VoodooGirl

It's speculation on both sides.

Some people speculate that F2P would utterly destroy the game.

Some people speculate that F2P could head the game into an entirely new direction and perhaps for the best.

To each their own.

Not saying that at all. At least not me, personally. I think the F2P business could possibly be an avenue for City of Heroes to expand and become even more profitable - if done right.

Here are some editorials/articles on the subject that I've read which I have helped change my opinion.

http://venturebeat.com/2010/07/15/fr...e-game-makers/

http://freetoplay.org/article/article_582/

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/featur...ewards_of_.php

http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming...-gaming-582868

http://mmohuts.com/editorials/is-fre...ture-of-gaming

I think it's a relevant discussion to have considering the nature of the MMO business. We have a competitor coming out in the future from another large comic book house that will be launching their Superhero MMO free to play.

"Free to play/microtransaction" isn't going away and there are indications it could be the business model of future MMO's/Online Games.

I would buy that power over, and over, and over...

The same could be said when assuming all of the negatives that have happened with other F2P MMO's would happen with COH if COH went F2P.

Summonable Nuns with Guns. 1 time use. They last for 45seconds.

But they were failures at launch before they switched to F2P, weren't they?

This was a dry run.

No, seriously, as posted by Freitag here, I can't name other MMO's.

I can't - because no other game is like COH.

Forum rules prevent me from mentioning the names of any other MMO.

No, no, it's one involving chickens, flying hens, and cannibal candles.

Because That Fantasy Tabletop Based MMO That Converted To F2P did experience a huge influx of players?

Funny you mention that - yes, I did get my sources and numbers from my chair - from my experiences playing the game, which I, get it, are entirely subjective - but that's my perception based off of my experiences.

Truthfully, for some it might be a necessity. I have an SG mate who I've been playing with since CoV launched - and for them, they are so financially strapped that the $15 really is an expensive purchase - and they love this game. They've played it on/off for years with their child (it freaks me out that their son is now a teenager and I remember when they were 7!)

Yes, making the game free makes it much more accessible to a wider pool of people who for reasons may not have played it before - one such group of people who may not have been able to afford it.

Are they suddenly any "less" of a "worthy" player? Do they become auto-noobs because they couldn't afford it before?

Conversely, why not instead have a server specifically for subscription accounts? With the change to F2P you're more likely to have a large flux of free accounts - would one server do?

We already have Trial accounts. Switching to F2P/MTS would allow people to play the game, ideally without severe restrictions, for free. How many people currently play a Trial Account right now and switch to subscriptions? Very few. I can't recall many Trial Accounts that switch to full subs - why? Because it's so restrictive.

If you haven't noticed, we've already had issues with spammers and griefers - on guess what! TRIAL ACCOUNTS. So switching to F2P isn't going to be magically opening a door that hasn't already been opened before.

That is the wrong type of Microtransaction - that's "microgriefing."

That's sort of along the line of people who denied the Holocaust ever happened *cough* Mel Gibson's father *cough*. If you refuse to see something, you won't see it, period. If you refuse to see the potential in something, you never will.

Simply because you refuse to see it doesn't mean isn't there.

And there's a lot of rude elitist players I can't remove either via petitioning. Go figure.

An option would be for subscription based accounts to have access to perks that can't normally be gained within the game.

I think what would need to be established is what would be considered "gated" content. Certain levels? Powersets? I don't think that would be wise. Side-switching, PvP, Bases/Base Editing - perhaps that could all be considered "gated" content that if free players wanted they could microtransact (MTS) for, but is otherwise free to subscribing accounts.

But when you switch to F2P the focus shouldn't be solely on the "subscribers" - all those "free" accounts are potential future subscriptions but are also customers who will continually make repeated microtransactions. When a game is switching to F2P it's not just about the longterm subscribing players - you also have to make the new "free" generation happy - so much so that they will enjoy the game so much that they'll want to upgrade to a subscription to get whatever extra perks come with it.

To say a free account would have to MTS levels 20 - 30 on each toon, or access to Dark Astoria, or whatever other gated content - would they want to upgrade to a subscription because they want to or would they do it out of annoyance of having to MTS each time? Is the goal to annoy the players, or give them a game they can enjoy on any level of subscription?

To reiterate, an established MMO switching to F2P shouldn't have a free subscription level that punishes the players for not having a paying subscription based account, but offers them as much as near to the complete game as if they had been a - let's call it - "legacy" subscriber experience.

To quote:

“Also, recall that for any MTS [F2P] game to be successful, you need a vibrant community that is only taking advantage of the free services” -- David Chang

/end rant

I am currently dealing with the flu. Any typos, grammatical errors, crazy ideas/rants - they were all intended. I don't make mistakes. Ever.