Optional monthly subscription is needed

Monthly recurring revenue is the holy grail for businesses. Portalarium could greatly increase and stabilize their revenue stream through an optional monthly subscription program.

Charge something like $10-15 per month in return for some COTO's, store credit, and other baubles. Perhaps give out one deco/pattern/wearable per month that is given only to subscribers. Maybe provide dev+ access by purchasing a one year subscription.

A successful subscription program could even remove the need for the quarterly telethon, which itself is a huge distraction and time sink for the company, isn't a sustainable revenue model, and is a source of derision for many in the gaming community who see it as a money grab of some kind. Subscriptions are an old, well understood model that will be easily accepted by the community and also scales easily.

When you first roll out the subscription program, you can acknowledge/placate your early backers by including a certain amount of free months for them. For example, give LotM backers 2 free years of access to the program, Barons 1 years, Edelmans 3 months, etc. Anyone who purchases the game at the lowest $40 level gets one month of free access. This gets all of your players introduced to the program, and maybe even hooked on the program, so that they continue to pay.

 

I'm unclear on how the quarterly's are "a huge distraction and time sink for the company" and "community who see it as a money grab". Can you provide more detail?


Thank you

 

i mean as long as they dont restrict some thing in the sub then i dont mind it at all just make stuff up that you get for subscribing intresting
and rewarding and i am sure many would junp on it for long term
the thing like rewarding store cerdit or stuff like that is nice also allot of othere stuff you can put in just make it optional so you dont have to do it an only reasen to do so is to get stuff for it

 

Interesting idea. It is a model that has worked well for other companies. I think it would be positive for the Portalarium and the players.

 

I like the monthly sub idea.

Honestly they need to make it easier to spend money on the game, and the monthly sub is a great idea if only for that reason.

Using COTOs is a hassle. I know it feels more immersive(I'm assuming that's why they chose to do it that way?), but it's really tedious and prevents me from buying more of them.

 

Portalarium is doing a great job of walking the thin line between community supported revenue and pay to win. Their business model was worked out years ago and I am certain they are going to stick to it.
Interesting ideas, however I don't see an argument in your post for the "need". Do you mean to say that the game will fail without using a subscription model?

 

better not, episode 1 paid for a lot paid thru 5 already.

 

Disagree. Telethons are great community events, get a lot of people online and both exposed to and excited about new content. It is very presumptuous to talk from a perspective of knowing more than port about their own finances, and there are two obvious hazards to your proposal:

• monthly fees would philosophically drive many existing players away, and not entice ANY new players.
• Making a drip of cotos for people who don't need them would completely collapse the market

 

Considering there was just a long thread on this topic that was closed despite civil discussion, I suggest you read it because many of us already had a say on what they thought SOTA funding should be and do not feel the need to repeat themselves anymore as it just gets you on the watcher's list.

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...siness-model-for-when-sota-is-released.82877/