| Mail |
You might also like: WoW Insider, Massively, and more

Reader Comments (30)

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 8:30PM Raffi256 said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
What?! I thought it was a charity!
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 8:33PM Mr Hett said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
I need that money for lunch. Mom would kill me if she knew I was spending it on freemium games.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 8:41PM Electrium said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
I haven't spent a penny on freemium content. I guess I don't really get it. It's good and bad...good, because I get more things for free, but bad, because we're going to see more content locked behind price tags.

Freemium isn't going away, that's for sure.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:34PM Special Agent Steve said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@Electrium
I would so much rather pay $60 for a good game with free multiplayer than $0 + infinity dollars it costs to properly enjoy a mediocre, "free" game.
TF2 is the only exception, but that's still a huge mess of hats and weapons.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:49PM Mmmmz said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@Electrium
Eh, most freemium games do it tastefully and I consider them less offensive than DLC for paid games. DLC that was planned alongside the game and released shortly after. That an map packs.

But hey, I'm crazy since I still remember when PC games had expansion packs and map packs were free as a thank you for being our customer and fan.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 11:31AM AntiVillian said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Special Agent Steve

However this point is completely subjective. There will always be bad games whether or not freemium existed and there will always be devs looking to milk there consumer base of every dollar they have. Personally I think freemium is great, it means I can find out if a game is good or not before deciding to support the developers. Obviously the model is not going to work for all games though.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 12:22PM freaparn said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Mmmmz

I'd still rather pay $60 for a freemium game's "all-access pass" than get whittled to death by a few hundred microtransactions. The problem with freemium design is that you're generally reduced to grinding or limited in playtime if you're not willing to put down some dinero. I've tried out a few, but the first time that comes up, I'm done.

It seems to be a viable business plan for a lot of games that wouldn't be able to get a subscription out of people, but it's not for me.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 8:54PM ChaskaCF said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
TINSTAAFL
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 9:10PM Corvin331 said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
So you're telling me the group that makes more money tends to spend more money? News @ 11 !
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:06PM gettinmoney662 said

  • 2.5 hearts
  • Report
@Corvin331

Not only makes the most money but probably has the most disposable income.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 12:34PM dez said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@gettinmoney662

Exactly this. The group that is most likely to spend money is the one that is probably single or not in a huge family, with a job that pays much more than what they could have made had they been younger.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 9:39PM wshwe said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Freemium is a very bad trend. I regard freemium games as costing more then paid games.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 9:56PM ComedyInK said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@wshwe

That's the point though :/
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:05PM tendoboy1984 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Well no shit it isn't free. It's probably the biggest scam the industry has thought of. You get the basic game for free, and you have to pay extra to get downloadable content like missions, items, characters, etc.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:08PM pluupy said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@tendoboy1984
That and those pesky penny auctions.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:07PM Schlecht said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
You can download this for free!
...huh? PLAY it? Bahahaha!!
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:27PM twocows said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@(Unverified)
Why? It describes the premise pretty succinctly, in my opinion.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:28PM twocows said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 10:32PM HaVoK308 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
I play a lot of iOS games, but I never once payed for additional content and/unlocks. If I enjoy a game I will put in the time needed. If I feel I need a shortcut, then apparently I don't like the game too much.

The problem with the so-called Freemium Model is, you are not buying additional content. You are buying content that has been deliberately removed. Content that you would have gotten with the initial price. Just like map packs and additional characters now, with retail games. They are all variations of that particular model. And I'm not a fan of it.
Reply

Posted: Sep 10th 2011 11:06PM DeathBeforeDawn said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
I really don't like the idea of paying just to advance faster in a game. that's part of the fun you know? Playing the game. It also seems like some of these companies design it to were you HAVE to eventually pay to advance which blows
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 12:30AM OrangeGamer said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Guild Wars is my favorite freemium game I've played so far. I mean, I know you have to pay for the box game, but I don't feel the need to buy anything yet in order to be on equal footing.

Stats make sense, make more money, spend more money I guess.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 1:31AM Vesuvium said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Makes sense. In many fremium games, you're basically got two tracks of play:

1. Pay for little perks and time-savings devices.
2. Or simply play through the game, occasionally earning or grinding towards more or less the same state of completion and access.

Middle-aged gamers with jobs and families tend to have less time and more disposable income, so they're more likely to go for option 1.

Younger games tend to have less income, more time. They go for option 2.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 8:04AM Tezz said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Vesuvium middle aged gamers with families and jobs tend to have little disposable income.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 3:38AM Fugaku said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
When I play freemium games, my single goal eventually becomes to not spend any money at all
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 5:16AM Faceless Troll said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
Instead of sorting this by age group, what they should really do is sort it by BMI.
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 5:52AM Roflmao1337L33t said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Faceless Troll
+1
Reply

Posted: Sep 11th 2011 9:42AM den69 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
I think I have spent about £140 on League of Legends... New champs and skins etc... But time spent playing/money spent is decent in LoL.
Reply

Posted: Sep 12th 2011 9:33AM joevill said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Wow... very surprised with these statistics
Reply

Posted: Sep 12th 2011 10:52AM KNDReaper said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@GiantGamer a Halo Map pack? NE- wait, Halo you say? hmm.. Yea, alright.
Reply

Posted: Sep 13th 2011 4:17AM antelope said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Grown-ups with day jobs have finally realized how much fun it is to annihilate the happiness of poor children playing a Pay To Win game! :D
Reply
Sorry, you must be logged in to leave a comment.

Featured Stories

Engadget

TUAW

Massively

WoW