Dont We All Know What A F2P Game Is By Now?

[Argoms]

Lets see, as far as I can tell,

1) Still free to play but a horrible design, people will leave and with good cause.

2) No, then it is just a demo. You can have pay-only areas, but, In Example, allowing levels 1-20 for free and over 20 costs money is not free to play (I believe WoW is doing something like that now).

3) The question is vague. Specific examples could create scenarios that are or are not free to play.

That's the thing, not everyone has the same answers to these questions. 

[Law_Abiding_Engineer]

I agree with your points Callback

 

Free:

Full access to the entirety of the gameplay

Full access to all combat/stat related items

Bearable playing conditions (slot restriction currently a bit too tight)

 

Premium:

Everything free offers, plus:

Various skins and customizations

Extra items not affecting gameplay such as pets, animations, titles, accessories, etc.

Convenience fees to cut out some of the grind (platinum weapons, frames, potatoes, boosts, rush fees)

Potentially unlimited access to slots

Miscellaneous other vanity items (stat trackers, particle effects, global shout-outs, etc.)

 

 

Now the thing that makes the Warframe game different, is that there are constant updates.  Although yes it's beta, its still good to have updates.  And, unlike many of the updates from Valve and TF2, these updates are the perfect range of changes.  First, they add a new weapon or cosmetic for those who like things that look new.  Second, they fix bugs and glitches that are reported and thus corrected.  Third, they change various things based off user's feedback (best example IMO is how defense maps are designed when voting to fight or leave, and how laser doors affect players).  Fourth, they add things to just overall improve the look and feel of the game (best example was the huge optimization and the adding of new map designs)

 

 

Now, I understand the issue that arises from F2P games that have ingame stores.  People who do not want to spend money on it, argue that they deserve the right or ability to get those items without having to spend money.  Certain things are arguable, but others, I think should be kept separate so that those with the money can choose to buy them (especially cosmetics).  Now, in reference to the Founder's package for Warframe, I have only bought the disciple package because it gave me a slightly better deal with platinum's and I enjoy helping companies that are new and working as hard as DE is, in improving the game.  Hell, Im so surprised at how fast they are in patching things and changing things and these changes, aren't just quick bandages, they are good changes.

 

Now, will I eventually buy the Head Master package?  Honestly, I might, but realistically, I doubt it because being in college and about to graduate, I have to put my money and focus on college, but, I don't mind spending a bit of money here and there, which is why I've paid what I've paid so far.  IMO, 200 bucks is a bit high, since its all-at-once, but knowing me, I have no issue spending 200 bucks over a certain period of time.  Anywho, I'll have to read more about the benefits and stuff and I like the idea of being able to know about what's new, first, but that's a pretty penny, and being that I've already bought disciple, means that the price will still be 200 bucks or so (wish it went down for every rank below that you buy)

 

 

Forgive me for writing such a long and kinda bland post but I just wanted to throw my 2cents out there.  In short, I feel like DE is putting in a lot of time and effort in improving the game and to be honest, it looks and feels a lot better than other games that ive bought that weren't F2P.  Anyway, can't wait to see whats next and see the next update :)

[Demonocolips]

i have gotten more enjoyment out of this game for $15

then i got out of any of the latest COD games which are alot more expensive

 do not mind spending money for good entertainment.

[Sniktch]

I'm going to pull out a quote, originally said by a gent named MrBtounge (look him up on YouTube) regarding the fall of Bioware. 

 

At the beginning, Bioware said "We want to make great games.  Therefore, we need to make money."  When EA *spits* bought Bioware, their corporate culture oozed into Bioware - and the principle became "We want to make great money, therefore we need to make games."

 

At the moment, DE is very much the first half of the quote - and I have no issue with supporting them.  Yes, it can be annoying to have to grind for stuff and/or get lucky with Alerts for potatoes/BPs.  But they DO have to make money in order to make great games.  Either endure, or drop a LITTLE cash.  $10 gets you enough platinum to buy several Frame and Weapon slots, with enough left over to snag Reactors and Catalysts.  Color schemes are nice, but not "needed" for the game - if you want more variety, spring for them.  If not, do without.  Everything else can be gotten with a little luck and perseverance.  I have bought 0 Frames or weapons with Plat - just slots, colors, and Catalysts/Reactors.  And I don't regret the purchase one bit.

[Creavyer]

i have gotten more enjoyment out of this game for $15

then i got out of any of the latest COD games which are alot more expensive

 do not mind spending money for good entertainment.

 now i havnt played COD but your right, even with 15$ you can get alot of weapon/warframe slots & even some potatoes

you dont have to spend 250$ like i did to enjoy the game at all

i still have 5k platinum left 

am missing some cosmitic items in this game that simply only can be bought for platinum 

i hope that will come one day otherwise i am never gonna be able to spend all my platinum >.<

[Skorpior]

 

so i been checking the forum pretty much everyday since i started playing warframe

to be involved, come with ideas or simply just read the hot topics of the day to see what's happening

 

but i keep seeing people making topics about how potatos or warframe/weapons slots should be either free 

or free to obtain, in my gaming experience the best game is usually the one you pay for.

So for those who do not wish to pay for the game, dont worrie i bought the grand master package, so you dont have to.

:) and can keep on playing the game for free.

 

I know alot of other bought these sweet packages

both to support the game & get a smaller benefits ingame

to be honest am mainly using my platinum to get cosmetics & more slots/potatos

 

 

the consequences of making the game totally F2P

1. forget about any support or atleast by proberly staff

2. forget about hotfixs on a weekly basic

3. forget about small or bigger expansions 

bottom line is somebody gotta pay for the game to continue & i am just one out of thousands 

who bought platinum & i dont mind at all paying money for a great game

that i have very high expectations to & hope to play for along time to come 

 

 

If you dont wanna pay for this game that is totally fine with me 

but just stop complaining about those potatos & frame/weapon slots are not that expensive

platinum should not be given out in bigger amouts the a larger number of players 

it wouldnt just ruin the game it would also preventing alot of players to even bother buying platinum

and with out the platinum contributer there woundnt be a game.

 

 

So if your a free to play kindaguy stop complaining & enjoy the game or get out! :)

 

That is so many true words.

 

Devs need money for 2 reasons. 1. To make their game better. 2. To survive.

 

I mean, devs are regular humans, they can't magically conjure games, updates, food and houses from their asses. They need money to do that stuff.

[Mbgunsling]

... I have no idea why we're not trustworthy. Grand Master benefits also include name in Solar Chart, access to Design Council (and recently Council chat). They get early access to coming stuff and participate in polls that get added to the game. It is a lot of money for sure and we are always discussing ways of giving them small tokens of appreciation as we continue into the future thanks to their support.

 

I am not even sure what it means that we didn't trust them??? We give them information that very often leaks within few hours, and we haven't stopped sharing despite that. I cannot see how we don't trust and value them.

Dont forget Lato prime.

Just kidding that was cheap.

Braton prime. now we're cooking.

Also, I'm mad that the frost prime is going to everyone (as per the "quest" or "special conditions"), Primes should be limited edition stuff yo. thats what excal was supposed to be.

 

I would seriously upgrade my membership just for a frost prime and a braton/latron prime.

JUST for that.

[Skorpior]

I'm going to pull out a quote, originally said by a gent named MrBtounge (look him up on YouTube) regarding the fall of Bioware. 

 

At the beginning, Bioware said "We want to make great games.  Therefore, we need to make money."  When EA *spits* bought Bioware, their corporate culture oozed into Bioware - and the principle became "We want to make great money, therefore we need to make games."

 

At the moment, DE is very much the first half of the quote - and I have no issue with supporting them.  Yes, it can be annoying to have to grind for stuff and/or get lucky with Alerts for potatoes/BPs.  But they DO have to make money in order to make great games.  Either endure, or drop a LITTLE cash.  $10 gets you enough platinum to buy several Frame and Weapon slots, with enough left over to snag Reactors and Catalysts.  Color schemes are nice, but not "needed" for the game - if you want more variety, spring for them.  If not, do without.  Everything else can be gotten with a little luck and perseverance.  I have bought 0 Frames or weapons with Plat - just slots, colors, and Catalysts/Reactors.  And I don't regret the purchase one bit.

Also, DE is the company that brought you the Unreal Tournament games, Dark Sector, The Darkness 2, the first 2 Bioshock games and... Ugh... Star Trek.

 

Now, i do play a bit of Test your Luck (REFFERENCE) for potatoes. However, i have only spent money on colour paletes and slots. I see no reason to spend money on weapons and warframes.

Edited May 10, 2013 by Skorpior

[aliasAnonymous]

Im curious, don't the developers get paid salary while their investors get paid via the return?

The whole, food and rent mantra, along with other soundbyte arguments, wear me out.

 

This isn't a position on the issue, just a position on the forum dwellers.

[bitlard]

The ultimate goal of any business is to maximize profit. No game developer will be persuaded to provide free in-game content if it hurts the company's bottom-line. The only reason why DE gives away stuff through alert missions and the starting 50 plat is to generate interest in the game, which will hopefully lead to increased sales. I.e. by getting a taste of having an orokin catalyst, you see how awesome it is to have a Hek with 60 mod points, and you start fantasizing about what you could do with a Braton, a Paris, a Twin Viper, a Scindo etc. with the same, and you one day decide to buy some platinum. Or by constantly looking at the alerts twitter feed, Warframe becomes such an integral part of your lonely life that you cannot help but keep thinking about buying some platinum.

 

The only reason why DE might possibly implement a system which allows you to buy warframe or weapon slots with credits, is if this leads to increased platinum sales. The only way this will happen without cannibalizing platinum sales is if the cost of warframe and weapon slots is so high that you would rather buy platinum than farm for credits. Or in other words, it'll cost a million credits. That COULD still work since it doesn't cannibalize platinum sales. It COULD even INCREASE platinum sales if it makes players think that their initial investment could yield significant benefits. In other words, if I spend 20 bucks, I can get the equipment I need to get enough credits, and eventually get 40 bucks worth of warframe and weapon slots. Although this COULD mean that more players buy the minimum amount of platinum, it might cannibalize sales of higher amounts of platinum, and it won't change the fact that there is a significant portion of the gaming community that will NEVER purchase any platinum, either because it's part of their gaming ethos, or simply because they don't have a credit card (or have strict parents)

[bitlard]

Whether they are paid a fixed or variable income is irrelevant. (And I should think that game developers do get bonuses etc if the company does well)

 

If the company (Digital Extremes) doesn't make enough money from the game to pay the people in its employ, it'll shut the game down. That means the developers have to find another job, and the gamers another game.

 

Im curious, don't the developers get paid salary while their investors get paid via the return?

The whole, food and rent mantra, along with other soundbyte arguments, wear me out.

 

This isn't a position on the issue, just a position on the forum dwellers.

[Drakontis]

Whether they are paid a fixed or variable income is irrelevant. (And I should think that game developers do get bonuses etc if the company does well)

 

If the company (Digital Extremes) doesn't make enough money from the game to pay the people in its employ, it'll shut the game down. That means the developers have to find another job, and the gamers another game.

 

This actually recently happened with DFO from Nexon America. They only had a core player base and it wasn't enough to support the game, so they shut it down. 

[Creavyer]

This actually recently happened with DFO from Nexon America. They only had a core player base and it wasn't enough to support the game, so they shut it down. 

 

now nexon dosnt care much about their players in general atleast asfar as i have experienced.

I just hope the firm will go down one day but it seems very unlikely

[Emotitron]

A slightly different take on F2P...

 

F2P (instead of shareware or trial versions) works on a couple ideas.

1. That exposing a player to the real game for free they will get hooked, much like old shareware and then want to pay for more. This however is actually counter to the true F2P philosophy.

 

2. Secondly (and more correctly) is the philosophy that in online games PEOPLE are the content. In games like Planetside 2 that is truer than most other games, as the entire game design requires a huge number of players to be online at all times. If any part of the game excludes players without budget to play, they lose a huge chunk of their content and the game withers and dies.

 

It is much like facebook. People say "Stop complaining about FB because it is free - you get what you get and like it". This is false. Facebook OWES the users everything as they are 100% of the sites content. If your friends aren't on FB, then you have no reason to be on facebook. It has to find it's money elsewhere and has to keep convincing users that they should stay on it.

 

Warframe is a weird bird for a F2P model, as huge numbers of players aren't important at all. Most of the Warframe community never even see one another or know they exist. Games only ever have 4 people in them at a time.

Warframe has for whatever reason chosen to go with a F2P model (probably because trying to get people to play a beta that isn't free = good luck in this market?). Since it is F2P it is kind of expected to play along the general rules of F2P, which is that pay-to-win is a deadly sin.

There really is no 'win' condition though in this game so it is all a very murky.

Edited May 12, 2013 by Emotitron

[Creavyer]

A slightly different take on F2P...

 

F2P (instead of shareware or trial versions) works on a couple ideas.

1. That exposing a player to the real game for free they will get hooked, much like old shareware and then want to pay for more. This however is actually counter to the true F2P philosophy.

 

2. Secondly (and more correctly) is the philosophy that in online games PEOPLE are the content. In games like Planetside 2 that is truer than most other games, as the entire game design requires a huge number of players to be online at all times. If any part of the game excludes players without budget to play, they lose a huge chunk of their content and the game withers and dies.

 

It is much like facebook. People say "Stop complaining about FB because it is free - you get what you get and like it". This is false. Facebook OWES the users everything as they are 100% of the sites content. If your friends aren't on FB, then you have no reason to be on facebook. It has to find it's money elsewhere and has to keep convincing users that they should stay on it.

 

Warframe is a weird bird for a F2P model, as huge numbers of players aren't important at all. Most of the Warframe community never even see one another or know they exist. Games only ever have 4 people in them at a time.

Warframe has for whatever reason chosen to go with a F2P model (probably because trying to get people to play a beta that isn't free = good luck in this market?). Since it is F2P it is kind of expected to play along the general rules of F2P, which is that pay-to-win is a deadly sin.

There really is no 'win' condition though in this game so it is all a very murky.

 

 

"Warframe has for whatever reason chosen to go with a F2P model (probably because trying to get people to play a beta that isn't free = good luck in this market?). Since it is F2P it is kind of expected to play along the general rules of F2P, which is that pay-to-win is a deadly sin."

 

warframe isnt really using the Pay2Win concept, i dont know if that was even what you meant by this.

I think warframe gives you every opportunity to play the full game for free

& the hole Pay2Win is a huge succes in other gaming companies, i just pray to whatever gods there are out there that warframe wont sell out & start selling Overpowered weapons for platinum only or whatever.

[Strudelhouse]

2) No, then it is just a demo. You can have pay-only areas, but, In Example, allowing levels 1-20 for free and over 20 costs money is not free to play (I believe WoW is doing something like that now).

Warcraft doesn't claim to be F2P, however. And those 1-20 free levels took something like 7 years to implement, and usually can be achieved within the first day without even trying.

 

Two things I've gotten from this thread:

 

1: I finally figured out what a potato was. How it's easier to say than Catalyst/Reactor, is beyond me. O.o Someone stated it looks like a potato. I'm looking at it now, and it looks like no potato I've ever eaten. http://oi41.tinypic.com/6r38kz.jpg

 

2: With all the 'Pay to Win' comments, is there some pvp I don't know about? How can you 'pay to win' in a co-op vs ai game? O.o

 

Sorry, a little confused at what I've learned. :/

 

I'm still in my first week playing this game. My friend Jaisu showed this game to me on Steam, and we gave it a try. I've managed to get 3 other people to start playing, and they all love it. While we would love to be able to fit all 5 in a party, we accept that this is beta still and it might (we hope) change in the future.

 

That being said, I see no reason why anything should be cheaper or easier to get in this game. I got founder because I see this game going somewhere. I would have paid for Grand Master, but $$ is tight. Are the payments consecutive? Could ya bill me? :P

 

Point is, a few of the commenters in this thread seem to be mistaking this game for something it isn't (Leage of Legends maybe?), and are using the defense they'd normally use on those forums, here. The whole 'Pay to whatever' comments, the constant wanting of more 'free' stuff, and the complaints about how this game is dying already (not just on these forums) while it's still in Beta, reminds me of Warcraft/LoL players. This game isn't those games. You're on the wrong forums.

 

This game is in beta still. Let the devs work some things out and get input from members. But to completely bash the game and automatically title it as a P2W game? Why are you even here? You're like the gnats who browse for videos on Youtube just to downvote them and bash them in the comments section. If you don't like the game, or where it's headed, why are you wasting others time with your negative attitue? O.o

 

I see this game going somewhere. I'll happily support it. This coming from someone who's on like day 5 with a level 30 Frost. <3 Frost. :3

Edited May 12, 2013 by Strudelhouse

[Creavyer]

 

Warcraft doesn't claim to be F2P, however. And those 1-20 free levels took something like 7 years to implement, and usually can be achieved within the first day without even trying.

 

Two things I've gotten from this thread:

 

1: I finally figured out what a potato was. How it's easier to say than Catalyst/Reactor, is beyond me. O.o Someone stated it looks like a potato. I'm looking at it now, and it looks like no potato I've ever eaten. http://oi41.tinypic.com/6r38kz.jpg

 

2: With all the 'Pay to Win' comments, is there some pvp I don't know about? How can you 'pay to win' in a co-op vs ai game? O.o

 

Sorry, a little confused at what I've learned. :/

 

 

now this thread isnt really about Pay2Win its about warframe business model & about people should stop making threads about how everything should be able to optian through free2play only, like potatoes (that can even be optain through free2play) & the warframe/weapons slots that are only platinum

[Strudelhouse]

now this thread isnt really about Pay2Win

Coulda fooled me.

[Emotitron]

 

2: With all the 'Pay to Win' comments, is there some pvp I don't know about? How can you 'pay to win' in a co-op vs ai game? O.o

 

Sorry, a little confused at what I've learned. :/

 

 

You aren't crazy, it is mostly people being really silly. PvE with no endgame has no win condition. People are just yelling that because they are being pack animals and they heard someone else say it when they wanted free stuff.

 

 

warframe isnt really using the Pay2Win concept, i dont know if that was even what you meant by this.

I think warframe gives you every opportunity to play the full game for free

& the hole Pay2Win is a huge succes in other gaming companies, i just pray to whatever gods there are out there that warframe wont sell out & start selling Overpowered weapons for platinum only or whatever.

 

Nope, not at all saying it was - you are correct. I was just remarking there are quite a few people wanting free stuff (or on the other end of the spectrum telling other people they are asking for too much) who don't fully understand F2P nor P2W. Without understanding the F2P philosophy people get some strange ideas about what should and shouldn't be in-game and in-store.

Overpowered at the moment is also meaningless really, as there is no endgame content to measure it against. The only way something can be OP in a game like this is if everyone starts using it. If something becomes disproportionately unpopular/popular, that should trigger some buffs/nerfs.