Rock Paper Shotgun article on Swtor F2P

[Count Sacula]

Welcome aboard and glad to have you.

[clamus68]

My thoughts of F2P games comes mostly from the REAL Japanese Anime MMORPG's. As Lucious pointed out Lord of the Rings Online started out as a sub game. Surprisingly EA had been good with that game. But yeah, the magic 1 million subscriber mark is currently eclipsed by GW2 only in the F2P realm. And even the definition of F2P is a loose one, because of that I refer to games that require 0 monthly subscriber fees as F2P. I believe even SWTOR will keep charging for the base game at retail outlets.

Flaws, I view them as any number of things but mostly I go back to flawed gameplay being the core issue. SWTOR had/has a bunch of flaws. This coupled with dwindling populations early on and the subsequent delayed reaction by EA is what forced the move to F2P.

I foresee people coming to the game but I can see people being turned off by the rather extreme limitations. Some will subscribe, a few will simply ante up the Cartel Coins but many will just bail out. That would be bad.

[Ocime]

What are your guys' thoughts on a different price point for a sub? Such as $9.99 or $11.99. I was thinking a different price might entice more subs. WoW is the giant and sub is $15 so, why not compete for the price?

[Lucious]

to me, as broke as i am, even i would not be enticed by cutting off 5 bucks on a sub. if the difference between subbing or not for people is 5 bucks, they probably shouldn't be subbing to begin with. save the 15 bucks and hop on a bus, or few, and start job hunting.

[Jetsu]

What are your guys' thoughts on a different price point for a sub? Such as $9.99 or $11.99. I was thinking a different price might entice more subs. WoW is the giant and sub is $15 so, why not compete for the price?

Looking at it from the perspective of people who aren't currently playing I don't think it would make a positive difference. I'd still be making a bit of a commitment beyond the box price to check it out and I'd be worried that it's a sign they don't feel their product is worth as much as the other games on the market and wouldn't bother checking. Meanwhile the current players would be happy in the short term, but would be under-funding it even more.

F2P requires no serious commitment to dig in a bit. I get to play my first character to the "end" for free, try out a bit of just about everything, and pay a la carte or start subscribing at any time if I want more, so I have even more choices. I don't even have to make ANY choices until I really understand what I'm paying for. If I were on the fence about a game this would certainly have me checking it out.

[anyaka21]

What are your guys' thoughts on a different price point for a sub? Such as $9.99 or $11.99. I was thinking a different price might entice more subs. WoW is the giant and sub is $15 so, why not compete for the price?

Honestly, I think it would be doable, make it a 3 tier sub base model. For example, limit you to only 1 server, 1 alignment, and only a couple of toons. And if, as another type of example, they give acting subs cartel coins per month, then don't give them that. It might entice a new person to join on a limited basis. But also give them a lot more freedom with the choices they make and how they play

[sethdanielpaul]

I don't think SWTOR is really going F2P in the normal sense, and a lot of the reasons have already been touched on. It seems to be more modular, as in pick and choose what aspects of the game you want, and pay accordingly.
Buying the core game gets you access to all solo content, and a small taste of the more traditional MMO content (flashpoints, warzones, etc.) to whet your appetite for more.
You can then choose what "premium" content you wish to consume, and pay for only what you want.
In a lot of ways this makes sense to me, as EA is really only charging for content that they have to further invest in (servers for warzones, flashpoints and operations, newly developed content, extra storage space on the servers, and so on).
While I've never had much luck with F2P games personally, I am interested to see how this model of "only pay for what you use" works out. That said, I will be maintaining my full subscription, and think many others will do the same.
Time will tell the story, but I remain cautiously hopeful.

[Count Sacula]

You can charge 3, 5,7,9 dollars but if the game sucks then people won't spend a dime. All this lipstick still makes it a pig so until they get their shit straight it won't change anything. The end game is still a joke. I mean who's idea was it to bring out a whole new raid but yet still have the exact same drops as the 3 prior raids?

I have been playing an Imperial Agent and am loving the story line. My 5 50's are just sitting there collecting dust.

[war1023]

The big problem is simply that EA cares more about making money than making a great game. After watching the F2P video I won’t be coming back. Sound like they are going to nickel and dime F2P to death to the point people that are F2P are paying more than sub would. I’ll keep my eye on the game and hope they start caring about the game and not the profit.

I'm not your wagon yet Count.

[Jetsu]

The big problem is simply that EA cares more about making money than making a great game.

I don't think they make anything anymore. They're in the business of business. They just buy out the development companies and skim their money off the top (and probably skim pretty deep). BioWare likely cares only about making a great game but they're limited by the resources EA provides, and EA only cares about making money.

The only way we're going to start seeing more timely deliveries of updates is if EA sees more profits. Hopefully F2P can do that, but don't expect much to change unless people start spending more money on it.

After watching the F2P video I won’t be coming back. Sound like they are going to nickel and dime F2P to death to the point people that are F2P are paying more than sub would. I’ll keep my eye on the game and hope they start caring about the game and not the profit.

What did you expect them to charge for? Call me a cynic but I'm actually surprised they're not charging for a lot more than they are.

I was looking through their updated chart and unless they charge a lot for some things I will probably be able to play for less than I do now. People who do and want everything will definitely save a lot of cash subscribing, but for a player like me it looks like a discount (3 flashpoints a week is more than I do now, 3 space missions are about how much I will probably do once the new ones are out and only for a while, 3 warzones is less than I do now but I wouldn't mind cutting back and buying a weekly pass to PvP my heart out every once in a while).

One thing I will agree on is that they went too far with the Item Licenses restriction (even if it ends up being a one time fee). They should be using items as an incentive for players to want to access content (which they'd have to pay for). Making those rewards a bittersweet victory (since you have to pay to actually use it as well) may end up driving players away from paying for content as well as item use. I guess time will tell.

[war1023]

They went way limited on WZ and FP; 3 a week is joke. For people that play WZ or FP who sub aren’t going to see any real change in the wait times. Heck you most likely see wait times go up for all the sub that shift over to F2P. As you said who going to want to pay for gear twice.
The over limited race choice; should have limited to the basic race choice that the game starts with. Where you had to pay to make a Sith Jedi Knight.
The lack effort in gear design; a new tier comes out and they recolor the last tear. All the cool gear is going to have to be bought with coins. Jedi robe with the hood down cost you 50 coins and BoP. Empire armor on the CE vendor 100 coins and BoP.
No matter how much money they make; EA isn’t going to spend 1 penny more on the game because it would cut into their profit. If they do spend more on design it will be stuff everyone has to buy with their coins.

[Jetsu]

If free to play brings in even close to the numbers they're likely hoping for even if every player that comes only plays their 3 a week it would be good for queue times. This isn't a model change to make it cheaper for players who are currently playing, or those that left in a tizzy because of some specific design decision. This is an additional model in an effort to encourage population growth.

Interesting comment about the races. They probably could have made a fortune if they'd have replaced the credit cost of unlocking legacy race with a coin cost. Likely a lot more than they are now by limiting existing race choices. I know a lot of people who have already spent quite a few credits unlocking the races they wanted, and there are plenty of people who are looser with their real life wallets than their in-game ones.

I feel like this game has always been plagued with a lack of graphics design work (since launch). I've heard that aspect was outsourced, so it's not really surprising, but I think it would have been worth the extra cost to have a team in-house because it's easier to collaborate and coordinate with a team that's "a few doors down" than it is to deal with people thousands of miles away, through a language barrier, and with representitives of their company down to the guys who actually do the work.

Most pet and mount rewards are reskins of the same model (the achievement mounts, the daily comm mount, etc...) Initially the game launched with a lot of gear models, but since it released they've been recycling the same ones as often as possible, even at end game. Even the new companion is a reskin of a flashpoint boss in game already. Enemies are frequently repeated and most of them end up being humans or battle droids of the sort we've seen 100 times before. Even a lot of zones reuse the same wall, ceiling, and floor segments (to the point where even completely different cultures end up having the same "feel" in a lot of ways). Heck, the new race they're working on is a reskin of a companion already in game.

They release new mechanics, voice acting, systems, events, and rewards but it seems like the "hardest" thing for them is adding new models. I don't think they were designing with the intent of encouraging spending when the game goes F2P. It's more that they can't seem to get any new models in a timely fashion and so the few they do get are focused on major things (like new operation bosses).

[war1023]

A lot depends on what counts as a WZ; if queuing counts as a WZ or finishing a WZ counts. I can see this turning into a huge problem; sub waiting till 1 min left and dropping if it’s queuing or F2P dropping if it’s not a winning match. For those that don’t know people dropping at the last min is a problem in sub 50 WZ. People twink a lvl 49 and drop match right before the match is over so they don’t gain exp. 3 WZ limit is only going to hurt 50 matches. Because it takes 3 wins to complete a daily or 6 games. Sub 50 it takes 1 win or 2 matches to complete the daily. You will see more people in sub 50 PvP and PvE then you will in 50. Because with the very limited F2P access and double paying for gear it’s going to hurt 50 play.
EA isn’t going to increase spending regardless of profits made. I wouldn’t be surprise to see them cut more to create greater profits.

[Jetsu]

Because it takes 2 wins to complete a daily or 4 games.

Fixed that for you. It changed in 1.4