Therefore, this was an endless loop. Most video game designers couldn't understand why Chen Mo wanted to make an MMORPG.
Logically speaking, the story of Azeroth could be used to make a Triple-A game. Moreover, there was no need to worry about the pricing model. They could just use a buyout system like other Triple-A games.
But what about MMORPGs? There were so many games out there, and no game company had found a good way to make money.
Buyout system, right?
Online games required players to keep playing. This was similar to LoL and PlayerUnknown's Battleground. Players were a part of the game experience, and losing players would be devastating to the game experience.
A strict buyout system meant higher barriers to entry and fewer players. Moreover, selling the game would be a one-off business, and there wouldn't be enough motivation for future updates. Selling DLCs didn't seem like a good idea either.
Charging for fashion?
That would work, but there weren't as many skins to sell like LoL. Strictly speaking, this didn't seem like a good fit with World of Warcraft either. What kind of fashion would you sell to the Tauren, Revenant, and Dwarves?
Charging for time?
It seemed to be the best solution, and it ensured the greatest degree of fairness. But the question remained, where would you find the time to give to the players?
Obviously, if this problem was so easy to solve, MMORPGs wouldn't be getting worse and worse.
But the players didn't seem to care. Since Chen Mo said that he would release World of Warcraft with twenty million units sold, and the price of the gaming pods was lowered, what else was there to say?
The players who could afford it would use this opportunity to get their hands on it. The players who couldn't afford it could just cheer for it, or trick their rich friends into buying one.
…
World of Warcraft had always been a trending topic, far ahead of everyone else.
Many companies were thinking that they were going to overtake it at first, and that they had to work harder!
But there was no reaction after a long time. When they took a closer look, World of Warcraft's popularity was a single digit higher than the second place … Because World of Warcraft had a 1 at the top, and the second place also had a 1 at the beginning, it didn't look that obvious. Moreover, Weibo's trending topic was very tight, so it was hard to tell …
These people wanted to vomit blood. Did it have to be so fantastical?
It wasn't that their business was bad or that they didn't have good eyesight. The main thing was that it wasn't common for their popularity to be in the second place.
The enthusiasm of the gamers was beyond imagination. Just the promotional CG of Wrath of the Lich King was enough to keep them high for a few days.
The players had too many questions about World of Warcraft, and they were all trying to find out more about it.
This game is definitely an MMORPG, right?
How much does this game charge?
How are we going to play this?
Very soon, the confirmation came. It was confirmed that it was an MMORPG. Not only that, but it also charged for time!
The official reply was, [World of Warcraft will use the time-based payment model. There are two payment methods: time card and monthly card. The point card is priced at 200 bucks for 3,000 minutes, or 100 bucks for 1,500 minutes. The monthly card is priced at 500 bucks per month. Players will be charged a certain amount of tax when they trade gold and game currency in the game. We are not considering other charging models for now. "
When this news came out, the players were first delighted, then shocked.
He was happy that this seemed to be a very fair and just charging model, but he was shocked that he could actually make money from this?!
The price wasn't cheap, but the key was who he was comparing it with!
200 bucks for 3,000 minutes was only equivalent to 4 bucks for an hour!
This was the same price as the PC internet cafes of a long time ago. For VR games, it was even cheaper than cabbages.
According to the game hours of AAA masterpieces, many AAA masterpieces only played for 30 to 40 hours in a week. Based on this calculation, didn't it mean that one or two hundred bucks could buy the game hours of a AAA masterpiece?
The AAA masterpieces in the Matrix Game Pod were all 1980 years old …
The price of the monthly card was quite scary, but the problem was, who would buy a monthly card?
Except for the studios that specialized in making money in the game …
Most players didn't have enough game time, and it wasn't easy to take out one or two hours to play every day. 3,000 minutes was equivalent to 50 hours, which was enough for many people to play for a month …
It was only 200 bucks a month, and it was still a next-generation VR game?
On second thought, while the price of the monthly card seemed scary, it was a huge profit for the players that had a lot of time on their hands.
Moreover, players could trade gold and in-game currency in the game, which meant that the developers recognized the living space of the studios and those that specialized in making money in the game. They allowed you to buy and sell as long as you paid a commission to the developers.
However, allowing this kind of buying and selling was equivalent to letting the developers make a profit. How much revenue could the developers make with that little commission?
The developers even made it very clear that they wouldn't consider other charging models, which meant they wouldn't consider charging for battle power, or charging for fashion.
It was fair, but many players were worried, Are we really going to lose money?
Although they always said that Chen Mo was going to lose money, they were just joking around. Many players were really worried about World of Warcraft's charging model.
It wasn't that they were worried that Chen Mo would die of poverty, they didn't care what happened to Chen Mo. What they were worried about was that if World of Warcraft kept losing money, the game might not be able to sustain itself …
Or even if the game didn't go offline, it might not be able to withstand the pressure of losing money and open up other ways to charge for battle power, ruining its reputation.
As a result, a strange scene appeared on the official forums. The players strongly requested for World of Warcraft to charge for its appearance …
"How can we play this game without charging for skins? How are we going to survive if we don't charge for skins? We have to! "
"That's right, I strongly support it. Please, Salent, let me spend money!"
"You have to understand that I'm not buying skins for Salent, I'm buying skins for Azeroth. You can't take away my right to buy skins!"
In fact, these people said so. On one hand, they might have a need to buy skins. On the other hand, they hoped to open up more avenues for the whales to burn money so that the game's profits would be better. It would be awkward if the game was shut down because of a loss.
Since World of Warcraft had too many players' hopes, many of them were willing to spend money on the Matrix VR Pod, hoping that the game would be good. Not only would the game have a good reputation, but it would also be profitable. This was why they were worried about Chen Mo.
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