PBW server is back up.

farstryder · #1 December 3rd, 2003, 10:26 PM

totally right geo. i wouldn't pay to play if it was required. i'm not against making voluntary donations, mind you, but i don't think it right to follow in the steps of the big game companies. Shrapnel isn't like that, Malfador isn't like that, and PBW isn't like that. It'd be a sad day indeed when if ever we had to pay to play our dear old PBW games.

plus, there's the matter of implementation. how would you smoothly implement such a measure with so many games running at once. i can only imagine how many players would miss turns, drop out of games, and just generally be irked. one can only guess what a nightmare that would be for the admins, having to reset all the turns and such.

Finally, I'd be very very willing to wager that many of the current die-hard PBW players would migrate to other sites, and use them to organise their own PBEM games. I mean, PBEM wasn't that hard to do when the PBW server went down just a little while back.

geoschmo · #2 December 3rd, 2003, 10:29 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by farstryder:
I mean, PBEM wasn't that hard to do when the PBW server went down just a little while back.

Obviously you weren't running eight separate games like I was.

farstryder · #3 December 3rd, 2003, 10:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by geoschmo:

quote:
Originally posted by farstryder:
I mean, PBEM wasn't that hard to do when the PBW server went down just a little while back.

Obviously you weren't running eight separate games like I was.

well, speaking from a player's perspective, anyways.

geoschmo · #4 December 3rd, 2003, 10:46 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by farstryder:

quote:
Originally posted by geoschmo:

quote:
Originally posted by farstryder:
I mean, PBEM wasn't that hard to do when the PBW server went down just a little while back.

Obviously you weren't running eight separate games like I was.
well, speaking from a player's perspective, anyways.

And that's the truth. PBW has always been more of a service to the game owner then the players. When it's working correctly it makes running games a breeze. This means a game owner can run games he's not even in as a player. You can do that PBEM too, but it's not a lot of fun. And it means owners can run many games simultaneously, which means more opportunity for players to get into a game.

AMF · #5 December 3rd, 2003, 11:02 PM

I agree that making a mandatory fee for PBW is not the best solution. However, I also think that the current "advertising" for donations is not too strong. Why not just a nicely worded request at the front end that says, simply, "we'd really like it if you donated $1 each month to pay for this site. If you don't want to, ok, no problem."

It would sort of act like the donations box in the lobby of museums - you can get in free, but many people do donate becuase it's easy to do so and it's right there...you could even put a PayPal button right there, give it a little "donation box" with animation, yadda yadda yadda...Maybe even a graphic showing running donations, and deficits for the costs involved, so that when you got low on funds people would see that and get more excited about donating...I'm sure there are plenty of javaistas out there who could whip that code up in their sleep...

In any case, PBW is a wonderful service, and I will go right now and donate even more money to it. (But I'm buying a new house in the next week, so not much this time around...)

Thanks,

Alarik

farstryder · #6 December 3rd, 2003, 11:05 PM

check out Simtropolis for an excellent example of asking Users for donations. what i really like is how easy it is to donate, and the fact that they list out the costs and what they need. of course, they have about 18,000 registered Users, which is around half again as many people as have bought SEIV...

Fyron · #7 December 4th, 2003, 01:34 AM

Quote:

totally right geo. i wouldn't pay to play if it was required. i'm not against making voluntary donations, mind you, but i don't think it right to follow in the steps of the big game companies.

The big companies let you play MP for free, unless it is a MMORPG... Blizzard lets you play for free, using the MSN Gaming Zone thingie is free, using Gamespy is free, etc.

Quote:

of course, they have about 18,000 registered Users, which is around half again as many people as have bought SEIV...

SE4 Gold was said to have passed the $500,000 mark Last year some time. Not SE4, just Gold. 500,000 / 40 = 12500 Users that had purchased SE4 Gold about a year ago or whenever that statement was made. Now add more people that have bought it since then, and then all the people that bought SE4 original but never bought Gold (of which there are a relevent number of).

[ December 03, 2003, 23:37: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]