Well i've been looking around and noticed that the MMOFPS genre is coming into style and is becoming increasingly popular but what i've also noticed is their all pay to play or you have to buy them from retail vendors.

I believe the first MMOFPS to be free with option to pay(micro payments)will be a huge success and will cause more people to come out with MMOFPS' that are free i think this is what is needed to start of the industry i mean huxley is a start but more manpower is needed in making the MMOFPS genre take of from the ground.

This is my opinion what's yours?

Right now MMOFPS stands to be a breakthrough because of the difference in gameplay from your standard MMORPG. But until we see dedicated server and bandwidth available at a reasonable cost...it will never gain the popularity of the 3rd person RPG.

As far as micropayments go...it all comes down to monthly cost. Whether it is 3 dollars a week, or 15 dollars a month, or bi/annual yearly payments, if it costs money people are going to expect alot. Unfortunatly expectations normally exceed what your money is actually paying for. Planetside is my prime example. It is a good game with decent graphics and a fairly large playing area, but it hasnt been updated in forever and company support for the product is barely even registering. Withought some new graphics updates and gameplay this game is destined for has beens with everquest and ultima online.

Also alot of games fail because it is hard to get people to pay monthly payments on anything. We live in an age of torrents making all software ripe for pirating. Music is on MP3s that are shared all over the net, and software companies are thinking of raising the price of games to over 100 dollars a title to make up the revenue lost to software piracy (of course this just makes the pirates even more justified). Every day I get the "where do I get free keys to *your favorite game here*" We need to realize that to get what we want, we are going to have to invest a little of our hard earned cash to get it. Companies don't hear opinions...they hear dollar signs.

Huntyre wrote:

QUOTE:
Companies don't hear opinions...they hear dollar signs.

Amen to that

i know its just sad that this happens most companies are looking for a profit however if i can make a mmofps i will definetly make it fully free until the game gets off then i might have optional payment for items but not paying dosent affect your gameplay at all

ThievingSix wrote:

QUOTE:
i know its just sad that this happens most companies are looking for a profit however if i can make a mmofps i will definetly make it fully free until the game gets off then i might have optional payment for items but not paying dosent affect your gameplay at all

You gotta understand though.

It takes money to keeps the servers running, Not to mention all the employees they gotta pay.
So with just having people buying items with no effect on the buyers gameplay doesn't generate that much money as you think it would.

But if you think as the game becomes popular you add more servers and the more people to play on the servers the more people to buy the premium items!

The problem with selling items is this...I dont really think it would be fair to sell combat upgrading accessories for real cash. Call me old fashioned, but I think I should get to keep what I kill. To me you should get a reward with your kill..your enemies dog tags, his gun, a weapon, ect.That being said, I would really get p!$$3d off if I had just spent 20 dollars in real money to buy a new autocannon just to have some zone-poser get a lucky head shot off and steal it.

Now I wouldn't mind paying a basic fee, but alot of what I like about some of my older games was the ability to make "virtual money" by completing tasks and making kills while playing to buy guns, armor, property, houses, clothes, armor...you name it. If you make it to where you have to use just real money that wouldnt be good.

What you could do is split the difference and make an exchange rate between real money and virtual money...aka set it up where you can pay real money to buy virtual money. Then you could satisfy both sides of the coin.

Of course you would have to limit items you can use based on experience level (no need to have the 1st level noob carrying the autocannon). The noob can kill you, pick it up and sell it...but not use it.

Another thing you could do is allow artists and developers to pay a fee to sell virtual items they make for...a programmers mall where they can sell custom looking guns, vehicles, weapons, ect. All you would have to do is set up a basic template for items and let them make a graphic representation (aka the basic operating parameters for a light pistol would be x strength, x range, x ammo, x number of slots in the inventory screen...but with a customized look). You could allow totally custom items, but you would have to screen carefully for gamebreakers.

Best of all, if your game becomes popular enought (and depending on the style) you can sell advertising space. A commercial at the intro would just p!$$ everyone off...but an animated advertizing board on the side of the road in your game world would be cool as hell.

People will play monthly fees for mmofps. People thought no one would play monthly for mmorpgs but millions of people do. Just look at halo 3 and the amount of people that brought it. Once there are good enough servers and the investment there will be alot of mmofps.

Which i dont understand. We have games like bf2142 that each have 64 people on them. Why can't they just do that at a bigger scale?

They can its just that they need to be able to sell and market the game effectively that they will have players on it for years

Taiko! wrote:

QUOTE:
Huntyre wrote:

QUOTE:
Companies don't hear opinions...they hear dollar signs.

Amen to that

I 2nd that.