MMO shifts to subscription model in China

[Arroth Thaiel]

Ran across this blurb on MMORPG about WoW moving from pay by hour to a monthly subscription model in China.

Revenue Model Shifts in China - Now Subscription-Based

If one of the biggest MMO's out there is moving towards a monthly subscription in one of the largest and most sought after markets, some interesting questions can be asked about the health of subscriptions as a business model and the future of MMO's using that model. Might not be as bad as popular opinion holds.

The Superdata monthly report linked in the article is revealing as well. Industry wide, FTP is still increasing while pay to play is decreasing, yet Blizz made the switch anyway? The paragraph about possible changes in Chinese consumer's spending habits indicates new opportunities might be about!

Maybe Wrestling could get revamped into Kung-fu?

 

[Uvtha]

Maybe Wrestling could get revamped into Kung-fu?

Don't remind me how much of a total dud the wrestling mastery is.

 

[CovenantX]

Probably because most people get turned off when it comes to pay-to-win (which is almost exclusive to F2P games)... Pay-to-win is when the game starts to die a quick death.

 

[petemage]

moving from pay by hour to a monthly subscription model[...]

FTP is still increasing while Subscription is decreasing, yet Blizz made the switch anyway?

I'm confused. So was it pay-by-hour or free-to-play?

 

[ShriNayne]

I'm confused. So was it pay-by-hour or free-to-play?

I found that a bit perplexing too! It would be more interesting if it had moved from free-to-play to subscription, it seems that the move was from one form of payment plan to another?? Pay-by-hour was probably working out a lot more per month than just paying the normal subscription...

 

[Arroth Thaiel]

I'm confused. So was it pay-by-hour or free-to-play?

Sorry for the confusion.

WoW was pay by hour in China, now it is a monthly subscription (pay by month) in China.

The Superdata report states that industry-wide (not just China or WoW), FTP increased, while pay to play decreased. I said "subscription" in the original post, which is only a segment of pay to play, so have corrected the original post.

 

[Arroth Thaiel]

Pay-by-hour was probably working out a lot more per month than just paying the normal subscription...

As per the Superdata report, Blizzards Chinese partner NetEase saw revenue increase from $8 million in July to $37 million in August, with most of the increase credited (by the MMORPG article) to the change to a subscription model.

Edit:
The MMORPG article credits most of the revenue increase to the change to a monthly subscription model. The Superdata report cited by the article indicates both a change in subscription model and the sale of the latest WoW expansion contributed to the revenue increase. The later seems far more likely.