VideoGamer.com's recent interview with Blizzard's Tom Chilton, game director for the totally underground MMO World of Warcraft, is full of interesting tidbits for the WoW-innoculated -- info on the possible new races and classes that could make their way into the new expansions, in-game territories yet to be explored, etc. However, one blurb from the interview has the online gaming world a-buzzin' -- probably because said blurb references the possibility of a free-to-play, micro-transaction business model for the monolithic title.
Don't get your dander up too fast -- Chilton merely said, "I certainly think it's possible that we could do some kind of micro-transaction stuff," later adding that, "whether we ever shift to a free-to-play model is really too hard to say at this point." It's unlikely they'll make the switch as long as the game continues to be a veritable assembly line for giant bags of money, however. What do you guys think? Would you support a transaction-based WoW?
Reader Comments (60)
Posted: Jul 5th 2009 5:15PM Freeballer said
I think this is the only way in hell I can get into WoW, that or a reasonable fee per month to play. Neither I think will happen anytime soon
Posted: Jul 5th 2009 5:21PM (Unverified) said
yeah, I mean $15? I COULD BUY A DVD WITH THAT CASH! YOU DAMN CON ARTISTS
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Posted: Jul 5th 2009 6:53PM Rallion said
I really don't understand how on earth people find $15/month unreasonable. With the worst job in the country, that's 2 hours pay out of a 160 hour work-month. It's a few dollars less than I pay for one IMAX movie ticket. And it's a quarter of what people pay for games that they'll probably only really play for a month or two anyway.
The hours of entertainment per dollar is phenomenal for almost all MMO's. If you play 4 hours per week. it's less than a dollar per hour. Compare that to...well, almost anything. Hell, that even beats out most books, for a fast reader.
If you don't want to play, fine. If you don't think they're fun, I can absolutely see why. But the standard MMO subscription cost is by no means unreasonable.
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The hours of entertainment per dollar is phenomenal for almost all MMO's. If you play 4 hours per week. it's less than a dollar per hour. Compare that to...well, almost anything. Hell, that even beats out most books, for a fast reader.
If you don't want to play, fine. If you don't think they're fun, I can absolutely see why. But the standard MMO subscription cost is by no means unreasonable.
Posted: Jul 5th 2009 8:27PM (Unverified) said
Its called Guild Wars. I don't want to get into this debate yet again, and I'm not a fanboy. It makes no sense for me to pay $15 when I can get my MMO fix for free in Guild Wars. High quality PvE and PvP, in my opinion and great community tools. Plus, my friends play Guild Wars, not WoW. At college, when every penny of your job goes to pay tuition, housing, books, and other stuff, $15 a month on an nonessential thing seems slightly rediculous when I spend maybe an hour or so playing games a week while I'm at college anyways. Thats how paying $15 is unreasonable to me. Plus, how long has WoW been out again? I don't remember, but the game has paid for itself 9x over, probably closer to 10000x over. Makes no sense to charge the same ammount of money if they don't include the expansion packs in free updates. Maybe my standards are too high, but oh well, I'm happy with what I play.
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Posted: Jul 5th 2009 8:08PM Nadril said
Considering the reason I don't play WoW isn't related to monetary issues, no, I wouldn't play the game even if it was micro-transactions.
(Plenty other MMOs to spend my money and time on)
(Plenty other MMOs to spend my money and time on)
Posted: Jul 5th 2009 9:12PM (Unverified) said
i would support it so much that i would actually start playing WoW
Posted: Jul 5th 2009 10:44PM OptimumEDGE said
I guess they don't make enough money from monthly subscriptions, now they're seeing microtransactions as a good way to rake in more dough.
Posted: Jul 6th 2009 12:32AM Mabui said
I'd probably install it again - try it out - realize even more people I don't want to talk to are now playing the game - uninstall it move on.
I can't really see spending that much money on cool gear in WoW. Maybe best just to have free servers and such to keep the riff raff away, then if the experiment fails you just toss the servers and move on.
I can't really see spending that much money on cool gear in WoW. Maybe best just to have free servers and such to keep the riff raff away, then if the experiment fails you just toss the servers and move on.
Posted: Jul 6th 2009 4:14AM kagai said
WOW, is that like a new drug? It sounds like Ecstasy? Ever since those "This is your brain on drugs.." commercials, I don't do drugs. I don't think people should do this WOW, either. It sounds like some serious s**t! Just say, "NO"!
Posted: Jul 6th 2009 7:47AM (Unverified) said
On paper, it sounds great. In practice, they're going to wring the money out of you like a wet sponge.
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