What monetization of "Destiny 2" can be tolerated by fans and Activision?



[ad_1]

I'm not quite sure what's going on behind the scenes between Activision and Bungie at the moment. Activision recently screened a good amount of shadow on Destiny, claiming that the series was underperforming. The game director, Luke Smith, announced yesterday in a tweet that Bungie was not disappointed with Forsaken and that he "decided to create a game that Destiny players would like, and at Bungie, we We love it too.Building destiny for the players who love it is and will remain our goal in the future. "
In a nutshell, I guess the conversation in camera looks like:
Activision: "Fate must earn more money."
Bungie: "But everyone loves the game now and says it's the best it's ever been!"
Activision: "Fate must earn more money."

So what to do? As much as the appropriate response seems to be to tell Activision to abstain, this is not how it works, and changes, to some extent, will probably have to be made. It seems that in the beginning, Bungie must continue to do what they did in the days of Forsaken to ensure that the quality of the series remains in line with expectations. It's a foregone conclusion, but if we have to deal with Activision's monetization problem, what options do we have for increasing Destiny's revenue while avoiding pushing fans back?
This is a difficult proposition for all games, but especially for Destiny, which is more difficult to monetize than many other Activision titles or other games they try to emulate. But let's go through all the options I can think of:

Free with paid DLCs: we already see this idea being tested in a minor way on a PC, but if the test succeeds, it can become permanent, if the idea of ​​permanent PC works, just comfort. The idea here is that by putting players out for free (look, Destiny is fun! Feel like it's good to shoot and loot!), Players will end up spending money on DLC and to Eververse afterwards.
The problem: I agree that it's a good idea, but I do not think it's possible enough for Activision. This does not encourage current players to spend more money than today, and they want more than $ 35 a year from players, what does the annual pass for the second year. Now, they are also losing full sales of games. As a result, DLC sales would require huge increases to solve all current revenue problems, which will probably not happen. It may be boring to hear, but it's the truth. This can be a good start to building the base of players, but that would not be enough.

Eververse Revamp With Pure Silver: Eververse was incredibly bad when it was just a crate box factory I can not imagine that it is making a lot of money in its current state. One of the ideas is to completely eliminate the idea of ​​brilliant engrams and simply set a flat price for money on every item in the store. You can cut a lot of trash that currently fills the engrams (do we really need 14 different legendary ghost shells and sparrows that people will never use compared to exotics?) And put the emphasis on them. essential elements that people want. Cut out your armor to avoid P2W charges, stay with cool cosmetics, people will pay $ 5 or $ 10 directly, rather than stuck them in loot boxes. Essentially the Fortnite / League of Legends skin store model, except that skins are ships or ghosts or ornaments.
The problem: Well, that would eliminate the way for players to get all these items for free as they do now with the current system of "winning brilliant engrams". Destiny players get very crazy when something is sold out and can not be won. However, it may be an area in which they have to give a little, especially if it is essentially aesthetic.

Cosmetic additions to the character: It's something I've been screaming for years now, we need the ability to) redefine our current Guardians and B) buy more cosmetic stuff for our Guardians. The first redesign may be free, but it costs money every time. Aside from that, you could sell countless amounts of new hairstyles, face shapes, scars, face paints, color palettes, exo pieces, and so on. at flat and silver prices.
The problem: there are some here. Perhaps one of the main problems is that the way Destiny was built permanently "coded" our character in the game, and its extraction for a redesign is probably not easy, otherwise Bungie probably would have already made. Even if it is possible, I must admit that it would probably be a relatively small niche of the community that would pay for this stuff, since you rarely see your guardian's unmasked face in this FPS, really just in the tour and menus, and only if you check the box for your headset to be turned off.

Ship Interiors / Guardians Apartments: It's an idea I had before the victory, but it's an idea that could somehow be married. Since Destiny is entirely devoted to the collection and realization of objects, I thought that a purely cosmetic space to allow your Guardian / clan to "relax" would be good. It can be the inside of your ship or a place in the city, but you can display your best weapons, armor and armor, as well as cool feats that could be linked to triumphs such as some banners, Flags or trophies (a Warbeast head the chimney, someone?). And if such a thing existed, some of its aspects could be sold. Extra showcases, different furniture, whatever. It will not affect the gameplay, but it would be a cool "collectible" that players can build.
The problem: Again, probably some kind of niche attraction for players, and it would have to be something completely built from scratch, just for that purpose, which is more complex than a lot of those other options .

A Battle of Destiny: Fortnite is currently ruling the world of income with his battlefield, and I keep trying to rack my brains to figure out how it might work in Destiny. I guess what you can do is kill more or less Eververse and have Tess sell a $ 10 combat pass or whatever by season, and each of the 100 levels or whatever else that would have been created in a new engram. Earn XP or reach milestones or complete challenges to classify and unlock items, or pay to unlock levels if you run out of time before the end of the season and you really want that level ship 100 or other.
The problem: I … do not really see the disadvantages here? I suppose, again, that would eliminate the potential of getting all of Eververse's material for free, but it may be a concession that players must make. I think it would be interesting and that's one more thing that players should be tackling. So that might be cool, but of course that would make some people angry.

A Destiny Subscription Model: If there is a game that I think could get away with a WoW-style subscription model, it may be Destiny because of its hardcore fan base , and if you force players to pay for monthly access to a game, it's a cash cow like most other games will never see.
The problem: I can not pretend that this is realistic at the moment. We are in 2018 and I doubt very much that it would have worked fully at the launch of Destiny 1, and certainly not now, as the current problem lacks players to introduce themselves. There may be a parallel universe in which it would work, but that's not it. Even if I would pay $ 10 a month to play Destiny if it solved all these problems and created a lot of new content, I can not say that the general public would get something like that. You would have the hardest of the hardcore base and literally no one else at this point.

Ghost Voice Packs: Here we come to something that I call a "macrotransaction" that would be expensive, maybe even between $ 20 and $ 30, but that's due to the nature of the product. I think Destiny could sell different voice packs for our Ghost, re-record its lines as different actors or actresses (I would kill for a female ghost to match my female guardian), and I would pay a lot for that this happens. It could be a luxury purchase, but it would have its share of takers.
The problem: It does not look like a normal "advertiser pack" for other games, because there are probably many more lines to record for it to work, and not just that, every time the game created new content, they should also record all lines with all other actors. If Bungie is already cutting costs by having (almost) dumb our Guardian, it sounds like an expensive prospect that may not be profitable for them, I'm not sure.

Pay-to-Win: Oh my boy. Here is the most controversial to date. I do not support it myself, but the idea behind this is that yes, Destiny is just starting to sell … a lot of its real loot. You do not have time to run the raid 50 times but still want to play with A Mille Voices? Buy it. You really want this full faction armor, but you do not have time to handle 200 areas lost at a rally? Buy it. Etc. It's "pay to win" for those who have more money than time, and yet what is the definition of "win" in Destiny, really? I would say that's not the case (you can have all the best equipment in the world, but if you're really bad, you'll always lose in Crucible or Gambit or in raids), and what others have or n & Do not really should not affect your own experience. You know what you have earned if you want to pay the price of iron for your collection.
The problem: I mean, it is simply not possible on Earth that this causes a nuclear fusion in the Destiny community. Even if someone who wants to spend $ 200 or something of the kind to own each exotic should not affect you personally, the mere fact of being able to do so would probably harm any experience of the game. Cosmetic Items obvious is one thing, but it would be a gesture that could bring some casual (rich), but disable huge portions of the hardcore base. I would not recommend it.
So, this is not a unique way to monetize Destiny, but I will not pretend to make Eververse's chests more irritating or do crazy things like waiting for payment deadlines, these are viable options. As you can see, there is no really interesting option here because Destiny is simply not a game designed for continuous monetization, other than paying for high quality content and small size. But that's not enough, especially when other Activision games are often entirely based on surprise boxes or card packs or anything else you can buy in Candy Crush. It sucks, but that's the reality right now, so we have to find compromises, it seems. What are you willing to sacrifice for the future of Destiny?
Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Read my new science-fiction thriller novel Herokiller, available now on paper and online. I also wrote the Earthborn trilogy.
The original article can be found by clicking here

[ad_2]
Source link