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Subscription Prices are stupid

pupurunpupurun Member UncommonPosts: 561

I'll cut to the chase. After being an mmo player for many years i came to a conclusion that the majority of mmo companies simply copy the common price of 14,99 $ or 12.99 euro and don't actually have a logical and suitable price for their product.

I can't accept that games like Xsyon or Aerravan(both low budget indie and underdeveloped games) ask for same sub price as Wow or Everquest 2 etc.How can a game created by tens of devs ask for the same price as games made by 4-6 people? On the other hand i also can't believe some companies that ask for a full price monthly subscription when their updates are rare(Vanguard). And pls don't start about server maintenance cost and shit like that. Subs that high should mainly include often updates and fixes.Another factor should be "age" and population of a mmo.I can't believe that some older titles still ask the same money when their development rate and main pop has been 1/10 of what it used to be!

On the other hand there is a global financial recession and this should alarm the mmo developers.Why don't they lower the standard 14.99 price on the AAA mmos?

Let's see if better prices would make people subscribe to some games(pls take in mind that a cheaper sub would also make many people subscribe to their 2nd mmo of choice without canceling their main game)

p.s. All prices are subjective and according to my personal taste, pls don't bash.

The purpose of this poll is mainly to see how/which games would gain extra subscribers if they'd lower their price.

Pls do not refer to subscription plans.I am refering on the monthly subscription as a basis

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Comments

  • KilmarKilmar Member UncommonPosts: 844

    I wouldnt pay 10 cent for playing wow, but I'm fine with the EQ2 fee. So your point isnt valid.

  • inBOILinBOIL Member Posts: 669

    swtor 49,99 buy to play without monthly fees.



     

    Generation P

  • romanator0romanator0 Member Posts: 2,382

    Originally posted by inBOIL

    swtor 49,99 buy to play without monthly fees.



     

    I might have actually been interested in the game if it was like that.

    image

  • marinridermarinrider Member UncommonPosts: 1,556

    Originally posted by romanator0

    Originally posted by inBOIL

    swtor 49,99 buy to play without monthly fees.



     

    I might have actually been interested in the game if it was like that.

    Agree!

     

    *sigh* I dont trust bioware to not be greedy anymore, just like I no longer trust Blizzard.

  • haratuharatu Member UncommonPosts: 409

    I should point out that from what I have been seeing on the market, subscription fees are generally a bit cheaper than they used to, but a lot of the savings made are more in the bundles offered. While monthly may be similar, the bundles hold value, many games offering a year subscription at half price (in some cases more than half price).

  • Merlin1977Merlin1977 Member Posts: 168

    I don't mind paying a monthly sub as long as the game is worth it, at the end of the day when i get bored with an mmo i just cancel my account, done it with WoW, EVE, Aion to name but a few.  

     

    Price wise though, i don't mind paying sub £10 a month for a subscription but if SWTOR is coming out for $17.90 (no idea where the op got this price from) then i may not bother buying it.

  • pupurunpupurun Member UncommonPosts: 561

    Originally posted by Merlin1977

    I don't mind paying a monthly sub as long as the game is worth it, at the end of the day when i get bored with an mmo i just cancel my account, done it with WoW, EVE, Aion to name but a few.  

     

    Price wise though, i don't mind paying sub £10 a month for a subscription but if SWTOR is coming out for $17.90 (no idea where the op got this price from) then i may not bother buying it.

    As i said in my starting post, sub prices are purely subjective and come through my pov.As far as the SWTOR price..well that was sort of a trick question.I want to see if there would be anyone willing to pay MORE than usual for one of the most hyped mmos to come...

  • MurlockDanceMurlockDance Member Posts: 1,223

    I like the OP's ideas but not the poll. If you're a gamer who has several subs, the poll doesn't reflect this.

    I agree about lowering subs on games that are old and have extremely low populations with little dev time on them. Vanguard certainly fits that bill, and I don't think it's worth a $14/month sub fee. I know it's sticky for SoE to change it because of the Station Pass, but I wonder if the game would be played at all if it weren't for that, despite it being a pretty ok MMO. Vanguard is one I'd go back to if it was $5/month for sure.

    I wouldn't put EVE, EQ2, or Rift on that list.

    EVE is not low population and sees considerable development. It fully warrants a $15/month fee, though I think EVE is a little expensive for its European players (we pay 15 euros/month). There are alternate ways to pay for it though, namely with PLEXes.

    Rift is brandnew and shouldn't be on that list. Plus they offered a founder's sub. I can't remember if it included the monthly fee since I went with the three month one.

    For EQ2, the Live servers have some population issues, but SoE just lowered the monthly price to 12 euros/month. Freeport server is doing very well and offers different payment plans. The game sees considerable development and lots of events.

    Playing MUDs and MMOs since 1994.

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  • skullquakerskullquaker Member UncommonPosts: 311

    missed out the all time rip off from funcom AO  THEY CHARGE 14.99  and still have a cash shop  

  • Merlin1977Merlin1977 Member Posts: 168

    Originally posted by pupurun

    Originally posted by Merlin1977

    I don't mind paying a monthly sub as long as the game is worth it, at the end of the day when i get bored with an mmo i just cancel my account, done it with WoW, EVE, Aion to name but a few.  

     

    Price wise though, i don't mind paying sub £10 a month for a subscription but if SWTOR is coming out for $17.90 (no idea where the op got this price from) then i may not bother buying it.

    As i said in my starting post, sub prices are purely subjective and come through my pov.As far as the SWTOR price..well that was sort of a trick question.I want to see if there would be anyone willing to pay MORE than usual for one of the most hyped mmos to come...

    Ah ok, seems from the poll that a fair few would pay that mind you, myself, I still stand by my £10/$16 sub maximum price (the $16 dollars is based on current exchange rates) as i'm much more a casual player nowadays.

  • fivorothfivoroth Member UncommonPosts: 3,916

     

    The sub itself is like real cheap. In the UK if you go out, you will spend more than 10 quid in one night. A lot more most likely.

    If you think about it, $14.99 doesn't have the same value as it did 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8+ years ago. If anything, subs should go up because of inflation etc.

    Most of the games in your poll should either have their servers shut down or they should get rid of the sub altogether.


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  • whilanwhilan Member UncommonPosts: 3,472

    Personally i'd rather not pay more for a game as is in swtor case, but if it's either pay more for a game i like or pay less for a game i don't like or are bored of.  I'll pay the higher fee.  Least there while it's more expensive and i may be wasting some of my money, if i'm paying for a game i don't like. I'm wasting all of my money.  Just to note this is a last restort for me paying a higher sub fee for a game.

    With that in regard, so far pricing for SW:ToR hasn't been released but i'd gather it be the same as everything else to stay competative.  You know how companies are.  They only charge higher if they think people will pay it, right now the MMo market is pretty stable with that price of $15 as the OP pointed out.

    Frankly myself i'd prefer it to stay that way.  IF you start flucating the prices, then things can go lower (which is good) but then it equally could go higher (as was the example for SW:ToR), which i'm not a fan of...It's a slippery slope i'd prefer not to start sliding down on.  Before you know it cause of gas prices...taxes...and what not we could end up paying 20 25 or even 30 dollars a month for the service to access this game.

    That will kill the industry faster then a bad game ever could.  Myself i'd prefer to keep it right at 15 dollars. It's worked that way before i'm still okay with it now.  Just my opinion of course.

    Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.

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  • YalexyYalexy Member UncommonPosts: 1,058

    Either you have a monthly subscription or you have box-sales, but not both at the same time and certainly I'm not going to pay for expansions either.

    It's not the monthly subscription, but it's the boxes and expansions that's a ripoff imho.

    So. In a MMO like EvE Online, where you simply download the client, start paying the monthly sub for your account and then get all expansions for free etc the monthly subscription of $15 is fully acceptable.

    In a MMO like WoW however, where you need to pay for every new expansion and even the initial client (full account creation) the monthly subscription shouldn't exceed $10/month.

  • fivorothfivoroth Member UncommonPosts: 3,916

    Originally posted by Yalexy

    Either you have a monthly subscription or you have box-sales, but not both at the same time and certainly I'm not going to pay for expansions either.

    It's not the monthly subscription, but it's the boxes and expansions that's a ripoff imho.

    So. In a MMO like EvE Online, where you simply download the client, start paying the monthly sub for your account and then get all expansions for free etc the monthly subscription of $15 is fully acceptable.

    In a MMO like WoW however, where you need to pay for every new expansion and even the initial client (full account creation) the monthly subscription shouldn't exceed $10/month.

    WoW charges for all the expacs and the original game because it is the most popular MMO and people will pay for it.

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  • LanfeaLanfea Member UncommonPosts: 223

    nowadays i really would like if more mmorpgs go with the 'buy to play model' like guildwars and i don't mind to pay for bigger content add ons / updates / expansions especially when i see the lack of content in newer games. also i would like to see that old mmorpgs instead of turning into a f2p / freemium game go to b2p with an cashshop and include old players f.e. like this:

     

    "dear customer, you bought XYZ in 2004, purchased the expansion sets A, B, C and D and were a loyal fan and subscriber for 37 months. as a little gift for all your support (and money) you spend in our product your account is reopened and is converted into a life time free to play one."

     

    well, just imagine eq2 did that. instead of going f2p they had sold the standard version of the game for 10 $, any minor expansion also for 10 $ and got a lot of old players back into this game. what would happend?

  • ukforzeukforze Member Posts: 331

    pity the poll didnt have more options :)

    my choice would of been "i would pay to play any of the listed games".

     

    The only game that i would consider looking at on that list is SWTOR but if  it is $17.90

    as the OP suggested theres no way i will even look at it no matter how good it is.

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  • waveslayerwaveslayer Member UncommonPosts: 507

    well if you cant pay the 15 bucks a month to play a game that you get countless hours of entertainment from then dont, there are several good games for free, but me and many others find monthly fees to be no problem, I would actually pay more in many games if that would get me a server without the stupid idiot names and conversions in world chat.

    I guess this topic has to come up once every couple months here.

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  • CookieTimeCookieTime Member Posts: 353

    None of those? Also lol @swtor price since it's not even out yet. *sigh*

    No game should have more than a 5€/$ monthly imo. Even with a small playerbase, that should be more than enough to cover anything.

    Eat me!

  • korvasskorvass Member Posts: 616

    Putting aside the arguments of whether a particular game is worth a particular subscription price, I don't think subs in general are unfair.

    A standard AAA subscription price pretty much amounts to only .50 cents per day.. that's not really very much at all for the hours you get.

    I don't really see a good way to argue the worth of individual games and their pricing policies. Simply put, a product's price is set at whatever the creating company believes it is worth. The only thing you can do as a customer, is agree or disagree and go elsewhere.

  • MumboJumboMumboJumbo Member UncommonPosts: 3,219

    Interesting experiment OP. I think there is a level at which I would gladly sub. That level depends: Is this MMO "my dream mmo"? If so it's very negotiable, if not the subbing option is not as interesting as B2P.

  • DarkPonyDarkPony Member Posts: 5,566

    Weird poll.

    But I agree there is a severe lack of competition in the pricing department and some games not being worth the same 15 bucks as others.

    I guess it is in all companies' interest to keep it at the high $15 point, seeing how sub revenues are so much higher than box sales / digital dl income over say, a year of operating.

    Example:

    250k $60 boxes sold with a 33% profit margin: 5 million

    250k $60 digital dl's with a 100% profit: 15 million

    ---------------------------------------------------------- +

    = 20 million in game sales

    ----------------------------------------------------------

    300k average subs throughout the year: 300k x 11 (all subs have a free month) x $15 = 49,5 million sub income, so around 70% of total income over a year.

    After a year the % of income of subs gets even higher.

     

    Conclusion: going into a price war over sub payments could have a huge impact on everyone's profit margins.

  • MumboJumboMumboJumbo Member UncommonPosts: 3,219

    Originally posted by DarkPony

    Weird poll.

    But I agree there is a severe lack of competition in the pricing department and some games not being worth the same 15 bucks as others.

    I guess it is in all companies' interest to keep it at the high $15 point, seeing how sub revenues are so much higher than box sales / digital dl income over say, a year of operating.

    Example:

    250k $60 boxes sold with a 33% profit margin: 5 million

    250k $60 digital dl's with a 100% profit: 15 million

    ---------------------------------------------------------- +

    = 20 million in game sales

    ----------------------------------------------------------

    300k average subs throughout the year: 300k x 11 (all subs have a free month) x $15 = 49,5 million sub income

    After a year the % of income of subs gets even higher.

     

    Conclusion: going into a price war over sub payments could have a huge impact on everyone's profit margins.

    ^Sometimes money really does do the talking!! Well said.

  • kitaradkitarad Member LegendaryPosts: 7,885

    I don't mind paying $20 for SWTOR

  • ruonimruonim Member Posts: 251

    mmo is profitable with subs set to 0,1$ a month.

  • Slapshot1188Slapshot1188 Member LegendaryPosts: 16,947

    Originally posted by pupurun

    Originally posted by Merlin1977

    I don't mind paying a monthly sub as long as the game is worth it, at the end of the day when i get bored with an mmo i just cancel my account, done it with WoW, EVE, Aion to name but a few.  

     

    Price wise though, i don't mind paying sub £10 a month for a subscription but if SWTOR is coming out for $17.90 (no idea where the op got this price from) then i may not bother buying it.

    As i said in my starting post, sub prices are purely subjective and come through my pov.As far as the SWTOR price..well that was sort of a trick question.I want to see if there would be anyone willing to pay MORE than usual for one of the most hyped mmos to come...

     Your trick question is created in a useless way.  It is setup so that only one choice can be made...  So what if I am willing to pay 4.99 for DAoC and 17.99 for SW:TOR?

     

    Poll is just going to create useless data.

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