I wish Lost Ark wasn't pay to win, I would never quit that game if it had genuine progression.

i stopped playing MMO's for this reason. Pay to win kills the game. The second reason i quit MMO's is that most companies (especially Korean MMO's) don't do enough to battle bots (automated farming for resources with multiple computers), or worse still, make botting part of the game. Many here probably still play MMO's but for me, the MMO genre is dead to me.

I'm grateful for these greedy publishers and greedy monetizations, honestly. Im spending way less money on gaming and I'm going outside more. Win win.

gonna get me shredded but, bring back the sub model or stop trying to make MMOs

Subscription has always been the best. I always say it as an entrance fee into a giant amusement park. Once you're in everything is "free" and is simply game play and reasonable grind goals for your character. All other models are like the bullshit county fair that is free to enter but you have to buy tickets for every ride. So every fun thing or is weighed against the cost of a ticket. This hinders and impedes the joy of every aspect of the game. I'd pay general admission over tickets any day

It's a sad state of MMOs. Either the greed is running rampant, or the development costs are so astronomical high that the companies need to sell P4C/P2W items just to make even. This is why I've pretty much stopped playing MMO entirely.

Games used to be created by people passionate about art, fun and discovering new things as they go on about making a game. Now it's just another corporate business with sole focus on pressing more money. Not like we don't want to pay for our games, of course i would pay a deserving amount for a game and keep it however corporates figured out some people just keep paying as long as they are sold the illusion of being "strong", skilled or being unique in a game.

MMORPG is my favourite genre, but now im a dad gamer. I switched to mostly playing offline games and been really enjoying my time.

It's fine, the Riot MMO is here to save us in 2038

Guild Wars 2 still kicks all of these other MMO's asses in terms of monetization. Just buy the game and the expansions, you literally dont need to buy anything else. The only thing I would buy would be a few bag expansion slots, thats it if you really wanted to not be milked.

And yet somehow the two subscription MMOs are the two biggest and have extremely large player bases in the millions.

Guild Wars 2 is free to play for the entire base game. To unlock the full game, no subscription is needed. Just buy the expansions which are always on sale. It's horizontal progression so there's no reason to spend real money for power. Every cosmetics in the store can be bought with in game gold earned by playing the game. I think GW2 is very fair if not the best model for players.

I don't like the subscription model. It's fine for when you play one main game for years on end but I absolutely hate managing subscriptions when multiple games require them. Canceling, re-subbing, forgetting a subscription to a game you haven't played in 3 months but have paid for anyway etc. It just isn't a comfortable user experience to always be like "Hey let's continue on with FF XIV.... oh where's my credit card?" Sure I've probably spent more on something like Path of Exile or even Dota 2 and I also quit games when encountering a P2W-wall but there has to be some other solution than having to manage 75 subscriptions

Completely agree man. Though I hate subscriptions at this point, because they are everywhere, I would pay a sub for a game I actually want to play. As long as everything else is gone. Cash shops have ruined the MMO genre we once knew and loved.

GW2 is great at using cosmetics to fund the game while also having plenty of cosmetics included for free

my biggest issue with monthly subscription is that it kinda forces you to focus all your time on that game, and as we know we are not young anymore, with real life stuff we don't have time to play one game every evening and thus we are loosing most of the money by not playing the game

To be honest, since couple of years, I started slowly stop MMO and multiplayer games. My favorite game are solo and I mainly just play that now. And FYI, the AI is way smarter than Humans sometime lol

Cries in Archeage :(

Ashes of Creation is my hope. I know it's been in dev for forever and it'll probably be another 5 years before it's out but that team started making that game because they were fed up with mtx. So here's hoping.

This video shows a lot of integrity and honesty. You're doing some damn fine work, Force. Please keep it up. We appreciate you.

I left Mmo's years ago because of monetization. I just want to play a game not be a paycheck. I want to pay developers for their work, but not have it beaten out of me.

Would rather pay $20 a month and feel that feeling of getting rich and better and cooler looking than other players because I EARNED IT!......That is the vital spark that is missing in MMORPG's PERIOD! (Also Ark Age was not P2W for a long time then turned into a cluster F)

I'm so tired of people defending these companies, when WoW started selling levels and gold that became p2w, there's no other definition of p2w than paying for weapons/armor/auctions/dungeon/raid runs with gold you paid real cash for.

preach, tired of what gaming has become, less about the gaming more about the money and greed. once a game becomes a vehicle for the monetization it is outta here.

This is going to be a potentially contentious view, but games have always been pay to win. It’s just the currency that has changed. Originally the currency was time. The more time you could put into an MMO the better your gear giving you an advantage. Back in the day I didn’t have the time to raid in WoW or grind arena so was always at a disadvantage. Was that fair? As players have aged they have less time but more money, and so the currency has changed to that. Is that unfair? Time is money and so I would say no. Pay for convenience - if you have time you pay with that, but if you don’t you can pay with money. In some ways, the current system is fairer than it ever was leveling the playing field between those with the time and those without. And, those with money reduce the cost to those with time. Now clearly there are games that totally abuse this, but it is a bit rich for someone who plays games all the time to complain that players can use the currency they have to keep up with you. What do people think?

Ashes of Creation: No box price and just a monthly sub. Optional cosmetic shop that sells just cosmetics. With the promise no P2W items will ever end up in the cash shop. Even no convenance items.

Love watching your videos while sipping my coffee :) Keep up the good work. Def my favorite Gaming KZfaqr by far.

Great video. I think it highlights how many modern games have intentional, built-in inconveniences, that can then be 'corrected' or improved upon by giving the company more money; in order to 'unlock' what would traditionally be considered a normal part of the game. Basically, shrinkflation has come to the gaming industry. "It's not a bug, it's a feature."

Absolutely agree. Been playing mmorpgs since Asheron's Call and DAoC. Subscriptions for these games were well worth the time invested. How much does it cost to go to a movie for 2 hours? Fifteen per month isn't that costly.

I won’t even spend 1.99$ for a Stash Tab upgrade….Just put that crap in the game!!! 😡

I think it may have been a mistake to lump Dune Awakening in here with the other games you discussed. Conan had some FOMO monetization of cosmetics - cosmetics available for a limited period of time - but no pay-for-convenience or pay-to-win really. So I would hope that Dune follows that same model, and we have no indication otherwise.

I just don't buy or play them. Pretty simple solution, it's up to the consumer, but consumers don't want to wait for the industry to die and be rebuilt so they keep propping it up.

Live service games need money coming in constantly. Monthly payments is the only reasonable way for everyone it seems, otherwise the game is just doomed.

Companies don't care how many play, they only care how much people spend, and have found doing the nickle, and dime thing with micro transactions of every type imaginable makes them more money, than just selling access to the game. Eastern games also aren't worse for being pay to win, it's just players there tend to play games somewhat differently than players in the West, as those games were developed around those players. Western developed online games are more geared towards Western players, so they are still pay to win, you just may not feel it as much, as the pay to win was made more around how you are looking to play. People for instance like to claim Warfarm isn't pay to win, but I absolutely would say it is, if you spend money there, you will **MASSIVELY** reduce the grind required to get, and level things, which is pretty much all playing that is about. That means it most certainly does have a huge pay advantage, therefore is pay to win, it's just that as it was made more in line with the Western audience, and is a Western developed game, people tend to be more forgiving of its pay to win nature, or just choose to ignore it. MMOs/live service games aren't a genre, as a game genre defines the actual playing experience, while all being a MMO means is you play it online, with a large number of people. There for instance are a lot of RPGs, that aren't MMOs, that work with party systems, so when you are playing with other characters, you, or the AI are controlling those additional characters. All being a MMO changed in this formula, was made those additional characters controlled by other people, it really didn't change how you play the game, it just meant that if doing content that required multiple characters, you now have to deal with all the asshats you can run into in online games. I would say that making a RPG, a MMORPG, unless you're playing only with friends, tends to just make the experience worse.

I think the way ESO does it is perfect. The games available even if you don't pay for an subscription, but if you're going to be serious about it you're going to need the subscription. I think thats a really good middle ground to have.

I feel this so much. My biggest hope is just, that the bubble will somehow someday explode and were back at least for games that are mode for fun and maybe some ways to support the devs further. I am totally fine to play MMOs that are somehow smaller, but just with a nice and stable community and good scaleable content. That would be great.

Dude, Monsters & Memories will launch January 2026 with just a monthly subscription. You should check out the play test at the end of June.

If MMOs are your favourite genre then you'd know that 90+% of them have been p2w since the start, the "subscription + box price" model was and is unusual, all this tells me is that MMOs aren't actually your favourite genre considering you don't seem to know anything about their history. And to address the main point of the video, an MMO being p2w or not is irrelevant to your enjoyment of the actual game, unless you're a compulsive spender it can easily be ignored, unlike in the 2000s, games aren't p2w in the truest sense anymore, there are no games that will completely stop you from progressing or playing the content unless you pay, which was often the case in the past. The value proposition to you, in a f2p p2w MMO, is significantly higher than a sub/purchase based MMO, it costs me nothing to play Lost Ark, for example, and there is absolutely nothing stopping me from consistently reaching the highest level raids, all it asks of me is that I play the game for an hour every day or two, whereas if I were to play FFXIV, it would cost me upwards of $180 a year, and they STILL sell cosmetics, boosts, appearance changes and qol in their cash shop, Hello? Why would I ever want to pay $180 a year for the privilege of logging into the game? At the end of the day, all that matters is the quality of the game, yes, nobody wants to play a p2w game that's also just a bad game, nobody would want to pay a sub for a bad game either, there's a reason Lost Ark is one of the only new MMOs to gain an audience, and it's because the gameplay, content and visuals are all top tier, on top of having a completely unique combat system. Does p2w truly matter? To an extent, but realistically, most new games aren't anywhere near p2w enough for it to be an actual issue, what matters is innovation, and quality, both of which are completely lacking in MMOs and have been for a long time, perhaps we should start calling out the real issues with MMOs lately? Or we can sit here and complain about p2w all day while ignoring the actual problem at hand? There's a reason more and more gacha games are coming to PC and consoles and absolutely dominating the market, these new gacha developers are making some actual quality games, and I'm sure we're all aware that they're far more p2w than any MMO ever was, yet, they're acquiring massive playerbases, why do you think that is? By the way, on what basis are you saying Blue Protocol is p2w? Have you even played it? Even the JP version is among the least p2w MMOs of all time, for what reason would you believe that the western version would somehow be p2w?

PSO2:NGS is a big example of this. some say its not pay 2 win but scratchers = money on the market = buying weapons and augs. then on top of that, they charge for bag space and "premium" which if you dont have, you get kneecapped and have to spend 1000 hours to make enough to buy a few items off the market.

Not everyone can afford x amount of subscriptions every month for everything in life now. Free to play is very consumer friendly and cosmetics should be purchased by people who want to.

One word that explains everything: mobile.

It won't stop because of Gamers. We can blame corporations all we want but if it wasn't selling, they wouldn't still be doing it. Gamers spend their time complaining about ridiculous identity politics, meanwhile these studios are selling the game piece meal, for over $100 with a promise to deliver a complete game. The gaming community has deteriorated into degeneracy and this is the result.

Ashes is our best hope. We should get a pretty good idea of its true potential in 1-4 months when aloha 2 comes out.

I would check your sources (@9:35 - "...from what I've heard...") The things available for purchase in Conan are, for the most part, variants of what can be earned in game - building pieces and sets , mounts, weapons and armor, that offer mainly cosmetic benefit.

Subscription services invariably lead to fewer games and more niche games. That's the problem. Only so many customers are going to sub to an MMO. Most willing are going to sub to the biggest game on the market. Rarely subbing to multiple games. So everything else becomes more narrow in its appeal and competitive advantage. It's splitting a % of a % that is small to begin with. Making new development even riskier, less frequent, and less innovative. This is exactly what happened with blockbuster filmmaking currently. It's a 200 million gamble on the 10th installment of a franchise, a remake, or nothing. And they are right to make Fast & Furious Part 30. Because only so many are willing to pay $30 to see a 10m budget movie about clean drinking water. Only so many are willing to pay a sub for multiple games. And if you're not making WoW 2.0 or Final Fantasy 17, then you're taking a big gamble enough are going to subscribe to your original IP MMO.

Give me pay for cosmetics and DLC/Expansions over P2W. Guild Wars 2 does a good job with this. City of Heroes when it went F2P with optional subs works, too.

I like the optional subscription like eso, 1st, eve then I can get them when I want but still pop on and see how things are without it costing me anything and then having the option to increase storage and stuff when it's my primary one

I think that New World has a relatively decent monetisation model - one upfront price (plus another for the expansion), and then a battle pass / cosmetic store that to me doesn't feel like you're at a disadvantage for not swiping for. My preference though would be a subscription.

Straight up New World has no pay to win or even pay for convenience. They have a costume shop, but thats it. At least the last time I played it anyway. One and done purchase, no monthly sub either. Extremely good MMO.

I`m glad you can see it and talk about it.

Did you forget gw2 exsits? The base game is 100% free with zero restrictions. The expansions are fairly price. Oh and there cash shop is mainly cosmetic.

I agree with you on basically all your points. I have been playing MMOs for since the 1990s and have left games, Black Desert and ArchAge, most recently, because of their cash shops. I now play ESO and find it much better in that regard. I like paying a subscription fee as it supports the games I play and I think that is fair to the people who work on the games. I have hopes for Pantheon, which I note you didn't mention. We'll see.

It used to be where game devs made games out of love but now they are succumbed to shareholders that want to push every cent out of a game. That's why indie devs will now and forever be superior to fully fledged studios backed by publishers. It's the unfortunate truth but I don't think there will ever be a major MMORPG until server tech improves to the point where it doesn't take millions to maintain a month

So pay a subscription for a platform service to play a game on that requires a subscription?

MMO games may be the wrong genre to play to avoid pay to win, going "back to the days" is difficult in our new world of Steam, Microsoft and PlayStation store accounts. You may have to look harder but non pay to win gaming experiences are out there, try almost any game from Hideo Kojima for a non pay to win experience. I feel your pain as I'm into Elite Dangerous (another MMO), paid expansions have gone badly, now numerous ships are currently only available through purchase.

Monsters and Memories is launching early access, no wipe servers next summer! Old school Everquest inspired game, with the team lead being someone who worked on the game during the classic trilogy of EQ expansions. No pay-to-win, it definitely deserves some coverage from you when it comes to upcoming new MMOs.

I hate how games these days awnser the question: "what monitisation should we have?" with the awnser: "Yes!!!" You have games like paxdei that has a initial price, a subscription, multiple "levels/tiers" and pay for convenience... That is just insane to me, how could anyone think that stuf like that is in any way okey?

long development not allways means it is far in progress of the game development, it depends how many times they reset the full process, test multiple ideas concepts and also can indicate in some cases issues in the development process.

did someone know what kind of headphones are using him?

Tbh, I prefer the Eso/76 method of buy to play with the optional sub. If you're filling your storage up in either game you're playing to much or keeping all the trash you shouldn't. Far as riot goes, oh well, no longer paying attention. I don't want a reinventing of the mmo genre, I just want a good mmo.

not gonna lie, its kinda why I rather watch MMOs than play MMOs .. if more people do like me and play something else, they eventually stop

I like the box and sub. I wish they would also have Gametime. Sometimes I want to play an MMO for just a bit once a month, I wish I could buy 20 hours of Gametime and use it whenever, and if I go afk in game it pauses my timer

Good points. That said, I think the best F2P monetization in the industry is PoE. Sure you might have to pay for stash tabs, but that is equivalent to a box price and you can try the game without them. Support packs etc are just great and make you feel good about supporting a game you love.

I share the frustration. I am an OG MMO player, and in the old school MMO's the cash shop was not built in as a part of the game. Subscriptions help the game, but the benefit of subscriptions do not provide a substantial advantage to the account. I login daily to EVE, DDO, LOTRO, SWTOR, and ESO. ESO and EVE are the only ones with a subscription that does more than give you extra cash shop currency. But DDO, LOTRO, and ESO do annual expansions (Paradox-esque) that go up to $100 for the Best Edition. So, which is it going to be? An annual sub for $100 a year, or an Annual Expansion for the latest content for $70 a year? The tech support costs for a MMO are huge, and if you enjoy the genre, like I do, it's part of the price. It's tough.

Being older and having income, I would be fine with a subscription based model so long as it can be under 15 dollars . But I could see this becoming a huge problem for players who enjoy multiple games or for casual gamers where it's not worth it and is troublesome to pause payments or keep track of everything.

MMO's took their lead from gatcha games as they make astronomical amounts of money. It was an unfortunate turn in the road of MMO's but it works because people complain but still stick their hands in their pockets and cough up the cash. If you want it to stop, then either stop playing as I did, or stop paying which I did first of all, before the in-your-face monetisation just sent me back to playing one off games. I buy a game and play it through. It's a one off expense and I can revisit it whenever I want to.. Moreover, when I play I'm immersed into it as I don't have to worry about anything but the story, mission or quests that I'm on. Freedom and no fomo involved.

I was having this internal monologue myself only a few days ago.

force, can you cite the names of all the games featured in this video? i want to check them out atleast.

It's crazy how much I *miss* the Box and Sub fee model being the dominant model in gaming.

Monetization is tricky, i also wish companies would go back to sub, but even pay for power (like with T&L) isn't clear money to power conversion.

The problem with the sub model, while standing on it's own it's fine and the least invasive/offensive. However, game companies are rarely content with leaving it as just a sub, introducing micro transaction on top even if just cosmetic. It should be pay a monthly fee unlock it all in game or no fee and have micro transactions not both. I don't mind paying for something I enjoy but bleeding your player base is a different thing altogether. The other thing I feel is overlooked is cost of transactions or subs. Most monetization is based on USD which is generally strong against other international currency, so when something like a Sub is $9 USD which sounds reasonable the rest of us are $20 or more, like when games are $25 or $35 dollars that's still a $60-$70 title else where, not sure if these guys have had a look around lately but that's a lot of money in the overprices state of the world right now.

Man did this industry ever get fucking greedy.

Indie devs will save most genres but MMOs are just hit. Too many adults have money but no time and doesn’t have a problem forking out some extra cash for an enjoyable experience with their preferred form of entertainment. Couple this with “infinite growth” AAA developers and you have your problem.

As long as games are being made for the global population, the idea of a box price and subscription is instant death for any new game despite me being a classic gamer longing for something like that.

We don't have to put up with it. Don't play those games. The lack of self restraint is what drives these companies to keep doing this.

An important point to note is that game prices have not kept up with inflation, budgets, payroll, marketing, and other expenses because gamers are not willing to pay those kinds of prices. It even shocks my friends when I say most games should be around $150 each if they kept up with inflationary costs. That said, I have a perspective on this from a parallel job with a similar driving force... I've been a web (marketing) designer for 24 years. I've seen all this before. Everything I design outside the website is designed to try to get people to the website and, hopefully, keep them there to shop. This same rule applies to games. Keep the initial price of the game at a price where you think most gamers will tolerate and then once you get the customer in, hit them to little shinies all over the place, enticing them to spend more. More money and more time. By doing that you have a captivated audience and can build loyalty and your brand and keep making more money. Luckily, because of what I do, I see this stuff coming a mile away and just make reasonable choices on what I do or don't want to do without succumbing to external pressures. None of this is new. It's just more in your face these days.

I've always been more of a fan of no cash shops but a monthly subscription. I agree with you here.

you hit it on the head when you said "I don't want to think about it while playing" when you were talking about the subscription benefits

Honestly I don't mind the "pay2win" in MMOs, I mean the fun from these games to me is to grind and get better at the game through actually playing the game, without boost, skips or any of that shit. Now as you said, the problem comes when the free or "normal" gameplay experience is soooo boring and grindy that it becomes not fun and almost impossible to get better at the game, not for the sake of the experience but to "force" you into spending money, thats the problem to me. Again keep the gameplay experience normal and fun, the progression organic, and you can add all those boost and whatever into the game, maybe useful for alts or something, just don't make the game impossibly hard and grindy to force people to spend money.

The only real issue with a subscription model is the barrier to entry isn't enough to stop bots or griefers anymore.

Now, thats a great video. It sums up pretty much my feelings about these monetizations.

watched on asmon channel, came here to comment and thumbs up. great vid!

I used to be an absolute MMO junkie but in the last few years I have lost interest -- the only MMO I still play is City of Heroes.

Finally, I’m glad someone is saying this. Box price + flat subscription is the best option… completely agree.

I think a sub fee is such a good way to fund mmo/live service games but I can imagine the average spend for the other routes is considerably higher than a sub fee.

Guys, What game is that? 16:20? They are apparently at area the cliffside Ruins, but when I searched for that I just get god of war

Great video !

And what makes this even better is streamers feed the market to a point where its never going to change.

pretty sure pax dei said the monthly sub was to keep your plots going, don't think that falls into ptw, its basically what all old style mmo's used to do. So if you don't want to have a plot, you don't have to pay a sub fee, only the box price.

I hate that they sell cosmetics in MMORPGs especially when the bought cosmetics look better than what you can get from playing the game. Cosmetics should be unlocked through drops or completing hard content. I cant even be bothered to MMORPGs anymore, they are just no longer fun. I play mostly Survival games now.

Pretty much, one thing I've never really done was truly reach the endgame of MMOs ever. Originally, it was due to time requirements and how much I'd pay to do it; but nowadays, it's because of this topic. I'll end game stuff that is pretty much stuck to offline obtainable endgame stuff. Monster Hunter being a non-MMO and pretty much serving to a grind that is not dependent on recurring costs. (Save for paying for an expansion). I'm ok with that, given that those games are not meant to be constantly going until they aren't profitable, like an MMO. They have a proper endgame to development and may make some money on cosmetics, but the commitment is only a few or so years and then they move onto another game. Keeping costs lower so to not require the level of recurring funds as MMOs do.

The issue is that even if we went back to all MMOs having monthly subs, they would still add the cash shop options. Gone are the days when you have to play the actual games to get stuff. I miss the old MMO days 😢

The other good thing about a monthly sub, is you know for a fact that every other player you encounter is paying the same amount as you. Not $1000 a week for bought power and convenience, it levels the playing field in that regard.

It is unfortunate but one mobile game I am playing is quite generous for now, but that shows on their revenue. There were some old Korean MMORPG that is less P2W or Pay to progress, they did not survive.

Can anyone list the games shown in this video?

My line has basically become anything that's not purely cosmetic, and even that I hate.

Sadly we can never go back now. Even if u could be a lean operation and efficiently and cheaply make beautiful MMOs at a fair sub price, companies are bound by shareholders and shareholders demand ROI. So MTX will always be on the table as some point when subs or player growth stagnate

can we talk about how ff14 has a b2p+ monthly sub and a cash shop full of exclusive shit you can't find in game and level skips and story skips and product promo shit like the mountain dew/grubhub thing these companies legit just do box price + sub and then paywall shit anyway

I'll be honest no body would have a problem if the game has pay to win mechanic if its fair in the first place. Monetization is needed to sustain a live service games. Some people has less time but more money and other has more time but less disposable income.

I disagree with your sub take. GW2 proves you can do the single main game price and charge for dlc. they are far from perfect but even the sub games charge as much as they do for cosmetics and convenience, so GW2 is far more economic than FF14 or WoW, and level with those games in content , size and variety.