So ESO is going B2P (pending what the cash shop contains, but I doubt they are going to sell you hotbars or guns out of planes), which is of some interest to me. While I wasn’t in love with ESO after the first zone, it’s not a game I hated either, and so being able to fire it up and check it out, without it reeking of the usual stench of a F2P MMO, has my interest.
Two questions though.
What exactly is the B2P model going to be? It can’t be the failed GW2 model, where (at least while I kept my eye on the game) spending extra was borderline pointless (crappy looking fluff and nothing else). I think, if they can pull it off, having $5-$10 DLC ‘mission packs’ ala Payday 2 would work for them, but only if the quality was high and the release pace was decent. If it’s one bleh pack every six months, that’s not going to work.
How much better is ESO today than it was in the first month or so of release? If it’s generally the same game, that’s not good. If its far closer to the game most of us wanted it to be (again, multiplayer Skyrim or something at least close), that would be great. If I can play a little ESO with a few friends whenever we want, tossing the devs a five or ten every month or two, I could see that working.
Hardcore Casual 
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It is a much better game now than it was at release. It fixed most of it issues i nthe first few months then went on to expand the game, They added a new high end group zone, some 12 man content and a 4 man “heroes defense” like dungeon. There is an actual PvE endgame now.
Dungeons got some repeatability, they scale to the groups leader level and have some sort of daily “pledge” reward with a faction that unlocks passives as you work with them. They also have a hard mode now for extra challenge.
PvP is the only aspect that is mostly unchanged aside from the removal of the forward camps. It’s a bit of a mess right now. Very fun when it works, but some exploits and player behaviour get in the way some times.
There is an upcoming patch, 1.6, adding the champion system (semi horizontal, semi vertical progression system similar to perks in skyrim), it will also add some player driven content in the form of the Justice system (stealing, pickpocketing and murdering inncocents or playing a guard to prevent it)
PvP wise, there is a revamp of most abilities and how buffs stack to make it more “sane”. It also adds on the ongoing effort of balancing stamina and magicka builds by adding stamina oriented morphs to class abilities (exclusively magicka before)
It also will finally remove the aoe target cap that has ruined PvP since months, and in that sense is kind of a jesus patch.
While I’ve been subed since launch because I’ve enjoyed what the game offered, in my opinion, it is at this point worth a sub for non fanboys. Even more after 1.6 hits. We’ve seen an increase in population jsut at the mere hype of that patch.
On a side note, the move to b2p is a huge mistake.
I’m glad it makes you reconsider the game, but it really sucks for those who are current players.
A good chunk of the community is really unhappy with what is felt like both a mistake and a slap to the face of current customers. It’s once again a case of milking early adopters until they switch to a cash grab with console players and f2p whales.
Agreed with all of the above. They seem to be going out of their way to keep the nickel-and-diming to cosmetics and focus on selling new zone/quest packs via big DLC-like crown sales.
My own brief interest in it is dwindling, but the game definitely didn’t have to throw in the towel and go B2P. However, there is that console release thing; it might have been some politics with Microsoft and XBox Gold fees that pushed it over the edge.
Well yeah, for now it’s “fine”, but we all know that as soon as you introduce a cashh shop, it’s the begining of the end. The model just doesn’t work without eventually breaking the game.
And I doubt they can produce DLCs fast enough to compensate for the lack of subscription on the long run.
As you said, this is mostly to make a cash grab with the console version.
Hi, do you still remember August 21st, 2013 at 12:15 pm, when you said that F2P is dead because ESO returns the genre “to the model that makes sense for players AND dev of good MMOs” and I told you that you were as wrong as you could possibly be and ESO would eventually be F2P game as well, because it isn’t WOW? In other words, do you remember when you were wrong and I was right once again?
Hear, Hear. $60 price tag is now part of the F2P basket. Just comes to show that the word “Free” in F2P has no other meaning than to catch people’s attention.
I think the argument here is more that f2p and b2p are essentialy the same business model, except that with b2p you pay for the right of being milked by a cash shop.
It’s almost like that quote contains the words “good MMOs”, doesn’t it? Really wish we had a recently released good MMO that was successful to prove my point, but I just can’t think of one, and the landslide of successful F2P MMOs is crushing me right now.
Back to your cave you go.
Yes, of course, I forgot; ESO was the new subscription-based sweet baby Jesus when it was released but now as it’s turning into F2P game it’s a POS. The usual mantra here.
“While I wasn’t in love with ESO after the first zone, it’s not a game I hated either”
You’re really good at this.
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I think it is a much better game than what it was on release. I played for the first month on release, after buying the Imperial Edition for the statue. There were entirely too many bugs to continue. Group phasing was messed up so you often could not see your groupmates. Lag was bad. There were teleport hacks everywhere. There was gold spam constantly. There was ability lag.
I returned about a month ago and most of that is fixed now, with the exception of a some lag in the PvP area at times and they have added a lot of content to the game.
I like how ESO does quests (fewer quests than WoW but the quests tend to take longer and are more involved). I am enjoying the combat system and the dungeons are fun. The game also has one of the best character building systems in the genre. I really love how you can be a sorcerer with a two-handed sword and leather armor if you want. Or a Dragon Knight with a healing staff. Lots of possibilities.