50 little pennies for ~20 hours of playtime a day justifies it enough for me
Free MMOs are still good, I sometimes take a break from AoC and DAoC to play Atlantica Online, Requiem, and some single player games, but my bread and butter will always be p2p MMORPGs.
I happily pay monthly fees because I want an evolving game. Actually, I coughed up $199 for the LoTRO Lifetime deal but I'd been paying monthly fees on other games for years before LOTRO. I pay because I want a world that is ever changing. A game that has NO END in sight. I suppose I could play free games but I want new content added every 2 or 3 months and the P2P games are better at that. And I want breathtaking graphics and rich ambient sounds and the F2P just don't cut it- for me anyways! And $15 a month is nothing! It gives me @ 100 hours of enjoyment a month. I pay $60 a month to use my cell phone for 10 minutes per month LOL! I pay $60 a month for Direct TV to watch 3 TV shows a week- so 10 hours of fun a month for $60!!
Lori
last time I checked, games have a max level and a finite amount of content. Which when you complete, you have the choice to do over with a new character or wait for new content to release, which for most gamers is several months after they completed the last bit of content.
I canceled my Direct TV when I realized I only watched it for 1 show per week. Instead, I now have Netflix and watch that show the next day on the internet. Total cost? 15 dollars and I get to watch movies of my choosing and many more than I'd of ever watched on TV.
An ever changing world and yes f2p games offer quests, Co-op and pvp, but most of the time on a much smaller scale. When I played FFXI I had no problem paying $12 a month because I enjoyed the game and it was well worth it. The graphics were good, the armor and weapons looked cool, and the end game was fun.
I always feel I'm paying for a persistent immersive world. Which you literally can't get in any other genre.
It would be nice if we didn't have to pay for it. And I agree with how some people have said it's something we've just learned to accept. But server up-keep IS indeed expensive.
I think we should pay the amount it costs to keep the severs up and no more. The profit should come from the game sale itself.
Not only do we pay monthly in MMOs but we're also paying for expansions every 1 to 2 years. You can end up spending hundreds on one game quite easily. But maybe when you're hooked on just one game it is cheaper than getting through 1 a month.
MMOs played (In order of how much I've liked them): Star Wars Galaxies, World of Warcraft, Vanguard, City of Villains / Heroes, Guild Wars, Warhammer Online, Age of Conan, Tabula Rasa, Anarchy Online, Ryzom, Final Fantasy XI, Matrix Online, RF Online, Rappelz, Hero Online, Roma Victor
I've only read part of the thread, so I apologize if I've repeated things said before.
You've already said the economic arguments (i.e. pay what the market bears, it's cheaper than other entertainment) is not the focus of your post, but rather it seems you're asking why people pay a monthly fee for a product that delivers what other software gives players in better quality and/or at a cheaper price. In essence, and please correct me if I'm wrong, you're arguing we seem to only pay for MMOs because they're a drug, and not a good one at that.
First off, I will say that I think a number of MMO players - particularly some of the vocal ones on these forums - would be better suited towards playing a game of Dungeons & Dragons (the one that uses imagination, not the MMO). I don't think this minor subset is important for the overall question of why most people play WoW or EQ or LoTR or CoX or most any other game on the market.
For me, and I'm certain for many others, it mainly comes down to playing a video game while surrounded by like-minded people in the chat room. I don't roleplay. I don't care much about the world lore. I don't feel the need to be #1 in the world and worshipped by peons on messageboards. I guess I'd liken it to sitting at a coffee shop by yourself yet being surrounded by conversations. Very few, if any, non-MMOs give you the experience of simply wandering the gameworld, joining a random group (yes a lot of us still enjoy PuGs), chat with them for a bit, split up and keep going on our merry way and all while listening to and participating in a number of other conversations in the world and in your guild.
Yes, a chat program can let you talk to people for free. And it's more likely you'd talk to people you're actually friends with and will have a beer with at the local pub (sorry guildies, but at the end of the day you're just shmoes I share an interest with). But, it's much more intuitive when chat is engrained in your game. It's not exactly easy to chat with your gaming buddies over MSN when trying to play Fallout 3 as opposed to WoW (and as I've learnt you better not be trying to play games when your significant other wants to talk on MSN unless you enjoy getting trounced)
Basically, it's the environment that keeps me coming back. The individual Kill X quests aren't exactly appealing and more than once I've stopped an MMO cold turkey simply because I couldn't handle the quests, but MMOs are improving in content, they're improving in telling a story and they're improving in making the community more seamless (unless you're Darkfall...). Oh, and instanced dungeons are great - my favourite way to meet new people in game is to join a PuG and run an instance. Great way to meet people.
As for whether it's worth $15 for that? I realize you may not care much for the economics, but they're relevant. MMOs entertains me enough to the point where I buy fewer games during the year, probably to the point where I spend less on entertainment now than I did pre-MMO.
MMO's have much lengthier and larger post preduction than single player games. Not many genres continually work on the product for years and years and years to add new content, bug fixes, and events. Hmmm are you sure about this? I'm not saying you are wrong as I dont really know myself. Its just that I'm pretty sure that companies spend many years working on a number of single player games. Hasnt Diablo 3 been in production for ages now? I'm sure I remember hearing about that years ago. I know it got announced last year some time but it was in production a long time before that. The thing is once a single player game is released the companies still work on fixing bugs and releasing updates for these games in the same way that they do for mmos. However they dont charge the players a monthly fee to do the work. Other factors to consider is a MMO is in a 24/7 persistent world with constant progression on multiple levels. These worlds require servers to be running 24/7 obviously and they require an active customer service team in game and out of game. Yeah this is true but does all of this cost £10 per player per month? Thats a hell of a lot of money. An example would be 500,000 subscribers x £10 monthly subscription fee = £5 million per month. Does it cost £5 million to keep a bunch of servers running and pay peoples wages to finish making a computer game each month? It seems rather over the top when a single player game can take a whole team working on it for several years and yet it gets sold for a one off fee of maybe £30. Thats make getting people to buy the same game every 3 months. (My maths is terrible and I may well have misplaced a zero somewhere in which case I will gladly impale myself on a sharp sword for my sins) Additionally MMO's typically offer multiple modes of play for various playstyles. There is PVE, PVP, Crafting, Exploring, Housing, Social, Politics, and mini-game aspects in most mmos. Plus all these modes of play are possible on the progression of a single character in a single persistent world. Ok..... PvE......you can do that in a single player game (obviously). PvE is meant for single player games as there are no people to play the game with. Offline single player games dont charge a monthly fee (cos they cant obviously). Neither should online single player games (ie most mmos). PvP......you can do that in a single player game. Many of them come with a multiplayer option. No extra money is charged for this and the PvP offerings that come with many single player games surpasses the quality of mmo offerings. Crafting......you can do that in a single player game. In fact you can do that in any game that has it implemented as it is nothing more than clicking a few buttons to make an item appear in your inventory. Its no different to just picking something up. Crafting is not an exclusive feature to online gaming and cannot be used as a reason to charge a monthly fee. Exploring......again what has this got to do with an mmo? You can explore a single player game. Are you saying that a company can class "moving around" as a reason to charge more money? You can lump "exploring" in with "PvE".......I think you're just trying to stretch it out a bit. Housing......I had my own house in Fallout 3. I didnt get charged a monthly fee for the privelege. People have their own houses in the Sims too. I'm sure there are plenty of player houses in other games too. Whats the big deal about player housing anyway? Why do mmo players get so worked up about this? You buy a house or rent a room, decorate it, then you buy a game and rent the use of it each month and then in the game you buy a house and rent the use of it, decorate it....then what? Do you buy another game within the game and sit your avatar in the in-game house you just bought while sitting in your house you bought and are currently renting.......mirrors within mirrors within mirrors.......when do you get to the point when realisation dawns and you think "WTF am I doing?!!!". Minigames......many single player games commonly come with multiplayer mini games. They dont charge you extra for it. Battlefield 2142, Quake Wars and CoD4 have lots of large multiplayer maps in them but they dont charge a monthly fee. They also have teams working on them adding new maps, fixing gameplay balance issues and doing general tweaking. This only leaves the social and political aspects. Socialising is not a feature. Its a side effect of playing an online game with other people that has a chat room included.....so we can scratch that one off the list. Politics is also a non-entity in most mmos simply because the gameworlds are static and unchangeable. Nothing a player does in an mmo (except for a few maybe) can actually have ANY effect on the game world......so how can you have politics in an environment that cannot be altered? Instead what you actually have is a load of people in a chat room which has can attached to a game world which is frozen in time. All people can do is talk but they cant actually do anything. People and guilds can earn points and then compare their scores with each other.....but thats about it. Players in mmos dont have any tools to create or enforce any kind of policies at all. All they can do is grind levels and farm phat loot. So we can scratch politics off the list as well. So ultimately there is no feature in an mmo which warrants a monthly fee. Those are my reasons to justify the monthly fee. Now I can't exactly justify the reasoning behind 15$ a month exactly, but it is just the industry standard. What I don't get is why doesn't a company come in and try to be more competitive with their pricing and say undercut that 15$ with 10$ or something along those lines. ....and I've just pointed out why those reasons arent valid......but yes roughly £10 is the industry standard. It is the inustry standard to charge people money for no reason simply because people are willing to pay it. Its a typical example of herd mentality and when "the masses" speak there is no stopping them. Logic and reason get brushed aside because "the masses" say "well.....thats just the way it is". People do it because other people do it. You dont get why other companies dont undercut the high prices of others? Well some of them do. Guildwars charges no fees at all and there are others which are F2P too. However games companies know that many people simply dont see the monthly fee as a large amount so why would they choose the cheaper option if they can get away with receiving lots of free money? I certainly wouldnt turn it down! They know there are millions of suckers waiting to hand them their cash for the privelege of playtesting their games and they are happy to take it. Some people would call it conning the public and others would call it good business.
*WARNING!!! This thread will require you to read everything and engage in deep thought and conversation. If you cannot do this, then you're wasting your time* To avoid responses concerning my experience in the genre, I've been playing any and all MMO's since 2001. So down to the topic at hand. What makes MMORPG's worth $15/mo when no other genre charges that amount? * It's not the quests, because single player games offer much more complex quests. Some games even offer the players the ability to change the game world with their decisions. * It's not the group play, because there are numerous examples of single player games allowing a Co-op mode for their games. * It's not the PvP, because there are numerous single player games offering the ability to PvP against others in a multiplayer mode. * It can't be the chat, since anyone can IM others or join chat rooms for free. What is it exactly about MMORPG's that hasn't been done for free, that makes it worth your money. Really think about this. Many people admit to doing large grinds whose only goal is to keep you subscribing. In my opinion, it's illogical to pay extra money to get the same gameplay you can get for free. If you have a logical reason why MMO's should charge a subscription, please reply with it. But before you do, ask yourself if that reason has been given for free elsewhere. In my opinion, the only distinguishing feature is that MMO's allow you to be a hamster. "Give me $15 and I'll let you jog on this treadmill for 30 days," says the MMO company. Keep in mind that while quality may justify a product having more value than something of lesser quality, a game mechanic of good quality alone doesn't justify a subsciption if someone else offers it for free.
What about the IP? What about the combination of everything you listed on there? It's also the fact that MMOs offer a "world" that is never offline ( besides updates, crashes, etc) in which the player can just jump in. No single player game can offer that. It basically means, if you want to play the game, you HAVE to play online; single players give you a choice. Most MMO worlds are also seemingly large compared to multiplayer modes of single player games where it's usually based on "joining a server" or a "room" or something along those lines. Note that I said seemingly, because most MMOs are basically an illusion of large worlds, even though most of the action takes places in intances (not all games though mind you), and player hubs are just large chat rooms basically. But we live in a world of illusions and people are happier when things seem "tied together" when they're actually not.
You've basically reinforced my point, possibly without meaning to. Logically, there is no reason to subscribe to a game based off the factors you provided, because it doesn't matter if the game is offline or online when you're not playing it. It only matters that the game is online when you are playing it, which a single player game with co-op guarantees, since your or a friend controls that server. Game world size can be bigger in single player games, because they don't have to support 10k people you don't play with or care about. I haven't personally measured single player maps to MMO maps, but I doubt you have either, so the size can be argued either way. I could say single player maps are larger than MMO's, since you can't prove me wrong.
As you said, it's the illusion of this or that, which is illogical. So logically, nothing really justifies the monthly fee.
I don't think you understand the meaning of something being "logical". If you agree that the premise of an illusion is a reason why people pay the $15 fee, then the justification is valid.
You also seem to misunderstand by what I say when I mean a "large world". It's not about the physical size of the maps, it's about the active parts of the world. Single player games narrow the scope down to your player only, it doesn't matter what happens on the other side of the map. However, MMOs offer a fully interactive world in which there are players everywhere, and the things THEY do can effect how you play. That is your "world".
Let me ask you something, if I could give you the choice to live in a world with only the people who are close to you, would you?
No sorry but that isnt true. MMOs offer the complete opposite of a fully interactive world. They offer a very shallow illusion of that when compared to a single player game. Kill a monster? Its back a few moments later. Complete a quest? No you didnt cos that npc is still dishing out the same quest to everyone else. Picked up a cool item? No its just been copy and pasted into your inventory from a database along with every other player who went through the same process you did.
In most mmos the actions of other players has virtually no impact on how I play the game. The players cant change the game world and they cant effect my character directly. The only way another player can have any impact on my gaming experience is if they kill a load of monsters in the area I am in and I happen to need to kill them to complete a quest......but even then those monsters respawn back a few moments later because an mmo is a world frozen in time. In fact I often develop the habit in most mmos of blanking out the fact that other players are near to me. I can see them sure but I cant interact with them physically and can walk right through them as though they are ghosts.....so they may as well not be there for all I care. What difference does it make to me? They are simply extra people to help me get quests done in my own personal single player online game.
Single player games narrow the world down to your character only.......but so do mmos. Most mmos are geared specifically to each individual player. You basicly have thousands of players all playing their own seperate version of a single player game. You can choose to team up with other players to get through areas of the map but thats about it. The only real way players can effect you in mmos is by talking to you in the chat channel. They can effect how you feel but in the game itself its pretty rare that they can actually do anything noticeable.
*WARNING!!! This thread will require you to read everything and engage in deep thought and conversation. If you cannot do this, then you're wasting your time* To avoid responses concerning my experience in the genre, I've been playing any and all MMO's since 2001. So down to the topic at hand. What makes MMORPG's worth $15/mo when no other genre charges that amount? * It's not the quests, because single player games offer much more complex quests. Some games even offer the players the ability to change the game world with their decisions. * It's not the group play, because there are numerous examples of single player games allowing a Co-op mode for their games. * It's not the PvP, because there are numerous single player games offering the ability to PvP against others in a multiplayer mode. * It can't be the chat, since anyone can IM others or join chat rooms for free. What is it exactly about MMORPG's that hasn't been done for free, that makes it worth your money. Really think about this. Many people admit to doing large grinds whose only goal is to keep you subscribing. In my opinion, it's illogical to pay extra money to get the same gameplay you can get for free. If you have a logical reason why MMO's should charge a subscription, please reply with it. But before you do, ask yourself if that reason has been given for free elsewhere. In my opinion, the only distinguishing feature is that MMO's allow you to be a hamster. "Give me $15 and I'll let you jog on this treadmill for 30 days," says the MMO company. Keep in mind that while quality may justify a product having more value than something of lesser quality, a game mechanic of good quality alone doesn't justify a subsciption if someone else offers it for free.
I think honestly that its that MMO's take all those things and put them all together.
I think that also its the thought of us doing all these things in a seamless world with thousands of other players.
I think that those two things really draw most people into the MMO field IMO.
Yeah absolutely thats what draws people towards playing mmos. Its what hooks people into them.
But the original topic of the thread was "What makes all of this worth a £10 monthly fee?" when there are games around which offer these things for free.
They make you pay the 15 dollars because unlike a single player game it's ever-evolving and they must continue to pay the staff even after release. Plus the server upkeep fees. No they make you pay a £10 fee because they know you want to play the game and they know you will pay it without question. How much do you think the server upkeep costs and staff wages actually are each month anyway? Some mmos rake in around £5 million each month. Dont you think thats a bit excessive simply to playtest a game which isnt finished or to pay for extra content which is actually simply a rehash of the content you have already been playing? I play MMORPG's (hences paying the fee) because I get the quests, co-op, PvP, and an awesome world that I can explore with others. When I get awesome armor, or a ship, I can show off and brag about it. Not to mention MMORPGs usually offer more freedom, no setting you in a direct path. Currently I'm actually just waiting for my Vanguard sub to run out, then I'll resub to EVE, LOTRO, and WAR. The three MMORPGs I personally like the most and put the most time into in the shortest amount of time (if that makes sense). Otherwise, I'll be playing Mass Effect. Awesome armour or a ship? What the same awesome armour or a ship which everyone else has had "copy & pasted" into their inventory from the games database? What are you showing off or bragging about exactly? Dont people mormally brag about something they have achieved.....something they feel proud of? You dont seriously feel pride from completing a quest in an mmo do you? Heh everyone look at what I've got! Oh yeah I've got that too! and Me! And me too! Yeah I did that quest too! Yeah I clicked on that button just like you did! And me! And Me! And Me! (multiply this by thousands) How do mmos offer you more freedom? Freedom to do what? Pick and choose where and when you will do any of the generic quests? More space to walk around? The option to stand around at the auction house typing dance emotes at each other? All of this "freedom" is simply a time sink which is great for mmo game design as the more time you spend in the game doing buggerall means more money for the games companies. ADDITION: I also play MMOs because I hate retarded AI. Like when you're playing a 'team-based' shooter and you just want to blow the heads off every team member. In MMOs that's either a tenfold feeling, or it completely disappears. What?! That doesnt make any sense. Thats totally back to front. You play mmos because you dont like retarded AI? But the AI in mmos is the worst kind of AI you can come across. In mmos the AI of mobs is bloody awful. Its like walking through a world frozen in time where the land is covered with roaming near-blind landmines dressed up in zip-up monster suits which home in on you if you pass within their "aggro radius"....which is usally a few metres. Yeah thats top quality AI. Compare that to the AI of single player games such as Crisis or Halflife. You want to blow the heads off every team member? Again you're being completely back to front as you cant do that in most mmos with the exception of EVE but then EVE is always the exception to everything as it is generally far superior to most other mmos. Play the multiplayer options in single player games as they dont have the same restrictions that mmos have.
You sound like someone who made up their mind before posting this thread what your conclusion would be. So what's the point of responding to your thread?
I suppose you don't go to the movie theatre to watch movies, because eventually the good ones will be on TV anyway.
If no one pays people for the work they do, why would they ever do the work? Think about it.
Playing | GW2 Wanting | Pantheon Watching | Crowfall Retired | WAR, Cabal, MO, CO, SHK, WoW, FFXIV: ARR
I have to say your logic is a bit flawed. The reason I play MMO's is because of all of those things you mentioned that aren't reasons.
Sure that are some good Co-Op games, great quest games, great pvp type of games. However they all lack one major thing I can't do all of these things in one of the games with a large amount of friends at any time of the day or night. Sure, even in a MMO things can be come limited during off hours. They also offer some of the best co-op capabilities in really any game out there without having to pvp in the games co-op mode. Also most other games do not encompass a good in-game chat system to talk with your friend if you are not in the same area and still be aware of your surroundings and not take away from the emphasis of the fantasy world.
There are better questing games, however how many of those great games with awesome quest offer good multiplayer support in a secure environment. I like to see my characters progress indefinently or to at least some point where the rewards take so long to get and become more trivial in comparison to the amount of time it takes to get them. This does not have to mean they are worthless if you are still having fun then it is worth it.
Another reason though is that many of the games that do come out with good co-op opportunities that are worth playing do not come out on the computer. Although I have all the system the computer is still the gaming system of my choice that and I can't aim worth crap with a xbox or ps3 controller.
That's the jist of it. There is more I could add it would help my argument other than allowing it to become much more clear.
You sound like someone who made up their mind before posting this thread what your conclusion would be. So what's the point of responding to your thread? I suppose you don't go to the movie theatre to watch movies, because eventually the good ones will be on TV anyway. If no one pays people for the work they do, why would they ever do the work? Think about it.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
You sound like someone who made up their mind before posting this thread what your conclusion would be. So what's the point of responding to your thread? I suppose you don't go to the movie theatre to watch movies, because eventually the good ones will be on TV anyway. If no one pays people for the work they do, why would they ever do the work? Think about it.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
Neonwire, you and I come from different countries, but our thinking process is exactly the same. Some people call us jaded, while others might say we've seen the light, had the veil lifted, snapped out of it, or some other cliche phrase that refers to us not being gullible anymore. I stand by and agree with everything you've said so far. Kudos to you for explaining things better than I can.
As for the rest of the posters here. If I haven't personally responded to your thread, it's not because I didn't read it. I've read every post in this thread so far. I haven't responded to those that repeat what others have said, because I've replied to every point at least once. So you can read the whole thread if you want, to get all my replies, otherwise thanks for keeping the conversation going.
I realized I got off topic without even knowing it, because the two things are related it seems. But Neonwire is right. The thread is about what makes MMO's worth $15/mo, when other games do similar or better for free. The answer it seems is nothing. MMO's aren't worth $15/mo, they just are because people are sheep and will pay it. There are many justifications as to why people pay the subscription fee and no one can argue those, because it is a cheap form of entertainment and fun is subjective. But in the end, whether you admit it or not, the MMORPG you're playing isn't giving you anything that you couldn't get for free elsewhere. The only exceptions are those MMORPG's that offer complete freedom, which most people call sandbox games, even though not all sandbox games has complete freedom.
I think that MMO's are the most inexpensive social hobby a person can have. I'm fine with paying $15/mo for something I enjoy doing rather than, say $15 a night bowling or something like that.
Currently Playing: Aion Trying Out: Retired: The Chronicles of Spellborn, EvE, LotRo, WoW, VG, AoC, CoX, RO Waiting on: Blade & Soul, Black Prophecy, Global Agenda, The Agency, SW:ToR, T.E.R.A. Working On: The 5th Dimension (coming soon)
*WARNING!!! This thread will require you to read everything and engage in deep thought and conversation. If you cannot do this, then you're wasting your time* To avoid responses concerning my experience in the genre, I've been playing any and all MMO's since 2001. So down to the topic at hand. What makes MMORPG's worth $15/mo when no other genre charges that amount? * It's not the quests, because single player games offer much more complex quests. Some games even offer the players the ability to change the game world with their decisions. * It's not the group play, because there are numerous examples of single player games allowing a Co-op mode for their games. * It's not the PvP, because there are numerous single player games offering the ability to PvP against others in a multiplayer mode. * It can't be the chat, since anyone can IM others or join chat rooms for free. What is it exactly about MMORPG's that hasn't been done for free, that makes it worth your money. Really think about this. Many people admit to doing large grinds whose only goal is to keep you subscribing. In my opinion, it's illogical to pay extra money to get the same gameplay you can get for free. If you have a logical reason why MMO's should charge a subscription, please reply with it. But before you do, ask yourself if that reason has been given for free elsewhere. In my opinion, the only distinguishing feature is that MMO's allow you to be a hamster. "Give me $15 and I'll let you jog on this treadmill for 30 days," says the MMO company. Keep in mind that while quality may justify a product having more value than something of lesser quality, a game mechanic of good quality alone doesn't justify a subsciption if someone else offers it for free.
First of all, not all MMO even have monthly fees, if you don't want to pay anything, play Guildwars instead. It is as good as most MMOs at least.
Secondly: Only you can decide what you think a game is worth to play. I do agree that MMO companies probably makes more money than solo player ones (no way that they are paying that much money for customer support and bandwith, they are probably taking at least half every month in profit) but I still think it is well paid money, it is about 4 Guiness for me at the pub (also a good investment) for many hours fun.
A solo game might give you more fun for each dollar but I don't pay some more to get more fun. I like MMOs. Of course once Guildwars 2 comes out I might give up on monthly fee games all together since it will hopefully delivers the same things as the rest as good for no monthly fees at all.
A long time ago in a galaxy far far away a company named Blizzard created a phenom called Diablo. This RPG took the world by storm and offered gamers a game that was a raw version of MMORPG's to come. It had multiclassed, skill based characters, loot, quests, mobs, social grouping, and many other elements of the modern MMO. It however lacked one important part; MASSIVE. Diablo was limited to a small online group in a controlled environment. It also contained many bugs and exploits that unbalanced the players and made everyone a virtual game god. Along came Ultima online, and finally the MASSIVE was added to the MORPG. I remember a friend of mine trying to sell me on the game by saying "There's no cheating because your character is saved on their server. You can't twink a toon." A game like this requires much in the ways of server maintenence, upkeep and the like. Hence, the monthly fee was created. We pay to keep the servers alive and well. And, to keep in spirit with the MASSIVE in MMORPG's, revenue keeps the designers working to create new and exciting content. Many free to play games have been released, but I have yet to find one that equally compares to the quality of the pay as you play counterpart. Until they catch up, I'll fork up my 15 dollars.
*WARNING!!! This thread will require you to read everything and engage in deep thought and conversation. If you cannot do this, then you're wasting your time* To avoid responses concerning my experience in the genre, I've been playing any and all MMO's since 2001. So down to the topic at hand. What makes MMORPG's worth $15/mo when no other genre charges that amount? * It's not the quests, because single player games offer much more complex quests. Some games even offer the players the ability to change the game world with their decisions. * It's not the group play, because there are numerous examples of single player games allowing a Co-op mode for their games. * It's not the PvP, because there are numerous single player games offering the ability to PvP against others in a multiplayer mode. * It can't be the chat, since anyone can IM others or join chat rooms for free. What is it exactly about MMORPG's that hasn't been done for free, that makes it worth your money. Really think about this. Many people admit to doing large grinds whose only goal is to keep you subscribing. In my opinion, it's illogical to pay extra money to get the same gameplay you can get for free. If you have a logical reason why MMO's should charge a subscription, please reply with it. But before you do, ask yourself if that reason has been given for free elsewhere. In my opinion, the only distinguishing feature is that MMO's allow you to be a hamster. "Give me $15 and I'll let you jog on this treadmill for 30 days," says the MMO company. Keep in mind that while quality may justify a product having more value than something of lesser quality, a game mechanic of good quality alone doesn't justify a subsciption if someone else offers it for free.
I think honestly that its that MMO's take all those things and put them all together.
I think that also its the thought of us doing all these things in a seamless world with thousands of other players.
I think that those two things really draw most people into the MMO field IMO.
Yeah absolutely thats what draws people towards playing mmos. Its what hooks people into them.
But the original topic of the thread was "What makes all of this worth a £10 monthly fee?" when there are games around which offer these things for free.
Thats what I am saying to OP is that when you put all those things together plus the ever changing world with expansions and the fact that they still have to pay the staff and keep servers up, all those things together and you get the monthly fee that we pay.
And the bottom line is that we pay it and as long as we pay it they are going to keep charging us.
I mean why wouldnt they?
The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced.- Frank Zappa
Running servers where hundreds, if not thousands, if not tens of thousands of ONLINE connections connect similtaniuously causinh a huge demand on server bandwidth and stability.
Its pretty simple to understand if you have ever played first person shooters.
Lets take unreal tournament 2004 for example (my favorite fps). They released a demo which millions of people downloaded. That demo had many servers which many people played. THEN the game was actually released, and the demo servers came down to 2 from possible hundreds. Suddenly, those that were playing the demo online and were having a grand old time were left with a problem, either buy the game and play instantly, or keep on playing the demo and have ridiculous waiting periods.
Of course the smart players bought the actual game. What did these players find when they bought the game? There were only 2 servers sponsored (paid for) by Ataris (Unreal tournament creator) and the other 2 were just demo servers that everybody had previously played on and had a limited map selection.
ALLLL the other servers were player paid for. Running servers is expensive.
If it offers enough gameplay to justify it. The average PC or console game, new, goes for $50-60. Good FPSs I finish in around 10-15 hrs. Same for action games. Something on the opposite spectrum like Fallout3 or Total War can get me closer to 60-80 hrs+. A MMO however, easily nets me 100s of hours of entertainment. Thats worth it to me, if its a quality MMO that is. Most MMOs are NOT worth any fee at all, which is why I don't play most of them past the beta.
Any MMO will HAVE TO do better than WOW for me to spend a dime. The polish and presentation better be equivalent or I'll just feel like I'm wasting money. MMOs are no longer a basement genre, so they can't get away with what they could back with EQ, DAOC or AO. They can't do what Funcom did with AOC. They can't pull a Darkfall or Vangaurd. I don't stick around for what could be and I'm ALWAYS an early adopter. If the beta isn't release worthy, it won't see my money. I'm not so forgiving anymore.
But in reality, players on the other side of the map don't effect you at all. Only people close to you could arguably effect you, and that's because they are competing for the same spawn, assiting you kill a mob, or are trying to kill you or you them.
As for your last question, I'd prefer that, but that is too simple of an answer to a complex question. It takes millions of people to support one family (ie. create and sell clothes, food, housing, water, entertainment), whereas way back when one family could survive on their own and do fine. If the people I knew and cared about had the ability to help each other survive, then yes I'd like to live in a world with just us. There are some really good people in the world that I don't know and would like to know, probably, but there are many times more bad people. In a MMORPG, it's even worse. The likely-hood of running into a random person that gives a shit about you is close to nil. In modern MMO's, getting two people to even exchange words in-passing is almost nil as well. So like I said, what people do in a MMO doesn't matter, since the majority of people don't care, and those that claim to care, don't ever actually try to communicate with those outside of their little circle.
You just kicked yourself in the balls with that. In reality, players on the other side of the map DOES effect you. Different games offer different types of effect, but an example would be them grinding the same mob as you on the other side of the map, thus increasing their chance for loot. This in turn changes the ecnonomy of the game slightly. Another example would be some group decides to gank a good buddy of yours in another area, so YOU decide to run over there and help him. This is totally situation and could not be as realistic as an AI implementation.
That's the point, you would like to, but ultimately you can't. Which is basically like saying: Sure, I would love to play a single player game without a monthly fee that offers what MMOs can give me, but in actuality, it's not feasible.
You can't argue about good/bad people on the internet. It's completely situational on the type of game you play, when you play, and HOW you play. Maybe you're just angry because you keep remaking alts on WoW and leveling them up in the Badlands on weekends.
Lastly, if YOU cared about the MMO, then what people do in the MMO will matter, and you will care. It doesn't mean you're going to care about the person, but what he does or what effect he has on the game as a whole. These mini-interactions make up a huge system in which you have no choice but the co-operate with. This is called the competitive scene, whether you decide to play a PvP based game, PvE based game, or a crafting based game. Like I've stated before, MMOs only give you the illusion of choice. But this illusion is enough to make people pay $15/mo.
Any MMO will HAVE TO do better than WOW for me to spend a dime. The polish and presentation better be equivalent or I'll just feel like I'm wasting money. MMOs are no longer a basement genre, so they can't get away with what they could back with EQ, DAOC or AO. They can't do what Funcom did with AOC. They can't pull a Darkfall or Vangaurd. I don't stick around for what could be and I'm ALWAYS an early adopter. If the beta isn't release worthy, it won't see my money. I'm not so forgiving anymore.
Wow, touchy?
You are never, ever going to be playing a MMO again, are you? If the beta isn't release worthy? A beta is to test whether or not it is release worthy.
You sound like someone who made up their mind before posting this thread what your conclusion would be. So what's the point of responding to your thread? I suppose you don't go to the movie theatre to watch movies, because eventually the good ones will be on TV anyway. If no one pays people for the work they do, why would they ever do the work? Think about it.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
Neonwire, you and I come from different countries, but our thinking process is exactly the same. Some people call us jaded, while others might say we've seen the light, had the veil lifted, snapped out of it, or some other cliche phrase that refers to us not being gullible anymore. I stand by and agree with everything you've said so far. Kudos to you for explaining things better than I can.
As for the rest of the posters here. If I haven't personally responded to your thread, it's not because I didn't read it. I've read every post in this thread so far. I haven't responded to those that repeat what others have said, because I've replied to every point at least once. So you can read the whole thread if you want, to get all my replies, otherwise thanks for keeping the conversation going.
I realized I got off topic without even knowing it, because the two things are related it seems. But Neonwire is right. The thread is about what makes MMO's worth $15/mo, when other games do similar or better for free. The answer it seems is nothing. MMO's aren't worth $15/mo, they just are because people are sheep and will pay it. There are many justifications as to why people pay the subscription fee and no one can argue those, because it is a cheap form of entertainment and fun is subjective. But in the end, whether you admit it or not, the MMORPG you're playing isn't giving you anything that you couldn't get for free elsewhere. The only exceptions are those MMORPG's that offer complete freedom, which most people call sandbox games, even though not all sandbox games has complete freedom.
I salute you for starting up a very good thread. It has given me plenty of food for thought.......as you can tell from my long rambling rants.
Basicly the responses that defend the monthly fee of mmos from other people in this thread boil down to this.......
1. Its fun
2. Mmos cost more to run
3. I can afford it
4. I am used to it and so is the rest of the herd
Obviously something being fun is not an excuse for charging extra money. A monthly fee should be charged in relation to any extra work or effort involved. I personally find mmos today to be extremely boring and limited (WAR is at the top of my list in that regard at the moment). Does that mean I can pay a smaller monthly fee than everyone else because my enjoyment levels arent as high as other people who are easier to please?
Mmos do also cost more to run......but they definately dont cost as much as people seem to think. These mmos rake in HUGE amounts of money every month which MASSIVELY exceeds their costs. Even WAR which is a pretty terrible game must rake in roughly half a million pounds each month. Obviously server upkeep costs, wages and additional costs cant possibly come anywhere near that much each month. Effectively these P2P mmos are getting profit which is equivelent to reselling the same game constantly for years. Even the worst mmo ever made in history will make more money than the best single player game ever made. A P2P monthly fee doesnt encourage gaming companies to make better games. It does the complete opposite because they know that they will make a massive profit even if the game is crap and they also know that they dont even have to finish making the game because people will continue to pay for it no matter what state its in. They know that the standards people expect are now extremely low. In other words they know their target audience are all suckers which are now addicted to online gaming. They will give them money for anything that works regardless of its quality.
They also know that people can afford it. I can afford it too. However while so many people are gladly handing over their cash every month to these companies regardless of the state of the product, the quality of these mmos is going to continue to be extremely low. This really pisses me off because I want to play a really good mmo and yet for years there havent been any that meet my standards. Instead we keep seeing extremely poor games coming out that satisfy the easy to please masses but do nothing for anyone with half a brain.
People have become used to all of this. Now it has become standard practice to charge extra money each month for games that really arent very good. The enjoyment factor is increased due to the fact that people can talk to each other. Human interaction is being relied on as a source of entertainment in place of good gameplay. People arent paying extra money because the games are good. They are paying extra money because they enjoy socialising. Again the games companies know this. It doesnt matter if the mmos themselves are bad because people will feel drawn to them for social reasons. This happens in work environments too. Even the worst jobs in the world can be made bearable if you have good people around you to share the strain of it all. This is what is happening with mmos as well. Most of them are terrible games and yet people are able to enjoy them because of the human interaction.......remove the chat channels and people will see how awful these mmos actually are.
Any MMO will HAVE TO do better than WOW for me to spend a dime. The polish and presentation better be equivalent or I'll just feel like I'm wasting money. MMOs are no longer a basement genre, so they can't get away with what they could back with EQ, DAOC or AO. They can't do what Funcom did with AOC. They can't pull a Darkfall or Vangaurd. I don't stick around for what could be and I'm ALWAYS an early adopter. If the beta isn't release worthy, it won't see my money. I'm not so forgiving anymore.
Wow, touchy?
You are never, ever going to be playing a MMO again, are you? If the beta isn't release worthy? A beta is to test whether or not it is release worthy.
So basicly what you are saying is that because his standards are high and he only wants to pay money for decent mmos, he will never end up playing any mmos because they are all low quality products. Yeah that sounds about right to me. I take my hat off to the guy for being sensible, sticking to his principles and refusing to give money to people that dont deserve it. Why should he pay money for unfinished badly made products anyway?
All he is saying is that mmos should be good games when they are released, not half finished with shit loads of bugs, missing features and badly implemented game mechanics. We shouldnt have to wait for years after they have released to become decent.
Actually when I now see a release date for an mmo I know that it isnt really the release date. Its just the date where the games company starts taking peoples money to play test its product. Its always at least an extra year or two until the game actually reaches its REAL release date where it is a game worth paying money for.
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50 little pennies for ~20 hours of playtime a day justifies it enough for me
Free MMOs are still good, I sometimes take a break from AoC and DAoC to play Atlantica Online, Requiem, and some single player games, but my bread and butter will always be p2p MMORPGs.
last time I checked, games have a max level and a finite amount of content. Which when you complete, you have the choice to do over with a new character or wait for new content to release, which for most gamers is several months after they completed the last bit of content.
I canceled my Direct TV when I realized I only watched it for 1 show per week. Instead, I now have Netflix and watch that show the next day on the internet. Total cost? 15 dollars and I get to watch movies of my choosing and many more than I'd of ever watched on TV.
An ever changing world and yes f2p games offer quests, Co-op and pvp, but most of the time on a much smaller scale. When I played FFXI I had no problem paying $12 a month because I enjoyed the game and it was well worth it. The graphics were good, the armor and weapons looked cool, and the end game was fun.
I always feel I'm paying for a persistent immersive world. Which you literally can't get in any other genre.
It would be nice if we didn't have to pay for it. And I agree with how some people have said it's something we've just learned to accept. But server up-keep IS indeed expensive.
I think we should pay the amount it costs to keep the severs up and no more. The profit should come from the game sale itself.
Not only do we pay monthly in MMOs but we're also paying for expansions every 1 to 2 years. You can end up spending hundreds on one game quite easily. But maybe when you're hooked on just one game it is cheaper than getting through 1 a month.
MMOs played (In order of how much I've liked them): Star Wars Galaxies, World of Warcraft, Vanguard, City of Villains / Heroes, Guild Wars, Warhammer Online, Age of Conan, Tabula Rasa, Anarchy Online, Ryzom, Final Fantasy XI, Matrix Online, RF Online, Rappelz, Hero Online, Roma Victor
I've only read part of the thread, so I apologize if I've repeated things said before.
You've already said the economic arguments (i.e. pay what the market bears, it's cheaper than other entertainment) is not the focus of your post, but rather it seems you're asking why people pay a monthly fee for a product that delivers what other software gives players in better quality and/or at a cheaper price. In essence, and please correct me if I'm wrong, you're arguing we seem to only pay for MMOs because they're a drug, and not a good one at that.
First off, I will say that I think a number of MMO players - particularly some of the vocal ones on these forums - would be better suited towards playing a game of Dungeons & Dragons (the one that uses imagination, not the MMO). I don't think this minor subset is important for the overall question of why most people play WoW or EQ or LoTR or CoX or most any other game on the market.
For me, and I'm certain for many others, it mainly comes down to playing a video game while surrounded by like-minded people in the chat room. I don't roleplay. I don't care much about the world lore. I don't feel the need to be #1 in the world and worshipped by peons on messageboards. I guess I'd liken it to sitting at a coffee shop by yourself yet being surrounded by conversations. Very few, if any, non-MMOs give you the experience of simply wandering the gameworld, joining a random group (yes a lot of us still enjoy PuGs), chat with them for a bit, split up and keep going on our merry way and all while listening to and participating in a number of other conversations in the world and in your guild.
Yes, a chat program can let you talk to people for free. And it's more likely you'd talk to people you're actually friends with and will have a beer with at the local pub (sorry guildies, but at the end of the day you're just shmoes I share an interest with). But, it's much more intuitive when chat is engrained in your game. It's not exactly easy to chat with your gaming buddies over MSN when trying to play Fallout 3 as opposed to WoW (and as I've learnt you better not be trying to play games when your significant other wants to talk on MSN unless you enjoy getting trounced)
Basically, it's the environment that keeps me coming back. The individual Kill X quests aren't exactly appealing and more than once I've stopped an MMO cold turkey simply because I couldn't handle the quests, but MMOs are improving in content, they're improving in telling a story and they're improving in making the community more seamless (unless you're Darkfall...). Oh, and instanced dungeons are great - my favourite way to meet new people in game is to join a PuG and run an instance. Great way to meet people.
As for whether it's worth $15 for that? I realize you may not care much for the economics, but they're relevant. MMOs entertains me enough to the point where I buy fewer games during the year, probably to the point where I spend less on entertainment now than I did pre-MMO.
What about the IP? What about the combination of everything you listed on there? It's also the fact that MMOs offer a "world" that is never offline ( besides updates, crashes, etc) in which the player can just jump in. No single player game can offer that. It basically means, if you want to play the game, you HAVE to play online; single players give you a choice. Most MMO worlds are also seemingly large compared to multiplayer modes of single player games where it's usually based on "joining a server" or a "room" or something along those lines. Note that I said seemingly, because most MMOs are basically an illusion of large worlds, even though most of the action takes places in intances (not all games though mind you), and player hubs are just large chat rooms basically. But we live in a world of illusions and people are happier when things seem "tied together" when they're actually not.
You've basically reinforced my point, possibly without meaning to. Logically, there is no reason to subscribe to a game based off the factors you provided, because it doesn't matter if the game is offline or online when you're not playing it. It only matters that the game is online when you are playing it, which a single player game with co-op guarantees, since your or a friend controls that server. Game world size can be bigger in single player games, because they don't have to support 10k people you don't play with or care about. I haven't personally measured single player maps to MMO maps, but I doubt you have either, so the size can be argued either way. I could say single player maps are larger than MMO's, since you can't prove me wrong.
As you said, it's the illusion of this or that, which is illogical. So logically, nothing really justifies the monthly fee.
I don't think you understand the meaning of something being "logical". If you agree that the premise of an illusion is a reason why people pay the $15 fee, then the justification is valid.
You also seem to misunderstand by what I say when I mean a "large world". It's not about the physical size of the maps, it's about the active parts of the world. Single player games narrow the scope down to your player only, it doesn't matter what happens on the other side of the map. However, MMOs offer a fully interactive world in which there are players everywhere, and the things THEY do can effect how you play. That is your "world".
Let me ask you something, if I could give you the choice to live in a world with only the people who are close to you, would you?
No sorry but that isnt true. MMOs offer the complete opposite of a fully interactive world. They offer a very shallow illusion of that when compared to a single player game. Kill a monster? Its back a few moments later. Complete a quest? No you didnt cos that npc is still dishing out the same quest to everyone else. Picked up a cool item? No its just been copy and pasted into your inventory from a database along with every other player who went through the same process you did.
In most mmos the actions of other players has virtually no impact on how I play the game. The players cant change the game world and they cant effect my character directly. The only way another player can have any impact on my gaming experience is if they kill a load of monsters in the area I am in and I happen to need to kill them to complete a quest......but even then those monsters respawn back a few moments later because an mmo is a world frozen in time. In fact I often develop the habit in most mmos of blanking out the fact that other players are near to me. I can see them sure but I cant interact with them physically and can walk right through them as though they are ghosts.....so they may as well not be there for all I care. What difference does it make to me? They are simply extra people to help me get quests done in my own personal single player online game.
Single player games narrow the world down to your character only.......but so do mmos. Most mmos are geared specifically to each individual player. You basicly have thousands of players all playing their own seperate version of a single player game. You can choose to team up with other players to get through areas of the map but thats about it. The only real way players can effect you in mmos is by talking to you in the chat channel. They can effect how you feel but in the game itself its pretty rare that they can actually do anything noticeable.
I think honestly that its that MMO's take all those things and put them all together.
I think that also its the thought of us doing all these things in a seamless world with thousands of other players.
I think that those two things really draw most people into the MMO field IMO.
Yeah absolutely thats what draws people towards playing mmos. Its what hooks people into them.
But the original topic of the thread was "What makes all of this worth a £10 monthly fee?" when there are games around which offer these things for free.
You sound like someone who made up their mind before posting this thread what your conclusion would be. So what's the point of responding to your thread?
I suppose you don't go to the movie theatre to watch movies, because eventually the good ones will be on TV anyway.
If no one pays people for the work they do, why would they ever do the work? Think about it.
Playing | GW2
Wanting | Pantheon
Watching | Crowfall
Retired | WAR, Cabal, MO, CO, SHK, WoW, FFXIV: ARR
I have to say your logic is a bit flawed. The reason I play MMO's is because of all of those things you mentioned that aren't reasons.
Sure that are some good Co-Op games, great quest games, great pvp type of games. However they all lack one major thing I can't do all of these things in one of the games with a large amount of friends at any time of the day or night. Sure, even in a MMO things can be come limited during off hours. They also offer some of the best co-op capabilities in really any game out there without having to pvp in the games co-op mode. Also most other games do not encompass a good in-game chat system to talk with your friend if you are not in the same area and still be aware of your surroundings and not take away from the emphasis of the fantasy world.
There are better questing games, however how many of those great games with awesome quest offer good multiplayer support in a secure environment. I like to see my characters progress indefinently or to at least some point where the rewards take so long to get and become more trivial in comparison to the amount of time it takes to get them. This does not have to mean they are worthless if you are still having fun then it is worth it.
Another reason though is that many of the games that do come out with good co-op opportunities that are worth playing do not come out on the computer. Although I have all the system the computer is still the gaming system of my choice that and I can't aim worth crap with a xbox or ps3 controller.
That's the jist of it. There is more I could add it would help my argument other than allowing it to become much more clear.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
Neonwire, you and I come from different countries, but our thinking process is exactly the same. Some people call us jaded, while others might say we've seen the light, had the veil lifted, snapped out of it, or some other cliche phrase that refers to us not being gullible anymore. I stand by and agree with everything you've said so far. Kudos to you for explaining things better than I can.
As for the rest of the posters here. If I haven't personally responded to your thread, it's not because I didn't read it. I've read every post in this thread so far. I haven't responded to those that repeat what others have said, because I've replied to every point at least once. So you can read the whole thread if you want, to get all my replies, otherwise thanks for keeping the conversation going.
I realized I got off topic without even knowing it, because the two things are related it seems. But Neonwire is right. The thread is about what makes MMO's worth $15/mo, when other games do similar or better for free. The answer it seems is nothing. MMO's aren't worth $15/mo, they just are because people are sheep and will pay it. There are many justifications as to why people pay the subscription fee and no one can argue those, because it is a cheap form of entertainment and fun is subjective. But in the end, whether you admit it or not, the MMORPG you're playing isn't giving you anything that you couldn't get for free elsewhere. The only exceptions are those MMORPG's that offer complete freedom, which most people call sandbox games, even though not all sandbox games has complete freedom.
I think that MMO's are the most inexpensive social hobby a person can have. I'm fine with paying $15/mo for something I enjoy doing rather than, say $15 a night bowling or something like that.
Currently Playing: Aion
Trying Out:
Retired: The Chronicles of Spellborn, EvE, LotRo, WoW, VG, AoC, CoX, RO
Waiting on: Blade & Soul, Black Prophecy, Global Agenda, The Agency, SW:ToR, T.E.R.A.
Working On: The 5th Dimension (coming soon)
First of all, not all MMO even have monthly fees, if you don't want to pay anything, play Guildwars instead. It is as good as most MMOs at least.
Secondly: Only you can decide what you think a game is worth to play. I do agree that MMO companies probably makes more money than solo player ones (no way that they are paying that much money for customer support and bandwith, they are probably taking at least half every month in profit) but I still think it is well paid money, it is about 4 Guiness for me at the pub (also a good investment) for many hours fun.
A solo game might give you more fun for each dollar but I don't pay some more to get more fun. I like MMOs. Of course once Guildwars 2 comes out I might give up on monthly fee games all together since it will hopefully delivers the same things as the rest as good for no monthly fees at all.
A long time ago in a galaxy far far away a company named Blizzard created a phenom called Diablo. This RPG took the world by storm and offered gamers a game that was a raw version of MMORPG's to come. It had multiclassed, skill based characters, loot, quests, mobs, social grouping, and many other elements of the modern MMO. It however lacked one important part; MASSIVE. Diablo was limited to a small online group in a controlled environment. It also contained many bugs and exploits that unbalanced the players and made everyone a virtual game god. Along came Ultima online, and finally the MASSIVE was added to the MORPG. I remember a friend of mine trying to sell me on the game by saying "There's no cheating because your character is saved on their server. You can't twink a toon." A game like this requires much in the ways of server maintenence, upkeep and the like. Hence, the monthly fee was created. We pay to keep the servers alive and well. And, to keep in spirit with the MASSIVE in MMORPG's, revenue keeps the designers working to create new and exciting content. Many free to play games have been released, but I have yet to find one that equally compares to the quality of the pay as you play counterpart. Until they catch up, I'll fork up my 15 dollars.
if interacting with other people in a game is like a hamster on a treadmill.
Then why post here, you should write you opinion in a txt file and save it on your desktop.
Read it every morning and feel good with yourself.
I think honestly that its that MMO's take all those things and put them all together.
I think that also its the thought of us doing all these things in a seamless world with thousands of other players.
I think that those two things really draw most people into the MMO field IMO.
Yeah absolutely thats what draws people towards playing mmos. Its what hooks people into them.
But the original topic of the thread was "What makes all of this worth a £10 monthly fee?" when there are games around which offer these things for free.
Thats what I am saying to OP is that when you put all those things together plus the ever changing world with expansions and the fact that they still have to pay the staff and keep servers up, all those things together and you get the monthly fee that we pay.
And the bottom line is that we pay it and as long as we pay it they are going to keep charging us.
I mean why wouldnt they?
The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced.-
Frank Zappa
Tl:dr
To the OP;
Running servers where hundreds, if not thousands, if not tens of thousands of ONLINE connections connect similtaniuously causinh a huge demand on server bandwidth and stability.
Its pretty simple to understand if you have ever played first person shooters.
Lets take unreal tournament 2004 for example (my favorite fps). They released a demo which millions of people downloaded. That demo had many servers which many people played. THEN the game was actually released, and the demo servers came down to 2 from possible hundreds. Suddenly, those that were playing the demo online and were having a grand old time were left with a problem, either buy the game and play instantly, or keep on playing the demo and have ridiculous waiting periods.
Of course the smart players bought the actual game. What did these players find when they bought the game? There were only 2 servers sponsored (paid for) by Ataris (Unreal tournament creator) and the other 2 were just demo servers that everybody had previously played on and had a limited map selection.
ALLLL the other servers were player paid for. Running servers is expensive.
If it offers enough gameplay to justify it. The average PC or console game, new, goes for $50-60. Good FPSs I finish in around 10-15 hrs. Same for action games. Something on the opposite spectrum like Fallout3 or Total War can get me closer to 60-80 hrs+. A MMO however, easily nets me 100s of hours of entertainment. Thats worth it to me, if its a quality MMO that is. Most MMOs are NOT worth any fee at all, which is why I don't play most of them past the beta.
Any MMO will HAVE TO do better than WOW for me to spend a dime. The polish and presentation better be equivalent or I'll just feel like I'm wasting money. MMOs are no longer a basement genre, so they can't get away with what they could back with EQ, DAOC or AO. They can't do what Funcom did with AOC. They can't pull a Darkfall or Vangaurd. I don't stick around for what could be and I'm ALWAYS an early adopter. If the beta isn't release worthy, it won't see my money. I'm not so forgiving anymore.
But in reality, players on the other side of the map don't effect you at all. Only people close to you could arguably effect you, and that's because they are competing for the same spawn, assiting you kill a mob, or are trying to kill you or you them.
As for your last question, I'd prefer that, but that is too simple of an answer to a complex question. It takes millions of people to support one family (ie. create and sell clothes, food, housing, water, entertainment), whereas way back when one family could survive on their own and do fine. If the people I knew and cared about had the ability to help each other survive, then yes I'd like to live in a world with just us. There are some really good people in the world that I don't know and would like to know, probably, but there are many times more bad people. In a MMORPG, it's even worse. The likely-hood of running into a random person that gives a shit about you is close to nil. In modern MMO's, getting two people to even exchange words in-passing is almost nil as well. So like I said, what people do in a MMO doesn't matter, since the majority of people don't care, and those that claim to care, don't ever actually try to communicate with those outside of their little circle.
You just kicked yourself in the balls with that. In reality, players on the other side of the map DOES effect you. Different games offer different types of effect, but an example would be them grinding the same mob as you on the other side of the map, thus increasing their chance for loot. This in turn changes the ecnonomy of the game slightly. Another example would be some group decides to gank a good buddy of yours in another area, so YOU decide to run over there and help him. This is totally situation and could not be as realistic as an AI implementation.
That's the point, you would like to, but ultimately you can't. Which is basically like saying: Sure, I would love to play a single player game without a monthly fee that offers what MMOs can give me, but in actuality, it's not feasible.
You can't argue about good/bad people on the internet. It's completely situational on the type of game you play, when you play, and HOW you play. Maybe you're just angry because you keep remaking alts on WoW and leveling them up in the Badlands on weekends.
Lastly, if YOU cared about the MMO, then what people do in the MMO will matter, and you will care. It doesn't mean you're going to care about the person, but what he does or what effect he has on the game as a whole. These mini-interactions make up a huge system in which you have no choice but the co-operate with. This is called the competitive scene, whether you decide to play a PvP based game, PvE based game, or a crafting based game. Like I've stated before, MMOs only give you the illusion of choice. But this illusion is enough to make people pay $15/mo.
Wow, touchy?
You are never, ever going to be playing a MMO again, are you? If the beta isn't release worthy? A beta is to test whether or not it is release worthy.
Would you go to the movies if the cinema charged every film viewer an additional £5 to "cover the cost" of the people running the cinema, even though you know that this should already be included in the original ticket price? Sure you could afford it but would it sit well with you knowing that the extra £5 is simply an extra fee being charged simply because they can and not because its warranted? Or how about being charged £5 to enter a pub on the pretence that it covers the cost of wear & tear on the pubs furniture?
I dont think this thread is neccessarily about whether the OP or anyone else can afford the cost because abviously a monthly fee isnt going to make anyone bankrupt. Its really more about whether the monthly fee is neccessary considering that other mmos dont charge extra (some have a one off fee and others are free) and also the quality of single player games (which often come with a multiplayer option) is often vastly superior to what we are seeing in most mmos. These P2P mmos dont really seem to offer much more than the other types of games in quality.
Very few mmos are actually made to a high standard and it has become common practice to release them in a heavily incomplete state and yet still charge a monthly fee while they finish making them. As the years go by people are beginning to accept this more and more. When an mmo releases these days with giant gaping holes in its content, huge amounts of bugs, missing features, extremely shoddy gameplay and badly thought out game mechanics (eg WAR) people just say things like "Oh well all mmos have problems at the start" and "This mmo has potential". Then several years later when the game STILL has loads of bugs and various other problems people say "Ah but no mmo is perfect. Mmos are always evolving" even though the actual game itself hasnt evolved at all and is essentially still the same game that it was on its release date. How does a static unchangeable gameworld that provides the exact same gaming experience to every individual player evolve anyway? The answer is that it doesnt. The devs might add new monster spawns, new zones and starter areas, nerf classes etc but this isnt "evolving".......this is called "making a computer game". Its the same process the game goes through before it gets released except that with mmos the process continues while people pay for it. The devs are making the game up until the release date. The only difference in this process is that after the release date the servers are opened to the public and the devs get paid extra money every month to continue making the game.
However Guildwars is a great example of the efforts of a fair company. They dont charge people for the privelege of taking part in the "evolving creation process" of their game. They just charged a straight fixed fee like any other computer game and continued to maintain, fix and tweak it just like any decent games company should do. Then as they work on extra expansions they charge for them seperately as individual products while at the same time still continueing to work on their original game. I dont hear about them going bankrupt or not being able to pay their staff. I really dont think that the wages for the staff of a P2P mmo come anywhere near the amount of money they rake in each month from subscription fees. The work they do is certainly skilled work but their costs arent THAT high.
WoW has 11 million subscribers each at roughly £10 a month. You dont seriously think they need this money to cover their costs do you? Pay them for the work they do? Sure......but these companies are totally taking the piss and its becoming common practice which I dont think is right at all.
Neonwire, you and I come from different countries, but our thinking process is exactly the same. Some people call us jaded, while others might say we've seen the light, had the veil lifted, snapped out of it, or some other cliche phrase that refers to us not being gullible anymore. I stand by and agree with everything you've said so far. Kudos to you for explaining things better than I can.
As for the rest of the posters here. If I haven't personally responded to your thread, it's not because I didn't read it. I've read every post in this thread so far. I haven't responded to those that repeat what others have said, because I've replied to every point at least once. So you can read the whole thread if you want, to get all my replies, otherwise thanks for keeping the conversation going.
I realized I got off topic without even knowing it, because the two things are related it seems. But Neonwire is right. The thread is about what makes MMO's worth $15/mo, when other games do similar or better for free. The answer it seems is nothing. MMO's aren't worth $15/mo, they just are because people are sheep and will pay it. There are many justifications as to why people pay the subscription fee and no one can argue those, because it is a cheap form of entertainment and fun is subjective. But in the end, whether you admit it or not, the MMORPG you're playing isn't giving you anything that you couldn't get for free elsewhere. The only exceptions are those MMORPG's that offer complete freedom, which most people call sandbox games, even though not all sandbox games has complete freedom.
I salute you for starting up a very good thread. It has given me plenty of food for thought.......as you can tell from my long rambling rants.
Basicly the responses that defend the monthly fee of mmos from other people in this thread boil down to this.......
1. Its fun
2. Mmos cost more to run
3. I can afford it
4. I am used to it and so is the rest of the herd
Obviously something being fun is not an excuse for charging extra money. A monthly fee should be charged in relation to any extra work or effort involved. I personally find mmos today to be extremely boring and limited (WAR is at the top of my list in that regard at the moment). Does that mean I can pay a smaller monthly fee than everyone else because my enjoyment levels arent as high as other people who are easier to please?
Mmos do also cost more to run......but they definately dont cost as much as people seem to think. These mmos rake in HUGE amounts of money every month which MASSIVELY exceeds their costs. Even WAR which is a pretty terrible game must rake in roughly half a million pounds each month. Obviously server upkeep costs, wages and additional costs cant possibly come anywhere near that much each month. Effectively these P2P mmos are getting profit which is equivelent to reselling the same game constantly for years. Even the worst mmo ever made in history will make more money than the best single player game ever made. A P2P monthly fee doesnt encourage gaming companies to make better games. It does the complete opposite because they know that they will make a massive profit even if the game is crap and they also know that they dont even have to finish making the game because people will continue to pay for it no matter what state its in. They know that the standards people expect are now extremely low. In other words they know their target audience are all suckers which are now addicted to online gaming. They will give them money for anything that works regardless of its quality.
They also know that people can afford it. I can afford it too. However while so many people are gladly handing over their cash every month to these companies regardless of the state of the product, the quality of these mmos is going to continue to be extremely low. This really pisses me off because I want to play a really good mmo and yet for years there havent been any that meet my standards. Instead we keep seeing extremely poor games coming out that satisfy the easy to please masses but do nothing for anyone with half a brain.
People have become used to all of this. Now it has become standard practice to charge extra money each month for games that really arent very good. The enjoyment factor is increased due to the fact that people can talk to each other. Human interaction is being relied on as a source of entertainment in place of good gameplay. People arent paying extra money because the games are good. They are paying extra money because they enjoy socialising. Again the games companies know this. It doesnt matter if the mmos themselves are bad because people will feel drawn to them for social reasons. This happens in work environments too. Even the worst jobs in the world can be made bearable if you have good people around you to share the strain of it all. This is what is happening with mmos as well. Most of them are terrible games and yet people are able to enjoy them because of the human interaction.......remove the chat channels and people will see how awful these mmos actually are.
Wow, touchy?
You are never, ever going to be playing a MMO again, are you? If the beta isn't release worthy? A beta is to test whether or not it is release worthy.
So basicly what you are saying is that because his standards are high and he only wants to pay money for decent mmos, he will never end up playing any mmos because they are all low quality products. Yeah that sounds about right to me. I take my hat off to the guy for being sensible, sticking to his principles and refusing to give money to people that dont deserve it. Why should he pay money for unfinished badly made products anyway?
All he is saying is that mmos should be good games when they are released, not half finished with shit loads of bugs, missing features and badly implemented game mechanics. We shouldnt have to wait for years after they have released to become decent.
Actually when I now see a release date for an mmo I know that it isnt really the release date. Its just the date where the games company starts taking peoples money to play test its product. Its always at least an extra year or two until the game actually reaches its REAL release date where it is a game worth paying money for.
Boobies?
I don't know. I'm still trying to figure out why so many people play WoW. There are tons of free or micro games out there that are so much better.