Recent string of Emails to Smedley in regards to PS1 F2P Status

[MasterChief096]

Here y'all go:

[Wahooo]

Originally Posted by basti

The game would need not just a pretty heavy change in how it handles stuff on the client, but also a few dedicated GMs to monitor and ban cheaters.

And that stuff costs money. So the game cant just go F2P without ever wanting any cash from anyone..

Considering they did little to nothing about this when there were quite a few people and multiple servers paying money I really doubt in game GMs gets even a glimmer of interest if PS1 goes F2P.

The more I think about that aspect the more disenchanted I become.

[Crator]

Basti made some good points on his last posts. Dream killer! Still, what would it hurt to have a reduced monthly cost along with giving PS2 subs access to play?

[CrazEpharmacist]

Originally Posted by Wahooo

Considering they did little to nothing about this when there were quite a few people and multiple servers paying money I really doubt in game GMs gets even a glimmer of interest if PS1 goes F2P.

The more I think about that aspect the more disenchanted I become.

A few GMs logged on PS1 for a few hours within the last month of so. So they already have that little glimmer of interest I guess you could say. I'm sure if the game becomes more popular and starts making more money they can assign more hours. We don't need a 24/7 GM. Just one to log on for a few hours or so every week and respond to hacking reports and whatnot.

[MasterChief096]

Once again, Everquest is free-to-play. What does Everquest have that PS doesn't?

[Effective]

Originally Posted by Sturmhardt

I don't know, you wrote that, you tell me.

The thing is they can't make money with it. It's not worth the effort for them. It would only be played by a few oldschoolers who could not get the pop high enough to live up to the game's potential. It would just be a sad story. SOE doesn't want to waste money and I get that.

.sent via phone.

You did say it, by saying Smed was right. Smed said, the no one is playing it and the reason no one is playing has nothing to do it with it not being F2P.

And all they have to do to prove this. Is make it free to play, or at the very least give out a free 30-45 days like they've done in the past. I seriously doubt that would take more then 10 minutes to do.

[Figment]

Originally Posted by MasterChief096

Once again, Everquest is free-to-play. What does Everquest have that PS doesn't?

PvE.

[CrazEpharmacist]

Originally Posted by Figment

PvE.

That's very true. PS1 requires large numbers for content. Everquest can get by with lesser population because of pve.

Also, few updates from Smedly's twitter today:

[vieric]

Hmm, it kinda looks like they plan to merge subs from this...not the best idea in my opinion but its still infinitely better then nothing. Besides, not enough concrete info at this point, so I suppose I would be wise not to get myself tied in a knot over it just yet.

At the very least they seem to get that people do indeed still want to play it now.

[MasterChief096]

Originally Posted by Figment

PvE.

That may be true, but think about it. PlanetSide basically needs approximately 180 people online per empire at any one time to sustain a pop-lock (three-way) and a smaller secondary fight. That's 540 people that should be active throughout the day, so maybe like a total of 1500-2000 active players that play at different times of the week.

Night fights would probably be smaller, but that also has its advantages (provides pace change, etc).

That's not a lot, especially if the game were free-to-play. I think that easily 2000+ people would play PS1 if it were free.

[Furber]

Thanks for the updates, CrazEpharmacist. I'm glad to know they're at least thinking about it. I'd be interested to find out what they have in mind.

Looking into it, it sounds like they'll probably do the PS2 sub = PS1 sub. A nice gesture, but I doubt that's going to do a whole lot for PS1's population. Unless there is a strong kickstart for PS1's population, it's unlikely whatever small amount of ps2 subscribers coming to PS1 would be enough to get the game going well again. They would probably just see a near empty game and leave it. We've already established the problem of "no one playing because there's no one to play with", and I don't see this fixing the problem. All in all of course I'm for this double subscription thing, but not as a final solution.

As for the second tweet, (I'm being optimistic here) it looks like they are in fact considering a F2P option. He says "we are looking at a simple way to do it", which I can assume relates to @JohnGunuko asking for him to make it f2p. JohnGunuko didn't mention anything about the 'ps2 sub = ps1 sub', so unless smedley is just poor with his wording (which he often times is) then hopefully he is in fact referring to making it f2p, not just reiterating the first tweet.

Still hoping they decide on a free month for 10 year anniversary, or maybe longer because a decade is pretty big deal. Hopefully by the end of that time, should it end up happening, Smedley will have his solution.

Edit: Nevermind. Looking back at it, the second tweet does mention the PS2 sub for PS1 sub. That may have been what smedley was responding to, and not about the f2p.

[Figment]

Originally Posted by vieric

Hmm, it kinda looks like they plan to merge subs from this...not the best idea in my opinion but its still infinitely better then nothing. Besides, not enough concrete info at this point, so I suppose I would be wise not to get myself tied in a knot over it just yet.

At the very least they seem to get that people do indeed still want to play it now.

Think about it, if even a fraction of the people who play PS2 try PS1 now and then, you have a large populace on the PS1 server.

[vieric]

well, most people into PS1 aren't that keen on PS2....same goes for PS2 users not being too keen on PS1, by no means am I saying people who like both don't exist, they do...its just there aren't too many of them.

Even then PS2 is bleeding out pretty bad right now, which further compounds the issue.
So yes, I am slightly worried about this course of action, but as I said, infinitely better then nothing.

[basti]

Originally Posted by vieric

well, most people into PS1 aren't that keen on PS2....same goes for PS2 users not being too keen on PS1, by no means am I saying people who like both don't exist, they do...its just there aren't too many of them.

Even then PS2 is bleeding out pretty bad right now, which further compounds the issue.
So yes, I am slightly worried about this course of action, but as I said, infinitely better then nothing.

Yea, no.

Most people who are keen of PS1 do like PS2. Most PS2 users have never played PS1, so they dont even know how terrible some aspects really were (ADADADADAD...), while others were so much better than in PS2 (I miss genholds :/ )

Ps2 isnt bleeding out. It clearly lost a lot of players since release, but thats normal for every MMO. First is the hype, then people play a lot less and a lot also stop completly for the next game. This applies especially strong for F2P games.

It will, however, pick up again, and eventually even beat the player numbers of the initial release hype, at some point. If you check the player statistics, you will see that it stabilized a while ago, and is now slowly growing. Stuff like MGL will propably boost the growth quite a bit.



Figment: if a fraction of PS2 players would play PS1 every now and then, then we would indeed get at least a poplock during prime time for EU and US. But the number in question is not players, but subscribers. Obviously there are less players than subscribers, but no idea how much less.


In any way, PS2 subbers getting PS1 for free as an extra is the best possible thing that could happen for PS1. F2P was never an option. Remember: Before PS2 announcmen, we actually pressed SOE to remove the free trial. Yes, that happend. The reason was the cheater problem that plagued us. Reality simply is: No matter what SOE does, if the game is full of flying scatmaxes that cannot be killed but can instagib the entire continent, then nobody of us will even think about installing PS1.

[vieric]

I disagree on most people liking both, simply put the two games as they are now cater to very different audiences, and there is not a lot of overlap in between them. PS1 was a bit slower paced but rewarded tactics more, while PS2 tends to have people fighting head on (clever players can and do deviate from this, but at present there's not a reason to). Now PS2 is slowly changing (if it keeps moving in its current direction, for the better), but thats how things are for now. put simply unless you happen to like BOTH games enough to play them on a regular basis, the fees merging will have no real impact one way or the other.

As for the PS2 population, I am wondering what your source was precisely? (not that I don't believe you, I'm simply curious and would like a look myself.)

Given the hacking issue, I feel that simply lowering the sub without merging it with anything would be a far better course of action, that way there's a barrier of entry to potential hackers.

They could even go with a B2P type model of sorts in which you have a product key tied to your account, If you manage to get yourself banned you would need a new key to make a new account, which means you get to buy the game again.