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Bonus Round: State of the Industry
- Thread starter SolidSnakex
- Start date
Grampa Simpson
Banned
The Korean MMO pay to pimp out model isn't really suited for a lot of the gametypes that we enjoy right now.
I suppose it works well in an RPG sense......There were times when I thought it would be nice in Fallout 3 for weapons that didn't wear out and didn't have to be repaired. That would have been something that I could have seen myself paying money for. $5 for a super-ruggedized version of this weapon or that weapon.
Edit - or $5 in any stat-tree based RPG to reroll my stats. I'm X hours into an RPG and I don't like what I've done with my stat point, it would be worth my $5 to be able to reassign them. Especially if I'm working 40 hours a week and can only afford a few hours a week towards my hobby.
I suppose it works well in an RPG sense......There were times when I thought it would be nice in Fallout 3 for weapons that didn't wear out and didn't have to be repaired. That would have been something that I could have seen myself paying money for. $5 for a super-ruggedized version of this weapon or that weapon.
Edit - or $5 in any stat-tree based RPG to reroll my stats. I'm X hours into an RPG and I don't like what I've done with my stat point, it would be worth my $5 to be able to reassign them. Especially if I'm working 40 hours a week and can only afford a few hours a week towards my hobby.
get2sammyb said:
Well as a gamer thats kind of to be expected, I dont think anyone misunderstood that the guys suggestions would be less friendly to us gamers than the current system.
I think the issue is, that Im starting to become more open to something a little less friendly to me, if it can stop all of the fucking studios from closing. A more long distance view if you will. I mean guys, this shit cant keep going on as is, the market will retract like a motherfucker and in the end fighting tooth and nail to keep the shit the same will bite us in the ass when all we have to play is derivative bullshit the studios deemed 'safe' and not risky. All this DLC fumbling about is just the studios trying to find a way to generate what they need to survive.
If you guys are going to bitch and moan about the possibility of next gen NOT taking as huge a graphical leap as this one did, and complain about the possibility of Sony and MS pulling a Wii, and demand that the games are longer and have more content without costing more in the vein of dlc, and complain about games jumping from 49.99 to 59.99 this gen. Then your going to have to be reasonable fucking adults and realize that the costs of making those games is going to increase substantially. You dont want to pay more, but that kinda creates a problem.....The studios have to be profitable to continue. So you had better open your mind to some of the least damaging compromises or GTFO, because gaming seems to be outgrowing the model its existed on in the past.
gerg said:
No. People are allowed to farm gold, but they aren't allowed to sell it. Big difference. Gold selling causes a huge threat to individual server economy. It ruins the auction house, a key role in the economy, and it ruins the value to items that have no business being over priced. This affects every single person on the server, and practically makes the auction house unusable because someone owns the auction house because he bought enough money to control the prices. It ruins the game play experience, and blizzard doesn't want that.
Also, buying items to give an unfair advantage is a bad business model. It ruined Gunbound completely because people who payed for high level items, completely outclassed every single player playing that game when Korean micro transaction bullshit came into play.
vocab said:
I think I used the wrong word. My mistake.
I'm not sure if it is, indeed, the same practice, but the process I was referring to was the process of paying someone to essentially play the game for you, and thus level your character to a certain point. Is that goldmining? What would be the correct term for that?
In any case, thinking the matter over, is it the case that Blizzard is against that practice? Upon reflection it would seem that they shouldn't be, as at the end of the day someone is still playing the game for X hours at a time.
gerg said:
No. That's called power leveling. It's paying someone else to do the bullshit you once did on your other character. It has it's pros and con, but It really has no threat to blizzards business model. They are still getting payed that subscription money. While it is illegal, people don't want to do that bullshit again. That's the flaw of the game really.
gerg said:
Its not gold mining, but it is equally as illegal as is selling gold for real life currency. You will be perm banned for doing either of them. They used to give warnings (which I never agreed with) but have since realized the only way to cut into it is perm bans for any offenses.
Puncture said:
What's Blizzard's rationale for this?
Do exchange rates and variations in pricing mean that they make less money from a person in China playing the game for 10 hours than someone in the US doing so?
Anyway, power leveling was the process to which I was referring to, and about which I believe most people wouldn't mind were it allowed.
Wouldn't the fact that you could "buy" your way to prestige, turn people away from Call of Duty instead of making more people come towards it?
And then people could just play the free portions, not buy anything ever. That's not going to make them any money. That entire business model is fucked because it assumes people will pay for little things if the entire game is free.
He really ticked me off when he kept flat out denying that it was not cheating.
"We can have people pay to get ahead?"
Person A: But isn't that cheating.
"NU UH"
Person B: No I'm pretty sure it is...
"NO IT ISNT OKAY GOSH"
And then people could just play the free portions, not buy anything ever. That's not going to make them any money. That entire business model is fucked because it assumes people will pay for little things if the entire game is free.
He really ticked me off when he kept flat out denying that it was not cheating.
"We can have people pay to get ahead?"
Person A: But isn't that cheating.
"NU UH"
Person B: No I'm pretty sure it is...
"NO IT ISNT OKAY GOSH"
Tylahedras
Banned
If World of Warcraft was a 60$ game that was free to play in perpetuity I might buy it. I don't because it's not, and that's money they've lost, meanwhile they make a fortune on the people that do.
They are welcome to make that trade off, but there's only one game that's done it successfully, and take note that it's basically completely taken over it's genre. I will not be paying monthly fees, any publisher that goes that route with any genre will lose my money and someone who doesn't will gain it.
I have a feeling I'm not alone in that. Se let COD: MW3 be pay to play, I'll just play Battlefield BC3 instead.
They are welcome to make that trade off, but there's only one game that's done it successfully, and take note that it's basically completely taken over it's genre. I will not be paying monthly fees, any publisher that goes that route with any genre will lose my money and someone who doesn't will gain it.
I have a feeling I'm not alone in that. Se let COD: MW3 be pay to play, I'll just play Battlefield BC3 instead.
I didn't really understand everything that was going on (wtf was the football analogy about?)
Anyhoo, I wouldn't mind it if games had a lower price up front and then gave people the option to either earn stuff by playing or buying those rewards if they don't have the time.
Let's say you buy MW2, you play it for 50 hours and unlock a bunch of content (maps, guns etc) but the more casual player who just wants to jump on and play can buy those things if they want. You could have extra incentives to show you've earned them like Shane was saying about the little prestige emblems if that matters to people
The point is getting that up front price as low as possible so more people will try more games and then go on and buy/play the ones they like.
Maybe if the game proves to be popular the developers can go on and make more stuff for it instead of a situation where they spend years building a game that bombs. If they only need to build say half of it up front to test the waters then that's a better situation for some, no? Give developers/publisher a chance to take more risk because you don't need to commit 100% to a project until it's proven.
Anyhoo, I wouldn't mind it if games had a lower price up front and then gave people the option to either earn stuff by playing or buying those rewards if they don't have the time.
Let's say you buy MW2, you play it for 50 hours and unlock a bunch of content (maps, guns etc) but the more casual player who just wants to jump on and play can buy those things if they want. You could have extra incentives to show you've earned them like Shane was saying about the little prestige emblems if that matters to people
The point is getting that up front price as low as possible so more people will try more games and then go on and buy/play the ones they like.
Maybe if the game proves to be popular the developers can go on and make more stuff for it instead of a situation where they spend years building a game that bombs. If they only need to build say half of it up front to test the waters then that's a better situation for some, no? Give developers/publisher a chance to take more risk because you don't need to commit 100% to a project until it's proven.
Puncture said:
Many games are not profitable because they don't sell because nobody wants to play them. Making them cost even more is just going to cause them to sell even less.
It's not completely a matter of games not being priced high enough, it is a matter of not understanding the markets(or making shit games).
And individual games not making a profit is not the only reason many of these publishers are not being profitable. EA has been horribly mismanaged these last few years for example. Contrary to belief, most games do not need to sell millions to be profitable.
Yes, amount of DLC will increase, but there is not going to be, nor need to be, a gigantic shift in the pricing model of video games.
DidntKnowJack
Member
But how would all of this relate to single player only games? (If at all?) Because we've seen publishers try episodic. And aside from Telltale, has anyone done it right?
Chip N Chance
Member
In terms of pay to play Call of Duty games, i could see people paying for EXP multipliers. Instead of charging for guns, you would just get a 3x multiplier on all your experience points earned. Sort of the way Farm Ville works. Personally i'm turned off by the idea, but people would do it. I also think that pay to play games arnt that bad of an idea. Its just that Microsoft is already charging people to play, so publishers are to afraid to add on top of it.
I think that MAG had potential to be the first console game to pioneer this idea. Leading up to this game i was always anticipating Sony to announce something along the those lines, but it never panned out.
I think that MAG had potential to be the first console game to pioneer this idea. Leading up to this game i was always anticipating Sony to announce something along the those lines, but it never panned out.
Jeels said:
It depends how you define "cheating".
There will be an advantage in that some people arrive at or are able to use a certain aspect of the game quicker than others - although the argument would be that people do this already - but people wouldn't be able to access (or have access to) certain aspects of the game by paying for them that those who don't pay for anything would never see.
DidntKnowJack said:
Maybe this model wouldn't fit single-player games all that well. However, I don't see why that's a bad thing; I don't think that we should be looking for a "one size fits all" glove here.
I think that single-player games could benefit from an iTunes model: pay $X each for segments of it, but pay slightly less when all these segments are bought together as a single unit.
gerg said:
Right, I am defining paying to get ahead (meaning, you don't have to play the game like everyone else) [getting ahead in a game will no longer be based on skill and time put into to attain such skill - it will be based on the former, as well as how rich or willing to pay money someone is] - as cheating.
I like the way Jason thinks. But surely it would be better in lets say a single player game is you get the first chapter free then if you want more you can pay for more.
To take it into a handheld game the way Jason was talking about getting a high level character - hell if Nintendo could sell you level 100 pokemon characters. Or Capcom selling high level Monster Hunter characters they would theres just not the infrastructure yet.
To take it into a handheld game the way Jason was talking about getting a high level character - hell if Nintendo could sell you level 100 pokemon characters. Or Capcom selling high level Monster Hunter characters they would theres just not the infrastructure yet.
DidntKnowJack
Member
Linkified said:
God, I hope they don't do that. Unless, like I said, that's a choice gamers have and not the only means to get new sp games.
fizzelopeguss
Banned
This rubin guy likes the sound of his own voice i think.
Eteric Rice
Member
gerg said:
There are servers where you can buy gold and items in EQ.
No one plays on those servers.
I (like most people) pay for content. Offer more content and I will pay more money. I will not pay more money for a prestige emblem. Granted, some people would, but I have faith most people would not.
I suppose there is model where you can unlock new content for free by reaching certain objectives. However if you are unable to reach those objectives or don't have the time to do so, you can pay more money to jump ahead to that new content; it might work.
Imagine, if by meeting objectives of the single player game you unlock weapons, maps, abilities in the mulitplayer game. OR, you could just pay some money and unlock all the multiplayer stuff right away. Most people would just play through the single player and unlock everything, but a certain percentage of people will just pay. Say if you bought the game in order to play online with friends, but they already have everything, you may be compelled to pay up and be on par with friends. The developer will make more money with this model and I don't think it would piss anyone off because the content is available for free anyway.
Of course the developer can only make more money if the game is actually good. Otherwise nobodies going to pay a penny more for the crappy game.
I suppose there is model where you can unlock new content for free by reaching certain objectives. However if you are unable to reach those objectives or don't have the time to do so, you can pay more money to jump ahead to that new content; it might work.
Imagine, if by meeting objectives of the single player game you unlock weapons, maps, abilities in the mulitplayer game. OR, you could just pay some money and unlock all the multiplayer stuff right away. Most people would just play through the single player and unlock everything, but a certain percentage of people will just pay. Say if you bought the game in order to play online with friends, but they already have everything, you may be compelled to pay up and be on par with friends. The developer will make more money with this model and I don't think it would piss anyone off because the content is available for free anyway.
Of course the developer can only make more money if the game is actually good. Otherwise nobodies going to pay a penny more for the crappy game.
Eteric Rice said:
If you'll read more of my posts you'll see that I incorrectly used the term "goldmining" when I meant to refer to "powerlevelling".
Jeels said:
On this view, why is "being better at something because I have more time to do it" then permissible? Inequalities will always exist; I am not sure why the inequality of having more money is so bad if it doesn't fundamentally ruin the gaming experience.
DidntKnowJack said:
You need to remember either theres fewer games out because game preproduction is longer and therefore end up in tighter experiences and can make more cash for the publishers.
Or you put in this method of paying extra after the first level to get game devs to create tighter experiences.
DidntKnowJack
Member
I guess I just don't accept that those are my only options. Because if it is, then I'll just stop buying altogether. I don't want any publisher to go out of business, but only up to a certain point do I ever put what they want/need over my (albeit selfish) wants and needs as a consumer.
DidntKnowJack said:
So you don't want to pay less for games?
Assuming the Farmville method is widely adopted amongst a certain genre (ie. multiplayer games) how would the situation substantially worsen for you, as a consumer? There'd be no difference in content for paying and non-paying customers, and you'd likely get more games for less money. I'm struggling to see much of a downside here.
Isn't it kind of odd that they used the Saboteur as their primary example of a "risk-taking" game? Granted I don't know everything about it, but from what gameplay I have seen thanks to youtube and live streams, it basically struck me as a mission-based open-world game very similar to Grand Theft Auto, just set in a different time period. If that's really what's being considered as a big risk nowadays, then the industry really is in trouble.
Rubin seemed to switch gears halfway through his talk, going away from paying based on time and towards paying for advanced unlocks. The former might make sense to an extent, but only if they handled it very very carefully. I sure as hell don't want to be paying to play by the hour, since there wouldn't be a time I turned on my system that money didn't come right to mind. Monthly subscriptions could work, but that makes it exceptionally hard on people who play a little of a lot of games.
Paying to unlock stuff you could otherwise earn through the game has been around for quite a while, and I don't have a huge problem with that, especially if it reduces the up-front cost of games. Besides, if the act of playing the game isn't fun enough that you'd rather pay cash to bypass it, then maybe you shouldn't be playing that game to begin with. That's why the market for something like WoW character-leveling doesn't make sense to me. If grinding your way through dungeons and leveling your own character up isn't enjoyable, play something else.
Rubin seemed to switch gears halfway through his talk, going away from paying based on time and towards paying for advanced unlocks. The former might make sense to an extent, but only if they handled it very very carefully. I sure as hell don't want to be paying to play by the hour, since there wouldn't be a time I turned on my system that money didn't come right to mind. Monthly subscriptions could work, but that makes it exceptionally hard on people who play a little of a lot of games.
Paying to unlock stuff you could otherwise earn through the game has been around for quite a while, and I don't have a huge problem with that, especially if it reduces the up-front cost of games. Besides, if the act of playing the game isn't fun enough that you'd rather pay cash to bypass it, then maybe you shouldn't be playing that game to begin with. That's why the market for something like WoW character-leveling doesn't make sense to me. If grinding your way through dungeons and leveling your own character up isn't enjoyable, play something else.
DidntKnowJack
Member
gerg said:
I don't want digitally distributed content. Or, as little of it as possible. Because 10 years down the road, or however long it is, that shit won't run anymore. I'd gladly pay more for content I get to keep forever.
Baki
Member
The FarmVille model cannot solely support the industry. Simply because it restricts the type of games that can be created, in addition to the fact that it only caters to a certain demographic.
I do however believe that it is a model that can co-exist with other models within the industry.
I do however believe that it is a model that can co-exist with other models within the industry.
SolidSnakex
Member
gerg said:
Because gamers like bragging rights. Look at the popularity of trophies and achievements this generation. If you could just go and buy those trophies or achievements to have them added to your collection instead of earning them, it would take away from their appeal.
Baki said:
Well sure. But no single model can support the whole industry.
SolidSnakex said:
I'm not sure how this model poses any threats to achievements as they are. If it does, however, the solution is to just use different achievements - instead of recognising the unlocking of a certain aspect, recognise particular acts of skill that are the same invariably of how much money one person has spent on a game.
DidntKnowJack said:
And, as I have said before, the Farmville model in question doesn't seem to necessitate a transition to digitally-distributed content.
DidntKnowJack
Member
Well, I was responding to someone talking about single player games distributed chapter by chapter. If not distributed digitally, how else would they be distributed? By disc? I don't want 10 discs for one game either.gerg said:
SolidSnakex
Member
gerg said:
I wasn't talking about someone getting trophies or achievements a cheap way through buying rankings. My point is that being able to buy a high ranking would be similar to being able to buy trophies or achievements. If you're able to just buy the highest ranking in Modern Warfare 2 rather than earning it then it just waters the rank down because anyone that wants it can get it. This obviously won't be a big deal for those that don't give a shit about things like trophies or achievements, as they probably won't care about what rankings people have in actual games. But for those that do care about that stuff, and there are many of them, they're going to take issue with being able to get there a cheap way.
The other factor is that with rankings in something like MW2, you also get perks and weapons that actually make you better. This was part of Geoff and Shane's point. Rubin kept denying that you're paying to make yourself better at the game, but that's exactly what would be happening if you could buy rankings.
I thought Jason was spot on in Episode 1, but couldn't follow all of his points this episode.
To me, what the industry needs to continue to expand are support for a lot of different pricing structures. Downloadable games have really helped to provide other price points, etc.
And Steam's ability to temporarily lower prices seems to be a really powerful tool.
EDIT: Further, its not the Modern Warfares or the Farmvilles that are the issue, it is the games that don't have quite as big of a budget but are compared (fairly) to other full price games, or that the whole next gen development cost structure is so risky.
Having a elongated/stabilized console generation would seem to allow for tools to lower costs, so maybe that will help.
To me, what the industry needs to continue to expand are support for a lot of different pricing structures. Downloadable games have really helped to provide other price points, etc.
And Steam's ability to temporarily lower prices seems to be a really powerful tool.
EDIT: Further, its not the Modern Warfares or the Farmvilles that are the issue, it is the games that don't have quite as big of a budget but are compared (fairly) to other full price games, or that the whole next gen development cost structure is so risky.
Having a elongated/stabilized console generation would seem to allow for tools to lower costs, so maybe that will help.
RPGCrazied
Member
anyone else think shane is annoying? bring garrett back, he is a good talker
Lasthope106
Member
I expected nothing less from Mr. Rubin. He is clearly a businessman, and is only concerned with figuring out how to make more money.
Over the past few months I've been thinking that all businesses operate on the assumption that there will always be growth. That is clearly not the case, and as we can now witness the game industry is suffering from over-saturation. Too many good companies making too many good games. In my case it has gotten to the point where I can't just only buy the best releases of the year because there are just too many. Something has to give, and I don't believe micro transactions will solve the problem.
Over the past few months I've been thinking that all businesses operate on the assumption that there will always be growth. That is clearly not the case, and as we can now witness the game industry is suffering from over-saturation. Too many good companies making too many good games. In my case it has gotten to the point where I can't just only buy the best releases of the year because there are just too many. Something has to give, and I don't believe micro transactions will solve the problem.
rezuth said:
So give an unlock for all the weapons in MW2 maybe £10 to do that, and maybe £10 for all the basic perks unlocked.
To say this is some form of cheating is ridiculous becuase they would still need to get their rank on the leaderboard up. And you could still level up and unlock prestige.
EarsOfASnake
Gold Member
In theory I would love to use a pay for play model, with all the games I play there is always going to be content I will miss. Paying for only the content I saw would be great if the value of content in the game was directly proportional to the price I payed. However a pay for play model wouldn't simply be a conversion of the current price structure so as to be fair to the consumer. If a car in Forza 3 is equal to X% of the game price am I going to see that price taken away for the overall product? No, I won't end up paying $50 for a game because I don't use 80 cars. Instead I will be charged $90 because I only wanted to drive 50 of them on 2 circuits because they will associate a $3 per car download price as the value of each car you could own. They want you to pay full price for a game that you only see 50% but to the player it is 100% of an experience because they made it so. It will always be spun to the consumer that you only pay for what you want, so it must be cheaper for you.
Mr Rubin definitely knows his market inside and out but it's apples to oranges in terms of the different segments of the video game market. Your not going to be able to sell an 'epic', 'movie like' experience in a 'casual' piecemeal fashion. You can't have it both ways and I think companies would rather push the brand and image rather than sacrifice that in the hope that people will pay only for what they want.
Mr Rubin definitely knows his market inside and out but it's apples to oranges in terms of the different segments of the video game market. Your not going to be able to sell an 'epic', 'movie like' experience in a 'casual' piecemeal fashion. You can't have it both ways and I think companies would rather push the brand and image rather than sacrifice that in the hope that people will pay only for what they want.
NeoUltima said:
Yeah well, thats where you and I disagree. We will see, but its been about 4 years now, and the shits horrible. I have seen nothing that leads me to believe the status quo with the exception of "lol make better games" is going to remain sustainable for a large portion of the industry. Essentially what Im getting from what you posted is "everything is fine" and it couldnt be farther from the truth IMO.
Essentially people are buying cheats, whether it's single player or multiplayer, the end result is cheapening the actual achievement of finishing a SP game or ranking up in MP, the reality is that people will buy such cheats and publishers will exploit it, it's like EA selling in-game dollars.
Lasthope106 said:
The problem is it costs too much to make a game, THAT's what making the industry unsustainable, there's a few solutions:
1) Find a way to make games cheaper, such as paying C/D-tier teams to make games instead of funding large A/B-tier teams with time and resources, like Activision is handing GH to Vicarious Vision, or like outsourcing part of the development to cheaper countries like Ubisoft, or farm an IP to third-party work-for-hire developers like Capcom is planning to do with their IPs. The problem is that letting less talented teams handle IPs is the games won't have the same quality, the question is whether people would notice or if they do notice, care.
2) Find a way to charge more, whether through subscriptions or DLCs, nickel and dime for everything.
Ultimately the problem is that for the same amount of content, because of the level of detail HD game consoles are capable of these days, it simply takes more man-hours to make the same amount of content now as it did 5 years ago, the graphical advances HD consoles have made IS MAKING IT WORSE.