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How do you guys like this idea for new Subscription Model?
Myrdynn
Member RarePosts: 2,479
I posted this in a TESO thread but was curios to what others thought in the general area
you know, someone needs to come up with a new sub model.
History lessons of MMORPGS show that games once started as pay by the HOUR. I believe Shadows of Yserbius was something like $3 an hour, which would be ridiculous now, but back then we also used to run from store to store getting aol.com hours.
A Subscription model following something like this would be great
$4.99- 50 hrs monthly (12 hrs a week approx) intended for the casual, fulltime student/worker/family person
$9.99- 120 hrs monthly (30 hrs a week approx) for some with a little more time on their hands, you get more then double the previous scale
14.99- Unlimited hours.
seems like this would be a pretty popular idea imo. Every subscriber is automatically charged 4.99 a month, and when you hit 48 hrs it notifies you you're monthly time is about to run out, click yes to automatically goto the next level, hit 120 hrs bam same thing
Its a win for gaming companies, cause I would keep a 4.99 sub to 3 different games if this was an option and I wouldnt feel like I have to log in
This is not intended to be a B2P vs F2P vs P2P thread
Comments
Sure, why not. That's more or less how the Asians do it I believe and it seems to work for them.
For me it wouldn't change anything since I only ever play 1 MMO at a time and I don't want my playing time to be limited so I'd go for the 15 dollar option. For casual players or multi-mmo players however I could see this being very attractive.
Exactly this. I can afford $15 a month, but no one's giving me a great reason why I should pay it. The myth about high server costs was already debunked. Companies can't justify the forced cash extraction.
The really awful ones are ones like EQ2 where if you stop paying, you go F2P with access to only some of your characters.
To answer your question though, I don't like the idea. Paying $5 less for a limited amount of time is even more corrupt and unfair.
I'd rather pay a by the hour/day with a cap at $15 than pre buying an amount of time. Like most people I have no issue with paying for a game. It's not the money, it's what you're getting.
PAying $15 a month then being asked to pay $40-60 for an expack seems unfair to me. Wasn't my $15 for new content ? I mean that is what people always say when they list reasons why p2p games are better...you get regular content. Why do you have to pay twice then ? Free to play often charge for new content but, you'r eonly paying once.
I'm not a huge fan of being locked out if you don't want to pay for a month because you only have a limited time for whatever reason. You may lose some perks in a f2p game if you stop paying but you can still log in and goof off.
I think paying per hr/day with the cap would work for a lot of people. You play less you pay less. But it really comes down to what you're paying for.
offtopic but thats been changed - now have access to all your characters w no sub
EQ2 fan sites
You are only looking at this from the poor customer point of view. The business needs to make money month after month and what you offer is peanuts.
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Online Games started as pay per MINUTE. This was why the shift to subscription was seen as a good thing.
Today they still sell timecards for games in Asia, as subscriptions are illegal (due to AOL style scams). This is the income source for most free to play (and pay to play) games in Asia
I, personally, would appreciate the return of the use of timecards in the west. This would help make games feel more 'fair' to players who have both a little, and a lot of time to play.
The most I would pay for retail if subscription was included is $30 and $5 subscription, with a possibility of $30 expansions and absolutely no MT. Any increase to any other cost would have to exclude subscription or retail.
I would rather pay $60 retail and $60 more every year for expansions and not have any other costs. MT would be OK if it was done respectfully. And subs around $10 a month would be OK if there were no other costs ever, even with AAA gameplay and quality expansions. That's $120 a year...
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