Article: Microsoft Responds To Pay To Play Outcries

[eRUPT]

TerribleDeliMeat writes, "Microsoft has posted a new article on the Live section of the official XBOX site. It tries to explain the reasoning behind PSO requiring a monthly fee on top of the Live subscription. It cites wild accusations of new quests, weapons, maps and ''other goodness'' on a regular basis."

Here's the full article for you guys to enjoy:
"Never let it be said that Xbox Live gamers don't have opinions.
Ever since it was announced that there would be a charge of $8.95 per month for the Phantasy Star Online Hunter's License (it's a license to play PSO on Xbox Live), the forums and fan sites exploded with wild accusations, vociferous rebuttals, name-calling, and petitions.
We love how passionate you are about games and Xbox Live (not to mention your hard-earned cash), so we want to clear up a coupla things...
First of all, many game publishers that deliver ongoing content charge a subscription fee. This makes sense for them because cool new quests and maps do not come from the content fairy. It takes teams of producers, artists, programmers, and other developers to create this great stuff. And as much as they love what they do, they still gotta pay the rent.
Sega doesn't charge an online playing fee for any of their great sports titles (you know you love NFL 2K3, NBA 2K3, NCAA 2K3, and NHL 2K3), and that's a sweet bonus. Phantasy Star Online is a different story, and for that one they charge a subscription fee. If you play PSO (and face it, those of you who do log hundreds of hours!) on the Dreamcast or the GameCube, you're already paying for a Hunter's License?and you can't even talk to your party! (The Xbox version, of course, supports Voice?as do all Xbox Live enabled games.)
Here's the deal, if you buy a copy of Phantasy Star Online you can play it on Xbox Live for two whole months for free! That's 14,000 hours of gratis gaming, people! After that, you cough up for the Hunter's License and the fun continues. If you don't feel like parting with the cash equivalent of a couple of drive-through lunches, then don't do it. Keep playing offline. If you choose to pay, know that your ducats are going right to Sega and Sonicteam to support the development of more, more, more PSO content. That's new quests, weapons, maps, and other goodness provided on a regular, ongoing basis.
So, no, this is not the tip of the iceberg or the beginning of the end?there are still lots of games that don't charge anything extra for online play, and there are more on the way. This is just one instance in which gamers can choose to pay a little extra each month to play online and receive premium content."

my view is this.they use the money to put towards paying the people who work on the servers and the game maintenance and porting all the dc gcn and pc quests to all systems abroad so that all can be happy.and hell if u dont wanna pay its as simple as cancelling.christ all stuff content wise cant be handed out free since it takes time and money to pay those people to sit there and make the maps etc.nothing is for free.and plus bandwith to log onto servers for pso is covered by those who pay the 8.95$,considering the bandwith for psoworld is maintained and dontated money goes to the server bandwith and maintenance to allow extra content to be on so just view that 8.95 as paying for extra text or new items as if it were being treated as a website.

[LordCronai]

This is BS pure and simple. Microsoft should simply cough up some of that money themselves that they make on Xbox Live and hand it over to Sonic Team so their so-called passionate customers don't have to pay.

Not everyone's rich.

But Microsoft is.

micro$oft has enough of their own problems to contribute the 8.95$ and besides at some point they would become broke from giving that money each month.

[LordCronai]

Oh, of course. Common people definitely don't have as many problems.

when your last name is Gates and live in washington or jobs as last name and live near a place called apple inc then well u dont have problems cause your not normal your the evil spawns of the legions of evil

[fox,cbn,microsoft,apple etc.]

[Shado]

The problem is the amount.

PSO is not an indepth online RPG. In a world of Everquest, DAoC, SB, AO, etc... the content of PSO doesn't compete.

$9 a month is not the same as the $12 the others charge, but it's not appropriate. When PSO approaches 75% of the content provided in those other games, then $9/month will be acceptable. Until then, $9/2 months is more appropriate.

As for MS's little pat on their back that this PSO supports voice chat, well... I'm already paying for that through Live! subscription.

I'll likely buy PSO for the XBox. Many will... but expect to see a LOT of people "vanish" after the first 2 months.

[TerribleDeliMeat]

Well...I figure Microsoft could have forgone the cost of PSOX (since they're basically marketing it, producing it, etc)...however...this is an excellent title to test the water for Pay to Play.

But you know, I've been playing the import for the last month...and haven't noticed a single instance of duping, hacking...so if the money is going somewhere (since I really doubt we'll be getting quests, items, and maps(?) on a regular basis)...I cant really complain.

They could just be sucking it up and not giving us anything like on Ver.2

"If you play PSO (and face it, those of you who do log hundreds of hours!) on the Dreamcast or the GameCube, you're already paying for a Hunter's License?and you can't even talk to your party! (The Xbox version, of course, supports Voice?as do all Xbox Live enabled games.)"

That's one thing I hate about Microsoft...their snotty attitude...

[TerribleDeliMeat]

Voice chat isn't included with Live package. Microsoft doesn't force companies to offer Voice with their Live titles. Its an option, just like scoreboards or friends list on titles.

Also, there's really no competation for console online rpgs. I mean, EQ:OA was absolute shit (I mean, I've never seen a game drop from $50 to $20 in 3 weeks). So Sega could charge $25 a month if they wanted...I mean...what would you do? Go out and purchase the non-exsistant console RPG?

By having Sega (Or Microsoft in the XBOX's case) control all the money on their end, they could change the fee rate at any given time. I wouldn't be surprised when Level 5/Microsoft of Japan's True Fantasy Live Online hits shelves on either side of the ocean, you'll see PSO drop to $5 a month.