PS2 Business Model

[NCLynx]

Originally Posted by 2coolforu

Reserves also brought the game back to life, with reserves I saw 2 poplocks and throughout the entire program I didn't see THAT many hackers, I mean it wasn't like one a day or anything as it would be in CoD, they were pretty few and far between.

I wasn't bashing it in anyway, I agree I never saw so many hackers that it made me want to kill myself. Maybe log off for that day but oh well. Some could be more annoying than others though, hah.

[Gandhi]

Worth mentioning that Higby said they have a team working on security this time around, and there'll be some as yet unannounced third party anti-hacking software used (Steam anyone? EQ is already using it).

[artifice]

The free to play business model is a bubble, a knee jerk reaction to the the dwindling pay to play marketshare. It won't last. There are dozens of typical free to play games coming out and all these pay to play games are moving in that direction. i can't imagine the market supporting this bloat in the long term.

The Guild Wars 2 business model of buy to play is where the market will move toward. It is the middle ground between these two extremes.

As for me, I refuse to play a game that is pay to win like pretty much all the free to play games. I also can't justify paying a monthly fee. I am willing to buy the game at retail price and I would even buy cosmetic items in the cash shop, but any hint of pay to win and I won't touch it with a ten foot pole.

[Volw]

My understanding is GW2 will be moving towards F2P as well. Even GW1 did to some extent with expansion packs. Something that's not really valid in an MMOFPS. I think core combat proved it well enough.

Theres no economical way to support a full scale MMO based on box sales only.

MMO development costs are typically $50m+ and that's not including marketing expenditure which is usually a lot. Could easily be another $50 mil.

In order for SOE to get only the development cash back, they'd need to sell at the very least over a million copies. Age of Conan, which was incredibly overhyped reached about that level.

Even if they sell a million, what about marketing expenditure and what about post-release support?

[artifice]

Originally Posted by Volw

My understanding is GW2 will be moving towards F2P as well. Even GW1 did to some extent with expansion packs. Something that's not really valid in an MMOFPS. I think core combat proved it well enough.

Guild Wars 2 is the same business model that Guild Wars always had. Revenue is generated from box sales, expansions, and cosmetic item shop.

Originally Posted by Volw

Theres no economical way to support a full scale MMO based on box sales only.

ArenaNet thinks they can.

[2coolforu]

Originally Posted by artifice

Guild Wars 2 is the same business model that Guild Wars always had. Revenue is generated from box sales, expansions, and cosmetic item shop.



ArenaNet thinks they can.

There's a reason Planetside has a monthly cost and EVE online has a huge monthly cost, its because dedi servers are expensive as hell. If you think you can run a server capable of hosting 100,000 FPS players for 6 years on box sales then you are deluded.

Having used small scale dedi's I can tell you the money has to come from somewhere

[CutterJohn]

Originally Posted by artifice

Guild Wars 2 is the same business model that Guild Wars always had. Revenue is generated from box sales, expansions, and cosmetic item shop.



ArenaNet thinks they can.

They also do an absolute ton of instancing. its a very server friendly game. PS.. Not so much. PS would definitely need either subs or solid item shop income to be viable.

[Volw]

Originally Posted by artifice

Guild Wars 2 is the same business model that Guild Wars always had. Revenue is generated from box sales, expansions, and cosmetic item shop.



ArenaNet thinks they can.

What exactly is the difference between having a cash shop and having a periodic expansion?

[artifice]

Originally Posted by 2coolforu

There's a reason Planetside has a monthly cost and EVE online has a huge monthly cost, its because dedi servers are expensive as hell. If you think you can run a server capable of hosting 100,000 FPS players for 6 years on box sales then you are deluded.

Having used small scale dedi's I can tell you the money has to come from somewhere

Except ArenaNet is doing just that. TRION openly admitted that most of the monthly fee does not go towards hosting costs when their beta testers pointed out Guild Wars 2, but towards "updating the game regularly for a better experience" as they put it.

The fact is, server and bandwidth prices have dropped dramatically over the years. In the 90s, Neverwinter Nights costed $6 dollars per hour to play.

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

They also do an absolute ton of instancing. its a very server friendly game. PS.. Not so much. PS would definitely need either subs or solid item shop income to be viable.

Guild Wars 2 is going to have as much instancing as World of Warcraft. Dungeons and housing only.

[Wakken]

I would personally like it to be like Arenanet does it. A payment for the game, and thats it unless you want to buy something as microtransactions. Maybe skins, effects etc. If they are going for microtrans however, do not give us stuff to buy that effect gameplay. No overpowered weapons or armor or something like that.

I showed my friend the Q&A video yesterday and that got him very interested. I axplained to him further what planetside 1 was all about and I hope SOE dont screw this one up.

However, being a student and all I think the Guildwars/ArenaNet system would appeal to me the most

[Volw]

Can we stop comparing a game that at the current stage has instance size smaller than non-MMO games with a game that is expected to support 1000 player battles please?

Once I see how many players per instance GW2 supports and what is exactly their business model I can change my mind. GW1 is a glorified server browser and it is not an MMO. (Nonetheless, I do love the game and can't wait for GW2!)

As for being a student - I was one a few years back - a pint of beer costs £3, subscription's usually less than £10. Is dozens of hours of gaming worth 3 pints? I think you have an answer there.

[Wakken]

Originally Posted by Volw

Once I see how many players per instance GW2 supports and what is exactly their business model I can change my mind. GW1 is a glorified server browser and it is not an MMO. (Nonetheless, I do love the game and can't wait for GW2!)

I thought it was confirmed that GW2 wont have any instances? Atleast not for every zone like gw1 had. (open world and citys etc)

And does it really matter anyways? We're talking about the business model and what people prefer/want in PS2?

[krnasaur]

I would be the guy to buy all of the vanity stuff for the game.


and when looking at game communities, P2P is way above F2P

[artifice]

Originally Posted by Volw

Can we stop comparing a game that at the current stage has instance size smaller than non-MMO games with a game that is expected to support 1000 player battles please?

Once I see how many players per instance GW2 supports and what is exactly their business model I can change my mind. GW1 is a glorified server browser and it is not an MMO. (Nonetheless, I do love the game and can't wait for GW2!)

As for being a student - I was one a few years back - a pint of beer costs £3, subscription's usually less than £10. Is dozens of hours of gaming worth 3 pints? I think you have an answer there.

I think you are confusing instances and zones again.

I hope you realize that SOE goals for PlanetSide 2 is a 1000 players per continent as they stated in the Q&A session.

Guild Wars 2 persistent World vs World PVP will have several hundred on each of the three server teams. Some of their dynamic events scale up to a 100 people and that is just one of many dynamic events in a single area.

[Gandhi]

If I had to choose I'd go for a subscription model set at $10 a month. Planetside is unique, there's really no other MMO like it and for that reason I think it can still do well with a pay to play model.

F2P would obviously bring in more players, but that doesn't necessarily mean more profit and it definitely doesn't mean a better community. I'd also be dead set against a cash shop that offers anything beyond cosmetic items, and I think that's a feeling shared by a lot of people considering the ruckus EVE's cash shop caused when it wasn't made clear that it would be vanity items only.