Despite it being denied time and again, there are those who are very vocal on the fact that they think Activision will start charging for CoD multiplayer at some point. We won’t mention the name of the main culprit, so let’s just call him Michael P…actually that’s too obvious, let’s call him M.Pachter.
Activision CEO, Eric Hirshberg, has performed a brutal melee kill on this by saying the following:
“Are we going to be charging for multiplayer? The answer is no.
The experience you have out of the box, connecting with the online community to play Call of Duty is absolutely integral to the experience and we’ll never charge for that. It’s not going to be something we’ll attempt to monetize; it’s part of the package.
Nothing we or anyone else tries is going to work if it doesn’t have tremendous value for people and add a tremendous value to the gaming experience. He’s probably looking at meta-trends in the world and in culture about online services and new ways things should be monetized from Netflix to cloud-based computing.
So there are certainly a lot of behavioral shifts towards long-standing online relationships… But at the end of the day, all I’m trying to get across is I can unequivocally say we will never, ever charge for the multiplayer.”
Activision wins – flawless victory.
Source: Industry Gamers
SpikeyMikey23
thats good, still wont stop them overpricing DLC, (dont get me wrong, im a sucker who’ll buy it anyway lol) but i can also see them introducing microtransactions, while the core multiplayer will be free (battlefield heroes etc) upgrades n ‘stuff’ will be charged for
cc_star
You think after a statement like this they will charge for stuff?
This statement is is as concrete as you can get.
On the DLC pricing, I really can’t see that it was over-priced. Its the most popular DLC ever… by the widest country mile possible. The amount of research which goes into setting the pricing is phenomenal, there’s a great interview here.
SpikeyMikey23
this statement says that the multiplayer will always be free. Battlefield heroes is free, but the still charge for upgraded weapons and the like. I can see activision doing this in the future. And they can then say, we didnt lie, we said we wouldnt charge for miltiplayer (but we can still charge you 99p for tiger camo for a famas ;) )
Popular doesnt mean (in my oppinion of course) that it wasnt over priced. I still bought it, but back in cod 4 days, the map pack was £6/7.99 not fully sure which one. And so were the world at war maps.
BrendanCalls
Well played Activision, on 2 counts
1 for announcing this good news in such an aggressive way
2 for not announcing it through the eternally mis-understood, walking PR disaster, Bobby Kotick.
cc_star
Yes!
Tuffcub
Pachter has changed his tune though – he isnt saying they are going to charge for multiplayer, he says they will starts a subscription service for DLC – Pay $1x a month and get access to all to COD DLC on all COD games.
Raen
Rock Band et al. need that model.
Bober9000
For me we are already paying subscription for this game.\
C’mon we are buying the same game every year. It has exactly the same multiplayer mode and exactly the same short and pathetic single player campaign (maybe excluding MW1).
The fun part is that we are paying 55Euros for our stats to be reset so we could start rebuilding them again. :D
SpikeyMikey23
lol like a very costly presige ;)
Bilbo_bobbins
you are right there boyo !
Bilbo_bobbins
They can’t charge for MP, basically because it doesn’t work. Until they get some servers that don’t disconnect every game etc, no one would pay it anyway, unless they are mugs.
deadwelsh
I read on another site they will be offering a subscription model – ranging from $1 to $15 per month. Effectively you are buying new weapons to be used in game against people who will have to make do with the weapons included on the disc.
If they are going to do this then fine, but i think they should not allow people who subscribe to play with the people who bought the basic model due to the advantage they will have with improved weapons.
Similarly i think anyone that prestige should only be able to play against others that prestige
cc_star
Thats just the sort of bullshit this statement was trying to head off
It looks like people’s anti-acti blinkers aren’t going to come come off, no matter how many stories turn out to be untrue, how many myths are dispelled.
You can play only against other Prestigers, by choosing Prestige from the core/barebones/hardcore/prestige multiplayer menu
On a side note barebones with no killstreaks, perks & attachments is highly tactical and well worth a look if you’re fed up with the arcade-y core ‘servers’
Sympozium
They will eventully in two-three years unless a MMO is announced
Charmed_Fanatic
We will see ;)
TSBonyman
Would COD be half as successful if it didn’t have online multiplayer? Perhaps not.
Still it’s good news these days when so many are charging for the online.
bigdon23
I take my hat off to him, good to see/hear.
I think that when it comes to dlc they should do what burnout did and get people hooked with a couple of free packs then charge after that, it worked on me anyway, where as a game that releases an overpriced pack straight after release i avoid like the plague