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According to this article:
http://www.pcgamesn.com/starcraft/blizzard-looking-possibility-starcraft-ii-multiplayer-going-free-play
There is a possibility of Starcraft II going free to play when they can find a way to monetize it.
While this is a good move for e-sport (lowering the barrier to entry for new players), it must also achieve a balance in order to not ruin the game/ create a game plagued with micro transaction.
What do you think might be a possibility to monetize the game? I have considered a few things but none seems to work. For example, if they go Dota2 way, which is selling skins for units, it might be super confusion for the players. For example, when Roach get the burrow movement upgrade, the aesthetic changes. In this case, an alternate skin can give some "indirect" advantage to the one using it.
I just hope that if it were to go free to play, they can find a good balance
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All they have to do is give us Paid name changes, and it will pay for itself. That is my honest opinion.
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I really dont like it personally. It might be good for esports and blizzard but I still dont like it. I have a big fear that it will just be "pay to win".
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Bought many copies of bw, and have my single copy of WoL, plan on buying the expos right off the bat, all worth the money. Please dont go this route. I dont even want to support Blizzard and I dont like this idea.
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One would assume that skins would either be superficial and thus not confusing, or there would be the option for your opponent to turn them off.
Is there any precedent for this in the RTS world? All the examples of free-to-play I can think of are RPG-related in some way.
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skins for units, some custom games might be sellable, portraits, also establishing cash tourney system where blizzard keeps $1 per person and pays out to top 2 or 4 etc. so many ways to have it free to play if they put the work in
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If they find ways to deal with hacker efficiently, then Im going to be iffy about this idea. But right now, it's no
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UI changes, decals, portraits, and maybe different voices for units. Its honestly pretty easy to come up with ideas o.o.
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Unlikely to happen anytime soon. If it was it would likely just be WoL, to get people into that, then to purchase Hots.
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Quite a few video game genres have really, really good f2p profit. Almost anyone in those genres should be seeking to go f2p. Unfortunately, competitive RTS is not one of those genres. Almost no skins, no items and no miscellaneous crap like portraits that will either be desireable or something that people won't crucify you for monetizing. The very few things they could sell would most likely have low desireability and thus low price, meaning that they shouldn't be able to make SC2 really that profitable at all as f2p.
So, basically, it is obvious that they would want to go f2p if they could, because it is insanely profitable, but they really can't go f2p because of the restraints of the genre.
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-Buy Clan tags
-Buy Name Changes
-Buy unlimited access to arcade and unlimited ladder games (maybe limited to 3-5 games a day of both arcade and ladder)
-Priority on the match queu (VIP [aka players who pay] have a 1/3 of the waiting time in queu for a match)
-All options and customizations unlocked (Options menu: graphics, hotkeys, sound, etc)
And I could go on forever
Edit: just for typos
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Though I'm pretty sure that this is only going to happen once all 2 expansions are out, and they are sure that they can't sell that many more.
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On September 23 2012 12:45 Niriw wrote:
-Buy Clan tags
-Buy Name Changes
-Buy unlimited access to arcade an unlimited ladder games (maybe limited to 3-5 games a day of both arcade and ladder)
-Priority on the match queu (VIP [aka players who pay] have a 1/3 of the waiting time in queu for a match)
-All options and customizations unlocked (Options menu: graphics, hotkeys, sound, etc)
And I could go on forever
Pay for playing games? Oh fuck no. Fuck. No. There would be murder.
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Let me put custom skins on my marines =)
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Ultimatly it will be bad for esports rather then good.
TF2.... perfect example.
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Buyable Playerportraits may be a first idea, considering the race for them during the early days of SC2 and when the Starcraft-Master-Portrait was introduced.
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On September 23 2012 12:45 Niriw wrote:
-Buy unlimited access to arcade an unlimited ladder games (maybe limited to 3-5 games a day of both arcade and ladder)
-All options and customizations unlocked (Options menu: graphics, hotkeys, sound, etc)
And I could go on forever
These are bad ideas.
1) No (successful) F2P game limits playtime by charging, the whole point is that it gets you to play a lot for free so that you buy other shit.
2) ...what? Nobody's gonna pay to up their graphics settings or turn off in-game music, that's just gonna piss people off.
They can sell skins, that's pretty much it. If you charge people to use, say, broodlords, the game just sucks for anyone who doesn't pay, and you also run into the issue of "has my opponent bought xx?"
that said I would absolutely buy skins for all my units that'd be kickass
Ultimatly it will be bad for esports rather then good.
TF2.... perfect example.
Wasn't TF2 kind of dead as an ESPORT even before it went F2P?
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Name changes, stat resets
Also aesthetic things, it won't be bad because the units will still have their own distinctive silhouettes.
Also things such as being able to have an image on your side of the map, in your main base, or like the bases on "your side" of the map, any image you want. Think of how fun it would be to show off your interests?
(and stuff like the icons on your buildings, maybe custom profile pictures, etc.)
and ofc these wouldn't have to be very expensive at all, just a few bucks
And maybe limitations like, no cross region play unless you pay a few bucks
And you could have the option of the above, and/or just buying the entire game with campaign and all the features
or something, i think it can work out
Perhaps after a few more years, they can do this? (Or start allowing free WoL soon in a couple years, but people will be playing HotS... but maybe newbies wouldn't mind since it's just to get them into what the game is like)
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On September 23 2012 12:38 NobledBlood wrote:
All they have to do is give us Paid name changes, and it will pay for itself. That is my honest opinion.
Doesn't really work in F2P 
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EPT
