45 replies to this topic

[Asmudius Heng]

I actually think the F2P aspect is not a bad thing.

By opening It up to anyone you can grow a customer base faster and get new people into an aging IP to revitalise it.

However - it is not the model that is the problem. It is the baffling decisions of PGI that make the game as it is.

Terrible new player experience is probably highest on the list of abysmal decisions for an F2P game. I called this out so long ago as the CORE issue they need to address if they want to grow. NOTHING has been done in favour of milking the current IP fans of every dollar.

The F2P downside is constant sales and constant updates to content that are saleable. This is a reality we have to stomach, but the fact that pumping out saleable items seems to be 90% of the content worries me greatly because that is no the fault of the model ... it is a failing of priorities for PGI unless they are in such dire financial woes that this is needed.

If MWO is doing well financially and has been .... then the way they are handling the F2P model is just plain BAD because the payments for the content of mechs etc is not JUST to fund more mechs ... it is to grow the game in scale and complexity ad bring more new players into the fold.

Subscription would have meant a VERY small player base to start with and not much chance to grow it IMO

[Blakkstar]

The monetization model of the game hardly matters. I didn't renew my subscription to EVE because I got bored of the 5 activities you can do in the game (trade, mine, PvP, mission, Faction Warfare) and the storyline content sucks. Just because you're forking over a monthly fee doesn't guarantee the game will be better. Subscription probably would have been the worst way to go for this game.

F2P probably was the right choice since the failure of Mechassault 2 (a dumb console arcade shooter) scared the industry away from releasing a proper fully-featured Mechwarrior sequel. That being said, there's really no reason for PGI to have screwed this game up to the extent that thay have. They've all but ignored their strongest asset in the Battletech IP, and after all this time we really only have a sandbox shooter...and one that is struggling mightily with the basics of play balance and game mechanics (when a proven system has existed for decades).

All the problems this game has are fixable (F2P not being one of them), but I'm not holding my breath.

[Khobai]

Quote

Generally speaking, I prefer a subscription model over F2P in games. I feel that subscription-based allows the developers to focus entirely on making a fun game where as F2P forces them to always be thinking about what else they can create in order to sell.

Just because a game has a subscription model doesnt mean it cant also be free to play.

Eve Online for example makes it possible to buy new subscription time with currency earned in-game.

However im inclined to agree that a subscription based model for this game simply would NOT work.

Edited by Khobai, 18 August 2014 - 05:45 AM.

[FDJustin]

Can't sell corndogs for $6 a piece unless there's a carnival. Keep that in mind if you ever want to build your own F2P game, and you'll do alright.

[Satan n stuff]

Green Mamba, on 17 August 2014 - 05:35 PM, said:

Well PGI(Russ) has to be held accountable

I'm inclined to agree on that, it's easy to always point the finger at Paul but he's not really the one making the decisions is he?

[General Taskeen]

Both subscription and "f2p" models have their own flaws for specific kinds of games, especially for game series that traditionally never had any model like it beforehand. They are the kind of game models that shift owning the actual game content away from actually being "yours" - it is on a server somewhere that can be shut down at any time.

Now many of us older games remember the "Triple A" era of games and how multi-player games used to work where all the game content was "yours." Traditionally MW games have had a Single Player story set in some Era of Battle Tech, along with added multi-player components. That multiplayer component was the original style lobby/dedicated server room type of stuff, where each server was specifically catered to a bunch of different host options and game modes. Games like this still exist thankfully, but are slowly being replaced by "f2p" game model plague.

The price of admission was the cost for a game disk, plus expansions, and free patches. All of that added up to games that lasted for decades and you did not spend 500$'s+ to do so. And games were much more 'open source' in a sense where you mod the game more freely, make your skins, import game models, or modify game files for overhaul mods, etc.

Back in the day I imagine MW games that were going to be pure multiplayer, like MPBT3025, probably would have gone with subscription-based, since "f2p" wasn't a thing. "F2P"'s tend to slide into how they can "monetize" in order to keep a game afloat.

Since "mwo" was envisioned to be pure multiplayer, subscription might have been better, but I would have much preferred MW5 with a Single Player story and a robust MP component added on for game fans to create their own MP experiences.