Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
Its like a pizza and a half less a month, thats not to expensive man
The vid you posted is from 2018, the first year of development.
Battlepasses have become quite popular in the last 5 years.
2018 is a year or more before Intrepid developed their Battlepass for APOC.
Everything is subject to change. Except no P2W.
Battlepass fits in with a quarterly release of content.
And it's not unusual for Battlepasses to have a free path as well as a premium/paid path.
So... Battlepass is not a major tweak of those quotes.
You really are not looking at the overall picture, there is a reason why games don't do a sub model anymore. You most likely don't understand tons of people out there that a sub model means they wont play the game. The larger that number the less players will be willing to play.
But hey i guess your sub is more important so they will be fine if they up the price up to 25+$ a month.
People also FUCKING LOVE SUBS. Just look at all the services people pay for on monthly basis. The only thing that determines whether people keep that sub is the quality of the content (and the payers forgetfulness). If Ashes is great and people keep saying that it's great - it will have enough subs to pay the devs.
Some people liking subs is not the majority you are coping (even more so if you are interacting with more people on forums and people from old school mmorpgs). There is a reason why AoC is not doing box / expansion cost.
Most people prefer not paying monthly that is just a fact. And if you trying to convince me people will be fine paying 25$+ (BASE PRICE) is just wild.
*EDIT
So for me that would turn into 34$ a month lmfao.
I prefer subs over buying an entry for $60 just to dislike the product and not have an alternative for a refund. Paying $15/m entry fee is far less than modern day gaming just in general. A lot of modern titles that involve the $60 price only last 30-40hours of actual gameplay before a player has finished the story campaign. You could play the entire game in ~3 weeks and still not yield the same amount as a subscription model.
Though I find it humorous that you claim someone else is wrong & coping and then proceed to make the claim your stance is fact.
Sounds like you have not being paying attention to modern games for awhile. If developers new subscription models worked tons of games would be actively doing it and pushing for it *ie destiny not having a active sub model and instead doing a box price every year as a work around to hide it.
You are 100% coping as well gaming history tells you other wise, as you clearly don't have the grasp on the barrier of entry it creates. And you are losing the point of the conversation about increased price of a sub model to balance out inflation (ie you aren't paying 15$ you are paying more), instead of the pressure being put on other people using a battlepass.
Again we are talking about what is successful monetization not you are fine with.
*edit
End of the day Intrepid studios doesn't need to revolutionary monetization in gaming, whatever model works for their game and makes sense, is what they should do. The game being successful is the most important thing, the more successful it is and the better the game the more options they have. If battlepass works and makes money while not adding p2w that should 100% be used. I have no issues with what they decide unless p2w is added.
If it is wow level success then they can do anything. They are already doing good having no box cost/ expansion cost (unless things change).
You're comparing the market today that uses F2P to get people hooked onto their game and then utilizes Battlepasses as a means to increase revenue by doing barely anything. Modern gaming isn't anything to be praised for their current practices. They use FOMO, whales, gambling, and children to increase their revenue. These aren't pillars of morality or good faith between developers and the consumers that consume their products.
The $15/m model works. I posted earlier in this thread that with the current staff the company would still yield $500million/yearly revenue after salary requirements with a 1/4 of WoW's peak numbers. The companies pushing for battlepasses, loot crates, fomo, etc are all bloated bureaucratic companies that are looking out for their investors and not their consumers interests.
I see you have a skewed outlook on the F2P model and i don't really share that. If your standard of f2P is like a gotcha game that involves P2W. That isn't the standard for all F2P.
Also this disccusion is not about AoC going F2P.
If you think AoC will have millions of subs (2-3 months in) then there isn't much point in this discussion since they would be fine. And wouldn't need to rely on anything else. I'm not going to argue what they will have I'm trying to be mindful of what they need. And if they don't what are the options that aren't going to increase the barrier of entry or add p2w. A battlepass doesn't add any negative effects and do to the modern age people are accepting of paying extra money for one.
Edit* On getting some amount of WoW player count the only issue would be if it is casuals having 2 subs at the same time. They most likely would stick to WoW. Maybe try AoC for a month or two (that is why i talk about after 2-3 months)
F2P models when it comes to MMORPGs have always been bloated with ways to get to a player's credit card asap. They will pester and displays ads continually to get the player to fork over some cash. I don't want any annoyances when I boot up a game or when I'm playing one. I've tried a number of F2P MMOs and they've all acted similar to one another.
It isn't about AoC going F2P but, discussing the current modern games that do utilize Battlepasses as a means for additional revenue. I personally find it lazy and obnoxious to the experience.
What exactly do Battlepasses even offer? Vanity items. A cosmetic shop already exists so why does there need to be an additional vanity item revenue source? If the game is struggling and needs additional revenue than ultimately the game has failed on the premise of what it was offerring by not having the sub numbers to keep it afloat or the economy is destroyed to the point where people can't afford anything. Meaning that it won't just be Intrepid suffering and a Battlepass wouldn't solve that scenario. Ultimately it's either AoC is successful because it kept to its promises or it fails because it didn't.
Even a game such as a "New World" is yielding 15million subscribers (Though I doubt that entirely). AoC yielding a couple million worldwide doesn't seem hard to imagine considering how many people there are that play videogames.
you can still have a very very good game that also has a battlepass on top of that. just because there is a battle pass, doesn't mean the game is automatically bad or not very engaging and the engagement comes from the battle pass. wont argue that there are games like that, but these things arent mutually exclusive.
edit: I still don't want a bp unless it doesn't require me to do things I don't want to do.
for example, id hate a bp that asked me to level the spear weapon to level 10. id prefer a bp that tells me to level any weapon to level 10.
I'm unsure where you are getting your numbers but whatever site you are using you should not be using. You are most likely getting bloated numbers from everything that are not nearly accurate.
There are varying degrees of successes, i guess you could view Aoc as a success with it being indie studio and having 3 servers up per region. And cutting more than half the team size and making back money of the development after some years being a new studio. With much limited growth on the game do to the money it makes not enough enough for new growth.
Ultimately again game development is expensive, a battle pass being cosmetics has 0 impact on any meaningful gameplay to you and can give additional revenue. Your negative view on it feels more out of spite than any reality where it effects you actually playing the game.
If you don't open the store page I'm unsure how that is even affecting your viewing experience on the game to begin with, since you don't even see it. So what i see is something that has 0 impact, something you don't really see but you are saying its bad just cause. Even if it gives revenge to the game which helps it stay a float and have a stronger dev team.
Expecting WoW level success i feel is not the best way to look at AoC, I feel it will have a lot of people at launch but what matters is 2-3 months after and the people that will keep playing the game and sustaining them for the rest of the year. Not the people trying it for 15$ and jumping out.
What point i find interesting is how is a battle pass lazy and obnoxious to the experience. It really is just a progression path you increase and gain rewards for those interested. A way to milk impatient people, give people very limited free items to play the game.
Most BP you just get general xp, but you can do certain dailies you get more xp. If there is anything i don't want to do, i tend to ignore it 9not an exclusive thing to bp that includes lame quest in games as well)
The ball is important!
Intrepid aren't planning on charging players for additional content post launch, so you're begging Intrepid to charge you for no content.
It's almost like a case of Stockholm syndrome. You're so used to developers releasing minimal viable products that they couldn't convince players to pay a subscription for and so have to resort to hiding an ongoing fee - that you are again begging other developers to rip you off in the same manner.
The fact that you are all talking about different versions of a battlepass seems to not have occured to most of the people wanting it in Ashes.
Right, so that is pay to win.
Hard no.
Love how we go to from leveling up a battle pass is now p2w lmao. This is a sign of someone does not play many modern games.
Possibly it could work but, I find it to be double dipping on cosmetic delivery while also being insulting towards the consumer for pushing them towards chores to do. Games are meant to be games. The content of a "chore" should be within the context of the gameworld and not from an external system outside the sphere of the actual game. No doubt BPs work for MOBAs and Shooters where you spend a great amount of time either in queue or in a main menu.
Rule of thumb to always follow don't do things you don't want to do. Either ignore it just so you aren't worried about it and don't care about the items. Or if you do buy it just play the game normally and you will get everything eventually, there is no rush to max it out (unless you are aiming for a certain cosmetic).
Us playing a mmorpg we will always have chores to do. The difference is in relation to the mmorpg we will have to do them where a battle pass they can be ignored, since they don't effect gameplay (and also doing dailies on a battle pass is not a requirement to compete it unless they design the battle pass to be annoying as possible and different than all other battle passes for some reason)
Yes, I found the source to be dubious at best but if the numbers are accurate even to 50% it goes well beyond the threshold I mentioned previously.
I don't disagree with game development being expensive. I disagree with modern developer studios that have matured that can't produce functioning/fun games even with $200 million such as Skull & Bones being the standard of what to expect. You have to remember modern AAA gaming studios are no different from government entities with their expenses. Everything is incredibly expensive, bureaucratic, staff bloat, out of touch higher ups, etc. Ashes being an Indie developer doesn't suffer from this wastefulness.
Stardock another Indie dev from 2008 produced a game costing around 1million in expenses but, yielded roughly $25million in revenue. I can understand the discussion of trying to make sure AoC survives if economic troubles comes afoot but, if they're struggling to get a base of subs they've failed already. It'll be another F2P MMO like many others that have come. MMORPGs have to yield subs if they are to survive without turning into a F2P because the subs are dying off.
Battlepasses are a bandaid approach to revenue garnering when the game truly needs surgery if its going to survive the eventual F2P curse.
Point is It isn't' IS job to change that and find some new creative solution to monetize people. They should do what works and focus on making a good game.
I mentioned this earlier but low balling salary alone then its 12m a year, IS is very much a triple A budget right now. And Id rather not see half the dev team let go to reduce cost if the game can not make enough money so sustain all the different factors they will have to pay. They should do a bit of everything in order to keep the barrier of entry low so more people are willing to play, or will accept maybe the sub model isn't that bad if they try it.
Again battle passes are not a band-aid approach games are all using this because it works and give profit. If battle-passes were band-aid companies would not be using the model. The point with AoC is not to be the main source but to have other incentives to spend money and keep people invested into the game. Essentially its a discount on a bundle of items with a requirement of playing the game and earning them over a period of time (unless you whale and buy level ups to get them faster which gives more profit to milk some whales.) Some people that might not buy things normally do to how common BP is might be more prone to spend money.
Based on the market with games it is clearly successful, if they did it in AoC and no one spent money on it id expect they wouldn't continue it. And would look for other ways to monetize.
Current staff is 200 people. Even if they're paid 200k/y that's $40mil/y expenses. A lot of the current modern studios are bloated with do nothing types and it's why their hiring practices are the way they are. They don't want warm bodies filling a seat producing this product. Which is where I acquired the 500mil/y revenue (post salary) with pure sub counts if it yielded a 1/4 of WoW's peak numbers (3million).
They are a bandaid fix if the company is utilizing them because revenue is down and they need extra capital to sustain the existence of the company/product.
I really don't care if a model is successful somewhere else. When it's applied to this genre it doesn't turn out well when said activities that BPs promote generally should be player and/or community driven decisions. Not an external system giving arbitrary missions for a player to do. I won't lie it works in other games but, I don't believe it's good for a MMORPG to have such a model.
We can argue forever on the issue but, I don't find there will be a moment where we do agree on the approach on monetization practices of Battlepasses.
And there will also be a Cosmetics Market.
I just expect that Cosmetics Market to be in the form of a Battlepass.
Wherever you are getting your numbers from again you should not use that site.
Something can't be a band-aid fix if they are using the model and growing their game off of it from the start. Saying its a band-aid fix makes 0 sense. It shows that there is a profit in that monetization without requiring any barrier to entry.
Again AoC is a sub model the point is BP can help get more profits without increasing the barrier to entry. Lets not be using inaccurate numbers on top of WoW comparison. This is AoC not WoW2.
meh I doubt 99% of intrepid employees make 200k a year. they probs make less than 120k a year.
anyways, bp arent a bandaid fix. bp exist because people like them and are willing to pay for them, otherwise they wouldn't exist or be so successful.
Is that your point is that my numbers are inaccurate? The numbers I've looked into from a number of sources. Provide data that shows they're off or be quiet about it. Thus far you've been short of dubious with your constant remarks.
https://growjo.com/company/Intrepid_Studios
https://www.zoominfo.com/c/intrepid-studios/1102976203
https://www.linkedin.com/company/intrepid-studios-inc/?originalSubdomain=ph
There is no plan to have Battlepasses. The assumption is that they're going forward with their current plan of a sub to play method. There is no need for an additional revenue source and Battlepasses don't fit a MMORPG genre for the points I've made previously. Revenue for the sake of revenue at the cost of other areas is baseline foolish.
Again, what inaccurate numbers concerning WoW? You make these constant claims that something else is false and provide zero evidence. You could just as easily google search "Peak wow sub count" and provide that I'm wrong about it being 12million subs.
California salaries so I padded them to 200k.
Post launch BPs are a bandaid. Pre-launch I'd consider their quest and community systems to be a disaster that they have to hand hold people through content using an external quest system. The vanity items are already in game. If you want to have more vanity items use the cosmetic store. I've yet to see a MMORPG use Battlepasses that isn't beyond its prime, failed game, or is F2P.
It seems you don't know what I'm talking about with numbers figured i was pretty clear as I had directly mentioned it multiple times.
The sources you are getting numbers from how many people are subscribed to mmorpgs are wildly inaccurate. That has nothing to do with IS, my number about low balling how much they make though is based on how many people are in the company and doing the lowest low ball i could do. I'm well versed with linkedin
Also battle passes fit with anything you have not any reasonable argument against it. Its hard to say something isn't a fit when playing he game and doing anything within a game gives you progress to get items. This is you trying to complicate it do to your bias against it, and make up things why a BP can not work. When in realty a BP doesn't effect your gameplay. Therefore has 0 downsides in relation to content.
Pretty much it be like going to a bakery and seeing a chocolate cake and telling the bakery if they keep selling cholate cake you won't go there anymore. Even though you are not being made to buy it nor does it effect the rest of your experience or the quality of the other food they give you.