Monthly Fees are the Devil

Why do we pay monthly fees to play video games?

I posed this question to myself because I’ve played countless games that required additional fees in order to play, be it micro-transactions, monthly subscriptions or purchasable expansion packs, and I wondered why I ever did it in the first place. What, exactly, am I paying for? I thought about it, or rather “stewed” about it, for a few days and came to a few conclusions.

I’m not paying for the server.

I’m not paying for the server use because, honestly, that’s a really minimal expense for the company and no reason to charge $15 a month. However, I could see that argument being valid if, say, the fee was in the $5 or less range even though the company would, more than likely, still profit from their players monthly fees over server costs and maintenance. And really, we could just run our own servers if it is such a hassle that it requires $15 a month; this is something first person shooters have been doing for years and even some of them (most notably the Battlefield series) have offered free servers hosted by the game company itself.

I’m not paying for GMs or customer services.

Have we really gotten to the point that we are actively paying for customer support. I don’t mean paying more for a product because the company has better customer support. I mean, we are literally paying money directly to a company for the sole reason of receiving customer support. Customer support was just something, in the past, which you received simply for being a customer. It didn’t cost extra “monthly fees” to get decent customer support. I believe in this practice, so I do not pay for customer support directly and especially not on a monthly basis.

I pay monthly fees for new content.

When I lay down that $15 a month to play the game, that I’ve usually already paid for (that is, $50 for the game itself), I’m paying the game company in advance for future content, plain and simple. As you can see above, the only logical thing remaining that my $15 is going towards is new content. I’m paying to keep the development team working on adding new things for me to do in the game world. This brings us to the major flaw in the system.

What if I don’t want the new content? What if I just want to play the content I already paid for?

Simply, you can’t. You paid $50 (new) for the game and one would assume you can play that content right now since you, well, paid for it. That’s not the case. Instead you must pay $15 a month to play the content you already paid for. Fine, many gamers understand that it does cost a pretty penny to keep the development team chugging along making new content. So, under the assumption we are paying for new content (to come in the near future) we quietly pay the $15 a month.

But what happens when that content never comes? Or gets delayed for months? Do we get a refund? We were “promised” new content this month, so logically, I would assume if it doesn’t come for 3 months that 2 of those months would be free right? Since I’m paying for new content and you failed to deliver, right?

The answer: No.

Hmm, that just doesn’t seem right to me. I assumed we (me and the company) had an understanding in this arrangement. I pay you now, you deliver later. That’s a pretty straightforward business deal but the games aren’t keeping up their end of the bargain. How do they get away with this? Any other company would be up to their eyeballs in lawsuits from disgruntled games. One answer: EULA and TOS agreements. The gamer is, more or less, forced to forfeit all claims to that payment and the game company doesn’t ever have to actually deliver their “promised content”. That’s a rather . . . shitty . . . deal, if you ask me. Hell, half of the time the game isn’t even that fun but I continue to play based on that promise, that in the future your game will have some kick-ass new content to do.

And this is the system that has been adopted and perfected by many companies; including huge headliners like SOE and Blizzard (although SOE’s newest project is free to pay with micro-transactions so at least they are trying to improve). They lead you along with empty promises, which they are not legally bound to, and force you to continuously pay for game, digital content, you already paid for (in the case of monthly fees, paid for multiple times). For an analogy, imagine you purchased a CD online for $15 and then were charged every time you listened to song because the band’s next CD will be free to you. However, it takes the band 6 months to get the CD out and in that time you have paid 10 times that amount you would have paid for just a new CD. It’s a way to swindle more money out of people without them realizing it.

For example, my wife and I just recently decided to figure out just how much we paid to play World of Warcraft. We each played for roughly 2 years and bought the original game and the expansion pack. The total cost of playing WoW for two years for two people was . . . approximately $800. When I first saw that figure I almost crapped my pants. I couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t possible I paid almost a grand to play one video game. But it is true; I funneled over $800 to World of Warcraft and Blizzard over the course of 2 years just to play their game. Now, one would think that after having paid that much money I would be able to continue to play the game I’ve already paid $800 for, but no. I’ve stopped paying the fee so I can’t play my game anymore. I was renting the game, I did not own it, and that’s a distinct many gamers overlook and don’t understand. It is also that ignorance that keeps this system afloat. If gamers figured out just how much they were paying for these games, I don’t think they would be too thrilled about it, and they would definitely demand more content for their dollar.

The problem is the lack of new content implemented combined with the fact that you don’t actually “own” the game itself. You are renting the right to play the game. The cost is not equal to the rewards received. For example, World of Warcraft’s Burning Crusade expansion cost much more than anyone realized. Most gamers only see the $40 for the box copy. They didn’t see the 6 months of subscription fees they paid between content updates (the time between Naxxramas and Burning Crusade launch). The actual total cost most gamers paid for the Burning Crusade was closer to $130. Another thing to consider is the content released since the Burning Crusade expansion. There have been only 3 major content updates since the Burning Crusade; Skettis, Netherwing and Ogri’la, Zul’Aman, and Sunwell Offensive. I’m not counting the Arena updates because, honestly, how hard is it to reskin existing armor a different color and add one point to each stat for “new content”. It has been 1 year and 4 months since the Burning Crusade launch (give or take a few days). So, for 3 new dungeons and a handful of new grinding quests the loyal WoW gamer paid $225 in subscription fees. Ask yourself; was the new content worth that much money? I’ll be nice and assume that, despite my earlier claims, $5 of that fee goes to cover customer support and servers. That still means the post-Burning Crusade content cost $150, is that still worth it? My response, and my guess at what most of the WoW players reading this are thinking right now, “Hell, no!”

But there are companies that do release content in a decently timely manner that does almost justify the monthly fees. Lord of the Rings Online has an option to pay $200 for a lifetime subscription (which after looking at my $800 WoW bill seems like a steal to me now). They also have released several content updates in the form of “books” which add a good chunk of content free and within a reasonable amount of time (2-3 months). City of Heroes/Villains (CoX) has released 12 updates in 4 years which comes to 1 expansion every 3 months or $45 an expansion (in monthly fees). That, to me, isn’t so bad since it is about the average price for a new game and/or purchasable expansion from other games.

So, where does this bring us?

Well, I can’t say pay-to-play systems are inherently bad, nor do I think they have no place in the gaming world. They work, sometimes, or at least in theory they do. But there is one thing that must be constant that isn’t in most situations: continuous, quality, sizable new content updates on a monthly or bi-monthly basis to justify the cost of playing. This is where most games are failing. There is not enough significant content updates to coincide with the vast amounts of revenue pouring into these games. Blizzard posted its first billion dollar profit recently, so why have we received only one major expansion in 4 years? And we had to pay for it on top of subscription fees! Besides, how much “new content” was released outside of the Burning Crusade? About 8 dungeons, a plethora a grind quests, and a number of new areas I can count on one hand? Why wasn’t Burning Crusade free? It’s not a stand-alone game, which excuses City of Villains and the Guild Wars expansions, so you can’t argue you need to charge people to “start up” the game. Blizzard is charging current players more money for content they technically have already paid for.

I don’t understand why gamers haven’t risen up against these companies and made them change their systems. I think it may have to do with the fact they are addicted to the games themselves, since that’s the only logical explanation an intelligent person would continue to do this. I know, I was definitely addicted to WoW, but that’s a different discussion altogether. I think there needs to be change, and it needs to happen now. It is sad when the industry is dominated by a game that does not deliver new content to its players and the others that do deliver are marginalized in the shadow of the giant.

I blame game journalists.