295 replies to this topic

[Draco Argentum]

League of Legends is the perfect example of F2P done right. You literally can't spend money to be better than a free player. Why is this so important? If you can buy power people will eventually drift away or pay money. This may sound great, get rid of the leeches and keep the paying cutomers!

The first issue is that a F2P PVP game needs a lagre pool of players to make sure there are actually matches for the paying customers to play in. Getting rid of free players makes the queues worse for the paying customers so they'll leave sooner than they would normally.

The second problem is that pay to win is usually ongoing and people can see that going in. I'd definately pay $50 for a good mech game. Will I pay some ongoing uncapped cost? No, thats just senselessly wasting my money.

A well done F2P model like LoL can work really well with only one danger though. If its a bad game people will find that out before you have their money.

[Trixie]

Most F2P models are fine nowadays. Stop overreacting.
I'd rather play a F2P with a cash shop than have a subscribtion anyway. Subs are awful.

Edit: I'd like to add that I love a Turbine style subscription, but I don't see how it'd work with this kind of game.

Edited by Trixie, 01 November 2011 - 01:02 AM.

[Azmodan]

a great F2P model is World of Tanks. http://worldoftanks.com/
i've played it for over a year now and the model of F2P it's just great. u can play for free all u want and u have access to all the content, but paying is worthwhile. because a game of that quality is not cheap and the devs need to be paid.

[Thorn Hallis]

I don't give a f'. P2P, P2W, P2F, who cares? It's a new Mechwarrior! That's all what matters!

[Singed]

Free 2 play gaming model has evolved a lot in a past years, and f2p games no longer considered second-rate before actual details are given. It all comes down to the quality of the actual game - if its good enough, there will be a lot of players and even purely cosmetic stuff can generate a solid income.

Edited by Singed, 01 November 2011 - 01:34 AM.

[Phantasmagorium]

As most people have already stated here, F2P is generally not a bad thing anymore. Yes, there's still plenty of second-rate Ragnarok Online-esque grind-fests with tremendous amounts of pay-to-win, but most of the more western F2Ps, be they designed for it or more in the line of Turbine games, generally have very sound systems in place. The two most common examples, League of Legends and World of Tanks, are both excellently done.

To expand on the World of Tanks, another thing to remember is that technically, no cash is required at all - between the incredibly frequent contests (as an aside - the Wargaming.net team is a great example of how to treat your players) and the fact that successful outfits (clans) actually earn gold for holding territory in the clan wars, everyone can potentially get their hands on gold items given enough time. Also, to respond to people who claim WoT is pay-to-win, well.. you're absolutely wrong. The (completely unupgradable) premium tanks are exactly what they should be - the Lowe is better than a brand-new, stock Tiger II, but worse than a fully-upgraded one; and the Type 59 is essentially a slower T-44 with a T-54 turret (and the -bad- T-54 gun). The real advantage of a premium tank isn't related to an actual fight at all, it's the cheap ammo and repairs - and I'd be perfectly happy to see premium mechs with the same philosophy. After all, this game is set BEFORE the Clan invasions - there are no omnimechs running about the place unless they're going to let us be Wolf's Dragoons, so something like that would work just fine.

[Adridos]

I like this model, if the developers look up to make a good F2P, people will dont have problem to spend a lot of money on it, since it will be equal and good experience as the previeus games. The bad F2P model is presented in AoE:O. You dont stand a chance against paying "idiots" (that game is awful) and its just a steal of the money because of the name of the franchise (it wasnt even planned as AoE, they just changed it to get more money). Their prices are bad too 20$=20€, 100€ for a Half a year content (thats even more than two AAA titles together). Unless the developers take that way, Im fine with it.

[Mindwiper]

Aff! The World of Tanks concept can work here too and isn't bad. The only thing they really have to look into is, that you don't get any advantage ingame while battling with other mercenarie companies. So no superduper ammo for pay and so on. This can get very cost intensive when you play pvp and want to achieve something with your lance.

[Candid]

Listen, I don't really care whether it's pay to win or not. As far as I'm concerned F2P is a subscription based MMO with a decorated lobby. If you're interested, come inside and take a look around, but you will need to do the equivalent of subscribing to get the whole picture or the best experience.

Problem? Not for me. I'd do that for a Mechwarrior game. If you don't want to, it's your loss.

[deadeye mcduck]

eldragon, on 31 October 2011 - 01:04 PM, said:

Forum is 1 day old and it already has its first troll. Gotta love the internet.

Go look at World of Tanks forums for how this forum will look like in a few months (i.e troll central)

[John Clavell]

If any of you play EVE Online you'll how much fun and rubble has been had about P2W recently. Competitive games such as this don't translate well to P2W in the long run, they harm the game. The developers in the PC Gamer have said the same thing. Only time will tell, Let's not get carried away with ourselves, the site was launched yesterday and still so much more information has yet to come out. No one but the developers know what is in store for us. Let's try to keep things based on fact as much as possible.

[Nekomimimode]

Actually, i am also concerned about the F2P model.
League of Legends so far is the one and only game that REALLY doesnt affect the gameplay with the cash-shop. All other F2P games are abusing the system.

The game that can be called closest to the MechWarrior online is the World of Tanks, where you get in tank scrimishes while driving a err.. tank. If anyone is familiar with it you should know that initially developers said the same thing - our system is not a pay2win, you can attain everything by playing the game. And you know what? It turned out to be lies. For example there is a stuff like "premium" shells, which practically ignore enemy armor and dont "ricochet" unlike normal shells. The difference between normal and "gold" shells are huge. Its not like you cant win against donaters, but it is alot harder. And i havent said anything about the premium "repair kits", "med kits" and so on. On the battlefield the difference between the donator and a non-paying player is huge. And this is by far not the worst F2P example.

Most of the F2P games pressure the player to pay. Actually you dont even have a choice - you either pay, or suffer. So far "League" is the only exeption to that rule, and i have probably spent on skins there more than i'd pay if it were p2p. But the only reason why i did so it is because the game doesnt PRESSURE me to buy stuff. The changes are purely cosmetical and doesnt affect the gameplay in any way. I hasnt spend even a cent in any other f2p game that DEMAND me to pay to be stronger than the other players.

The devs may say stuff like:

chrisy05, on 31 October 2011 - 12:53 PM, said:

"Ekman also promises that while players will be able to buy items with real money, nobody can buy anything that will confer a tactical advantage. “Anything that would affect or give your a tactical advantage, you can’t purchase with real cash. You have to earn that by playing the game,” he says."

But i have seen TONS of such promises, and the end result is always the same. World of tanks is the most recent example of it. Man's greed knows no bounds.

What i want to say with this post is that i WOUNT belive ANY promises unless i will see the exact list of items sold in the cash-shop. And i really DO hope that MechWarrior online can become the second exeption of the F2P genre alongside the League of Legends. But i dont belive in it. Not yet.

[Sly J]

I'm not too worried about a P2W scenario. Based on what I've seen so far (which, granted, is very little), this game is being developed by a group of people who are just as rabidly enthusiastic about Battletech as most of us are. You don't spend over 2 years painstakingly searching for a way to secure a stable environment to develop a game under a extremely prestigious licence just to make a quick cash grab. They fact that they haven't abandoned this game despite everything that has (or more accurately, hasn't) happened over the past two years means that the people behind this are extremely dedicated to the franchise. It's pretty obvious (at least to me) that Mechwarrior is in good hands.

[doggie015]

damocles, on 31 October 2011 - 01:05 PM, said:

also on DLC:
"Q. Will DLC be offered in the new MechWarrior® Online™ game?

A. Not in the way that you imagine it. Content will be pushed to you via the game patcher. Once a patch has been applied, new game content is immediately available to you. Larger patches could be considered expansion packs but again, it's pushed to you the player at no cost."


-A patcher that just pushes updates to you? Sounds like true PC gaming again.

So... Basically this is a mechised version of the now F2P TF2... BRING IT ON!!

[Skatch]

This is actually a perfect game to do the F2P model with. There are so many mechs that as long as there is a good balance between them, keeping some mechs shop based for cash wouldnt be bad. For instance some medium mechs will be free, and some will cost cash, but there should be much difference in base stats between a free mech or a paid one within any class of mech.

I could see them giving like the Vulture for free, but you would have to pay to unlock a Mad Cat. I just hope they keep good customization of weapon payloads, and things of that mature and dont try to nickle and dime us there.

[Tyra]

doggie015, on 01 November 2011 - 02:34 AM, said:

So... Basically this is a mechised version of the now F2P TF2... BRING IT ON!!

I...could live with that.

[little]

Azmodan, on 01 November 2011 - 01:06 AM, said:

a great F2P model is World of Tanks. http://worldoftanks.com/
i've played it for over a year now and the model of F2P it's just great. u can play for free all u want and u have access to all the content, but paying is worthwhile. because a game of that quality is not cheap and the devs need to be paid.

Which has premium ammunition which free players can't get. So I really wouldn't use the "World of" games as a good F2P example...

[Youngblood]

Sly J, on 01 November 2011 - 02:26 AM, said:

I'm not too worried about a P2W scenario. Based on what I've seen so far (which, granted, is very little), this game is being developed by a group of people who are just as rabidly enthusiastic about Battletech as most of us are. You don't spend over 2 years painstakingly searching for a way to secure a stable environment to develop a game under a extremely prestigious licence just to make a quick cash grab. They fact that they haven't abandoned this game despite everything that has (or more accurately, hasn't) happened over the past two years means that the people behind this are extremely dedicated to the franchise. It's pretty obvious (at least to me) that Mechwarrior is in good hands.

Hear hear! If I could dedicate myself to something for that long, well...I might be somewhere different than I am now. Rock on, devs.

[Razor Kotovsky]

mal, on 31 October 2011 - 01:03 PM, said:

Because that would be a tactical advantage, which that quote clearly states can't be bought with cash.

No, that would be strategical.

There is a very fine line between f2p and p2w. I've learnt that across the bigger projects like WoT, APB:Reloaded and NFS World. They all claim the same but fail to deliver.

Needless to say most fans would just subscribe rather than get through premium bullshit but that'd leave them without easy prey.

Edited by _5224, 01 November 2011 - 03:40 AM.

[OnLashoc]

Bryan Ekman, on 31 October 2011 - 01:51 PM, said:

This is a great and very important thread. Rest assured we will address this in a future blog/announcement. I think people will actually be very happy with e F2P model we have developed.

Dude you are an absolute RockStar in my opinion for even coming to the forums and posting directly to a thread!

However, don't listen too much to some of the doom sayers, cause 99.999999999999% of us are just friggin stoked there is going to be another MechWarrior, specially those of us who had been around playing MW4 since 1999 and were told the making of MW5 was canceled.

So again THANK YOU!!

Onnie