Make Arma series under subscription ?

[EricM]

This may sound a bit provocative, but don't you believe that BIS should somewhat change their business model and make the Arma series somewhat "under subscription" à la World of Warcraft or EVE Online instead of trying to sell standard retail DVD every X years ?

I know there are psychological barriers and technical issues, but let's examine a couple of points :

First BIS is developping the same game since 2001, always refining, adding new features, improving it, patching, debugging etc... We will probably never have a totally different game, just a steady evolution/perfection of the ultimate military sandbox game in a perpetual "work in progress" state.

The series can count on a great community of fans that keep buying multiple copies of the game, playing, modding, supporting the game since 2001. So basically we fanboys already are on subscription, just not knowing it.

With each new generation of the game, the improved quality and complexity of the game makes it harder for modders to offer addons that can rival standard BIS model (islands, vehicles, characters, animations...). Only pros or very dedicated and talented modders with lots of time on their hand (semi-pros) will be able to keep up in the future.

From a business perspective (and for development planning) it's better to have a steady cash flow income instead of irregular sales that can be jeopardized at every new version of the game. With a subscription, BIS would have the resources and incentive to add little by little almost anything. Plus, BIS would control the distribution directly and get a bigger chunk of it.

From a marketing point of view, you don't have to market a totally new game every time and bother with new publishing contracts and PR. Just like WOW or EVE Online, you aknowledge that you are building on the same winning formula and regularly exanding the universe and possibilities, upgrading the graphics etc...

With its online coop campaign concept (quests ?), its huge and complex world (chernarus with its history), and its FPS/RTS/RPG/Persistent world features, Arma looks more and more like a modern military MMORPG.

So, next time (Arma 2 expansion/Arma3 ?) why not aknowledge all this and ask this community for a lower but steady fee (how much is to be discussed) for as long as they want, instead of a lump fee of from time to time ?

Those who eventually get bored won't waste much money, those who keep liking will support the game as long as it needs and as long as they want. In the end, if the game is good BIS would get much more money (see Blizzard revenues) and the users a better game.

The Question is : what if you stop "paying" ? I guess you should still be able to play offline and online with your friends, but you would be denied the access to BIS servers for updates and thus stuck at your current version number and hence only be able to play with people with the same version as your version "grow old".

What's your opinion on this ?

[arma2disapointed]

I´m republican hawknose.

[Mojo]

Interesting, but would BIS then need to house servers to keep the official servers up to date, like WoW?
Would they provided a subscription download, so that members who's dues were paid up, could download the patches, updates and even the full version of the game pre-patched?
Would there be a supported server list, hardware list, OS list?
Would the dedicated server crowd need to purchase rights for their version on the server?

While I find the concept pretty interesting, I think the logistics of it are too much to consider as realistic. BIS would need to create or significantly upgrade their network infrastructure to support the new system.

What do you do about those that would rather steal the subscriptions than pay, ala WoW?

Regardless of the results of a pol, I think that if BIS were to countenance this sort of business vertical, they'd have to increase so much of the overhead that they'd be operating in the red for at least the first few quarters. They'd need a war chest on hand to be able to retool.

Is BIS really focused upon the civilian market? It seem to me that there is a great deal more money to be made in government contracts, more stable an income, more stable a customer base.

I'll remain undecided for now, but I do think the idea is interesting.

[Ti0n3r]

No thanks. I would never subscribe to a game in the state Arma2 currently is in.

[wooly-back-jack]

I'd never subscribe to a game.

[Hoak]

Generally, no. What I think BI could do, that would net them more income is manage Mods content. The Mod support BI offers with its games is unprecidented, and not only makes difficult for them to create and sell compelling expansions for their games, it puts a bewildering volume of mods on servers, that can be off-putting to new players, or the player just looking for something familiar.

There are several ways that Mod content could be mananged -- some even could compensate the mod Developers, and done right would be a win/win/win scenario for BI, Mod Developers, and Fans... I for example would be willing to pay for professionally organized and deployed Mod content. A good content management plan, and deployment model could raise the quality of all mods and increase the collaboration between Mod Developers...

[HOPEnSPIRIT]

Not read all your post yet but from what I know of WOW this could work...

• Would generate income for them to work on patching, I wouldn't pay over £5 a month though.
• They would need a proper support area so bugs can be recorded efficiently (vBulletin Project Tools).
• Patching would have to be regular, WOW patch something every week or two, if you notice everytime we got a patch in ArmA it patched hundreds of things so it should be possible for a weekly update.
• Downloads of Updates would just replace the old version, so when a major release comes out say ArmA III looking that far ahead.
• Hosting always seems to be a problem, yes they could run some massive player servers like WOW do but I think it would be benefitial for them to rent us servers we can setup as we wish too.

Think all the stress of the past few months of Bugs alot of people including myself and BI Moderator have said some silly things, having proper support and weekly / bi-weekly patching even if it just patched one thing would be a step in the right direction and would calm the community.

[Llauma]

Well, that's assuming that BIS actually wants to continue this series. I guess they will put all their effort in carrier command. What will come after that I don't know. We can only hope they'll grow to a size where they can develope two games simultaniously. If not that I think we'll see a non military RPG after CC.

About the MMORPG idea. I'm not sure about it. I like the way it is now. If I want a good coop night I'll join a passworded server where I know I'll get it. I'd rather face AI's then thousands of noobs with no interest in the general mission. Keep on developing independant games and if I like them I'll buy them. The modding part of the game would also be doomed if it was became a MMORPG.

No thanks...

[Maddmatt]

No.

Perhaps they could make money selling several expansions. Considering that the game sold very well, I can see that happening. I'd pay for good content.

But I wouldn't pay a subscription for a game where much of my time with it will be spent modding it and playing offline, that's just nuts. Offline content is just as important for the game as online, would be ridiculous to have a subscription for that.

We don't need BIS to provide us with MP servers anyway.

[BangTail]

NO!

I am happy to support BIS with the initial 40 euros but there is NO way I would pay monthly. This series of games are a blank canvas and are made great by the community. BIS gets the money for providing the canvas, no doubt about that, but the true potential of the game will be realised (as always) by the community.

Eth