2014 Membership - Update from Smed

"Hi everyone,

Thanks for the feedback. We listened.

Here are the basics of our revised plan. Please note - we have not had the time to do estimates of the work involved, and also we're continuing to listen. so this isn't baked just yet. Do not expect that this is all going to happen immediately. We plain don't know yet. we're doing that meeting tmw.

1) We're lowering the price of All Access to $14.99
2) We're going to make it so every subscriber to all our PC games an all access member. Basically there will be one SOE membership for our PC games. Please note there are some minor restrictions around our kids titles (simply put - if you're a 12 year old who signed up for FR you won't have access to the adult games so we'll likely leave the lower priced kids offerings as separate subscriptions for under 12 for the same low prices).
3) We're keeping the 500 SC included with the subscription instead of going to the "pick an item" system. We heard you. You didn't like the change. The only change we are making is that we're now going to make you claim it monthly. You can still hoard it though I realize this is a bit of a pain but honestly it's the best compromise we could come up with that solves the problems I mentioned in the other thread.
4) we are going to be giving our members a 10% discount in our marketplaces.
5) European players - we have an idea on how to include you in this but we need to discuss with our partners.We have a pretty good idea on this though. give us a bit of time to suss this out.
6) Nothing is changing with Player Studio items - you'll still be able to buy them with your 500SC.
7) Console titles - you'll notice I only mentioned the PC titles. Our goal is to include the PS3 and PS4 games that we have, but I want to be up front and say that isn't a done deal.

In a nutshell that's where our head is at.

As always your feedback is welcomed. Please do us a big favor and carefully think about #3. Our goal is to give you more value in the subscription to make it more attractive and making it simpler in the process.
I really feel like we're making a good decision going this route. It makes things simpler and gives more value to our players.

Thanks

Smed"

Originally posted here: http://www.reddit.com/r/Planetside/comments/1ulcav/moving_forward_with_subscription_plan_changes/------
* Please keep all discussion regarding the PlanetSide 2 Premium Membership changes to this thread, so we can easily monitor all feedback. Thank you in advance!

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"When I read through all the posts here and on our forums, it never ceases to amaze me how people can think we're just money grubbing jerks because we're trying to make money.

I can tell you from the bottom of my heart that's just not how we think. Most people I know in the games business are in it because there is literally nothing else they want to do ever. From the time I was in high school I knew that's what I wanted to do. The same is true for a lot of people here at SOE and around the industry.

Obviously one of our goals as a corporation is most certainly profit. And yes, when you guys buy our stuff it makes us happy. But money has nothing to do with why it makes us happy. We're happy because you guys bought something we (or one of our other players made).

We're in the middle of developing Everquest Next Landmark (on schedule right now for end of this month). We rebooted the game 3 times. It was a massive delay and it hurt us financially. But it was the right thing to do for us, and for the industry. Most importantly you all are going to get to play something we're very proud of and we think is a whole lot of fun.

I believe a lot of this rhetoric is the result of us not being transparent enough, so we're going to change that. I want us to start explaining the "why" in the decisions we make.. particularly the financial ones.
The changes we originally proposed would not have made us more money than the previous plan. Even if some people cancelled, though to be honest we thought our plan was pretty darn awesome and you would love it.

The same is true for a lot of the decisions we make. We're trying to make life better for you, and yes.. for us too. But while some of those decisions are financially based, most aren't. It's usually something to clean up a tangled process or solve other problems.

So. how do we really feel about monetization?

Here it is.

We believe if we make great games, we'll make money.

In that order.

So I therefore am going to make it one of my personal missions to explain the thought process behind our business decisions. I want to be able to have an honest enough dialog that I can actually tell you "yeah this is important to our bottom line.. that's why we did it"... and have you at least not question whether that's the real reason. You may disagree with it, but at least you'll be able to make a reasonably informed judgement as to whether or not we're the greedy company some of you seem to think that we are, but at least you'll hear the why.

My hope is that by doing this we can at least get people to say "ok. that makes sense.. I don't love it but it makes sense and I'm ok with it". And if you don't, then we have work to do.

Smed"

Originally Posted here: http://www.reddit.com/r/Planetside/comments/1unhw1/philosophy/

Thanks Lupe, SOE might not think they've benefitted from anything here but you've earned the respect of all the PS2 players. Hope you come up with good ideas for when the PS4 guys come in.

From the other thread: Yes. Then I could still use MY 500 SC as I see fit.

sebo said: ↑

“if this was really a problem you could of just limited how many times the 500 sc will roll over..”

Would you have preferred that?

• 

Margaret "Luperza" Krohn

I am a europe player and would be really glad if we could get more attention and acces to player stuido stuff. I have been playing this game for like 2 months. Bought the full sub plan and SC for 300$. That's all

I like this Idea to maybe say let it roll over 2 months and you have to spend it which is 1000SC the cost of most items in the market such as helmets and most guns that are around 700 SC

That is a realy good news.
Also there is a another way you can go on with you change and wipe some of this negative reaction to it. Add to your shop an item that will give 1000cp and it will cost 700 sc. That way your plan will increase it's value and will help players upgrade some perks.
Anyway I am glad that you consider our feedback.

The all access subscription is enticing, I enjoyed playing DCUO and have plans to support EQ Next Landmark and the game that follows. I might have been one of the few that liked the idea of a pick one plan, the only caveat to that is I wanted to see some bundles like camos be applicable. Nice to see some positive reaction either way, not many companies are willing to listen even at the cost of their almighty dollar.

Thank you Smedly and SOE for listing to the players, I appreciate it, I will not cancel my sub, i will always support the subscription plan how it is.

Sounds like they listened... sounds good.

I have never held a premium membership, but I may have to look into the all access pass when EQN/EQNL comes out. I was not even considering it before reading this thread.

Good job SOE, this is a PR win I think.

PS: Just remember to keep using official forums for communication.

I'm giving that a like because it's really close to being decent but it's still an unwelcome limitation on what we already have.

It's cool that we can be subscribers across SoE titles and I'm sure it adds value to the package for most people.....myself included(not huge value but value)....but lets keep in mind that Sony stands to massively benefit from exposing us to more of its offerings so it's a wolf in sheep's clothing all day long. Win/Win though and I'm glad for it.

It's not cool that what I used to have is having a limitation placed on it......especially such a short duration....1 month, no thanks. 2 months, no thanks. 3 months, maybe! 4 months.......I can deal with that.

Is that similar to what i mentioned the other game is doing ?
The 500 SC stacks monthly but you need to log in once a month to claim it ?

But overall looking good .. As a non-member it is enticing

Edit: NVM it's been confirmed by Smed that its stacks monthly for as long as you wish, and can remain unspent .. Just need to claim it per month..

Thanks SOE for solving this this well.

I'm still probably gonna grab a membership, so all's well for me.

Exchanging SC for Certs is a big no-no.

I'm not interested in most other SOE games, I'm interested in a MMOFPS because of the FPS bit. The only other SOE game I've spent significant time on is Infantry Onine. Making this an All Access plan and giving me an opportunity to forget about what I'm paying for aren't making this much more appealing.

SOE is, at the moment, the only name in town when it comes to MMO action games that are truly MMO and are built with some quality. I feel like that's being used to exploit me, because monetization planning in earlier stages wasn't done very well or behaved differently than what was predicted. Not that I want to see the company do poorly, but why should I care?

@deggy
it's not such a gamebreaker, you will get to buy 1 gun or upgrade 1 perk per month, it will take about 2 years just to upgrade your perks. Anyway since the 500 sc are not going anywhere there is no need for that

1 yes
2 yes
3 yes reason why the change was going to affect player studio and soe was going to loose money from it.
4 yes allows people to buy stuff
5yes
6 yes
7 yes

Great change--and if you guys still are wary of the 500SC thing and the pressure it puts on, I, personally, would be perfectly fine with a limit on how many times it can be rolled back (twice, as in you can have no more than 1000 SC from the membership alone at any given time) as well as the monthly claimant thingie.

I'm confused. How is the 500SC/mo as it stands now, different from the 500SC/mo where you "have to claim it"?

Call me crazy, but I actually dislike the reversal on the redeem tokens. Basic economics here, if you can get an item for free 1/month, it actually puts downward pressure on the prices. Furthermore, you get a benefit in every game, not just one. They were offering a fantastic deal and the screaming minority (who are notorious for being unable to do math) aborted a fantastic pro-consumer change. I was already a member, so I am still happy this is a net positive change for no increase in cost, but my god are people stupid. I'm not buying more SC for every game I play casually, and they were going to give us an ability to actually get items for more than one game, making that all access pass all the more valuable... I feel robbed of the excitement the original notice and first update offered me by shortsighted pricks.

Means you have to log in regularly to gain the membership, whereas it won't be sitting on accounts where they wouldn't be able to get the SC back.