Price of OrbusVR once fully released?

[Sinmar_Magrov]

To Jinx,
While I don’t agree to many things you say you are of course right in that there are many different people with almost as many opinions on what they like, there ARE more than me though that like subscriptionbased games and are willing to pay to support the developers with a regular and known income to build the game we want to play.

For example (related to your own examples above): I do currently pay for TSW (at least until I became lifetimer), SWToR, WoW and ESO (actually on BOTH PS4 and PC). I know that am not exactly a “standard” user but there are many that pay (and like it) for at least one of the games above.

So I stand by my opinion in my original post and different opinions aside I really hope to see you in game during the beta and then live to kick some monsters small and furry butts!

[Sour]

I know for sure if they sell cosmetic items I will buy them. I do worry a subscription would neuter player influx and retention.

[Jinx]

@Jonas_A – Oh yeah, see while I think the mandatory monthly sub isn’t a good idea based on history, I’m down with optional month subs and other ways I could willingly pay to support the devs on-going.

Beta, I’ll be there! I can’t wait to get my wand “back”! =)

[Johann]

I wonder if it would be different in VR as the price point to come in is a lot higher. I would suspect that people that have VR have more disposable income. I know I would be willing to pay quite a bit for a game and paying a $10 or $20 month subscription would not be an issue for a great game like Orbus.

[Luvstosmooch]

I used to thing the exact same thing, however there are a lot of vocal VR users that are very touchy about prices and I would really expect a sub to hurt the game and the community. Sure the people that love the game like us would happily pay a sub but that is not the majority I think

Edit: and when I say majority I don’t mean like the majority of frequent Orbus players - I mean on a wider scale. We will end up with a lot more casuals without a sub.

[Arthemetis]

How will orbus bring in funding to support continuous development? Paying for the game only ounce means you exepect a certain amount of copies to be sold monthly to pay for all the overhead. At some point you wont get a continuous stream of new people buyung the game. My suggestion would be a monthly subscription and the purchase of the game. This would ensure a sready income stream.

[Draven]

It’s pretty amazing how many people refuse to pay for any type of game subscription on principle, which is why many game studios/publishers have moved away from it. Optional subscriptions and cash shops, while they can be questionable (depending on how they are implemented) tend to be more successful for many games.

[Riley_D]

So the primary source of “ongoing” incomes will be a) the in-game store, which will sell cosmetic items such as pets, and b) the production of yearly expansion packs which will introduce new content into the game.

There is really no assumption built into our plan that we will continue to sell large numbers of copies of the game every month on an ongoing basis. Essentially we’re planning on like 90% of our income coming from the initial sales of the game at launch, and then with each expansion pack that’s released. The in-game store and “in-between expansion” sales are just additional revenue that would allow us to hire more people to add more things to the game.

Essentially, I am very confident we can support the “upkeep” costs of the game without an issue. The question is just how much staff we will be able to hire long-term to work on the game. We’ll scale that up (or down) based on our sales. By not starting off with a 30-person team, we’re running very lean which means we can do a lot with what we do have.

[SosoDeSamurai]

i really hope for you and us, that this plan will prove to be successful. Even if the VR Community isn’t that big at the moment. But i think you calculated this business model

[Jake_S]

I like your concept of using cosmetics. I know it’s a different genre, but LoL using skins has been hyper successful for them. If you can find something that people want to spend money on, but aren’t required to in order to play keep up with everyone else… then you’ve created a wonderful financial model. Usually it’ll keep people around longer and they’ll continue to support the game with their wallet. As long as the game stays fun.

I’ve never liked Mmos really all that much. Usually turn out to be boring. But, looking at the way you’re designing this game seems to be with fun and community in the center of it. I’ll definitely bring out my wallet to support a game like that in VR. Even if I’m not going to be totally into the genre.

[Sammy_D]

Also, bear in mind WoW pretty much nailed their own coffin shut by turning the game from a social MMORPG into a soloplay game. They dumbed everything down so people didn’t have to communicate to ask/share info, made it possible to fly over entire continents so less people were bumping into other players while travelling, added an auto-group finder so people didn’t need to communicate to run a dungeon, then got rid of what was left of the in-game community by adding private home areas for players so they no longer hung around cities. It turned the game from a thriving, busy world into a pretty, but empty landscape.

MMORPGs need to get designers on board who understand the psychological side of game planning (in addition to writing/art/plot design - they all work in unison) and how to encourage rather than kill in-game communities. WoW was insanely popular for many reasons, but one of the major factors was that players would log in just to hang out in the world. It was a giant, beautifully crafted chatroom that did everything to encourage communication between players.

Blizzard can keep adding new content all they want, but they’ve killed the community so the players have left along with their wallets. Any new VR MMORPGs can learn a lot from WoW. It’s a decade-long study in social gaming. I doubt Blizzard will reverse their decisions, but new dev teams can avoid the same mistakes.

[Draven]

Kinda hard to argue that WoW is a failure, given that even with all the changes listed they are making hundreds of millions of dollars a year, (if not billions).

I do agree with the sentiment though, that having robust social systems in the game is critical and they should avoid additions that reduce or negatively impact them.

[Sammy_D]

I wouldn’t describe them as a ‘failure’. But they have lost a lot of players because of design decisions they made, and could be doing a lot better if they had focused on doing more of what was working rather than changing the game design about. But their mistakes are great for new dev teams, as they can see what went wrong and avoid doing the same.

[Draven]

Yeah, don’t take this the wrong way, but this feels a little like armchair quarterbacking. They have a lot of really smart, talented people over there and really robust analytic tracking. All MMOs have a life cycle so the fact that they’ve managed to keep several million subscribers for the last 10+ years is really remarkable. I can appreciate you don’t like the direction they’ve taken the product, but that doesn’t mean it was the wrong call for them as a business.

Anyway, I’ll drop it there, I don’t want to hijack an Orbus forum thread to debate other developer’s decisions.

[Sammy_D]

I’m responding on the basis of not just my own opinion but those of people I know who worked with Blizzard back in the early days. It’s pretty standard opinion among a lot of people who have studied the business side of things too. It’s not that there weren’t ‘really smart, talented people’ working there. This side of game design just wasn’t understood until after the fact because there hadn’t been another game like WoW to really experiment with it on this scale or for this long. I don’t have any investment in WoW, so I don’t care what Blizzard does or doesn’t do on a personal level. I was just pointing out different factors and their results that new MMORPGs can learn from. If my post came across as insulting in any way, then I apologise. That wasn’t my intention.

[Sno]

For a non sub based game? Not really

Idk what you expect. If they sell 1000 copies of the game, that barely pays a single person’s salary. Last I checked, they have six employees.

They need to make $$ somehow, no sub=higher initial cost

[Odinson]

Ongoing income will come from cosmetic in game purchases, and everyone knows how successful micro-transactions can be for sustainability, even where the game is free to play. There is no need for a sub or high initial cost if micro- transactions exist (so long as it doesn’t turn into pay to win).

I just want the game to be successful bc I love it, and I’m concerned that a higher initial cost will deter the already small VR community. Then again the relatively high cost can and will be compensated for with promo’s.

[Sammy_D]

That’s a good business model and will allow you more freedom to focus on making a good game rather than changing things around for more profit.

In terms of the small VR community, I think that will grow once the ‘right’ game is announced. It’s a chicken and egg scenario at the moment. The VR player base is small because there aren’t yet games out there that really get people’s attention (and therefore entice them to upgrade to VR), yet many of the bigger developers are waiting for the VR player base to grow before making the games that people want to play. It’s a difficult one. I admire the indie teams out there, like Orbus, taking the risk early on. I hope you do really well and are rewarded with a huge player base before the bigger developers get on board the VR train!

[Cassadin]

$40 is about £30 (at the moment ). For an MMO experience, that’s pretty good, and for the only VR one, definitely fair imo. In terms of value (hours played per $ spent), I’m expecting the outlay to more than be worth it. Any MMO is bolstered by being able to do stuff you already did with new people for a different experience.

I agree that subscriptions are a dead model for gaming, the community in general just votes with its feet. As mentioned earlier, WoW gets away with it purely from critical mass. The sunk cost fallacy (the more you invest in something the harder it becomes to abandon it) and the huge number of subscribers they had means that the subscribers that are left are still commercially viable. That will eventually change I think.