EA CEO Riccitiello on SWTOR, F2P and their shift in business model
EA CEO John Riccitiello talks about the shift of EA's business model towards microtransactions, Free to Play,SWTOR and more. ~RantGaming.com
(EA, FIFA, Industry, PC, Star Wars:The Old Republic, Wii U)
Since Guild Wars 2 is the biggest MMO to come and it's F2P, many MMOs will loose players. They should consider going F2P or lower their monthly-fee. The same applies to other games.
Yeah I could see FFXI at least merging a few servers (still kind of surprised almost each sees at least 2k each day). I think the best bet would be trying to lower the monthly fee and then seeing what happens from there.
I opened up a Steam account for my son the other day, so he could play some of these free to play games. Two hours later he asked me if he could have £2.50 to buy some extras on there.
I told him he couldn't, he had a strop about it. And then I pushed him out of his window. I didn't really, but it just showed me how easy it is for people to quickly run up a bill for these games. It's free to play, as long as you're are willing to have the very basic parts of the game.
No wonder everyone is jumping on the bandwagon, Free to play is anything but free to play.
Exactly, this so called "f2p" model ends up costing more than subscription based games half the time. People keep talking like it's the only future for MMOS but 10m+ people still subscribing to WoW says otherwise.
While I am apprehensive about the industry's shift toward micro-transactions and F2P (in particular will gaming turn play to win), I also cannot help but be optimistic about this approach. Reason being is that there is so much potential in the idea and ideal that giving gamers more power as consumers can ultimately help improve gaming and the industry as a whole.
In an ideal world--the sort where magical pega-corns gallop across the skies and puke rainbows--if we are allowed the freedom to constantly vote with our wallets, this could encourage developers to want to offer quality improvements and constant (as opposed to every year or two) updates to an an already enjoyable base game. The more content and the better content, the more potential they have to make money after all, and on an ongoing basis rather than as one lump sum.
The latest example of successful F2P that comes to mind is Sega's PSO2 which launched in Japan early July 2012. It offers a pretty packed base game for free with a cash shop aimed towards convenience rather than necessity (which was a problem in older F2P games like Silk Road Online or Perfect World--some folks were spending hundreds, even 500 bucks a month). If this is the direction things are going, then it's a win-win in my eyes at least.
As for older games, F2P or lower subs with cash shop would be a way to revitalize them, and I believe in AOC's case, it did just that. There are plenty of folks who might want to try a game like FFXI but not necessarily want to pay the full sub price for a game released 10 years ago. On the other hand, they might be more inclined to give it a go if there wasn't a sub fee, then pay to unlock the game features they desired.
Bioware + EA's financial backing + Star Wars license + MMO and it's not even been out 8 months and it's already going free to play. This combination should have been a huge success but once again EA have found a way to take a perfectly good studio (Bullfrog, Maxis, Westood, Mythic all say "HEEEEEYYYY") and drag it under.
EA should change their motto to "EA Games - Ruin everything"
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I told him he couldn't, he had a strop about it. And then I pushed him out of his window. I didn't really, but it just showed me how easy it is for people to quickly run up a bill for these games. It's free to play, as long as you're are willing to have the very basic parts of the game.
No wonder everyone is jumping on the bandwagon, Free to play is anything but free to play.
In an ideal world--the sort where magical pega-corns gallop across the skies and puke rainbows--if we are allowed the freedom to constantly vote with our wallets, this could encourage developers to want to offer quality improvements and constant (as opposed to every year or two) updates to an an already enjoyable base game. The more content and the better content, the more potential they have to make money after all, and on an ongoing basis rather than as one lump sum.
The latest example of successful F2P that comes to mind is Sega's PSO2 which launched in Japan early July 2012. It offers a pretty packed base game for free with a cash shop aimed towards convenience rather than necessity (which was a problem in older F2P games like Silk Road Online or Perfect World--some folks were spending hundreds, even 500 bucks a month). If this is the direction things are going, then it's a win-win in my eyes at least.
As for older games, F2P or lower subs with cash shop would be a way to revitalize them, and I believe in AOC's case, it did just that. There are plenty of folks who might want to try a game like FFXI but not necessarily want to pay the full sub price for a game released 10 years ago. On the other hand, they might be more inclined to give it a go if there wasn't a sub fee, then pay to unlock the game features they desired.
TL;dr: Aliens.
EA should change their motto to "EA Games - Ruin everything"