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New rumor on F2P

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  • Eir_SEir_S Member UncommonPosts: 4,440

    I always said this game wasn't good enough not to be F2P in a year.

  • ZylaxxZylaxx Member Posts: 2,574

    Quote: Originally Posted by xXBlademasterXx View Post

    I have been hearing a lot of rumors about SWTOR going free 2 play.

    Rumor - A currently circulating story or report of uncertain or doubtful truth.

    Don't put stock in rumors. Games with far far smaller populations have continued to be pay-to-play for years.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    LOL.  But those games didnt cost $500 million to make either.  I say put the game out of its misery already, its been a tortanic struggle to keep subs.

    Everything you need to know about Elder Scrolls Online

    Playing: GW2
    Waiting on: TESO
    Next Flop: Planetside 2
    Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.

    image

  • noncleynoncley Member UncommonPosts: 718
    Originally posted by JYCowboy
    Originally posted by knighthammer

    Its not going free to play, i overheard a phone call, full transcript

     

     

    [Erickson answers the phone after comandeering a work desk]


    Erickson: [sounding official] Uh, everything's under control. Situation normal.

    Voice: What happened?

    Erickson: [getting nervous] Uh, we had a slight sub malfunction, but uh... everything's perfectly all right now. We're fine. We're all fine here now, thank you. How are you?

    Voice: We're sending a squad up.

    Erickson: Uh, uh... negative, negative. We have a mad ex employee here now. Give us a few minutes to lock him down. Large bloke, very dangerous.

    Voice: Who is this? What's your operating number?

    Erickson: Uh...
    [Erickson shoots the phone]
    Erickson: [muttering] Boring conversation, anyway.

    Don't try to make Erickson out as a hero.  Han might have shot him ... in the old days.

     

    Yes, Erickson's no hero.

    Erickson: "1,8 million? !.2 million? You're far too trusting, princess. You maye proceed  with the operation.

    [CUT SCENE]

    Luke: 'What is it, master?'

    Ben: 'I felt a great disturbance in the force, as if two hundred thousand subscribers tops cried out and then suddenly were still'.

  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    Originally posted by gervaise1

    Whether the post is by a Bioware person or not it is clear, from what Bioware has previoulsy posted, that f2p will have been / is being considered as an option. Does this mean the game will be going f2p? No. EA will have considered a whole range of options: increasing the monthly sub; decreasing the monthly sub; paid for DLC; reducing the number of servers to 1; closing the game and paying LA whatever they have to; porting the game to mobile phones; annual lsubscriptions; lifetime subscriptions ..... anything and everything will be on the table whether the game is making money or not.

    Doesn't mean anything will happen.

    The way the post is written? Well if it is from a Bioware employee then this may well be deliberate.

    The legacy system is hard so that it can be made an cash shop item - well that was obvious. Pretty sure it was discussed here; was certainly discussed on the VN forums.

    The fact remains however that f2p - to work - requires people; and not just anybody but people who spend money. EA will have their own data but to put things in perspective the data Zynga have released can be used:

    - last quarter Zynga reported that average revenue doubled to an average of 33 cents for the quarter

    - previoulsy Zynga have said that most revenue comes from 5% of the playerbase - the other 95% paying nothing.

    EA said SWTOR needed 500k monthly subs to break even - say $7.5M/30 days or about $23M/quarter. (Sure it is less now.)

    Using the Zynga numbers - and this is just to put things into perspective (a bit if fun):

    - SWTOR will need 69M "subs" per quarter each paying an average of 33 cents to break even.

    69 million!

    Or if they only have 500k subs they need to be about 140 times better than Zynga at generating revenue via micro-transactions. Every month. And deal with the inbuilt churn that f2p games have.

    EA will have done these type of calcs - they will have used their own data and a whole range of sub numbers, average revenue numbers, bronze/silver/gold type sub memberships. And got some scary answers I suspect - probably why nothing has happened so far - or rather why the focus is on getting the number of subs needed to break even down. If they get it to 200k or whatever then f2p will probably never arrive.  

     

     

    I am going to repeat my earlier post with the attached link about Zynga's recent profits: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/174638/Zynga_stocks_nosedive_after_a_disappointing_quarter.php

    Free to play is no guarantee of making money - hence the reason some old games remain p2p. Get a dedicated following who will stick with something regardless even if updates don't exist. As long as developers talk about 'great plans' that they would 'love to tell folk about but ...'.

  • TeknoBugTeknoBug Member UncommonPosts: 2,156


    Originally posted by uohaloran
    My fondest memory of something like this happening is about a week before the NGE hit SWG (which was absolutely and literally a bomb on the userbase -- no inclination or hints at what it was) a guy came to the forums spelling out exactly what the new patch with Trials of Obi-wan would be and everyone laughed at him and told him how stupid he was.  His post was even locked.

    I still smile at the thought of how he was graciously warning us a week ahead of time what would really happen in very convincing detail.  Makes you wonder who it really was, too.


    I remember that very well, we were like "lol jedi a starting profession", a week before that particular post, John Smedly even said "the CU is here to stay", oh my god how I so hate SOE for that type of shit now.


    Actually the person that posted that was an "internal" tester of that NGE version of SWG at the time.

    image
    image

  • IcewhiteIcewhite Member Posts: 6,403
    Originally posted by gervaise1
    As long as developers talk about 'great plans' that they would 'love to tell folk about but ...'.

    As long as NDA's exist, companies will always gag-order their developers. :shrug:

    In the end, it does more good than harm to keep this sort of ammunition out of the hands of Prophets of Doom.

    Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.

  • KyngBillsKyngBills Member UncommonPosts: 452
    Originally posted by sookster54

     


    Originally posted by uohaloran
    My fondest memory of something like this happening is about a week before the NGE hit SWG (which was absolutely and literally a bomb on the userbase -- no inclination or hints at what it was) a guy came to the forums spelling out exactly what the new patch with Trials of Obi-wan would be and everyone laughed at him and told him how stupid he was.  His post was even locked.

     

    I still smile at the thought of how he was graciously warning us a week ahead of time what would really happen in very convincing detail.  Makes you wonder who it really was, too.


    I remember that very well, we were like "lol jedi a starting profession", a week before that particular post, John Smedly even said "the CU is here to stay", oh my god how I so hate SOE for that type of shit now.

     


    Actually the person that posted that was an "internal" tester of that NGE version of SWG at the time.

    I remember that exact thread as well...It's threads like that over the years that caution me whenever someone comes on and says they have inside info...Because sometimes they do...The Legacy System on SWTOR was leaked WAY early...Sometimes Folks do know, and they do tell...I laugh at the instant doubters more than I do the "leakers" now...

     

    I absolutely LOVED the CU and was heartbroken when the NGE announcement came...I've always said had they just stuck with the CU, added the Instances, etc...The Game would have done just fine...Not WOW fine mind you...But definitely 100 times better than what the NGE did...And for the record we had almost exactly two weeks notice for the NGE...image

  • ignore_meignore_me Member, Newbie CommonPosts: 1,987
    Originally posted by Icewhite
    Originally posted by gervaise1
    As long as developers talk about 'great plans' that they would 'love to tell folk about but ...'.

    As long as NDA's exist, companies will always gag-order their developers. :shrug:

    In the end, it does more good than harm to keep this sort of ammunition out of the hands of Prophets of Doom.

    I don't agree. Being secretive and perceived as out of touch with your playerbase is cancer. The company providing X game is already seen as somewhat of a black box, given fertile ground the playing public will assume the worst. Better to be a good communicator and leader with your customers.

    Survivor of the great MMORPG Famine of 2011

  • SleepyfishSleepyfish Member Posts: 363
    Originally posted by Deewe

    Enjoy ;)

     

     

    Old Today , 06:03 PM | #1



      EA blames us and to some extent they're right to. but it was fan feedback from the day we opened the forums that encouraged us to design it for the fans the way it is and that included making it more like Kotor then an MMO like Wow.

    Heh Deewe, if you really work for EA. That is BS, I was on the forums before and during Beta and none of the feedback except for rabid bioware fanbois had anything to do with the game being a clone of TOR or WOW, which in the end it was an abonination of both. Another static gear grind. Poeple that dissagreed with you on those forums were quickly forum banned or had their posts erased by Donna Prior who now thank god is in the Siberia of the gaming world SOE. There were numerous topics regarding gear, making progression compatible with a more organic crafting system, a more story driven non two faction based system, and no one wanted mailboxes and 50 foot raid bosses and battlegrouds.. right. Space travel, crafting and exploration posts were basically axed as well as anything raiding guilds from EQ ( Ensidia)  didn't like. You basically let Lethality and Skywauker run rampant on the official boards in a fanboi rage( whom I have enjoyed destroying on the GW2 forums btw) and you paid the price for it. Just do me a favor when you are in the unemployment line, look for a job at WOW, or EQ, or any other game company, stay 100 miles from Anet at all times because the last thing I want is ANY future input from you #$#$ers.

  • DeeweDeewe Member UncommonPosts: 1,980
    Originally posted by Sleepyfish
    Originally posted by Deewe

    Enjoy ;)

     

     

    Old Today , 06:03 PM | #1



      EA blames us and to some extent they're right to. but it was fan feedback from the day we opened the forums that encouraged us to design it for the fans the way it is and that included making it more like Kotor then an MMO like Wow.

    Heh Deewe, if you really work for EA. That is BS, I was on the forums before and during Beta and none of the feedback except for rabid bioware fanbois had anything to do with the game being a clone of TOR or WOW, which in the end it was an abonination of both. Another static gear grind. Poeple that dissagreed with you on those forums were quickly forum banned or had their posts erased by Donna Prior who now thank god is in the Siberia of the gaming world SOE. There were numerous topics regarding gear, making progression compatible with a more organic crafting system, a more story driven non two faction based system, and no one wanted mailboxes and 50 foot raid bosses and battlegrouds.. right. Space travel, crafting and exploration posts were basically axed as well as anything raiding guilds from EQ ( Ensidia)  didn't like. You basically let Lethality and Skywauker run rampant on the official boards in a fanboi rage( whom I have enjoyed destroying on the GW2 forums btw) and you paid the price for it. Just do me a favor when you are in the unemployment line, look for a job at WOW, or EQ, or any other game company, stay 100 miles from Anet at all times because the last thing I want is ANY future input from you #$#$ers.

    Wow take a break man ;)

     

    More seriously I'm not the author of the OP supposed leak, I just parsed it.

     

    Thing is I totally agree with you, on the forums and on the beta ones, people asked for more SW, more sandboxes elements and well certainly not more Wowish Kotor online. And well we all know the decision makers didn't listen, because they all know better than the players what is best for them.

    To more Wowish/Kotor is the specific part that debunked it for me.

  • GruugGruug Member RarePosts: 1,789

    I call "troll post" on this. This exact post was post here on mmorpg.com and SWTOR forums over a week ago. The whole lack of intellectual ability of the "quoted rumor" was so obviously a hoax that no one believes it. That is no one but those that wish to "hate" on another MMO not to their liking that is. Anyway, just another post to be ignored.

     

    Let's party like it is 1863!

  • Garvon3Garvon3 Member CommonPosts: 2,898
    Originally posted by ShakyMo
    Ea don't do f2p, daoc and uo still have a sub.

    Thats because those games are still making money and have a stable user base.

    Only failed MMOs bleeding subs go FTP.

     

    Of course SWTOR is going to go FTP. It's the perfect type of game for it, and they're bleeding money.

  • IncomparableIncomparable Member UncommonPosts: 1,138

    The thing that saddens me is that the devs listen to the 'fans' whoever they seem to be, without knowing to deliver on what some of these opinionated fans are saying and how to make an MMO for 2012 after a decade of people playing MMOs to live up to expectations of established norms of what is quality but to also make things interesting for the usual problems of never ending stories.

    The good of WoW is:

    the combat,

    animation,

    art style,

    rich lore in general and not necessarily from WoW alone,

    raiding,

    pvp is small and exists at first in the open world in shared quest areas

    thats what WoW has specifaclly for WoW then everything else WoW has that is good is from other MMOs and not really anything new or special such as U.I., lvling system, etc

     

    So if swtor was to be WoW and Kotor, then how does a tripple A MMO in 2012 expect to fall short on Kotor without Pazaak, or swoop racing to qualify as a tribute to kotor (but does have story with an alignment system despite not having much real alternativing paths in the plot even for long World Arcs, or story quests are linear except for a few isntances) and also in comparison to WoW does not have the standard quality of WoW with U.I. and 3rd party programs people are accustomed to for U.I. customization, pvp areas in questing areas, duel arenas, lfg tool, large BGs that it does not deliver on that as well.

    So even though these fans requested something I did not want completely since it leaves out player housing, and crafting to be more complex... (but honestly even WoWs crafting is more hands on and therefore more at the dangers of the enironment instead of a companion run system, or raid farming system mostly.) That despite this request leaves important thinns like open world pvp objectives, player housing and complex crafting... had the request that the BW devs thought they were delivering actually be delivered, then the game would have been a lot more sucessful... so the fans made a very reasonable and safe request that even I would enjoy since I like to gamble, love to drive fast, and like to pvp.

    So swtor devs did not deliver on what they said they recognized as the fans request for swtor.  Only if... and, the sad thing is, BW was talking about the importance of a good luanch, and now are dealing with lay offs becuase they put too much in a certain kind of development which is not sustainable... the story was too ambitious it seems, and they needed more than EA to bank roll them but actuall donations to hire extra teams to add swoop racing, pazaak, 3d space combat, day/night cycles, more dynamic worlds with NPC movements, alliances with territories creating a sense of accomplisment from questing in the area that unlocks vendors in the areas for example things that adds more to the game other than the flat out standard. Which can also make open world pvp interesting by having freinds in new places to help. Could have aded a large BG, maybe even GW2 dynamic events but that is more of a hindsight approach to making MMOs more fun, which is not a standard for MMOs yet so swtor does not need that to do very well, but as the fans actually requested... had it been delivered on launch with lfg tool etc. then it would have been a lot better.

    So swtor does not need to go F2P... not yet, while it is strong, and has potential. Its going to have an expasnion, and if they release the expansion with only more lvls, 1 more small WZ, 1 more ops, then they might really have to consider going F2P since the development is too slow to include the KOTOR expectations, the WOW expectations and tripple A 2012 expectations... people wont see it as $15 worhty and its a shame... its a good game, but its not a WoW clone, and not a full KOTOR clone... only if, only if.

    “Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble”

  • AmbrosiaAmorAmbrosiaAmor Member Posts: 915
    Originally posted by ktanner3
    I'm Batman and this is my internet cover.

     

    So the WhistleBlower stated on the 19th:
    1. Game is going F2P.
    2. Adding the cash shop.
    3. New type of coinage to access Quests/Content/etc.
    4. The only thing not verified from him/her is if Danny and Jimmy are gone.
    So Mr. Batman... about this internet cover.

    image

  • Rommie10-284Rommie10-284 Member UncommonPosts: 265

    That's another "leak" that proved to be water gushing in.  And it's pulling EA itself down with the Tortanic - and I find it hard to believe they'll willingly go down with the ship.  More disaster-related footage is in the queue.

    500 worlds - yeah, and it'll cost you 2500 dollars to access them!  The former head cheese forgot that part of the deal.

    Avatars are people too

  • Einherjar_LCEinherjar_LC Member UncommonPosts: 1,055

    Is it still a troll conspiracy if it's true?

     

    Adjusts tinfoil hat...

    Einherjar_LC says: WTB the true successor to UO or Asheron's Call pst!

  • TealaTeala Member RarePosts: 7,627

    Not so much a rumor and it certainly wasn't BS.

  • DeeweDeewe Member UncommonPosts: 1,980
    Originally posted by Einherjar_LC

    Is it still a troll conspiracy if it's true?

     

    Adjusts tinfoil hat...

    I lol'ed ;)

     

    All things taken into account now what's interesting is:

    • Team has been seriously downsized
    • JO and DE (and more :( ) about to be let go
    • Legacy perks are as is to prevent most players to buy them before F2P
    • Cathar $10 bucks
    • New companions in cash shop
     
    BioWare execs still clueless the game doesn't need to be more Kotor like.
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