ScrapTower wrote:
P2P going F2P is exactly that. A failure. A desperate cash grab from developers and investors, because the business model that the game was designed for didn't work. It didn't work because the game sucked quite frankly. The game simply was not good enough to keep people paying monthly subscriptions. It's a way for a failing game to actually generate some revenue before it dies. I'd hardly call it more successful. F2P is not the "modern" MMO business model that many people like to call it. It's only "modern" because literally all of the recent MMOs have failed, and almost all of them started out P2P.
Edited, Jul 30th 2013 11:21pm by ScrapTower
nope, you're way oversimplifying things, and because of that, you're basically incorrect. You're starting from an incorrect hypothesis (ie, going F2P = fail) and trying to fit the facts to that hypothesis, instead of the hypothesis to the facts.
Argue all you want, but facts are facts. LOTRO has been around for years, precisely because it switched to the f2p model. Since the servers are still running, and Turbine is still collecting revenue, and people are still enjoying it, that is called a "successful game".
SWTOR did not go F2P because it was "simply not good enough". It went F2P because their sub-based business model couldn't cover the outstandingly huge budget of the game in addition to expansions/new content.
It doesn't matter what you call it, or how you get your facts incorrect, many games are thriving on the F2P model now. I don't particularly like most F2P models, but I'm not so blind as to ignore the trend when it's stacking cash right in front of me. Like it or not, F2P with micro-transactions is a proven method to bring in more revenue than most sub-based P2P models.
edit: thanks but no thanks for your wall-o-yoshi-quoted-text. I actually agree with Yoshi's reasons for staying sub-based, but that has very little to do with the conversation we're having here. Keep in mind that SE doesn't need to answer to investors. They don't need to go F2P because they 1. have a dedicated fan base that they can count on to play their game, and 2. have incoming revenue from multiple other sources so they don't need the "cash-grab". Again, none of this changes the fact that, for many games, F2P is the best model from a business perspective.
Edited, Jul 30th 2013 11:31pm by Llester Edited, Jul 30th 2013 11:42pm by Llester