The internets most quoted villain, Mark Jacobs, had this to say in an interview:
I think his message was ‘oh look at these people they’ve come back and they’re not playing WAR’. You’d have to ask him, but certainly that seemed to be the way he was coming across and I find that kind of funny. I play multiple MMOs… the idea that you only play one is really kind of silly.
Hey bud, that only works when you don’t have standard $15.00/month MMO subscriptions. There’s a reason SOE’s Station Pass works out to be less than $5.00 per game. Aside from a hardcore minority, people won’t pay full price for more than one MMO. If you wanted to support the booming (boomed?) casual gaming market and take a slice of that pie, you should set your price point somewhere that allows people to taste your wine along with their cheese.
Not everyone has industry/press subscriptions to their favorite games. Most people actually have to make a choice on what game they play, especially when they have families that all play the game. Newsflash: getting Average Joe to pay $15/month is a challenge in itself.
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.
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Excellent point Cuppy. I’m in the “one sub at a time camp”.
This is a good post as well:
http://m3mnoch.wordpress.com/2008/09/04/war-success/
might have wanted to add the question asked and the comment asked for that comment he made:
Q: Are you worried about the upcoming World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, diminishing your subscriber base? What have you done to prevent that?
Mark Jacobs: Are we worried about it? Not really. It’s an expected thing, we knew when we launched that Lich King was coming out. We’re treating it as we would any other MMO launch that was happening around the same time. One of the things about MMOs is that people play multiple games, that’s one of the reasons I was very surprised by Paul’s comments. He knows that people may play WoW and they’ll play WAR and maybe even a third game at the same time.
We’ve done surveys on that, the industry has done surveys… so any comment along the lines of ‘well if they’re in my game they’re not playing in another game,’ flies in the face of all research that’s been done among MMO players.
*AND YES, it’s true, people do play more then one MMO
Sure, people DO play more than one MMO. But not the masses.
Maybe people who play multiple MMOs are more likely to be surveyed. : )
Why refer to Jacob’s as a “villian”? Its fine to have your preferred game, but such terminology seems like an unnecessary flame. I remember you trying WAR and deciding you preferred WOW which is great, but why bash the other game or its developers?
I hope both games do well and that the resulting competition spurs more product innovation across both IPs.
Do people not play more then one because of the financial aspects, time or because they are comfortable with the one that they play? THAT would be an interesting study. I usually play 2 at a time…I tried the Station Pass, but there weren’t enough SOE titles that I wanted to play…plus I felt that I SHOULD be playing more then I was
If the multi-MMO players are “hardcore”…what category do those who multi-box fall into?
Barakah – my villain statement was in reference to him always making these controversial statements and being the subject of many a blog post. =) Not because I think he’s a literal villain.
I’m not bashing any game. I make opinionated statements about things said in the industry. If it here Morhaime saying this, I’d quote him the same.
I think my dedicated readers can attest that I’m not one to flame.
I feel like maybe checking out the combat changes in TR, the new content in Lotro, or the new halloween event in CoX. But I am not going to spen $15 each, to see if the changes are enough to keep me playing.
I pop into DR and GW all the time since there is no barrier to re-entry. I think that’s why Tobold and other getting a free War sub was such a big deal. For them they can pop in anytime and make a decison to keep playing. For me I need overwhelming reviews, or information (or a free play weekend) for me to spend any money
I still pay for Warcraft and Warhammer, mostly because i like talking to my guild friends in WoW and doing casual stuff with them while enjoying the PvP aspects of WAR, something WoW never caught me on really. I will probably leave WoW as played wrath beta and don’t see much in it for me but hard to leave the friends behind.
But i pay under £20 a month for gaming with friends, less than a single night at the pub for me really.
A side note : Funnily enough, since I have an account with so many MMOs and seeing that I only pay my subs via gamecards, I get a lot of limited time free sub-reactivation offers in my email. This actually allows me to play more than one game at once, leading to a situation where at any given time I am usually enjoying one paid subscription and one or more ( albeit limited, which suits me fine ) free subs.
Just an observation I thought I’d share.
Well Mr. Jacobs has been in the MUD and MMO industry for a very long time, (longer then most, except Dr. Bartle) he can make any statement he wants in my books.
I know that for me, it’s the financial aspect. I have two account, usually per game. That’s $30 each month right there… until my son is old enough to want to play, and then it becomes $45 per game per month. That payment level is hard enough. Factor in that I usually only have the time for one game at a time, and a subscription to another game becomes an exercise in throwing away money on the game that I don’t play.
I know people who pay for multiple MMOs. They are not many and they’re the more hardcore gamer sort, for certain. I have a difficult time imagining that a hugely significant amount of people pay multiple subscriptions.
I have done it before, specifically with the station pass. I played EQ2, SWG, and PlanetSide. It was a nice setup, but… currently I don’t find multiple subscriptions worthwhile. So, other games I play tend to not require monthly fees. But, I also can’t really afford more than one game and I am rather limited on time as well.
fyi: It’s Joe Sixpack, not Average Joe.
Newsflash: getting Average Joe to pay $15/month is a challenge in itself.
No, but if I am not mistaken..Joe the Plumber has that much cash…and some to spare.
If McCain wins we can guarantee two or more MMO’s per household
Overheard from Sarah Palin as she was entering her personal jet she was taking to Sak’s
I do not think it is so easy as to say that only a hardcore minority pay for more than one MMO, but it is a matter of the total entertainment and hobby budget for a family and what people prioritize.
Gaming in general is still not a highly regarded pastime or hobby for most people. E.g. i fthe choice was between paying for cable TV or MMO subscriptions? Or movie tickets or MMO subscriptions?