I keep hearing that 'console games will go subscription based to play online' and have mixed feelings on the issue.

Hear are my thoughts...

I used to play World of Warcraft for a long time, paying the monthly subscription. I quit and now play PSN online mostly. But when I played WoW, though other MMORPG's came out, I never considered buying them as I couldnt justify paying TWO subscription fee's.

The same will happen if console online games go a subscription route. I will pick just one game and pay that subscription fee if I like it enough, and want to play it online.

But I wouldnt buy other games like I do now, as I couldnt justify paying subscription fee's to more than one.

The moral of the story, I would buy less games than I do now. If other people out there are like me, this would actually hurt their sales - if you dont buy their game, you obviously wont be paying the sub fee either.

The other problem with this, there are games out there now what people play online, but wouldnt pay to play them online. Like Transformers WFC, which is what I currently spend my online time on. But only a hand full of people play this online, usually around 2,000 users online when I play. If all those had to pay a sub fee to play it online, I believe its online user base would die completely. This would happen to most games which arent your CoD's, Halo's which have a large online userbase.

At the moment, the only game I would consider buying and paying a fee to play online, is Transformers WFC. But even that I probably wouldnt bother with, as with a small user base already it would just die, as I dont think many of those who play it online now, would pay to do so. So in effect I wouldnt buy the game (I have barely touched the 1 player).

Most games with online play I wouldnt buy anymore, and would just stick to games that focus on 1 player content. God of War, Uncharted etc.

It would become much too expensive in my opinion. Most game don't have nearly enough conetent to warrant a monthly fee to be allowed to play online and, like you mentioned, paying for several games would be sour money part with (not to mention money that a lot of people don't have, especially teens or students). If a game is gonna cost me 100$ (yes, that's what new games go for aorund here...) and I have to pay a fee as well to play online, then no thanks.

I honestly don't play online that much.

I've played about 100 hours for Mario Kart Wii, 30 for Street Fighter IV and Tatsunoko vs Capcom and about 20 for SSBBrawl and Mario Kart DS.

If subscription fees were involved, I would doubt I would play at all online.  I think the same would happen to other people, I think the lack of subscription fees helped boost sales of PSP Monster Hunter titles compared to PS2/Wii versions.

I probably would still buy them, but only certain games that have long legs, like LBP or Bad Company 2.

I'd do this because I can empathize with the developers. I mean, theoretically speaking, we only pay for one fee; the game itself. They pay other fees such as maintaining servers, bandwidth, making sure their upload speed is up to spec... etc.

And then, they *have* to come out with patches, because their reputation would be hurt if they didn't listen to the community and fixed the issues. That requires an R&D team that needs a monthly salary.

All in all, the companies thrive on DLC and useless 'visual upgrades' in order to fund them after the initial game price. Most people should understand why companies are considering monthly fees.

I agree with what you say, but still it doesnt derive from the point I was trying to make which is the introduction of monthly fee's on games could actually have the effect of losing money. Atleast to the smaller games, I doubt it would have that effect on the most popular games such as Halo, CoD, Battlefield, though I think their user base would decline some, their would still be enough willing to pay and subscribe that they would make more money.

But other games would die out. Those that already have a small user base it would decline to a point where no one plays it online, and then though who are willing to pay to play it wont bother cause there arent enough others out there doing the same.

I can see a subscrioption fee for World of Warcraft, but I'm not really onboard with this idea for other games.

Then again, I'm also not that big a fan of paid DLC and sadly a $15 map pack sells over 2.5 million on the first week.

I for one would certainly be more selective of the type of games I buy... For the price of $60, a single player campaign just isn't enough for me to justify a new purchase... except for top tier single player games like God of War and Uncharted, I'd probably game a lot less.

I understand that server maintenence, bandwidth and other expenses can add up, but IMHO, those factors should be considered with the intial pricing of the game or even during the consideration of the project.

Here's a thought... If new games prices went down, they'd probably get more sales to such a degree that they'd increase profitability... and if the price cut is significant enough, they'd see used game sales dry up overnight.

The way that I see it is that consoles will go the way of xbox live and start charging monthly/yearly subscriptions and if the publisher wants to charge an online fee your microsoft/ sony/ nintendo subscription will ofset it  for only a one time price to get unlimited online play while you have the subscription, If you dont have the subscription, they will probably give you a month free code in the box and if you want to continue playing online, you will pay probably $2 a month if you want to continue playing. I think that if publishers go this route it may take away some possible sales, but I can also see that if the subscription base is strong enough, that some future dlc might be lower in price or compleatly free. But who knows. Just thinking out loud I guess.

I have a feeling it would make the industry more healthy... Despite making games less popular. Yeah, not so healthy to consumers.

It would hurt more then a few game companies that bank on yearly editions because why would they buy the games at $50-$60, then pay an additional $15-$20 on subscription fees to play online or get content that probably could have been put in the game before release and then buy the next addition a year later?

It is the exact reason why the musical genre fell off so hard in recent years. Gamers are probably willing to pay for one subscription like Xbox Live but only the insane would juggle multiple ones for games that they might not even play online outside of weekends. 

The PC idea of such won't work with consoles, game companies are going to need to find another avenue if they suspect this will fly with the majority of gamers.