'The Daily Grind' asks: "Would you be as excited for GW2 if it had a subscription?"

[:1]Over on The Daily Grind at Massively they asked an interesting question.
"Would you be as excited about GW2 if it was a subscription game?"
On the surface, it's an easy question for me. But I found the tone of the piece to be particularly interesting. He's really saying:
'Are you just excited about this game because it's comparatively cheap vs. other MMOs? Just like you get excited about 99c whopper day? Or are you really excited about the game on its merits compared with established titles?'
To answer all of the above the questions in order: No. No. No. Yes.
I would certainly not play if it was subscription based, but I don't believe their business model will adversely affect how fun the game is. I think the opposite, in fact. There are things that I'm dubious about in GW2 (levels, skill ranks, character attributes) , but I think the finished product will be very compelling compared with existing titles.|||I said before that I don't mind maintaining a sub if the game's worth it, GW2 being the only one so far that has features that would justify the sub. WoW is close, but not quite there, and other games just don't cut it imo (of those I researched or tried, that is).
Admittedly, between the collector's edition and all the expansions / cash-shop stuff I'll end up buying, I'm sure it won't be any cheaper than sub games. The difference in price only really shows up significant in the long run, i.e. in the replay value.
In a way, a sub is no cheaper than buying new games regularly. So it begs the question, would I rather still play this, or play something else. So far the answer for GW1 was quite obvious, I usually would rather play GW1 than other games I bought and end up just sitting on my shelf, i.e. price is not the factor here, entertainment value is.|||I don't like monthly fees because I tend to play sporadically and a monthly fee will either be wasted money for those months where I hardly play or it will make me play way more than I'd like just so I can justify the monthly fee. I once let a subscription run for a whole year without playing before I decided I wasn't ever going to play again.|||A basic no is my answer. I like games that don’t look cheap which GW fits but if it had a monthly sub I would never have played GW. Other few things to understand is most of the game playing population does not read on-line zines, or are active on the forums. Most are no longer in school or college and actually have to be concerned with where their money is going. $15 a month may seem cheap but when we pile on the other ‘subscriptions’ going on in life, Netflix, gym, TV, Phone, Internet etc… (and I don’t have kids either) I’ll pass.
Then again many people pay for their gym each month and never go, so judging most people fiscal responsibility may be the fault in my logic.|||Agreed with Erasmus here, though I would pay it if the game was worth it.
edit: @Grim: there's plenty of other reasons why I tried GW1, the hench being one, and dual-prof being another. I would probably have tried it even with a sub, but no sub made it that much easier to get into.|||Subs tend to lead to greater degrees of player burn out.
Feeling you have to play, or should be playing, when all you want is a break for a bit.
Guild Wars doesn't have this problem, so for that reason alone I would be less excited.|||Maybe. Only if it's easy to play solo (aka, not required to have a full human team), would I be willing to pay a monthly subscription. I liked Aion (a lot), but the fact that you can hardly do anything alone (especially when you get further along), finally made me stop. I don't want to wait a lot of time to find people to do what I want to do. That way I'd be paying for waiting...|||The biggest burnout I had, oddly, was in Diablo 2. I think burnout is more indicative of grind than sub... although I can understand how you'd confuse the two.
Lady makes a good point, about waiting, but I'd generalize that to any kind of wasted time. Wasting time (instead of playing) is bad in any game, but it's doubly frustrating for games with a sub.|||Quote:








The biggest burnout I had, oddly, was in Diablo 2. I think burnout is more indicative of grind than sub... although I can understand how you'd confuse the two.




I burnt out in Eve, can't go back.
It ended up taking to much time, and paying sub I felt I should be playing that more when I wanted to be doing other things as well.
I ended up begrudging the game and all play felt like grind.|||I stand corrected... I don't picture Eve online as particularly grindy.
It makes sense that there's as many ways to burnout as they are ways to keep players playing past the point that they are having fun. For me it was the level grind, for you it's subs.