Ryzom

I am not sure exactly how many US dollars 18.99 Euros is, but I voted keep it the same. Having said that, I would gladly pay $25 (US) until the player base was large enough to cut the price a bit, if that could be done. Many of the previous posts have raved about what makes Ryzom such a wonderful game, and I would have to agree. It is a totally unique game. In the interim, I have joined WoW with some other Ryzom refugees, but quickly grew bored with the relentless grind. Surprisingly, what I missed the most about Ryzom during this time away was the peace and solitude of digging and chatting with friends in 2,3 or more windows (even missed the required blow up for chatting too long ).

I can't stress enough the maturity and kindness of the vast majority of the community, which is what ultimately made Ryzom the game I learned to love and miss so dearly.

I would suggest a two-pronged appraoch to marketing:
1) the obvious- advertise in the gaming mags, even before the game is open again, let the average gamer know of the coming event of Ryzom's re-opening.
2) advertise in "older" mags such as Discover, Time, Neewsweek, Playboy, Parenting, Popular Mechanics, etc. The majority of Ryzom gamers are in their mid 20's or older (in my opinion/understanding).

Someone had the (good) idea to make the Silan quests a bit more like the real thing on the ML, make the items useful and/or a little unique. If memory serves me correctly, the crafted items for the quests are just a source of income and not very useful. The reward items were the goal.

Silan is a great way to introduce players to the game, but pales in comparison to the mainland. Maybe the trial sub could allow a new player to visit the ML for a little while to really see what the game has to offer, but should not be available to anyone who has not reached at least level 15-20 in an offensive skill, or else they would not be able to travel much without a guard or two. However, sneaking is a very important skill to learn as well as fighting.

Someone asked if people would still play if we had to start all over again. For me the answer is yes. I started a couple alts, one was on the French server in Les Bannis and one was on Aris, which I left on Silan to visit there once in a while and help some noobs learn to love the game as I do. I would hate to lose my 3 "almost master" skills, but would hate to lose Ryzom even more.

petersk wrote:I am not sure exactly how many US dollars 18.99 Euros is, but I voted keep it the same. Having said that, I would gladly pay $25 (US) until the player base was large enough to cut the price a bit, if that could be done.

The question was if you´d pay £18.99 (UK Pounds not Euro!) which is the equivalent of €24 or US$38!!!
Way to much if you ask me, €15 (ca. £12 /$24) for a monthly subscription would be a reasonable price, i´d be grateful for a more competitive one, though!

symolan wrote:[...]

I am quite convinced that it is not feasible to start a marketing-campaign that is so specific to work on the segments some pointed out in previous posts. e.g. house-wives: get banners on sites for pregnant women or what? You just loose to much by such kind of advertising. You still need to ad on the usual mmo sites. [...]

It has been successfully done before. SWG advertised the rich life for woman players, from being a dancer spending hours in cantinas and talking to the customers you healed by your art to fashion creators, cooking tasty, useful in battle and at the same time amusing yummy foods. From building fine arts exhibitions to organising complex player cities. Fishing or milking animals for the fun of it was a successful idea back then and now when LotrO reimplemented fishing it proved successful again. SWG had the largest female population in the MMO history and before they changed the game designer and the policy over all here were articles in gaming magazines about this part of the market that was (finally) into gaming in a world dominated by the boy-player. And we are talking here about a game working years before Ryzom was released. In all these years women got dominating the web design, blog life - MM is not about "mainly men" anymore.

symolan wrote: To me the solution would be to get a slice even of the wow-players (just a slice, mind). And I think there is a way to do this. Ryzom is not simply too complicated, it is just too different at the beginning to what these people know. One who is used to quests just laughs seeing the first missions in ryzom. the "quests" in ryzom are mostly just terrible. still remember the pain of fameing... this is a kind of grinding far worse than simple leveling as there is no danger to it at all.

From my recruiting experience Ryzom becomes complicated mostly after the average player gets close or even masters. At that point he has to have the imagination and will to use his brains to see the richness of the world around him. The average boy-ish player will ask about ten times "what do I do now" then cancels subscription, the typical Ryzom customer will start helping trecks around, plan for his next digging adventures, start to study patterns for best ways to get supremes or get into military organising. I see some big difference in expectations and way to look to a gaming environment here.

symolan wrote: However, I think that one should improve starter quests so that the players of other mmo's feel at home in ryzom a bit faster. Then these quests should lead those players to feel what is actually different and better in ryzom than in other mmo's. And there are a lot of things that are actually better.

Starter quests were lieing big time the normal player. As a two years long recruiter can say it was quite embarrassing to explain them all the time the game is _not_ what they see on the new newbie island. The new island brought in some players ... it's a difficult choice to decide if they did more good or more bad to the game overall. Honestly I don't think this can be decided unless one has the statistical data in hand.

Actually Ryzom was created asuming there will be constant CSR driven events. Of course this is splendid but also darn expensive...

symolan wrote: have you ever seen a newb that harvested/crafted for a while (the first few hours are hard, I mean one that did it for some days) quit soon after? Within our guild none who started harvesting/crafting in earnest came close to quitting the game for real.

Weird, we even had a general policy of recruiting only people who enjoyed digging and/or crafting because as a general rule these were those who had best chance to stay in game. On the island (old one or new one the same) you could see from a glance when somebody enjoys the dig/craft system or not.

symolan wrote:[...}So even a silan-player does win a real advantage by something he crafted on his own and thus is lead to one of the fortes of the game.

There was a lot of advantage to use crafted stuff instead of NPC on the island. Had a stable character there and I know the huge advantage to wear jewels/armor/a crafted weapon. Now if they expected that crafted gear make them kill all then I rather see those expecting it not the typical customer of Ryzom.

symolan wrote:Easiest to win are crafters I think. Coz the class-less crafting system is just hot. You want to win them, then show them how crafting really works at the beginning. I know there are crafting quests in silan. They too are pointless. What about more sophisticated crafting-quests showing why the crafting system is so much better than in any other game (... that I played till now. Is there another?) Nowadays the quest is: make ten of this and drop at npc. That does not show that things can be crafted in a million varieties. Would be lots better to show silan-players how to craft armour in different styles and colours so that they really can start to individualize their char early on.

SWG crafting system was in some respects better, I've heard of another game (a very bad graphically one - can't remember the name now) with a great crafting system as well.

But the problem we face here is a word that comes back a lot of time: quests. Ryzom is not quest based game. You can make it of course, but it won't be very different from making it a fps in my opinion. Quests as tutorial are fine but at the same time they lie about the real way the game works. Learning from other players is extremely important in the way the community works. ... Very hard to judge where and when teach people to play and mostly how to use/avoid quests.

Now what can be improved is the way pvp works (because it's a superior way to use the complex system of skills), and boost the craft system with a good way to commercialise the products (the existing one is pittyful at best), invest in email/forums because this community is a lot about chatting and of course have in mind a possible implementation of player house/cities - instantiation could be taken into consideration.

But coming back to marketing, before Ryzom SWG worked on 15+ servers, had a huge capital, boasted with 2 million users, had player housing (best ever), complex craft system, complex harvesting system, well defined pvp... and it didn't make it. It didn't make enough money to keep it working as it was. That's fact, and that's why we discussing marketing system rather than developping Ryzom2.

iphdrunk wrote:This is what they tried with Cho sahrd and *failed miserably*

It could've worked if they hadn't forgotten the most important element, advertising. Many do love the 'fresh start' effect, but that effect is only going to last for a month at most, so you'd need to massively advertise the (re)launch date for like 3 months prior.

But even if the new owners did want to go for that effect, they could archieve the same by just locking all the old characters for the first month. (That I wouldn't mind at all, it may even be fun and interesting.) There's never a good reason for a wipe.

As for those longing back to the community-building harsh environments of the old days (which includes myself), that can be accomplished much more permanently by simply scaling up the difficulty. Bringing back kitin patrols is a good start.

this all depends if we are just bringing back the game or if we are suggesting a long standing price. im sure a lot of people would donate way more than 18.99 to get ryzom back and running... set up an official spot to donate and watch the money pour in... to ask for 18.99 or more a month.. is a bad idea.. as many have said before.. there will be no growth.. why would someone switch to ryzom when thy know little about it and it costs more than some others...this is the main problem ryzom has struggled.. we need advertising and some way of getting people excited and interested.. i think the price has a lot to do with it.. i know a lot of people who cant even afford $14.99 or whatever it was.. obviously ryzom needs a certain amount to continue running and prosper so i wouldnt suggest it being free at all.

theres has to be a common ground and something thats fair but allows ryzom to grow.

xl2i5 wrote:im sure a lot of people would donate way more than 18.99 to get ryzom back and running... set up an official spot to donate and watch the money pour in...

1. Do that.

2. Set up an optional higher subscription. No benefits, just a way for people to continuously provide extra financial support if they want to and can afford it.

3. Advertise and market to the correct audiences.

katriell wrote:just a way for people to continuously provide extra financial support

There were already ways to do this:
1. Keep your subscription on monthly payments.
2. Pay subscriptions for multiple accounts.

sidusar wrote:There were already ways to do this:
1. Keep your subscription on monthly payments.
2. Pay subscriptions for multiple accounts.

Good point. xD

arfindel wrote:It has been successfully done before. SWG advertised the rich life for woman players, from being a dancer spending hours in cantinas and talking to the customers you healed by your art to fashion creators, cooking tasty, useful in battle and at the same time amusing yummy foods.

didn't want to say that it was impossible. I just assumed that resources will be (very) limited and was worried about stray losses (is that the word for german "streuverlust"?) in such marketing campaigns. That would also worry me if ads were done in major print products. such ads are terrible expensive and I doubt that pockets are full like the wow-ones.

arfindel wrote:From my recruiting experience Ryzom becomes complicated mostly after the average player gets close or even masters. At that point he has to have the imagination and will to use his brains to see the richness of the world around him.

Certainly true. Thats why I think it important that players are shown the fortes on silan already. Get them addicted to harvesting/crafting early on. I guess you are not able to show quest based that helping people will be the most fun part later on (want to trek again...).

arfindel wrote:There was a lot of advantage to use crafted stuff instead of NPC on the island. Had a stable character there and I know the huge advantage to wear jewels/armor/a crafted weapon.

sure, but that is something I realised way after leaving silan.

arfindel wrote:But the problem we face here is a word that comes back a lot of time: quests. Ryzom is not quest based game.

don't want to have ryzom turned to a quest game. far from it. just thought about a way to take the mainstream-mmo player from point A (quest based) to B (sandbox style) by showing them in silan-quests how he will be able to spend his time on ML.

arfindel wrote:But coming back to marketing, before Ryzom SWG worked on 15+ servers, had a huge capital, boasted with 2 million users, had player housing (best ever), complex craft system, complex harvesting system, well defined pvp... and it didn't make it. It didn't make enough money to keep it working as it was. That's fact, and that's why we discussing marketing system rather than developping Ryzom2.

don't know the exact story of SWG. but how is this possible? 2 million users paying 10$ or something a month is actually quite a nice cash flow...

regarding marketing: I somehow feel that resources will once more be very limited and thorough marketing campaigns do cost a lot. So, it would be useful to get the new players addicted as soon as they appear on Silan. To decide on this, one would need to know the data: how many trial accounts quit after what time? After what time period did new subscribers quit and what was the percentage of quitters? If this percentage was too high (I guess you could benchmark that to other mmo's) you would need to change something for the starters. If this percentage was good, spend more money on marketing. (some should be spent anyway)

btw: I do not want to alienate the new honoured owners of the game, but from a marketing perspective it might have been an idea to make just a tiny comment after re-opening the forums. Kind of "Dear homins. The best of worlds will be available again soon. Start spreading the word." I know something along these lines is on, but not in the forums...

hoops, just saw boroshis post. so the btw is cancelled...

embrel
leanon

symolan wrote: don't know the exact story of SWG. but how is this possible? 2 million users paying 10$ or something a month is actually quite a nice cash flow...

SWG had in some ways the opposite problem Ryzom had. I mean while Ryzom was built on scarce resources SWG was built on huge capital.
So they made an awesome big world (5 planets, satellites etc), hugely resource consumming freedom of player housing, cities, vendors, CSR teams for 15 servers (they were lousy, but still working for money), good connection for all these servers, aso, aso.

Now a business not only has to be positive in numbers but also pay back the initial investment. With all huge success SWG didn't pay back at a fast enough pace, or - at any rate - at the pace WoW showed possible for a game. And corporate investors are always the worst because they are not people involved with that precise business, but only with the revenue it generates.

On top of that was Sony brand which is renown for their "respect" towards customers. That's, in short, how a niche game became a vulgar fps and lost 3/4 if not more of the player base.

I belive from both SWG and Ryzom previous failures there are things we should learn, in "we" as current Ryzom makers not us, the players.

symolan wrote: regarding marketing: I somehow feel that resources will once more be very limited and thorough marketing campaigns do cost a lot.

This depends a lot on whom is paying. For Gameforge, we like it or not, a web ad campaign was almost for free. I have personally not the slightest idea what are the new owners able to pay. WHat I know is they auctionned a considerable price for Ryzom that's why I hope they would want to see those money put to work.

One way to cheaply advertise is have game opened, or beta opened so that word passes from people to people. A working game advertises itself better than a closed future release, that's what all game makers know when they give keys to full of bugs betas.

ANother idea about advertising for free is have a newbie island with some of the hidden landscapes of the game to give people a target. Have a glimpse at the underworld, never mind you get killed in seconds when you walk 10 meters, have a glimpse at some scenery from the desert etc. Give people a reason why they should learn a difficult game and work a slow levelling curve up. Maybe open up only the free trial for some months, give imagination some food.

symolan wrote: So, it would be useful to get the new players addicted as soon as they appear on Silan. To decide on this, one would need to know the data: how many trial accounts quit after what time? After what time period did new subscribers quit and what was the percentage of quitters? If this percentage was too high (I guess you could benchmark that to other mmo's) you would need to change something for the starters. If this percentage was good, spend more money on marketing. (some should be spent anyway)

Biggest problem is there are probably only 3-4 other similar games, one is SWG who won't give away data, another is Horizon which is not very successful, has wonderful craft, horrible graphics. So comparizon is not quite available.

My opinion is most people left game after reaching mainland, but again the island addressed a wrong player base who was strongly disappointed when reaching mainland where there was no quest to lead them by the hand. Of course I might be mistaken...
It's nothing wrong to love quests, but Ryzom player base generally doesn't need them to be happy while quest lovers feel lost, bored etc.

By the way, a maybe efficient way to address typical ryzom player base might be a thick good game printed/download/CD manual.
And a second way to make the game more expensive without telling so (even if I would not dare to codnemn the company for doing so) is to limit the number of masters one can have and the number of characters one can build.
On the community side one can take the countermeasure to emphasize the anti-bot policy.