Pachter Predicts $100 Xbox Live "Platinum" Membership

[Silver Patriot]

We get extra weapons and armor for money, it's called DLC for games and it's actually optional instead of forcing you to pay for something you might buy.

In an ideal world we'd have a teir specially for online playing that didn't have any of the fancy bells and whistles they harp on about that was either very cheap or free altogether. (which it SHOULD be seeing as game servers are being taken down without penalty and the entire mode works via P2P)

Of course MS knows if they do this they'd lose 95% of their Gold status clients overnight because all we want to do is just play the damn games online which has been a free capability of PCs for DECADES and on consoles since the Dreamcast back in the 90s.

*Cough*Teleplay Modem [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleplay_Modem]*Cough*

or better yet

*Hack*X Band [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XBand]*Dies*
[sub]"Nationwide play was available for $3.95 per hour for the duration of the long distance call, whereas playing against somebody in your local calling area was free."[/sub]

Another one of the serious problems, was "pulling" as it was termed, where if someone was losing a match, they could simply pull their phonecord out (or turn off their system) so they wouldn't take the loss, and the other player wouldn't get the win. In spite of complaints, the company could never find a way to discern who disconnected. Catapult was also unable to prevent harassment; there were no filters or privacy controls to prevent vulgar language and obscene mail. Details of this can be found here.

Some things never change.

 

[lapan]

I dont even like most of the features of the normal membership!

I would however pay for a cheaper membership which only enables online play.

 

[MetalMonkey74]

I love the fact that basic online play is free on the PS3, and with all the free stuff and advantages of the PSN+, i'm a happy bunny

 

[VanBasten]

$100 a year may seem steep, especially if you're in a twist over the jump to $60 for the Gold membership, but when you consider what else you could get with the eight bucks a month it works out to - a pack of smokes, a cheap lunch, three or four decent cups of coffee - it's hardly an outrageous sum.

These types of "well lets list what other irrelevant stuff costs that much" arguments to argue in favor of charging for stuff that really should be and always used to be free is stupid.

Ultimately the only thing that should matter is does what's being charged justify the price it's being charged. And charging for allowing the full functionality of games(multiplayer) is ridiculous, no matter how inexpensive it really is. And charging even more for it, and then justifying it with other useless features is even more ridiculous.

 

[Little Duck]

I'd go for it IF I got the specials AND free points to spend in the arcade and on add ons (more than what it would be worth otherwise) AND Membership for say 18 months.

 

[Something Amyss]

I had to double check the date. He predicts stuff like this every year or two.

 

[Susan Arendt]

Make Netflix searchable from my 360 and I might just pony up for a Platinum membership. Maybe. That's an awful lot of money, so whatever extras came with it would have to be really special. A free XBLA game every year, perhaps, or permanent discounts on all content.

 

[Deofuta]

If it offered services that I truley found usefull, then sure I would get it. Benifet to having a nice job I guess. 100 dolars a year aint bad at all. Would still be Cheaper than WoW.

 

[vikeif]

You know world of warcraft is 15 bucks an month, and people pay out the ass for that. At least xbox360 lets play all their mutli-player games (I'm guessing.) 8 bucks a month... Comparatively, not that bad really. I admit the price jump is a load of BS, but it's not like we don't already know that Microsoft does this kind of thing. As for Pachter, I'd rather wait for proof of the platinum shit from Microsoft, and who knows, it could end up being awesome. I mean, it's bound to happen sometime.

Really though, consider it is still cheaper per year than most things are per month, it's generally not gonna hurt a wallet to bad, but then again if you don't do online multi-player, I'd just wait for their specials or just stick to silver.

Edit: typos are tasty.

 

[Mista Miggins]

I would hate it if they went through with this. I have a big enough problem with having to buy half the game content for the game you spent $40 for. Now we have to spend $100 just to get the extra content. It's like what Nintendos' 'Pokemon' did with having to preorder your game for stuff you could never get otherwise.

 

[Andy Chalk]

Lots of entertaining reactions to all this. Thanks for that, guys.

But for the record, maybe a little more thought should be put into the matter before you start yelling. Many of you are treating this like it would be price increase. It won't. It's a new, higher-priced service tier. Not interested? Don't take it. Stick with Gold.

Second, the idea is that the Platinum membership would offer substantially more than Gold in order to justify the price. Halo armor is an example of something Microsoft could throw in as an easy incentive that's essentially cost-free. Nowhere did anyone suggest that people pay an extra $40 a year for horse armor.

The suggestion that Xbox Live should be free to begin with is fallacious. PC multiplayer is free, yes, but that's not what you're paying for with Xbox Live. You're paying for ease and convenience, exactly the same reasons so many prefer console gaming over PC. Wanting it both ways is human nature, I suppose, but it ain't gonna happen.

Call me crazy if you will, but I strongly suspect that a lot of the frustration and anger bubbling over in this thread is due largely to the fact that you all know it's going to happen, and many of you, deep down inside, know that you'll end up springing for it.

 

[ionveau]

You know world of warcraft is 15 bucks an month, and people pay out the ass for that.

As much sense as that makes on the surface, the problem with equating WoW to any other type of pay model is simply that WoW has so much content to the game, that you could literally put 200+ days (That's 4800 hours) of your time into it, and still not be 'on the top'. There really are no other games with that much content to them available on console.

And I'm not simply talking about gaining levels or anything, getting to level 80 in WoW is literally the 'learning' process. The real game opens up when you hit the max level, imo. The gear is the super pisser and ultimately the nexus that consumes all of your time, if you let it.

Yes you can put your whole life into the game and not get anywhere but same can be said about clicking a pen you can do it for days but your not getting more contant its just the same motion your doing over and over it offers enjoyable grind that people are happy to pay for well you have to be an MMO player to love wow

Anyway as my buddy always tell me Microsoft is greedy

 

[SelectivelyEvil13]

Call me crazy if you will, but I strongly suspect that a lot of the frustration and anger bubbling over in this thread is due largely to the fact that you all know it's going to happen, and many of you, deep down inside, know that you'll end up springing for it.

Ok, you're crazy . We've got a 360, PS3, original Xbox, PS1 and SNES, and 2 Gaming PC's in the house. We've never...once, paid for XBL. Once my brother and I built my roommates gaming PC, well, he's never turned his 360 on since.

EDIT: Btw Andy, I think another part of the anger/frustration is people view this as precedent setting. I could personally care less if you _really_ want to waste your money on a service 'you think you need'. The problem is, the message it sends to other companies, that they can milk their fanbase for such trivial services, as soon as they can get their fans to believe that they are incapable of getting the service on their own.

I have to agree on precedents; this type of pay model for Xbox Live is getting outrageous because they know that people will spring for something that is:
1) A service that they do not own and will end once they stop paying
2) Will cost them little to nothing when compared to the massive return
3) A bandage to cover over the flaws of Xbox Live by throwing shiny, digital rubbish in the customer's eyes. They will still have to deal with lag and the horde of vile prepubescents, racists, homophobes, and other trash that mars the overall community experience.

As an upfront $100 charge, this is two-thirds of a Kinect! And even if there were discounts on DLC, it still seems rather shadowy because again, you do not have a tangible product in your hand. By the day's end, what would the Platinum member have but a few 360 tricks that their home computer could probably accomplish for less, access to some special game textures and models, and data to be stored in their hard drive, backed only by Microsoft's own continued support for availability based on your purchase history.

They want to offer more garbage that less people care about. I would certainly be interested in even just a projected estimate as how many people would subscribe to a "Bronze" membership that offered just online play for less than Gold. I would even be interested in a more "pay as you go" plan because I own both a PS3 and 360 and so far the only game I would bother renting to try the online is Halo Reach. Otherwise, any other game I can get cross-platform pretty much for my own limited, online needs.

I would even say that special armor for Halo is pretty much the same as Horse armor; it's a cheap aesthetic that does not add any depth or value to the experience. Heck, at least in Oblivion, you can actually see the armor in-game.

 

[Vyress]

I can't believe there are people that would pay this OR justify the fee for something that's free everywhere else.

PC, Wii, PS3, NDS, PSP: I can play online on all of these platforms without having to pay nything. And believe it or not: you don't need to pay for the right to play online to have a great online experience. (PSN+? Playing online is still free.)

As for the services? Most people won't care about them. I sure don't. And the people that do... you do realize you'd just pay to be able to access a service on your Xbox that you're free to access on your computer (which you are using to post here...) in the first place, right...?
Facebook, Twitter, Netflix and so on... they're free to access on the PC already. Why the hell would I want to pay to be able to use them on my Xbox? (and Netflix is USA only so many people won't care anyway) Apple services on your Xbox? The people that care about iTunes and whatnot - most likely - already have iPhones. You'd think they can do all that stuff with their iPhone already, right...?


I mean honestly. Unless you like to pay for free stuff or paying double for something you already have I don't see any reason to justify paying for a 'Platinum' account.

As for the people who do think that it is worth paying more to gain access to free services...

Ah well, you're free to waste your money as much as you like I guess. The rest of us will simply enjoy playing online for free on every other platform and access services on our computers - like the one I just used to write this post - when we are not playing. ^^

 

[vikeif]

You know world of warcraft is 15 bucks an month, and people pay out the ass for that.

As much sense as that makes on the surface, the problem with equating WoW to any other type of pay model is simply that WoW has so much content to the game, that you could literally put 200+ days (That's 4800 hours) of your time into it, and still not be 'on the top'. There really are no other games with that much content to them available on console.

And I'm not simply talking about gaining levels or anything, getting to level 80 in WoW is literally the 'learning' process. The real game opens up when you hit the max level, imo. The gear is the super pisser and ultimately the nexus that consumes all of your time, if you let it.

get what you saying but it is still one game, Xbox live is pretty much every game in it's library, your blizzard subscription only work for warcraft, not any other online mmos or games.

Edit: I only have silver really, their not much on xbox live I really want to do multiplayer anyway.