GD site down for a short time this weekend

[mamba]

Isn’t overpriced usually a matter of personal opinion since it’s based on cost & value, and value is a variable that changes from person to person.

That is a matter of perspective, I personally do consider it overpriced, but as I said, as long as enough people are willing to pay for it at that price point, it is not overpriced in absolute terms.

Blizzard, like any other company, is in the business to maximize its profit. If they had a lot more subscriptions by lowering the monthly fee, they would be making more money. If they charged more without the subscription rate dropping they also would be making more money. The difficult thing is finding that sweets spot where you charge ‘enough’ to get a lot of money without yet loosing a significant number of potential customers based on price alone.

[mamba]

I have to admit, as a gamer I’m having trouble wrapping my brain around most f2p games. I could see myself paying into League of Legends had I more time to play but I don’t really understand why people spend money on facebook games that seem to basically be pay-to-win.

I never actually played one, but at least I can see myself doing so whereas a monthly fee is something I never even would consider. As to spending money on Facebook games, their quality is so questionable that I would not even consider most of them to actually be a game, I certainly would not spend money on those - I would not even spend time on them.

Lord of the Rings MMO and Path of Exile are two games I was thinking about giving a try though, both are F2P. So far I did not yet however.

I do, however, think that this model could have some positive side-effects for the game industry. It is a model where you try before you buy and, to some degree, the amount of money you spend is commensurate with how much you’re enjoying the game (hypothetically). I think the more recent trend of making a large and, in most cases, unrecoverable upfront investment, puts more emphasis on marketing than building a great game.

I agree, which is why I am ok with that trend, it used to be demos and reviews (I always prefer a demo as it gives me firsthand experience), but F2P fits right in with that too. Alternatively having a cheap base game and DLC to expand it, which also seems to be becoming more popular (well, DLC at least, the base game price has not changed much).

So far I consider a lot of DLC a ripoff however when comparing what you get for your money to the full game, but generally speaking I am ok with the concept. My main gripe is that for DLC to work for me, it would either have to be available early on or expand the game at its end instead of adding content in the middle, because by the time the DLC is available I have usually finished the game. For that reason AddOns / Expansions usually work better.

Recently I have been thinking about waiting for the GotY edition for games with DLC to avoid that pitfall

I think it will also be beneficial if payment models can allow more niche titles to be supported by smaller audiences who are willing to pay a little more to support a game that is catering directly to them, as opposed to many mainstream games that seem to become “watered down” trying to appeal to everyone.

Definitely, I am more willing to spend a smaller amount on an indie game if it is in a category I like, most recent larger releases were underwhelming to me (mostly into RPG / TBS games). Take Arcania for example, it seems to be so basic as to have lost most of its flair, given the reviews, so based on that I am staying away from that, Deathspank and Torchlight I preordered however, without knowing much about either (other than that they are ARPGs and a few trailers).

[medierra]

Providing I’m reading your post correctly, isn’t this the case with Grim Dawn, and the fans who have already pitched in money for it?

I think the different pre-order levels are sort of going in that direction but not quite in the way or extent that I was talking about. I guess I’m thinking of something more flexible where people can donate more or less over time depending on how much they get into the game. I’m also speaking more generally, not in terms of Grim Dawn.

I mean, I look at people I know who play League of Legends and there are some who have spent under $20 but others have spent well over $100. If you have a small portion of the audience, that is able to, paying out large sums like that, then you can do well without needing to sell nearly as many copies of a game. Meanwhile, you might also get people who only spend $10 but normally wouldn’t have spent anything if they had to make an upfront investment of $60 to buy the game.

I think that type of monetization is just a little scarier because it seems like it has to be done right with some level of restraint on the developer’s / publisher’s part so that it doesn’t become exploitative. Of course, one could argue that box retail is worse in the sense that you often have already forked over $60 on some hyped up title before you find out it is a flop or just not a good value.

DLC tends to have that same issue - don’t always know exactly what you’re getting and sometimes it seems to fall flat of expectations. I think a lot of companies see it as a way to turn an additional quick profit on a recently released game.