Steam as a Subscription based Service

[Mr Eos]

Think of it as future proofing.

Give Steam users 2 options. (It's actually more than 2)

You either buy games outright as we always have or pay a monthly fee to get access to the entire steam catalog. You could technically do tiers and special packages that give people multiple options that dicate what is available to them.

Example. Bronze, Silver, Gold

Bronze cost $5 mo, and will get you access to all of greenlight, indie developed games and all Triple A games that are a year old.

Silver Cost $10 mo, and will includes everything, except Triple A games are availabe at 6 months.

Gold Cost $15 mo, and gives instant acess to all games on steam.

Although this is just a quick shot in a dark to help you get started.
The primary purpose of me throwing this out there is because I foresee a potential future crash happening, meaning... the influx of new games could quite possible drop to very drastic levels as publishers and developer start declaring bankruptcy. Which means your profits are also going to take a hit.

In order to secure Steam as a platform, you're going to need to find another source of income that doesn't rely on New Releases from big name games.

Good luck.


P.S.
You'll need to build a system to handle the splitting of funds to each respective developer based on the amount of hours played on a per month basis, etc.

[Mr Eos]

As another potential future...
IF you did this, you would actually encourage developers and publisher to design their games with longevity in mind.

Now obviously, some of you have thought that idea through and have hit a snag at the part where funds get split according to hours played. And you've realize the huge potential for abuse and to divert funds towards a game that doesn't deserve it. Bots and players sitting AFK artifically inflating player hours, etc.

That's why I said good luck. Because that will be the hardest hurdle.

But.. it can and will sort itself out mostly, because the monthly fee will ensure that any attempts to aritifically boost player numbers or hours played within the month will still amount to a defecit from any developer or publisher who wishes to attempt it.

[Fox]

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

Think of it as future proofing.

Give Steam users 2 options. (It's actually more than 2)

You either buy games outright as we always have or pay a monthly fee to get access to the entire steam catalog. You could technically do tiers and special packages that give people multiple options that dicate what is available to them.

Example. Bronze, Silver, Gold

Bronze cost $5 mo, and will get you access to all of greenlight, indie developed games and all Triple A games that are a year old.

Silver Cost $10 mo, and will includes everything, except Triple A games are availabe at 6 months.

Gold Cost $15 mo, and gives instant acess to all games on steam.

This was asked several times already. Not only do you need all publishers' approval for it to be doable, but the reactions to a subscription-based service are less-than-welcome, so, implementing it may be met with quite a share of hostility from users.

And this may not be a deal that publishers will approve of :

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

P.S.
You'll need to build a system to handle the splitting of funds to each respective developer based on the amount of hours played on a per month basis, etc.

[wuddih]

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

P.S.
You'll need to build a system to handle the splitting of funds to each respective developer based on the amount of hours played on a per month basis, etc.

so you want to disable any form of offline play, ok.

[Mr Eos]

So I said. 2 options... apparently you missed the very first part of the post.

in more obvious terms, give people the options (Just like gamefly does)
To buy the game outright. Which would technically give you offline play if you did.


IE.
Option 1, you like to buy your games. Nothing changes
Option 2, you like to pay a monthly subscription for access. Must be online.

Just remember too, that technically, it's all digital.. so it can all dissappear tomorrow, and there's nothing you could do about it. At least a Subscription based service is more in line with what digital content actually is. You renting the ability to play that game for as long as they wish to host it for you. May as well get in proper alignment with the product you are selling, right?

[Start_Running]

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

So I said. 2 options... apparently you missed the very first part of the post.

in more obvious terms, give people the options (Just like gamefly does)
To buy the game outright. Which would technically give you offline play if you did.


IE.
Option 1, you like to buy your games. Nothing changes
Option 2, you like to pay a monthly subscription for access. Must be online.

Just remember too, that technically, it's all digital.. so it can all dissappear tomorrow, and there's nothing you could do about it. At least a Subscription based service is more in line with what digital content actually is. You renting the ability to play that game for as long as they wish to host it for you. May as well get in proper alignment with the product you are selling, right?

It'd be a loss for the developers so they wouldn't support it. SO it'd have to be closer to $150 per month .

Reason. Let's take Fallout 4 or MGSV. It would essentially mean you'd beaably to play your fill of the game for $15. A month is more thanm enough time to burn through the content of either game. SO why then would a developer agree to something like that? Or a publisher?

[Mr Eos]

Originally posted by Start_Running:

Originally posted by Mr Eos:

So I said. 2 options... apparently you missed the very first part of the post.

in more obvious terms, give people the options (Just like gamefly does)
To buy the game outright. Which would technically give you offline play if you did.


IE.
Option 1, you like to buy your games. Nothing changes
Option 2, you like to pay a monthly subscription for access. Must be online.

Just remember too, that technically, it's all digital.. so it can all dissappear tomorrow, and there's nothing you could do about it. At least a Subscription based service is more in line with what digital content actually is. You renting the ability to play that game for as long as they wish to host it for you. May as well get in proper alignment with the product you are selling, right?

It'd be a loss for the developers so they wouldn't support it. SO it'd have to be closer to $150 per month .

Reason. Let's take Fallout 4 or MGSV. It would essentially mean you'd beaably to play your fill of the game for $15. A month is more thanm enough time to burn through the content of either game. SO why then would a developer agree to something like that? Or a publisher?

Only very few gamers would burn through those games in a month. The casual majority would be playing it for years. BTW, the casual majority is what turned gaming into the billion dollar industry that it is today. Not the hardcore "I beat these games in 48 hours" player.

You also missed the part where if this concept actually took off, it would encourage developers to make games with more longevity. They would actually make their games with enough content to keep players playing for more than a month.

Because what's funny is, they'll all look at games like Dota and CS:Go, and realize how much more money they are making on a month to month basis....