F2P hurts competition on console…

[Vertigo]

If I were to estimate total PS4 and PS5 consoles to be a potential playerbase of 160 million and that recent estimates of base PS Plus of 48 million being true… Unless we were to assume the remaining 110 million users don’t have internet; that’s a lot of players with an additional paywall in place for their favorite online game where something like Fortnite, Warzone 2.0, Apex and Overwatch 2 do not; or feature cost of entry to begin with.

Many of the industry’s most popular online games including GTA Online, Rainbow Six, Diablo 4, Destiny, Monster Hunter World, Forza Horizon, Fallout 76, Sea of Thieves, etc… all of these have an additional paywall for base console subscription plans on top of costs associated with buying the content you want to play just as if it were a boxed release (for the most part). And we have seen a never ending variety of approaches to trying to make this work.

We have all these publishers and studios chasing the growing market of live service games. It’s risky and we’ve seen many tragedies as a result from Anthem to Halo Infinite. This paywall is anti-competitive for any developer and publisher who finds a free-to-play launch too risky.

But let’s take the Sony angle here since I think it’s a bit more relevant to current events and of course the audience reading…

Let’s say Microsoft’s acquisition of ABK proceeds as planned. Now not only is Call of Duty at risk of being removed from PlayStation platforms but until then revenues made on PlayStation will go directly to their competitor. That’s fine as Sony is doing the same currently with MLB, Destiny and more to come.

And you would have to assume that somewhere amongst all these new live service efforts from Sony and any other studio working today is the hopes to take a piece of that pie from the F2P giants.

That paywall alone is kneecapping your own studios to keep the biggest publishers happy. We’ve just seen data and documents on how important CoD revenues are to both ABK and Sony. Let’s not forget that Fortnite being exclusive to the PS4 for a fair amount of time as well as it became the biggest game in the world. These relationships served all parties well with big bucks to be made.

So now what?

The easiest thing is to put everything behind base paywall and of course that’ll piss everyone off. So the next best thing is to remove it altogether.

Doing such would tank subscription numbers for both XBL Gold and base PS plus. For Xbox the transition to Gamepass only is effortless as their Gold software offerings are mostly throwaway and a separate subscription. For PlayStation a restructure and price re-evaluation of ps plus tiers would be nice. Base ps plus costs were mandatory for me so the additional $40 spent for extra was great value. But if I don’t need plus I probably won’t sub to Extra.

To put it in plainly… both hardware manufacturers are just fucking their own studios over.

 

[John Elden Ring]

Too be fair, im too old an tired of F2P games and their live service bullshit.

If they become the norm and physical disks become no more im quitting gaming.

 

[Vertigo]

Too be fair, im too old an tired of F2P games and their live service bullshit.

If they become the norm and physical disks become no more im quitting gaming.

Game design tropes associated with f2p moniker isn’t my biggest concern tbh.

Hypothetical scenario could be like a f2p arena shooter vs a $70 arena shooter.

Let’s use Ubisoft’s f2p Xdefiant vs Sony’s $70 Concord (not that I know what the game is). They could both feature similar content and modes and the only disparity being cost of entry and the paywall.

Concord would just be punching upwards against a game with more resources and and a larger playerbase by default.

This is also assuming Sony’s stays conservative with their approach and avoids f2p launches, which I’m generally against. People should get paid for their work.

 

[Vertigo]

double post

 

[Zzero]

I don't understand your argument. How is f2p hurting competition? I'd say that online multiplayer, in general, results in fewer big name choices for gamers, but that is only because other gamers like them. If single player games continue to offer experiences that people want to buy, then people will continue paying ofr them and other people will continue building them in exchange for money. And that's what competition is.

Let’s use Ubisoft’s f2p Xdefiant vs Sony’s $70 Concord (not that I know what the game is). They could both feature similar content and modes and the only disparity being cost of entry and the paywall.

Like this, how does that hurt competition? That isn't hurting competition, that is competition. Both are after the audience, both are using different approaches to get that audience.

 

[Vertigo]

Why would single-player games be relevant to competitive environment for online multiplayer games? You don’t need a Xbox Live Gold or PS plus subscription to play your single player games. All online games on console require an additional cost to actually engage with the games as designed.

 

[Vertigo]

Like this, how does that hurt competition? That isn't hurting competition, that is competition. Both are after the audience, both are using different approaches to get that audience.

One game has access to 160 million players, the other to 48 million ps plus subscribers. On top of the $70 price to play the game.

Why should Concord be limited to an audience of ps plus subscribers when a f2p Xdefiant is not?

This is not competition. It’s punishment for any studio who isn’t big enough to risk their house.

 

[Gediminas]

Like this, how does that hurt competition? That isn't hurting competition, that is competition. Both are after the audience, both are using different approaches to get that audience.

how about reviews and basic opinion of the people? like 70$ vs 0$ is that 70$ is in huge disadvantage. we already see comments like : oh, it is free on games, so if it is shit, no problem. etc.. whole perception?
like that is a problem. people and reviewer aren't treating those games on the same scale which can kill your game.

 

[Zzero]

One game has access to 160 million players, the other to 48 million ps plus subscribers. On top of the $70 price to play the game.

Why should Concord be limited to an audience of ps plus subscribers when a f2p Xdefiant is not?

Thats not Ubisoft's choice. It's Sony's. If Sony wants more people in its market it could expand access. You could even argue the other way, Concord gets the advantage because Sony makes all of the money from Concord sales while Ubisoft, a third party game, has to pay a 20-30 percent fee on any money processed through the Playstation.

This is not competition. It’s punishment for any studio who isn’t big enough to risk their house.

Big enough? With the possible exception of China/Asia, F2P started with small companies. I remember F2P being small (comparitively) stuff like Runescape versus big stuff like EQ and WoW. F2P was Newgrounds versus console stuff. Then it was cell phone games nobody had ever heard of while the traditional players insisted on upfront fees. Its only now, after 15 or more years of the little guy embracing F2P that the big players are doing it too.

 

[Deleted member 223]

The Xbox Live / PS Plus Paywall has had the unintended consequence of incentivizing GAAS/F2P dev, not necessarily the F2P model itself. I think the F2P vs Traditional Boxed model argument is separate.

In business, when studying economics you're always taught to watch for the unintended consequences of policy decisions as any intervention will in one way or another incentivize outcomes. Some of those outcomes you will not see coming and thus those very same become either negative or positive unintended consequences,

The problem is that both MS/Sony have a vested incentive in keeping it that way - $$$$$$$. Consumers are the net losers, specially those that like titles structured under the traditional boxed $60-$70 model. Traditional is not dying out of favor per say, it's being incentivized by market actors to die - whether some intended for that by design or not.

Like the thread if just for the fact that you're bringing that conversation forward.

 

[Vertigo]

The Xbox Live / PS Plus Paywall has had the unintended consequence of incentivizing GAAS/F2P dev, not necessarily the F2P model itself. I think the F2P vs Traditional Boxed model argument is seperate.

In business, when studying economics you're always taught to watch for the unintended consequences of policy decisions as any intervention will in one way or another incentivize potential outcomes, some of those outcomes you will not see coming.

The problem is that both MS/Sony have a vested incentive in keeping it that way. Consumers are the net losers, specially those that like titles structed under the traditional boxed $60-$70 model.

Whether a game chooses to go f2p for gaas vs having an entry cost shouldn’t be a factor from being barred off from the largest potential playerbase. The current model seems more flawed now than ever.

 

[Deleted member 223]

The online paywall has to die period. Let the subscription service stand on its own and traditional and F2P models stand on their own feet.

I know MS will kill Xbox before killing Xbox Live Gold online paywall req. Even if they get rid of Gold they'll somehow find a way to transition that paywall to Gamepass basic. Sony has more or less done so with PS Plus Essential too. And since these execs have made subscription numbers part of the indicators investors base a company reviews on.. anything that addresses the paywall and has a negative downward push on sub numbers becomes literally red-line heresy for any CEO.

It's fucked now. And thus consumers are fucked. At the end of the day, it's the consumer that pays at the end of the stick, more specifically speaking, the hardcore consumer of yesteryear (us) that prefers the traditional $60-$70 boxed model as opposed to the bite-size chunks/salami slice way of providing content that is F2P (for the most part).

It's ideal to just get rid of it altogether, and less ideal to just add F2P behind the paywall to make it fair for everybody. It also creates the problem that F2P is no longer F2P.

 

[Yurinka]

If I were to estimate total PS4 and PS5 consoles to be a potential playerbase of 160 million and that recent estimates of base PS Plus of 48 million being true…

The around 48M PS Plus subs isn't an estimate, it's an official Sony number (exactly 47.4M as of March 2023). But there isn't 160M playerbase in PS: there are >117M PS4 sold (as of March 2022) and 38.4M PS5 sold (as of March 2023).

Sony said that around half of these PS5 users didn't have a PS5. Meaning that the PS4+PS5 userbase is around 136.2M.

Unless we were to assume the remaining 110 million users don’t have internet; that’s a lot of players with an additional paywall in place for their favorite online game where something like Fortnite, Warzone 2.0, Apex and Overwatch 2 do not; or feature cost of entry to begin with.

I assume a portion of these 136M no longer uses the console so there's no point on paying the sub and another portion won't be interested on (paid) MP games or the games included in PS. Then there's some people who owns multiple consoles either to have a couple of them in the same house or in a couple of houses (or it's a company with multiple consoles, like gamedevs or tournament organizators).

We have all these publishers and studios chasing the growing market of live service games. It’s risky and we’ve seen many tragedies as a result from Anthem to Halo Infinite. This paywall is anti-competitive for any developer and publisher who finds a free-to-play launch too risky.

A portion of the games always have been flops, since 50 years ago. Most of the ones who fail, even today -these two example- don't fail because they are GaaS.

In many cases, GaaS reduces their risk because instead of releasing the game with 100% of the total content and features, they release it with let's say 25% and as long as it makes sense for them they keep developing and adding stuff post launch.

Which means that in GaaS if the game is a flop at launch and they quickly see it doesn't make sense to keep supporting it they can cancel post launch stuff, meaning they don't have to invest on what it's needed to develop and market that 75%, or whatever is the percentage for every game.

And you would have to assume that somewhere amongst all these new live service efforts from Sony and any other studio working today is the hopes to take a piece of that pie from the F2P giants.

That paywall alone is kneecapping your own studios to keep the biggest publishers happy. We’ve just seen data and documents on how important CoD revenues are to both ABK and Sony. Let’s not forget that Fortnite being exclusive to the PS4 for a fair amount of time as well as it became the biggest game in the world. These relationships served all parties well with big bucks to be made.

So now what?

A majority of the game revenue comes from GaaS (DLC, IAP, passes...) and that percentage keeps growing, so this is why all major publishers -not only Sony, also MS, Nintendo, EA, Take 2, Ubisoft etc- are investing more in GaaS: they want to join the train before it's too late and their business model gets irrelevant.

In the specific case of Sony the pressure is very low: their main non-GaaS titles sell >20M copies and keep improving, their console is the one with the biggest 3rd party support and revenue, being the top grossing platform for most third party top publishers and games. And their game sub is also the top grossing one by far. They are also now starting to make a lot ot profit from cinema/tv adaptations of their IPs plus PC ports, and in accesories they also make more money than ever.

But still, they want to keep their 1st party games relevant in terms of revenue for the future and get their portion of the MP/GaaS market. And so far Destiny 2 continues being a great success, GT7 and MLB have been very successful in their adaptation to GaaS and the Marathon trailer got a record 19M views in a around month, which means there's a ton of interest and will sell very well. So far things are going very well.

The easiest thing is to put everything behind base paywall and of course that’ll piss everyone off. So the next best thing is to remove it altogether.

Doing such would tank subscription numbers for both XBL Gold and base PS plus. For Xbox the transition to Gamepass only is effortless as their Gold software offerings are mostly throwaway and a separate subscription. For PlayStation a restructure and price re-evaluation of ps plus tiers would be nice. Base ps plus costs were mandatory for me so the additional $40 spent for extra was great value. But if I don’t need plus I probably won’t sub to Extra.

To put it in plainly… both hardware manufacturers are just fucking their own studios over.

Sony is making a shit ton of money with F2P games like Fortnite, Gensin Impact, Warzone, Trackmania, Apex Legends, Fall Guys, Destiny 2, Sims 4 or Rocket League etc.

If they can be played in online MP without requiring PS+ is because it's worth it for Sony: not requiring PS+ enlarges the userbase of these games, which also means it also enlarges their amount of players who will end paying there.

F2P are one of the most profitable cows for Sony, so the best for them is to continue milking it and to take care of it instead of killing it. Regarding PS+, they already reviewed it and its pricings recently and as a result its revenue grew a lot and seems to continue growing.

Excluding the covid related issues that prevented to sell more consoles during a certain period of time, Sony is making more money than ever in terms of profit and revenue even during a generational transition period and while investing more than ever in many areas.

Give them more time shipping consoles without supply constrain, with more people jumping to the new console (where the average spent per user is bigger than in the previous one) and to see the results of many of these investments generating them even more revenue and profit: in a couple years they'll be making way more money than now.

GaaS and F2P aren't fucking them: the opposite, they are part of the record success they are having now.

I don't understand your argument. How is f2p hurting competition? I'd say that online multiplayer, in general, results in fewer big name choices for gamers, but that is only because other gamers like them. If single player games continue to offer experiences that people want to buy, then people will continue paying ofr them and other people will continue building them in exchange for money. And that's what competition is.

Like this, how does that hurt competition? That isn't hurting competition, that is competition. Both are after the audience, both are using different approaches to get that audience.

F2P isn't hurting competition, this is a baseless nonsensical statement. Today there are more games being sold than ever before in both PC and console. The console with the biggest amount of games sold is PS4 and PS5 is getting better related metrics so it's on track to end performing even better.

 

[Vertigo]

Destiny requires PlayStation plus. Marathon will probably cost $70.

Whether a publisher or studio chooses to go f2p should have no weight on them bypassing the subscription paywall. All of these games are competing for players.

Of course there’s money in the f2p model. But any game that doesn’t embrace it is immediately kneecapped on console.

There is no reason whatsoever to keep paywalls in place for ANY multiplayer function just because a game isn’t free to play.

 

[Deleted member 223]

Console markers should not be in the business of incentivizing one model over another through their policy decisions (whether intended or unintended - and whether correcting it sacrifices some of their bottom-line). The Xbox Live Gold/PS Plus Paywall incentivize the F2P/GAAS model over traditional.

All of that amounts to picking winners and losers more so than other practices of theirs that also do this.

Anyone that tries to argue against that reality and argues pro status quo is a total moron with serious problems in critical thinking. Now if you're OK being a shill and proud of your warped interpretation to shield and run cover for your favorite horse (either Sony or MS in this case) then sure I can see it making sense....... but with that said, fuck off too clown.

 

[anonpuffs]

I don't believe this is a good argument. We've seen time and again that as long as the quality or appeal of the games is great enough, [reasonable] pay walls don't stop customers. Otherwise there would be no one migrating from console generation to console generation, a $300-500 lump sum paywall is much harder to overcome than a $10 monthly fee. Call of Duty sells the most copies of any game every year despite the PS+/XBL paywall on its multiplayer component.

The critical factor is consumer expectations and not the paywall itself. Why does assassin's creed sell much more than the average $20 indie despite being $70 and everyone always complaining about how generic they are?

Also, f2ps are increasingly hard to succeed with. Just because you have a higher TAM doesn't guarantee success or doom nonf2ps to failure. F2ps are going to find out that just like MMOs, only the biggest will survive. Fortnite is the World of Warcraft of f2ps.

 

[Alabtrosmyster]

This is also assuming Sony’s stays conservative with their approach and avoids f2p launches, which I’m generally against. People should get paid for their work.

Employees get their salaries either way, the risk is taken by investors (alongside the benefits).

Now, not taking money upfront means that there is a chance nobody buys your horse armor or funny hats.

So, F2P becomes the defacto only option for online games (unless you are called CoD ot GTA, even GTA V... it's available for so cheap that it should probably be called f2p). If you charge for an online game very few people will try it because there are millions good f2p options.

I don't like the model, these games can turn into money pits for those who are addicted to them. But I don't think they are threatening to SP paid games, they're just different beasts, just like you can have pure action movies alongside rom coms.

Also, f2ps are increasingly hard to succeed with. Just because you have a higher TAM doesn't guarantee success or doom nonf2ps to failure. F2ps are going to find out that just like MMOs, only the biggest will survive. Fortnite is the World of Warcraft of f2ps.

Ironically, it's possible to play WoW for free (I have a friend who spends time selling items on the game's market place and somehow that converts into free play).

 

[ethomaz]

F2P games have no weigh in story to keep me playing.

 

[Vertigo]

Employees get their salaries either way, the risk is taken by investors (alongside the benefits).

Now, not taking money upfront means that there is a chance nobody buys your horse armor or funny hats.

So, F2P becomes the defacto only option for online games (unless you are called CoD ot GTA, even GTA V... it's available for so cheap that it should probably be called f2p). If you charge for an online game very few people will try it because there are millions good f2p options.

I don't like the model, these games can turn into money pits for those who are addicted to them. But I don't think they are threatening to SP paid games, they're just different beasts, just like you can have pure action movies alongside rom coms.

Ironically, it's possible to play WoW for free (I have a friend who spends time selling items on the game's market place and somehow that converts into free play).

I titled this wrong but it’s not that f2p threatens single player games. I don’t think that at all. Those are different things.

It’s that a game being f2p over an online multiplayer game that’s got a price tag attached to entry has a significant potential playerbase advantage and that’s only due to an additional paywall in front of the $70 you will pay to buy the game to begin with due to XBL and Plus subs. Many games have their online functions behind yet another paywall where most f2p games do not.

This is with Sony trying to launch a variety of Online multiplayer and service games with a retail price attached to them… hoping to strike gold in the process.

Call of Duty can be replaced. If you give studios a fair playing field.

 

[Alabtrosmyster]

I titled this wrong but it’s not that f2p threatens single player games. I don’t think that at all. Those are different things.

It’s that a game being f2p over an online multiplayer game that’s got a price tag attached to entry has a significant potential playerbase advantage and that’s only due to an additional paywall in front of the $70 you will pay to buy the game to begin with due to XBL and Plus subs. Many games have their online functions behind yet another paywall where most f2p games do not.

This is with Sony trying to launch a variety of Online multiplayer and service games with a retail price attached to them… hoping to strike gold in the process.

Call of Duty can be replaced. If you give studios a fair playing field.

I think Call of Duty is like some sort of sport or something, if you drop NFL Football you may not necessarily pick up CFL Football instead. Even if it's similar in many ways (it's better in fact).

For things to change a better challenger has to come by and CoD needs to mess the expectations of their die hard fans... This almost happened with Battlefield 3\4, then Battlefield dropped the ball and CoD came back on top with a few good releases.