Would you pay an additional $5 a month to cut lag?

[C`gan]

This was brought up in Skype. Would you pay an additional $5 monthly per subscription to help alleviate lag problems in game?

[LOVWYRM]

yes- would do that- but it summs up if you have several subs^^

[Chasing]

This is an interesting idea, but I don't know if it would be beneficial overall.

My reasoning is as follows.

1. Existing and 'loyal' customers may quite happily stump up an extra $5 a month if they felt that it would make a direct improvement to the game.

2. $14.95 going to $19.95 per month puts Istaria well above the pricing range of other MMO's. This may have more of a negative effect on potential new players.

3. A % of the existing playerbase would either not be able to afford the additional cost, or would be resistant to a price increase.

Bear in mind here that the current trend is to switch to free to play models and generate revenue other ways (adverts, item shops for real money, basically the game is free but you pay for 'services' or 'upgrades').

Increasing a subscription model in price, which may be considered going against the market, is very risky.

4. Perhaps a subscription addon at $5 per month or similar to get bonus vault space or a higher spellbook cap might be a better way to go.

I'm not saying its a bad idea, I just don't know if it would help or not.

[Creme]

What would probably wind up happening is those on free accounts would still play free and gain the benefits. Or those free accounts would go to $5/mo and they may or may not decide to continuing playing.

Those with single subs might continue their subscriptions as is.

Those with multiple accounts, depending on how many, might wind up cancelling one or more of their accounts to keep their monthly outlay the same.

This could wind up with a revenue stream that's less than or the same as before; however it wouldn't wind up being the same number of subs, now all paying an extra $5. It would probably be less subs, paying $5 more and that might not be enough to cover whatever costs would need to be covered to fix the lag, in which case, the lag wouldn't be fixed and the game would now cost ~$20/mo per sub and no fix for the lag.

[Frith-Rae]

I voted no.

Istaria still being priced (for all game options) the equivalent of the "next gen" MMOs and all the newer ones is off for me. I don't feel it should be 14.95 in its current state a month. But I'm paying it.

I would not pay more. And noone else would pay 20 bucks a month for a slowly updated game when its more than every single other MMO out there (that manages to avoid the lag at 14.95, including games just as old as Istaria).

[Tullamore]

Perhaps, but, it depends exactly on what's meant by "lag." I have not personally experienced what I'd describe as "lag;" i.e., a noticeably slow frame-rate, jerky graphics, etc. What I've experienced (as have quite a few others) is way too many "crash-to-desktop" situations, along with having the game "not respond" during the occasional teleport or recall.

A slow frame-rate is annoying, but, having to re-load the game (and, occasionally, reboot my whole system to straighten everything out) is a major pain.

So, I'd pay if it'd fix the latter...since I haven't experienced the former, I'd have to say no.

[velveeta]

I voted no.

Istaria still being priced (for all game options) the equivalent of the "next gen" MMOs and all the newer ones is off for me. I don't feel it should be 14.95 in its current state a month. But I'm paying it.

I would not pay more. And noone else would pay 20 bucks a month for a slowly updated game when its more than every single other MMO out there (that manages to avoid the lag at 14.95, including games just as old as Istaria).

as much as i love horizons, i must agree with frith on this one....
horizons is much too expensive for its level of game play......
i gladly pay it, to prevent it from failing into oblivion, but i certainly could not afford or justify the additional expense for something that should be a standard part of gameplay, in my opinion....

[Ettanin]

I voted no, why?

Istaria is as expensive as WoW.
Blizzard manages to give a lag-free experience with $14.95 a month. So VI can do the same.

Also, Istaria is 8 years old and barely updated. It's too expensive already.

[Ettanin]

I voted no, why?

Istaria is as expensive as WoW.
Blizzard manages to give a lag-free experience with $14.95 a month. So VI can do the same.

I admit, the problem is that the netcode is optimized for 56k usage. (which i see in the effective throttle regardless whether i play on my 25m line or my 768k line, it's always 2kbyte to 4 kbyte/s sent by the server) Hence the higher latency as this type of stream is insufficient to cover all object locations at once. A rewrite may be needed.

[Andaras]

No!

I already support them with the 4 active (never canceled)
subs.

We already had this discussion with VI 2 years back when they
asked about raising the Monthly Sub from 12.95 to 15.95.
That increase I saw worthy, as it allowed them extra influx of
cash and put the sub cost to same as other games.

As it currently stands, do we really think increasing their revenues
would improve things? Would players be given _any_ sign of
appreciation for the added burden during a recession? If Istaria
cost more monthly than any other of the bigger games, how many
players do you suspect will come back?

To me it doesn't sound like the many struggling to pay for this now would
be able to remain, let alone those that left due to cash constraints
would be able to return. This idea reeks of "Killing the Golden Goose".

"The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through
your fingers" -- Princess Leia

Strictly my opinion, take it for what it's worth.

[Darkwing_Duck]

I agree with Andaras here. as I myself am a multiple sub holder, if the prices for each sub goes up $5.00 sadly financialy I`ll be forced to cancel several of my subs just so I can keep playing.

The lag really isn`t that bad. I`ve played games where the lags so bad I can`t even move your character. So I personaly can`t complain

[Abbie]

I must agree with the no sayers. Bringing Istaria up 5$ would make alot move to other games. If someone would pay more. Do a character slot upgrade and pay 4.95$ more each month, or merchandise setup to 9.95$.

Or another idea, make it possible to donate to VI, maybe via paypall ect......


Best Regards

[Nia]

I have two problems with this and Lovwyrm picked up on the first one straight away... I have *ten* gifted subs and am already paying waaaaaay too much to game. Add another fifty bucks to my monthly spend and it's just not going to happen... so I would just have to sit down and decide which plots to axe and there goes loss of revenue to Vi (not to mention the source of much fun and merriment to my Gnomian Master Builder self).

Secondly, who knows how much of the lag is due to my own hardware setup and not server-side? Get everyone paying another five bucks and man are Virtrium ever gonna cop it from anyone who gets any sort of lag due to any reason whatsoever... guilty by association.

I love ya', C`gan, but my wallet is starting to look at you askance...

Nia : Chronicles of the Twisted Guild : Blight Shard

[Dragonboy]

I voted no, why?

Istaria is as expensive as WoW.
Blizzard manages to give a lag-free experience with $14.95 a month. So VI can do the same.

Also, Istaria is 8 years old and barely updated. It's too expensive already.

While just as expensive you cannot compare a game with 14mil subs and Istaria. If Vitrium had over 200 mil per month from subs they could as well.

However back on topic... I voted a definite NO.
Firstly the only lag I have is when I join rift runs or join the fight when Amon comes online.
Secondly raising the bill with $5 a month is an awfull lot. About 1/3 increase in price is something I do not intend to pay.
Got 3 gifted acounts at the moment, do not want to pay for a 4th...

[Thicklesip]

I can barely justify $15 a month for my one sorry little plot-- and as the plot is the thing keeping me here, downgrading to a cheaper plot-less sub would be pointless for me. While one less player in the game might reduce the lag for everyone else, somehow I don't think that's what C`gan had in mind.

[AguaRush]

i vote no. istaria is already expensive as is.
its already an older game
*shrugs*

[Chasing]

Lets try a different way of looking at it

What would people feel they would be prepared to pay for with RL money (lets ignore what the actual sub cost is, maybe, could be for now).

For example
- A plot or lair
- Changing your characters look
- Character Renaming

etc.

[Ettanin]

Dudes, even the devs are [currently] against higher prices:

Not sure where this low on funds thing came from, but I would like to point out that this thread was NOT started by anyone here at Virtrium. Nor are we asking for more funding by existing players. Finally, there are no plans now or in the future to move to a micro-transaction game.

[Charys Stormchild]

Had to vote no, simple reason is I can't afford to pay more...having trouble enough paying bills as it is on a fixed, low income. I love the game, but higher prices might make it impossible for me to keep on subbing.