Over at the Common Sense Gamer Darren posted yesterday about something that got me thinking. With the news that we may be seeing Warhammer Online launch on September 23, Darren wondered if Mythic would be the first MMO developer to raise the monthly subscription fee above $15.00. Most likely they won't, seeing as how that $14.99 is an industry-wide standard, but it's an interesting idea. Exactly how much would an MMO gamer be willing to pay to play their particular game?
We here in the Western world are used to monthly fees. We pay rent monthly, pay bills monthly, and many of us receive paychecks monthly, so the monthly subscription is something we understand and accept. But elsewhere in the gaming universe there are a variety of pay rates for subscription games. People playing WoW in China, for instance, pay by the hour when they log into Azeroth. Ulimately, though, no matter how we pay to play, we are paying nonetheless. But the questions arises, would you pay more than $15.00 a month to play a game? Those that bought the Hellgate: London special edition paid almost $200.00 for unlimited access to an MMO that's on the skids. An extension of the question might be, why do we pay?
I've had this very conversation with my mother, who seemed concerned at my level of commitment to an online gaming habit. In my household online games have served as the sole source of entertainment up until very recently due to a physical separation from our consoles. It wasn't until last winter when we bought a PS3 did we step away from the MMO space and indulge in another form of entertainment. We've been poor, and so it was easy to justify to my mother that I spend less time during the week playing video games than she does watching television (which is true), and I pay one-third the amount she spends on her cable service.
For people who have moved across the country a couple times in the last few years, $15.00 a month to connect with friends we are no longer geographically close to is a small price to pay. That said social contact happens within a game I particularly enjoy is a great bonus. Above and beyond the cost of MMOs this issue delves into the value of gaming in general. Nintendo stated at their E3 2008 press conference that they want to close the gap between those that game and those that don't. They see their game systems as valuable to those who would never pick up a video game, hense Wii Fit and Brain Age.
Nevertheless, there is still the pervasive concept in our culture that if you are subscribing to something game related that you are somehow fringe in our society, that the gamer is less worthy of respect, and the MMO gamer even less so. But we are willing to pay for magazine subscriptions, website accounts, Quicken Online, why not pay monthly for our entertainment? Why must someone who plays an MMO be considered extra geeky and receive only derision from their fellow gamers? It might be a case of that element in human nature that wishes to connect ourselves to the mainstream even as we accept our disenfranchisement. Yeah, I'm a gamer, but I'm not a loser like those MMO players. But I play MMOs with genius level intellects, with some of the smartest people I have known, and I play MMOs with people who aren't so book smart, but are great people to hang around with. Yes we pay monthly to play the games, but in the end we are still gamers.
