2 options to make MPQ more profitable & make players HAPPY

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

You play the devil's advocate and try to counter argue each thread that criticizes the D3P strategy (how impartial can you then be ?). I think there is a conflict of interest since IceIX is in your alliance and acknowledging D3P is wrong in their strategy would not be so good.

Anyways, again, since fiddling with prices will have no effect on the things people are complaining about, I still don't see how JUST PUT EVERYTHING ON CLEARANCE SALE, FOREVER will make players HAPPY

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

You play the devil's advocate and try to counter argue each thread that criticizes the D3P strategy (how impartial can you then be ?). I think there is a conflict of interest since IceIX is in your alliance and acknowledging D3P is wrong in their strategy would not be so good.

He hasn't played "Devil's Advocate". He has acknowledged on several threads and many posts that the game has flaws. He simply disagrees with my proposition. Which is why I posted it to be honest. I wanted feedback. And I'm glad to see post where people have had an opposite opinion. It broadens my thoughts to see what others think so that my perception can grow even further.

gamar wrote:

Anyways, again, since fiddling with prices will have no effect on the things people are complaining about, I still don't see how JUST PUT EVERYTHING ON CLEARANCE SALE, FOREVER will make players HAPPY

I agree. I'm not calling for a clearance sale. I'm calling for an overhaul of the pricing system that is a bit much at the moment.

Unknown

Honestly, paying money to do well in a PVP event just feels like cheating to me, so I will never do it, no matter how much they charge. If they change healing the way OP describes, and it ends up being whoever buys the most health packs wins the PVP events, I'll just stop doing them.

However, as a developer myself, I have no problem spending money on a game. Dropping $15 for HP to get a slot on my 20 person team was a no brainer for me. I play Candy Crush as well and would rather pay to unlock levels than bother my friends to open them. Putting fifty cents into a game every once in a while just feels like playing in an arcade to me and I have no problem with it. D3 could make zones/dungeons to travel like the other Puzzle Quest games. Some special characters can be earned only in each special zone and they could charge a few dollars to open each quest section. They could even add a new PVP tab to the game where players actually play other players and charge a monthly fee to maintain it. I would gladly pay the money for any of these things. I think there are lots of ways for D3 to make money without breaking the game, but it doesn't feel like they are headed in the right direction.

noobprime

rooter wrote:

I think there are lots of ways for D3 to make money without breaking the game, but it doesn't feel like they are headed in the right direction.

This is the most important point, but the game is 'young' yet and evolving. Things simply aren't stable yet, see they haven't fixed server side issues, event scaling and sharding. Standing still to fix things that are broken really *is* the right direction. But the last 2 big adds (alliances and seasons) did up the engagement level of the playerbase. People complain about the price point, but really they want MORE content, and not just the new hero kind. Slashing the prices won't really 'buy' happiness. Making a better product will.

Unknown

gamar wrote:

arktos1971 wrote:

You play the devil's advocate and try to counter argue each thread that criticizes the D3P strategy (how impartial can you then be ?). I think there is a conflict of interest since IceIX is in your alliance and acknowledging D3P is wrong in their strategy would not be so good.

Anyways, again, since fiddling with prices will have no effect on the things people are complaining about, I still don't see how JUST PUT EVERYTHING ON CLEARANCE SALE, FOREVER will make players HAPPY

That's not what we were saying originally.

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

I completely understood how to use maxed 3* characters, don't you worry for me. I just don't want to pay a fortune to perform in events that bring nothing exciting. And I do not anymore. Same for many other guys right now.

I'm glad you've learned some things in the past couple of weeks.

arktos1971 wrote:

You play the devil's advocate and try to counter argue each thread that criticizes the D3P strategy (how impartial can you then be ?). I think there is a conflict of interest since IceIX is in your alliance and acknowledging D3P is wrong in their strategy would not be so good.

I'm impressed; you're indeed very perceptive. Django does have a policy of "always appease Ice." This is why TU1 created his massively popular This Game Isn't Fun Anymore thread, because he was cleverly using reverse psychology in order to... ummm... hmmm... now I'm confused. Now that I think of it, Ferret's pointed criticism of the Spidey nerf is also quite puzzling in the context of Django's overarching D3 is Cooler Than a Breakdancing Velociraptor So Please Don't Sandbox Us, Ice! propaganda campaign (working title). You seem to have a good handle on such things, so could you explain it to me?

arktos1971 wrote:

If you feel normal that a forum has turned into a general bashing of the company who produces a game which criticizers pay for, I don't think it is. It is symptomatic of something going wrong.

Sure. The server issues absolutely need to be fixed, and I think there should to be improvements in the aspects that I noted in my previous comment. I don't personally mind most of those problems, because I don't buy 10-packs anyway, my PVE scaling is generally wonderful, I've hit Top 10 in all but one of my S1 death brackets, and I've been getting more relaxed brackets in S2. However, I think they've hurt the user experience in general, and I've made various comments on the forum to that effect.

The fact that there are very real problems doesn't mean that every "I'm (fake-)quitting because D3 is greedy!" rant is sensible. To be clear, the OP's proposal isn't, at all, one of these aforementioned rants, even though I don't particularly agree with most of its ideas.

arktos1971 wrote:

But how could you criticize a game that you do not feel the need to support financially when you just try to treat people who are angry against the current system as dumb guys who do not know what they are talking about.

... huh?

arktos1971 wrote:

I started the game at the same time you did. So our history is the same (I thought you were older in the game).

I apologize for nerfing your "older players' opinions are irrelevant" argument.

arktos1971 wrote:

Let me remind you when you told me Patch was damn good. I hadn't maxed him. Once that was done, he was truly damn good.

I'm sorry that you can't share the same experience because you choose not to invest in this game. A level 25 Patch is not so fun to use.

Yeah, it'd be nice to have him, esp since half of Django has a big Patch, and the alliance chat was lit ablaze when the new Patch PVP popped up. But, he's not an Iso priority at the moment. My 5 L141s can get me 1000+ points in PVP with little discomfort.

Oh, and I'll let you in on a little secret: do you know how I avoid the not-so-funness of L25 Patch? I don't use my L25 Patch. I use my big boys.

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

gamar wrote:

arktos1971 wrote:

You play the devil's advocate and try to counter argue each thread that criticizes the D3P strategy (how impartial can you then be ?). I think there is a conflict of interest since IceIX is in your alliance and acknowledging D3P is wrong in their strategy would not be so good.

Anyways, again, since fiddling with prices will have no effect on the things people are complaining about, I still don't see how JUST PUT EVERYTHING ON CLEARANCE SALE, FOREVER will make players HAPPY

That's not what we were saying originally.

aaronschmiz wrote:

TL:DR version (for those who hate long posts)... Lower prices = happier consumers/players which leads to a lot more purchases = more revenue/profit for MPQ. "The happy goose lays the golden eggs"

Unknown

noobprime wrote:

rooter wrote:

I think there are lots of ways for D3 to make money without breaking the game, but it doesn't feel like they are headed in the right direction.

This is the most important point, but the game is 'young' yet and evolving. Things simply aren't stable yet, see they haven't fixed server side issues, event scaling and sharding. Standing still to fix things that are broken really *is* the right direction. But the last 2 big adds (alliances and seasons) did up the engagement level of the playerbase. People complain about the price point, but really they want MORE content, and not just the new hero kind. Slashing the prices won't really 'buy' happiness. Making a better product will.

Absolutely. But lowering the price of the game (in a F2P business model) would help people improve their roster (since at the moment, this is the only cool thing to improve in the game, right ?)

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

noobprime wrote:

rooter wrote:

I think there are lots of ways for D3 to make money without breaking the game, but it doesn't feel like they are headed in the right direction.

This is the most important point, but the game is 'young' yet and evolving. Things simply aren't stable yet, see they haven't fixed server side issues, event scaling and sharding. Standing still to fix things that are broken really *is* the right direction. But the last 2 big adds (alliances and seasons) did up the engagement level of the playerbase. People complain about the price point, but really they want MORE content, and not just the new hero kind. Slashing the prices won't really 'buy' happiness. Making a better product will.

Absolutely. But lowering the price of the game (in a F2P business model) would help people improve their roster (since at the moment, this is the only cool thing to improve in the game, right ?)

But it doesn't sustain play... lowering the price of the game to the point where the community's main way to build their roster is through HP purchases, not playing, will lead to people "finishing" their progression quickly and getting bored since all that's left to do is pump iso into guys. To carry on the analogy, THAT would be killing the goose that laid the golden egg!

noobprime

arktos1971 wrote:

noobprime wrote:

Absolutely. But lowering the price of the game (in a F2P business model) would help people improve their roster (since at the moment, this is the only cool thing to improve in the game, right ?)

I don't see it that way (and it could be just me).
So you lower the prices, get a couple more 141s and then what? You get bracketed *up*, face harder fights and competition and get frustrated. Even if you paid *less* to feel frustrated, you're still frustrated. I think lowering the prices only accelerates that. MPQ may make more money in the short run, but I doubt the playerbase will actually get any happier.

Honestly what I think it would be *cool* is if the game worked when I wanted to play . Having timely disbursement of rewards, working servers, posted PVE mechanics (which one is it this time? rubber band? no rubberband?), elimination of cheaters, etc. You know, the simple things for now.

mohio

noobprime wrote:

People complain about the price point, but really they want MORE content, and not just the new hero kind. Slashing the prices won't really 'buy' happiness. Making a better product will.

Sorry if this was mentioned earlier - I read the OP and a couple of the first and last responses only . Anyway - I completely agree with your statement noob, but I think what the OP was getting at is that people would be happier TO PAY if things were more reasonably priced (If this is not what was meant, then my apologies). Personally, I have been completely F2P so far, and I don't see myself buying HP anytime soon because there is very little value to be had. I am fine with the slow progression that the normal reward structure affords, and I only use one or two shields per tournament, which is pretty self-sustaining between PvP and PvE rewards. Now, maybe if I could get more bang for my buck, I would be far happier to spend some money so I don't have to constantly make sure I will have enough for that new character always a week or two away.

That said, it wouldn't increase my happiness in the game itself (which frankly is the best way to encourage people to spend money on it), and I also don't think it would be a great idea overall, since as some others pointed out early on in the thread, it would be far too easy to max out characters (cover-wise at least) and would make the game feel very P2W. The other thing is - this might be profitable in the short term, as more people see the value in putting a little money into the game. But I think it would possibly hurt overall profits as the whales that are currently supporting the dev team would need to buy in much less frequently, and the "new customers" might really just be one-time customers (although buying in once makes you more likely to buy again, so I could be wrong in this).

Unknown

UNLESS they innovate and bring new stuff to the game.

Not that this is cool or sexy, but for instance on Candy Crush you had "Xmas limited series" and the likes. Here it's only new characters and same pvps going on over and over again. Elite PvPs are **** now prizingwise.

The business model may be NOT to keep the players stay long in the game, because (maybe) the peak in $$$ they spent is from day X to day Y and they know guys will move forward to something else right after.

I believe the game has stronger potential than any other Match 3. The quality in development, and all the cosmetic improvements made in the last weeks shows they want it to last.

But I don't think that guys will stay long if they have rosters full of unlevelled 3*. What's the point of making them 141 initially then ? If the goal is not to level them up ???

Something is dichonomous here.

I paid for half of the ISO needed. Still enjoy the game a lot because I still can get covers. But how many tournaments are needed to fill 42 chars covers ? There are 516 covers to be won. And 5 Million+ ISO.

Something that is impossible to reach is not desirable.

There should be a balance between play/invest, but not at this price. That's just what I am saying.

noobprime

mohio wrote:

I think what the OP was getting at is that people would be happier TO PAY if things were more reasonably priced (If this is not what was meant, then my apologies).

Sure they would be happier, but only at the instant of the monetary outlay - it would be a fleeting happiness. After that they would be faced with the same game framework that is frankly still lacking at this point (this is why you feel that there is little value to be had).

HailMary

noobprime wrote:

Honestly what I think it would be *cool* is if the game worked when I wanted to play . Having timely disbursement of rewards, working servers, posted PVE mechanics (which one is it this time? rubber band? no rubberband?), elimination of cheaters, etc. You know, the simple things for now.

Heh, yep. They seriously need to fix the servers first. That would greatly improve how the game feels.

That said, I've never quite agreed with asking them to post things like rubberbanding mechanics. I think the general impetus behind mechanics like rubberbanding and scaling has bee to level the playing field between newbies and veterans, and not require players to live and breathe the game in order to get good placement. I think publicizing some things about scaling probably wouldn't hurt, but I think explaining rubberbanding on the forums would directly undermine the original purpose behind rubberbanding. A simple refresh countdown on each node would go a long way towards clarifying PVE mechanics for the typical player.

mohio wrote:

The other thing is - this might be profitable in the short term, as more people see the value in putting a little money into the game. But I think it would possibly hurt overall profits as the whales that are currently supporting the dev team would need to buy in much less frequently, and the "new customers" might really just be one-time customers (although buying in once makes you more likely to buy again, so I could be wrong in this).

I agree with your general point, but I don't think whales are the devs' main source of revenue. More likely, it's far more widely distributed revenue coming from low/mid-tier players buying roster slots and cover packs.

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

Oh, and I'll let you in on a little secret: do you know how I avoid the not-so-funness of L25 Patch? I don't use my L25 Patch. I use my big boys.

You control your frustration, which is good for you . The game is addictive and you do not feel the bad points of this addiction. Even better (and I am not being sarcastic).

We'll see how the game evolve in the future.

I think a team of 30+ devs can not live out of love and fresh water (translation of a cool French popular sentence). Some guys try to give ideas so that MPQ makes money without punishing us.

I'd be very interested to know what would make YOU HM invest in this game. If you care to tell us.

As for the rest of the original statements/replies/replies to replies... I think we need to stop. A war of sarcasm leads to nowhere. We don't agree on several aspects of the discussion.

I tend to offer more for less money to my customers (that's my personal experience, not based on emotions) and that led to a successful career. You may disagree with that. It's pointless to try and change your opinion about this. And I had business in Toys, DVDs, Bakery, Health, Leisure... I never believed an addictive game should have its business model on rarity/high prices. I do not want to base frustration on money and affordability. That's just me maybe.

As for my personal history in the game : I became a whale because I did not understand the MMR, rubberbanding thing, until I found out on the forum. I just thought (and I was right) that MMR, scaling... were here to make us build up our rosters out of money. Since I enjoyed the game a lot I told myself "I haven't enjoyed a game like this in years, so let's put money into it". But that was not enough. Once the roster is built, you need to shield hop, buy Health Packs... I do not agree to go further, because this is becoming crazy.

We play a "F2P" game and many guys are ashamed to say they spend money on it. But many have spent way more than they dare say on the forum. I have numerous private messages testifying so.

Having a max char is really cool. And when you have the choice, it's even cooler.

I'm certainly not as skilled as you are, but I still enjoy the game in another way as you do. I still play a lot, and your experience and mine are extremely different, but as long as we are both happy, that's the most important thing.

There should not be judgements of values because some are F2P and other P2W. Both are needed in the life of a game like this.

Some F2P are more profitable than usual $60 games. It's just a different business model.

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

I think a team of 30+ devs can not live out of love and fresh water (translation of a cool French popular sentence). Some guys try to give ideas so that MPQ makes money without punishing us.

Of course. However, overwhelmingly, I see a basic disconnect between the things that players complain about as "punishment," and the things that players suggest as "alternative monetization." For example, making HP cheaper will not help you get out of MMR Hell, and I don't see how MMR Hell aids D3's supposed greed.

arktos1971 wrote:

I'd be very interested to know what would make YOU HM invest in this game. If you care to tell us.

As I noted earlier to aaron, there really isn't much at all at this point, which honestly somewhat saddens me. I started playing with the mentality that MPQ is just some fluffy mobile game that I'll stop playing when I manage to hit some sort of paywall. That paywall never materialized, and were I to go back in time with my current understanding of the game (and with the new fight-completion cover drops), I would've dropped some cash on early roster slots, and likely would have paid for a relatively early spot in a good alliance. Right now, I'll drop some cash on additional alliance expansion, but that's all I can think of at the moment.

arktos1971 wrote:

Once the roster is built, you need to shield hop, buy Health Packs... I do not agree to go further, because this is becoming crazy.

Shieldhopping with your roster should only be needed if you're hitting 900+ points, and health pack purchases really aren't necessary. I've hit 1100 in PVP multiple times, and while I've shieldhopped, I've never had to buy a health pack. Your monster roster would give you far more stamina than me, since you can rotate maybe 8-10 high-tier characters during a single push.

arktos1971 wrote:

We play a "F2P" game and many guys are ashamed to say they spend money on it. But many have spent way more than they dare say on the forum. I have numerous private messages testifying so.

Yeah, I don't like people bashing other people simply for spending a good bit of money on the game. After all, the devs need to make money. I'll poke fun at people who repeatedly make bad investments regarding what items they buy, but that's simply because they're getting terrible ROI, and my investment background cringes at the sight.

Similarly, the numerous threads that complain about the devs daring to encourage players to spend money annoy me, and I find bragging about F2P status to be only marginally more sensible than complaining about the game being P2W. As I noted before, I don't advertise my F2P status, and I've only started mentioning it recently in specific discussions as a supporting data point.

arktos1971 wrote:

Having a max char is really cool. And when you have the choice, it's even cooler.

Of course. I'd like to 141 my 3/5/5 Mr. Rogers (I refuse to level Daredevil & Loki out of pure spite ), but to me (and to the devs), Iso scarcity is a basic aspect of player strategy, and I rather enjoy it. The same goes for the 13-cover limitation: the built-in tradeoffs add a layer of strategy, which I like.

arktos1971 wrote:

I'm certainly not as skilled as you are, but I still enjoy the game in another way as you do.

Hahaha, as some of my fellow Djangoliers know, I do stupid stuff in-game a lot, like forgetting to remove +3 All AP boosts before prologue healing, taking the wrong characters into a fight when switching between PVP and PVE, etc. And yeah, I'm not big on the collection aspect, while you are. I, as a high-level F2P player, are an outlier, just as you, a whale, are an outlier. I'm quite impressed that MPQ lets players like me exist, and I don't expect MPQ to ever cater to my F2P whims. However, I'll point out issues that I see affecting a larger, more important portion of MPQ's playerbase.

arktos1971 wrote:

Some F2P are more profitable than usual $60 games. It's just a different business model.

Sure. But, I've seen nothing that supports your claim that MPQ is not profitable, or that its current monetization model is doomed to failure.

Unknown

HM, read this : http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1774 ... me-revenue

You'll see that some of my comments are not so dumb after all.

What I see in MPQ is a "F2P" game with a very strong potential. But, it lacks innovation. Have you read what they are saying about innovation on this article ?

When you just stick to figures, small-term profits and do not trust how innovative you can be (or are just not innovative) YOU FAIL.

You have no idea what kind of struggles and energy I had to go through just to prove I was right. And I was. But was bashed for months/years because I was going against the trends.

MPQ's game structure is now a 25 days loop for PvPs, and 15 days for PvEs. That is most certainly based on the current business model. So they are trapped in those kind of analysis and forget about customers service and innovation.

I'm sorry if I felt arrogant, but this is so crystal clear to me that they are just going to a business model where only a few titles (like Candy Crush) succeeded ($1.88 billion in 2013). They don't even use the business model of Candy Crush anyway. They milk the cow outrageously till it dies. And expect new players to replace the veterans who left. That's not good at all.

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

HM, read this : http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1774 ... me-revenue

You'll see that some of my comments are not so dumb after all.

What I see in MPQ is a "F2P" game with a very strong potential. But, it lacks innovation. Have you read what they are saying about innovation on this article ?

When you just stick to figures, small-term profits and do not trust how innovative you can be (or are just not innovative) YOU FAIL.

You have no idea what kind of struggles and energy I had to go through just to prove I was right. And I was. But was bashed for months/years because I was going against the trends.

MPQ's game structure is now a 25 days loop for PvPs, and 15 days for PvEs. That is most certainly based on the current business model. So they are trapped in those kind of analysis and forget about customers service and innovation.

I'm sorry if I felt arrogant, but this is so crystal clear to me that they are just going to a business model where only a few titles (like Candy Crush) succeeded ($1.88 billion in 2013). They don't even use the business model of Candy Crush anyway. They milk the cow outrageously till it dies. And expect new players to replace the veterans who left. That's not good at all.

What conversation are you even trying to have now? Because literally everyone else in the thread is discussing Aaron's idea that cheaper costs = more profit and customer satisfaction, and you seem to be arguing about something nobody else is talking about

Unknown

Just trying to show that aaron (and others) are right.

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

Just trying to show that aaron (and others) are right.

Right about what? Lowering prices? How does anything you've posted on this page or in that article support that?