Free to Play

FYI all the large stores I've been to price match to cover this exact scenario. Otherwise I'll return the item, get full refund, then immediately buy a new, unopened version for less cost. Then the store is left with an open-box return which will sell for less.

 

Large stores know that the majority of purchaser never return items.
This is not a large store. This is a Development team of about 15 people.

I might feel empathy for players that bought the game a week or two before. However, I would ask, how long they played the trial version?
Most players that bought after release, were able to try out the game and make an educated decision on purchase. Other games do this but not all of them.
So I can safely say that people that purchased most likely found the game fit their needs. For many of us, it really filled a gap that was missing in current MMOs.
So I can further deduce that purchasers had fun playing the game.

If this was WoW we would have spent $60 plus subscription costs. Although, SOTA has been on sale for a while so it most likely was not $40 for many purchasers.
Let me know if you can go for a night out and spend less than $40? (Please exclude yourself if you think taco bell at 2am is going out.)

We got an Orb, we got some telethon stream rewards, we got an awesome game community, we got and awesome game.

 

I got tons of special things no one will get who join now F2P

Professional Knowledge of Crowdsourced Game Development from a Customer Perspective Experience of over 5 years . 2013 until now
- The right and wrongs of announcing your Vision, !!Successful Crowdsourced Video Game = Expectation created with Announcment - Reality of the Game when launched
- Pledge Rewards Promise - Risks and Challenges of creating Rewards close to Pledge Rewards after Pledge Closure.
- Underpromising , Overdelievering - vs. Funding Money Phishing and Overpromising Danger
- Pro and Cons of a Gifting Pledge Rewards after finished Crowdsourcing
- Alpha , Beta, Early Access , Pre-Launch, Full Wipe - The right and wrong way to expect customers to understand them
- Pros and Cons of Community Involvement in Development - Suggestions, Creation of Assets, Suggestion of tools, Organising Music and Story Quest
- Real Time Events with a Global Community, Tight interaction with minority of Community - What to keep in Mind
- Changes of Direction during Development of Games - Risks and Communication Challenges
- The highly informed Customer - Underestimation of Information and Insights your Customers founds about your Company, your Speeches, your Blogs and more !

Professional Knowledge of Forum and Community Management consisting of Backers who are also your Investors
- Set Up of Forums, Communication Tools , Challenges of Equal Treatment, Does and not does , Pro and Cons of Awarding Community Member - not only positive
- Community High Activists, Different Interests, Politics and Financial Interest of individual Community Members during Developement - What do watch out for
- Splitting of Community during Development into Subgroups - Happy and Dissatisfied - Haters vs Whales
- Community Events organised and the Positive and Negative Outcomes
- Direct Interaction with Customers In Game and in Real Time Events - How are they perceived.
- Experience and insights on what works and what not worked
- Professional Experience on Challenges of Gaming Development with acceptance of Community Involvment
- Banning Backers - When it is Ok , Does Banning help or harm your Goal more on todays Social Internet
Your Community - your voice, your press, your news, your marketing

So that i got all and i left out tons more what a F2P will never get.


I believe we have huge amount of Community Members who just as the Developers are cappaple of providing priceless insights, experience for every new business or game developer thinking of going the road of crowdsourced Game Development. ( Raw included)
Hell. Even knowledge you can use in every business.

We have a knowledge achieved that is far more worth then a 60 Euro

 

When more players join our game, the demand for everything will be increased and then the value of everything will also be increased. The value of all your items in the banker and inventory is going to be more valuable. And, there is a good chance that you can make money by selling them to new players especially all the reward items granted to you from all the past Telethon.
If there is a HUGE number of new players join our game, I can certainly guarantee all the old players that you are going to make good money by simply selling all your unique items including lot deeds, home deeds, reward items and all the rare items to them. You are going to be able to sell all these items at a much higher price than now because of the much increase in demand from all the new players. Free to play is a good promotion for our game and it also grant every old player a good opportunity to boost the value of all their ingame items. Everyone will be benefited if our game is successful.

 

Someone is offering SOTA at a lower price? Darn!

 

Thanks for your résumé, we'll keep it on file.