Did I hear this properly

[ShinMaruku]

I heard through the grape vine that it's free to play. Confirm or deny.
If it is I will certainly hope on this game.

[Cayenne]

I HIGHLY doubt it's gonna be free.

They charged us to play that train wreck of a game (PSU) online, I'm sure they're gonna charge us to play for PSO2 as well.

[yoshiblue]

Didn't they charge for blue burst too?

[ShinMaruku]

If PSU was a train wreck the changing for it would not have endured.
Sure you were pissed but enough people liked it. That said the market has significantly changed since PSU. They cannot look to the pay 2 play thing when only wow can handle that. (Even their grip is lessening, slowly but it's deteriorating.)

[NoiseHERO]

whats a grape vine?

[ShinMaruku]

It hides between a Hunewearls hips.

[Alexvrb]

If PSU was a train wreck the changing for it would not have endured.
Sure you were pissed but enough people liked it. That said the market has significantly changed since PSU. They cannot look to the pay 2 play thing when only wow can handle that. (Even their grip is lessening, slowly but it's deteriorating.)Well PSU seems to have generated enough money to justify new PS games, so there's one reason to like it even if you didn't care for PSU itself. Personally I didn't mind it, it was OK. It got better in some ways over time too, though I haven't played it in some time. Going PC only does have me a little concerned about userbase and cheating, but on the other hand it will mean a single platform to support, and it will be easier to add content. Whether or not this translates into better support and more content remains to be seem, but I'm cautiously optimistic and will play it regardless.

Regarding model, P2P has its advantages. Especially in the early stages when the game is new, and they're trying to recoup development costs. It also helps them build up a little cash to develop new content, too. Later on when the game is a little bit more seasoned it is easier to transition to another model, if they so choose. Personally I prefer P2P, but a Hybrid system is decent if it's done right. Pure F2P I'm not that big on.

[sugarFO]

If a game was designed with free to play in mind in the beginning it wouldn't have all the nice things we see in the videos, you'd have to pay for such customization and options and such from a cash shop or whatever. Free to play usually isn't high quality and if you never buy anything there's always that feeling you're missing out on something.

At least from my experience with free to play games, none of them have matched up to PSO2's quality from what has been revealed.

[NoiseHERO]

It hides between a Hunewearls hips.

If it wasn't for those hips I wouldn't have checked. D<

NOW TELL ME!

[ShinMaruku]

Find one named Juri then ask her to spread.

[Cayenne]

If PSU was a train wreck the changing for it would not have endured.
Sure you were pissed but enough people liked it. That said the market has significantly changed since PSU. They cannot look to the pay 2 play thing when only wow can handle that. (Even their grip is lessening, slowly but it's deteriorating.)

PSU is a train wreck, SEGA has a history of trying to revile things that should be left alone and try something else. Example, if you have seen that episode of the angry video game nerd (google it if you don't know about it) about the genesis was being put on life support to make it a little better and last longer. Kill it and start fresh. Look at the dreamcast, great system but overpowered by the PS2, SEGA learned and moved on.

SEGA made PSU (not that bad but not that good either, also wasn't popular), then the expansion (to please the current players), then PSP (made more tweaks hoping to bring new players), then PSP2 (WAY better). and finally PSP2i (The game it should have been in the first place). Couldn't they just test all these tweaks and scrap the ones that don't work instead of releasing a new game every time they "think" they got it right?

On topic: I personally believe PSO2 should be free to play online bu SEGA's past experience with the previous Phantasy Star games (PSO v.2, EP. I&II, PSU, PSO:BB) I feel we are gonna have to pay again.

[AzureBlaze]

Grape Vine= The Rumor Mill
A grape vine is long, and has many...grapes...so if one were to whisper down the lane of the vine, it would be difficult to determine the original source of the 'word' that has been passed along the vine. OP means
"Thinks heard somewhere, can't cite a source"
Yea....figures of speech. (go figure??) They sort of are a little outlandish if you put too much thought into it. (I believe the California Raisins first Heard it thru the Grapevine, which is a song)

I have not heard anything about pricing anywhere, in rumor or in anything official.
Date * Global Server * Price of game * Month Price (if any)
Are the "Big 4" that everyone is most waiting for/thought might get told at TGS. Because it's not the price point (buying in, monthly, cash shop or any other devised method) that's the deal-breaker, its the TREATMENT of the customer that is. By this point you either know you'll love the game, or it "doesn't look like it's for you", in which you don't care/aren't reading the forum.

They have already proven several times they will take your money and give you nothing.
They have proven that some people's money is worth more than others
If it was free no one could complain, but it wasn't.

People will pay nearly anything if the content is cool enough, AND if they're guarenteed to get what they pay for. That makes the only remaining key point "Global Servers". You know the game will come out eventually, that it will cost a reasonable sum to buy it...but everything revolves around that 1 announcement. Price/monthly/cash shop is moot if you'll never get the content.

Incidentally, the 'global server' was actually mentioned in a video breifly, so it's the only 'non-grape-vine' item here, though it still needs clarification. Your best bet: pester them on their Facebook (in english) with the question.

[moorebounce]

The Dreamcast version was actually free for a while to try and get players hooked. I didn't play it long enough to see if they started charging a fee. I got NOLed and just played offine from that point.

As good as PSO2 looks so far I can't see it being free. It would be nice but I don't think it's happening.

[Keilyn]

I used to argue about the F2P Quality, but I know F2P generates due to the sheer amount of players more money. Companies are willing to work if they know they have a large population that makes their game popular.

Dragon Nest has 60+ Million Subscribers
Maple Story has 92+ Million Subscribers

WoW is up there because Blizzard Can Advertise their subscriber base....but they aren't even in the top 10 list of F2P subscriber base out there. In fact WoW is actually slipping a bit. A lot of players did not want to upgrade their whole system on their latest expansion and chose to leave to new games altogether......

Its true that P2P games charge you monthly subscriptions, but the difference between the P2P and F2P games I've played is that a time comes when a P2P player paying $10 - $15 a month, along with $40 - $60 per expansion eventually has to upgrade their video card to be able to play through new content. in F2P games, they add more on the similar tile-sets.

I've never had to upgrade a computer playing an F2P from beginning to end, but when i played Lineage 2 I had to upgrade my system twice. When I played EverQuest II, I had to also upgrade multiple times. Friends of mine in WoW Raged-Quit from having to upgrade for new graphics.

Its crap too...because I started building Stronger, More Powerful System based on First Person Shooter optimum requirements because I would play MMORPGs before, have a good framerate, then reach endgame with all the most advanced graphics and between players, bandwidth and the load on the server, my framerate would drop like a rock.

I am now playing on 480 GTX SLI because of those "EndGame" things that dont happen when Im playing F2Ps.

I dont give a shit if PSO-2 is F2P or P2P. All I give a damn about is if SEGA actually would be fair to not pull the same crap they are doing in PSUJP....and if they do, I rather not even waste my time starting a character. I rather not get addicted and give a bunch of Xenophobes my money. What counts is that they do things right...

....but I still want to have some form of Western Representation to have a voice, otherwise every PSO-2 player that is NOT JAPANESE will be treated as a second or third-class citizen and I refuse to walk around with a Masters in Music and Masters in Computer Sciences and be treated by a maggot simply because I was not "born" a pre-designed way to the Japanese.

[RemiusTA]

Japan doesn't care about us because we don't care about Japan. At least, according to their sales, we don't. It's no surprise they act that way. The problem I have with it is, if you're going to say you're giving us the service, don't act like bitches and gimp us just because it isn't going the way you thought it would. It's TERRIBLE integrity on Sega's part.

And games like Maplestory clean house so much because 1) they appeal to a crowd of tons of kids, and 2) absolutely ANYBODY can play AND run the game with no issue.

Since they're able to play at leisure, they have no issue eventually shelling out $5 or $15 once they get hooked to pimp their character out. The stupid fanatics have no issue shelling out $100s a month.

[Cayenne]

I've never thought of that, good point Remius.

I would rather pay $50+ for the game and be aloud to play when I want then worry about putting as much play time in for my money.

[RemiusTA]

The issue with that is what it takes to maintain that kind of thing. In order to have people continuously pay for stuff, you have to be depriving them of something that they need. In P2P games, this is usually obtainable with a fair amount of time put into the game. In F2P games it's also obtainable....but usually at the expense of ridiculous amounts of time. To the point where you'd probably rather just pay instead of waste your life.

Which is why most of them become Pay-to-Win before they die.


PSO has always been the kind of game where i rarely had a shortage of interesting things to find or look for that were well within my reach. If an amount of those items became Cash Shop buyable...well, first off they probably wont be as useful or unique as they were if they were obtainable in a fair manner. Long story short....it'll change the game up in a way i wouldn't agree with too much. I like playing a game and feeling like im moving somewhere. But there is nothing more annoying than playing a game and having a constant feeling of missing out on something because i didn't pay for it. And there is nothing more discouraging than to see someone walk into a room with an awesome weapon and ask them where it drops, only to have them reply "in the cash shop for $5."


It not only takes all of the neatness appeal out of the weapon, but...wouldn't it have made the game that much more fun if instead of hunting for 3 rare weapons in a stage, you were hunting for a possible 4? Or maybe 5? Every item stuck in the cash shop would make the game more exciting if it were in the actual game.


That's my only gripe with it. You have to syphon content from the actual game itself in order to feed a cash shop. And not only are you taking the content out...you have to dumb it down to not upset the balance of the game. So it's basically just ruined content in my eyes. So if they DO have a cash shop, i'm praying its Clothing only.

[ShinMaruku]

I play quite a few f2p games and you do not pay for power in them. In DFO and DN you have to spend in game time for power. They sell cosmetic stuff which is fine because people are fine paying with that. And you can by them with game gold. I can make a few million gold in DFO in a normal play set.

[NoiseHERO]

I hate paying for cosmetic stuff...

[Angelo]

I don't mind paying for cosmetic stuff, but I (obviously) don't enjoy it.

So long as PSO2 stays under the belt when compared to other MMO subs, I'll be okay with it I suppose.

They've always charged 9.99$ a month here in the states, which is 5 or 6 bucks less than most MMOs.


...since the Phantasy Star games are not MMOs. Is that still an inflammatory thing to say?

[Cayenne]

Keep this in mind, if they charged us $9.99 a month for PSO:BB that was just a re-released game with a small amount of content added, what makes you think they won't charge for the sequel that they are making from the ground up?

[ShinMaruku]

I hate paying for cosmetic stuff...
See you don't have to you can earn it in a multitude of ways.

[Anon_Fire]

Keep this in mind, if they charged us $9.99 a month for PSO:BB that was just a re-released game with a small amount of content added, what makes you think they won't charge for the sequel that they are making from the ground up?

Actually, it was $8.99 a month for PSO:BB from what I remember.

[ShinMaruku]

There was little reason for charging that much for a old game.
They did that because they knew they could. If they want to expand they can't pull that shit.
Nobody here can confirm if it was stated that it's free?

[Keilyn]

The issue with that is what it takes to maintain that kind of thing. In order to have people continuously pay for stuff, you have to be depriving them of something that they need. In P2P games, this is usually obtainable with a fair amount of time put into the game. In F2P games it's also obtainable....but usually at the expense of ridiculous amounts of time. To the point where you'd probably rather just pay instead of waste your life.

Which is why most of them become Pay-to-Win before they die.


PSO has always been the kind of game where i rarely had a shortage of interesting things to find or look for that were well within my reach. If an amount of those items became Cash Shop buyable...well, first off they probably wont be as useful or unique as they were if they were obtainable in a fair manner. Long story short....it'll change the game up in a way i wouldn't agree with too much. I like playing a game and feeling like im moving somewhere. But there is nothing more annoying than playing a game and having a constant feeling of missing out on something because i didn't pay for it. And there is nothing more discouraging than to see someone walk into a room with an awesome weapon and ask them where it drops, only to have them reply "in the cash shop for $5."


It not only takes all of the neatness appeal out of the weapon, but...wouldn't it have made the game that much more fun if instead of hunting for 3 rare weapons in a stage, you were hunting for a possible 4? Or maybe 5? Every item stuck in the cash shop would make the game more exciting if it were in the actual game.


That's my only gripe with it. You have to syphon content from the actual game itself in order to feed a cash shop. And not only are you taking the content out...you have to dumb it down to not upset the balance of the game. So it's basically just ruined content in my eyes. So if they DO have a cash shop, i'm praying its Clothing only.

Right now PSU = Pay to Win Game. A person pays money for a "premium" course game, and players spend money on GC because they dont want to run a map 100 - 200+ times to get a weapon. GC weapons actually have more ATP/TP, ATA and a little less PP, but higher weapon %s. I've seen more people individually spend money on GC than any other game cash shop...

Also, I've played F2P games and P2P games.

So many people defend the notion of MMORPG by working on making SOLO-Characters intended for multiple players. They love to complain. The way you Solve your problem is actually make friends, work together and actually play the game. Then you will be playing a game online with people.

Lets face it! If you are going to play a roleplaying game online to play Solo and get all the rewards from running maps, you might as well stop playing Online Games altogether and go back to singleplayer games.

You mention PSO.

You do know it started F2P....It was FREE on Dreamcast, then the game was $5 a month when version 2 came out. Of course players had to shell out $40 to get the extra weapons, leveling from 100 to 200. Then if you wished to continue you had to pay the monthly fee or buy the new version on a new console.

This meant buying the SAME GAME + UPDATE over again + new console if you hoped to continue. Just so at the end of it all you go to PC, play PSObb and watch the servers close down.

In every major F2P game, I've seen players who wish to play only SOLO without parties spend the most amount of money on cash shop options. They get what they want......but its WELL UNDERSTOOD in PC MMORPGing and Action Oriented Games that you play the game to become good enough to fill a role in a party with other people.

So the idea is to play the game and socialize....and then do big things in parties and clans. This is why there are Guilds, Clans and PvP to serve their scale and why gaming really changing forms as a player is REWARDED for reaching a point when they evolve to being able to do bigger and better things in the game...

If players really want to play solo 90 - 100% of the time and they want to show off and look forward to their five minutes of Solo-fame, they do better to simply play a singleplayer game and try for something good in there.

In MMORPGs the players who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups.

In the real world the people who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups...

See the common ground?

Soloing is nice when you are "young" and "immature" and you don't need to worry about group complexities, but its like when you are a kid and can put your hand in the cookie jar in 10,000 different ways. A time comes when its just not cute anymore and people just frown upon it.

PSU is the same way. People use the cash shop to do all possible to get the best weapons....but I can take two players with shit equipment, teach them to TA a map...or play together and we could efficiently run maps together....and have a far stronger group oriented Dynamic.

[Cayenne]

They can still make this a Free to play online game (pay for the game first of course) and keep adding content, keeping players longer, bigger fan base, may lead to an expansion in the future. The question is, will they make the right moves?

[blace]

Nobody here can confirm if it was stated that it's free?
Everywhere I looked people are guessing whether it'll follow PSU and use a GC style system or whether it'll be like the past games were content is slowly pushed out. Nothing on it being F2P.


They can still make this a Free to play online game (pay for the game first of course) and keep adding content, keeping players longer, bigger fan base, may lead to an expansion in the future. The question is, will they make the right moves?
Guild Wars did that, but I have no experience with it to say whether it works or not. Since Guild Wars 2 is coming soon and that it's expanded and enhanced over the original I'm guessing it worked well.

[Keilyn]

I'm big into guild wars....

Guild Wars was not F2P.

You had to buy the game and the expansions. It was $50 for each game and expansion, but with the exception of Eye of the North, all were self contained. They were bought because many players wanted the new skills for PvP. The in-game store came into play because players demanded more character slots because they wanted one of each class and they wanted to not have to make mules..

However they came through for people in very big ways.

I will say that although you did not pay a subscription fee...the best thing they put in that expansion was the Bonus Mission Pack.

Phantasy Star is kind of light in its stories...like, although we have a 500 year war among the races in PSU, you dont hear of "great heroes" and the only "great villain" is the reoccuring falz. You hear of plenty of characters...in PSO and PSU...some really nice, some really cool....but stretch it out a few generations and you really hear of nothing. :(

I saw how nice and cool the character creation video was in pso-2, then I saw the gameplay, you know running through maps in parties...and enjoying everything, but then I thought "arent we doing the same in PSO and PSU?"

Trying to tell the world we are running in parties but the odds of getting a full party of players you know and love are slim at best.

[Cayenne]

Guild Wars did that, but I have no experience with it to say whether it works or not. Since Guild Wars 2 is coming soon and that it's expanded and enhanced over the original I'm guessing it worked well.

That's exactly what I had in mind when I wrote that! They made their money, had like what 3-4 expansions and now getting closer to making GW2 (I will be getting that as well).

Huge fan base, very popular, fun, always updated, and no monthly subscription. That's what SEGA NEEDS to do!

[Aeran]

I believe there's a possibility that PSO2 will be free to play until a certain level, then you will have to start paying up. (Much like PSU.)

And as people have found "arkzcash_icon" next to "meseta_icon" in the game's memory/files while dat mining, we're likely also gonna see a version of Guardian's Cash, basically the cash shop PSU has.

Monthly fee as well as a cash shop, sorry to say it..But it does sound like SEGA.

Lets just hope they will balance those two out properly.
I mean, we can hope! Right? ..Right? Guys?

[blace]

Lets just hope they will balance those two out properly.
I mean, we can hope! Right? ..Right? Guys?
Um yeah, sure why not.


Not like Sega hasn't screwed anything up, right?

[ShinMaruku]

Let's be fair it does not seem to be Sonic team. Which is GOOD.
They currently seem to be failing on Sonic let them stay there.

[Hatemachine]

Gotta say F2P is unlikely, namely as they tend to shoehorn in some degree of a Single player story game which would in turn make for it to be a full game WITH online features, granted it's online is pretty much the Focal point as it IS in it's very NAME for gods sake lol.

But none the less it's usually still there for folks who just want a Phantasy star RPG to play, even PSU had/has a single player, it wasn't that GOOD at least by my standards, but it was there, if they don't do a single player story THING with this one I still doubt it.

Sega KNOWS people are chomping the bit here to get their hands on this sucker, people are expecting a P2P model as has been pretty much standard.

Also and sheepishly I agree I coulda save alot of space and time by saying, if they were gonna make it F2P they woulda made it a MAJOR selling point, any major company trying to drum up press for it's latest MMO tend to scream like 14 year old girls at a (insert latest soulless musical abomination here) concert.

[MinscTFA]

Perhaps I'm uneducated, however it's been my understanding that F2P is more expense to the player than P2P. To me, paying to get "the cool stuff" takes away the point of the game. There's a crap load of stuff in PSO I've never gotten. Sure, I use some "hacking" method to get them but that just wasn't me. Really, I don't see paying for items to be all that different. Something gotten with no effort.

[Cayenne]

We should replace the term "F2P" with "no monthly subscription". I'm about 99% sure you're gonna have to buy the game. It's the monthly thing I'm worried about.

[NoiseHERO]

Called B2P

[Ezodagrom]

Let's be fair it does not seem to be Sonic team. Which is GOOD.
They currently seem to be failing on Sonic let them stay there.
How is Sonic Team failing on Sonic? Sonic Colours was good, and Sonic Generations looks like it's going to be good as well.
Sonic 4 Ep1 was meh, but it doesn't really count, it was mostly made by Dimps.

[Geistritter]

Did someone order a wall of text?


If a game was designed with free to play in mind in the beginning it wouldn't have all the nice things we see in the videos, you'd have to pay for such customization and options and such from a cash shop or whatever. Free to play usually isn't high quality and if you never buy anything there's always that feeling you're missing out on something.

At least from my experience with free to play games, none of them have matched up to PSO2's quality from what has been revealed.

This is misinformed; while the vast majority is garbage, certainly, there are a few free online games these days that are of good quality, and at least one I can think of that PSO 2 is going to have a hard time looking as good as. High profile free games I can think of off the top of my head that play like this series are Dragon Nest and Mabinogi Heroes (known as Vindictus in North America). Another game I hear in passing often is League of Legends, though I know absolutely nothing about that game other than that it has an unfortunate abbreviation.

I couldn't tell you much about Dragon Nest other than that its gameplay is extremely similar to PSO 2's (and indeed, probably where PSO 2 got its jump attack mechanics from), but Mabinogi Heroes has been out for a couple of years now and is the only Korean online game I've played that I'd describe as both "good" and "fun". It's also lowered my hopes for this game considerably; PSO 2 looks dated in comparison, and the thing isn't even out yet. Seeing a wall shatter into dozens of pieces in Heroes on impact, then seeing one inexplicably explode and vaporize in PSO 2 just... disappoints me, for example.

Anyway, Heroes' combat, a mix of Dynasty Warriors, Monster Hunter, and yes, PSO, is very solid, and its physics engine is a scream; it took a number of days for it to run out of new things for me to trip over and fool around with (try grappling enemies and pulling them near certain things before you throw them!). None of the content available is locked to non-paying customers, and said players are not at a disadvantage compared to ones that do fork over money; the vast majority of the perks are cosmetic. This game was a pleasant surprise when I tried it out, and continues to be entertaining a couple of weeks later. I won't be with it for a long time, as a dedicated player can burn through its content and level cap pretty quickly, but I'm definitely having a good time with it.

That said, I'm still hoping PSO 2 ends up being its superior. Nothing I've seen of it thusfar suggests it will be, but I've got my fingers crossed; I don't get to be a badass robot wielding a gun bigger than I am anywhere else.


revile revile revile revile

Revise. Revise. You mean revise. "Revile" refers to abusive criticism, and while that often goes in the direction of this series these days, it's not the word you're looking for.


Lets face it! If you are going to play a roleplaying game online to play Solo and get all the rewards from running maps, you might as well stop playing Online Games altogether and go back to singleplayer games.

...

If players really want to play solo 90 - 100% of the time and they want to show off and look forward to their five minutes of Solo-fame, they do better to simply play a singleplayer game and try for something good in there.

In MMORPGs the players who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups.

In the real world the people who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups...

See the common ground?

Soloing is nice when you are "young" and "immature" and you don't need to worry about group complexities, but its like when you are a kid and can put your hand in the cookie jar in 10,000 different ways. A time comes when its just not cute anymore and people just frown upon it.

Holy cow, you make my head hurt.

Online games aren't exclusively the realm of social butterflies and/or people who feel the need to show off to feel good about themselves. These sorts of games offer something that most single player, offline games don't: a time sink, a go-to when you've got moments to burn or nothing else to do, a slow, but constant progression toward a goal.

What's more, it can be more satisfying and challenging to play alone; indeed, I play the above-mentioned Vindictus solo unless I absolutely need a group to achieve an objective, and in those situations I'm consistently one of the most useful members of the group because I had to learn how to survive on my own, without having my hand held by a larger group or by superior players; I know the boss' pattern, I know the range of my attacks, I know when to use my abilities to good effect, and I know how to read the flow of the battle, because I'm used to it being my neck on the line, and there being no one to help me if I make a mistake. I'm not the doofus that gets himself killed every third second because he has no idea what he's doing. I otherwise play it like a single player game, albeit one you can play with other people, and sure as hell not to impress you, or anyone. It's just how I prefer to play.

PSO/U/Zero were no different; I played by myself or with one or two close friends exclusively, finding full parties to be chaotic, irritating overkill. It neither affected my enjoyment for nor effectiveness at the game, and it's unlikely to do so in PSO 2, either. I never had to worry about being the one bitching about some random jerk ganking my stuff, either.

Even if I was, people can play however the hell they want; they're paying the same money you are, and if they're playing by themselves, they're not causing you any problems, so who are you to call them wrong, much less immature? Don't be so quick to insult people who choose to do things outside of the way you perceive as "correct". A video game is meant to be fun, and if that's what the player is getting without bothering anyone else, it's none of your business how it's achieved.

And finally, on the topic of free to play with buyable content versus a flat fee, I vastly prefer the latter. I know what I'm getting, and I don't have to be at the mercy of greedy businessmen and random number generators to get everything the game has to offer. Everyone should pay the same and get the same product, no questions asked. "Pay to win" doesn't apply to all free to play games, but it's common enough that I don't want it in any high profile title. Free games also attract certain demographics I'd rather not have to put up with, besides; making them pay money locks most of them out, meaning they wouldn't do the developers' wallets any good anyway.

[NoiseHERO]

Did someone order a wall of text?


No.

L2summarize

[Geistritter]

Bite me; that was the abridged version.

There. Happy now?

[MinscTFA]

Did someone order a wall of text?

*axe*

And finally, on the topic of free to play with buyable content versus a flat fee, I vastly prefer the latter. I know what I'm getting, and I don't have to be at the mercy of greedy businessmen and random number generators to get everything the game has to offer. Everyone should pay the same and get the same product, no questions asked. "Pay to win" doesn't apply to all free to play games, but it's common enough that I don't want it in any high profile title. Free games also attract certain demographics I'd rather not have to put up with, besides; making them pay money locks most of them out, meaning they wouldn't do the developers' wallets any good anyway.

Good point. While it will never keep all the idiots away, we certainly don't need more.

Now, most certainly will have to be purchased. It's universally excepted people don't like to pay to pay online (especially when we paid money to buy the game). Many of us also dislike the idea of paying real money for in game currency and other shit.

Perhaps I'm simply foolish thinking this, why not instead have a place on "Pioneer 2" where you can buy phisical PSO related merchandise and have it delivered to your door? Have exclusive schwag which can only be purchased during special online events. Nerds eat that kind of stuff up. That way they are ensured a source of revenue for the online service.

[Enforcer MKV]

Ya know, I've been reading this topic, muling over the different perspectives of everyone posting so far, and I had a thought...

How about dropping the overall cost of the montly sub, and have the item shop be exclusively clothing. No weapons, no EXP boosters, just...clothing. Now, the people who don't want it to be free to play have their monthly price tag. The people who do want it to be free....well, no offense, but even as a proponent for the free to play model myself, the concerns of our peers are relevant. But I'm sure that most people who want the game to be free could at least manage $5 a month, right? You do have to pay, but you're giving the developers money to produce content that in turn, you, the consumer, get to enjoy. (Well, if Sega bothers to support us. MAKE IT HAPPEN, SAKAI!)

Now, if the shop is exclusively clothing, you eliminate the fear of Pay to win. For those who want the clothing, they save up the money, and pay for the items they want. This money, in turn, goes to Sega, who uses that money to, once again, make missions for us to enjoy.

Now, Global Servers (Which we had better get.), switching gears slightly, just improves the situation. If we're all playing together, then that increases the playerbase for everyone, which gives more people to play with. The group players can group, the soloist can solo. That makes the game more fun for everyone, and encourages everyone to stick around longer, which, in turns, gives Sega more money (through the sub), which they in turn use to make more content for us, encouraging us to stick around for even longer.

This system makes sense to me, anyway.

On an unrelated note, I'm actually hoping PSO2 gets pushed back, because if they're trying to release in 2011(normal year or fiscal year), and they're only 50% done, I have my reservations.

[ShinMaruku]

How is Sonic Team failing on Sonic? Sonic Colours was good, and Sonic Generations looks like it's going to be good as well.
Sonic 4 Ep1 was meh, but it doesn't really count, it was mostly made by Dimps.
I heard things on both sides on colours and Generations runs like ass.

[Cayenne]

Revise. Revise. You mean revise. "Revile" refers to abusive criticism, and while that often goes in the direction of this series these days, it's not the word you're looking for.

Swing and a miss. I meant reveal. It's a forum, people mess up from time to time.

Thank you for playing grammar teacher, now give it a rest.

[Alexvrb]

Perhaps I'm simply foolish thinking thisNever a good start! Just kidding. ;-)

why not instead have a place on "Pioneer 2" where you can buy phisical PSO related merchandise and have it delivered to your door?Only if I *also* get the item in-game. :P Like a poster for my virtual room to match the one I bought for my actual room. :-D

[NoiseHERO]

Bite me; that was the abridged version.

There. Happy now?

WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST SAY THAT BEFORE

[bupjo]

Right now PSU = Pay to Win Game. A person pays money for a "premium" course game, and players spend money on GC because they dont want to run a map 100 - 200+ times to get a weapon. GC weapons actually have more ATP/TP, ATA and a little less PP, but higher weapon %s. I've seen more people individually spend money on GC than any other game cash shop...

Also, I've played F2P games and P2P games.

So many people defend the notion of MMORPG by working on making SOLO-Characters intended for multiple players. They love to complain. The way you Solve your problem is actually make friends, work together and actually play the game. Then you will be playing a game online with people.

Lets face it! If you are going to play a roleplaying game online to play Solo and get all the rewards from running maps, you might as well stop playing Online Games altogether and go back to singleplayer games.

You mention PSO.

You do know it started F2P....It was FREE on Dreamcast, then the game was $5 a month when version 2 came out. Of course players had to shell out $40 to get the extra weapons, leveling from 100 to 200. Then if you wished to continue you had to pay the monthly fee or buy the new version on a new console.

This meant buying the SAME GAME + UPDATE over again + new console if you hoped to continue. Just so at the end of it all you go to PC, play PSObb and watch the servers close down.

In every major F2P game, I've seen players who wish to play only SOLO without parties spend the most amount of money on cash shop options. They get what they want......but its WELL UNDERSTOOD in PC MMORPGing and Action Oriented Games that you play the game to become good enough to fill a role in a party with other people.

So the idea is to play the game and socialize....and then do big things in parties and clans. This is why there are Guilds, Clans and PvP to serve their scale and why gaming really changing forms as a player is REWARDED for reaching a point when they evolve to being able to do bigger and better things in the game...

If players really want to play solo 90 - 100% of the time and they want to show off and look forward to their five minutes of Solo-fame, they do better to simply play a singleplayer game and try for something good in there.

In MMORPGs the players who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups.

In the real world the people who are given the greatest praise are those who can function in groups...

See the common ground?

Soloing is nice when you are "young" and "immature" and you don't need to worry about group complexities, but its like when you are a kid and can put your hand in the cookie jar in 10,000 different ways. A time comes when its just not cute anymore and people just frown upon it.

PSU is the same way. People use the cash shop to do all possible to get the best weapons....but I can take two players with shit equipment, teach them to TA a map...or play together and we could efficiently run maps together....and have a far stronger group oriented Dynamic.

well, color me "young and immature" then, being called a n*gger by racists in your group is not as fun as you'd think. i agree with you on the purpose of MMORPG's, but when i did play PSU...soloing was awesome. i kinda didn't want to be called racial slurs from people that got a big kick out of it. not all people that solo in games are the way you assume they are. some of us solo to avoid jerk, racists and sexists

[Alexvrb]

WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST SAY THAT BEFORE

http://29.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lks1i3dBte1qgk8hoo1_250.jpg

[Ezodagrom]

I heard things on both sides on colours and Generations runs like ass.
About Colours, I have the game and I find it quite enjoyable. I haven't really seen many complaints about it, the major complaint I've seen was about the focus on 2D/focus on "blocky" platforming.

About Generations, from what I've heard there have been improvements since the demo, but it can't really be judged until the release.

[NoiseHERO]

Generations looks fine to me... I don't get it. I'm just gonna blame sonic fans for not knowing what they want, and then proceeding to talk shit.

It DOES look like they're trying to impress too many diverse groups of fans... (IMO I think it needs more knuckles and metal sonic, and LESS shadow and silver)

[Keilyn]

Ok since I've seen two misconceptions in this thread....I will address the two my eyes see.

1) If a pure soloist is out to avoid everyone, why turn an online Massively Played Game into an Online Singleplayer game? Its true I've seen some soloists who are good natured and want to do well...But EVENTUALLY I hear the very same thing "I solo to avoid inefficiency and I won't let them have the drops I want...too complicated" in at least 10 - 20 different ways its spun.

I have not met a single soloist so far who says "I solo because Its just the way I am" and usually when introduced to reliable people they change their tune faster than Obama can smile and chant "CHANGE" on your TV set.

2) Another poster said something along the lines of "Japan doesnt care about us because we don't care about them"

That is a wrong answer. There are Japanese Communities where we LITERALLY let Japanese populate land in the US and Europe (Japanese Community in France anyone? How about Brazil? What about the different population centers in the United States? How about their presence in the Philippines?

We EVEN let them regulate their own Customary Law and even so...they still play the Xenophobes. If you walk into some airports and places, I literally am told in Spanish, English and Japanese language every message. Other airports is Spanish, English and Chinese....

We literally pay for Alien Companies to come here...we give them Visas too and we allow them to open up branch offices here, not even being citizens here...and if I walk down to City Hall...all DOCUMENTS exist in not just English...but Ive seen EVERY MAJOR document in Japanese.

We do more to help Japanese and care for them, so the excuse that "SEGA and JAPAN does nothing because we don't care about them...when we cater to them, buy their products...protest when things go wrong and desire more of their products and despite their population, Japanese Culture is by far the 6th most studied culture in the United States and the second most studied Asian Culture in the United States.

The only way to get closer to the Japanese in our Generosity is to Surrender to their government, adopt their language. Give all our land, values and freedom to them and live in the hype.

[Reksanden]

Ya know, I've been reading this topic, muling over the different perspectives of everyone posting so far, and I had a thought...

How about dropping the overall cost of the montly sub, and have the item shop be exclusively clothing. No weapons, no EXP boosters, just...clothing. Now, the people who don't want it to be free to play have their monthly price tag. The people who do want it to be free....well, no offense, but even as a proponent for the free to play model myself, the concerns of our peers are relevant. But I'm sure that most people who want the game to be free could at least manage $5 a month, right? You do have to pay, but you're giving the developers money to produce content that in turn, you, the consumer, get to enjoy. (Well, if Sega bothers to support us. MAKE IT HAPPEN, SAKAI!)

Now, if the shop is exclusively clothing, you eliminate the fear of Pay to win. For those who want the clothing, they save up the money, and pay for the items they want. This money, in turn, goes to Sega, who uses that money to, once again, make missions for us to enjoy.

Now, Global Servers (Which we had better get.), switching gears slightly, just improves the situation. If we're all playing together, then that increases the playerbase for everyone, which gives more people to play with. The group players can group, the soloist can solo. That makes the game more fun for everyone, and encourages everyone to stick around longer, which, in turns, gives Sega more money (through the sub), which they in turn use to make more content for us, encouraging us to stick around for even longer.

This system makes sense to me, anyway.

On an unrelated note, I'm actually hoping PSO2 gets pushed back, because if they're trying to release in 2011(normal year or fiscal year), and they're only 50% done, I have my reservations.

I agree with the last part there(didn't read the rest). It wouldn't do well for them to release the game early, and have it fail. It'd be better to finish the game first(though, can you really call ANY game that recieves updates and add-ons completed?) It's like making a pie, then adding more and more to it in hopes of improving it. Lets just hope what they put in it is awesome. As of whether or not it's F2P or B2P, or even has a monthly subscription, I'm gonna be playing the game for what it'll have in it, not if it's free or costs.

[Cayenne]

No doubt people will pay whatever SEGA will demand for the game but (just a guess) half of the people buying games look at prices first, I used to be one of them when I was a teenager with no job and try to convince my parents "it's only this many dollars for this game and used to be this". How they decide the price of the game will determine how many players will actually shell out the cash for it, besides how many games are out there that they could be spending money on besides PSO2?

[ShinMaruku]

Well from fellows that were there it seemed to point to it being free to play. So here's to hoping.

[ShadowDragon28]

I *hope* it's free to play (not saying it should be).
But wouldn't mind paying for new clothing/Parts, my room decorations, or music discs that change the music in a mission to help support the server and get updates and events.

If there is a monthly fee, I *pray* it's only $8 like it was with PSO EP I&II, I could at least live with that as long as the servers are global. I want no more of that seperate country servers and waiting 5-8 months for the content updates/events that the JP game/server got 5-8 months ago, no more of that bullcrap and I'd even pay $9 a month.

[Cayenne]

Oh, a whole dollar more? Big spender!

[ShadowDragon28]

A dollar can buy a meal in some places. Good way to loose weight. Eat 1 taco and drink lot's of water from a water fountain.
Do that for a month and I can have enough saved up for Sega's monthly fee and even shead a few pounds too. Yep.

[Mike]

OP seems to have found an answer so I'm closing this.