Words of Wisdom from Extra Credits

The closer we get to launch, the more I feel we are getting caught in the trap described in this video. I don't always agree with the EC folks, but when they stick to games and game design, they are usually right on the mark.

 

I enjoyed the rant there.

There is some truth the accusation that people that complain about free to be play games not being free are a little self entitled, but I would say using the words "free to play" when promoting a game and not actually being free, is false advertising and deserves some of that negative feedback.

 

Why are you discussing Free to Play titles here? What relevance does it have to Shroud of the Avatar?
Shroud has always been advertised as Buy to Play.

 

SOTA has done very well by large gamer investors (Whales), The model is different, but not that much, BTW: I find the term whale rather offensive.

 

*sigh*

B2P vs F2P just means one has an upfront fee. After that they both have to do the same things, get people into the cash shop to keep the servers running.

 

"Players to serve as content for the whales"

Yikes.

 

You'll need to blame Las Vegas for that.

 

I don't know... its not really absolutely clear to me that in the long run that a company like Portalarium couldn't keep the servers running through profits of base sales of games they market. Every company has operating costs, and server costs are just one of them.

As of right now, the cash shop is funding the development simply because there isn't a game on the market, we don't have an influx of new players buying the game, and Portalarium doesn't have any other products on the market. So that's where things stand as of now. There's an argument for using the cash shop to pay for server maintenance over the long run, but I don't know that its necessary for every B2P model.

 

So who here thinks that when the game gets released there will be a huge influx of new players?

As far as my opinion; anyone who wanted this game has already purchased it, because it is already released. AKA anyone in the public domain can purchase and play it.

Also my opinion, right now they are looking for ways to fulfill this part ----> "Players to serve as content for the whales", seeing as they can not keep players in a player driven game

 

Personally, I never felt the need to invest a dime in SotA. I bought a Citizen pledge back in 2013 because I really believed (and still do) in Richard Garriott's vision for an online RPG. Strong with all the experience this dev team has, and with all the progress shown so far, I don't regret a penny.

For what it's worth, even though I agree with his analysis on Hearthstone revenue, I believe Hearthstone is 100x more pay2win than SotA. You need a couple hundred $ spent on packs to be able to play a good variety of decks at a competitive level. Given that it's a 'strictly PvP' game by nature, that makes that fact far worse than it would be in a game like SotA, were it even the case!

edit : just remembered, I did buy the eternal crafting tools for convenience shortly after persistence.

 

Then you should liquidate whatever investment that you've made while you can get something for it.

 

Port is currently selling the game for less than $6 in Russia, Port is never going to get much more than that for it, if only because plenty of gray market sellers are waiting to unload once the price is back to $40.

 

Case in point SeedInvest;

Please invest in us, we will give you gold shiny armor

Why would an investor in this company care about an in game asset?

They are trying to get the whales on a bigger hook with smaller bait

Maybe I already have

 

Then why do you care?

 

Whale-hunting garbage devs have more or less ruined mobile gaming outside of Nintendo's ecosystem, but if that mindset wants to infect PC gaming as well, we'll fight them on the beaches, as it were.

 

Except that's the business model for Play for Free games, and always has been... Play for Free games are paid for by (usually) around 1% of the installed user base... the other 98% pay nothing. Those Whales are why the game exists at all. It was born "ruined" if that is your definition for ruined, because that has always been the monetization model for mobile games.

The market dictates the model... The market, for better or worse, expects to be able to play for free... That notion started in the mobile world, but the Market has infected the other worlds... The studios follow the money.

If you want my personal opinion of the model, then I agree with you. I would rather the days of the monthly subscription... Those days are past, but the market drove that change, not the studios.

 

No devs, or more likely the folks paying the devs, drove this change. Once upon a time F2P games had a pretty reasonable split between free and paying customers, it wasn't 50/50 but it was close. Then the micro transaction was introduced as a way to convert more free players over to paying, even if it wasn't for the full amount. Eventually, someone noticed that the majority of microtransaction payments were coming from a small segment of paying customers. Then someone tried making a game designed to maximize that subset of payments and made a lot of money. That completely halted innovation in the mobile market, if a crappy match 3 can make billions, why try anything new?

 

I'm unfamiliar with this period... Could you please name some titles that used this model so I can educate myself?

That's how the free market works. Where are you getting your numbers for how much titles earn?

 

Runescape circa 2001 and Puzzle Pirates circa 2003 both used this model as did WoW when it initially went limited F2P. Microtransactions have more or less murdered this model unfortunately, so there aren't many modern examples.

Both King and Niantic have disclosed their gross revenue for some titles over the years.

 

It's a load of horse fertilizer to think that this EC video describes our game

• Our game is not "pay to win".
• Our game is not pre-funded by Sony.
• Our game does not sell the best equipment.
• Our game does not cater anything of advantage to the "whales".

So, in a nut shell, the fear expressed in this video does not fit a description of our game.
SeedInvest isn't for the shiny gold "anything", those are extremely small perks which invite the player to become an owner with a real monetary value if our company makes it big.
https://www.seedinvest.com/portalarium/series.b

But even with all that said, our "whales" are a very long term devoted fan base and not some run of the mill new start-up
I've been a long time subscriber to Extra Credits, I've seen this video long before and it just simply does not apply to our Shroud of the Avatar
~Time Lord~