Free vs Freemium vs Upfront games (Gaming)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Tuesday, March 06, 2018, 00:02 (2252 days ago) @ ManKitten

It seems the main idea I keep coming back to is, are they selling us a product or a service and perhaps the service is where all the revenue is.

You have to be careful.

If you look at the box office results year by year for movies, you will see that adjusted for inflation the trend is that the movie industry is making more money year after year.

If you look at the stats for music recording, we see a sharp decline around 2000 and a leveling off. This is unadjusted for inflation, making it worse.

What happened in 2000? Napster? Is Piracy to blame? You can pirate movies too. So why do movies make more money year after year?

Apple put a price on a song of $.99. When it's that low, I think it gives the impression that it's not of value. And so people feel okay about stealing it. Especially when you pay virtually nothing now with streaming sites. Music has little value. It's always 'there'. When was the last time you sat and listened to an album (that wasn't MotS), devoting all your attention to it? Or do you listen to music like most people now - while you work, while you're in the car, or at parties? There are so many you just go through them from song to song as soon as a new one comes. Disposable.

Movies are making more money because there is still value to them. First of all, ticket prices are going up. This thing is worth your 10-15 bucks. Secondly, movies are not as ubiquitous as music. You don't see movies unless you sit and devote time to them. This is changing a bit too, as you can always have one on Netflix or the TV in the background, but for the most part movies are treated as, and priced as, a thing of value worth your time, money, and full attention.

Games benefit from this the most. A game requires your attention basically at all times. But when you charge 99 cents for a shitty mobile game, or give your game away for free, what are you really saying? Your game doesn't have the value to sustain someone's attention for long periods. There's so many shitty mobile games, almost nobody makes money and there's not a lot of loyalty. I am not shocked most free to play games are ghost towns.

But if you charge full price up front, not only are you saying that your game is worth that, but players will go into the game expecting the same. They'll put it in and play nothing else. They will willingly give themselves over because they made that investment. And if it does live up to that, they'll play it far longer.

Cheap games make people think they are disposable. We should be making bigger and better games. And charge MORE for them.