1) You say I don't acknowledge anyone else's arguments... But you and Hodapp are also doing this. I was DEBATING, in the DEBATE THREAD about Eliminate's pricing and whether this was was good or bad. If I wanted too, I don't even have to think any other position was right. That's the point of a debate. You try to convince people to think like you by presenting your points and then them presenting theirs. So far I DISAGREE with all your points, like you DISAGREE with mine, and if you don't disagree with them, you haven't stated otherwise. I apologize if you don't like that, but I'm not required to think what they're doing is the best move for the company. 2) The reason I keep changing is because you all keep suggesting new scenarios. I adjust according to those scenarios and say what I think will happen. I say it's free and it'll get bad reviews. You say people will still download it. OK then, well, if it's going to get ">100,000 downloads a day" how will they handle it? The entire topic of the thread was to debate the free price. All these issues affect it. Medical Care is not just a straight forward issue, neither is gay rights, and neither is this. They are all multifaceted. 3) That analogy is incorrect first of all, this is saying that Apple will lose money if they give out ">100,000" iPhones a day and then expect to make all their revenue back due to app purchases. Also, you're X's and Y's don't work. They make X amount of money by selling Y amount of games normally. Instead, they make X amount of money by HOPING people feel the need to rank up and buy Y amount of energy packs... Unless they were always planning on selling Eliminate for $0.99, this just doesn't add up. If they were... That's a COMPLETELY different story. 4) If printers are close to free, why the hell did I spend so much money on mine? Razors are free because they are cheap to make, I doubt Eliminate was cheap to make. We've already been through the Facebook Scenario. 5) As far as I can tell, Eliminate wasn't planning on going on sale for $50.00... A simple dollar fee would be just as effective as giving it away for free. Also, in this set-up they're making it so that there is STILL SOME THINGS YOU CANNOT DO IN THIS VERSION OF WOW THAT YOU MUST PAY FOR. NGmoco is charging people to do something they can already do! So far, I can't see a single time in that last post where your argument actually made sense...
Once again, Razor's are extremely cheap and always will be cheap, where work like this was selling for $9.99 before this. Secondly, Printers ARE NOT given away free, only cheaper. NGmoco could have made Eliminate cheaper and it would have worked. Once again, however, both these are flawed while comparing to Eliminate because Printers NEED ink to function, and razorblades NEED razors to function. While playing Eliminate, you do not NEED to buy Energy Packs to play the game. If you did, it would be a subscription service (another better idea).
Ok, so let's break it down to the crux of your argument, which I don't necessarily disagree with. 1) The first point isn't true. We've seen download numbers for the top paid apps and top free apps. Top free apps get TONS more downloads than top Paid apps. Can you acknowledge that as truth? They would necessarily see less downloads for a paid app than a free app. 2) The crux of your argument, which I am not necessarily arguing is this: Brazillian Rider: You don't think that enough people will pay for Ngmoco's model of in-app purchases, because they are not required to play the game. I think that's a fine belief. I don't know for sure what the conversion rates for the in-app purchasing is. All I know for sure is this: Ngmoco believes the conversion rates will be exceed the income for a $0.99 game, and they have researched this for 8 months, and have decades of gaming experience. The sum of your argument is that you think you know how the market will behave better than Ngmoco. I can't say for sure that you are wrong, but given the choice, I would side with ngmoco's instinct on this. arn
I'm probably not going to buy energy packs at all, seeing as how there will be in-app surveys which will give you energy, and usually those kinds of surveys only take a small amount of time.
this is the last we know about the energy renewal system http://toucharcade.com/2009/10/01/eliminate-hands-on-preview/ this was days or so before it was submitted to appl.
Then this thread is really stupid. This is just like when Eliminate was first demoed at the Apple event, and focused on DLC because it was being announced and everybody assumed that they would have to spend a fortune on DLC to play Eliminate. No one knows for sure yet, so just wait people.
Again, anyone who's played mob wars or any of the various zynga games on Facebook will find this familiar. This is almost exactly the same business model that they use. The app is free, but if you are the competitive or hardcore type, you can purchase "points" to recharge a stat faster, allowing you to play continuously for an extended period of time. They also had surveys from affiliate programs that you could participate in if you didn't want to spend real money for ingame points. It has been tremendously successful for the Facebook apps that implemented it properly, so if ngmoco did their research properly AND tested/balanced with a large enough population, this will be ridiculously successful....if the iDevice population thinks the same way as the Facebook population. There are a lot of variables to consider, but the business model itself is very viable. Regarding the D&D online....Guild Wars actually started the trend, at least on a large scale level, to the best of my knowledge...you had to pay for the game, but there was no monthly fee....I remember when they first started, everyone thought they were going to fail and that the business model wouldn't work...but so far they seem to be doing just fine. D&D online takes it one step further and offers the game itself for free....it's amazing to see the spending habits of people and how they determine when to spend. I think in other countries and markets, this model has existed longer though.
I'm sure if you play this game every day your going to pay 30 a month? If apple allows micro transactions in the pennies maybe. A micro payment of < 3 cents per day would far exceed the true value of this game. I consider the value < $10
You sir, obviously haven't read the thread. Stop cluttering this thread with your crap. And anyways, it is speculating but it isn't speculating like you are inferring (i.e. "I think Eliminate's armor will be pink with purple cherries!"). It's something that has basis and something that's extremely critical to NGmoco's business plan with Eliminate... I just don't understand why people can't read before posting stupid comments.
