Hellgate: London requiring subscription fees for online play?!? - confirmed

U

uzor

Supreme [H]ardness
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Nov 17, 2004
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http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/45282

What the fuck is this??? I was so looking forward to this game and only just now come to be told that I have to pay an MMO-like subscription fee to play with friends online or else I only get half a game? NO THANK YOU! Article says Roper is now saying it was designed as an MMO from the start?

I.....I'm just too pissed right now to even think straight. :mad:

 
Dion said:
Its a action mmo. What did u think it was?
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An action RPG similar to Diablo 2 (but newer and better)LIKE THEY HAVE BEEN SAYING SINCE DAY 1!!!!!!!

 
So whats the big deal about fees. If its a good game whats the difference? Running servers isn't free. Its a good source of income to allow for more products. The devs said they will update the game. Time will tell how this works out. They also haven't said how much the fee will be. It can be assumed 10-15 bucks but who knows. Also I don't recall them saying anything about having no fees. Saying its similar to D2 doesn't count. I guess people complain about other fees to(cable,internet,etc). Yes it does suck but move on. Play the game and enjoy it or don't pay. The only thing I hate about fees if the fact that I can't stop and play without my money wasting, where in D2 i can play and feel like money isn't being wasted.

Also look at D2. No fees and the servers lag, go down, lag...Took years to get patchs also.
 
the way that lead developer was explaining at geforce lan 3.0 is that he liked diablo but he hated not being able to add content because there was no money to do so. Yeah he had about 300 gamers grumble in unison when he said that. He doesnt know the business model on how he was gonna charge ppl. I think theres gonna be a short single player, nothing epic like a diablo or final fantasy. The bulk will be MMO by the looks of the demo.
 
Another game to write off my list.

I'm already swamped with games to play between my consoles, my handhelds, and my PC. I have no need for games I have to pay monthly for to continue enjoying. That would just make me feel obligated to play and that's something I don't need.
 
What bothers me here is that it really looks like they're just jumping on the bandwagon. With no mention of this prior to now, its hard to believe they built this game to be an 'mmo.' Its one thing to say that they need money for patches and such but don't try and convince us your instanced game and its interactive chatrooms are an mmo. We're not that stupid. Furthermore- tell us what it costs, because everyone is expecting the worst.
 
I'll wait and see before I start complaining. The single player is not subscription based.

Quote
Drawing similarities to ArenaNet's Guild Wars, Hellgate's online is heavily instanced. Group and solo PvE is the game's main focus; PvP will exist in a small scale form, but is not a major element of the initial launch. It will also feature a Hardcore mode similar to that found in Blizzard's Diablo II, a game on which many members of the Hellgate team worked. Hellgate's multiplayer will contain all of the missions and story from the single-player aspect of the game, as well as exclusive gameplay modes and content. Like the single-player game, it will be comprised of dynamically generated areas and items. Further content will be continually added over time by a dedicated Flagship team.

Flagship expects to launch an open beta prior to the launch of the game. Pricing details have not yet been determined, though Roper noted that there will be some kind of trial or free play system for those looking to get a taste of the game without commitment.

"I think that just as Diablo and Diablo II started this religious argument over whether they're RPGs or not, I think that Hellgate will spark that same debate over whether it's an MMO or not," commented Roper, who added that the game has been designed as an MMO from day one. Check back this week for an extensive interview with Roper, delving more comprehensively into the online aspects of Hellgate: London. ​
 
I also had no idea they were planning on doing this, I would only pay for it if it was a phenominal game and everyone was raving about it.. I also agree about the jumping on bandwagon comment, I'm sure it is very tempting for game devs/publishers to have their game subscription based and rake in that wow-money.. but be careful not to piss off your community!!, or they will not see the profits they are hoping for..
 
So? You pay the internet bills, insurance bills, water/gas/electric bills every month and complain about a GAME's monthly bill? :rolleyes: I'm sorry nothing is free.
 
Mr. Stryker said:
So? You pay the internet bills, insurance bills, water/gas/electric bills every month and complain about a GAME's monthly bill? :rolleyes: I'm sorry nothing is free.
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We realize that. That's what our $60 upfront is supposed to be for. If at least they had mentioned this a year and a half ago when information was first starting to come out this wouldn't be such a big problem. The problem (aside from the MMO doublecharging bit that I won't get into here) is how/when they made this announcement/decision in the dev cycle. It feels very "tacked on at the last second because we think we can get away with it" not "this is how it has been from the very beginning".

 
Mr. Stryker said:
So? You pay the internet bills, insurance bills, water/gas/electric bills every month and complain about a GAME's monthly bill? :rolleyes: I'm sorry nothing is free.
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Its not about that for me. I don't mind paying. However I am not going to pay for another one. I will at most play two pay to play games but i still buy other games to play. This game doesn't look good enough for me to pay a monthly fee in addition to what i allready do. Not to mention i agree they are just jumping on the bandwagon.

Sux they went this route but thier call. Lost my cash.
 
i dont mind paying IF

1. i can choose between paying to play on THEIR servers
2. i can play multiplayers for FREE on other people's servers


the issue with this pay crap is they force you to pay, and play on their servers's and their server's only.

Sorry, i want to have a LAN game at my house, so WHY should i pay ou for that?


I think they should do more an xbox live based model

You have a Free version, which would let you play on other servers

a 2nd level, you pay like $5-$10 - gets you access to play on their servers, but no stats tracking, or content updates

A 3rd / premium level, gets you stats, you can transfer characters, you get free content et cetera.


give people some options.


P.S : As said above, why am i paying you $60 to start - is that some "set up" fee now, and it is BS that they need money to come in to make content, so you charge for major add-ons, sorry but the online game industry has always made it fine with free online play.

P.P.S : Someone said okay, if you pay you get updates and such, SO why is it we are paying for THEIR coding errors and mistakes? they better be patching and fixing my game for free cause of THEIR MISTAKES.
 
I haven't been paying particularly close attention to this game so I don't know for sure, but I was under the impression it was being developed as a pay-to-play MMO all along? I knew it was being developed by the guys who were largely responsible for D2, but by the same token, most of the information that I did come across on it had the game listed under the MMO heading so I just assumed that it was going to require a subscription. Obviously this is now incorrect, but I'm curious if the developers ever said that it wasn't going require a subscription?
 
There are at least 7 million people out there that 3 years ago would have sworn they would never pay a monthly fee to play a videogame that have done so now because of World of Warcraft.

All it takes is the right game and all but the most obstinate people will be willing to pay a monthly fee for a game they really enjoy.
 
I think with the rising number of pay to play people are going to get sick and tired of it and stop. Not to mention if they are already paying for one game it is going to be hard to pay a fee for another game.
 
JustinSane said:
I think with the rising number of pay to play people are going to get sick and tired of it and stop. Not to mention if they are already paying for one game it is going to be hard to pay a fee for another game.
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QFT do game developers really expect customer to pay 15$ a month for each and every new game that is going to be released in the future?

This kind of thought is typical of the rampant opportunistic capitalism that is emerging today. All developers are thinking about is how they can suck each and every dollar out of customers, and they fail to realize that by requiring a monthly fee they are going to limit their customer base. If all games required monthly fees to play, consumers will purchase far fewer games and thus developers are going to see less profit. This sort of thinking is only going to push gamers to consoles, as consoles such as the XBOX require ONE monthly fee for each and every game.
 
If everybody charges a fee, it doesn't mean no games get played by the gamers. It just means gamers only pay for the best ones continually instead of buying a variety. This further underlines the need to be an incredible success or a complete dud. This immense risk is part of why it's hard for developers to innovate since they can destroy their company on an idea they think will be great but didn't pay off.

http://www.forbes.com/infoimaging/2...sts-tech-cx_rr_game06_1219expensivegames.html

It's a rough breakdown of game development costs. Scroll to the bottom and click the "In Pictures" link to get pie-charts showing the % that each factor is getting. These of course are estimates/averages, and are just reference numbers.

Guild Wars took a huge risk in deploying an expansion model instead of suscription. But obviously, Guild Wars has worked thus far. But the suscription model is still the safer bet. I'd like for them to use the Guild Wars idea, which succeeds due to the instancing.

Guildwars servers only bear the costs of players in the towns. It's just a matchmaking service like Diablo chatrooms(but they also have to log player stats). There's no gameplay in the cities so there's much much less traffic to maintain inside the cities. The instances are cheaper than a persistent world MMO because there's no persistent world to keep track of. The player goes in, fumbles around the instance, but when the player leaves, they can just toss away the results instead of holding onto the results for the next player to enter the area and then send those results to the next player. This allows them to soak the hosting costs for players(which NCSoft helps with since they can provide hosting at "bulk" pricing). The rest of the suscription cost is content creation, so Guild Wars just releases created content through expansion sales. I could see this sort of game working on a similar model. But again, it's risky, and that's probably why they went with the more popular method. And if it turns out to be more profitable than Guild Wars's model, then they'll definitely want it.

The trick is, will you buy it? There's no reason to get mad at them for offering something you don't want. You don't lose anything. If you end up paying for this, then you agree that the terms are acceptable to you.
 
kelbear said:
.....
The trick is, will you buy it? There's no reason to get mad at them for offering something you don't want. You don't lose anything. If you end up paying for this, then you agree that the terms are acceptable to you.
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Exactly :)
 
It seems lame to me that they're charging for the type of game it is. It's a instanced online RPG. Unlike WoW or EQ2 where we're sharing a huge world that has to be maintained and kept up. There I can understand paying to play. But we're paying for a fully instanced game? Nuh uh, I'm out. Waiting for Huxley.
 
You know, back when i was writing full time, i did at least 3 separate interviews with devs at flagship. I know I've read probably a dozen more. This has never been mentioned before. In fact looking back, they seem to have taken great pains to give the impression that the game would not be subscription based with out ever actually saying it.

So was he lying when he said this was the plan since day one? Probably not. Has Flagship been evasive and deceptive as hell? I'd say so.
 
pigwalk said:
It seems lame to me that they're charging for the type of game it is. It's a instanced online RPG. Unlike WoW or EQ2 where we're sharing a huge world that has to be maintained and kept up. There I can understand paying to play. But we're paying for a fully instanced game? Nuh uh, I'm out. Waiting for Huxley.
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How do yuo know, perhaps they have intentions of adding new content the same as WoW and others do, i mean, it cant be like D2 and pay monthly, because once people finish the game, why pay, the idea of a paying model is to keep people coming back for more
 
I think if the game is done likw WoW, with new content and items update and added regulary so idieally your in an un-ending game, then yes, it would be worth it, even at $15 a month thats $180 a year, how many people buy 4 new $50 games that the content never changes and never updates......
 
The only way I would even consider this game now will be if they sell three version's, and if not screw those greedy bastards. A single player version for no monthly fee, a CoOp version for just like three-five players for LAN, and the big Multiplayer game

Look at CounterStrike:Source, they are like an MMO in this Hellgate idea, they sell a game for $50.00, it is online with gear to buy and upgrade, they patch the game still after two years, they add new content like maps and model's still after two years, and no monthly fee, how is London going to be that much different where they require a fee on top of this ?
 
I concur, we shouldnt have to pay to play diablo iii online, thats just over the top. If this is what the future of PC gaming is going to be, I might just stop playing...
 
"Most crucially, Roper noted that Hellgate: London is guaranteed to include some kind of free online mode that gamers will be able to access without any monetary commitment. "

From the Shack.
 
Good to hear potentially. I wonder if Yesterday's comments were really misconstrued, or if there was a bit of "Oh Shit!" going on over at Flagship and EA..Don't have time right now, but I will certainly give the new interview a read and chime in with my thoughts afterwards.

 
They still have not said how much it is, how its going to work. But as usual people like to assume the worst. I dont like the idea either but im not going to cry about it. If Its good and I like it I will pay.

Also as long as they provide support there should be no reason to complain. Theres little difference if they released expansions every 5-6 months or charged 10-15 a month. You just have a choice to upgrade to the expansion.
The thing I dont like about p2p fees is because I cant quit for awhile then come back and maybe only play 5 days for that month. My 15 bucks would be wasted if I did.

Look at Bnet, its free. But it lags, its slow and goes down like 6 times a day.
 
QUIT WHINING!

The SP portion will not have monthly fees, and hopefully we will be able to play it at on a LAN

Its not even out yet, we don't know if it sucks or is awesome, and your already complaining.

YEESH :mad:
 
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