Pay to Play?

GrandInquisitor, "Pay to play would suck huge ultralisk cock and singlehandedly cripple the game's popularity. MMO's can be successful pay-to-play, but only because the precedent was established for it. No RTS has ever charged for online play, I believe."

On May 21 2007 18:39 semioldguy wrote:
Actually paying to play might increase my chances of playing, it means less immature people most likely. Most people who complain about these relatively small monthly fees are the people without jobs and people I generally don't like anyway.

okay, maybe not increase, but it wouldn't stop me. And there is always LAN.

On May 23 2007 12:28 Excalibur_Z wrote:
Copy-pasted from the other thread since this is the one linked from the sticky:

You guys are looking at this the wrong way. There are two different kinds of pay-to-play. There's a monthly subscription like WoW, then there's an unlimited subscription for a one-time fee, like Kali.

I noticed this the day Starcraft II's website came up. Nowhere does it mention Battle.net is free in the press release. Nor in the FAQ. At first I was concerned that it would be pay-to-play, but now that doesn't seem to be a problem. I'm 100% convinced this will be the new plan for Battle.net:

- Out of the box, the game will cost about $50-60. For this, you get the single player campaign, the ability to play against the AI, the map editor, and LAN/Hamachi play. This is already what most games offer.

- For an extra $10-20, you can register an SC2 Battle.net account. This is for several reasons:

- This is primarily to deter hackers and pirates. If you are caught hacking in the new system (it's going to happen, the best they can do to fight it is proactive moderation) you are banned, and must pay again for a new account.

- As for pirates, generating CD-Keys is something that can be done for any game. Having to register an account is something that can't be circumvented. Repeat or grievous offenders may also have their CD-Key banned, forcing them to buy a new game. I see this as less realistic though.

- The new Battle.net will have additional features. Presumably this will include active hack scanning, a routed peer-to-peer system such as the one War3 uses, a tournament system a la War3, continuous ladders such as War3, possibly with the added benefit of cross-Ladder season-final tournaments.

Another, less likely scenario is that Battle.net will actually be split between general multiplayer and competitive multiplayer. This would mean that serious Ladder players would pay a registration fee and would gain access to Ladder-exclusive events and games. I don't see this happening though since that would deter novice players from attempting the Ladder and improving their skill.

In any case, it's not reasonable to ask for a monthly subscription for an RTS game. It's not feasible for the consumer or the developer. It's not going to happen, so relax.

On May 21 2007 18:37 GrandInquisitor wrote:
huge ultralisk cock.

On May 23 2007 13:32 Element)LoGiC wrote:
I really like Excal's thoughts. I would pay a lot of money to not encounter hackers, abusers, or anything else that could get an account banned on battle.net.

I think overall, the community would be much better.

Not monthly though

On May 23 2007 13:41 Zironic wrote:


But that is already implemented for free in Warcraft 3. It wouldn't make sense to start charging for something that is already given out for free, would just upset customers.

If they want to charge money they would need to add alot more features to battle.net that would be worth the price. One thing that could make sense is if they add a monthly fee to the ladder and pay out cash prices to the top 100 players.

On May 23 2007 13:44 Kaolla wrote:


not really all newbs would stay away and remember for every good player there's many newbs -.-

On May 23 2007 13:52 TheSchwA wrote:
Who would honestly pay to play a video game...

On May 23 2007 13:58 Pika Chu wrote:
Blizzard ANNOUNCED OFFICIALY that bnet will be free for sc2-ers and will be played from the WoW taxes.

So no pay to play for us, thx to WoW.

On May 23 2007 14:10 useless wrote:


Source? Id like to read up on that.

On May 23 2007 13:53 boghat wrote:

Are you an idiot?

On May 23 2007 15:25 TheSchwA wrote:


ARE YOU an idiot? Honestly, unless you have extra money, what would give someone the idea that paying to play a video would be a beneficial plan?

On May 23 2007 16:02 Manifesto7 wrote:
I would pay a lot of money to register my username, thus greatly reducing the presence of hackers, abusers, and bad mannered people. People would respect their id's, and I always think that is a good idea.

On May 23 2007 13:50 boghat wrote:
I'd rather suck an ultralisk's cock then pay a monthly fee for sc2.

On May 23 2007 13:02 semioldguy wrote:


Hey, I don't play WoW, back when I did play MMOs quite a few years ago it wasn't rampant with immature people. Apparently that's not true anymore.

I was a teen from a poor family. I've even had to live on the street before. And you can always find a job if you are out there looking hard enough. At sixteen I had found a job and was making more than either of my parents and helped them with bills, and food and such. Even if you're poor, you can still learn to manage a little money each month to have fun or for the ones you care about to have fun. Additionally, from my experience, the ones complaining aren't the ones who make little money, they are the lazy people who can afford it but don't like the idea of having to pay.

I don't have a problem with people who make little or no money, I have a problem with the attitude that usually comes with those people who publicly complain about it. When your dirt poor, you complain among those you live with about money issues, but you don't bring those complaints to other people. So why don't you shut the fuck up until you learn a little more about what you're trying to defend.

edit: it's a very embarassing thing for a teen to be a part of a poor family so why would they want to bring attention to themselves for being poor by complaining about it?

On May 25 2007 14:18 NotSorry wrote:
I won't be happy about it, but I'll still pay a monthly fee if thats what it comes down to.

On May 25 2007 14:54 semioldguy wrote:


Did you even read these posts? Clearly he is not attacking poor people, as any idiot could see.

I didn't see it as an attack of "who I was." I am angry because he is defending his position using examples filled with his ignorance, and the sarcasm doesn't help him cause. If he expects a civil response, he should give them himself. "Do us a favor, get the fuck out" seems hostile to me. Why the fuck shuold I be nice to him if he responds to me like that?

Not everything in the world can be free, everything in the world cost something somewhere along the line. If a company is using their resources in providing the service of cracking down on hackers, creating a pleasurable and stable multiplayer gaming environment and other various forms of support for a game; then they have a right to charge a fee for their efforts.

If someone is making money off something they are much more likely to do a better job than if they weren't getting paid for it. And they will want to keep people paying for the service or attract other to the service (depending one one-time or recurring fees) which will also encourage them to keep doing a good job as they don't want to lose people/business.

On May 25 2007 14:54 semioldguy wrote:


Did you even read these posts? Clearly he is not attacking poor people, as any idiot could see.

I didn't see it as an attack of "who I was." I am angry because he is defending his position using examples filled with his ignorance, and the sarcasm doesn't help him cause. If he expects a civil response, he should give them himself. "Do us a favor, get the fuck out" seems hostile to me. Why the fuck shuold I be nice to him if he responds to me like that?

Not everything in the world can be free, everything in the world cost something somewhere along the line. If a company is using their resources in providing the service of cracking down on hackers, creating a pleasurable and stable multiplayer gaming environment and other various forms of support for a game; then they have a right to charge a fee for their efforts.

If someone is making money off something they are much more likely to do a better job than if they weren't getting paid for it. And they will want to keep people paying for the service or attract other to the service (depending one one-time or recurring fees) which will also encourage them to keep doing a good job as they don't want to lose people/business.

On June 02 2007 09:05 RtS)Night[Mare wrote:
they might implement some kind of cost like xbox live, but they'll have to be really taking care of the ladder, like microsoft, or else that kind of idea will fail.

but i dont think they would implement payment in their bnet services

On June 02 2007 11:38 Dionyseus wrote:
If it's pay to play I wouldn't do it no matter how good the game is. Buying the game is payment enough.

Phyre the reason why MMO's are pay to play is because of server costs. RTS have practically no server costs because the players themselves host the game.

On June 02 2007 11:51 [jOyO] wrote:
Are people that poor that they cant pay 15 bucks a MONTH???? (which is what it most likely be). save a dallor half the days of every month and you have it.. Im sure if it was pay to play it would be fucking sweet.

On June 02 2007 11:51 [jOyO] wrote:
Are people that poor that they cant pay 15 bucks a MONTH???? (which is what it most likely be). save a dallor half the days of every month and you have it.. Im sure if it was pay to play it would be fucking sweet.

On June 02 2007 11:58 Phyre wrote:

So what would we get for that extra $15 a month? The most obvious comparison would be with WC3 in terms of features, but let's compare this to all RTSs on the market now. What would that $15 give us that other RTS games don't already give us for free?

Anti-hack? They already will give us this for free, it is integral to the games success and even if they charged for it there is no guarantee that they can totally eliminate all hacks. WoW still has abuse from what I've heard. There is just higher expectations if we pay.

Better patch support? Again, this is considered standard for most RTS games. If they don't patch it regularly until it's considered "balanced" for the most part it will die.

Tournaments? From what I understand, WC3 already has this for free as well. Perhaps if there is some large prize then they could charge an entry fee.

On June 05 2007 06:32 vicml21 wrote:
lol strafe put it so well.

But one of the reasons why SC1 is doing so well, IMO, is because it is free. Mind you, its a very fun game, that is very well balanced, and still is being supported by patches, but the fact that its free helps it a lot. If Starcraft were pay2play there wouldnt be many more people still playing this game. If anything maybe a small bnet upgrade fee or something? Some one time fee used to help pay for SC2 servers or whatnot, for those interesting in playing online. A bnet upgrade might warrant this cost, and it would be 1000X better than a monthly fee.

On June 05 2007 08:10 Element)LoGiC wrote:


Um... you people realize that sc ISN'T doing so well, right? I don't consider getting hacked in every public game I join, or the abuse, or disconnecting like in abyss, or having no ladder for almost a year like wgtour to be well.

The majority of the community is bottom-feeding scum. They don't have to pay for the hundreds of accounts they win-bot or the ones they use to get online with their friends and hack on BGH/Fastest. Most of the people playing this game right now are BGH/Fastest/Umsing high school kids that smoke pot, and drop out of high school to go work in a trade.

Because of this, I think people should have a one-time fee on every account they make. Blizzard is making a killing off of Warcrack, I don't think they'll notice all of the lost revenue from the above demographic. It would be awesome if there wasn't so much server workload due to winbotting, and name spamming. Have you seen those bots that go into channels to spam? Hundreds of them. Battle.net is in a very bad state right now.

You need to start taking into consideration what the majority of the community actually is, instead of complaining about how small it will be if you had to pay.

On June 05 2007 09:27 Hawk wrote:


WC3 and just about any other rts have a built-in anti hack or other system. FPS games have this too. The only genre that makes you pay on MMORPGS. You make it seem like blizzard is hurting for cash...

On June 05 2007 10:26 Element)LoGiC wrote:


Ah, yes, about this. This is not entirely what I meant. I say blizzard ISN'T hurting for cash. What if it's like 5 bucks for one account? That's not going to make them more revenue than if they made the game cater to the majority of players, and that's what I was trying to convey. A lot of people would still play if it was pay to play, except for people that don't play sc for any other reason than boredom. I think having to purchase accounts would fix widespread hacking, because you'd actually have an investment to lose, and have to buy another account.

Anyway, I hear that Warcraft III has good anti-hack capabilities. I hear not a TON of people hack on that like Starcraft. I don't know exactly how they did this, but it would be very nice to play public games without fear of being map hacked and abused. That stacking abuse made a lot of players very cocky in games, constantly heckling other players, and making fun of people, lowering the standard of the community.

On May 23 2007 13:50 boghat wrote:
I'd rather suck an ultralisk's cock then pay a monthly fee for sc2.

On June 05 2007 11:02 Bub wrote:


are you sure you meant to say "than" than "then" ?

On June 05 2007 11:26 Angel[BTL] wrote:
I would pay also. For those who blatantly say that if they were to put a monthly fee the number of players would be lower than if it was free, I say look at World of Warcraft. You must be prettty ignorant to say people are not playing the game cause it's having a monthly fee. And I know that I'm comparing mmorpg with rts game. But this is just an example to people saying no to the fee.

Look for the numbers of players for WOW which like the last time was 9 million. I recognize also that most of the players for sc are the ones with the age ranging from 13 to 19 years old who don't have the will to pay for a service. For me it seems naturally that Blizzard gets motivated to make a good hack free ladder if he gets a monthly fee. How many of you would support something for the benefit of others for free? Not many I assure you.

Ofcourse the ones who agree on my point are a bit more mature than the rest.

In other words I say yes to paying it. But I expect in return a good quality service.

On June 05 2007 11:49 _PulSe_ wrote:


Hurray for good quality service and what not, but why should i pay for it. What happened to the days where companies took pride in their games and wanted to provide a high quality atmosphere simply because it is what they should do. Back when starcraft first came out bnet was awesome for those that could use it and they tried their best to keep it good. For no other reason than they felt a responsibility to the gamer. Its pathetic how companies like EA just abandon a game they invested time in because they dont see profit in it. even incredibly recently in battlefield 2142 there a loads of problems players are having that have not been addressed. I just think some companies are trying to milk a game for all its worth and sucking us dry. If they had any respect for themselves and their game they would do this for free.

On June 05 2007 10:36 Hawk wrote:


That's what I'm saying. There's plenty of games out there where there's no additional fee and they include pretty much everything you've stated. Consumers get shafted at every turn with prices in EVERYTHING, I'm not about to pay to play a game that should have been out a half decade ago.

On June 05 2007 18:10 Liquid`Nazgul wrote:
dont you guys all pay to go to the movies and stuff?

thats a billion dollar industry they could probably provide them for free and live off the ads

On June 05 2007 08:10 Element)LoGiC wrote:


Um... you people realize that sc ISN'T doing so well, right? I don't consider getting hacked in every public game I join, or the abuse, or disconnecting like in abyss, or having no ladder for almost a year like wgtour to be well.

The majority of the community is bottom-feeding scum. They don't have to pay for the hundreds of accounts they win-bot or the ones they use to get online with their friends and hack on BGH/Fastest. Most of the people playing this game right now are BGH/Fastest/Umsing high school kids that smoke pot, and drop out of high school to go work in a trade.

Because of this, I think people should have a one-time fee on every account they make. Blizzard is making a killing off of Warcrack, I don't think they'll notice all of the lost revenue from the above demographic. It would be awesome if there wasn't so much server workload due to winbotting, and name spamming. Have you seen those bots that go into channels to spam? Hundreds of them. Battle.net is in a very bad state right now.

You need to start taking into consideration what the majority of the community actually is, instead of complaining about how small it will be if you had to pay.

On June 05 2007 19:38 Hot_Bid wrote:
yeah seriously, you guys are acting as if $5-10 a month really is that much

would you trade 1 movie a month to play BW on really great updated servers, more patches, leagues, more features, more support from blizzard?

its a fucking easy choice, i'd pay in an instant

everyone is all hung up about paying because they didn't charge for bnet before

On June 05 2007 08:10 Element)LoGiC wrote:


Um... you people realize that sc ISN'T doing so well, right? I don't consider getting hacked in every public game I join, or the abuse, or disconnecting like in abyss, or having no ladder for almost a year like wgtour to be well.

The majority of the community is bottom-feeding scum. They don't have to pay for the hundreds of accounts they win-bot or the ones they use to get online with their friends and hack on BGH/Fastest. Most of the people playing this game right now are BGH/Fastest/Umsing high school kids that smoke pot, and drop out of high school to go work in a trade.

Because of this, I think people should have a one-time fee on every account they make. Blizzard is making a killing off of Warcrack, I don't think they'll notice all of the lost revenue from the above demographic. It would be awesome if there wasn't so much server workload due to winbotting, and name spamming. Have you seen those bots that go into channels to spam? Hundreds of them. Battle.net is in a very bad state right now.

You need to start taking into consideration what the majority of the community actually is, instead of complaining about how small it will be if you had to pay.

On June 05 2007 21:45 CubEdIn wrote:
Guys, is this even an issue? I mean you pay for World of Warcraft because they're constantly working on improving the game by adding new levels, new areas, etc. They're constantly improving the game. This won't happen with StarCraft. Don't mistake a patch that fixes bugs with a patch that adds an area, new items, etc.

On June 06 2007 03:24 Boblion wrote:



They will add new units, the new race and better weapons with each patch for sure and of course if you pay more you will have heroes for mele games.


Seriously i cant understand why some people think that starcraft 2 (RTS) is like WOW (MMORPG)
starcraft will only need to be updated with few patches so the money you will pay monthly >>>>>>> Vivendi shareholders only. Your 10 $(?) wont be used for starcraft.

When i started to play about 10 years the games were cheaper ( ok nowadays it costs more to create ) but also often better (btw).

Why should i pay a monthly fee? And why not a weekly fee for warcraft 4 ? Oh yea that is really cool...

On June 05 2007 20:01 fusionsdf wrote:


Yeah. I pay 10 bucks to buy a movie.
I watch the movie over and over again for free.

If I think it really benefits from seeing in the theatre (Extremely rare) then I will pay a one time fee to watch it.

Honestly. Does anyone here rent the same movie over, and over and over again? Or go to the theater to watch the same movie over and over and over again?

The movie analogy is broken

On June 06 2007 06:20 Liquid`Nazgul wrote:

Ehh who watches the same movie 9 years day in day out.. the point is that SC will give you so much pleasure that to me it's EASILY and I mean really, really easily worth paying for. The comparison to movies is not in seeing it but in the fact that you pay for something you enjoy. If it makes you feel better try comparing it to bowling, where you pay every time you want to play. Well I enjoy SC more than anything so I would definitely not mind paying for that.

I'm not saying that paying is a good thing but I think you guys are definitely being unfair here. Red Alert also costs $60 just like SC2 but you'll only play the missions of that and then be done with it.

On February 01 2008 00:30 IH4t3z3rg wrote:
Any updates on this topic? Sorry to bump this but i think it's a very interesting one

Anyone with fresh info?

On February 01 2008 00:43 XMShake wrote:

The fresh info is why the hell did you bump this and its quite obvious they aren't going to make it pay to play.

On February 01 2008 02:36 JensOfSweden wrote:
Pay to play is nice.

If you can't pay like $10/month your a cheap bastard. I guess most of the people who don't wanna pay are the 14-year olds who don't have money

On May 21 2007 18:34 Monoxide wrote:
"Blizzard was silent on whether using Battle.net for StarCraft 2 would require a charge or subscription fee. The service will certainly have new features, Blizzard assured the press in the audience, but they weren't willing to get into pricing specifics."

Who will play this game if blizzard charges a monthly fee similar to WoW?

Poll: Will you pay to play?
(Vote): Hell Yes! SC2 kicks ass!!
(Vote): F*** No, this is bullshit!
(Vote): Maybe... i'll see if i win the lottery or something...

On February 01 2008 02:36 JensOfSweden wrote:
Pay to play is nice.

If you can't pay like $10/month your a cheap bastard. I guess most of the people who don't wanna pay are the 14-year olds who don't have money

On February 01 2008 02:36 JensOfSweden wrote:
Pay to play is nice.

If you can't pay like $10/month your a cheap bastard. I guess most of the people who don't wanna pay are the 14-year olds who don't have money

On February 01 2008 04:30 Glider wrote:
I don't get all the people who are saying "hell no" to pay to play. I mean common, its supply and demand. How much hours of fun does starcraft give you for a whole month?? u don't think thats worth 10 bucks?? Especially since a shitty 1 hour and half movie and two happy meals cost just as much. Just because its free in the past doesn't mean it should stay free, things generally should cost what they are worth. and 5 to 10 bucks a month to play an amazing game on a server with people around the world is well worth it. Stop comparing it to what it is like in past and consider what it is worth in the present.

You go out and drink with few buddies and it can easily cost 20 dollars and the fun lasts just a few hours. Bowling for few hours, another 20 dollars. And you wouldn't pay 5 to 10 for a game that can easily give u 30+ hours of enjoyment per month?

Besides, even if they do ask for subscription fee it wouldn't be much at all. considering wow costs 15 per month, and the the MMORPG servers requires much much more expensive startup and upkeep fees.

On February 01 2008 07:01 decafchicken wrote:
Isnt starcraft client side anyways?

On February 01 2008 07:23 AcrossFiveJulys wrote:


There is definitely a server involved that facilitates battle.net... what do you think

"connecting to battle.net..." means?

On February 01 2008 08:54 MYM.Testie wrote:
Paying a monthly fee might mean marginally less laggers due to less poor people.
Thus, it is worth it.

On May 21 2007 18:40 CowGoMoo wrote:
pay to play --> SC1 wont die after all.

You are young, my son, and, as the years go by, time will change and even reverse many of your present opinions. Refrain therefore awhile from setting yourself up as a judge of the highest matters.

Pay to play is nice.

If you can't pay like $10/month your a cheap bastard. I guess most of the people who don't wanna pay are the 14-year olds who don't have money

On February 01 2008 12:22 GeneralZap wrote:


This is foolish and selfish. They do not need 10$ a month. That is generally one hour of work, and when SC2 get's old, you could have given 360$ dollars if you played 3 years straight... Ridiculous. That is more ridiculous/worse than paying 360$ for a good game! It also endangers pro sports, and discourages pro gaming, because less people, (80% in this case), would play. While some could actually be better players than those who play online for 10$ a month.

On February 01 2008 14:43 Entertaining wrote:
Pay to play for me = hamachi forever

On February 01 2008 12:46 funKie wrote:



Also, not everyone who plays SC lives in the United States, therefore, is kind of hard for people outside the US to get Dollars or internet dollars, ask me, my government has a cap on the amount we can spend on the internet (it's 400$ )

On February 15 2008 04:20 EpiK wrote:
who the fuck would vote "to pay to play?" That only works for mmo's, and people still complain about monthly payments for wow

On May 21 2007 21:55 Kennigit wrote:
Not a chance in hell

On February 01 2008 12:46 funKie wrote:



Also, not everyone who plays SC lives in the United States, therefore, is kind of hard for people outside the US to get Dollars or internet dollars, ask me, my government has a cap on the amount we can spend on the internet (it's 400$ )

On February 18 2008 13:18 aeronexus wrote:
pay to play pisses me the fuck off... just letting Blizzard know. I would be happy to boycott SC2 if they slap a monthly fee on bnet. fifty or sixty bucks a copy isn't enough?!?!? go to hell.

On February 18 2008 15:30 D10 wrote:
If you think how you will enjoy the long term services of bnet ...

On February 19 2008 01:08 Snet wrote:
If $15.00 a month would give me a hack-free Bnet, with ongoing built-in ladders, and server upgrades, I would gladly pay it.

But the fact that Broodwar, and video games in general, are still played by a large amount of minors who still think $15.00 is an insanely unfair amount of money, it might not be a wise choice for Blizzard.

Anyway, RTS games aren't really suited for P2P, so I wouldn't stress over it. They don't charge for WC3, and that's the style of BNET I think they are aiming for in SC2, with auto match making and built in ladders and ranking systems, etc...

Also, with such a highly anticipated game, I think they will avoid anything that could bring a negative vibe to the release of Starcraft 2. They already bank enough off of WoW, I think Starcraft is more of a passion project for the Blizzard team.

On February 19 2008 01:08 Snet wrote:
If $15.00 a month would give me a hack-free Bnet, with ongoing built-in ladders, and server upgrades, I would gladly pay it.

But the fact that Broodwar, and video games in general, are still played by a large amount of minors who still think $15.00 is an insanely unfair amount of money, it might not be a wise choice for Blizzard.

Anyway, RTS games aren't really suited for P2P, so I wouldn't stress over it. They don't charge for WC3, and that's the style of BNET I think they are aiming for in SC2, with auto match making and built in ladders and ranking systems, etc...

Also, with such a highly anticipated game, I think they will avoid anything that could bring a negative vibe to the release of Starcraft 2. They already bank enough off of WoW, I think Starcraft is more of a passion project for the Blizzard team.