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Unread 20 May 2005, 23:00   #1
Zoro
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Would you pay extra?

Call me crazy
How much extra would you pay if the game had 20,000 active planets?

I“m not going to go into great detail with this idea but i“m going to throw this open to discussion.

PA costs ***** pounds to run and it has a dedicated team of coders and runners (PA team) who I would imagine get very little (probably nothing)

PA also has a loyal band of players many who have been from the start.
These players play each season in quite a small (in comparison to early rounds) universe of about 4 to 5,000 planets.

Now the game costs money to run - but it seems a price as many 2,000 people are willing to pay. To be honest it is a rediculasly low ammount of money to get 3 months of gaming.

He“s the idea.
The 2,000 people who are willing to pay each season pay a little more. 2, 3 maybe 5 pounds extra to meet the costs of the PA season (however much it is).
Then with a word of mouth and any other cheap or free marketing push the game should be opened up to fresh players or even old players who haven“t tried the new version of the game.
Without restriction.

It would then be the job of the core players (2,000) to train and help the new players and get them into the game. When the next season comes the cost could then be split between the core players and any new (or old) players that are willing to contribute.
Basically over the 3 month period the fresh players would have to be preached to about contributing to keep the game going.

Anyway without whaffling on too much that is the basis for my idea - discuss.

And try to be positive.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 00:23   #2
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Re: Would you pay extra?

so pay more now, to play more later,...

You are right about the cheepness of 3 months of gaming,.. i know other games with less community and less graphics (yes it's true) which costs me more,...
£10 a credit?? sounds steep,... but it isn't Really,.. unless you don't have it to spare,..

People have the free account as it is to try b4 u buy,.. and that's exactly what i did, liked my gal, and the people i met, so i paid for it. Perhaps a free 1 week before the round,.. in a havoc type set up, where everyone gets loads of resources to buy what they need,..
Just another thought,...
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Unread 21 May 2005, 02:01   #3
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Re: Would you pay extra?

I'd do it, even if you can't spell 'ridiculously.' ;P
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Unread 21 May 2005, 04:00   #4
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Re: Would you pay extra?

well maybe upping the cost to the core 2000 players would probly cover the server load of the current players plus maybe a few more, but certainly not several more and definatley not 10 times as many players. You have to rember the more players, the more bandwith, and more processing power you have to have to handle the load. All this combines equals more costs.

Also, I don't think I'd enjoy the game as much if there were too many people. One thing I like about PA is the close community that is a result of not having a ton of people.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 04:34   #5
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Re: Would you pay extra?

I'm not sure this is a serious problem. If planetarion weren't making money, or even if it wasn't a profitable enough franchise, Jolt would probably have dumped it a long time ago. The reality is that database storage space isn't expensive at all. The biggest cost is bandwidth, and transferring text and numbers over the net doesn't require a megaserver like battlenet's or xboxlive's.

Plus the gamers themselves are solid gold, because they're people who are for the most part into all kinds of video games. Thus advertising companies pay Jolt well to get the chance to pitch the latest products.

All told I think PA charges so little per month simply because they can do so and still make a tidy profit. And tbh most gamers wouldn't pay as much to play PAonline as they would for jawdroppers like WoW or EVE anyways.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 09:24   #6
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Re: Would you pay extra?

I believe you are way out on your estimation of 2k hardcore players.

Its gonna be about 1k MAX, and thats being generous.

Its easy to be top 300 logging in just twice a day now, which shows how little activity is actually needed.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 09:59   #7
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Yes ok
There probably not 2,000 active players, but there are 2,000 paid for accounts (well so i“ve been told).
The point is there are a hard core group of players (whether it be 300 or 1,000) who make the game exist. What I am talking about is making the more enjoyable and in my opinion more planets makes for a more enjoyable game.
Free with restriction is not really an option. Most people wouldn“t devote time to such a game if they are hanicaped - well I know I wouldn“t.

The question is - Would the regular or core players pay a little more to introduce new players (or old) to the game WITHOUT RESTRICTION - free but with no handicap.
This introduction of fresh blood could be just what the game needs.

What do u think?
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Unread 21 May 2005, 10:03   #8
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zoro
Yes ok
There probably not 2,000 active players, but there are 2,000 paid for accounts (well so i“ve been told).
The point is there are a hard core group of players (whether it be 300 or 1,000) who make the game exist. What I am talking about is making the more enjoyable and in my opinion more planets makes for a more enjoyable game.
Free with restriction is not really an option. Most people wouldn“t devote time to such a game if they are hanicaped - well I know I wouldn“t.

The question is - Would the regular or core players pay a little more to introduce new players (or old) to the game WITHOUT RESTRICTION - free but with no handicap.
This introduction of fresh blood could be just what the game needs.

What do u think?
No - some people may pay extra, but some would have the attitude 'if he's not paying, why should i?'
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Unread 21 May 2005, 10:49   #9
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Re: Would you pay extra?

the restirctions only really start to hurt a free account after about 2 weeks, they can stay competive until then ( we did extensive tests of the restrictions in the round 13 beta), so this gives players 1/5th of the round to decide whether the game is worth playing or not. It may be worth looking at reducing the restrictions still further though.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 10:58   #10
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Re: Would you pay extra?

People dont like being forced to do things, and by doing so your likly to cause less income from the current playerbase. Alot of players here need one account yet buy 3 or more accounts. I myself bought 6 and in F-Crew we have two people whom bought 15 each. These extra credits go to people whom deserve a credit but cant pay for one. Now if your being forced to pay more to subsidise a group of players, many of whoms only reason for not paying is they are tight your going to get less of this good will and your also going to see people buying 1 account thinking "Why should i pay for those people to play for nothing, I just wont pay"
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Unread 21 May 2005, 14:15   #11
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Personally, I won't pay a penny more than I have to and will moan at any price increases until the day Jolt starts putting something back into the game instead of skimming all the proceeds off for itself. To me, the amount we pay seems a lot for a glorified hosting company. Until they come up with the goods they promised when they bought PA, I would not receive a price increase in a good way.
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Unread 21 May 2005, 14:51   #12
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Re: Would you pay extra?

I am not talking about Jolt making any extra money - I“m talking about any extra costs being made up by the current core players to allow many new free players into the game (without the current free restrictions)
I am talking about allowing people to try a full season (basically get them hooked into all aspects of the game) so they have more than 2 weeks to make a decision about the game.

I would certainly pay much more (maybe 20 or 30 pounds) if I thought the universe was to be bigger - 10k+
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Unread 21 May 2005, 18:41   #13
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zoro
I am not talking about Jolt making any extra money - I“m talking about any extra costs being made up by the current core players to allow many new free players into the game (without the current free restrictions)
I am talking about allowing people to try a full season (basically get them hooked into all aspects of the game) so they have more than 2 weeks to make a decision about the game.

I would certainly pay much more (maybe 20 or 30 pounds) if I thought the universe was to be bigger - 10k+
.
Have you been paying £20 or £30 more a round? No you say, Well rather than start bringing up ideas that price the game out of some peoples reaches and make it appealing not to pay even if you can afford to, maybe you should put your money where your mouth is and actually start buying more accounts than you need and handing them out to people who show a bit of promise during their trial period. Many people aready do this every round yet so many people who moan about the lack of players or people like you with idea seemingly cba to do your bit.

Your £30 extra may only be 9 accounts but its 9 more accounts that there would be. And if everyone who can afford to choose to bought more accounts they would soon add up but if you force this onto people people are likly to revolt and not pay at all out of greed or principle

Although one thing i would like to see would be more bulk buy packages to allow us all to do a bit more. For example if we want to buy 6 accounts, give us another discount, even if its only a couple of quid, say £18 for 6 its more accounts for a tiny bit less per account. From a business pov its worth taking a little less per unit the more thats bought in bulk as its money immediatly there rather than money that potentially is there in the future
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Unread 22 May 2005, 11:29   #14
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Re: Would you pay extra?

In the past I have paid for complete galaxies. I was not saying that everyone should pay 20 or 30 pounds (i“ve got no pounds sign). I was saying that I would be willing to pay that ammount if it was worth it 10k planets or so.
My point is simple
The current crop of players however much they can pay carry the load for the general costs (servers, bandwidth etc) and then the universe is opened freely without restriction to everyone else.
Then we do are best to tell old players and new ones about the game. And most importantly teach the newer one (not just bash them).

PA only grew in the first place cos it was free - it was when p2p was sprung on everyone at the last minute that the problems started.

I say rebuild they game from the ground up. With people who can afford it paying a little more (just for a few seasons). Then when the community is strong again implement some kind of p2p that everyone is in agreement with and aware of.
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Unread 22 May 2005, 15:36   #15
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Well. Lets say we have those people paying for the game. Lets say this would make the game a free game avaliable for most. So, where we would get the extra fresh players? That would cost too, i believe making the game free wouldnt attract so many more people. You can see around and see many free games having their playerbase decreasing everyday. On my view, lets face it: Planetarion was one game who had the advantage of being created in the end of the "Internet era", when dial-up was the ruler of the flow and everything on it was new and people actually believe oceans of money could flow from every website created. But this time is gone and now internet have plenty more things to do, so PA drowned among so many options. Tick-based is dieing, not only Planetarion.
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Unread 22 May 2005, 19:01   #16
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Quote:
Originally Posted by antheon
well maybe upping the cost to the core 2000 players would probly cover the server load of the current players plus maybe a few more, but certainly not several more and definatley not 10 times as many players. You have to rember the more players, the more bandwith, and more processing power you have to have to handle the load. All this combines equals more costs.

Also, I don't think I'd enjoy the game as much if there were too many people. One thing I like about PA is the close community that is a result of not having a ton of people.
Words spoken by someone who arrived after p2p. The game probably will never be more fun than like round 3 and 4 when there was like insane amounts of people playing and there were like 200 clusters full of planets.

Anyways, in response to the idea, in a perfect world, it's a great idea. However, in real life, it would never work because you'd only have a small amount of people willing to pay that much more, and it would hardly cover server costs, and even if we did put more into it, Jolt would just skim it off for themselves anyways.

So, it was a good idea, but it won't work.
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Unread 23 May 2005, 10:42   #17
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Re: Would you pay extra?

Well said Nolez - ur probably right

In response to Intruder
Again ur probably right too - there are so many options for people on the internet now maybe PA could never grow as big as it use to be, even if it was free.
BUT there are still many people out there who would be interested in such a game as Planetarion. The fact that there is discontent in many other tick based games could present an opportunity for PA. The time is right to open the game up free to the masses again, speed up the demise of other tick based games and collect there discontented members introducing them to the new PA which has developed considerably over the last few years.

Out of every catastropy comes opportunity.
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Unread 24 May 2005, 23:51   #18
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Re: Would you pay extra?

I paid for 6 accounts this round so paying £20 donation for everyone to play and increase player base
I would do it I already do it.
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