would you play this game if it went free to play/hybrid?

[Niwashi]

I'm against F2P cash shops even if they do limit themselves to cosmetic items. In some ways that's as bad if not worse than offering progression stats. A lot of the top long term rewards in the game are cosmetics or other fluff items like mounts. If those have to compete with the ones offered through a cash shop, they're going to suffer for it. There will be far fewer in-game rewards, and the ones that remain will be simpler and less worthwhile, because in order to make any money the company has to reserve their best fluff items for the store.

[Ceodore]

Free to play works for games like Warframe, where the chat is not a focus, and it isn't essentially an instant messenger with quests and enemies. Warframe can do this extremely well because it's a 1st/3rd person shooter action game. MMORPGs that attempt Free to Play ALWAYS (I MEAN ALWAYS) suffer for it. RMT tells and bots are just two of the many problems that Free to Plays suffer from. Other issues arise in server quality, eventual population limits, and game design quality. Those three aspects also generally suffer heavily. When you can rely on a subscription, you can know about what income you have to work with, and what you can produce with that income. With a free to play, there's the constant necessity to create gating items that players HAVE to purchase. Even if they just aesthetic things, this is still an issue if you make all the other gear in the game simply hideous. And MMORPGs have a plethora of ways to make a player feel that glamour items are not optional, but a necessity. This can range from character creation option (Want to have custom horns to your face Au'Ra?) to animation options (How many Dark Knights want to have the Omnislash Animation for Carve and Spit) to clothing options (All the clothes in the game now look like Hempen gear, and ALL other image items for gear now costs money) to mount options (All players now only have their chocobo, ALL other mounts now cost money) and even housing options (You want a small house? 10 dollars a month, medium? 20, Large? 50). Free to Plays WILL exploit your wallet anywhere they can. Even Guild Wars 2, a Hybrid, has done this, by making certain glamour items that are absolutely coveted be gated behind an RNG item that costs money.

Free to play? Absolutely not. Hybrid? Still no. Pay to Play? SE, I'll keep drip feeding you less than 1% of my monthly pay check if you keep making content that caters to my fan boy. Thank you for not going or considering Free to play.

[justinjarjar]

I'm against F2P cash shops even if they do limit themselves to cosmetic items. In some ways that's as bad if not worse than offering progression stats. A lot of the top long term rewards in the game are cosmetics or other fluff items like mounts. If those have to compete with the ones offered through a cash shop, they're going to suffer for it. There will be far fewer in-game rewards, and the ones that remain will be simpler and less worthwhile, because in order to make any money the company has to reserve their best fluff items for the store.

Look at the SWtOR model, the cash shops is cosmetic in nature (and sold in packs), but it can all be sold on the market board (GTN in that game). This way the hardcore players can cherry pick what they want and buy i off other players looking for in game money or have repeats. Works pretty well and creates a better economy then we currently have.

Edit: you cannot buy straight up pack items you have to invest a lot of real life money into buying packs to get some of the rarer items (like a tgc). This way it does not have a flood of items in the market of high rarity. Also Niwashi in no way does F2P kill the engagement of the game, it just focuses it else where, no one can finish the raid and get the best gear without playing the game.

[Niwashi]

Look at the SWtOR model, the cash shops is cosmetic in nature (and sold in packs), but it can all be sold on the market board (GTN in that game). This way the hardcore players can cherry pick what they want and buy i off other players looking for in game money or have repeats. Works pretty well and creates a better economy then we currently have.

It might be better than some implementations, but it still keeps them out of being actual game rewards. You can buy cosmetics with real-world cash or with in-game cash, but either way, you're just buying them, not playing the game. In a subscription based model, the best cosmetics and fluff can be offered as rewards for accomplishments you make within the game itself, making that gameplay far more engaging.

[Ceodore]

Works pretty well and creates a better economy then we currently have.

Actually, this kind of economy doesn't really work all that well, as has been seen in many other F2Ps and hybrids. To name just one F2P, Tera has run into a terrible economy after it went Free to Play and added glamour items to their in game store. What you are assuming here is that high end players aren't going to buy these items then sell them on the market too, because, why not just spend in game money and get what glamours you want instead? Right? Wrong. The fact is, this currency isn't just for the glamour items, it's for EVERYTHING on the market boards, which includes armors, weapons, trinkets, consumables, just about EVERYTHING in the game. SO, even the high end players with a lot of game currency still buy their own glamour items, and then buy extras to sell themselves. You've succeeded in nothing here, because the demand for these glamour items isn't high when you can just drop 1 or 2 dollars for it instead and save massive amounts of game money. Sure, those are some messed up priorities, but those with disposable income already are generally those that play videogames too. People without disposable incomes are generally having to work too much to make ends meet to bother with spending ANY money on a video game, let alone time, and as we all know, time IS money.

Hybrid systems still suffer the same problem with cash shops offering just glamour items, even if they can be purchased with in game money. Guild Wars 2 is a hybrid game that allows players to trade in game money for cash shop currency, and vice versa. This has resulted in a one way flow of currency creation in the game and has drastically affected their markets. Money is being easily created and thrown into their economy, and it's resulted in price increases on items on the markets. The problem has also gotten worse recently too, as the amount of game currency you can now purchase with real money has increased dramatically. At launch, when I first started, I was able to purchase cash shop currency for about 500 of the in game currency per cash shop currency. That amount has increased about 50 times. The same trend has occurred with the reverse process too, with the cash shop currency now being able to be converted to about 50 times what it was at launch. Weapons that would have cost you 100s of dollars at the launch are now dropping in the price when relate to real world currency, but have sky rocketed in price when related to the game's currency due to the rapid inflation of how much in game money is available in circulation.

So no, no cash shop items, glamour or not, sellable on market or not, will help a game's economy. What is necessary for a game's economy to remain stable is an equal flow of game currency being created and being destroyed (i.e. monetary sinks). SE believed that housing would be a good gil sink, however, this failed to be the case because the houses are just buy once, instead of requiring monetary maintenance to retain. This is also a suggestion that has been made several times as a fix to the currently dead housing wards where FCs and private players have bought up all the houses, then died off, leaving unused real estate. As it stands, there IS no real reliable gil sink in this game. Gil just passes between players for the most part on the markets, and massive amounts of it is created daily from roulettes and vendor sales. A cash shop glamour system in this game wouldn't help the economy either, because again, as with TERA, the rich still have the capability to buy and sell those cash shop items just the same as the poor, only they won't hurt as much if their items don't sell as fast, so they can keep the sale prices high and not even buy the items themselves.

[Colorful]

History has already shown FFXI to be the victor in terms of stability over time. It started before WoW ever came out and it outlasted WoW. That says something about its quality despite it not having mainstream appeal.

Outlasted WoW? Last I checked WoW still had 7+ million active subscribers, and a new expansion coming out soon.

[Khyan]

Let this thread die slowly please.

[WingsOfAzrael]

f2p = p2w simple as that
no just no, i'd quit

[Gextiv]

The grind as it is now... just imagine how MUCH more grindier the game would become if it were to become f2p.

No. No. No!

[Riardon]

No the hell with the stupid F2P model which plagues the gaming industry. There is no "FREE" in this world. Everything is give and take and in the gaming industry nowadays is more Give than take from consumer perspective. You end up paying more than you thought you will and the game gets full of 10years old children who can't pay a normal game so they end up playing the free ones plus they are easier target for IAPS and cash shops. I prefer more honest communication between me and the devs/company. I know it's hard to develop a game and they want money plus profit so it's better to be honest and ask for a monthly sub.