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Can a Free Online Game Make Money?
Zenithal asks: "I've been slowly and silently developing an online game for quite some time now, and I'd like very much for it to be free. The problem is that the game will require several servers and lots of bandwidth if it is at all successful. For now my workplace is willing to sponser my needs, but if things ever picked up it would start costing serious money to run. What I'm wondering is, how can I make any money to maintain the game universe and possibly maybe even get cash for a few beer? I know the potential is there to sell box versions and manuals, but that just doesn't seem realistic. Any ideas Slashdot?" If you aren't willing to sell the game, then maybe you can sell things about the game to fund its further development. Of course, it goes without saying that the game will have to be good, so one of the first things one should do is get a good core group out there to test it. Also, if any game like this is to succeed, it should not ignore whatever community that happens to develop around it. I know something like this is unlikely, but if it were to happen, what would you do to get it started?
There are a few gotchas with this:
You're asking people to fork over a monthly subscription fee for the privilege of playing in your shard/continent/what-have-you. Your world had better be a lot more fun than the free alternatives that others will set up. You can do this; you just have to be willing to support several *good* full-time artists and game designers to build, maintain, and continually improve the universe that your players will be logging into.
Collaborative efforts could in theory compete with this, but in practice *good* artists and game designers who can work full-time (read: have maintaining the world as their paid day-job) can almost certainly provide a richer environment than a patchwork of volunteers could (this is art, not software).
If you're trying to get Joe Teenager to install and use your software, you're going to need a nice, packaged box with a good manual, and a fully-staffed tech support pool. What the user pays for when they buy the box is the ability to call you and have you hand-hold them through installing the software and connecting to your servers. You're *going* to have to sink a large amount of money and manpower into the division that handles this - if you have crappy support, most of your users will give up, and spread the word that your boxed software was impossible to use. Your servers will sit idle, and you'll lose a lot of money.
Subscription to your service should be optional, not mandadory. Ideally, you'd have about three versions of the box on the shelves, with different price tags - one that's just the client (with support for using the client), one that's a client bundled with a subscription to your service (with support for both), and one that's the client and _server_ with support for maintaining the server (charge them through the nose for this, because they're going to be *using* this tech support).
You don't have to be in control of the project itself, but you do have to have a paid team working on the software. This lets you address bugs customers find promptly (which you'll need early-on if you want to *keep* the customers), and continue to tweak the install and server selection routines (which you'll need to keep making more idiot-proof, and adapt to new server/client versions), and add features to the software that would help you make a more interesting game world.
All of this will cost a *vast* amount of money to set up, but will have a sustainable revenue stream coming back in. You'd have to do most of this regardless of whether the game was open or closed. Opening it means you save a bit on maintaining the software (because others' improvements and bug fixes are folded in for you), but forces you to work harder making your game world attractive (because anyone can set up their own world to compete with you).
Technical edges don't last past release anyways, so as far as I can tell you'd lose nothing by making the software itself Open or Free. Your IP is in the artwork and world design.
DroidArena is a free online game just starting up with several thousand users. Right now, the site operator is having difficulty making ends meet, but it will be an interesting case to see if he can break even or make money down the road.
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If you ask me, you're saying 'how can I give something away to people at no cost when it costs me money to do'.
You can't.
The only realistic model is to have people pay to play.
One new discovery of mine is the Java based massively, multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), Runescape.
It's Java based and it's free. There is a small download but you can pretty much play it anywhere as long as you have a Java enabled browser. Currently, Runescape uses three servers and their FAQ says it costs $50,000 a year to run the game. I've been playing for two weeks and the most people I've seen on Runescape at one time is ~800 per server (2500 total). The game is less than a year old and the website says it is still in beta. The company who develops Runescape is Jagex. They're probably the best ones to ask this question because Runescape is one of the most popular, free MMORPGs available today.
- rk
Rangers Lead the Way!
Hell yeah, advertising works wonders. The incredibly popular NeoPets game uses a variety of advertisements to make money.
Often they have various real life products for sale within the game world, that people can use. They also offer people game money for opting in to get tons of spam. Visit Cartoon Network, here's a hundred units of currency. Sign up for this new auction site, here's some new attack for your little pet. Nominate someone to run the Olympic torch for Coke, and here's some new Coke machine for your NeoHome. They've managed to create quite an inventive and cool game, despite the kiddie slant given to everything, and it's still entirely free. Millions of people play it, and they've managed to employ quite a few artists and coders off the advertising revenue and sales of shirts and the like.
A few years ago, the online game I help administrate was looking to go to a pay-for-play system. They had to scour through the database, removing references to various copyrights. They had to work out payment systems, worry about players actually being paying customers that they had an obligation to help, and various other worries. In the end, the administration at the time decided that it wasn't worth the hassle, and the game continues to remain free yet small to this day. We advertise the people who founded the game, who also provide bandwidth and the server space, but no money's moving around the game whatsoever except for a few donations from the players to the providers. Every few years, talk of it going to a pay format or being sold is kicked around, but I don't think that'll ever happen.
I hate advertising like most people around here, but to be honest, if you are wishing to have an online game make money without charging users a fee, then advertise.
It could be possible to include ads in text RPG scenarios:
You enter the orc lair kitchen. There are various cooking implements strewn about the walls. A can of cool, refreshing Fizzy(tm) soda.
HP: 13 % drink can
Ah, that cool, refreshing Fizzy(tm) soda has restored some of your endurance and has given you courage to attract many females of your race.
HP: 14 % go north
... and so on...
Graphic based games could incorporate logos, etc... Yes, it's sick, vile, and evil, but it does sometimes pay in the real world.
I donate all spillover Karma to the charity of my choice... Ada was still a babe despite what people may say...