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f2p mmos that are doing their f2p model wrong
sazabi
Member UncommonPosts: 389
im talking about all mmos - those that started p2p or b2p and then went f2p and those that were f2p from the very start.
some imo are doing it pretty well:
ddo and lotro - you can do a lot of stuff without buying a thing, but if you want more you can either buy or grind the tokens/coins or whatever they are called to get some more content. basically its up to you.
league of legends - you cant buy power in the game, but you can buy boosts to get points faster. also skins for the champions, some of them look pretty awesome, but they are just visual eye-candy and optional.
these mentioned games seem to be getting pretty good income.
however...:
allods - there was lots of hype in this one, but quickly the game lost most of its popularity thanks to completely imbalacing cash shop.
global agenda - increased gold gain, exp gain etc seemed like a fine idea for premiums. also exclusive auction house...
but - f2p players cant buy anything from there. seeing how much excessive resources f2p players could have grinded it seems pretty bad for the players who actually can use auction house. if i wanted to get insane ammount of some resource i could only rely on other premium users which is ofcourse the minority. on top of that there is no traditional trade system which is uncomfortable. to make it even worse you can only trade by mail... which is also a premium feature. connect the dots and you get the severely paralyzed economy not just of f2p players, but premium users as well. so in the end... the whole game economy seems really bad. makes the players really go all for themselves and doesnt promote much cooperation.
world of tanks - you can form groups only with premium. which means that the standart process of 'hey guys lets try this game together' doesnt actually work. you could only TRY playing it with friends by BUYING. again it doesnt really connect the community.
so 2 of these games are anti-community... when community is pretty much the main thing in mmos, while other makes p2p users imbalanced.
what are your thoughts about this? do you think such f2p models can live for long without changes?
personally i dont think so. as far as i heard allods started to change something... the other two just started their f2p lives.
Comments
First, you need to come to the realization that there is no F2P game, but only P2W. Next, you need to accept that they P2W payment model is there to get players to spend money and all future development is designed to around enhancing the item mall. Finally, comes the foresight to see that games with the P2W payment model are not games at all.
what? one of my examples is actually purely against P2W and succeeds at it pretty well, sooooo your argument is invalid.
even the two out of three examples of bad f2p models are actually normal games and you cant buy any imbalancing power there.
also not games at all? some are pretty enjoyable without min-maxing whatever like in DDO.
i wonder which games made you so pesimistic and what you consider a good game.
For a game to be Pay to Win it has to have a few things:
1) It hasd to be PvP focused. That's really the only way you're going to "Win" at anything in a game.
2)It has to have a cash shop.
3)The cash shop has to offer items that give you higher "numbers" than anything else that can be aquired in game.
0118 999 881 999 119 725... 3
I have been playing Global Agenda with my son lately. It is great. Totally free, and there is no "winning" since we are only doing PvE.
still you cant do anything together with your collected loot :P
while completely not my intention of this thread, but global agenda PvE content is extremely limited.
Really? What do you mean? I have been able to either equip or sell my loot?
It is FREE. I don't mind if the PvE content is limited. When i exhaust it, i wil move on to the next game. That is the beauty of a free game. You have ZERO commitment to it.
Doing it wrong in players stand point or wrong in a business stand point.
In a business stand point, they don't care what the players felt as long as they make money.
And quite honestly to the players stand point they want to have the most fun with the least money spent.
Battlestar Galatica Online
Even upgrading npc bought weapons takes cash shop funds, even though you can earn them in game its a extremly slow pace. For example to upgrade a medium cannon takes 100000 cubits, which is roughly 50-70 US and thats just 1 of 6 cannons. never mind other things u need to upgrade on top.
The entire game is like totally pay to win, or pay to even have a fighting chance, its why I quit it, and many other players have quit due to recent patches to make it even HARDER to get the resources you need to advance. The companies other games (its all browser mmo's with pvp) are bascally the same way, 100% pay to win or else you do not have a chance even in pve.
Being a pessimist is a win-win pattern of thinking. If you're a pessimist (I'll admit that I am!) you're either:
A. Proven right (if something bad happens)
or
B. Pleasantly surprised (if something good happens)
Either way, you can't lose! Try it out sometime!
^ That's very true. But since you dont' pay anyway, maybe the game company dont' care that much about you anyway.
People are selfish by nature. Players just want the cheapest entertainment without having to pay. And comapny just want the most money.
LotRO (or really DDO) is a terrible example of a F2P mmorpg that doesn't require you to buy items from the cash shop. Yes, I realize we here at mmorpg.com are in love with the geritol induced World of Warcraft that is LotRO, but I really wish people would stop calling it a great free title.
I have yet to play a F2P MMO that I could stomach for more than a few hours so in my honest opinion I think every F2P MMO is doing it wrong.
"f2p mmos that are doing their f2p model wrong" ALL OF THEM
Cant stand them, really I cant. They take semi ok ideas for mmos and end up ruining them for one reason or another. Either spending money on gear to compete in pvp or pve or its immersion breaking ads...its never good. I wont play a F2P mmo.
League of legends is an excellent Free to play model.
You can buy skins, boots and points to unlock more champions, however you can aquire these points just from playing the game as well. There are free champions you get to play every other week or so and they change so you generally get a chance to play them before you purchase them, unfortunately not all champions are equal in price but they are all viable characters. Its a DOTA style game that blows dota out of the water, This game blows the old dota out of the water and im sure DOTA 2 will adopt alot of its elements like any GOOD game producer.
There are no power buys, you can't buy anything that gives you a significant advantage that no one else couldn't aquire free, it takes more time to get it free but your a business you have to make money some how.... I would love to see MMO's that were free that followed this model.