The Planet Offer (Includes POLL)

[skyjuice 12]

agree, especially if it will cost extra i will surley NOT play online!

[+Guest]

I'll not be playing online for quite some time, seeing as to how I'm already playing another MMO with friends of mine and don't like stacking up the monthly costs. Asides from that I feel that the planet offer currently offers little extra. Perhaps some years after launch I might give it a go.

[katamariguy 6]

I've already spent enough on bills just for multiplayer. Seems fair, though, since were getting so much extra. I might try when(if?) I get Cities XL

[Tonywolf7 0]

I'd love to play online, but I would like to know a price in American Dollars, if this game ever comes out in the states will it tell what the online price would be?

[Thirdrepublic 2]

I'd love to try the online side to the game, but i'll probably skip it due to extra cost.

[USA_Pride 49]

I will not pay a subscription for a city builder. I've had SimCity for nearly 7 years now and if I had to pay monthly for it I'd be in for over $700 at $9.25 per month.

Planet Offer just seems like a money grab.

[ifurkend 0]

Thx for raiding this thread from the tomb, Pride. Someone or g314 may setup another poll to compare the feedback before and after playing the demo. -- ~~~~

[honderich 0]

I have been down the subs route before and it is a path I have no wish to go down again,so it is a no as far as I am concerned.I am not even sure that I will buy the game at the moment.

[LordOscar 0]

I have enough time and money to spend 100

[Candyghost 0]

 I would have say NO but just got for Yes, I'll definitelly will play PO thanks to the "Lifetime Edition".

I took me some time to understand where to click on the German site of Amazon but finally managed to translate the basic with opening another session on the French site (you can do it also on the UK one for instance).

MC confirmed already the game will be playable in French, German and English wherever you get it so at the end, my opinion is that the "Lifetime Edition" with lifetime subscription to PO is the best deal. Indeed, it cost you less that the game + 1 year subscription...

[Soviet779 1]

Originally posted by: Candyghost

 I would have say NO but just got for Yes, I'll definitelly will play PO thanks to the "Lifetime Edition".

I took me some time to understand where to click on the German site of Amazon but finally managed to translate the basic with opening another session on the French site (you can do it also on the UK one for instance).

MC confirmed already the game will be playable in French, German and English wherever you get it so at the end, my opinion is that the "Lifetime Edition" with lifetime subscription to PO is the best deal. Indeed, it cost you less that the game + 1 year subscription...

quote>

Thats what the people who bought the "lifetime edition" of Hellgate: London thought, look how that turned out....

[earwax_man 18]

I would have considered getting it, but now I just want to go and play SC4. Seriously, why pay for MASS TRANSIT? Isn't an mmo supposed to be about just being online and not paying for things you need. I'll never buy it now

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Seriously guys... is it really necessary to say the same thing over and over and over....?

 

[MattShizzle 11]

Not at all interested in online playing. Also don't like that there's no region play.

[Jokurr 175]

I voted no but i might try it some day, even though I highly doubt I will. But hey, never say never.

[TBD-TooBusyDisorder 0]

I'm for at least giving it a try. Whenever I'd play online games in the past, I'd be a year or two too late to have any chance of being anything big in the game, so, maybe this may be my shine!... Okay maybe that's a silly reason to use the PO.

But I will definitely at least try it for a month or two; not gonna lie, it's not that expensive really. I used to play World of Warcraft; 1 month of WoW is 3 months of PO; it's quite the difference.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Incoming thread...

Suggestion: Free On-line game + Pay for items 

[aaaaa 1]

MC announed subscription plan for CXL online gaming: $9-6 monthly subscription fee for online play and addtional charge  for premium items (GEM's). Some items like mass-transport system (except basic bus system) are availabe only to the online playing.

Many people in Simtropolis and other citybuiding game communities seems to be disappointed with the announcement and saying that they will not play online at all. City builder/Tycoon type game players are not so willing to play on line and pay monthly fee. Most city-building gamer hates monthly fee. It is unheared of in this genre of game. CXL is not MMORPG game like WOW. I think that this subscription plan wil not work and MC will not make much money from it.

My suggestion is that  MC should abolish monthly fee and make online play free but sell premium item as pay item. MC can not make any money from online feature if players don't subscribe and don't play online at all. I guess that there are not so many commited fans who are will pay monthly fee and play online. Only ardent fans of city building game are willing to pay monthly fee. MC can not make much money in such situation.

Instead, by abolishing monthly fee, free online gaming will allure many casual gamers to try online playing feature of CXL (it's free, anyway)  and make them to be hooked in the online playing. Then, they will desire for more fun from the game, willing to spend money for it and will buy premium items.

This is how many online games in Korea  draw mass of casual people to their game site and make money, lots of money. Many of them are simple casual game like puzzle or board/card game. Even online Tetris game makes money in this way. I will say that MC will be able to make more money from "free" game than montly subscription fee scheme.

[TBD-TooBusyDisorder 0]

While I agree, I think it may be a little too late to suddenly change what we're paying for.

I suppose the only fee could be paying for the bandwidth it would take to have online play, not just the labor that goes into the items made.

Right now, I believe MC does need all the cash it can get in order to improve on the game.

[Jokurr 175]

Well they are already doing that with GEMs on top of the monthly fee. It's far too late for the Planet Offer monthly fee to disappear though.

[aaaaa 1]

By going to "free" game, MC may have to spend more money on the bandwidth and server cost.

But, in today's world, network bandwidth and computer server cost are cheap, dirty cheap. Human labor and development cost are expensive, very expensive. Development cost is not affected much, though. It is near fixed cost regardless of the number of online players. The development cost are nearly same for both free game scheme and subscription scheme. So providing free online game service does not add much cost to MC than case for current service scheme.

And it is not too late. Many MMORPG games in Korea, which had charged monthly fee previously or at initial launch time, now turn to "free-for-play, pay-for-item" business model. It were so successful that practically most of online games in Korea (including most MMORPG's and FPS's) are serviced in such scheme, but make quite a money this way. Online gaming  business in Korea is thriving and is one of the fastest-growing business. I think that the "free" game scheme is major factor of recent success of Korean online gaming business.

 

[TBD-TooBusyDisorder 0]

While brandwidth may not cost so much, they still have to even out the income/outcome, and if the theory that MC is hard pressed for cash is true, it may be a nescessity for the company right now.

When I say too late, I don't mean that the online fees MUST be a permanent thing, I mean it's a little too late for a sudden change; maybe a few months or a year or two down the road they may remove it, but for now it's safe to say it's dead set; they've probably got their deposit boxes all set up and ready to start accepting subscriptions.

I do see your point with the Korean games, I mean, look at MapleStory: it's free, but they offer something called NX-cash which allows you to buy some special bonuses that any non-player could look at and say what they're asking you to pay for is really silly, but oh man do they ever bring in the dough. Thing is though, Cities XL (and even The Sims 3, which EA has set up a store for players to buy objects for the game with real money) has a degree of modding and customization that other online games don't have. The Sims games (and even Sim City) have player made content that are often even more popular than the EA/Maxis made content, and sometimes could be considered "better quality"; soon enough, Cities Xl will probably be taken over by the custom-content creators and people will be looking to them for new things for their games, and that's where your idea of paying for bonus content will likely fall short.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Thread merged. 

[8elhaj 0]

If they have they give good updates and good content and give us the ability latter to have more than 5 cities then i will have bo problem paying for the first 3 months then see how it goes then renew another 3 months if the good quality is constant. So that would be 40+(20 x 2) =80

i dont think 80 is a lot if the game keeps me interested for 6 months. Sometimes i pay 60+ dollars for console games or 50 for pc games that dont last more than 5 days and get boring.

The real deal is if the PO Mode will be as interesting as advertised i will wait for reviews.

I wish MC the best of luck

[crazychickensc12 84]

I don't think I will actually partake in CXL anymore. My focus has switched to Aion an ACTUAL MMO and I'm not gonna pay for 2 online games at the same time no thank you.

[sparky66 0]

i think it would be great if online play was free to all, but you had to pay for additional content e.g. £5.00 for a medieval building set or £10.00 for mass transit etc. (yes i'm English). OK maybe that pricing needs working out a bit but it would make a lot more people interested in this game and paying for it and additional content. i would still be happy with just single player mode with added mass transit but somehow i don't think that will ever happen...

[mirrors20 0]

So, just to make sure i understand..

I am buying the planet offer, (once i get a none empty envelope) , see other thread for more on that.

I buy the skii GEM, and i get the mass transport, but then 5 months down the line i have to cancel my subscription for some unknown reason, do i then lose access to the GEMs and the mass transport? or do i keep access to them?

[sparky66 0]

Originally posted by: mirrors20

So, just to make sure i understand..

I am buying the planet offer, (once i get a none empty envelope) , see other thread for more on that.

I buy the skii GEM, and i get the mass transport, but then 5 months down the line i have to cancel my subscription for some unknown reason, do i then lose access to the GEMs and the mass transport? or do i keep access to them?

quote>

keeps the GEMs (they are for single player too).

loose all additional content e.g. mass transit.

[mirrors20 0]

Originally posted by: sparky66

Originally posted by: mirrors20

So, just to make sure i understand..

I am buying the planet offer, (once i get a none empty envelope) , see other thread for more on that.

I buy the skii GEM, and i get the mass transport, but then 5 months down the line i have to cancel my subscription for some unknown reason, do i then lose access to the GEMs and the mass transport? or do i keep access to them?

quote>

keeps the GEMs (they are for single player too).

loose all additional content e.g. mass transit.quote>

Ah, thanks that is great

[mr-tom 2]

That's dismal.

Seriously - who is going to pay