Subscription model for better multiplayer experience... Would you pay for it ?

[Jim Panse]

Greetings Commanders & Frontier Team,

i don´t know if this was discussed already but i´ve had it on my mind for longer now. To be honest, i´m not pleased with the actual networking system. I know its beta but the instancing dosen´t work very well. So my question to you all out there and Frontier:

"Would you pay a monthly fee if there would be a change at the networking system ?"

I would definitly do it. Everyone is talking about the multiplayer experience... but the actual system dosen´t give it to us. 10 bucks/Euro/dollar/whatever would be fine from my side.

What are your ideas or suggestions ?


Hope to read a lot

Cmdr. Jim Panse

 

[popuptoaster]

No, the worst part of this game so far is some of the other players in it, I'll be in private groups or solo anyway.

 

[Jim Panse]

So it could be optional ? For all the gamers that wanna play solo it would be free... and the others could pay a fee if there are interested. Could be a way.

As i statet, i would pay to see a other networking system.

Thanks for your input !

 

[Babalawo]

Couple things about this...

1) No, I would have EVE flashbacks so hard I would PTSD out and end up shooting the cat; *grin*

2) I have real concerns that go-live is so close and the networking components are in such a poor state. Given that connectivity is required, due to even solo play drawing information from the shared universe, this is a serious problem. Ask the devs of SimCity how well it works when your initial wave of users can't connect to the game they have been waiting so impatiently for, and for which they just shelled out a pile of money. Given that there are so many problems with the relatively small community of users that are Alpha/Beta backers, I can't even imagine how badly the servers will be crushed when this widely-awaited and much-hyped game drops if there aren't massive upgrades in the next 30 days.

 

[Dr Zachary Smith]

"Would you pay a monthly fee if there would be a change at the networking system ?"

No, main reason I stopped playing EVE. Continuously paying for a game every single month really is a killer, very difficult to justify to ones spouse for a kick off [£50 cash was hard enough] + it's just not doable by a lot of people who don't have much money...it would bring a new meaning to the word ELITE, like only the rich can afford to play it Hopefully they will work out the network issues. I would probably stop playing and ask for a refund if this ever happened Also it would put off casual gamers, the people who have a life and a job and a family, nobody wants to pay monthly for a game they only get to play for a few hours at a weekend.

 

[par2005]

I am always willing to pay if it means everything will be working smoothly, new content will be developed all the time, and multiplayer will be awesome.

I think WoW is a perfect example of that - millions of players paying monthly subscription. But the main thing there was that WoW has delivered. If Elite would deliver, I would pay for sure.

 

[Jim Panse]

Couple things about this...

1) No, I would have EVE flashbacks so hard I would PTSD out and end up shooting the cat; *grin*

2) I have real concerns that go-live is so close and the networking components are in such a poor state. Given that connectivity is required, due to even solo play drawing information from the shared universe, this is a serious problem. Ask the devs of SimCity how well it works when your initial wave of users can't connect to the game they have been waiting so impatiently for, and for which they just shelled out a pile of money. Given that there are so many problems with the relatively small community of users that are Alpha/Beta backers, I can't even imagine how badly the servers will be crushed when this widely-awaited and much-hyped game drops if there aren't massive upgrades in the next 30 days.

I don´t know what are the maximum amount of connections that the servers could handle but i fear that your are right about that. How many gamers are playing at the same time ? A few thounsand ? What will happen when the amount jumps up to 50k or more. Is FD prepared for this ?

 

[Jim Panse]

No, main reason I stopped playing EVE. Continuously paying for a game every single month really is a killer, very difficult to justify to ones spouse for a kick off [£50 cash was hard enough] + it's just not doable by a lot of people who don't have much money...it would bring a new meaning to the word ELITE, like only the rich can afford to play it Hopefully they will work out the network issues. I would probably stop playing and ask for a refund if this ever happened Also it would put off casual gamers, the people who have a life and a job and a family, nobody wants to pay monthly for a game they only get to play for a few hours at a weekend.

I can understand your position. Was a EVE player as well. But Elite ist not EVE. Don´t want to deepen this here.
But server and develpoment costs money. Wondering how FD will shoulder this ?

 

[Babalawo]

One additional bit of info on this... apparently (I jsut discovered here http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Elite:_Dangerous) that there is a peer-to-peer component to the client. This explains a lot of the lag issues, since all calculations are dependent on the slowest connection present. Thus, Solo runs smoothly for many players and Open does not, and the more players present, the greater the chance and incidence of lag. Not sure how this can be remediated, which makes my earlier worries much more severe.

 

[Jim Panse]

One additional bit of info on this... apparently (I jsut discovered here http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Elite:_Dangerous) that there is a peer-to-peer component to the client. This explains a lot of the lag issues, since all calculations are dependent on the slowest connection present. Thus, Solo runs smoothly for many players and Open does not, and the more players present, the greater the chance and incidence of lag. Not sure how this can be remediated, which makes my earlier worries much more severe.

Yep the peer to peer component is the flaw... i can´t imagine that this will work under full stress conditions. But this is the cheapiest way to achive multiplayer. Other systems needs big hardware backbones. And this would need a monthly fee...

 

[Sandmann]

Nope... I play it to play the game, it's not facebook. Pay for Play is one of the things that kept me away from games like Eve, WoW, LOTR etc. For me the multiplayer aspect is a far second place to good game play.

 

[The Big One]

I have in ZX Spectrum Elite hundreds of hours. For me it was always a single player experience. I like the multiplayer in ED, but I don't believe, that it will ever be a smooth experience even if you pay for it. It's simply not possible by design. So no for me.

 

[Thygrrr]

HELL YES!!!

Anything around 5 to 10 EUR a month I would pay in a blink of an eye assuming I always get to play in dedicated server islands where gameplay is low latency, consistent, and cheat proof. I could imagine this working with virtual server instances, e.g. On EC2.

I play games for the multi player. Otherwise I could still play X3TC/AP. Single,player elite is neat, but nothing compared to playing with or against real humans.

 

[TiberiuS]

In short: NO
Never have paid regular fees for a game and never will be. For me this has also kept me from playing EVE or other games wit monthly pay.

 

[Swan]

Nope... I play it to play the game, it's not facebook. Pay for Play is one of the things that kept me away from games like Eve, WoW, LOTR etc. For me the multiplayer aspect is a far second place to good game play.

Link to Facebook and your friends for 1,000,000 credits! Log in every day to receive special upgrades for your ship!

Back in reality; no. If a subscription model had been mooted from the outset then I wouldn't have come in on the Kickstarter. If they did turn around and say, "Oh btw guys, we're going to charge 9.99 a month," I think I'd rather use it for a WWE Network subscription, UNLESS of course, that money found its way into enhancing the game in a manner which we cannot currently imagine. That would make me ~think~ about it for a little while, but then I still probably wouldn't.

 

[Glock_17]

Never again will i pay every month to be able to play the same game over and over.

Also i think alot of people also chose Elite for it was said to be a single purchase and buying additional expansions and not a subscription model.

 

[Cosmos]

Greetings Commanders & Frontier Team,

i don´t know if this was discussed already but i´ve had it on my mind for longer now. To be honest, i´m not pleased with the actual networking system. I know its beta but the instancing dosen´t work very well. So my question to you all out there and Frontier:

"Would you pay a monthly fee if there would be a change at the networking system ?"

I would definitly do it. Everyone is talking about the multiplayer experience... but the actual system dosen´t give it to us. 10 bucks/Euro/dollar/whatever would be fine from my side.

What are your ideas or suggestions ?


Hope to read a lot

Cmdr. Jim Panse

Since the latest update the networking side of the game is working wonderfully for me. I see my friends and lots of players.

 

[Dr Zachary Smith]

I can understand your position. Was a EVE player as well. But Elite ist not EVE. Don´t want to deepen this here.
But server and develpoment costs money. Wondering how FD will shoulder this ?

Voodoo mad coding skillz...I hope

 

[Thygrrr]

Ers

Link to Facebook and your friends for 1,000,000 credits! Log in every day to receive special upgrades for your ship!

Back in reality; no. If a subscription model had been mooted from the outset then I wouldn't have come in on the Kickstarter. If they did turn around and say, "Oh btw guys, we're going to charge 9.99 a month," I think I'd rather use it for a WWE Network subscription, UNLESS of course, that money found its way into enhancing the game in a manner which we cannot currently imagine. That would make me ~think~ about it for a little while, but then I still probably wouldn't.

They can just sell he subscription to players who want their experience to be non-p2p. Others can stick with the p2p protocol that already works for them.

I would pay for this value added service in the blink of an eye.

 

[Robert Maynard]

It would be a bit of a shock to the 25k backers (plus the other 15k or so who backed using the Backers' App after the Kickstarter) who were told:

Will the game be free to play after the initial purchase?

We do not plan to make it subscription-based. Once you have purchased the game up front, you will be able to play thereafter for no further cost. Everything in the game will be purchasable with in-game Credits, earned from trading, bounty-hunting, etc. We will probably allow the supplemental purchase of Credits with real money, for those who want to accelerate their progress through the game.

We do plan to charge for additional updates, to be available sometime after the original release. These will offer additional content, features and gameplay.

Last updated: Wed, Nov 21 2012 4:49 PM +00:00