am i the only one whose afraid if sto goes F2P that it will permanently stun the games growth.
If STP goes F2P you can say good buy to content and game play updates new races new quadrants . So what if F29 has boosted population of Champions Online. look at the CO website they hardly ever have anything new and exciting to report. The only time you hear about anything happening in the way of CO updates is their state of the game which is very cryptic about future add ons if any.. hell CO is in such bad shape that last weekend they re ran the Halloween theme even they did back in Halloween of 2009
Now lets look at STO
While it is true that STO is on its third Exec producer (if i remember correctly) Under Dan Stahi watchful eye we have gotten 3 large game updates with a fourth right around the corner, featured episodes and soon the foundry . Dan gets this game he has a vision for STO and we can all agree thie game is a million times better since hes been in command of the project then it ever was at launch.
here is some facts
its not as apparent where co is going then it is sto
sto updates and new items hit the front page all the time and the forum. 2 times a week there seems to be articles from many game mags talking to the sto team about the future
CO only things gaming mags want to talk about co is their jump to F2P and their plans for the future are very cryptic
CO is 18 months old with ii believe two major updates under their belt
STO is exactly 13 months old with three major updates done and a forth in the pipe line, the foundry and three featured episode series i believe each is 5 episodes long
If STO goes F2P it could go stagnant like co. this would be a disaster given how big the trek universe is, and what this game can and will become with DStahi at the helm.
The fact is you get what you pay for. and look what we have paid for and got in comparisson with our sister game (CO) in less amount of time... if you dont pay anything then you get nothing do you really want that to happen cause i dont...
this is the only trek mmo we will ever get and its doing a hell of a lot better with DStahi .in charge. but go F2P and you tie him and his teams down on what they could have delivered to us otherwise. dont do that cause in the end if that's what the community wants then in the long run it's gonna be the community who is hurt the worst
Champions only went F2P a very short time ago. The 'stagnation' you refer to was the result of a dwindling population while still P2P; Cryptic's/Atari's hope being that going F2P will turn this around.
It is still too early to say whether or not it really worked.
I think your wrong on this. F2P model can open up the game to alot of people who wouldn NEVER pay to play this game. Also i've tried CO and had alot fo friends try it. The game is total TRIBBLE. The game play & graphics are really lame. STO is 100% better in everything. If sto went free to play it would be better because those who wanted to pay could buy speical perks and in game content. and it would be free to everyone else. - OOP
yes but without sub money there will be no money for new features and content. who ends up buying the cow when they can have the milk for free. you can already get this game for pennys on the dollor witthout income from subs what you see now is all you will see period
people already complain that cryptic has a micro transaction store
and some people on these very forums are wishing cryptic would push out more content faster
can you imagine how mad people would be when content comes even slower then it alrteady is and then the only way to get it is through the C store
atleast with subs and game time cards people can pay to play sto in any way they wish with cold hard cash or credit card.or checks. But put content packs in the c store and that removes payment opitions from 3 ways to 1 way and not everyone has a credit card. so there again people will be alieanated there as well
I strongly disagree. Especially considering the state of the early game, and the apparent fact that fixing it is not a priority any time soon, it seems to me going F2P is the only way to expand the games player base.
This game deserves a chance. The only chance it has is if the early game can be made more appealing. Right now the early game (ensign to captain) almost the same dog it was at launch. F2P would make it more appealing.
Then players can get past the terrible early game (because its free) and make it to the fun content later on, past Captain.
IMO F2P should be done THE MOMENT it is financially viable for the games sake.
Here just let them play free (minus a few things bank, crafting, mail, fleet, exchange, feature episodes, repeating quests, # of days played) to L10. Sure you can keep playing. but you can't get any missions needing LC1 or above or T2 ships.
the problem i have is that many people still dont fully understand the free to play model, or somehow think that subbing is a guaranteed success. how many mmo's have failed because of the sub model? plenty. subbing is no better or worse than free to play. its just different.
im afraid the OP use of CO as a reference point is irrelevant. what they have or have not done over the last 18 months has nothing to do with anything. they have their own budget and their own subscriber base and that will have dictated what they did with the game. just because its made by cryptic means nothing. it is a completely different game.
co has been pay to play for the past 18 months, much like sto has and he claims co has had not much content update. so whats that got to do with free to play? apparently if he thinks co is stagnant then its the pay to play model that has done it. maybe people just dont like the game, maybe its not that good. none of these factors have anything to do with STO.
co has now reported an increase of 1000% in its first month now its gone free to play. whilst its too early to get excited about it, and we have no idea what money it was pulling in before, free to play is making them more money that the previous sub. thats a good thing and will now see co get more content as a result. he seems very unimpressed with the fact they are drawing in more people as he believes they have not released more content as a result. maybe that because its only been one solitary month. how about giving them a chance? the state of the game over there has said they now plan to release episode packs like the sto featured series. thats immediately more content due than they had before.
if sto went free to play and experienced anywhere near that number, it would give the team more money to use. more money means more content.
it is of course a risk and it could backfire and they could make less, and they probably should not change whilst the sub base is growing or holding steady because of that risk factor but there is nothing wrong with using a F2P model. its had its success and its failures just like subbing has.
as for everything becoming mico-transactions, again i disagree. yes the c-store would become a much bigger factor but the people that continue to pay or are lifetime dont have to unlock things other than the usual stuff and they at least get 400 atari points to spend on what ever they choose. featured episodes would be free for subscribers.
the people who play the game for free have to unlock stuff but they are more likely to do that as they no longer pay a sub.
Atari are planning on providing the ability to gift points.
My gaming sites big plan was to gift these points but it had to be put on hold when we realised the ability does not exist. I couldn't believe that an e-commerce product could not be purchased for one by another.
When this changes it will not only allow players with no paypal or card to play but it will give them a method of obtaining game store items. More than half of my sites revenue will be giving back to players in this way, in the form of competitions or even loyalty rewards i.e. login 100 days in the year, 365 and so on.
Whatever ideas we come up with, we are determined for the younger generation to have access ot the items that normally require access to money.
What you are forgetting is: f2p does not exclude subscriptions. look at cos model. yes f2p. but it sucks to play it it that way because you just get lame archetypes.
+ CO was NEVER a real success in the first place. so it didn't have anything to build on anyway.
Now, sto, you can still stay subscribed, because f2
Cryptic does not at this time have plans to implement F2P on STO...
This means that it is makes little to no sence to even start threads like this, because it should be obvious that if and when the time comes where they are actually considering implementing F2P model we will know.
The one thing that bugs the hell out of me as far as "today's gamer" is that they expect everything to be handed to them, expect everything to be easily obtained, and the minute that something is made difficult or not easy to obtain they throw a fit.
Maybe I am getting old, I dont know. What I do know is anything worth getting is worked for, not given. You want the shiny sports car, you gotta work for it. You want the shiny purple whatever, you gotta work for it. Its the same when it comes to the cstore. Now I can see the benifits of CO having gone ftp, and I understand the reasoning behind it, that game needed more people. But the last thing I want to see with this game is 1500 nublettes with the USS Boobyprise roaming sector space, not that that doesnt happen already, but there is much less of that now then there would be if it were ftp.
Do I have money to spend on the cstore, yes, and I guess that is what separates me from the general crowd of people crying for ftp. But I dont think FTP is the answer. The game has leaped forward a great deal since beta and thats all because of the great community of people we have here, given we dont interact with each other on a regular basis aside from the forums, but a great community none the less.
The developers listen to what we want and try to give it to us, not everything can be granted, but if you think about it A LOT of what we have asked for has taken place. Catians, a revamped Sovy, various other revamped ships, new uniforms, etc
I can understand not having money, I wasnt always able to play the way I wanted to, I was canceling subs left and right in order to make things work. Hopefully this points trading thing will work and be a good thing for the game. I honestly see it as a better option then going FTP.
Thats all I got, and like I said, feel free to rip what I said apart...I am tired and havent had the greatest day, so half of what I said prolly doesnt make a whole lot of sense.:p
I think the reason for the perceived stagnation in CO is because the effort to convert to a Free to Play model required a lot of stuff to be reworked, so the new adventure pack had to be put on the back burner until after the conversion was complete. After Revalation, the CO team decided they wanted to experiment with smaller updates that happened more frequently (STO went even further down this route with the weekly episodes with much success, which is why CO is going to be trying something similar in the near future). Around the time of Demonflame's release, F2P used up most of the resources so aside from the changes going into F2P there's wasn't a lot of "new" content to report on (although there was new content too, in the form of new mission chains and such in existing areas that tied together the story lines better).
If you have a look over at the CO website though, news about future stuff is starting to show up again. Robobo just put out a state of the game with a lot of good info in it for example.
For me the biggest reason for not wanting this to go F2P is found in between the lines of various dev posts. I get the impression that they are a bit short staffed for all the work they want to do and also need to do on STO. By staying a subscription model the direct cash flow should stay higher allowing for a larger staff.
Wow! Look at all the people in this thread passing their uneducated assumptions off as fact! I haven't seen so many gathered in one place in a long time.
Wow! Look at all the people in this thread passing their uneducated assumptions off as fact! I haven't seen so many gathered in one place in a long time.
While this is a bit more rude than I would have put it, I'm afraid I have to agree. A lot of disinformation in this thread that a mere Google search would immediately refute, followed by baseless speculation that blindly steps away from historical, research-based evidence to the contrary.
I disagree. You're forgetting that F2P brings in new players. It could also keep players that would otherwise be likely to leave. Say the player population goes up 20% after it goes F2P. Now all those players are going to have more money to spend in the c-store than they normally would have. C-store sales could very well go up to a point where they'd exceed subscription revenue. And if they go with a gold/silver type model, where gold players get extra character/ship/costume/etc. slots, as well as other perks, much like LOTRO has, they have revenue from the gold subscriptions.
I know I hope STO will go F2P before the end of summer. I have a very limited gaming budget that only allows for one MMO subscription at a time. Once SW:TOR comes out, I'll likely have to make the painful decision to leave STO unless it goes F2P before then.
Why do we have several of these threads when there's a stickied thread about this topic (which was created with the intent to gather all this discussion in one place)?
yes but without sub money there will be no money for new features and content.
People REQUESTED they bring back the LT sub for Champs when they heard it was going F2P. Champs STILL has a sub option, and alot of people subscribe. The same is true of LOTRO. And TBH, money is money. It makes no difference whether its coming from subs or the C-store. Cryptic/Atari is going to re-invest it however they want, not necessarily depending on where it came from.
I'm for whatever makes STO a success in the long run. Both P2P and F2P seem to have valid reasons for going down their respective paths. Like someone said already CO is a different game and ST also had a huge established fanbase and community. We've got canon to draw upon ("We want MVAM") though I don't know what CO has, that game never appealed to me, and if STO already has a healthy sub base then it may be not worth the risk going F2P. While the factors for deciding which model are going to be the same (e.g. sub base) for both games, the result (e.g healthy vs non healthy) means you can get a different model.
Comments
I consider F2P to be a bad idea in this case.
It is still too early to say whether or not it really worked.
people already complain that cryptic has a micro transaction store
and some people on these very forums are wishing cryptic would push out more content faster
can you imagine how mad people would be when content comes even slower then it alrteady is and then the only way to get it is through the C store
atleast with subs and game time cards people can pay to play sto in any way they wish with cold hard cash or credit card.or checks. But put content packs in the c store and that removes payment opitions from 3 ways to 1 way and not everyone has a credit card. so there again people will be alieanated there as well
You want new Featured Episodes? 2000 Cryptic Points in the Cstore.
Want Mark XII gear, ships, items, crafting recipes, visit the C-Store. Want to unlock the next rank above VA, hi C-store.
EVERYTHING would be micro-transactions, and that would just plain suck.
I think Champ's release notes and updates speak for themselves.:p
Ships and items? In my C-store? It's more likely than you think. :rolleyes:
This game deserves a chance. The only chance it has is if the early game can be made more appealing. Right now the early game (ensign to captain) almost the same dog it was at launch. F2P would make it more appealing.
Then players can get past the terrible early game (because its free) and make it to the fun content later on, past Captain.
IMO F2P should be done THE MOMENT it is financially viable for the games sake.
Patently wrong as can readily be seen by anyone who cares to spend more than a few seconds checking out the silver/gold benefits matrix for CO.
Fail.
After that you gotta pay.
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=185819
im afraid the OP use of CO as a reference point is irrelevant. what they have or have not done over the last 18 months has nothing to do with anything. they have their own budget and their own subscriber base and that will have dictated what they did with the game. just because its made by cryptic means nothing. it is a completely different game.
co has been pay to play for the past 18 months, much like sto has and he claims co has had not much content update. so whats that got to do with free to play? apparently if he thinks co is stagnant then its the pay to play model that has done it. maybe people just dont like the game, maybe its not that good. none of these factors have anything to do with STO.
co has now reported an increase of 1000% in its first month now its gone free to play. whilst its too early to get excited about it, and we have no idea what money it was pulling in before, free to play is making them more money that the previous sub. thats a good thing and will now see co get more content as a result. he seems very unimpressed with the fact they are drawing in more people as he believes they have not released more content as a result. maybe that because its only been one solitary month. how about giving them a chance? the state of the game over there has said they now plan to release episode packs like the sto featured series. thats immediately more content due than they had before.
if sto went free to play and experienced anywhere near that number, it would give the team more money to use. more money means more content.
it is of course a risk and it could backfire and they could make less, and they probably should not change whilst the sub base is growing or holding steady because of that risk factor but there is nothing wrong with using a F2P model. its had its success and its failures just like subbing has.
as for everything becoming mico-transactions, again i disagree. yes the c-store would become a much bigger factor but the people that continue to pay or are lifetime dont have to unlock things other than the usual stuff and they at least get 400 atari points to spend on what ever they choose. featured episodes would be free for subscribers.
the people who play the game for free have to unlock stuff but they are more likely to do that as they no longer pay a sub.
My gaming sites big plan was to gift these points but it had to be put on hold when we realised the ability does not exist. I couldn't believe that an e-commerce product could not be purchased for one by another.
When this changes it will not only allow players with no paypal or card to play but it will give them a method of obtaining game store items. More than half of my sites revenue will be giving back to players in this way, in the form of competitions or even loyalty rewards i.e. login 100 days in the year, 365 and so on.
Whatever ideas we come up with, we are determined for the younger generation to have access ot the items that normally require access to money.
+ CO was NEVER a real success in the first place. so it didn't have anything to build on anyway.
Now, sto, you can still stay subscribed, because f2
Cryptic does not at this time have plans to implement F2P on STO...
This means that it is makes little to no sence to even start threads like this, because it should be obvious that if and when the time comes where they are actually considering implementing F2P model we will know.
The one thing that bugs the hell out of me as far as "today's gamer" is that they expect everything to be handed to them, expect everything to be easily obtained, and the minute that something is made difficult or not easy to obtain they throw a fit.
Maybe I am getting old, I dont know. What I do know is anything worth getting is worked for, not given. You want the shiny sports car, you gotta work for it. You want the shiny purple whatever, you gotta work for it. Its the same when it comes to the cstore. Now I can see the benifits of CO having gone ftp, and I understand the reasoning behind it, that game needed more people. But the last thing I want to see with this game is 1500 nublettes with the USS Boobyprise roaming sector space, not that that doesnt happen already, but there is much less of that now then there would be if it were ftp.
Do I have money to spend on the cstore, yes, and I guess that is what separates me from the general crowd of people crying for ftp. But I dont think FTP is the answer. The game has leaped forward a great deal since beta and thats all because of the great community of people we have here, given we dont interact with each other on a regular basis aside from the forums, but a great community none the less.
The developers listen to what we want and try to give it to us, not everything can be granted, but if you think about it A LOT of what we have asked for has taken place. Catians, a revamped Sovy, various other revamped ships, new uniforms, etc
I can understand not having money, I wasnt always able to play the way I wanted to, I was canceling subs left and right in order to make things work. Hopefully this points trading thing will work and be a good thing for the game. I honestly see it as a better option then going FTP.
Thats all I got, and like I said, feel free to rip what I said apart...I am tired and havent had the greatest day, so half of what I said prolly doesnt make a whole lot of sense.:p
If you have a look over at the CO website though, news about future stuff is starting to show up again. Robobo just put out a state of the game with a lot of good info in it for example.
While this is a bit more rude than I would have put it, I'm afraid I have to agree. A lot of disinformation in this thread that a mere Google search would immediately refute, followed by baseless speculation that blindly steps away from historical, research-based evidence to the contrary.
Fascinating.
I know I hope STO will go F2P before the end of summer. I have a very limited gaming budget that only allows for one MMO subscription at a time. Once SW:TOR comes out, I'll likely have to make the painful decision to leave STO unless it goes F2P before then.
http://champions-online.com/node/595220
The fact that you are utterly and completely wrong so early in your post means theres little reason to continue reading.
People REQUESTED they bring back the LT sub for Champs when they heard it was going F2P. Champs STILL has a sub option, and alot of people subscribe. The same is true of LOTRO. And TBH, money is money. It makes no difference whether its coming from subs or the C-store. Cryptic/Atari is going to re-invest it however they want, not necessarily depending on where it came from.