by Karen Hertzberg on Jan 13, 2010
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We gamers expect a lot from a AAA MMOG launch, and not without
good reason--if we're going to plunk down roughly $60 of our
hard-earned cash for a game, we want it to be polished and fun. But the
same financial realities that keep us pinching our gaming pennies
generally force MMOGs to rush to launch, leaving polish in the hands of
a too-short beta. What if big name developer could make
revenue
during a game's beta phase by adopting a free-to-play with
microtransactions model? Explore this topic in today's Loading..., Beta
What-ifs.
You vote with what you
view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the
result is the Ten Ton Pulse (
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/thepulse/" target="_blank">What
is The Pulse?).
Here
are today's top 5 Pulse results:
Biggest
movers today:
What do you expect from a MMOG? When you plunk down $50-60 (or more, if
youre the kind whos into collectors editions), install the client,
patch and fire up the game for the first time, what is it youre hoping
to find? You want that game to be fun, of course. You want the virtual
world to impress you. You likely also expect a high degree of polish,
from functional mechanics to classes that feel balanced and unbroken.
But, if youre like most gamers, youve become skeptical that any MMOG
will deliver these things at launch.
On our weekly conference call yesterday, the Ten Ton Hammer editorial
staff wandered off on a gaming-related tangent about player
expectations. Jeff Ethec Woleslagle noted that gamers used to be a
lot more tolerant of the work-in-progress nature of MMOGs back in the
pre-WoW era when there were only a few titles on the market. Back in
the days of Ultima Online and EverQuest, we put up with a lack of
polish. Most of us diligently reported bugs and were even somewhat less
likely to complain about them. We enjoyed the evolution of our chosen
game, and we felt as though we played a role in that evolution. We were
part of something.
These days, however, were a far more demanding lot. In the immortal
words of a Queen song, we want it all, and we want it now. Weve paid
good money (in a tight economy, no less) to buy the latest MMOG, and
that MMOG has 30 days to impress us and convince us to add a $15
subscription fee to our monthly expenses. If it fails to impress, well
move on--theres always another game on the horizon if the current one
doesnt deliver.
Jeff also pointed out that those with a penchant for free-to-play
games, particularly in Asian markets, dont seem to have a problem
enjoying MMOGs that are, lets face it, usually less robust than their
AAA cousins. Why is that? Is it just a different mindset altogether? Or
could it be that the lack of any significant monetary investments
allows players to lower their expectations regarding mechanics and
polish and just have fun? Does a bunch of gamers having fun engender
the sort of community that makes a game sticky, retaining players for
the long haul?
In that serendipitous, one-thing-leads-to-another way that thoughts
often move through my head, the overwhelming demand for
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/sto">Star Trek Online
beta (were out of our plethora of keys already, but you can still
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/79227">download the
client) got me to thinking about whether AAA MMOGs
could parlay their open betas into something free-to-play-esque. We
know that most games are rushed to launch due to financial
pressure--pay-to-play games dont make money until they start selling
boxes and subscriptions. But what would happen, I wondered, if a MMOG
launched a lengthy open beta complete with the sort of
microtransactions that fund the ongoing development of free-to-play
games? In other words, what if the big name developers could make money
while taking their sweet time to launch a polished pay-to-play version?
I think the biggest hurdle would be converting players to a
subscription-based model after theyve
experienced free-to-play content. (Maybe the folks at Turbine
could tell us how it's worked out for them. They successfully converted
Dungeons & Dragons Online to a free-to-play model with a
subscription option. I wonder how many free-to-play members have since
subscribed.) If you could help fuel the development of a AAA game by
paying for certain aspects of its open beta content via
microtransactions
would you? If you knew that buying points to purchase
that prestige class, or that special mount or pet, would fund a lengthy
beta, enabling the developers to launch a pay-to-play game that was
everything it promised to be, would you get out your credit card? And,
when it came time for that game to go pay-to-play, would you feel
invested enough to subscribe? Your involvement in the community would
likely play a huge role. If you were made to feel that you were part of
the development of something special, and if youd made friends and/or
joined a guild, you just might stick around.
The notion of a lengthy open beta funded by microtransactions came to
me late last night when I was desperately trying to get to sleep. Ive
had perhaps 4 hours of shut-eye tops, and only one large cup of coffee
so far today, so Ill readily admit that my idea is probably full of
holes. But I think its also full of possibilities. Head over to the
Loading
forum to tell me whether Ive got it all wrong, or whether
Im
on to something. While you do that, Ill be in pursuit of more
caffeine.
3 new Ten Ton Hammer features today! 47 in January!
47 in 2010!
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- Karen "Shayalyn" Hertzberg
and the Ten Ton Hammer team