At 20$ a box, is there a real difference between F2P and B2P?

Rivan12

Well, future sales of the game will be more than 20$ it looks like to me. Already existing box prices have risen in last few days.

Then, there is the inevitable recall of all boxes. A rebranding/repackaging to Tamriel Artwork and current content disc to avoid a bit of the download times. And I bet a price increase back to the 50/60$ range when the new ESO:TU boxes hit the shelves.

Moonscythe

As of today, Amazon has the box for PC or Mac for $29.99 but the digital copies are the full $59.99.

your experience may vary

jamesharv2005ub17_ESO

The new "box" might not even be a box at all. It may only be available digitally on the PC after the B2P switch.

Darkonflare15

darthbelanb14_ESO wrote: »

The only difference between B2P and F2P is you have to buy the game. That's it, fundamentally they are the same model.

So when you buy a game that is $60, $40, or even $20 and is not a mmo is it consider F2P? No, since most games are B2p. You buy it and you play it. This is not a new model. I never heard of Grand Theft Auto ever being sold as free to play. No. It is a buy 2play game.

jamesharv2005ub17_ESO

Darkonflare15 wrote: »

darthbelanb14_ESO wrote: »

The only difference between B2P and F2P is you have to buy the game. That's it, fundamentally they are the same model.

So when you buy a game that is $60, $40, or even $20 and is not a mmo is it consider F2P? No, since most games are B2p. You buy it and you play it. This is not a new model. I never hard of Grand Theft Auto ever being sold as free to play. No. It is a buy 2play game.

You are confusing games like GTA with MMOs is the problem. Of course you buy single player games. Its MMOs we are talking about here.

VisceralMonkey

Interestingly, I was tracking prices for the game the day the b2p announcement was made. It went from the lowest at $14 to around $25 now, even on key sites. So it did have an effect. On amazon it jumped form $25 to $35 for the physical edition.

Darkonflare15

jamesharv2005ub17_ESO wrote: »

Darkonflare15 wrote: »

darthbelanb14_ESO wrote: »

The only difference between B2P and F2P is you have to buy the game. That's it, fundamentally they are the same model.

So when you buy a game that is $60, $40, or even $20 and is not a mmo is it consider F2P? No, since most games are B2p. You buy it and you play it. This is not a new model. I never hard of Grand Theft Auto ever being sold as free to play. No. It is a buy 2play game.

You are confusing games like GTA with MMOs is the problem. Of course you buy single player games. Its MMOs we are talking about here.

Not confusing since it still the same model. It does not matter if it is a mmo b2p or a normal game that is b2p it is still is b2p. Single player and multiplayer both go by the model of buy 2 play. Plus the free 2 play model does not suit just mmos. You have free 2 play mobas, free 2 play adventure games, and free 2 play fighters. So buy 2 play and free 2 play does not only belong to mmos. So it really does not matter if it is a mmo or not.

Bouvin

Gyudan wrote: »

F2P: free to play - you download the game for free and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.
B2P: buy to play - you pay a certain amount of money for the box and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.

Every time someone comes up with another news flash saying "ESO goes F2P", there's always a discussion about how the game is actually B2P and how it is a huge difference. The initial payment would act as a floodgate and prevent the game from being invaded by trolls, griefers and bots.

If the price of the game was the same as when it launched (60-80$), they would be 100% correct. However, due to numerous sales (and this has been going on for months, it's not new), the box price has dropped a lot, -50% at least, and that's still with the 30 days subscription included.

Do you think the current box prices maintain the difference between F2P and B2P?

Well I can't find a box in town where I live. Been to Walmart, Target, Best Buy, 2 Game Stops. None of them are carrying the box.

Seems like it was removed from the shelves in more places than Australia.

eisberg

Bouvin wrote: »

Gyudan wrote: »

F2P: free to play - you download the game for free and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.
B2P: buy to play - you pay a certain amount of money for the box and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.

Every time someone comes up with another news flash saying "ESO goes F2P", there's always a discussion about how the game is actually B2P and how it is a huge difference. The initial payment would act as a floodgate and prevent the game from being invaded by trolls, griefers and bots.

If the price of the game was the same as when it launched (60-80$), they would be 100% correct. However, due to numerous sales (and this has been going on for months, it's not new), the box price has dropped a lot, -50% at least, and that's still with the 30 days subscription included.

Do you think the current box prices maintain the difference between F2P and B2P?

Well I can't find a box in town where I live. Been to Walmart, Target, Best Buy, 2 Game Stops. None of them are carrying the box.

Seems like it was removed from the shelves in more places than Australia.

Yup same for me here in Colorado, can't find it anywhere for the box version. Amazon has it though.

Bouvin

eisberg wrote: »

Bouvin wrote: »

Gyudan wrote: »

F2P: free to play - you download the game for free and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.
B2P: buy to play - you pay a certain amount of money for the box and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.

Every time someone comes up with another news flash saying "ESO goes F2P", there's always a discussion about how the game is actually B2P and how it is a huge difference. The initial payment would act as a floodgate and prevent the game from being invaded by trolls, griefers and bots.

If the price of the game was the same as when it launched (60-80$), they would be 100% correct. However, due to numerous sales (and this has been going on for months, it's not new), the box price has dropped a lot, -50% at least, and that's still with the 30 days subscription included.

Do you think the current box prices maintain the difference between F2P and B2P?

Well I can't find a box in town where I live. Been to Walmart, Target, Best Buy, 2 Game Stops. None of them are carrying the box.

Seems like it was removed from the shelves in more places than Australia.

Yup same for me here in Colorado, can't find it anywhere for the box version. Amazon has it though.

It's funny. They still have a ton of other old box games at the stores like Diablo 3 w/o the expansion.

eisberg

Bouvin wrote: »

eisberg wrote: »

Bouvin wrote: »

Gyudan wrote: »

F2P: free to play - you download the game for free and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.
B2P: buy to play - you pay a certain amount of money for the box and play as much as you want afterwards, without a subscription fee.

Every time someone comes up with another news flash saying "ESO goes F2P", there's always a discussion about how the game is actually B2P and how it is a huge difference. The initial payment would act as a floodgate and prevent the game from being invaded by trolls, griefers and bots.

If the price of the game was the same as when it launched (60-80$), they would be 100% correct. However, due to numerous sales (and this has been going on for months, it's not new), the box price has dropped a lot, -50% at least, and that's still with the 30 days subscription included.

Do you think the current box prices maintain the difference between F2P and B2P?

Well I can't find a box in town where I live. Been to Walmart, Target, Best Buy, 2 Game Stops. None of them are carrying the box.

Seems like it was removed from the shelves in more places than Australia.

Yup same for me here in Colorado, can't find it anywhere for the box version. Amazon has it though.

It's funny. They still have a ton of other old box games at the stores like Diablo 3 w/o the expansion.

That is because the game did not really sell all that well. What was it 1.2 Million world wide at launch? And more then likely didn't sell all that much afterwards. At that point it is just taking up space, and space is money.

What is funny is that I still see Guild Wars 2 boxes at many stores, selling for the MSRP of $40, and that game is 29 months old, so apparently that game is still selling to make it worth it to keep on the shelves. Not surprising though, the game sold something like 2 million at/near launch, and then sold another 1.5 million for the next year after that. And that game only had Guild Wars 1 as it predecessor, where as ESO had the Elder Scrolls Legacy behind it, much bigger IP than Guild Wars is.

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO

There is very little difference between b2p and f2p. Even with a box price at $60.

See it this way, the "normal" model is: you pay $60, then $15 a month.
B2P is: you pay $60
F2P is: you pay nothing.


In both cases, there is that $15 a month to compensate for.
And that's a job for the cash shop!
So either ways, the game needs to behave like a f2p game if it wants to make up the lost revenue. This makes b2p actually worse than f2p for the players, as they just paid for the right to access the cash shop.

asteldian

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO wrote: »

There is very little difference between b2p and f2p. Even with a box price at $60.

See it this way, the "normal" model is: you pay $60, then $15 a month.
B2P is: you pay $60
F2P is: you pay nothing.


In both cases, there is that $15 a month to compensate for.
And that's a job for the cash shop!
So either ways, the game needs to behave like a f2p game if it wants to make up the lost revenue. This makes b2p actually worse than f2p for the players, as they just paid for the right to access the cash shop.

There is a huge difference in b2p and f2p when considering the console audience. For pc the game is practically f2p. But for console, the difference between free and buy is up to $1 Billion (obviously not all 18M Skyrim buyers will get eso, but without a sub a lot will).
Considering at best the pc subs are giving $54M per year, it is easy to see why B2P is a winner. It will give what years of subs cannot.

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO

asteldian wrote: »

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO wrote: »

There is very little difference between b2p and f2p. Even with a box price at $60.

See it this way, the "normal" model is: you pay $60, then $15 a month.
B2P is: you pay $60
F2P is: you pay nothing.


In both cases, there is that $15 a month to compensate for.
And that's a job for the cash shop!
So either ways, the game needs to behave like a f2p game if it wants to make up the lost revenue. This makes b2p actually worse than f2p for the players, as they just paid for the right to access the cash shop.

There is a huge difference in b2p and f2p when considering the console audience. For pc the game is practically f2p. But for console, the difference between free and buy is up to $1 Billion (obviously not all 18M Skyrim buyers will get eso, but without a sub a lot will).
Considering at best the pc subs are giving $54M per year, it is easy to see why B2P is a winner. It will give what years of subs cannot.

That market is the same whether you go sub or b2p.

A thing to consider is that market penetration will reach a point where b2p sales will slow down, at that point, subscription model wins over cash shop implementations. The proportion of players paying in f2p games is very small and it won't be able to compete .Especially with DLC content not coming for a few months after that launch.

Market penetration may be slower with sub, and that's debatable, but in the end people interested in ESO are a finite number, and as the game increase in quality and become the best ESO it can be, the more people will consider it passes their personal quality standard. Sub or no Sub, when that happens, someone will buy the game and if he likes it, subscribe.

FFXiV is a proof that the console market can be viable for a sub game on console. Heck, it's a proof that subscription games are the best.
There are even people paying a sub of $30 in DCUO despite it being free. Note that DCUO is the most succesful f2p mmorpg on consoles, and it is doing less than $4.5M monthly, less than the 54M a year 300k subs bring in.
Console players are prepared to pay for subs if the game is worth it.
ESO just has to become up to par and it will do just fine. It made a great deal of the way and will accomplish another big step with 1.6.

So while PC currently may be at 300k susbcribers, it should improve over time. Look at Eve Online never stoping growing for a decade. ESO can and should aim to do that. If space submarine running excel can, so can ESO.
And with console subs, this could be 300k + 300k + 300k just for starters.
Again, growing over time and considering console market is larger and has less competition, could be substantially larger.

It won't be worth the change if the difference in sales between b2p sales and what sub would have sold is less than 3M. ($180M to replace the loss of $162M of 1year subscription.)
It is doubtful that more than 3M absolute players will buy the game this summer, it's no Skyrim, and being b2p is not what will make it sell much more.
I really don't think it work out. And even if they do manage to sell 6M copies, it only gives them 2 years worth of subs. An MMO can run for a decade, they will lose money with b2p no matter what.

I hope it sells a lot more though, even the 18M of skyrim, that way ruining the long term potential of ESO won't have been for pocket money.

Saturn

The difference in B2P and F2P lies in the revenue that the developers receive or do not receive from initial game sales. If they do not receive the revenue from the initial game sale aka F2P they are more liable to implement reasons for people to use their cash store, i.e. Pay2Win items that can otherwise not be acquired in the game.

I believe that implementing these mini-expansions and putting them on the store, will (along with the initial game sales revenue) persuade players to either A: spend money to get an expansion or B: become a subscriber for full access to all expansions.

I truly believe that Zenimax Studios know what they are doing with this, but that is mostly because of how Paul Sage and Matt Firor explained it in the TU stream they did.

For your actual question (lol):
I don't think the pricetag (regardless of what it is) will act as a floodgate, if a game is popular, there are bound to be bots, currency-for-cash spammers, trolls, hater and every other type of person you can imagine. Take WoW for example, it has all of these aforementioned archetypes.

What will act as a floodgate and has acted as a floodgate from the beginning is the age gating, you might disagree, but I believe that the majority of the trolls and haters belong to the Under 18 category. This is of course not 100% true, but it does have a larger impact than you would think and probably a larger impact than a pricetag.

So no, I don't believe it will act as a floodgate, but it will keep the super freeloaders away and those are the most important to keep out of this game, because they want everything handed to them and it is that especially, which ruins games.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO

Gyudan wrote: »

Do you think the current box prices maintain the difference between F2P and B2P?

In spite of the many ZOS 'fans' who are desperately looking for a way to differentiate the new ESO from, say, Runescape, the fact that there's a trivial price tag on the box makes precious little difference.

Like GW2 etc. the box fees likely won't even cover costs for the 'free' time that the old purchase price included, the only very, very minor impact it will have is with the RMT spammers and botters who will still have to make a small up-front payment .. but then they had to do that back last April when ESO was the worst bot-fest the MMO world had ever seen and was like that for several weeks.

EsORising wrote: »

GW2 was very different than f2p's but they already had a fanbase and still have to pay fullprice for the game. $20 is a big difference than $60 bucks.

I presume you're alluding to GW1 here, my understanding is that the playerbase for GW1 was minimal by the time GW2 launched and certainly dwarfed by the number of new players that only discovered GW with the second one.

While I see you point, I don't think it really was very important in establishing GW2's community .. in fact, I'd argue ESO's was far, far larger due to the fact that the majority (I expect) were TES fans and so came together as a result of that.

eisberg

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO wrote: »

asteldian wrote: »

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO wrote: »

There is very little difference between b2p and f2p. Even with a box price at $60.

See it this way, the "normal" model is: you pay $60, then $15 a month.
B2P is: you pay $60
F2P is: you pay nothing.


In both cases, there is that $15 a month to compensate for.
And that's a job for the cash shop!
So either ways, the game needs to behave like a f2p game if it wants to make up the lost revenue. This makes b2p actually worse than f2p for the players, as they just paid for the right to access the cash shop.

There is a huge difference in b2p and f2p when considering the console audience. For pc the game is practically f2p. But for console, the difference between free and buy is up to $1 Billion (obviously not all 18M Skyrim buyers will get eso, but without a sub a lot will).
Considering at best the pc subs are giving $54M per year, it is easy to see why B2P is a winner. It will give what years of subs cannot.

That market is the same whether you go sub or b2p.

A thing to consider is that market penetration will reach a point where b2p sales will slow down, at that point, subscription model wins over cash shop implementations. The proportion of players paying in f2p games is very small and it won't be able to compete .Especially with DLC content not coming for a few months after that launch.

Market penetration may be slower with sub, and that's debatable, but in the end people interested in ESO are a finite number, and as the game increase in quality and become the best ESO it can be, the more people will consider it passes their personal quality standard. Sub or no Sub, when that happens, someone will buy the game and if he likes it, subscribe.

FFXiV is a proof that the console market can be viable for a sub game on console. Heck, it's a proof that subscription games are the best.
There are even people paying a sub of $30 in DCUO despite it being free. Note that DCUO is the most succesful f2p mmorpg on consoles, and it is doing less than $4.5M monthly, less than the 54M a year 300k subs bring in.
Console players are prepared to pay for subs if the game is worth it.
ESO just has to become up to par and it will do just fine. It made a great deal of the way and will accomplish another big step with 1.6.

So while PC currently may be at 300k susbcribers, it should improve over time. Look at Eve Online never stoping growing for a decade. ESO can and should aim to do that. If space submarine running excel can, so can ESO.
And with console subs, this could be 300k + 300k + 300k just for starters.
Again, growing over time and considering console market is larger and has less competition, could be substantially larger.

It won't be worth the change if the difference in sales between b2p sales and what sub would have sold is less than 3M. ($180M to replace the loss of $162M of 1year subscription.)
It is doubtful that more than 3M absolute players will buy the game this summer, it's no Skyrim, and being b2p is not what will make it sell much more.
I really don't think it work out. And even if they do manage to sell 6M copies, it only gives them 2 years worth of subs. An MMO can run for a decade, they will lose money with b2p no matter what.

I hope it sells a lot more though, even the 18M of skyrim, that way ruining the long term potential of ESO won't have been for pocket money.

Market research shows Free 2 Play Revenue increasing, while the revenue from Pay to Play decreasing all at the same time the revenue of both together is increasing. The Pay2Play Market was at 2.5 Billion for 2014, with 2 games being 1.3 Billion of that, and then the other games that are holding up the rest of that 2.5 Billion are mostly games that have a subscription model and a Free 2 Play model.

For 2013, The top 10 MMO with subscription held 2.2 Billion of the 2.8 billion in revenue, but 7/10 of those games also had a Free 2 Play model to them as well, and 2 of the games held 1.3 Billion of that 2.8 Billion.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/07/19/world-of-warcraft-still-a-1b-powerhouse-even-as-subscription-mmos-decline/
http://www.superdataresearch.com/market-data/mmo-market/

Also, Final Fantasy 14 is not the poster child that you might think. At one time they said they had 2 million registered Users. But Square announced they have 1 Million subscribers between their 3 subscription based MMOs (FF11, FF14, and Dragon Quest 10), and Square talked about getting into the Free 2 Play market.
http://www.polygon.com/2015/1/2/7480177/square-enix-final-fantasy-14-final-fantasy-11-dragon-quest-10-subscribers.

The evidence is there. Pay to Play is in decline, MMO after MMO after MMO changing their model, Pay to Play revenue being held up mostly by games that are not subscription based only games. The revenue from Pay to Play is dropping and it is dropping fast, and predicted to drop fast as well.

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO

@eisberg‌
As I said, those market research include all f2p games rather than only MMORPGs.
The f2p model works for mobas, fps games and other simplistic low content games.

Also, the facts remain that even for those games, at the exception of the top end ones, they lose revenue over time as the game suffers from attrition.
f2p games are designed to get a lot of people trying the game, paying, then leaving. They have a high turn over but do not wish to have player retention.
At some point, they all exploit the entirety of their potential player base and just fade out.

As of square enix, wanting to go into f2p doesn't mean anything. Perhaps they want to design a moba of their licenses, or something of the like, and that would be an interesting move.
However, you cannot consider 1M subscribers to not be a massive success.
That's $180M a year, without counting box sales.
For reference, DOTA2, a moba more succesful than any f2p mmorpgs ever will, can only manage $136M. And it's backed by valve with steam being the biggest platform available.

WoW is a freak of nature and an outlier, so is LOL, we can't really compare "normal" games to them.
But a game released not that long ago able to gain 1M subs in a year makes it the perfect poster child for the subscription model. If it starts like that and follow the same growth pattern others have, how high can it go?

ESO has similar advantage, it's on PC and soon consoles, comes from a beloved long standing IP and has shown some actual improvements since it got released. There are no reasons it couldn't have the same success.

It works when you create a great game and improve upon it.

The f2p model is just drowning the sub model in total revenue because it includes all the mobile games and the army of fps/mobas/arena games releasing every year. But objectively, none of those games are good enough to be worth a subscription.

And finaly, I already addressed why the AAA mmorpgs are doing switches in another thread. No need to discuss the same thing in two different places.

MornaBaine

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

Sotha_Sil

"At 20$ a box, is there a real difference between F2P and B2P?"

20$. Glad I could help.

Arato

MornaBaine wrote: »

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

You don't.

Once that serial code is burnt that disc is worthless. If you pay for a used MMO, you're a grade A moron.

nerevarine1138

Arato wrote: »

MornaBaine wrote: »

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

You don't.

Once that serial code is burnt that disc is worthless. If you pay for a used MMO, you're a grade A moron.

Yep.

OP: $20 is not the regular retail price. MSRP is still the same as it was at launch.

LuxLunae

Didn't steam sell ESO for 25 bucks for the base during christmas? I suspect they will do something similar to get people to also buy imperial edition to even out to $59.99. That's steam for you.

rawne1980b16_ESO

Funkopotamus wrote: »

Where is the link to the price of $20.00 ?

In the UK we can get it incredibly cheap for the Pc now.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Elder-Scrolls-Online-PC/dp/B0080V93Q8/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1422361750&sr=8-1&keywords=elder+scrolls+online+ps4

NewbieKenobi

$20 was the upgrade/transfer cost for copying the account content from PC over to a console version. To support a game, a cost is still required and gives a better game experience. And it keeps the trolls away that inevitebly finds their way into every F2P. B2P is great as long as the developers continue their support for the game.

AlexDougherty

MornaBaine wrote: »

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

You can't, that's why you should never buy a used copy of an MMO.

The disc contains a copy of the game's client, but you can download that for free. What's needed is the code to create an account, and that's single use.

If you paid $20 for a used copy, then you paid about $20+postage too much.

MornaBaine

AlexDougherty wrote: »

MornaBaine wrote: »

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

You can't, that's why you should never buy a used copy of an MMO.

The disc contains a copy of the game's client, but you can download that for free. What's needed is the code to create an account, and that's single use.

If you paid $20 for a used copy, then you paid about $20+postage too much.

Oh I haven't bought one, I was just curious. I wonder how people get away with selling used copies of MMO games then if you can't actually use them?

eisberg

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO wrote: »

@eisberg‌
As I said, those market research include all f2p games rather than only MMORPGs.
The f2p model works for mobas, fps games and other simplistic low content games.

Also, the facts remain that even for those games, at the exception of the top end ones, they lose revenue over time as the game suffers from attrition.
f2p games are designed to get a lot of people trying the game, paying, then leaving. They have a high turn over but do not wish to have player retention.
At some point, they all exploit the entirety of their potential player base and just fade out.

As of square enix, wanting to go into f2p doesn't mean anything. Perhaps they want to design a moba of their licenses, or something of the like, and that would be an interesting move.
However, you cannot consider 1M subscribers to not be a massive success.
That's $180M a year, without counting box sales.
For reference, DOTA2, a moba more succesful than any f2p mmorpgs ever will, can only manage $136M. And it's backed by valve with steam being the biggest platform available.

WoW is a freak of nature and an outlier, so is LOL, we can't really compare "normal" games to them.
But a game released not that long ago able to gain 1M subs in a year makes it the perfect poster child for the subscription model. If it starts like that and follow the same growth pattern others have, how high can it go?

ESO has similar advantage, it's on PC and soon consoles, comes from a beloved long standing IP and has shown some actual improvements since it got released. There are no reasons it couldn't have the same success.

It works when you create a great game and improve upon it.

The f2p model is just drowning the sub model in total revenue because it includes all the mobile games and the army of fps/mobas/arena games releasing every year. But objectively, none of those games are good enough to be worth a subscription.

And finaly, I already addressed why the AAA mmorpgs are doing switches in another thread. No need to discuss the same thing in two different places.

The Market Data I have been showing is for MMOs only, which do include MOBAs, doesn't include games like Angry Birds type games.

FF14 doesn't have 1 million, it has less. Square Enix has 1 Million between 3 MMOs combined.

The subscription model is a shrinking market, and that is a fact, and it is shrinking fast, and for the fact that the top 10 MMOs hold up ~80% of revenue for subscriptions and 7 of them have Free 2 Play as well, should really tell you something about the subscription only Market.

When they went Subscription, they put themselves in a shrinking market, having to literally rely taking players away from the other games they already subscribe to, a market where most people only subscribe to 1 game, and to entice them to move their subscription away from what ever game they are playing, ESO really had to be put out its A game, and it didn't. ESO got mediocre reviews on the average across the board from both the players and the professional reviews.

Either ZOS and Zenimax Media knew they were not going to stay subscription and duped all those suckers for more money while they continue to develop the game, or they were naive enough to actually think they had a game that was far better then what was already out there to actually take subs away other games in a shrinking market. I'll give them a benefit of doubt and say they were naive, and not nefarious.

AlexDougherty

MornaBaine wrote: »

AlexDougherty wrote: »

MornaBaine wrote: »

This question made me curious and a quick check confirmed that indeed you can easily pick up used copies of the game for $20 in quite a few places. However, I'm not sure how you register for a new account with a used game. Anyone know how that works?

You can't, that's why you should never buy a used copy of an MMO.

The disc contains a copy of the game's client, but you can download that for free. What's needed is the code to create an account, and that's single use.

If you paid $20 for a used copy, then you paid about $20+postage too much.

Oh I haven't bought one, I was just curious. I wonder how people get away with selling used copies of MMO games then if you can't actually use them?

Oh, well people with bad decision making capabilities buying them, combined with poor regulations on that sort of thing (too many websites assume MMOs are the same as other computer games).

frosth.darkomenb16_ESO

@eisberg‌
MOBAs aren't mmos. World of tank is not an MMO. Heck, I don't know what Counter strike online is, but I doubt it is an mmo either.
They all have a lot of players and are online games, but they are lobby based systems, they do not have the massively multiplayer aspect. it's about how many players you can interact with at a single point.

Because of this, those market data are hard to use to compare f2p mmos and subscription mmos. There is simply too much noise.

And this "shrinking" market is what I explained in the other thread. In short, it's simply because the games that get released as susbcription have a form of planned obsolescence. They no longer are aimed at being long term endeavors so they don't stay sub long enough to maintain the market size.
The few games that have actually attempted to be susbscription only have succeeded. ESO did not even try.

For the cash shops in some subscription only MMOs, that's just adapting to new times. It tells more about how people are ready to pay a sub than it says about f2p. Those games can get players to pay a sub, some times for expansions and even sparkle ponies. Why shouldn't they?