Curse

IlikeGW · Nov 23, 2009, 03:08 PM // 15:08

This is all you'd get:

- Have proper GM's who could retrieve deleted items/trashed accounts.
- More CM's who have the time to interact with the players

Pay to play has never had benefits like this.

- Have a bigger development team releasing regular content updates
- Able to have a team of people re-skilling mobs and so adapting to fotm builds, and thus keeping us on our toes and busy
- More of a sense of 'hands on the wheel' by Anet, and so a more confident community

If anything they're much worse with content updates for some reason. Maybe it's the massive piles of money take away their incentive to work on the game properly?

JR · Nov 23, 2009, 03:09 PM // 15:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

We need to cast our mind back to when GW1 was first released in 2005. WoW had'nt been out long, still had issues with wait times etc etc and had nowhere near the level of clout it has now.

You can't pull the 'Well WoW did it, and look at it now' argument without ignoring the entire context and timing.

Back then the hardcore MMO players (most of which had just recently migrated from EQ) were looking for something familiar. WoW stepped up to fill that gap nicely. There was also a lot of skepticism surrounding free-to-play MMOs (people following your logic), which has faded considerably since. Now there are probably as many succesful AAA F2P MMOs (holy acronyms batman) as there are monthly fee MMOs.

Your average joe had little way to judge between the two, other than Blizzard's significantly larger marketing budget getting them a lot more coverage. There was a definite sense that Guild Wars was the underdog, and those that did swing towards it probably did so precisely for the lack of monthly fees.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

I'm not arguing that GW was'nt fantastic vfm, i'm saying that their business model is flawed because it cannot deliver what people expect of an MMO(which whether it was intended or not GW is now) in 2009 and in the long term.

You can't call a highly successful business model flawed just because it doesn't live up to your expectations and desires. Yes, if ArenaNet wanted to make a WoW killer they would need WoW-level funding. They aren't, and they don't.

trialist · Nov 23, 2009, 03:11 PM // 15:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

We need to cast our mind back to when GW1 was first released in 2005. WoW had'nt been out long, still had issues with wait times etc etc and had nowhere near the level of clout it has now.

You seem to have a selective memory. Like i said in my previous post, GW at launch had no Sorrow's Furnace and by just playing pve during the betas, you already completed a third to half of the available content. I distinctively remember beating the game a week after launch and no, i wasn't power gaming. Just going through the game normally. If i wasn't a pvper, i would have gone wtf? That's it? If GW was pay to play, i can't really imagine myself paying for just a week of pve content.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

I'm not arguing that GW was'nt fantastic vfm, i'm saying that their business model is flawed because it cannot deliver what people expect of an MMO(which whether it was intended or not GW is now) in 2009 and in the long term.

Micro-payments and GW2 say hi.

Fril Estelin · Nov 23, 2009, 03:14 PM // 15:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR

It's a make or break vicious circle, and I'm just not sure anyone but WoW can pull it off anymore.

IIRC Activision Blizzard has 68% market share. Not Microsoft OSs' level of monopoly, but we're getting there. Any ambitious MMO, such as Aion, who wants a share of the pie will have to be very, very, very patient.

Quote:

ArenaNet has (what was) a revolutionary business model, and it works well for them. At a time when the genre is plagued by dying MMOs I would love for ArenaNet to stick with it.

Exactly. Such a move would bring them, a few months/years down the line to inevitable "death" (in the sense of barely enough players to support their total costs). Or being forced to go back to a form of F2P (WAR has a nice "infinite trial" limited to Tier 1).

OT: OP you are starting from the principle that "if some people want it, then it's viable" which is not business common sense. Anet only exists thanks to the niche they created (top-quality F2P; not F2P itself which is a small world getting bigger) and it's vital to them to have this bubble, without which they may not survive. You (and me) may well pay for a more polished, expanded and supported GW, but we don't constitute a "market". Not yet at least.

Aljasha · Nov 23, 2009, 03:17 PM // 15:17

why do people think games should last forever? i simply don't get it. gw is doing well regarding the fact that the last major content update was released two years ago. however and ofc, it is getting old and dieing but you will never experience gw like it was once a new campaign hit the shelves.

just get over it.

Shanaeri Rynale · Nov 23, 2009, 03:20 PM // 15:20

Yes I remember the GW vs WoW debates that were on forums, and how the f2p thing was GW's main attractant.

My thoughts are, was that for the long term health of a game f2p has shown not to be ideal and perhaps P2P would have been a better long term route.

Quote:

You can't call a highly successful business model flawed just because it doesn't live up to your expectations and desires. Yes, if ArenaNet wanted to make a WoW killer they would need WoW-level funding. They aren't, and they don't.

I did'nt say it was'nt successful. I said it was flawed because it's not sustainable. If a buisness model's aim is to make a shed load of money and then stop it's done what it's supposed to.

Anet's business model was to make a shed load of money to tide us over, then release something else to make a shed loda of money to tide us over, then release something else to make a shed load of money to tide us over.... and so on and so on.

What we got was 2.5 iterations of that. What Anets buisness model is now is that they made a cashcow (GW) and are slowly letting it bleed to death while hoping they have enough from the cashcow to make a new one. It's a buisness model, sure. But it's not the one they stated at the start.

JR · Nov 23, 2009, 03:23 PM // 15:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

I did'nt say it was'nt successful. I said it was flawed because it's not sustainable.

I didn't say you said it wasn't succesful, I said you said it was flawed - which it isn't - because it's succesful.

Are you following this?

pumpkin pie · Nov 23, 2009, 03:40 PM // 15:40

“Certainly you can look at business model as a big reason for the success of ‘Guild Wars,” says Strain.

“’Guild Wars’ has been a phenomenal success, and we’re proud of it,” he says. “We’re not going to ruin it by making it more like every other MMO on the market.”

^^source

interesting find for me (at least) as of December 2008 there are 5.8 million ACTIVE guild wars accounts.

^^source

and its not gonna happen

Benderama · Nov 23, 2009, 03:48 PM // 15:48

$5 is reasonable and in my opinion every mmo shouldnt charge much more
We would have been able to.

Quote:

- Have a bigger development team releasing regular content updates

we got content updates every 6-12 months a lot more frequent than other popular MMOs?

Quote:

More of a sense of 'hands on the wheel' by Anet, and so a more confident community

part of what makes GW so good is that the community are quite a big factor in the direction the game takes

sorry to be sort of narrow-minded but for paying to play i don't know if i'd be that much happier. i like the way that other MMO's demand money whilst GW shows that its not that necessary.

vamp08 · Nov 23, 2009, 03:49 PM // 15:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanaeri Rynale

GW2 is being designed as an MMO from the ground up, and without the support needed and expected of a modern MMO it could well fare badly.

Citations are your friend. Credebility = 0%

Verene · Nov 23, 2009, 03:51 PM // 15:51

The vast majority of people got into GW because of the fact that it's so different from every other MMO - including the fact that it's free to play.

If it were play to pay (a business model that I can never support), it would have no playerbase.

gremlin · Nov 23, 2009, 03:55 PM // 15:55

I don't like pay to play games I don't care that maybe gw would be a lot better if it was a pay game.

I have been told often and at length that wow is rubbish compared to gw and wow is pay to play.
Is there a game similar in concept to gw that's pay to play that is a lot better ?

I consider myself a typical gamer, I own many games and I still play several of them as it all depends what mood I am in and which friends I am online with.

Lets see how pay to play would affect my life.
GW1
Gw2
Ghost recon advanced warfighter 2
Call of Duty modern warfare 2
Il2
Colin Mcrae rally
Need for speed
Diablo3

Ok that lot would be around £40 a month and I would probably only be playing a couple of them in any given week.
But I would have to pay monthly for them all whether I played or not.

To put it simply if I owned a game company pay to play is a wonderful idea that would make me rich but its a very bad idea for gamers.

zwei2stein · Nov 23, 2009, 03:59 PM // 15:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR

I didn't say you said it wasn't succesful, I said you said it was flawed - which it isn't - because it's succesful.

Are you following this?

Yet they stopped making new content chapters. Because it was unsustainable.

And if they stopped doing it, yep, there is some flaw that prevents them form producing more.

It was, in fact, bad enough to scrap original plans and start over.

N1ghtstalker · Nov 23, 2009, 04:03 PM // 16:03

if this was p2p
i would have quit a week after i got it

Laraja · Nov 23, 2009, 04:04 PM // 16:04

/notsigned

I bought GW *because* it is free to play. As much as I wanted Aion, I didn't buy it because it's subscription based. One of the big draws of GWs is that, because you're not paying monthly, you can walk away for a while and not feel like you're wasting money by paying for something that you're not playing.

Fril Estelin · Nov 23, 2009, 04:06 PM // 16:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

Because it was unsustainable.

After EotN was released it was the technical limitations of GW1 that justified GW2. Business-model-wise we had the April update.

Enko · Nov 23, 2009, 04:06 PM // 16:06

if this game was pay to play, I probably would've stuck with City of Heroes since I already had 4000 hours in that game and paying for 4 accounts. the person that got me into Guild Wars, likewise, probably would not have been playing this either.

Shanaeri Rynale · Nov 23, 2009, 04:08 PM // 16:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR

I didn't say you said it wasn't succesful, I said you said it was flawed - which it isn't - because it's succesful.

Are you following this?

Flawed is not achieving something that was stated as something purpose. You can say the invasion of Iraq was successful but there are few who disagree it was'nt flawed.

Quote:

After EotN was released it was the technical limitations of GW1 that justified GW2. Business-model-wise we had the April update.

I'm not sure thats totally correct. Technically the engine and game were fine. What broke GW1 is the complexity of professions, skills and balance which if utopia was released would trash.Not that we have balance now anyway, but you get my point.

I dont need citations to show GW2 wil be an MMO, if it barks like a dog it's a dog. http://www.iloveguildwars.com/2009/1...-what-we-know/ We know that GW2 will have persistant worlds, crafting, servers, higher level caps, Realm vs realm, auction house etc etc Seems like an MMO to me..

I note from the page I listed above that GW2 could well include another revenue stream in the form of optional downloadable content. Yes another pointer that the f2p model they chose was'nt enough to deliver what they wanted.

So yes GW2 will be f2p, but like so many games if you want the shinies you may need to pay for it.

I guess the point I was trying to make, was that. Is the current buisness model working in terms of quality of service for GW1, or is/was there another way of creating that service, for example p2p.

AngelWJedi · Nov 23, 2009, 04:14 PM // 16:14

make gw p2p?! are you crazy? if i wanted to pay to play a game i would have picked WoW or any other game like that. f2p is the big reason i love gw. not every one could afford to pay to play even if its only 5 dollars a month. its true i wish they would do more for gw. but i bet even if it was p2p they could be half *insert bad word* to even do work then. but thats my opnion.

Dre · Nov 23, 2009, 04:17 PM // 16:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dzjudz

I'd rather not spend 480 euros to play a game 4 years.

this

The main reason I bought guildwars is because it doesn't have monthly fees