Destroy All Critics!

There is ZERO reason to waste bandwidth complaining about the quality of a web comic. I can (and do) ignore most of them without anyone's help. PVP, on the other hand, is awesome, and everyone should know about it.

Back when content always cost money, the purpose of a critic was to tell you what was good and what was bad so you didn't waste your hard earned scratch on crap. That's still more or less true when it comes to things that you can't try out for free. The thing is, there's not much you can't try out for free these days.

With the free model in place, what does a critic have to do? Well, in the age of the internet, a role of critic gives way to that of an advocate. There's no longer any point to criticizing as everyone has access to the same (or at least adequate) content that a critic does, normally for free. The new problems is that of sorting the wheat from the chaff, and that's where the critic/advocate again becomes useful. There's hardly any use for 'bad' reviews these days. I can find things I hate on my own, thanks. What I need is a concentrated dose of what's awesome. What that is amazing would I possibly miss if the advocate doesn't alert me to it?

People seem more naturally predisposed to rant about what they hate, but that's of no use in the internet age. Useful information centers around what's great and why. Provide that, and you're contributing.

-Adam!!!

Ground Up in the Rumor Mill

This week there are ourWorld rumors regarding Gem Coupon Codes. To be clear:

There are no valid ourWorld Gem Coupon Codes being distributed right now!

For those not in the know, a Gem Coupon Code is a 16 digit, alpha-numeric code that, when valid, adds something like Coins, Gems, etc. to an ourWorld account.

Coupons Codes are activated on the ourWorld SETTINGS page.

We use Gem Coupon Codes for the following reasons:

• Rewards for surveys and similar offers. (usually for 20 Gems.)
• A special bonus for Newsletter readers. (always 10 Gems)
  

Both of these codes are designed to work once per account for a limited time. 20 Gem codes usually last about a week, 10 Gems codes usually last about two. After that, they just quit.

There is a second type of Gem Code Code that we don't use too often. The single use code. These codes don't expire with time, but they only work once, ever. Once HotZexyGrl12 uses the code, it's spent and her friends can't get those Gems.

Clearly a culture of Coupon Code swapping has cropped up in ourWorld. I wonder what the ratio of players who read the newsletter/did the survey is compared to the number who are swapping codes and getting them off of sites like this. There's nothing wrong with the swapping, but when we start getting angry letters from parents because the bogus code their kid got doesn't work, that's a problem. Yes, this is actually happening.

What's this all mean? It means our messaging about Coupon Codes has been lost or at least muddled. In a sense, they don't cost us anything (not counting my time.) That said, if the norm for collecting these codes no longer includes their designed purpose, we may need to change our Gem Coupon Code strategy. That might be very good news, or very bad news, for the players who rely on these codes for their Gems.

-Adam!!!
GameGuts Blog

Free at Last

I've just finished the free audio-book version of Chris Anderson's Free: The Future of a Radical Price. While there is a fair amount of controversy regarding the book, free is the baseline price for most Web-based games, like ourWorld, Yoville, Club Penguin, and pretty much everything else in our category. In other words, we're neck deep in free, and living with the necessities, benefits, as well as the pitfalls of it.

Because free is the default base price for all of our games, the gaming public takes it for granted that the games will be free. In fact, we use the 'freemium' model, where the minority of players that do pay are supporting the vast majority who are playing for free.

The book relied most heavily on Maplestory for its gaming examples. In Maplestory's case, everything in the game could be achieved with effort. The non-free items save players time, but do not provide access to anything that the non-paying players can't achieve given time.

In ourWorld, we certainly sell items that save player time (subscribers level up 2x faster, and an assortment of non-free items can increase that multiplier even further.) In addition, there are items that the highest level players can earn with out paying, but players who don't mind paying can get whenever they choose. Unlike Maplestory, however, we have hundreds of items that only paying players have access to. These items don't do anything but impact how the avatar and living spaces look, but as looks and image is what ourWorld is all about, it's socially rewarding to have these "Gem-Only" premium items.

With free as the default price of online games like ourWorld, the challenge is really how to balance the free version of the game with the premium version. What should be free? What should cost money? When we started last year, almost everything was free. As the site matured, the ratio of free to non-free has shifted steadily toward the latter. As the players gaining benefits from this shift are supporting the site, this is not a problem at all. In addition, while growth is slower, the non-paying players still have more features than they did this time last year, even if glass-half-empty users only see the ever increasing number of features they 'unfairly' don't have access to.

I expect more and more aspects of ourWorld to become free as new non-free items are released. As non-free features age, the cost of giving them away gives way to the benefits. This happened with Condos (ourWorld living spaces) a few months ago, and the result has been totally positive for both the players as well as the bottom line of the site.

Free at last!

Adam!!!
Gameguts Blog

The End of Online

Most online games are played on a computer or video game system. The rise of these systems as a source of entertainment has supplanted TV, toys, sports, and traditional play as the primary source of entertainment for a lot of kids. The conventional wisdom, from the President on down, is that kids need to get off the couch and go play outside. I don't have a problem with that, at all.

My prediction: As being online gets cheaper and easier, smart toys will start appearing that making playing outside as cool or cooler than sitting on the couch. Off the top of my head:

• Bats, balls, gloves, and sporting goods we haven't thought of that automatically record your stats and measure your records against your friends, and the world at large.
• Action figures that allow kids to take part in grand adventures, shared by other kids all over the world.
• Geo-cache style park games, played by individuals, small groups, or as part of a larger world-wide campaign.

These ideas are mostly 'old-toys-only-better', which means I'm certainly off the mark. The idea that people need to be sitting on the couch to get play benefits from the online world is just old fashioned thinking. Once smart toys are priced competitively with dumb ones, a new brand of old fashioned play will return in a big way.

Who wants to sit in from of that stupid screen all day, anyway? It doesn't *do* anything!

-Adam!!!

Member's Only

That's some cooooool water.

We added our first public Member's Only area to ourWorld yesterday. The players have been asking for a swimming pool since pretty much always, and we finally released a swimming area called the Beach.

Only Resident Subscribers can go there*.

As expected, there is a vocal chorus of "not fair!" from the free-play community. While I understand their reaction, it's hard to muster a great deal of sympathy from my personal perspective. Most of ourWorld is free, but new features more and more are for paying players. You know, the people who keep the site running with their dollars.

It's unfortunate how weak the free-player's position is, really. When they threaten to leave the site and never come back, the net loss to the site is usually close to zero. I wish it was a bigger deal. I wish the free-players could contribute more to the site so they could be given more in exchange.

If wishes were subscriptions, we'd all swim.

-Adam!!!

* Free players can go to the Beach if Grouped with a Resident subscriber, so it's not totally off-limits.

Even Freedom isn't Free

One of the most common inquiries sent to ourWorld support are requests for more free stuff. Its not surprising as the ratio of free vs for-money content has shifted, gradually at first, but more so lately, towards stuff that only paying customers have access to.



We have a lot of kids playing, particularly younger teens. I understand they don't have control over whether or not they become customers as a credit card or PayPal account is required (we do accept by-mail payments, but its not a popular option.)

Just today we got a from a player who wanted us to make items cheaper because, and I quote "I honestly don't want to spend money for a online game. (No matter how cool the game is!)"

Her honesty is nice, but she is saying explicitly what the cynic in me thinks every time I read a message requesting we give more away for nothing. If she's never going to become a customer, her value to ourWorld is based on her contributions to the community and the number of paying customers she refers to the site. Statistically, that's not a huge value to us, so I have to say no. Over and over again.

We could give more away for free if:

• Doing so will radically increase the retention of Tourists, leading more to eventually become Customers. The numbers don't currently support this.
  
• We can increase the value of Tourists (through ads, promotional deals, or something else I haven't thought of.)
• The free items lead to additional purchases by the players who do spend.
  

If the players' requests don't have an impact on one of those three things, the answer has to remain a polite, but firm, no.

-Adam!!!

Super Tourists

When I first wrote the series of posts covering Tourists, Customers, Fans, and Super-Fans, I wasn't in the Virtual World business. Now that I am, I want to re-explore Tourists. Not just any Tourists, Super-Tourists!


Quick recap: I call the players who are using the free version of your product Tourists. They are checking it out, and maybe they'll pony up some cash and become customers. (Note: Tourist is the literal name of non-paying players in ourWorld. I don't know if that's coincidence or not. I came up with the term Tourist long before I ever heard of ourWorld.)

If you are a player with a free membership this is what you offer:

• You might buy something and become a Customer.
• You contribute and enhance the community, increasing the value of the game for Customers and Fans
• You may refer other players to the game, so even if you never become a Customer, you may be responsible for someone who eventually does.

Note: A Tourist who doesn't do any of those things may be harmful to your game. Community contribution is subjective, and freeloading troublemakers can be an issue. Tourists who constantly use up the time of your support staff can also be an issue. I hate to cut anyone loose, just in case there is potential, but sometimes you have to.

Super Tourists are players who bring a lot to the table, besides their own money. They are as involved as a Super Fan, only without the check-book. They enhance the community by having a lot of friends and being fun to play with. They refer a lot of players to the site, many of whom become customers. For games where volunteers are needed, they're front and center. It's generally accepted that volunteers don't do it for the 'stuff', but for recognition. It may be that Super Tourists require more 'free stuff' than normal customers because their lack of spending limits their experience.

As I've recently posted, ourWorld has just started an assortment of reference features (click the avatar in the sidebar!) but we haven't started ID-ing Super Tourists yet. I'm not even sure how many (if any) there are. I'm going to look into it.

-Adam!!!

I want to make money by giving my games away.

Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail, is working on a new book about the economy of "free". His views on how business works totally jibe with what I want to do, but I can't wait until 2009 to find out what he says.

I want to:

• Build a website with PDF downloads of complete, ready to play, card games.
• Give the games away for free*
• Invite other game designers, including designers of out of print games, to do the same.
• ?
• Profit

Ideas, anyone?

* My current plan is to charge for the downloads, but if there's a model that allows me to support the site, and myself, without charging, that's the way to go for sure.

This is the article, about the article, which will be in the next (current?) issue of Wired.

-Adam