So Free 2 play mmorpgs, Why do they all have to be about grinding a insane number of levels? When you look at a Free 2 play game, and compare it with a pay 2 play game, usually more often than not the free 2 play game has a much higher level cap, or a slower rate of progression. I believe this is deliberately done in order to extend game time while providing the least possible amount of content.  

Many MMO gamers are hungry for a free 2 play game that does not force us to choose between a Solid game, with horrible cash shop balance, or a Crappy game with decent cash shop balance.

It seems when it comes to mmorpg  games  you really do have 3 options. 

#1 You play a good game, like Atlantica online, Runes of Magic, but these games are set up so that once you reach the mid-high levels you are basically forced to use the cash shop, or spend an insane amount of time to obtain items that are required of you to progress. Most of what it comes down to is, Ether you pay up an outrageous sum of money much higher than a 15/mo standard fee, or you spend all day playng to make up for it.

Then you have scenario #2 You play a mediocre game like Requiem bloodymare, or Sword of the new world, That has decent cash shop balance in both PvE and PvP, However the game is a 100% Typical uninspired Korean grind fest. You grind, and grind and grind some more. Graphics look Generic 2004 Korean, and in some cases even the text is not yet properly translated to English. So you get a ok cash shop, with a poor game.

Then there is choice #3 play only P2P games. You pay a monthly fee 15/mo and you get to be on an equal playing field with everyone else. No cash shop, no unfair advantages, you get what you earn. This is the most balance of the 3 imo, but why not try a 4rth option..

Option #4 Why not make a game pay as you go. For Example, if you only plan to play about 10 hours that week, you pay for 10 hours of time. Lets say $3,99 for 10 hours.  I personally would be taking advantage of that a lot. As a Full time college student and a part time worker, Its rare when I have more than 10 hours a week to play an mmorpg, heck I think those 10 hours would probably last me even 2 weeks. 

IT does not have to stop there though. $3,99 for 10 hours, or perhaps $4,99 for 18 hours, $9,99 for 35 hours,  $14,99 for 65 hours. They could even add an unlimited amount of time for like $19,99 a month. To me this payment feature, assuming that companies use realistic prices, (No $9,99 for 10 hour pricing). Could work very well and entice many different kinds of casual players to mmorpg games. Its not a cash shop, but its not a full subscription fee, its a low commitment pay as you go plan. I hope some day it gets implemented into mmorpgs. 

Why has a Sandbox Free 2 play mmorpg never been made?

Is there any company working on a Sandbox non level grind based Free 2 play mmorpg game? 

Originally posted by Calintz333

 So Free 2 play mmorpgs, Why do they all have to be about grinding a insane number of levels? When you look at a Free 2 play game, and compare it with a pay 2 play game, usually more often than not the free 2 play game has a much higher level cap, or a slower rate of progression. I believe this is deliberately done in order to extend game time while providing the least possible amount of content.  

 

Many MMO gamers are hungry for a free 2 play game that does not force us to choose between a Solid game, with horrible cash shop balance, or a Crappy game with decent cash shop balance.

 

It seems when it comes to mmorpg  games  you really do have 3 options. 

 

#1 You play a good game, like Atlantica online, Runes of Magic, but these games are set up so that once you reach the mid-high levels you are basically forced to use the cash shop, or spend an insane amount of time to obtain items that are required of you to progress. Most of what it comes down to is, Ether you pay up an outrageous sum of money much higher than a 15/mo standard fee, or you spend all day playng to make up for it.

Then you have scenario #2 You play a mediocre game like Requiem bloodymare, or Sword of the new world, That has decent cash shop balance in both PvE and PvP, However the game is a 100% Typical uninspired Korean grind fest. You grind, and grind and grind some more. Graphics look Generic 2004 Korean, and in some cases even the text is not yet properly translated to English. So you get a ok cash shop, with a poor game.

Then there is choice #3 play only P2P games. You pay a monthly fee 15/mo and you get to be on an equal playing field with everyone else. No cash shop, no unfair advantages, you get what you earn. This is the most balance of the 3 imo, but why not try a 4rth option..

 

Option #4 Why not make a game pay as you go. For Example, if you only plan to play about 10 hours that week, you pay for 10 hours fo time. Lets say $3,99 for 10 hours.  I personally would be taking advantage of that a lot. As a Full time college student and a part time worker, Its rare when I have more than 10 hours a week to play an mmorpg, heck I think those 10 hours would probably last me even 2 weeks. 

IT does not have to stop there though. $3,99 for 10 hours, or perhaps $4,99 for 18 hours, $9,99 for 35 hours,  $14,99 for 65 hours. They could even add an unlimited amount of time for like $19,99 a month. To me this payment feature, assuming that companies use realistic prices, (No $9,99 for 10 hour pricing). Could work very well and entice many different kinds of casual players to mmorpg games. Its not a cash shop, but its not a full subscription fee, its a low commitment pay as you go plan. I hope some day it gets implemented into mmorpgs. 

 

Why has a Sandbox Free 2 play mmorpg never been made?

 

Is there any company working on a Sandbox non level grind based Free 2 play mmorpg game? 

you forgot the 4:gw way yhou buy the game ,buy the pvp kit then go to war .free as long as you own the game

by the way did you know lord of the ring online is 9.99/month

you cant beat that lol

 i think most companies prefer the way it is now, and on one hand i like the 15dollar/13euro a month fee, its not TOO much and its ENOUGH to keep the developers developing :), take the old and aged WoW as an example, lost its glory a bit but still making a shiny new expansion due to the subscriptioning. (to not even mention SC2 and diablo 3..)  ah well, everyone their opinions :o

Ever heard of Dungeons & Dragons online : Eberron Unlimited ?

Will be Free to play on Septmeber 9th!

Its far from a sandbox but its not a grinder where you can uber items from the store.

Or $200 for... forever. I get what you're saying. If you pay $15 a month, you're pressured to play more because you don't want to believe your money's going to waste. This leads to burning through content much faster than devs anticipated, which will make the game appear to lack content. It also kills any fun factor there might've been if you took your time.

If you can pony up $200+ for a hardware upgrade, a Lifetime Sub really seems like a great deal. Especially if a sandbox game used it - many people play sandboxes for much longer than themeparks, because in a sandbox, most of the content is player-created. That means it's (essentially) neverending. EVE attempts to remove the pressure of $15 a month by allowing those PLEX game time cards to be purchasable with in-game currency - ISK. Great idea in my opinion. A Lifetime Sub is just another way of doing this, except you pay all up front.

If companies are going to start charging by the hour, I think they'll fear that people won't play as much and they'll inflate the hourly charge to the point where actually paying $15 a month would be cheaper.

Originally posted by Papadam

Ever heard of Dungeons & Dragons online : Eberron Unlimited ?

Will be Free to play on Septmeber 9th!

Its far from a sandbox but its not a grinder where you can uber items from the store.

I have not herd about the new change to D&D but from what I have herd they will be selling a lot of very valuable in game items in their cash shop. I did play D&D back in 2004 when it first came out and found it to be a solid mission based game. Really enjoyable. However with this new cash shop they plan to put in I don't know if I trust the developers enough to make it balanced and fair, especially right from the start. 

About the  one time payment, I totally agree with you, I would honestly LOVE to be able to pay $200-$250 dollars for a game once, then never have to worry about subscription fee again. Sure they could just keep expansions coming and charge standard $50-$60 for the expansion, I see no problem with that. I would love a game with a feature like this. I know LoTRO does it. Its to bad I didn't like any single class in that game, otherwise you better believe I would be playing it right now had I liked one of the Classes. 

Too many great games that are free to play once you buy the box. They may not be MMO's, but its all about fun for me. I suppose if there was a pay as you go, I would try that out. But lifetime or monthly subs are pretty much out for me at this time. Most recent MMOs are not worth any monthly fees. I think most MMO game companies only put a sub on their games because the players expect there to be one, and in that case they know they can get away with it. I, however, am voting with my wallet.

I would like to see companies offer " blocks of time " along with their  per month pricing.

$8 for a 100 hours ( no expiration date ) of play time and the usual $15 a month would satsify 90% of the players.

Originally posted by Palebane

Too many great games that are free to play once you buy the box. They may not be MMO's, but its all about fun for me. I suppose if there was a pay as you go, I would try that out. But lifetime or monthly subs are pretty much out for me at this time. Most recent MMOs are not worth any monthly fees. I think most MMO game companies only put a sub on their games because the players expect there to be one, and in that case they know they can get away with it. I, however, am voting with my wallet.

I would like to know of a few online Free 2 play once you buy the box games. So far the only ones I know are Neverwinter Nights series, and  Monster hunter.  Ah can't forget bout Guild wars

Originally posted by Calintz333

Originally posted by Papadam

Ever heard of Dungeons & Dragons online : Eberron Unlimited ?

Will be Free to play on Septmeber 9th!

Its far from a sandbox but its not a grinder where you can uber items from the store.

I have not herd about the new change to D&D but from what I have herd they will be selling a lot of very valuable in game items in their cash shop. I did play D&D back in 2004 when it first came out and found it to be a solid mission based game. Really enjoyable. However with this new cash shop they plan to put in I don't know if I trust the developers enough to make it balanced and fair, especially right from the start. 

 

If you consider +1 weapons in D&D powerfull then yes they sell thoose ;)

DDOs buisness model will be little different, you get access to about 1/3 of the content for free then you can buy - adventure packs, a couple of classes/races, some convinience items, hirelings, character slots and things like that.

They probably dont want to sell powerfull items in the store because they want people to buy the quests which give them the powerfull items. I think its worth a look if you are sceptic. They opened a brand new server called Cannith if you want to start from scratch without everyone being at lvl cap.

It boils down to 50 cents a day, for a 15 dollar a month sub game. you can't get entertainment for cheaper.

now if you switch games everymonth, you get variety, quality and cost effectiveness, and your dose of medicine for your addiction, its what I do, and i don't shake too much.

I am not going into how you judge games, it is your right to judge them however you want.

However, your method of payment already exist.  It is called timecards, which some even do the transaction virtually, but it is not as good in the western market for every company to use.

For Eastern markets, timecard is one of the main method of paying for playing mmo, since alot of mmo players play in cybercafe which timecard becomes much more efficient than a monthly fee.  Western market players do not play in cybercafe enough for this business model to be an efficient payment model.  Big companies can still use timecards in the western market, but they would need distributors to sell the physical version, and only bigger companies have this type of resources to spend on selling timecards.

In the end, some people AFK alot when they don't play anyways, so monthly fee is not always a waste.

Originally posted by Calintz333

 

Option #4 Why not make a game pay as you go. For Example, if you only plan to play about 10 hours that week, you pay for 10 hours of time. Lets say $3,99 for 10 hours. I personally would be taking advantage of that a lot. As a Full time college student and a part time worker, Its rare when I have more than 10 hours a week to play an mmorpg, heck I think those 10 hours would probably last me even 2 weeks.

 

IT does not have to stop there though. $3,99 for 10 hours, or perhaps $4,99 for 18 hours, $9,99 for 35 hours, $14,99 for 65 hours. They could even add an unlimited amount of time for like $19,99 a month. To me this payment feature, assuming that companies use realistic prices, (No $9,99 for 10 hour pricing). Could work very well and entice many different kinds of casual players to mmorpg games. Its not a cash shop, but its not a full subscription fee, its a low commitment pay as you go plan. I hope some day it gets implemented into mmorpgs.

 

 

Is there any company working on a Sandbox non level grind based Free 2 play mmorpg game? 

Actually the non f2p MMOs are using option #4 in Asia. No one pays a monthly sub there. You buy hours to play WOW in China.

The difference is that if you can get a large sub-base and charge $15 ... you got all the people who are only playing 10 hrs to play more. In US/Europe, $15 is a small sum of money and most players won't mind paying even if they are not playing that much.

Originally posted by Comnitus

If you can pony up $200+ for a hardware upgrade, a Lifetime Sub really seems like a great deal.

How is it a great deal?  No games are forever, no one expects to be playing the same game in 20 years, if these games were even in operation then.  That's why the MMOs want to sell you the lifetime sub, they know you're going to get bored and move on and they're going to have more money than you would have paid over time anyhow.

It's a scam and it's sad how many people fall for it.

Here would be an interesting way of doing things for payment option... Make the game itself free to play other than the original purchase.

However in a fantasy game make it where the game starts off with 2 or 3 seperate continents.  However when you purchase the game you look at the box to see which continent (gamewise) you gain access to.. Kinda like guildwars did with their expansion packs. There could be a different flavor to each the starting continents. A huge story line that is going on as well in each one. As you play if you decide you want to check out the other continent. Instead of having to buy an entire expansion. you could pay like 20.00  for a continent access upgrade to the continent you wish to check out. Scrap the monthly fee though.

Also charge for big content patches IE digital download expansions much like EQ2 did with some of their questline dungeons or LoTRO is doing with this new digital expansion. 

People lately are seeming to think that they should be just able to get everything for free... What they fail to realize is that these companies are in this business to make a profit.. and yes they are in it to make a profit off of us the players.. Profit is not a dirty word. and companies that attempt to make it big off of their game by putting in charges in whatever form are not monsters. Hell I am a fan of MMOs but I know if I could make one. Not only would I want to make a game that is entertaining. But also one that would make me successful allow for me to provide for my family.

Originally posted by Cephus404

Originally posted by Comnitus

If you can pony up $200+ for a hardware upgrade, a Lifetime Sub really seems like a great deal.

How is it a great deal?  No games are forever, no one expects to be playing the same game in 20 years, if these games were even in operation then.  That's why the MMOs want to sell you the lifetime sub, they know you're going to get bored and move on and they're going to have more money than you would have paid over time anyhow.

It's a scam and it's sad how many people fall for it.

I dunno about you but there are 3 games i've played that getting a lifetime sub would have saved me in the long run.  Over the course of 5-6 years that I played EQ, adding both my accounts if I paid a 1 time $200 charge for each, I would have saved ~$1400. 

Apparently Aion in Asia has a system which I thought was fantastic. As I understand it you pay say $15 and cash gets drawn from that only for the time you actually are playing the game.   However, I guess the rest of us get the typical rip off subscription;   If you go out of town or take a break you are still charged for time you don't use.   It's kind of like filling your car with gas, but the station comes and steals a gallon of gas out of your tank each night.   Guess what next month. even though your car didn't move all month, it's time for a refill.  It's a bogus method of charging that really shouldn't be tolerated. 

Anyone who whines about 15 bucks a month for unlimited MMO game time must be a kid begging money from his mom. You can't take two people to the moves for 15 bucks. Most single player games these days can be as few as 20 hours long for $50! And you complain about mmo's costing 15 bucks a month?

Originally posted by Morgaren

It boils down to 50 cents a day, for a 15 dollar a month sub game. you can't get entertainment for cheaper.

 

Only if you play every day though.

That's the trouble with monthly fees. Unless you play all the time, there's a feeling you aren't getting your money's worth, that you are losing money not playing. So I think it cuts down the variety of what people play. And it makes them play a game until they get really really sick of it.

Personally, I would rather not feel the pressure to play and have something like 100 hours for $10. That would probably last me 3 months in some games. 

I'd looked at how much I played various games.

LOTRO, I've played 320 hours, counting my alts. I'd paid $270 for it.

Atlantica, I've played 700 hours. It's free, but I've blown $80 in the CS.

Sword of the New World - 1200 hours. Another "free" game. $200 in the CS

Guild Wars - 200 hours = $40 for the original game, 2 expansions for $20 each..

Compared to other forms of entertainment it's perhaps a little expensive. $70 for all the TV I can watch a month (DirecTV), which is actually probably 250 hrs a month (generally one baseball game + a movie or 2 TV shows a day). On the other hand, compared to going out and doing something, it's cheaper.

And compared to buying books/dvds, it's hard to compare, since they have re-sell value, as well as being able to read or watch it over and over again for years to come.

Originally posted by kujii

Apparently Aion in Asia has a system which I thought was fantastic. As I understand it you pay say $15 and cash gets drawn from that only for the time you actually are playing the game.   However, I guess the rest of us get the typical rip off subscription;   If you go out of town or take a break you are still charged for time you don't use.   It's kind of like filling your car with gas, but the station comes and steals a gallon of gas out of your tank each night.   Guess what next month. even though your car didn't move all month, it's time for a refill.  It's a bogus method of charging that really shouldn't be tolerated. 

You make a good point but would you rather pay per minute and end up paying more than what the monthly fee is?  It is a potential risk I wanted to point out.  Although, I am always in favor of more options and if they gave the option of paying a flat fee for unlimited play or an option to pay per minute, that would be cool.  But in all honesty, I might still pay the flat fee in that scenario...

Also, just to put things in perspective, cable/satellite works the same way as MMOs as well as channels such as HBO and Showtime and satellite radio.  And I probably spend a lot more time playing an MMO then I do watching TV (and the MMO is a lot cheaper than cable!)  I'm not saying two wrongs make a right but it does put things in perspective.