Except for EVE which I stopped playing recently (but not because of P2P) I'm playing only B2P games since I think P2P is overpriced for the content they're pushing out lately.

Plus it's a total ripoff when they charge a box price + sub + expansion box prices

Originally posted by CyclopsSlayer

Vanguard:SoH - Even though it was on life support with no real dev tem for years, it had several vibrant guilds raiding and grouping. Went F2P and a few months later most all the big raiding guilds have packed up and moved on. The existng ones can't even reliably form 6 man groups. The F2P cash shop model eliminated the need for end game content as BIS gear now drops from L10 boxes you need to buy a key to open.

Lineage 2 - Went F2P about a year ago, now no one raids, no one seiges, no one PvP's, pure casual heaven. The guild there went from 20-50 online in any single night, to often <5 on in prime time. The Dragon raids that required 100+ people never seem to happen.

Aion - Alliances would form everytime a Fortress would go vulnerable, they regularly changed hands. Went F2P and it went from 2 fortress attack/defenses a night to 1 maybe 2 nights a week. Same number of people around, the Season boss would get mobbed, just no one cared to work to own a fortress any more.

EQ1, EQ2, DDO, went Freemium so are only technically F2P, you need to pay to get full content. Age of Wushu is looking to be the same. Allods is pure P2W.

Games that are designed F2P from scratch may fair better, as GW1/2. I cannot speak about SWTOR as I left long before F2P and refuse to look back.

everything you said here has little to do with players and much to do with badly implemented cash milking shops...

Lineage 2 was pretty much dead already when it went to F2P, so was aion, eq1,2 and DDO... (I'm thinking about western market)

But again, you're talking about how cash shops ruined the gameplay, not how F2P attracted horrible group...

GW1 and 2 aren't designed to be F2P! When will people learn the difference, it's B2P, you still have to buy the box if you want to play the damn game. It does have cash shop but it's fluff only and it has no influence on your gameplay and gives no real advantage. 

I've played alot of P2P games and alot of F2P, freemium and those few B2P games...

Community experience was as follows:  B2P = P2P => F2P > Freemium...

Every coomunity has it's douchebags, but F2P games tend to attract larger scale of people so it's only logical that it has more douchebags... :P

I think leveling on it's own is a mindless time sink and they are actually trying to make the game last longer for players.

But if the game is good enough and interesting enough to keep it fun and it doesn't make you feel like you're just wasting your time till you get to "the good stuff", then that's fine I guess. I know that it takes time for you to learn your class, but you shouldn't be forced to be bored as hell until you actually start having fun. 

I bought almost every big mmorpg worth buying which had a sub... Every single one of them turned out to other sub models because there wasn't enough people playing the game.

Having a sub based game just to bar entry is a doomsday waiting to happen. MMORPGs today focus on casual players with deep pockets who are willing to pay for boosts and convenient items.

I've got no problem with sub based games, but it has to be damn well worth it or it'll flop. I don't know about you, but I don't want to lay out ~50$ on a box and 15$ a month just so the game shuts down or goes f2p in period of 4-6 months...

Originally posted by Dogblaster

Originally posted by Whitebeards

Originally posted by Zefire

I was having a good time playing neverwinter even with all those annoying bugs exploits etc but now that the economy is destroyed i feel i have no reason to keep playing this game.

Everyone has billions of astrals and if you think that those people are banned or that they will do something to save the economy then u are naive.Only a true wipe will save this game and by reopening the servers with as lees exploits as possible.

The game destroyed and thats it i have no willing to play this any more even if it was fun at the beggining

Nice exaggeration there. 

Even if ''only'' 5% of population had this amount of money. bye bye economy.

usually, the 5% of population has that kind of money anyways... 

I still didn't see a game economy ruined... even in GW2 - economy got better as it always does, everywhere :)

Originally posted by Theodwulf
nothing in the world is "FREE"... servers and the people who run them and those that develop content and the electricity to empower them all,  cost money..someone is paying  someone for these services.. you, who pays nothing,  ARE the product.  Does F2P scare you yet?

never scared me, never will...

Players aren't the product... You're the buyer in this case and you'll always be a buyer, but in this case you're only a potential buyer until you actually decide to buy something with your money to get from that company.

The thing is, F2P market is huge and competition is heavy. In order for games to survive they'll eventually have to think about what they're doing with the cash shops and how they're limiting the gameplay. The first company to implement the cash shop right will get the most players and the others will have to follow if they'll planning on making money...

The same way F2P with bad cash shops are wiping out P2P games, that's how good shop F2P will wipe out bad shop F2P eventually...

Originally posted by Manolios

expansion...this means 35+ euros. nty

i log on rarely just to see how things are, but for me GW2 remains the epitome of boredom. Not a bad game at all but boring as hell.

If i was to play full time this game, i would like to see an expansion with open world pvp. at least having the option to it, like flagging yourself as outlaw or something like that.

Anet also must transform it to a real GUILD WARS game and allow open world combat between multiple guilds who are in war between them.

here's another one who thinks guild wars is called that way because player made guilds have fought in the game xD

Originally posted by Mtibbs1989

Originally posted by korent1991

Originally posted by Mtibbs1989

What I'm getting out of this article is that Arenanet hasn't even thought twice about doing an expansion. This makes me want to not even return to their game knowing that there's no major advancements in content coming in the near future for their game.

"Expansions are definitely something that we'll potentially look at in the future, but we don't have a timetable on it. We're open to it, but I think our major focus as a studio is making the living world concept as strong as possibly can for the players that we've got."

ofcourse they didn't think twice about it... because they're constantly adding new content to the game trough patches FOR FREE... They've added alot of content so far.

From what I read they take out every content update they add, so your point is quite invalid. They do this to make players believe that the world is "persistent" or "evolving".

Nothing in my point is invalid. The PVP maps are there to stay, the new PVE area (the medium island) is there to stay and this new patch they're preparing will take place there with new events and new stuff to do there... They're adding some new stuff for WvWvW which will stay there, and so on...

They didn't take anything out of the game, they added LIVING story which means the story advances as we play it and the outcomes will affect the world of tyria forever and it will not change.

Unless you're thinking about the winter xmas, halloween, valentines and that sort of themes events. In that case, yes they've taken out those jumping puzzles and stuff.

Originally posted by sidel

Originally posted by SavageHorizon
Age Of Wushu & ArcheAge, there's two.

Age of Wushu is garbage and it isn't seamless. its instanced-zoned i call it.

 

and Archeage hasn't been released yet and the jury is still out on it.

not yet in Europe and America, but there's enough to tell it's close to what you're looking for :P

The prices are blown out of proportions but it was expected since it's PWE behind it.

I don't really understand, wouldn't it be better if prices were 5-10-15$... That way more people would buy it and they'd get alot more money and players wouldn't feel they're being ripped off xD

It is F2P game and I don't expect them to give it to us just like that, but with this kind of prices they aren't doing anything good for themselves. 

Originally posted by Mtibbs1989

What I'm getting out of this article is that Arenanet hasn't even thought twice about doing an expansion. This makes me want to not even return to their game knowing that there's no major advancements in content coming in the near future for their game.

"Expansions are definitely something that we'll potentially look at in the future, but we don't have a timetable on it. We're open to it, but I think our major focus as a studio is making the living world concept as strong as possibly can for the players that we've got."

ofcourse they didn't think twice about it... because they're constantly adding new content to the game trough patches FOR FREE... They've added alot of content so far.

Originally posted by Amjoco

Originally posted by mCalvert

Originally posted by botrytis

Originally posted by monarc333

Originally posted by FateFatality
expansion pack needs to bring new classes and more PvP events , and new races and up level cap and bring in 20 man raids and hopefully do some graphical tweaks to engine :)

Yea I'll pass on raids, but everything else sounds great! And lets add in mounts and upgrading our home instances, cause right now they are just ghost towns.

LOL really? The current server I am on - every major city is using overflow as do most of the zones. So, yes, I guess it is a ghost town.

 

Mounts are a waste - since we have portals.

Lies. There is no such server with overflows. One reason being they lifted the zone caps so you don't get overflows.

There are overflows.

Especially in lions arch and divinity's reach. I'm always stuck in the overflow when I port there. :/

Originally posted by FateFatality
expansion pack needs to bring new classes and more PvP events , and new races and up level cap and bring in 20 man raids and hopefully do some graphical tweaks to engine :)

20 man raids and up the level cap xD have you ever seen expansions for GW1?

No linear progression means exactly that... which means, no new levels... and if you want to raid - you have WOW, RIFT, TOR. We don't need raiding :P

Originally posted by Manolios

Originally posted by pmiles

Any game came break the WoW formula... it's a matter of whether they have the balls to stick with it.

 

Still no subscription fees... check

Still no trinity... check

 

Yep, ArenaNet's balls are still intact.

 

Blizzard on the other hand constantly explain to the playerbase how things didn't go as they expected, how they've learned from this and how they are going to avoid it in the future.  That is true... they've found new ways to screw things up with each new patch.

GW2 is making improvements... WoW is running in circles.

GW2 8 months in... WoW 8 years in...

 

Don't you just love trends?

 

wow is running in circles while gw2 is making improvements...thats an experts opinion i guess?

hmmm gw2 after only 8 months has ''lost'' how many of the daily player base? maybe half? and its a game you only pay once. imagine this game with a sub? i guess you just cant...

wow after almost 10 years has more than 7m subs. not free or b2p users but subs. can you understant the difference?

and yes, we all love trends :)

and why do people always try to compare games on this "if it's a sub" basis ... well it is not , deal with it.. every game can be compared but you have to look at the whole package.

ANet chose that model because it has proven good and they earned enough money from GW1 on that model to make GW2 and now in GW2 they're making more than enough money since they're constantly updating the game and giving players huge content packs for free. Can you imagine blizzard doing that with wow lately? I guess you just can't...

Also you have to take into consideration that GW2 sold mills of copies without china... WOW has 7 mill with china. If you're already pulling up the numbers you could put them in a decent perspective.

GW2 managed to get exciting and good combat system which works good without the trinity. They were creative enough to come up with it and they had the guts to do it so they're as far as they can be from wow here.

There are no quests, but there are renown hearts which help you while you're exploring the world and you just don't know where to start or go.. It's still not like quests but it does come a little bit close to it, ofcourse you don't have to do them in order to advance which is alot different than wow.

I already said about constant updates so I guess that's a plus on anets side as well...

The artwork is just amazing in GW2 and I really do like that, also music is J.S. and that kinda speaks for itself... So on the music aspect and artwork/graphics -> GW2.

What I like more about blizzard is their astonoshingly awesome trailers or short movies. That's something I always like to take a look at even if I'm planning on playing the next expansion or not.

I like how gw2 isn't dumbed down because it's "too hard" sometimes... That was something I liked about WOW as well in vanilla and BC until they ruined it.

Only interesting thing is that I didn't have that same feeling which i had when I first entered WOW. But it did come close to it.. I can't explain it tho xD weird 

Originally posted by ThaneUlfgar
Considering that Neverwinter is still in Beta, it seems a bit dumb to compare it to GW2 at this point. But hey, whatever floats your boat, I guess.

ofcourse it's in "beta" .... but don't you think it's pretty much the final product what we're seeing here?

I expect few minor bug fixes and everything to remain exactly the same so I think it's ok to compare games since it won't change much, like any other game in betas.

Originally posted by SuperDonk
Well,... this just ruined my day.

exactly the same...

Even tho I'd love to see SW games and play them but this just makes me sad.

With day 1 DLCs and extra locked contents to milk out 150 $ out of me just to experience the full story of a title is enough to keep me away from it.

Originally posted by Gothikaboy

This is the last straw, if you are so hungry for money you are willing to accept these ads being displayed. I'm off.

If these ads are still here within a week I'm deleting my account and I'll never visiting this site again.

I have to be ready to alt-f4 at all times just so my girlfriend will not think I'm a fucking pedophile.

hahah....

My girlfriend asked me what's this game on ads and we went trough screenshots and concluded it's overblown advertising for a game targeting 15 year olds :D

so I doubt your gf would think that about you just because of some ads on a gaming site which has to get their money somehow. Also, I'm using adblock until those ads are gone because they're irritating as hell. :D

Originally posted by cybertrucker
So which of these 2 games is better? Which one has better story? Better combat? Better world? Also which one do you think will offer more depth and longer playability? Thanks and lets try to keep it civil.

Better story so far has GW2... Even tho D&D is huge and has huge lore I just don't see it so far in the game, while GW2 has 2 books which describe what happened between GW1 and GW2 and then the games personal story which leads you trough the world (if you want to play the PS,ofc)...

Combat in Neverwinter is generic and I've seen it before, locks you in place and offers crosshair but it's nothing new, while GW2 combat is miles away from everything we've seen so far and it's fun to play and it works good when you learn how to play your class.

Now the really tough quesition is the latter one, because somehting I might play for months someone will play for weeks and get trough the content much quicker. Also there's always a matter of someones taste and character so it's hard to say how long a game will last for someone.

Originally posted by thinktank001

Originally posted by DeniZg

Actually, it's quite the opposite of what you've mentioned.

LoL is the most popular F2P, lasting for more than 3 years, highly profitable and is the most played online game in general. Even former P2P games converted to F2P have managed to remain on market and make money (LoTRO, STO, SWTOR etc.). Also, compared to P2P market, F2P market is much more profitable and will contintue to expand, as long as it remains that way.

IMHO, business models don't kill games. It's the games' quality that does so. If some game is high quality product, it will thrive, no matter the business model.

 

Cash shop (CS) games are of low quality. P2P developers that swap business models know this, and they know that the switch puts their game at the top of the CS pile. 

 

CS games are profitable, but it isn't that profitable on a per title basis.  Publishers know that the largest influx of cash for this business model (and most games) is during the initial launch period, and this leads them to just pump out low quality games at the fastest possible rate.   This allows them to make a little profit from a lot of different titles, and is a good situation for CS consumers, since they will have a lot of different titles to play.  

Not neceseraly, I kinda hate it that GW are the only games with good pay model and I don't get it why more games don't go that path.

If you're already aiming for F2P with intrusive cash shop, why not making it a B2P with fluff cash shop? I don't know how it works in asia but I think games would get alot more money out of it that way (I have in mind games that are good enough to even consider lasting few years on the market).