Potential commercialisation model

[chhopsky 25]

Hi,

Suggestion for commercialisation model:

You buy lives. Rather than paying $x to purchase the game and play it online forever, you could buy, say, 50 lives for $30. Or whatever amount, up to the ongoing full retail cost of the game. Some people will be saying 'whoa slow down crazy pants, i die all the time because i'm terrible and this would get expensive' but hear me out.

Everyone in the games industry is looking for a new way to commercialise their games. Tribes is free but you have to pay for items and classes in-game. That sucks; as a player trying it out and not ready to commit there's nothing to ever stop me playing it, as long as I'm okay with a gimped, sucky experience.

The concept of lives originated in video arcades where you needed an arbitrary meter to stop people from playing the game indefinitely. This transitioned over when home consoles became a thing but for the most part, died out when saved games started being a thing and we could store our progress. It was no longer about how long you played it for so we wanted people to get through no matter how many times they died.

I don't like buying full-priced games. In Australia a retail box game can be over $100, which is ridiculous considering that most of the time our dollar is better than the US dollar. I've had a lot of people baulk at buying ArmA2 for DayZ, so the idea of a demo trial being that you get 1 or 2 free lives actually sounds awesome to me. You can get people playing, get them hooked, then they die enough, they feed in some more quarters. I can't tell you how many times I've died but it wouldn't be that many. Permanent death in and of itself already gives serious repercussions for death but what if you knew that next time you died you were forking out another $5 for 20 lives? (or however much it might be, I don't know). How much do you care about your character's life now that there's a dollar value on it?

Anyway, just a thought. I'm going to buy it regardless of what the model is, even though I've already bought ArmA2 and no doubt will buy ArmA3. It's an interesting reversal of the subscription model because it rewards good play. Not many commercialisation models do!

Please apply thoughts/comments/abuse here. God knows I tell so many people their ideas are terrible and they are shit at the game, probably only fair to let them hurl their slings and arrows.

Edited July 30, 2012 by chhopsky

[dcskill 117]

"So now I get to kill people as soon as they spawn and they get mad as usual but now I can make them lose money too? Sweet!"

You know it will be that way.

[Seanyboy360 39]

"So now I get to kill people as soon as they spawn and they get mad as usual but now I can make them lose money too? Sweet!"

You know it will be that way.

Oh wait... I"m also helping out rocket by making him get even MOAR MURRNEY YEY! IT JUSTIFIES EVERYTANG ;O

[spammy@live.de 19]

worst idea ever.

[xDIx Revenge 51]

Pay for lives? I dont think you thought this through. Sure you can get the same experience, but the amount of rage that would create upon death, by hacks, scripts, any other bullshit that may not be sorted, and just annoying players. It just can't work, even if it was 1c per life, id rather buy $60 for a game, then pay some shitty run off of a subscription model.

Oh btw, don't buy games from retail. The internet exists, i purchase all my games from overseas, (if they are console, otherwise steam sales all the way). I buy from the UK, full price brand new games (like MW3 and whatever else) never exceed $60 for the standard version.

[chhopsky 25]

Obviously not now, since we're still deep in alpha territory and the game changes every two weeks. You may not like the subscription model but a lot of people do - it's working quite well for WoW, EVE, et al.

I don't remember the last time I bought a boxed game. What if it were a staged increase? So, past a certain amount of lives, when your total spend is the full retail price of the game, you get unlimited lives?

What I'm ultimately looking at for this is a way to provide a low-cost way to get people through the door and playing. And to make them value their lives a bit more so they don't do retarded things like throw flares in Cherno at night >:)

"So now I get to kill people as soon as they spawn and they get mad as usual but now I can make them lose money too? Sweet!"

You know it will be that way.

I'm not entirely un-fond of that! But on that note, see my other thread that makes an attempt at proving that the game isn't the deathmatch the whiners say it is.

[hoik 415]

I had a simular idea - but was too scared to post it! So I think its actually quite a good idea - it is interesting from a marketing perspective as well as a gaming perspective - what if you could 'earn' lives just like in old arcade games?.

[Louis13245 29]

Too many potential issues. Customer support would be flooded with complaints with unfair deaths. There's a reason why no online game that I've heard of runs on a purchase life based system. They are subscription based, true, but not in a way that dieing directly causes the consumer to have to pay more money.Legally it would also be awkward. By purchasing that life, you purchase the right to use that life in whatsoever way you wish. If another person were to kill you, it would essentially be destruction of property. Obviously, it would be stated in the terms and conditions otherwise, but a developer would be opening themselves to no end of trouble.

Finally, its a system that punishes newcomers with heavier fees, while giving lower fees to veterans of the game. This in turn would lower revenue as you've increased the barriers to entry for the game. I know that this might not apply to all newcomers, but I've no doubt a significant majority would find that system repellant. People want to know that they're going to get their money's worth when they purcahse something, and this system simply does not allow for that. While it is true that it might add slightly to the game by makeing people value their lives more, the same can be acheived through various other means of addtional content, rather then a outside force of financial commitment.

[Rhoobarb1 12]

I paid £15 ($23.62) for the Arma 2 CO double pack direct from BI. I see that as an amazing price for what you get. I just dont like subscription based play.

[MagicFloof 2]

Couldn't hackers just come on and kill everyone 50 times using some script? It's happened to a server I played on before, He broke our legs and killed everone in the server like 20 times in seconds

[Louis13245 29]

I don't remember the last time I bought a boxed game. What if it were a staged increase? So, past a certain amount of lives, when your total spend is the full retail price of the game, you get unlimited lives?

What I'm ultimately looking at for this is a way to provide a low-cost way to get people through the door and playing. And to make them value their lives a bit more so they don't do retarded things like throw flares in Cherno at night > :)

There's a simpler model for getting people through the door and hooked onto the game. Steam does it quite often. Allow for a trial period of a day or two where anyone can play the game free of charge. If they then wish to continue after the trial period, they pay the full retail price. I'd also speculate that your method of pay by life might also put strain on the number of transactions occuring at one time, as one transaction would be split into what is essentially multiple transactions. Not too sure about that, but its a consideration.

[paradox. 12]

People People he means that this idea could happen in the standalone game. wWere there won't be as many hackers, banditry will be fair by then(hopefully) and all bugs and glitches will be eliminated(the ones that are game breaking and commonly annoying) I myself don't partically like the idea...but it could work nether the less.

[necroslord 73]

I don't like being blunt but yes, this has to be the worst bussiness model ever.

This would discourage a huge amount of players, specially in a game where people die so much. It is more expensive than a subscription fee to an MMO.

I'm not that sure that an explanation is required.

[TurtleMadness 5]

As a consumer, why in the hell would you want this? Why would anyone want this?

Sure, it would cost less in the beginning, but what if you play for like months at a time?

Edited July 30, 2012 by TurtleMadness

[Yatagan 62]

Yeah, no. Subscriptions and microtransactions are absolutely horrible in 99.99999999% of games and this is no exception.

I'd rather pay $100 to play infinitely (Which I still wouldn't do), than buy my lives.

So, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

Edited July 30, 2012 by Yatagan

[chhopsky 25]

There's a simpler model for getting people through the door and hooked onto the game. Steam does it quite often. Allow for a trial period of a day or two where anyone can play the game free of charge. If they then wish to continue after the trial period, they pay the full retail price. I'd also speculate that your method of pay by life might also put strain on the number of transactions occuring at one time, as one transaction would be split into what is essentially multiple transactions. Not too sure about that, but its a consideration.

Timed 'free for the weekend' trials don't work as well as 'hey you mean i can play this now?' It's got to co-incide with the player demand.

I would also support getting a number of free lives, then having to pay full retail.

As a consumer, why in the hell would you want this? Why would anyone want this?

Sure, it would cost less in the beginning, but what if you play for like months at a time?

Because I've had a lot of people refuse to play this because they don't want to spend the money to try it out.

Plus, that's just how I roll. I play all games on perma-death mode, because death has to mean something for life to be important.

Edited July 30, 2012 by chhopsky

[chhopsky 25]

Too many potential issues. Customer support would be flooded with complaints with unfair deaths. There's a reason why no online game that I've heard of runs on a purchase life based system. They are subscription based, true, but not in a way that dieing directly causes the consumer to have to pay more money.Legally it would also be awkward. By purchasing that life, you purchase the right to use that life in whatsoever way you wish. If another person were to kill you, it would essentially be destruction of property. Obviously, it would be stated in the terms and conditions otherwise, but a developer would be opening themselves to no end of trouble.

Well, no. There's basically nothing that's legally correct that you've said in there. But it's good that you're thinking about it. Also remembering too we're talking about a point where it's a retail product, not plagued by hacks that kill everyone on a server by teleporting them into the sky or something equally terrible. It's difficult to compare the current alpha state with the RC state it would need to be in to work. That customer service desk WOULD be interesting though.

Finally, its a system that punishes newcomers with heavier fees, while giving lower fees to veterans of the game. This in turn would lower revenue as you've increased the barriers to entry for the game. I know that this might not apply to all newcomers, but I've no doubt a significant majority would find that system repellant. People want to know that they're going to get their money's worth when they purcahse something, and this system simply does not allow for that. While it is true that it might add slightly to the game by makeing people value their lives more, the same can be acheived through various other means of addtional content, rather then a outside force of financial commitment.

That's kind of the point - you get a barrier of entry that's almost zero cost to the new player to try it out, which then reduces its load over time. So you've got the option of paying full retail price for a game, or you've got the option of paying $5 to get 10 lives to test it out to see if you like it. If anything, I'd say that more people would get hooked and buy the game because you've lowered the barrier of entry.

Edited July 30, 2012 by chhopsky