Gametrailers Bonus Round: The future of games, how we may end up paying

[darksora]

http://www.gametrailers.com/episode/bonusround/402?ch=2&sd=1

First watch this episode (episode/ chapter 2), it brings up some really interesting (and worrying) points of the future. Basically want to get a discussion going on in this thread about the topics raised especially by jason in this episode.

Some ideas to think about when posting:

Do you think it's a good idea?

predictions?

Do you believe that the business model of facebook games can relate to the game industry?

Do you agree that it's fair for someone to buy powerful items that may take a non-payer hours to unlock?

Do you think this business model might kill competition?

Imagine playing a future call of duty game and being able to pay money for higher rank or to unluck better elements (weapons, skills) from the get go.

Or playing a final fantasy game and being able to unlock the most powerful weapons from the get go (think zodiac spear from ff12).


(Also, mods please move this to the right forum if this is the wrong one. Wasn't sure where to post this but found it relevant to gaming)

 

[Treefrog]

Watched it last night.

It is a very interesting topic for sure, and it does make a lot of financial sense for the companies involved.

Lower the base price of the game and charge per hour played, a great concept, if you like the game your likely to play for as many hours as needed for completion, if you don't like it, then you save a load of money.

The problem though is exactly how much should they charge. A 10 hour game, £3 to £4 per hour would be reasonable, for a 50 hour game unacceptable.

I'd be up for it, the amount of games I buy and don't see the end credits for is a rather high ratio, I'd have saved a bundle, it has to be the right price.

Buying in game items to get ahead.......don't see why not, we used to have cheat disks/cartridges that cost us. Even if you buy the items you don't inherit the skill to wield them. It gives a slight advantage at the beginning, but other users catch up.

So yeah, I'm up for both, sounds like a reasonable deal to me.

 

[Lefein]

I'm sorry but I am laughing my butt off at people who think that it was a good idea that these next-gen (now current gen) consoles don't have support for things like the GameShark and such..

All it really did was give the publishers more control over what content you can access as a gamer. Don't get me wrong, there are some good up-sides to having more secure consoles but this seemed like one of those side-effects no one ever really thought of or talked about. In a way, it's just more proof that the media is under so much control with the money flowing into the industry thee days. Too late, now.

 

[Mael Duin]

This would kill competition. For example, lets take World of Warcraft. You bought it, you buy expansions and you pay your monthly fee. This game needs time and also because you pay for it all the time, you won't play other games. At least not other MMO's. Now lets move this same thing to Modern Warfare 2. People who bought this game and likes it will only play it. They pay for it so they won't quit playing it. They NEED to play it because they paid for it. Now if they don't pay, how likely they are going to go back to the game? What if they do, will they "feel that they are behind from others"? They will buy the stuff and experience. Now they won't quit at all, because they have spent so much money on one game. This also would make many of my old games useless, I wouldn't even touch 'em at all if I had to pay to play.

As for is it fair that you can buy upgrades etc? To be honest no, I don't see it being unfair. Actually we are already doing it. We are preordering games, which usually includes something bonus, for example if you preorder Bad Company 2, you get stuff for free right away. Normally these things you would get only later on by unlocking.

Against at "pay-to-play"
For at buying stuff

 

[darksora]

I think Dead Space did something similar too by offering sets of powerful weapons or a better suit. Glad this topic is off to a good start, should bring in a variety of opinions.

personally, I'm frightened by the idea of paying a subscription for everything we play or the thought of allowing people to become amongst the best with money.

However, the above posts did remind me that i already play games that have this system and I enjoy them. S4 is a 3rd person shooter which gives players the choice to buy powerful in game items and boosters using real money and I never really complained then. It's the thought of having this become used for most if not all games that scares me.

 

[D0nni3]

This is an interesting argument and i seem to remember something about this before, Personnally i think this would damage the industry greatly, in the eyes of a publisher/developer this is a dream come true they can effectively profit off a release for a much longer period than you could with just DLC or hell i know this is old fashioned but with just the game you buy (how i miss the days of getting a full game out of a box) but it potentially removes the competition from online gaming, to use there example if you could buy a prestige character on MW2 your effectively removing the point of prestige if you can buy it then there's no boasting to be done because someone who has only put an hour into the game can seem equally as good as you.

As for single player gaming if this becomes such a trend as some think then were going to be playing the same formular over and over as these games which sell the micro's well will keep being chucked out, i know this could be said now with everything turning into a franchise but the more money these companys get from people just spending the £5 for this or that then it's too tempting for these people to rehash the same ideas

Maybe i'm thinking too many bad things about theses companys but these days money comes before creativity 90% of the time and that greed could easily take over and i for one like spending £40 and getting a game i can play finish and then sell

 

[mickice]

I'm ok with publishers making us pay for the hours we play/enjoy a game like what WOW does. What I don't get is, if we do end up paying the publishers, we shouldn't then also have to pay Microsoft for live.

 

[TheTenth666]

what about retail shops?
what about factories that do the DVDs/Blu-rays?
what about used games market?
what about going to a friends to show you the last game you bought?
what about giving a game you played enough to someone of your family?

all this non physical gaming will profit the companies 100% and the gamer 0% as the game will never be his (as a game you buy) it will remain virtual, and in my sense some kind of theft.
Take Second life or some free MMOs, you have to pay real money to get virtual items, what's the sense of that?
so this will reduce the production costs, but what will we games get in return? I'm quite sure we'll pay even more than now as there'll be DLC all the time and even more abusive than right now, with DLC you must have to have fun in the game or you'll get pwned ...

oh yeah, Michael Pachter says "this will happen" so I'm quite relieved as he's a total moron and couldn't predict rain as his coat gets wet

 

[TheTenth666]

Problem is I can play LBP for 10 hours in a week and not at all for 1 month. Will they keep my save? of course not so I'll have to pay the DLC again. And how will they measure the fact that some short games will give some peope more fun and some need to play 20+ hours to be satisfied? and what about online games that you can play 100+ hours with friends, and have to stop for 2 months for your job so you'll lose all your progress.
That's what wil happen, because all Microsoft brought this generation is greed, and to see that these developers or game publishers don't even think of how many people will get screwed because of this

 

[darksora]

[QUOTE="TheTenth666, post: 0]Problem is I can play LBP for 10 hours in a week and not at all for 1 month. Will they keep my save? of course not so I'll have to pay the DLC again. And how will they measure the fact that some short games will give some peope more fun and some need to play 20+ hours to be satisfied? and what about online games that you can play 100+ hours with friends, and have to stop for 2 months for your job so you'll lose all your progress.
That's what wil happen, because all Microsoft brought this generation is greed, and to see that these developers or game publishers don't even think of how many people will get screwed because of this[/quote]

Where were saves mentioned? I'm assuming progress will be saved normally. I dont see that changing.

 

[FLASH48]

If and when it comes to pay to play, i'm done with gaming. Or i will just stock up on games i think i would like to play!

 

[Ezekiel]

I will say just a few words on this. The future of gaming as it stands to be envisioned and implemented... is doomed altogether. The idea of online centric games and consoles has for the most part, ruined gaming. Everyone has allowed everyone to do and make whatever they feel like and charge whatever they like without so much as a word of resistance. It's not the actual internet that is killing gaming, it's the companies involved in making the games that do nothing but take advantage of the consumer and it's the fault of the consumers that buy into their business and let them trample on their consumer rights.

 

[*goo]

I'm pro digital distribution but dead against 'pay to play' gaming.

If they change the model completely to be almost 'pay per view' style gaming, I'll no longer be a gamer.

The industry needs to realise gaming is a luxury, not a necessity. A lot of people will happilly do other things if the price ends up being prohibitive.

 

[mickice]

I think at the moment we as gamers have less time, we are flooded with content, then DLC then downloadable games it's all too much.

If some studios have to close down for the health of the industry I don't mind.

 

[Xelis]

Saw this earlier, EA have already started toying with this idea, Dead Space had weapons and armour upgrades available to purchase, FIFA 10 you could buy temp upgrades for your Pro. I wonder have many people purchased those, I doubt many did.

As for changing the model for selling games. It wont work for console games, Farmville is a casual game on a casual website, it's also an inexpensive game to make and the key thing is it's an on going game, you can't complete Farmville, so the model works perfectly for this type of game.

Try applying that to something like Final Fantasy and as you saw in the video it gets a whole lot more complicated. Final Fantasy is a single player game by nature, you can't give out the game and hope and pray people buy weapons, it won't work and you can't expect them to 'pay as you play' as it's a 40-50 hour game and as said in the video, who wants to sit down to enjoy a game then find out you have to stop half way because your running out of money to keep playing.

 

[Bunta]

as a few have stated this is not a good idea, from there stand point they are looking at the potential key word potential profits that could be earned, but in reality it wont happen.they stand to loose more than they would gain. i would never pay for any type of media that i cannot own. movie, game music etc, if they were to implement that, they would kill the industry. people want to pay for there game and play at there leisure, no different than buying your blue ray movie or going back listening to their old cds etc. they do that im done as a gamer as well. if they want to improve profits then what they need to focus on is finding ways to make engines more efficient and easier to program creating a shorter length in time to make a game, less time to make a game is less money you spend on programming etc. don't pass the buck onto the consumer because u cant some up with ways to streamline your end of the business. Only time will tell in a few short years what they will do but as a consumer i will have no part of it. i work and raise kids, and i like the idea of playing my games when i want, take it over a friend house, heck swap games with friends etc, u go online u loose all of that, as one person stated its not a balance only the studios stand to gain, and not the consumer, and in the end its the consumer that keeps them in business, lose the consumer , u go out of business, end rant

 

[Thorzilla]

[QUOTE="mickice, post: 0]I'm ok with publishers making us pay for the hours we play/enjoy a game like what WOW does. What I don't get is, if we do end up paying the publishers, we shouldn't then also have to pay Microsoft for live.[/quote]

You're basically paying for the same thing. I agree with you though. I don't mind paying for FFXIV but I won't pay jack if I have to pay someone else, because I'm ONLY using SE's servers, not theirs.