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F2P ... Tell me whats wrong with it...
darkhalf357x
Member UncommonPosts: 1,237
...because I'm not seeing it. Open to all arguments but please try to stay logical and back them up.
Looking to see if this is more a personal choice (opinion) or actually a bonafide benefit (or constraint) to the player.
Whats your view?
Go!
Comments
Probably just perception.
F2P seems to create an atmosphere where it pits the devs against the players. Devs will nickel and dime certain game features that would normally be included in a P2P game thus making the player feel like they are fighting the devs for every piece of content and feature.
Mind you, P2P can be seen as the same. I'm only suggesting F2P creates a stronger perception of this.
Or people just don't like a la carte and want all the sides together. Combined stuff tends to be cheaper (assuming buying the same amount of stuff) than a la carte in other markets so again there's a perception that F2P isn't exactly consumer friendly.
F2P iz phail bcuz someone I follow on youtube said its phail and tehn my guild leeder sed teh F2P gam wuz phail to bcuz it phailed and had 2 go F2P.
On another note:
I personally don't see anything wrong with the model. Lets me get a sample of the games and decide if I want to be a premium subscriber.
F2p = hackers
The real problem seems to be either failing mmos trying to save themselves with a quick fix cash garb before the end. Those games that offer nothing new and never add anything but items for their cash shops.
These games are bad examples of what f2p should be but often get used as the reason why f2p is bad.
The other reason is people not understand the diference between pay to win and pay for convinience. p2w is bad in most cases but it means you're buying something that gives you an actual advantage over other players that a non paying player can never earn. more health more mana doing more damage ect are examples.
Pay for convenince are items like mounts/xp boosts ect that let you earn things faster. These short term advantages can all be over come by time so they don't really give anyone an advantage a non paying player can't get to. He just can't get them as fast.
A free to play game that can provide customers with convenience or cosmetic items and still offer new content, bug fixes ect without falling prey to the easy money of pay to win, has nothing wrong with it. Those games are few and far between however.
STO, LOTR are to that have proven themselves somewhat. TERA is on the right track but it's too early to say if it will work out for them.
Because, the developers deliberately build a road filled with potholes and then sell you bags of rubble to fill in the holes.
I would rather the developers would develop the best game they can in terms of gameplay and then charge me a set fee to play it. That way if they want to succeed they are concentrating on improving the gameplay experience rather than producing a gimped version they can monetize.
When looking at a business model, just be careful to think carefully about what it is you are actually paying the developers to develop. Are you buying a game or is the game just the bait?
Why do you play games?
I play games as a pastime. That is to pass the time. So a model which encourages the developers to feed me content that takes time to do is fine by me.
The problem I have with F2P is that it is not, in fact, free to play but free to pay.
There are games out there with a subscription model that can be free to play, like Everquest and Everquest II. SOEs current system is called "Krono"s. How it works is that if you use one on a character the account gets 30 days of play time. But these are in game items and freely tradeable. So earn some plat (about 600 plat at the moment I believe) and buy one from another player and your game is free. I know people with 6 or more accounts that have been doing this (and the previous system of buying game card codes for plat) and have not paid a subscription for the last couple of years. Now that is free to play.
Had no problem with TERA before it went F2P, paid my sub and everything was smooth (at least for me) but now I have hard times to connect, lag kills my characters (when it takes 2 seconds for my warrior to evade attacks it makes the dynamic combat impossible, died many times because of this) but the worst: since F2P I always get launcher errors (right now "Error: 02112:0000 JSON parse error;") and when I finally manage to get into the game, chat is full of racism, porn etc. no moderators whatsoever...Sad really because it's a great game but F2P is hurting the experience...
I can see they take money from the cash shop and barely pay any game moderators, or get more stable servers...if it wasn't for TERA's universe (I'm a big fan) I'd have moved on, long time ago...it's worst in Europe (Gameforge should disappear from the face of the Earth)
But don't get me wrong. I love F2P's, huge Vindictus fan, enjoy C9, loved the Neverwinter beta and looking forward to it, but in the end if I had the option to choose, I'd prefer a sub that provides a more stable / complete experience. Just like I paid 1 year of Rift and never get any problems with it.
F2P doesn't bind you to the game. While P2P and MAAAAYBE B2P mmorpgs which always have some microtransactions bind you more to the game and to the world.
I've also felt really involved into the game and a familiar community with subscription based games. I guess its more for hardcore playertypes because you'd invest much more time if you pay 15$ every month.
For reference: in the summer of 2011 I splurged out enough money to get WoW up to Cata and for one month of sub (around 100+$), I never subbed more than a month and actually played only 3 weeks. I've been playing World of Tanks for roughly 3 years (since CBT)... completely for free... you tell me where the advantage is.
F2P offers choice, true some are crap but you can try them for free and decide if you want to invest.
P2P offers the illusion of quality, don't get me wrong it could be there but who are we really kidding? P2P is a treadmill game these days where devs try to get you to play more time so you pay more and if you don't play you waste money whereas in a equal quality F2P title you can play however/whenever you want.
The only game in my entire gaming experience which has ever earned the right to be Pay to Play is EVE Online and that game is truly a beast to behold... everything else...every other cookie cutter themepark... or gimmicky themepark MMO that tried P2P can go jump in a river, the age of Everquest is dead, a few worthy embers will remain but the tide is going towards F2P and consumer choice, it will be a more darwinistic world but in the end it is for the best, who can't swim will sink.
I never bought that social darwinism nonsense, nor free market philosphy. Markets are not free the existence of "insider trading" and advertising demonstrates this. As for social darwinism I suggest you read Pyotr Kropotkin's critique of Darwinism "Mutual Aid", there are a number of free e-book versions out there.
As for treadmills, go down to your local gym and see how many people are happy to use them. Nothing wrong with a treadmill, it is all in how you think and feel about it.
Finally I tried EVE online, as did my son, we lasted a couple of months and despite finding a friendly corportation to help us along the way we both found it about as exciting as watching the boards on the verandah warp in the sun while drinking beer at a Hotel in Dubbo. At least the beer was cold.
Really dont like Free to play conversions, or MMOs that started off as monthly fee then went Free to play when everyone left.
Seems that most of these type of Free to play MMOs keep the monthly fee and add an unlimited free trial. Meaning that you can only play the full game if you pay $15 a month. I will not play ANY Free to play MMO that locks away most of the races and classes behind a monthly fee.
If your MMO was worth $15 a month in the first place you wouldnt have had to go "Free to play".
So aside from an opinion (darwinism works in terms of games, oh sure you can shit the bed a few times but do it enough times and you get SWTOR which you can say anything you want about it it underpreformed massively and was pretty much the turning point in the industry as a whole, thank christ SoE sort of learned their lesson with SWG and haven't tried to WoW-up any of their other MMOs), a bad attempt at humor and... another opinion, you've got nothing?
I will say this much: EVE-Online right now isn't as crazy as when I first started playing it (2005) but if you want a tip of where things get wild in it: Wormholes, it's basically like the wild west.
As for a treadmil... well I do push up and jog, healthier tbh, more interesting and you can run into people you know during the jog, that said I much prefer my MMOs to at least have something to them... not just a craptastic gear grind.
The system is too open to abuse by the developer, infact the system changes by game. At least with p2p all subscribers are equal and know thats all they ever need to pay.
F2P has open ended payment options and requires a few to subsidise the many.
I am happy F2P is now being snubbed by people like Mark Jacobs.
However F2P combined with a hybrid model can work.
This. Plus nothing in life is free. Rather than charging a fair price, F2P games use deception and trickery to prod you to keep reaching for your wallet. All F2P games that I know of offer character advancement for a fee (xp potions). Meaning all F2P games are P2W. I will not ever download a F2P game.
Luckily, i don't need you to like me to enjoy video games. -nariusseldon.
In F2P I think it's more a case of the game's trying to play the player's. -laserit
Any system is open to abuse, what's there stopping a P2P dev from making P2W items? the fact you pay a monthly sub? really? People need to drop the shallow and one sided views already, F2P is the future because it is open, if you want a closed system where everything is controlled including how much time you're allowed to play (no more than what you paid for) then be my guest but I'd rather have the freedom of choice over the illusion of control.
What if I told you focusing on creating a good game cost money?
Path of Exile is the only F2P game with an excellent cash shop.. No item boost, No exp Boost .. only cosmetics and extra slots for chars and items
I prefer to pay the same amount of money as any other player and get access to the same content, no more and no less. So I prefer sub games.
Or I would prefer them if devs would just allow solo players to be on an equal footing with groupers. Since they never do I'm fine with free to play because I refuse to ever pay again to be a second class citizen.
But if a game ever does release that allows me to solo start to finish and at end game without punishing me through lack of access to gear for things like PvP and without forcing me to face premades I hope it is a sub game so that I don't have to worry about fighting against another player's fat wallet.
I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.
~Albert Einstein
Free 2 Play blurs the distinction between achievers and purchasers.
I have a cool mount in Runes of Magic.
Did I do some long quest chain? No.
Did my character slay some mega-boss? No.
Did I grind reputation for hours? No.
How did I get it? Credit card.
See the blur? Am I an achiever for having my mount?
Something that can easily be applied to subscription based games as well BTW.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Odd, and here I thought I saw a TON of people with those wonderful pay only mounts in WoW...same with those pets...and the pets from the Blizzcon...btw, those examples are not "achievers" those examples are epeeners who require being able to brag about an item instead of bragging about FUN PLAYING THE GAME!
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson