The Daily Grind: What's a fair price for subscription fees?
by Seraphina Brennan 
Nov 19th 2009 at 8:00AM
Filed under: Business models, Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind
Sure, we always have the option of playing more money up front to pay a reduced monthly cost, thanks to the miracle of multi-month subscription plans, but today's question isn't about that. It's about your thoughts on the subscription fees. What do you think is a fair price to charge?
Now don't be silly and say free, because we all know servers don't run themselves and bandwidth isn't free. While we're not all in the know about the cost to a blockbuster MMO, we do know how much we're willing to shell out for our games. What's the price you'd like to be able to shell out?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Solude said on 8:06AM 11-19-2009
Guild Wars is online and supports millions... free.
BattleNet is online also supports millions... free.
Not sure why people think companies need monthly subs to be profitable but...
I gladly pay $15 a month for the MMOs I enjoy and frankly even $25 wouldn't break the bank. Once upon a time yes UO was $10 but my ISDN line was $200 so given broadband is peanuts now... I'm still ahead ;)
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Wisdomandlore said on 9:05AM 11-19-2009
There's a big difference between Guild Wars and Battle.net and a real MMO. When you need a server for say, 2-12 people, just about anything could do. Halo, for example, simply utilizes one of the player's Xbox as a server. Once you go beyond that number things start getting costly. 32-64+ player shooters need dedicated servers to run smoothly, and if the developers are unwilling to foot the bill then players have to.
Now up that to over a 1000 people and you need some seriously powerful hardware, plus a team of technicians to run them all, and I imagine some costly internet bills. You need some type of subscription of RMT model to pay for it all.
Now if Guild Wars 2 really is a persistent world MMO (re: not composed 99% of instances), and it really is free (no RMT or sub) then I will believe you.
Meagen said on 10:07AM 11-19-2009
@Wisdomandlore How do you define "no RMT"? GW1 has options to buy additional character slots (you get 4 free with your first campaign, 2 with every subsequent one), additional account storage, character makeovers and renames, and unlocks for PvP.
GW2 will definitely have no sub fees (it's one of the few things they've explicitly said about the game so far), but it might have a similar online store. Does that count as RMT, or do you mean only things that give a real in-game advantage (like the option in DDO to start characters with 32 instead of 28 points)?
Scuffles said on 8:16AM 11-19-2009
I'll start this off with FREE
because when I played P2P games I felt almost obligated to get my game time in because I had payed for it ....... with F2P games I buy what I want when I want and if I don't play for a few weeks, who cares because its not wasting my subscription time.
Arguably you do ironically tend to pay more for F2P than you do P2P but you can also go months of playing without dropping dime into it, which means when times get tight and you can't afford to deposit which has happened here and there it isn't cancel your account and suck up not playing your favorite game because you can keep right on trucking in your favorite F2P.
And with lots of P2P adopting a mutant subscription fee + a cash shop ..... I can say there is no way I'd go back to them on principle alone.
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Adam Teece said on 8:17AM 11-19-2009
I would so stand on the front lines to face the Bane as long as I had great equipment, weapons and support.
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Adam Teece said on 8:19AM 11-19-2009
Sorry for my last comment, for some reason when I filled in my password it autofilled and submitted from a previous comment on the site. Anywho...
I think 14.99 a month is fair as long as when you pay for multiple months you can get it down to 9.99 a month.
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Vulturion said on 8:19AM 11-19-2009
£8-10 For a top-game I'm playing intensely.
£3-5 For a casual game, especially if no initial purchase required.
I wouldn't ever pay a fee for a AAA game I'm not going to playing intensively, or more than one AAA subscription at a time.
I cannot really say what my upper limit would be, but if a game of extraordinary pedigree and quality were to be released charging £15-20 say I'd probably pay... for the month or two it takes to complete the content, then I'd be getting out of there!
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Jesse said on 8:20AM 11-19-2009
I personally believe $12.95/month is reasonible.
But, no matter how high they raise it, they're going to get away with it. We're still going to pay it. And, they know it.
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Kalos Democritus said on 8:22AM 11-19-2009
The only MMO that I actually play is EVE, and I don't mind the subscription fee for a few reasons:
1) There's no charge for the client, and the 14-21 day free trial is long enough to decide whether you like the game before you actually spend any money
2) If you make enough ISK in game, you can buy PLEXes and play the game for free
3) Major revisions to the game come out every 6 months or so, and there's never a charge for those
All in all, it seems like a more than fair system to me.
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Malachi said on 8:31AM 11-19-2009
Oh, but there is... they charge you $4,00 more if you don't get it from steam. Ok, that's less than a cheese burger, but I had to be anal about it. CCP, of course, offers new content em balance tweaks every few months free of any charge, which is great.
Having said that - and still comparing with food, because it's close to lunch time - $14,95 is what I pay for a good pizza around here. And I'll gladly forgo a pizza night (or three) to play one of my favorite games for a whole month. And considering the whole free expansion stuff, yeah, it's actually quite cheap.
Halldorr said on 9:02AM 11-19-2009
$4 for the EVE client? I've never had to pay anything to download the EVE client...I just download it from their site.
TommyB said on 11:01AM 11-19-2009
You do indeed have to pay to upgrade your trial EVE account to a subscription one, it's a one-time fee of like 5 Euros, even if you buy it directly from their website.
They call it a "registration" fee.
Rambie said on 12:08PM 11-19-2009
If a game wants me to pay $15/month they better not want $40 per expansion without even a free month! (I'm looking at you Blizzard.)
I don't mind a RMT game but they also better not charge $15/month plus required items from the store just to play.
I agree CCP's EVE subscription model is my preference. I don't mind paying $15/month when the expansions are free. The RMT in EVE isn't game breaking, I've even sold a PLEX or two in game for the ISK.
Daniel said on 4:47AM 11-20-2009
Ive gone thru 5+ trials of eve, I just can't decide if to get it monthly. :)
I like playing with a group, and noone i know in rl is even slightly interested in playing it.
Itanius said on 8:24AM 11-19-2009
There are a lot of variables that determine subscription value, imo.
How much did I pay for the game up front?
Is there any in-game advertising? Can I turn it off?
Are there microtransactions available? Do they affect gameplay & progression?
Is the game's quality (client/server stability, etc) justify a recurring subscription?
Obviously, there are many free-to-play games out there, so that model works. If you're asking what maximum monthly fee I'd pay to play a high quality MMO that doesn't feature any advertising or game-affecting microtransactions, then I'd say perhaps up to $30 per month. Again, there are a lot of circumstantial variables that would affect my decision.
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Flolah said on 9:57AM 11-19-2009
If a company ever charged even close to $30 a MONTH for a subscription, I'd ask to see what they were smoking, and they might share.
nevin said on 8:28AM 11-19-2009
Happy to pay $15 per month for a AAA but unfortunately most of the titles being released all think they are AAA which they aren't.
Some games scream for lower subscription fees which would draw in more subs. Most publishers however fear pricing lower for the impression that will give to the market...self fulfilling foot shot.
Would starting off cheaper and increasing prices as you see it's popularity rise work? Surely market forces would show the appropriate price if you allowed the sub price to fluctuate. Of course it could drop as well and there are fixed costs to pay for but the F2P crowd seem to pull this off in their own way.
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Gareth said on 8:47AM 11-19-2009
I don't mind paying a monthly fee, but I need to feel that it's money well spent... sure, a company needs to pay the bills, but I expect a game to be stable, content rich and have a regular expansion / update schedule.
Paying $15 for a post launch beta test is not acceptable.
I subbed for HGL (doh!), you live and learn...!
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Aganazer said on 8:56AM 11-19-2009
I would pay up to $25 a month if the game was compelling enough.
Its funny that so many people are saying 'free'. Playing MMOG's is already one of the cheapest forms of entertainment available. Haven't you been to a theater lately to see what those fools are charging these days? Even the price of lunch is approaching $10 a meal. Filling my gas tank costs about $40. Even my trash service is up to $20 per month. Nothing costs less than $15/mo and especially not anything that can keep you entertained every night of the month.
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Wieland said on 9:01AM 11-19-2009
15€ is enough for todays MMOs.
I would even be willing to pay 20€, but the MMO worth that has yet to be made.
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