Getting what you pay for.

Microtransactions. A scary word to a lot of traditional MMO players, yet a word that has gone from looming on the horizon to laughing in the faces of doubters. It is not news to anyone that one of the most successful revenue models for current games today is the “free-to-download, pay-for-bonuses” type of subscription. If you look at it from a business standpoint – you are giving your players the ability to spend as much money as they want, however often they want. From a player standpoint, you can pick and choose what sort of content you want to utilize and you don’t have to pay for what you are not interested in.

With the whole debate lately regarding raiders vs. casuals vs. non-raiders – I got to thinking. What if you had to pay additional for raid content once you hit 70?

Take a game like World of Warcraft. The 1-60 game came out polished. It was fun, it satiated the adventuring appitite of most players who weren’t racing to the top. The 60-70 content in The Burning Crusade is also exciting and the new quests, upgrades, and zones are very entertaining. What if after you reach max level and you wish to start raiding – you’d have to pay more? Maybe a higher monthly subscription, or maybe you purchase each raid zone.

What would this solve? We’ve all heard the debate from casual/non-raiding players. “We pay the same money that the raiders do, so why do they get to see all the content and we do not?”

My dispute to that claim is that, I don’t pay $14.99/month for MMORPG’s so that I can ’see all the content.’ I pay my subscription fees because when I am logged into the game, I expect to enjoy myself. I see my subscription fee as an alternative to going and seeing a mediocre movie at an overpriced theater. I see it as a fairly cheap form of entertainment that is flexible in the fact that when I want to play, I can play. A game is always there for me to waste my time in; for 5 minutes, for 4 hours, or an entire evening. I do not have to call up friends and make plans and decisions about what to do. If all my friends are busy or if I’m not feeling well – there is always Everquest 2 to play. I always know that some of my guildies will be online to chat, and that my character will be left where I put her – waiting to complete that quest I didn’t finish earlier.

That convenience creates a ready-made entertainment that I feel is incredibly worthy of $14.99/month. I considered the $39.99/month that I payed for the EQ1 Legends server as being a totally viable price considering the amount of enjoyment I received out of it. I consider the optional adventure packs in EQ2 as being a perfectly legitimate way to provide me optional content that I can choose to purchase if I desire more things to do, or completely disregard if I don’t feel it’s necessary to buy.

So maybe I’m enjoying the game as much as I possibly can, with the time that I have. There is tons and tons of content in Everquest 2 that I may never get to experience because of time restraints and other obligations. So why is it that I have to pay the same fee that the raiders are paying? The answer is, because I am enjoying myself JUST as much. I don’t think that using the argument of “not seeing everything the game has to offer” is a very legitimate excuse for debating the usefulness of raid content. Obviously, the endgame raids are fulfilling the gaming desires for a large percentage of the playerbase – it may be what they need to make that $14.95 a month worth it to them. And who are we to decide what $14.95 is worth to other people?

You get what you pay for when you subscribe to an MMORPG. As long as you’re enjoying yourself while playing, then it shouldn’t matter what other people are doing in the game with their more plentiful time. One of the many beauties of the MMO genre is the ability for so many people with such varying interests and traits can come together and communicate while playing the same game. If you’re feeling slighted because you cannot participate in raids, then the MMO that you’re playing is really not worth the subscription cost for you. There are plenty of games out there that will cater to you if you feel that you’re being cheated out of content. (This is where I am obligated to link Peggle, which is the most fun game that I have played in a LONG time. Others agree.)

Tami Baribeau is the Associate Producer for Metaplace, Inc, currently working on Island Life.  She is also the Lead Editor of feminist gaming blog The Border House, and the National Facebook Games Examiner for Examiner.com.  She can be reached on Twitter or by email.