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Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

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Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#51

Post by KRONWALLED »

zylent wrote: post #23
eksemplar wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could but the profitability of free2play games are whales. I don't remember where I read it, but the vast majority of people playing free2play mobile or Facebook games never spend a single dollar. This means that if you set a limit on it, you'd be limiting your profit by an extreme amount. I'm all for it by the way, I think games that sell game affecting content for thousands of dollars are targeted scams portray…

Minor nitpick: League of legends requires you to purchase heroes as they come out, and this gives the player incentive to spend ~5$ every month or so. DOTA would be a better example as you are not required to purchase heroes.

League of Legends doesn't require you to pick up champions when they are released. Yes you can buy them with real currency but also with ingame currency aquired through playing the game. Will it take longer for new players? Of course it will but you dont need every new champ to win at this game. For long time players like me it wont take long as you can easily get the points needed for the unlock between two releases.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#52

Post by jquery »

angarg12 wrote: post #45

I'm active in the clicker/idle game scene so I can give a bit of background: It isn't rare lately for people to come to https://www.reddit.com/r/incremental_games/ and discuss possible ways to monetise games. How to best implement microtransactions, opt-in ads, or even some talk lately about cripto mining. Then yesterday someone wrote a post about the 'unannoying way to monetise', which is to make the game paid. http…

$30 isn't really steep given the thousands of hours of... ahem... gameplay. It's easily justifiable for a niche hobby purchase. I've been idling Clicker Heroes for thousands of hours and it has a very soothing mathematical zen rhythm to it. I highly recommend it to anyone who's enjoyed Cookie Clicker or other idle-type games. What makes Clicker Heroes extra special is the high-quality design and the lovely math that's gone into making sure progress is smooth and eternal. I have high hopes for CH2 and will pre-order it as a vote of confidence.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#53

Post by sago »

A great piece, an ethical decision, and I hope the start of something bigger. I agree that free to play is often horribly exploitative, not to mention horrible game design.

But that price point. That makes me worried. Browse around Steam to see the company they are trying to keep at $30. In the reddit thread the dev said they've chosen this price point based on $2m production budget. Fair enough they've done their homework and run the models. I'm sure they've done a competitive analysis. But it feels too expensive to me.

I really really hope I am proved wrong. As spectacularly as possible.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#54

Post by mirashii »

0xcde4c3db wrote: post #4

> Also, we like games with mods and we want mods. Real-money shops make little sense with mods, when you can just download a mod to quadruple the number of rubies you get. Also, it is simply too easy to cheat. I think this touches on an important aspect of microtransactions that to my knowledge remains largely unexamined (but maybe I'm just not reading the right critics). Specifically, games are traditionally built a…

I think Valve's model of pure cosmetics with an active workshop and ability to implement custom games shows you can still have microtransactions without turning away the notion of a player community. It just seems to me that the common monetization schemes implemented in other games is a bit of a blatant money grab made by forcing people to artificially grind.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#55

Post by ge0rg »

We made a lot of money from these players who spent thousands. They are known to the industry as "Whales".

I haven't seen this addressed yet, but what if the whales we are seeing are not poor addicted victims nor rich people but simple fraudsters?

It really makes sense if you are a person with access to "unlimited" credit that you can't spend in a way that can be traced back to you.

There is so much credit card fraud going on, and it's surely possible to decouple that from the actual in-game transactions by buying cash cards. The credit companies can't trace back the money, and the in-game transactions never get challenged.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#56

Post by chki »

ge0rg wrote: post #55

We made a lot of money from these players who spent thousands. They are known to the industry as "Whales". I haven't seen this addressed yet, but what if the whales we are seeing are not poor addicted victims nor rich people but simple fraudsters? It really makes sense if you are a person with access to "unlimited" credit that you can't spend in a way that can be traced back to you. There is so much credit card fraud…

But is it really worth commiting fraud to beat somebody in Clicker Heroes? Doesn't every transaction you make with a stolen credit card increase the chance of getting caught/no longer being able to use the card because it gets blocked?

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#57

Post by koonsolo »

ge0rg wrote: post #55

We made a lot of money from these players who spent thousands. They are known to the industry as "Whales". I haven't seen this addressed yet, but what if the whales we are seeing are not poor addicted victims nor rich people but simple fraudsters? It really makes sense if you are a person with access to "unlimited" credit that you can't spend in a way that can be traced back to you. There is so much credit card fraud…

I've heard multiple stories (firsthand) of kids accidentally ordering virtual stuff on mobile for thousand(s). It happens only once, but there is no way to recover the money.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#58

Post by gizmo686 »

ge0rg wrote: post #55

We made a lot of money from these players who spent thousands. They are known to the industry as "Whales". I haven't seen this addressed yet, but what if the whales we are seeing are not poor addicted victims nor rich people but simple fraudsters? It really makes sense if you are a person with access to "unlimited" credit that you can't spend in a way that can be traced back to you. There is so much credit card fraud…

credit card fraud is very pro consumer. If the rightful owner issues a chargeback they will likely be returned their funds at the merchants expanse. Given the nature of ftp games, I suspect few would bother disputing these when they come up.

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#59

Post by mnsc »

jquery wrote: post #52
angarg12 wrote: post #45

I'm active in the clicker/idle game scene so I can give a bit of background: It isn't rare lately for people to come to https://www.reddit.com/r/incremental_games/ and discuss possible ways to monetise games. How to best implement microtransactions, opt-in ads, or even some talk lately about cripto mining. Then yesterday someone wrote a post about the 'unannoying way to monetise', which is to make the game paid. http…

$30 isn't really steep given the thousands of hours of... ahem... gameplay. It's easily justifiable for a niche hobby purchase. I've been idling Clicker Heroes for thousands of hours and it has a very soothing mathematical zen rhythm to it. I highly recommend it to anyone who's enjoyed Cookie Clicker or other idle-type games. What makes Clicker Heroes extra special is the high-quality design and the lovely math that'…

I'm at the end of cookie clicker and I honestly don't see any interesting progressions forward. I just got 350 chancemakers so now I'm just creating spreadsheets to try to time the "get xxx777777 levels on ascension".

But actually this is a feature and not a bug since I actually appreciate the sense of "I'm done for now" that lets me pause gameplay for a couple of months and wait for a new tier building or something else. I think a more polished clicker game sounds rather scary given my player profile since I could easily see myself get totally absorbed. So CH2 being $30 is good news for me personally since that guarantees I wont get caught. =)

Re: Clicker Heroes 2 is abandoning free-to-play

#60

Post by aeontech »

patio11 wrote: post #32
greggman wrote: post #3

it concerns me how many of my friends in free to play game dev are okay with exploting whales for profit.

I go back and forth on this, because there seems to be material disagreement on whether whales are, in fact, a) folks with problems or b) folks with hobbies which are, relative to a single video game, expensive. There is a good presentation from the CEO of Kongregate talking about this here: https://www.slideshare.net/emily_greer/dont-call-them-whales... I share your moral intuitions about exploiting whales if whales…

Right, but I don’t think 100/mo is quite what is considered a whale.

Just as in casino gambling, where I believe the term came from, a whale is someone who throws a few hundred to several thousand into a game in a month, possibly in a large number of smaller transactions so they don’t even realize their running total. It’s the people for whom the “10’000 rubies for 49.99” in-app currency chests are meant for.

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