Paying to Play

[Jemsee]

Do you?
Have you?
Will you?

Personaly I have a problem with paying a monthly fee to play a game I payed top $ for.
I'v played for free on Battle net and MS Gameing Zone (aoe2).
Why can't these others be free also?
Everquest looks like a lot of fun but I think they want 10$ a month and autocharge my credit card.
I ass-u-me that these new online games are the same.
Pay for a game then pay permission to play it.
Sorry, but that just seems wrong somehow.

What about you all?
How do you feel about paying for playing?

[Artevoi]

Why would I pay for something I'm already getting for free in Diablo 2?

[Master Ghaleon]

I would prolly never pay to play any game, since I got plenty of people over my house to play games with, but if there was a really good game that it would be worth paying to pay, i would

[DarkDragoonX]

Bah, I'm not paying to play after I already spent money to buy the game! Greedy bastards.

[Brian]

Yeah, some of the new online games look very tempting, (and the old ones have been as well), but I'm still not willing to pay per month after I've already bought the game. Maybe a yearly fee of $15 or something, but no way 10 bucks a month.

What they should do is make the game have a very reduced retail price, of no more then 20 dollars.

[The Savior]

Originally posted by Brian
What they should do is make the game have a very reduced retail price, of no more then 20 dollars.

Asheron's Call is free now, and has been for over a year. The expansion is only 10-20 bucks. What I don't understand is why people are so unwilling to pay for servers that cost a company huge amounts of money to keep up, pay for monthly updates, pay for new hardware, etc.

[AlexMax]

No, no and no.

In my opinion, if you have to pay to play online, it ain't worth the price.

[Dart Zaidyer]

Sometimes a constant charge is what's necessary to keep the game running, but I think the prices can stand to be lower.
And I'm only going to pay constantly for a top-notch game, too. Games like Graal, for instance, are a complete joke and an insult to your hard drive space and your wallet.

[zables]

personally i think that its a complete Crock! if they expect you to pay 60+ bucks to play a game and then they wanna ding you 10 bucks or whatever extra a month to actually be able to play it the way it was meant :sb:. Im sorry, but whoever thought of that needs to have their ass kicked and then be raped by mad goats while people are plotting threats on their life and at the same time are preparing to napal their house! :angry: :whap:

[The Savior]

Originally posted by zables
personally i think that its a complete Crock! if they expect you to pay 60+ bucks to play a game and then they wanna ding you 10 bucks or whatever extra a month to actually be able to play it the way it was meant :sb:. Im sorry, but whoever thought of that needs to have their ass kicked and then be raped by mad goats while people are plotting threats on their life and at the same time are preparing to napal their house! :angry: :whap:

You really don't understand anything about the games, at all. It's not like it doesn't cost the companies to keep up servers for the game, in some games provide monthly (usually very large) updates, etc. What game are you talking about that costs more than 60 bucks?

[zables]

actually i do know quite a bit about games, and i know that companies do have routine expenses, but still... it is a crock, there has got to be another way to do it, like actually create/support their own servers...

[The Savior]

Users creating their own servers wouldn't work for MMORPGs, which are the majority of pay to play games. I would also like to hear "another way to do it" that would not only be secure, but cost virtually nothing (compared to current costs)

[Mak-X]

Yeah, the pay to play games are mostly MMORPGs where the games are hosted by the companies themselves that support thousands of players. Where a game like Starcraft is actually hosted by the player's themselves, but is in no way Massively Multiplayer requiring a huge server. Basically Battle.net acts as a chat client to get players together and set up games. Once the games actually start though, the game is hosted by the players. Battle.net only takes over when the game is over.

When Sega.net was first out it was free. Apprently Online Gaming didn't take off well enough as well as the Dreamcast so Sega.net went pay to play for access to play all Sega.net games online. Phantasy Star Online went pay to play with Version 2 with $15 for 3 months.

Depending on the price and the kind of game it is, I'll pay to play online if its worth it. I know I do want to play online games on my GCN. I'm hoping PSO will be free. Online gaming isn't going to take off if people are going to have to pay a lot to play in addition to internet and game costs.

Now for a game where its online only and its a Massively Multiplayer game, its expected that there will be a fee.

Blizzard's Battle.net is paid for buy the sales of their games, which are played exclusively on battle.net. I don't think Diablo 2 even had a banner ad space. Most of the ads on battle.net for Warcraft 2 and Starcraft are for Blizzard's online store.

Microsoft's plan with Xbox with its Xbox Live service seems good. For $50 a year you have access to play all online Xbox games. Not just for a specific companies games, all Xbox games.

[Jemsee]

Originally posted by Mak-X
Microsoft's plan with Xbox with its Xbox Live service seems good. For $50 a year you have access to play all online Xbox games. Not just for a specific companies games, all Xbox games.

After reading this post I may be tempted to pay IF it were a reasonable fee. 50$ a year for any game may be acceptable.
I guess people are willing to do it though or FF would not have had a problem with being overloaded with the release.
Just have to see what they do in the states.

[MGS2-Jebs02]

I have never payed to play i am not now, and i am absoloutley discousted that people should pay to play a game, if buying the game wasn't already enough money spent![COLOR=firebrick][COLOR=blue]

[Artevoi]

Originally posted by Mak-X
I don't think Diablo 2 even had a banner ad space. Most of the ads on battle.net for Warcraft 2 and Starcraft are for Blizzard's online store.

If you're talking about ads in the chat area yes it does, still mostly for the online store.

[Mak-X]

huhm, I guess I was wrong about Diablo 2 then. Either they didn't have them when I played or for some reason I missed it. I guess for whatever reason I thought it didn't have ads.