The Daily Grind: What's a fair price for subscription fees?

I believe it was PC Gamer that did a six month MMO section in their magazine a while back. I can't quite remember the exact amount, but I believe it was your average MMO (a $15 a month payment) brings in somewhere near 65% profit. Around $9.75 is all profit after paying workers, server maintenance, etc, etc. I honestly think $10 / month is quite fair.

Maybe do it like the Chinese / Koreans do, and pay for how many hours you play, which really ends up coming up quite close to $12 a month if you play 6-8 hrs a day average.

I think 15 is a bit much. I'd like to see it go down to $9.99

Considering Moore's Law yields faster computing at decreasing prices, I'd expect better games to require roughly the same subscription rate growth into the future, increasing roughly at double the rate of inflation.
1995-1999: $9.99
2000-2004: $12.95
2005-2009: $14.95
2010-2014: $20.95
2016-2019: $29.95

Non-Minimum Wage wages will rise over that 10-year period of time, as well.
If you're making $10/hr now, that will rise (3.5% per year) to $14.11
If you're making $20/hr now, that will rise (3.5% per year) to $28.81

Overall, though, the traditional subscription model would appear to trend toward taking a larger percentage of your income due to the apparent historical disparity between the 3-4% rise in inflation/wages, and the 7% increase in pricing over time.

And then there was the Black Swan.

The monthly fee is for server upkeep only right? Since expansion packs end up costing 40 extra?

I personnally like the GW style or F2P style the most. P2P don't lock you in to a "contract" There is no way of really knowing if the life-time membership is going ot be worth it. Its just a gamble based on opinions, imo, so that is my least favorite payment plan.

The 2nd worst to me is the P2P w/cashshops running on the side in the form of trading card games or other outside of game purchases. I understand that these are businesses and not "games" to the developers so I can't hold a grudge for them all charging 15 a month regardless if its worth it for a so called AAA title. The problem I have is that by letting ppl use real money to cheat is basically like playing a singleplayer game with codes on. Sure I can just buy my way to the top, but that really accomplishes nothing besides minor ego boosts. Aka playing techno bowl on nes and always picking SF...

Until companies start to release niche games again I'll just stick to F2P games since I'll no doubtedly find something majorly wrong with the made for the masses games titles that seem to be in season atm. To me, its the journey not the max level that matter.

I'd pay $3.46 per week :P, and no more.

That's literally $15 per month for 12 months, divided by 52 weeks. It will let me pay to play almost when I want, and not pay when I don't want to play, and it's less than the cost of a Footlong.

I wouldn't mind a $3.46 buy for 24 hours of logged non-afk time, that isn't limited to a week, considering I'm in college right now...

A time-priced MMOG should have both these types of payments, because both are "unlimited" in their own way.

How do you play money up front?

I think the current pricing of $14.99 is acceptable for most games. Coming from Singapore, it isn't $15 per se, but more like $26, before the current economic crisis. And $26 means 5 good meals or two weeks worth of transport!

I mentioned most games, as there are some games that are just not worth the price of $14.99. The now very common "I wouldn't pay for a beta" saying is, however, ultimately detrimental to a game that might have to be released regardless of state due to the myriad of publisher-developer issues.

So, perhaps, instead of charging a whole $14.99, perhaps, $5-8 would be good enough? I quite like Crimcraft's model, where you have an unlimited free trial, pay $5 if you just want to see how a subscriber experiences the game, and $10 when you are want the features/to support the game.

Most games, even those which many consider "betas" (like Crimecraft), do get regular patches. Age of Conan and Warhammer Online are now no where what they were when launched. What they need is support to continue running.

I believe it all boils down to perception. The way the games are being touted, an unpolished game would be the last thing that graces the average consumer's mind. The beta testers might say it is not finished and needs more time, but many just attribute it to the fact that they want to play more.

Perhaps, developers could be more direct with their problems. Publishers, could be more innovative with ways of charging the consumer, looking at the long term and ramping up the cost as opposed to making the consumer believe that what they are going to get is the promised experience and gather that $14.99 for a month or two.

For the fun any MMO's gave me, I would say $5 / months. And I have pretty much played them all or beta tested several of them !

I paid roughly $3.55 for 42 hours of game time on Aion Chinese before the game launched, so it really isn't as bad as you're making it out to be. Just checking now, it's running $5.45 for 62 hours 30 minutes, roughly nine cents per hour. Avg. 40 hours a week on an MMO and you pay $15.59 a month, slightly more than it costs a month now. In general, it comes out to be better, especially if you have a few days where you don't play, and it carries over into the next month.

The problem with eve is that is big. Really really big. And you start to feel lonely.

You could socialize, you could die a bunch trying to find something to do, but till the find-a-fleet option is introduced and usable (post dominion groans and gurgle bugs are fixed), it feels a bit... boring. I have a couple of accounts, have started everything from manufacturing and mining, and have characters as old as public release of EVE. I still find it lonely