Top Ten Free-to-Play Games - Investment Opportunities for Developers
After digging for what really motivates gamers to invest in free-to-play games last week, Danny "Ralsu" Gourley is at it again. This time, Ralsu tells Ten Ton Hammer readers (and any F2P developers who will listen) what could show a company's commitment to its F2P game:
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F2P developers have to learn to take beta seriously if they want gamers to take their product seriously. Beta should be more than a marketing opportunity. The product presented to testers needs to be stable and robust for as much content as is available for the beta.
It will be interesting to see how Runes of Magic handles things post launch, as I don't see them being like the majority of other companies out there who run portals full of free to play titles. Hopefully they will understand the importance of investing in less but higher quality titles.
It will be interesting to see how Runes of Magic handles things post launch, as I don't see them being like the majority of other companies out there who run portals full of free to play titles. Hopefully they will understand the importance of investing in less but higher quality titles.
Man, I hope so. I really like that game, and I'd like to see them address its problems before moving on to the next thing.
When folks usually write about F2P games you can normally tell they are biased against them and are writing about them because they have to. It really takes away from the articles so I normally avoid reading discussion or reviews about F2P games on most sites. Thanks ,Ralsu, for being one of the few good writers about the genre that doesn't loathe actually writing about it.
I also couldn't agree more about beta testing. I've never understood how so many F2P developers don't get how much first impressions effect the success of their games. Save the hype for after the game is polished so people are left with a good impression of it so it becomes apart of their F2P rotation and keep it in mind when they spread the word around about it. I shake my head when I see a new game come out with translation that isn't very good. So many people get turned off from the game by it and I figure it should be one of the easier things to get a couple of native speakers to run through.
When folks usually write about F2P games you can normally tell they are biased against them and are writing about them because they have to. It really takes away from the articles so I normally avoid reading discussion or reviews about F2P games on most sites. Thanks ,Ralsu, for being one of the few good writers about the genre that doesn't loathe actually writing about it.
I also couldn't agree more about beta testing. I've never understood how so many F2P developers don't get how much first impressions effect the success of their games. Save the hype for after the game is polished so people are left with a good impression of it so it becomes apart of their F2P rotation and keep it in mind when they spread the word around about it. I shake my head when I see a new game come out with translation that isn't very good. So many people get turned off from the game by it and I figure it should be one of the easier things to get a couple of native speakers to run through.
When Danny came to me with his idea for doing a F2P top ten list, I was thrilled Birinus. I think NA F2P gamers are a market that has yet to really be tapped by a competent news site. I'm certainly glad you enjoy Danny's series, because it means we're heading in the right direction.
Something to consider with beta tests and free to play games, whilst our understanding of the testing phases comes from over a decade of this genre, we need to take several things into consideration.
1. Language
Alpha, Beta, Open, these are all relative terms and to expect Beta to mean the same thing for every developer and publisher is a little unrealistic, especially when you complicate matters further by throwing in companies from all over the world. I know back when I started playing MMOs that the idea of there being an actual bug in beta was unheard of, the whole idea was that you fixed all your technical issues in Alpha and then the content was tested in Beta, but times change.
2. Release Date
Most free to play MMOs have been out for months if not years in their native territory, so the only thing they are really interested in testing is localisation and server stability. Bugs that you see in an English Beta of a free to play game that has been ported from Korea are likely to be present in the live Korean version too, unless created by a bad localisation string (pretty common but falls under localisation testing).
I still hold to the old ideals that the game should be playable, although light on content, by the end of Alpha and that leaves Beta open to the marketing ploys that publishers want it to be and also ensures that you aren't going to get a lot of negative press from it being unplayable. I don't however see companies changing the way they do this.
Top Ten Free-to-Play Games - Investment Opportunities for Developers
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