Seems like alot of people want this game to become Free 2 Play. >.>

[Starlord]

I am worried about SEs track record. I didn't feel like I got my money's worth out of FFXI at all and I still have a sub to it might cancel soon since I had enough. Which is why I rather just have it free to play have people who want vanity items pay for it.

If you didn't know FFXI updates were very few and very slim if you look at any of their recent updates you would think is this a joke? For example, buy stuff from the craft guilds faster, store more items with storage slips, in fact the majority of their updates are bug fixs or slight tweaks to content. Anyway the major updates they make you pay for like the 3 addon stores for $10 each for $30 total, every new update you were paying $10 just to play the new content. Then came the year they rolled out abyssea same thing each new set of abyssea zones cost $10 each for a total of $30 over 3 patchs. You would think the sub fees would pay for stuff like that but no. If you didn't buy the abyssea addons not only would you not be able to get af3 gear but you probably wouldn't be able to exp either since everyone went to abyssea to exp now.

Will SE do the same thing in FFXIV? If they have a big patch will you have to throw down an extra $10 to play it on top of your monthly fee?

Well, I am terribly sorry you experienced that with FFXI, but personally, the content was "Long lasting" that even with content patches only coming out every 3 months I always had something to do, ( back in my younger days when I played like nearly everyday lol). But No I don't want to pay for 5 bucks for this 10 bucks for that 20 bucks for a package deal, too many bad experiences with f2p mmos that I threw money away on that I much rather play a p2p game.. heck I would even play WoW if FF didn't exist because everything was all in one big package deal.

I don;t have to play every day to get my 10-15 bucks worth a month. I only need to play 10hrs of FFXIV to get my 9.99 worth ( to me anyways), but I certainly don't have to play everyday to get my money's worth of the game itself ^.^.

Long story short, I rather not do a f2p format because in the long run you spend more on f2p games then on a p2p ( again that varies from person to person but this is my view on it)

[Preypacer]

Planetside 2 and Guild Wars 2 (to some degree), are two reasons why F2P is the future. You're kidding yourselves if you think Pay to Play has a future when it's quite clear triple A games can exist without an on-going cost and still pull in a massive amount of cash and subs.

1. For the millionth time, GW2 is not free to play. You have to buy it. Having to buy something to play it =/= Free. I'm not sure whether to be amazed or depressed by how many people can't make that ever-so-basic distinction. Have some of you people never encountered the word "free" before in terms of "not having to pay for something"?

2. If Planetside 2 is purely funded by cash shop sales, then you can bet your ass there are items in there, and will be more down the line, that are not "mandatory" but are compulsory enough that people will buy them.

There's this big, huge, glaring misunderstanding when it comes to F2P. So many people look at it as "whether or not you're forced to buy items to compete".

That is part of it. It is not, by any stretch, the whole of it.

It's not that people will feel they have to pay to play as they want that drives Cash Shop sales. It's that they will do so.

The concept of cash-shops/microtransactions is derived from the long-running practice of RMT (also known as "eBaying") that would take place rampantly in many games, long before "F2P" even came into existence as an actual revenue model. People proved without even intending to that they were willing to pay far more on in-game items than they ever would on a subscription alone. People would pay their $15 a month subscription fee, and then go and spend upwards of hundreds - even thousands - of dollars on in-game money, items, characters, power-leveling... Things that were conveniences, that helped them progress faster, that helped them become more competitive, and that helped them bypass parts of the games they didn't want to deal with. Kinda sounds like a lot of the items you'll find in a typical cash-shop, now don't it?

How long do you think it would take before companies saw this phenomenon and realized "We're missing out here"? Hello Cash Shops.

The developers found they could do away with the subscription fee not because "it's too much of a barrier to new players". They did away with it because if they could tap into the kind of money people were spending on RMT/eBaying, they wouldn't need subscriptions... They'd simultaneously gain the advantage of being able to say "Hey! You can play our game for FREE!".

The entire concept of F2P/Cash Shop/Microtransactions is based on the proven fact that people will pay money to gain conveniences in a game, and far more than they would on subscriptions. F2P/Cash Shop MMOs are designed around that fact.

F2P doesn't exist because the developers/publishers want to be generous to their players. They exist because those developers know they can get far more revenue from those same players with that model.

"But what about those who don't pay? Huh? A ha! Gotcha! I win!"

Not so fast....

First, of all who, statistically, "never pay a dime"... how many of them are actually playing at all? Go ahead and see if you can find that statistic. See if you can find a F2P MMO publisher or developer who provides "active account numbers" specifically including only those who are actively playing their game at all. I think you'll find it difficult to find such info. And that's just the way they want it.

So what about those "people who never pay anything"? Easy.

Those people serve an entire other purpose. What they don't provide in actual revenue, they do in being a warm body in the game, or at least a registered account. It's no secret that MMO companies love throwing around population and "active account" numbers in their PR releases. That's precisely where non-paying players come in.

Here's a couple other reasons why people getting to try the game for free actually benefits the developer/publisher:
1. A F2P, or even B2P (ie. GW2) game doesn't require an active subscription. Once you've set up an account, it's always active. Even if you haven't played the game in over a year, your account is still considered an active one. And I will guarantee you that when F2P MMO developers release their population numbers every so often, that there is no differentiation made between those who are actively playing and those who haven't logged in for months. If you're a truly free player, you're a number helping to pad the "active account numbers" for a PR release - even if you're not playing. That's your value.

2. Little chases off new players like the impression that there's no one playing the game. It's disheartening to log into a game only to find the newbie areas a barren ghost-town, where the player-to-NPC ratio heavily favors the NPCs. Conversely, logging into a game to see it thriving with all kinds of new players running around can very well have the affect of keeping new players around longer. The longer they're kept around and the farther they get into the game, the greater chance there is of them becoming a paying one - the game is designed to make that as likely as possible. So if you're a free player, then that's another way you are still valuable to the developer/publisher.

Letting people play for free isn't some act of goodwill or generosity. It's a very shrewd business strategy, and a successful one at that. Just look at how many people buy into it without even thinking twice.

Cosmetic items through cash shops is how these games will make the money, just because you don't like it or think it's Pay To Win isn't going to stop business's from going ahead and doing it anyway.

Not really sure what your point is in this statement, but you're seriously mistaken and incredibly naive if you think it's the cosmetic items keeping F2P/Cash Shop MMOs running.

Are you saying that you would not play a seriously polished and excellent F2P game, just because someone could spend a couple of pounds on a cosmetic item? As for comments akin too "In the end you WILL spend more", this is true IF YOU ARE PREPARED TOO. No one is saying you have to buy anything.

And again the fallacious "you don't have to buy anything" argument comes up.

If I see a really cool looking item on the cash shop that I decide I'd like to get, and I find out that the only way to obtain that item is by buying it, then yes... I am forced to buy it, or I'm forced to do without. Those are my options.

Not much of a choice from where I'm sitting. Especially if my finances don't allow it.

I would much rather know that I can obtain everything and anything I want in the game by actually playing it, where I'm never even required to weigh that choice in the first place.

Saying "well you're not forced to buy anything" is such a hollow, flawed and fallacious argument on its face that I'm amazed how many people use it as a "gotcha" response.

I despise Pay to Win, i've embraced Free to Play, it IS the future. Suck it up.

I think we're on year 3 now, at least, that people have been making that claim.

Yet here we are in 2012, long-running subscription-based MMOs are still running and still sub-based. New MMOs are still coming out with subscriptions and doing just fine (any arbitrary definitions of "successful" that some might feel compelled to throw around as "fact" notwithstanding).

No, F2P is not "the future". They're an option that is ideal for games designed with that payment model in mind. One size does not fit all, nor does any one payment model. Subscriptions will be around for a long time to come. You need to suck that up.

[Levian]

Preypacer: Thank you.

[Preypacer]

Preypacer: Thank you.

lol no problem.

There's just a lot of stuff going on with F2P/Cash Shops that, it seems, many people never even think about. They seem to take it at surface value, see it only for what they want to, and that's it. So many arguments for it that I see completely ignore every other side of the situation. The "you're not forced to buy it" one that I addressed above is a great example.

It seems people's consideration of that begins and ends with "do I need to buy that item to play the game? No? Okay, then it shouldn't be a problem for anyone." It's not that simple, nor one-sided. Not even close.

And what of people who would like those items - "fluff" or otherwise - because it's part of what they enjoy about these types of games? They have to pay more $$$ than everyone else just so they can enjoy the game as they'd like to? I don't see that as fair at all, and I have no interest in that kind of stuff either.

My favorite are these types of remarks:

"I have no problem with them selling fluff items on the cash shop. If it's helping bring the company more money, then that's great. There's nothing I'd really be interested in buying anyway".

Basically, "I'm happy to let other people spend their money to help support the game/company. Just as long as it's not me".

Such an amazingly self-centered attitude that, again, it baffles me how openly, and often, people express it.

Anyway! I've had my rant... so I'll stop now

[Elexia]

I love when people say an MMO is the future. How'd that work out for Rift, Tera and SWTOR? You know, the MMOs that are "the future of MMOs" as well? D:

[TomCarroll]

I love when people say an MMO is the future. How'd that work out for Rift, Tera and SWTOR? You know, the MMOs that are "the future of MMOs" as well? D:

In order to be "the future", you'll have to introduce something pretty revolutionary, which none of the titles you've mentioned have done. In fact, they were pretty much carbon-copies of WOW with a few changes. 14 will be different, but I don't see it being genre-defining or "the future" of the genre. It's going to take a lot of pages out of Blizzard's book, only because they've pieced together a pretty solid formula for the genre.

The only foreseeable future for the MMO genre is the f2p model, but only because the market is just so over-saturated now. When XI came out there was no real competition until WOW came along. Its immediate success was a cue for developers to churn out one MMO after another. Inevitably, subscription-based gaming is detrimental to making money since the entire MMO playerbase is spread so thin. Most f2p games make tons more money on that model than they ever would have on a p2p model, and only because you've got chumps who'll pay for all sorts of items and perks.

[Antipika]

I love when people say an MMO is the future. How'd that work out for Rift, Tera and SWTOR? You know, the MMOs that are "the future of MMOs" as well? D:

Well Rift is still sub based and a new expansion is coming, actually the game is doing pretty well for a WoW clone. It doesn't have millions of players, still running smoothly.

[Starlord]

No MMO is a clone..

Definition of a Clone: ~ To make multiple identical copies of (a DNA sequence).

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/clone

No MMO that I have played are "Clones", the feel of the game might have some similarities but it will never be a "True" clone.

Well Rift is still sub based and a new expansion is coming, actually the game is doing pretty well for a WoW clone. It doesn't have millions of players, still running smoothly.

Suppose to mean something? man people can be childish sometimes *rolls eyes*

Some people block me because I state my opinion that is the opposite of there opinion, This is the internet after all.. never know what you expect. *smiles*

[Gramul]

*smiles*

...Right.
Well, on the subject, people call a game a "clone" when it has most of the features, visuals, or playstyle of another game without significant changes to justify their interest.
That's why you see people getting annoyed on Steam Greenlight whenever they see a game in the style of minecraft that looks and plays a lot like it.

[Deakka]

I definitely would like to see some numbers from f2p publishers, as far as "Average amount spent per player" and "Average percentage of purchasing players". It would be interesting to see on average how many players simply pay their initial purchase cost and then stop paying. On a somewhat related tangent, I know Bioware made out like a bandit with the armory crates from ME3 multiplayer. They even managed to get me for about 10 bucks or so >.>

I think if SE can recreate the "Final Fantasy" feeling, they'll never need to succumb to f2p/b2p models. Let's hope