DC Universe Online

[Guest Reno]

Who here is playing/planning on playing the new MMO based on the DC Universe?

 

My time in the beta was enough for me to warrant a full purchase, so I'll be looking for people to play with and possibly start a league with. I've got a character on both EU servers, though I may switch over to the US servers. If you're wanting to play on PC, head over to Steam and you can purchase it right away and get one as soon as it's downloaded and updated.

 

If you're already playing, post your platform, characters name, server and alignment.

[DC 536]

I'll be looking to get it next month.

[Paul 584]

Nah, Im not paying a tenner a month on top of actually buying the damned game. I hope the rest of you enjoy it though.

[Guest Dave7g]

Nah, Im not paying a tenner a month on top of actually buying the damned game. I hope the rest of you enjoy it though.

 

Exactly, I have some interest in it, but paying monthly is extortion. It's the same as every other online game.

[Paul 584]

If it was around a fiver I may have considered it.

[DC 536]

I was under the impression it was being launched as a non-subscription title. I'm pretty sure there was a lot of press about it not being subscription based, so that part sucks and I may have to re-think things.

[Paul 584]

£9.99 a month mate.

[Maxximus 353]

Forget that. I'm out.

 

I was really looking forward to this one too. Shame. I just can't afford it right now.

[Guest John Hancock]

It's £10? On your bike Steam. I thought it was a one off payment type thing for this one, because there was no mention of a subscription fee on the Steam overview.

[etz 78]

Yeah, I had access to the beta and didn't even bother trying it because the subscription thing just makes it an immediate no, which would have sucked if I had liked it. I'd rather not know if it's any good.

 

And at £10 pound a month, you've bought some other game, every three to four months.

Edited January 14, 2011 by etz

[Guest Dave7g]

If it was €10 per month without the €50 for the disc, I would have tried it out. €120 per year to play a game that you already bought for €50.

 

No deal.

[Omega 354]

Personally I don't see the issue with subscription MMO's. The ongoing server costs alone fort a popular MMO are going to be astronomical, even if you have some paid for content I doubt that would be able to keep a game going forever. A tenner a month isn't exactly extortion and any hobby is going to cost you some money to play with other people. Playing with yourself is always free ;)

[Paul 584]

I want speak for anyone else, but I cant justify spending a tenner a month on another game. Add to that the fact that I'd be paying £50 for a game as well, what happens if I find I dont like it after a month? A waste of £50 then. Or £30, whatever you pay. No, I dont have the money to be able to make that worth it.

[etz 78]

I'm sorry, but £10 a month is extortion, server costs are nowhere near what people seem to think they are. We're talking in the region of £1 a month per player, absolute maximum, for a popular MMO. And more players drives the cost per player down exponentially, despite the additional hardware required. Of course, it's higher when it isn't popular and initially, but that's what the box price is for.

 

Subscription based games are essentially a license to print money for their operators, it's just that the vast majority of the operators are totally incompetent and so incur massive expenses or bulk player loss.

Edited January 14, 2011 by etz

[Omega 354]

I'm sorry, but £10 a month is extortion, server costs are nowhere near what people seem to think they are. We're talking in the region of £1 a month per player, absolute maximum, for a popular MMO. And more players drives the cost per player down exponentially, despite the additional hardware required. Of course, it's higher when it isn't popular and initially, but that's what the box price is for.

 

Subscription based games are essentially a license to print money for their operators, it's just that the vast majority of the operators are totally incompetent and so incur massive expenses or bulk player loss.

 

Total bollocks to be honest. Even if the server cost in itself is simply £1 a month a big MMO such as WOW that's £13M a month just on the servers! You add on top of that the cost of the server techs, developers, marketing, forum admins and all the other costs with just keeping a MMO GOING let alone actually actively working on expansions and sequels and I'd doubt that your £10 per month is 90% profit as you suggest.

 

Or are you suggesting the MMO's should be run as not for profit? I do believe that a company tends to run to make a profit for the owners.

[Paul 584]

Actually that raises a good point, sequals and expansions, should they be funded by subscription costs? After all you still have to pay for them so should they not be funded by the cost of the pack itself?

[Omega 354]

Depends on the expansion doesn't. Both Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Litch King for WOW only ADDED content to the vanilla product so you only got the value from those once you got past level 60/70. Cataclysm is a total change to the vanilla content and so even though you have to buy the two previous expansions to get the 80+ content (and new races) a basic vanilla player gets all the benefits without paying any extra.

 

The real point I'm making is that sure you can see that on a day to day basis the very basic needs for one player on a server may not seem to cost very much but if you want to play a decent online game with lots of other players that is constantly being hotfixed and patched so that it plays as best it can and also has evolving content then you should expect to pay the extra it costs to do that. If you can't afford it then that sucks but simply saying "OMG, I can't believe the company making this game isn't shouldering the ongoing costs so I have to sub, Fux that.." is just stupid and short sighted.

 

I'm sure people pay their license fees and internet broadband charges, it's all a sub so you have access to whatever it is they provide and whilst it does turn a profit for the companies that revenue is often and necessarily plowed back into the product in various other ways you don't directly pay for.

[The Icon 152]

I see one of two ways that makes it seem like anything other than extortion.

 

Like with some games you pay for the game and then you play free on the server. With optional choices to upgrade to help out as it were. But your choice if you ever pay or not. (Like the TWO sub choice.)

 

Or you get the game free and you pay to play.

 

Paying for the game and to play it is extortion server costs or not.

[Guest Dave7g]

What's the difference between millions of people playing for free on the Call of Duty servers and people paying to play on this?

[The Icon 152]

What's the difference between millions of people playing for free on the Call of Duty servers and people paying to play on this?

 

Some companies like more money is the difference.