News - Mobile gaming survey reveals 98 per cent never spend on F2P

[HEXUS]

So 2 per cent of gamers are propping up the whole free-to-play industry.

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[jimbouk]

And what percentage of email users 'spending' on scams keep spammers in business? If your distribution costs are next to zero and you can hit a large enough user base then you only need a small minority to make some money.

[McEwin]

I just don't believe a lot of games are -worth- spending money in/on. I can't put my finger on it but they just feel like they were produced to make money - focusing on shallow effects and gimmicks rather than clever immersive gameplay/interactions. It's like ZX spectrum all over again: cloning other games and selling on the back of perception not substance.

[LSG501]

I play a few 'free to play' games and I have spent some spare money on them too. Reason people don't pay for them is usually because the prices are so extortionate that it's stupid, take ea's (yes good old out of touch ea) need for speed world, to get one of the games top cars it's like £16 for the boost (game paid currency), you can buy a whole game for that...the conversion rates in some countries are even worse making our £16 look cheap against our hourly rate of earning.... then theres what you actually get for your money, this game is rampant with cheating (no one does anything), the dev's don't exist and realistically theres been nothing done to the game for over a year....

[slipthemonkey]

It's not that surprising, most of those type of games are just for killing time, like Candy crush and the ilk and are not worth any major investment. I have spent some money on F2P games (not a lot) but only if it's a game which I felt deserved some kind investment and I appreciated their effort in making it. There is also a risk factor on phones and tablets that you can lose all your progress and then all your money you've poured in to it.

It is generally not worth it, especially when you consider the likes of Humble Bundle and what they provide for generally very little outlay.

[crossy]

I've tended to avoid F2P because - in my mind it stands for "Free to Pay". As an experiment I tried getting the game "Kingdom Rush" on PC and tablet. It's F2P on the tablet, but paid-for on the PC.

Now on the PC it cost me £6.99 from Steam, and I leveled up (bought) four new characters on the tablet and that cost me £7.27! So I can definitely see why the vendors like the F2P model. Similar story with the F2P version of KingdomRush:Frontiers - if you were an avid, but unskilled, player you could easy splash £20 or more getting those "got to have" items to progress.

Suffice to say, I'd be very, very, very wary of ANY EA F2P title! And if anyone mentions Candy Crush/Saga I do a sign-of-the-cross warding off gesture!

[Andi-C]

No surprise there then ! I'd rather see adds than pay for a mobile game...

[Saracen]

No surprise there then ! I'd rather see adds than pay for a mobile game...

I'm the opposite. I'd rather pay for the game than see adverts. However, I won't buy a pig in a poke. I will (subject to some constraints) pay ONCE, and up-front, for a game, provided I'm convinced it's worth taking a punt on. And, over the years, I've spent thousands doing just that. I will NOT, though, start paying, bit at a time, for in-game content. If a game does that, it loses me, or I just play the free bits until I get bored, and move on.

Oh, and I reject most F2P games before ever installing based solely on what access rights they demand.

[Ttaskmaster]

Most of the mobile games I have played, replayed and continued to play have been completely free and very very good.
I've played a few F2P ones, none of which endured beyond a few weeks.
I've paid for some games and only managed a few levels before getting bored.

My favourite mobile game ever ever ever was Mass Effect: Infiltrator and I paid once, up front, for that one and never regretted a moment of it!!

Gaming on mobiles sucks anyway, unless you have one of them tablet-sized phones in full 1080p, in which case you might as well play on a tablet... touchscreen sucks for most games.

[jim]

I quite enjoy playing F2P games with the express intention of never paying for anything. Usually, the paid items are to make the game easier, and so I think it's a bit of a challenge to take the game on without any of those bonuses.

[scaryjim]

The thing that stands out for me is that the 2.2% who actually spend in-game is of all gamers, but we already know that only 1/3 actually stick with the game beyond day one. That means it's more like 7% of actual players who pay for things, which sounds much more reasonable. With free to play games you can properly trial the game, because it's free anyway - there's no "one hour trial" or limited demo version. That makes me much more likely to give a game a go: I get a better chance to learn if I like the game or not, I can always come back to it a few times and give it a proper go, and I don't lose anything if I end up deciding I don't like (or that the payment aspects are too large a part of the game). There's not really any down side from where I'm standing...

[BobF64]

Now on the PC it cost me £6.99 from Steam, and I leveled up (bought) four new characters on the tablet and that cost me £7.27!

Its one of the things that really baffles me about the "micropayment" prices. The maximum cost should be, lets say, £20, and for that you never need to pay again. It staggers me that theres a £69.99 option that you can buy again and again.

The thing that stands out for me is that the 2.2% who actually spend in-game is of all gamers, but we already know that only 1/3 actually stick with the game beyond day one. That means it's more like 7% of actual players who pay for things, which sounds much more reasonable.

But it still speaks volumes about society in general, these small percentages supporting and propping up the lives of the majority.

[mack_5991]

its free to play but pay to win, which is why i never buy those damn games. if i want to play a game, i buy it and i dont expect to have to buy upgrades/booster packs to progress.

[Saracen]

....

But it still speaks volumes about society in general, these small percentages supporting and propping up the lives of the majority.

Those small percentages aren't propping up this part of the majority.

I play a little on free games, but not much. And I'm not going to PAYG in a game, period. If that means no more PAYG games ever got developed, oh well. I, personally, wouldn't bat an eyelid. So yeah, I play a bit on occasion, but if I couldn't, ever again, well whoop-de-do. I wouldn't miss it for a heartbeat.

[Noli]

Overall I don't like how Free2Play is changing games.

A quick exception, I'm playing Greed for Glory on 'droid (a Clash of the Clans clone) and early on threw caution to the wind, paid out £6.50 for in game 'diamonds' and have got my money's worth in terms of hours played. Having said that, progress now is so slow - waiting days for upgrades - is that really a game? Might sound silly but imagine a blockbuster FPS where you literally had to wait days between playing levels... insane.

The concept seems fine but, let's just say that it biases developers to make really hard or tedious levels where paying will allow you to win/progress easier. The grind involved for not paying can be so painful. And then there's the *constant* reminders and buttons for in app purchases. It just all feels so naff.

I don't accept the trialling aspect either - a free app with just the first level or two should be enough to tell me whether I want to pay or not. A free game which ramps up to needing real payments down the road is just insidious.

Example: Plant vs Zombies: the original was pay upfront and the game was awesome. The 2nd was unbalanced with horrible grind stuck in worlds waiting for random key drops. Yuck (they fixed later but still). Multiplayer in free2play where £££ can trump skill also smacks of something rotten. Since when was gaming about money instead of skill?!

Games like the orig. PvZ and Great Little War Game prove that there is a market for traditional upfront payment. At least you know that the game mechanics and multiplayer have been designed for *FUN* and balance and fairness. After all, isn't that what *gaming* is actually all about?

[crossy]

The concept seems fine but, let's just say that it biases developers to make really hard or tedious levels where paying will allow you to win/progress easier. The grind involved for not paying can be so painful. And then there's the *constant* reminders and buttons for in app purchases. It just all feels so naff.

From what I've seen, "Dead Trigger" got accused of doing that - yes, you could "grind" and pay nothing, but you'd have to be very, very, very patient and dedicated.

I don't accept the trialling aspect either - a free app with just the first level or two should be enough to tell me whether I want to pay or not. A free game which ramps up to needing real payments down the road is just insidious.

I think I might have picked you up wrong - but I disagree. I've got NO problem with the idea that you can get the first two or three levels in a game as a "free taste", but then have to pay if you want to continue. "Galaxy On Fire" from the TegraZone was like that, and yes, I did stump up for it. But then again, once I've done that I don't expect ads or any more demands for money - unless they're adding more missions as DLC.

Example: Plant vs Zombies: the original was pay upfront and the game was awesome. The 2nd was unbalanced with horrible grind stuck in worlds waiting for random key drops. Yuck (they fixed later but still). Multiplayer in free2play where £££ can trump skill also smacks of something rotten. Since when was gaming about money instead of skill?! Games like the orig. PvZ and Great Little War Game prove that there is a market for traditional upfront payment. At least you know that the game mechanics and multiplayer have been designed for *FUN* and balance and fairness. After all, isn't that what *gaming* is actually all about?

PvZ2 really, really annoys me - not only is it VERY aggressive in punting the "Now buy this to progress" angle, but it also keeps firing up notifications - effectively ads for the game itself.

No, like you I think there is a place for ad-supported and free-to-play-pay-to-progress (F2PP2P?) games. What I don't like is hybrids, play to progresses with ads, and especially any combination of paid-for along with ads or pay-to-progress. As I said, if I've paid for a game then no ads and I expect not to be fleeced for "optional" content that's actually required.

In terms of mobile gaming, I'm currently playing Bejeweled2 (paid for) and SmashHit (free, but if you pay then you can save and continue, which I've done). Word of warning about SmashHit - it's a good game (strange though) but it'll drain your battery quicker than any app I've ever seen.

Here's a question - Humble Bundle games? You've paid for them - but should they also be free of that "optional" paid-for DLC and ads? Last Android bundle I think contained at least one game that "offered" the chance to pay for extras.