The future of MMO business

Now we all know that we have several models of MMO business:
F2P, P2P, P2W.

Now we know that sometime F2P and P2W come together in some MMO’S.

But when you have a sub every month to play a game (P2P), you don’t expect to pay more than the monthly sub.

I’m not talking about the retainers of the FFXIV that we have now, I’m talking about what’s next?

The elder scroll online have the collector edition that will let you play as an imperial in any alliance with unique bonuses, crafting styles, gear and more.

Here is the link:
http://elderscrollsonline.com/en-uk/joinus

If you buy the standard edition you can’t do that. So they locked an entire race, crafting style and more bonuses like EXP rings behind a pay wall.

WoW had this mount that if you want it you need to pay real money to get it.

SE added retainers that if you want you need to pay 2$ a month, some people say its not P2W and some say it is P2W, but if we accept this now, what’s next?

What does that tell us? Does that mean that in today’s world of MMO we will have companies that will dig deep in our wallets and have cash shops to a P2P MMO games?

Is this going to stop here or is it going to be P2P + cash shops + P2W?

Here is a clip that explains what I’m talking about.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lRi-aku1nw

Just be reasonable. Increasing inventory slots eats up memory, probably memory that is needed for other tasks. To increase your total available inventory space even if it is your retainers it'll cost them money to increase. $2 a month is not that bad. You're paying for something extra. Ice cream doesn't come with every meal. You'd have to get it separately. Same thing with server transfers. It's extra. You don't expect that they should give that service away for free do you, just because there is a monthly fee? How is paying for extra retainers P2W? Are those people suddenly going to have a better chance at clearing turn 9?

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Originally Posted by MyuZero

Just be reasonable. Increasing inventory slots eats up memory, probably memory that is needed for other tasks. To increase your total available inventory space even if it is your retainers it'll cost them money to increase. $2 a month is not that bad. You're paying for something extra. Ice cream doesn't come with every meal. You'd have to get it separately. Same thing with server transfers. It's extra. You don't expect that they should give that service away for free do you, just because there is a monthly fee?

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If i accept this (and i dont) then whats next?
what if they come tomorrow and ask for more? like hers an expansion but the new race/class/job is locked for the people who pre-order it or pay extra 20$, would you accept this?

and dont tell me they wont do it, WoW did it, ESO did it.

Honestly, if it is included in the 3.0 expansion with a bunch of new stuff in it. $20 would be a steal. From my prospective though I came from a world where expansions are very common. Look at Starcraft and Starcraft 2 (and the 3 expansions that are planned with it). Or how about Warcraft 3 Reign of Chaos and Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne. I know these aren't games that require a monthly subscription but the content is kept behind a pay wall. You don't get to play the new stuff unless you pay for it which is what we're talking about here. Most of these games cost the same as a brand new game especially if you look at Starcraft 2 and the new expansion for Diablo 3 that came out the same week as our 2.2 patch. If I think it's worth it and I really want to play it I will buy it. It's as simple as that. I don't need to buy the expansions for the new content but I will chose to because I want it.

Then you make the choice to pay for it or play with what you have.
Expansions on games usually cost money anyways since it's a good chunk of new stuff, and if done right, makes it feel like a completely new game.
If a company decides they want to keep an aspect behind a pay wall, that's their choice. As long as it's not something previously included in sub/base game cost, I don't see the problem.
ESO's paid race gets a mount slower than the first horse you can buy and crafted armor which I think only makes it look different, not change stats. You can also buy the armor from someone playing the race if you really like how it looks. Big deal.

You'e overthinking too much.

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Originally Posted by Thorauku

You'e overthinking too much.

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ATMA grind, what can i say :)

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Originally Posted by Heat

If i accept this (and i dont) then whats next?
what if they come tomorrow and ask for more? like hers an expansion but the new race/class/job is locked for the people who pre-order it or pay extra 20$, would you accept this?

and dont tell me they wont do it, WoW did it, ESO did it.

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...And yet, SE has been running another MMO for 11 years now, and never did it. So it's not necessarily going to happen just because WoW did.

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Originally Posted by Heat

ATMA grind, what can i say :)

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Huh?

/10char

The only future I care about is some damn Full Diving.

Let me Full Dive.

for me
p2w is when you pay to access certain dungeon/OP class/job/race or strongest weapon while other user cant access it

i can accept expansion need to pay or some cash shop weapon can be bought to give early boost but strongest equipment can be get from in game
even exp boost,inventory slot,vault slot is acceptable and SE is not the first company give player to 'rent monthly' slot space

retainer system for 2$ is worth but i wont pay for it bec my 2 retainer already enough for vault slot, retainer venture is great bec can give random item or help farm other item

*dont bash me*

No point in talking about it. Die hard fans just shout you down with "its not like its a weapon!" lick SE's boots and orgasm that they get to pay them money.

I work really hard for my money don't you, i want to enjoy the game.

Simple with the right monthly subs destroys, The the peer pressure that you pay to win. You will pay the same amount on a free to play or free to win games ( with the avg amount of users) . Just sucks!.

Some how the kids now days feels . It should have all been cheated or given to them. They forgot what was the social part of mmo's were about.

They lost the ways of the fact it only a game and you enjoy it and actually met some friends or be like omfg I met some cool people or get life lesson that some tiimes they move on , but down the road there always there. Unless there a ************** , then you move on.

As a f2p user (most of mmos i played were f2p) you need to pay $100+ a month just to stay competitive, $500+ a month to win. My guess - they want to merge two models with a player base of p2p games (very large base) and monthly fee of f2p games (very large fee thus small online).

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Originally Posted by Thorauku

You'e overthinking too much.

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my thoughts exactly

You are paying for more inventory and more slots to put items on the AH..... The same thing they had you do in FFXI when you wanted an extra character except there it was one dollar extra a month instead of two. But then again you had a lot less inventory space and AH slots. All I can say is get over it and move on. Pay for your retainers or don't. Either way you still have access to Coils.

I don't mind paying for vanity items so I'd love if they added a vanity shop

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Originally Posted by Heat

what if they come tomorrow and ask for more? like heres an expansion but the new race/class/job is locked for the people who pre-order it or pay extra 20$, would you accept this?

and dont tell me they wont do it, WoW did it, ESO did it.

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How hard is it to pre order a game? Paying an Extra $20 depends on what I get extra. As for FFXIV and Expansions I'm pretty sure it will follow FFXI and people are going to pay for them and if you don't you don't get anything, And I doubt that SE will force player to pay extra money outside of buying an expansion just to unlock a class or content.

As for ESO I'm sure after a few weeks or months the Items from the collectors edition will be for sale. Its called making money. They are looking at it like this, "Lets add items to a collectors edition only and people will Buy More and then after a few weeks we'll just sell each Craft/Class/Items for $2.99-5.99 each". Its like going to Gamestop and pre ordering a game some give you Bonus items, If you don't pre order then you don't get, But after a few weeks they are available for purchase.

As for FFXIV I could really care less what they add for sale long as its basically vanity, Like extra Retainers its not an advantage. Yes you get more space and can sell 20 extra slots but its not game breaking, I can get 12 more retainers for free, I just have to put in a little extra work. Now if SE wants to add ilvl200 Weapon/Gears that aren't vanity then I will have a problem. Paying for Hair Styles, Phantasia Potions, Name Change, Minion, Mounts, and gear that is only for Vanity is all fine by me.

Making mountains out of mole hills aren't we? I hate to break it to you but purchasing more retainers was on the tables long before the game relaunched. The original design team saw that people purchased extra character in FFXI to just be mules and wanted to add that to FFXIV. The way the game is designed now, you can't buy more character to be mule so you have retainers.

Monetisation is coming to all games, even console games like Gran Turismo, Bravely Default and Forza Motorsports.

It's sad but don't expect it to get any better.

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Originally Posted by Heat

The elder scroll online have the collector edition that will let you play as an imperial in any alliance with unique bonuses, crafting styles, gear and more.

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But FFXIV already did this. Buying the Collector's Edition gets you a Fat Chocobo, Coeurl, Behemoth Barding, Wind-up Moogle, Baby Behemoth, and a Warrior of Light helm, which gives you +10% exp until level 10 on every class.

You could complain that FFXIV "locked all this behind a pay wall" too. Being an Imperial and having the ability to crafting in the Imperial style are both as important as the mounts and minions. The only gameplay benefit in the Imperial Edition is getting a horse early and cheap.

I've been burned by a game promising not to do microtransactions. But in the end, all you can do is quit or not pay for them. We can only vote with our wallets in this case.

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Originally Posted by Dyvid

I hate to break it to you but purchasing more retainers was on the tables long before the game relaunched.

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Oh, and I can confirm this. They've had it planned since the inception of 1.0, but put it on the back-burner when they made FFXIV free. In fact... I think when they did so, they gave us a second retainer free. Hmm.