negativity?

 

Bill Roper...the man behing HELLGATE: LONDON too.  So sure he had three hit universes, and a failed one.  Not to mention he wasn't involved from the start of champions:online, so really he has nothing to do other than newly elected PR guy. 

Putting him in front of PR has people worried.  His last game failed.  Flagships nice little game, Mythos got sucked with Travis Baldtree(or whatever his last name) was a fantastic little game that got lost as well.  So in my opinion that is 2 games trashed by him, 3 success. (Not including older console/gameboy titles of course)  So people have every right to be concerned about Champions chance of success.

The good news was about a month ago Mytho's surfaced, it's being worked on and will be released. They are adding to it because it won't be free. Anyone investing or planning to make a mmo should have a budget based on 100,000 subs, because that is really what they can realistically expect. Perhaps 500,000 in initial sales, but after 6 months or so 100,000. Anyone selling someone 1 million plus, they are taking those investors for a ride.

Been playing CO for months now and it is a great game. Most customizable game ever in both character design and ability selection. The lifetime and 6 month payments are given by request of many beta members.

Originally posted by Emotep

Lord of the Rings Online is a failure....

Less than 200,000 subscriptions and less than 1% of the total market share = failure.

 

 

 

 

 That chart is over a year old and before the LOTRO expansion was released. 

Originally posted by Emotep

It's like saying "We don't have confidence that our game will have high subscription retention".   Every game I can think of that has a lifetime subscription has been a failure.  (EG. WW2 Online)

I thought about getting Champions since Cryptic made City of Heroes which was a decent game, but then I saw the lifetime subscription thing, coupled with the game being published by Atari of all companies....

I would be more worried about the game developers not really developing at the rate they would if everyone did a lifetime subscription since that would of already got the subscribers tied into the game why would the developers care if they were bringing updates or not?

Also would be worried that the game would go under and you would be out money... 

I wasn't following LOTRO when it was released, but it's my understanding that it made certain statements that would make you feel more assured about forking over money for a lifetime sub, such as their plan to run the game for 10 years, and more importantly their guarantee of quarterly updates.

I haven't seen anything like that from Cryptic about Champions Online, but I may have just not seen it.  In any case, I would look for something like that before making a two-year commitment (which is basically what a lifetime sub is).  Also, it should be noted that not every studio's statements should be taken at face value (such as Warhammer's "This will be the only game you will ever have to buy for the rest of your life.")

LOTRO is probably the only game with lifetime subs that has actually succeeded long enough for it to be worth the money and turn out to be a good deal.  I've met people in the game and they're very happy with their lifetime subs, because not only has it paid off by now and they are playing for free, but it also allows them to leave and come back to the game whenever they want, like they always have a free decent game on the side while they try out different games.

So many MMORPGs are released to hype and fail (for all intents and purposes) within 3 months.  Unless you have some reason to think that Champions Online is definately not like most recently released MMORPGs, I'd be wary of getting a lifetime sub.

Originally posted by holdenhamlet

I wasn't following LOTRO when it was released, but it's my understanding that it made certain statements that would make you feel more assured about forking over money for a lifetime sub, such as their plan to run the game for 10 years, and more importantly their guarantee of quarterly updates.

I haven't seen anything like that from Cryptic about Champions Online, but I may have just not seen it.  In any case, I would look for something like that before making a two-year commitment (which is basically what a lifetime sub is).  Also, it should be noted that not every studio's statements should be taken at face value (such as Warhammer's "This will be the only game you will ever have to buy for the rest of your life.")

LOTRO is probably the only game with lifetime subs that has actually succeeded long enough for it to be worth the money and turn out to be a good deal.  I've met people in the game and they're very happy with their lifetime subs, because not only has it paid off by now and they are playing for free, but it also allows them to leave and come back to the game whenever they want, like they always have a free decent game on the side while they try out different games.

So many MMORPGs are released to hype and fail (for all intents and purposes) within 3 months.  Unless you have some reason to think that Champions Online is definately not like most recently released MMORPGs, I'd be wary of getting a lifetime sub.

They have made similar statements over at the TenTonHammer interview series about how Cryptic has a years worth of updates and an expansion in the works currently. Does anyone realize that statistically the average mmo player only plays an mmo for 6 months? Lifetime subs = more money than 6 month subs, besides it is intended for the die hard fans. Not everyone will purchase it, and the game will have the majority paying monthly subs. The other benefit of lifetime subs is a constant pool of people who will come and go from the game (at least from my experience with LOTRO, especially around expansions).
 

Cheers!

I dont have the time to go through all these posts, but I did want to say that lifetime subscriptions do not mean that the game will suck. But it is a good marketing move to get people who are excited about this game to pay some good money for a game that they might change there mind about in 2 months time. And the company knows there are those out there that will do that. Because NO game pleases everyone and no game ever will. Some people may find the game very enjoyable and wish they had payed the lifetime subscription. It all depends on what they want in an mmorpg.

Wow, 9 pages spent debating the success of a game still about 3 weeks from launch.  You people need to play a game and wait till the damn thing comes out.  Myself, I pre-ordered it, will beta it next week.  If it sucks I will have wasted $50.  To whoever counted in the cost of their computer towrds the expense of the game - what - you bought your computer to only play 1 game and use it for nothing else? No other games, no email, news, blogs, sports, movies, nothing?  Hmmmm, my computer is used for many things not just, potentially, CO.

Originally posted by elderotter

Wow, 9 pages spent debating the success of a game still about 3 weeks from launch.  You people need to play a game and wait till the damn thing comes out.  Myself, I pre-ordered it, will beta it next week.  If it sucks I will have wasted $50.  To whoever counted in the cost of their computer towrds the expense of the game - what - you bought your computer to only play 1 game and use it for nothing else? No other games, no email, news, blogs, sports, movies, nothing?  Hmmmm, my computer is used for many things not just, potentially, CO.

Waste $50? Why not just cancel your preorder?

Yeah I only put down $5 on my preorder. I'll just cancel it if it doesnt work out for me. I just looked at their pvp options and it looks worse than what we had with City of villains. So looks like I might have to bail :(

Originally posted by Legato89

Originally posted by elderotter

Wow, 9 pages spent debating the success of a game still about 3 weeks from launch.  You people need to play a game and wait till the damn thing comes out.  Myself, I pre-ordered it, will beta it next week.  If it sucks I will have wasted $50.  To whoever counted in the cost of their computer towrds the expense of the game - what - you bought your computer to only play 1 game and use it for nothing else? No other games, no email, news, blogs, sports, movies, nothing?  Hmmmm, my computer is used for many things not just, potentially, CO.

 

Waste $50? Why not just cancel your preorder?

Whether or not it is wasted remains to be seen - the whole sentence read "If it sucks I will have wasted $50".  I remain positive the $50 is not wasted and that I will have a good time playing the game.  However, I have played many games - single player and MMO's... some were worth the cost and some were a waste of time and money.  Speculating on which it will be before I have played it is not really worth anything.  It will be what it will be, time will tell.  Also I have beta tested a few games and loved the beta and then hated what was released - so I will play the beta of CO and reserve my actual opinion on the game until I have played the released version.

Originally posted by Darkholme

... But remember guys! To be a success an MMOG has to have over 11 million subs worldwide!!!

Not

WoW is an aberration, it is an anomaly that should never, ever be considered a benchmark for an MMOGs success or failure level. 50k to 100k unique users might be a success for some companies, or even less than that.

As for the Lifetime subscription being a sign of a bad game destined to fail... that is ridiculous.

Well said.

Originally posted by PatchDay

Yeah I only put down $5 on my preorder. I'll just cancel it if it doesnt work out for me. I just looked at their pvp options and it looks worse than what we had with City of villains. So looks like I might have to bail :(

 

Luckily for me PvP is one of the lesser parts of a game.  If you like PvP more than anything else then I would agree with you that this is perhaps not the game for you.  If I was going to play PvP I would probably return to EVE.

the key is if they butcher the openess of the champions system they will basicly flop.  day one.

what I am hearing is more about class types and power frameworks which make me think that its just another class/level based POS.  so no I am not going to drop that kind of money into a superwow clone.

Like others have mentioned, LotRO offered the lifetime sub, and I am glad I took advantage of it.  It allows me to play when I wish with no feeling that I "need" to play to justify my cost.  Lifetime subscribers offer the company sub numbers, and gamers that will be there to pay fir the next expansion (witch in LotRO's case probably will be many, mnay more considering the intelluctual property.  Another advantage to the life time sub that I see (at least in LotRO's case is that most lifetimers if not activally playing might come back to check out special events like festivals and free contant and be there to populate the worlds while Turbine recruits new players.

Trolls are amazing, they are capable of creating DOOM out nothing.

If anyone that is in beta has questions/doubts, they would post on the beta forum.

If anyone that is not in the beta posts any doom post, they are talking about... nothing.

To anyone that is curious about the real game, check Monday with the open beta ;-)

Talking about nothing ... I wonder what we will see in another 10 years!

Originally posted by Tadamitsu

the key is if they butcher the openess of the champions system they will basicly flop.  day one.

 

what I am hearing is more about class types and power frameworks which make me think that its just another class/level based POS.  so no I am not going to drop that kind of money into a superwow clone.

If that's what your "hearing", your not listening very well.  The game lets you choose whatever powers/stats/etc you want.  There are no "class types" and the frameworks just house powers of a specific type... ie fire, ice, electric, might  

You could choose a power from each framework if you wanted.