Why Pay Monthly?

The standard $15 admission to most MMO’s is one that I would gladly say goodbye to in a heartbeat. Spending $50 to outright buy a game in the beginning and then maintaining the game at $15 a month is simply insane. Why would anyone pay a developer/ publisher monthly for something they already purchased for $50? Server maintenance, free monthly updates (until your eventually hammered with a $40 expansion), and customer service are but a few things that come to mind.  But why pay monthly at all?

  • Community: Paying $15 a month automatically grants access to a moderated community of fellow gamers. The riff raff (gold sellers and various spammers) are kept at bay (theoretically) by the monthly pay.
  • Brand: Allegiance to a particular licensed brand can often prove to be costly. Take World of Warcraft for instance. Ones interest in playing in the Warcraft world online (outside of the battle.net hosted Warcraft RTS) comes with a $15 a month cost. For an individual nostalgic over the Warcraft license, the monthly cost is not seen as a deterrent.

Is the cost of a movie night with a friend worth the associated community and brand? No. There has to be more to cause an individual (in this author’s opinion) to surrender some monthly cash.

  • Quality:The monthly fee required for most MMO’s ensures a quality that is unfound in free-to-play MMO’s. Words to spark a civil war by. I believe that $15 a month brings to the table expectation, by the consumer, for a refined product. Though this is not always the case as some companies seem perfectly happy to take money without improving their games (SOE). Other companies, such as Blizzard Entertainment, continue to refine and polish a game (WoW) that is now five years old. Quality has a price my friends, a price now listed as $15 a month.

What about games such as Guild Wars you say? Community, brand, and quality are alive within the game and there is no monthly fee needed to play. On this matter, I would like to note that no other game follows the Guild Wars model of pay-per-expansion (if you want to upgrade the game).

In the end, sometimes it is best to bite the bullet and take it like a man. So quit your whining! Community, brand, and quality come at a price. Like it or not, the days of free are over. Publishers and developers have seen the income MMO’s provide. A virtual goldmine my friends; a new gold rush for the modern era.

Notes –

Different subscription models:*

  • Free-per-expansion: Guild Wars (not really an MMO)
  • Free-to-play (but make sure to visit our store!): Maple Story, Dungeons & Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited, and Free Realms.
  • Monthly: World of Warcraft, Warhammer Online, Lord of the Rings Online, Age of Conan, & Final Fantasy XI.

*not an exhaustive list by any means

Surf Report – 12/7/09

Welcome to a Monday edition of the Surf Report.

.: God :

What does it mean to be a man?

Mark Driscoll believes that the transition from boyhood to manhood is marked by the following 5 events:

1. Leave your parents home.

2. Finish education/ vocational degree.

3. Start a career-track job vs. a dead-end job.

4. Meet/ marry a woman.

5. Have children.

My thoughts:

  • Not everyone is “called” to marry.
  • I agree that no transitional event marks when one becomes a man.
  • There is nothing wrong with marrying later in life.
  • Being single does not equal being irresponsible.
  • Playing videogames/ interest in videogames is not a sign of immaturity. Videogames are as valid as a hobby as sports. (I agree when Mark speaks of how dumb it is when people throw their lives away playing videogames.)

Your thoughts?

.: Life :

“Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy—the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.” – President Franklin D. Roosevelt

.: Gaming :

Recently Syp over @ Bio Break had a great post that outlined a year of free-to-play MMO’s. This got me thinking, why not play an MMO a week? Sounds like the ultimate MMO tourist challenge to me! As you might have guessed from the header above, I have decided to play Maple Story this week. Time for some quirky Korean fun! Thoughts and comments will be shared in next week’s Surf Report (12/14/09). Stay tuned.

That is it for this weeks Surf Report. Make sure to comment below and have a good week!

Fiery Actions

As videogames progress as an art and hobby, the level of how much a game lets a player express himself has increased. Awhile back I was playing through Fallout 3 (which I did not finish as the scenario described below freaked me out) and came across a mission that I could just not resist.

I blew up the town…

What had started as an innocent trip to the local watering hole soon turned into a life changing event. The whole thing started when a man approached me about leveling the shanty town of Megaton to the ground. Seems the residents hadn’t been too smart in building the town around an undetonated atomic bomb. For my part, all I had to do was place a detonator on the bomb and get out of Dodge. Easy right? It was. I was actually surprised at how no one noticed me placing the detonator on the bomb. Not even the Church of the Atom fanatics, who were worshiping the weapon at the time I placed the detonator, did not notice me. Detonator in place, I made my way towards Pennington Tower…

Fortified, the tower was actually the remains of an old high rise building. Inside, I soon found out, lived people of wealth who paid for protection and sanctuary from the Capitol Wasteland. I climbed to the top of the tower, stepped out onto a balcony, and was told to detonate the bomb. The horizon was suddenly filled with a blinding flash. Megaton was no more. I had become a murderer. I had blood on my hands.

Save.

Quit Game.

The destruction of Megaton made me seriously consider the action/ consequence system of Fallout 3. You see, I play games to break them; I play games to see what they are made of and then see how far they will let me go. The problem with my gameplay style this time was that I had gone down the road the developers of the game wanted me to. I had done something I would never do in real life. I had killed virtual people in the plume of a fiery mushroom cloud. My past actions lead me to this weeks question:

  • Even though its just a game, when does a game go too far and if so, how far is too far?

Feel free to comment below.

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