Infinite as a LIVE SERVICE

fuzzyyogi · November 28, 2019, 9:28pm

Microsofts business model and Phil’s execution of gamepass. Ultimate gamepass, xcloud made me thinking. How is Halo infinite going to fit within this business model?

My guess is that Halo Infinites multiplayer is going to stick around for a looong time. Just iterating on itself. Cuz when you look at major esports titles almost all of them are a single game that updates itself. (CS GO, FORTNITE, STARCRAFT, ETC) Except COD I can’t think of another franchise (with multiple titles) that has a major Esports scene.

So Infinites multiplayer grinds along the live service model. While subsequent titles comes out with new campaigns.

Thoughts?

WerepyreND · November 28, 2019, 10:49pm

Or, and I’m just spitballing here, they could just make a good game with lots of content that people want to buy and support it so people will be inclined to buy the next one since players know its going to get support.

The lIvE sErViCe model exists to release barebones husks and patch in the rest of the game later or in rare cases it “only” makes the game worse by turning into a grindy mess for the sake of exploitative MTXs… It doesn’t exist for our benefit. You don’t need a constant flow of new content if players were not being constantly being given less and less content for the same price.

They can support the game without trying to cash in on the next get rich(er) quick scheme. And without any actual gameplay to make any sort of judgement, we can’t really say whether Infinite would be worthy of support beyond the usual ~3 years in-between it and the next entry in the series. It is tremendously difficult to patch your way out of a bad base game.

fuzzyyogi · November 29, 2019, 12:39am

> 2533274819446242;2:
> Or, and I’m just spitballing here, they could just make a good game with lots of content that people want to buy and support it so people will be inclined to buy the next one since players know its going to get support.
>
> The lIvE sErViCe model exists to release barebones husks and patch in the rest of the game later or in rare cases it “only” makes the game worse by turning into a grindy mess for the sake of exploitative MTXs… It doesn’t exist for our benefit. You don’t need a constant flow of new content if players were not being constantly being given less and less content for the same price.
>
> They can support the game without trying to cash in on the next get rich(er) quick scheme. And without any actual gameplay to make any sort of judgement, we can’t really say whether Infinite would be worthy of support beyond the usual ~3 years in-between it and the next entry in the series. It is tremendously difficult to patch your way out of a bad base game.

Woah you took this on a conclusion jumping tangent real quick. My post was under the assumption that infinite has a good launch (bugfree and content wise) Let’s break it down

The context : Xbox is seemed to be moving toward a subscription based model. Phil Spencer isn’t as interested in the Financials of console/game units sold anymore. He sees money is in the longevity of the game. That’s what gave birth to game pass, the decision to make future titles play on current generation among other initiatives. To make players play as long as possible. And their decisions so far have been consumer friendly. I mean 1 dollar for a 3 month ultimate game pass sub?

My premise: so given the context its not far fetched to think infinite to follow along the same vein (let’s assume the launch quality is top notch) I’m not saying it has to be a subscription model. But Phil would want people to play Infinite for as long as possible. And for that to turn into profit. And a live service game doesn’t guarantee a bad/game game. I mean you can just Google and you’ll come up with all kinds of examples ranging from CS GO, Fortnite to Anthem, Destiny 1. One can hate fortnite all they want, but you can’t deny what a juggernaut fortnite is in the gaming industry. And if I was in charge of Microsoft studios I’d be ignorant not to learn from both successes/failures of these franchises.
EDIT: in strictly against lootboxes though. You should ALWAYS know what you get for your money.

My 2 cents: I think Halo Infinites multiplayer needs to really earn its keep. I’m not sure how Gears is doing, but halo esports scene is barely clinging on, and I think even with a good game it needs something extra to be a big player in the world scene. (this is evident from HCS latest blog). They also need the casual audience to be engaged as well. This context puts it on 343 to deliver the goods. Beyond that, they need to make big time revenue. This is where the live service model steps in. There are ways to implement them that is non intrusive. Like how a portion of H5 mtx was used in HCS prize pool. Or even a marketplace where halo infinite modders can sell their creations.

Cuz if halo is just doing ‘okay’, in my opinion it’d be hard to justify a AAA launch every 3/4 years for a mediocre return. Given that games have always been 60$ and the cost of production skyrockets.

I might be wrong and halo might end up being likeGod Of War, RD2 as a really solid standalone game rather than being like fortnite, CSGO. But I gotta feeling that Infinites gonna try and be both.

WerepyreND · November 29, 2019, 4:17am

> 2535424770694943;3:
> > 2533274819446242;2:
> > Or, and I’m just spitballing here, they could just make a good game with lots of content that people want to buy and support it so people will be inclined to buy the next one since players know its going to get support.
> >
> > The lIvE sErViCe model exists to release barebones husks and patch in the rest of the game later or in rare cases it “only” makes the game worse by turning into a grindy mess for the sake of exploitative MTXs… It doesn’t exist for our benefit. You don’t need a constant flow of new content if players were not being constantly being given less and less content for the same price.
> >
> > They can support the game without trying to cash in on the next get rich(er) quick scheme. And without any actual gameplay to make any sort of judgement, we can’t really say whether Infinite would be worthy of support beyond the usual ~3 years in-between it and the next entry in the series. It is tremendously difficult to patch your way out of a bad base game.
>
> Woah you took this on a conclusion jumping tangent real quick. My post was under the assumption that infinite has a good launch (bugfree and content wise) Let’s break it down

A conclusion based on industry behavior and history, as opposed to hopes and speculation. If it feels like I am upset with you specifically that is not the case, only that the way the industry has implemented “live services” up to this point has largely been bad for players and is unnecessary.

> The context : Xbox is seemed to be moving toward a subscription based model. Phil Spencer isn’t as interested in the Financials of console/game units sold anymore. He sees money is in the longevity of the game. That’s what gave birth to game pass, the decision to make future titles play on current generation among other initiatives. To make players play as long as possible. And their decisions so far have been consumer friendly. I mean 1 dollar for a 3 month ultimate game pass sub?

I don’t disagree that they seem to be pushing more for players to play on xbox branded services rather than platforms and games pas is indeed a great value for consumers as it stands. (Though subscriptions like that need to remain an alternative for full purchases not a replacement, but I digress). But an ongoing service =/= a “live service” in the context of a specific games. MS and the industry as a whole still have a lot to prove/fix in that regard.

> My premise: so given the context its not far fetched to think infinite to follow along the same vein (let’s assume the launch quality is top notch) I’m not saying it has to be a subscription model. But Phil would want people to play Infinite for as long as possible. And for that to turn into profit. And a live service game doesn’t guarantee a bad/game game. I mean you can just Google and you’ll come up with all kinds of examples ranging from CS GO, Fortnite to Anthem, Destiny 1. One can hate fortnite all they want, but you can’t deny what a juggernaut fortnite is in the gaming industry. And if I was in charge of Microsoft studios I’d be ignorant not to learn from both successes/failures of these franchises.
> EDIT: in strictly against lootboxes though. You should ALWAYS know what you get for your money.

I also don’t think its far fetched to think Infinite will be a “live service” and that’s the problem. The industry impression of what a “live service” is is either a threadbare game with nebulous content based entirely around squeezing out more money via MTXs or “huge” games that are padded out with grind designed to frustrate the player into spending money and MS has been no exception.

Fortnite has an easier time getting away with it because its actually free to play and games like CSGO or Starcraft II go many more years between true successors than many of these AAA titles that ask a full 60 every 1-3 years just from one series. My point isn’t that Infinite is unlikely to be a live service, but that it shouldn’t be and we don’t actually have to take it lying down.

> My 2 cents: I think Halo Infinites multiplayer needs to really earn its keep. I’m not sure how Gears is doing, but halo esports scene is barely clinging on, and I think even with a good game it needs something extra to be a big player in the world scene. (this is evident from HCS latest blog). They also need the casual audience to be engaged as well. This context puts it on 343 to deliver the goods. Beyond that, they need to make big time revenue. This is where the live service model steps in. There are ways to implement them that is non intrusive. Like how a portion of H5 mtx was used in HCS prize pool. Or even a marketplace where halo infinite modders can sell their creations.

The Halo esports scene is barely clinging on because the grassroots community was effectively destroyed in the during the Reach-Halo 4 era and Halo 5 was only ever artificially propped up by 343/MS in the first place. You can talk all you want about getting that casual audience, but unless you actually fix the fundamental problems actual “esports” oriented Halo players care about you are not going to have a playerbase to actually play in said competitive environments not matter how many skins they sell. These companies only ever look at the monetary success of their competitors without looking at the legwork it took to build an actual community to monetize.

> Cuz if halo is just doing ‘okay’, in my opinion it’d be hard to justify a AAA launch every 3/4 years for a mediocre return. Given that games have always been 60$ and the cost of production skyrockets.

Until such time that the industry becomes vastly more transparent on how development money, time, and resources are spent they have no right to plead poverty. They have the power to raise games prices if they actually need to(and games in the N64/PS1 era were more expensive than today relative to inflation and development costs so take from that what you will). If a franchise selling 5 million+ copies per installment is just doing “okay” by any standard that says more about the devs/pubs failures than it does the costs of development.

> I might be wrong and halo might end up being likeGod Of War, RD2 as a really solid standalone game rather than being like fortnite, CSGO. But I gotta feeling that Infinites gonna try and be both.

Yep, and that’s the problem, selling a full price product that they expect to replace in a year or 3 while also including progression/monetization of a live service meant to last far beyond that is just double dipping. Maybe Infinite will be a long lived multiplayer platform with campaign expansions, but given the actual history of the industry, I don’t think that is a realistic expectation.

TL;DR My thoughts on Infinite as a live service is that based on precedent it will result in a worse game for players and should be avoided even if that will likely be the case.

eviltedi · November 29, 2019, 8:51am

> 2533274819446242;4:
> > 2535424770694943;3:
> > > 2533274819446242;2:
> > > Or, and I’m just spitballing here, they could just make a good game with lots of content that people want to buy and support it so people will be inclined to buy the next one since players know its going to get support.
> > >
> > > The lIvE sErViCe model exists to release barebones husks and patch in the rest of the game later or in rare cases it “only” makes the game worse by turning into a grindy mess for the sake of exploitative MTXs… It doesn’t exist for our benefit. You don’t need a constant flow of new content if players were not being constantly being given less and less content for the same price.
> > >
> > > They can support the game without trying to cash in on the next get rich(er) quick scheme. And without any actual gameplay to make any sort of judgement, we can’t really say whether Infinite would be worthy of support beyond the usual ~3 years in-between it and the next entry in the series. It is tremendously difficult to patch your way out of a bad base game.
> >
> > Woah you took this on a conclusion jumping tangent real quick. My post was under the assumption that infinite has a good launch (bugfree and content wise) Let’s break it down
>
> A conclusion based on industry behavior and history, as opposed to hopes and speculation. If it feels like I am upset with you specifically that is not the case, only that the way the industry has implemented “live services” up to this point has largely been bad for players and is unnecessary.
>
>
> > The context : Xbox is seemed to be moving toward a subscription based model. Phil Spencer isn’t as interested in the Financials of console/game units sold anymore. He sees money is in the longevity of the game. That’s what gave birth to game pass, the decision to make future titles play on current generation among other initiatives. To make players play as long as possible. And their decisions so far have been consumer friendly. I mean 1 dollar for a 3 month ultimate game pass sub?
>
> I don’t disagree that they seem to be pushing more for players to play on xbox branded services rather than platforms and games pas is indeed a great value for consumers as it stands. (Though subscriptions like that need to remain an alternative for full purchases not a replacement, but I digress). But an ongoing service =/= a “live service” in the context of a specific games. MS and the industry as a whole still have a lot to prove/fix in that regard.
>
>
> >
>
>
>
> > My 2 cents: I think Halo Infinites multiplayer needs to really earn its keep. I’m not sure how Gears is doing, but halo esports scene is barely clinging on, and I think even with a good game it needs something extra to be a big player in the world scene. (this is evident from HCS latest blog). They also need the casual audience to be engaged as well. This context puts it on 343 to deliver the goods. Beyond that, they need to make big time revenue. This is where the live service model steps in. There are ways to implement them that is non intrusive. Like how a portion of H5 mtx was used in HCS prize pool. Or even a marketplace where halo infinite modders can sell their creations.
>
> The Halo esports scene is barely clinging on because the grassroots community was effectively destroyed in the during the Reach-Halo 4 era and Halo 5 was only ever artificially propped up by 343/MS in the first place. You can talk all you want about getting that casual audience, but unless you actually fix the fundamental problems actual “esports” oriented Halo players care about you are not going to have a playerbase to actually play in said competitive environments not matter how many skins they sell. These companies only ever look at the monetary success of their competitors without looking at the legwork it took to build an actual community to monetize.
>
>
> > Cuz if halo is just doing ‘okay’, in my opinion it’d be hard to justify a AAA launch every 3/4 years for a mediocre return. Given that games have always been 60$ and the cost of production skyrockets.
>
> Until such time that the industry becomes vastly more transparent on how development money, time, and resources are spent they have no right to plead poverty. They have the power to raise games prices if they actually need to(and games in the N64/PS1 era were more expensive than today relative to inflation and development costs so take from that what you will). If a franchise selling 5 million+ copies per installment is just doing “okay” by any standard that says more about the devs/pubs failures than it does the costs of development.
>
>
> > I might be wrong and halo might end up being likeGod Of War, RD2 as a really solid standalone game rather than being like fortnite, CSGO. But I gotta feeling that Infinites gonna try and be both.
>
> Yep, and that’s the problem, selling a full price product that they expect to replace in a year or 3 while also including progression/monetization of a live service meant to last far beyond that is just double dipping. Maybe Infinite will be a long lived multiplayer platform with campaign expansions, but given the actual history of the industry, I don’t think that is a realistic expectation.
>
> TL;DR My thoughts on Infinite as a live service is that based on precedent it will result in a worse game for players and should be avoided even if that will likely be the case.

I agree with what you wrote. At this time I’m very sceptical about Halo being a live service title and it being on game pass after the disastrous Gears 5 launch, it was played a lot day one but it’s population has been decimated, I’m willing to bet game pass users made up the majority of the early players. Game pass is ok if you want to play several games a month or you want cheap access to games on a subscription basis that you can pick up and drop at will. It’s certainly value for money if your games are on it and not removed.

For me game pass is not value, in fact most games I buy do not release on it and I don’t see DOOM Eternal, Cyberpunk and Zombie Army 4 being on it either. Also, I enjoy collecting, I have all three collectors editions of the above mentioned pre ordered. If Halo Infinite launches on game pass in the way Gears 5 did it will be a disaster imo. Gears 5 launched a broken mess, it was also sold at full AAA price with a free to play in game economy. It’s possibly one of the worst examples of using micro transactions I’ve seen.

I’m very worried about Halo Infinite after that, will most try it on game pass and drop it if they don’t like it ? Equally, it could be the second coming a we’re all on our kness saying “we’re not worthy, we’re not worthy” lol and it’s all sunshine and roses. Who knows ? We don’t know enough about Halo Infinite, whether it will be a games as a service or not, we don’t know the in game economy and so much more. All I can say is there was a time when I though Halo being games as a service was ok, after Gears 5 I’m not so sure.

Sorry I had to remove some text above. Too many letters to post.

Fully_Skully · November 29, 2019, 12:34pm

I thinking having a single game for MP that gets updated consistently with content and engine updates when it needs it while releasing singleplayer content separately would be really cool. It would definitely be heavy on the mtx if that were to happen though because then they wouldn’t be getting as much money as if they kept the release system we’re on now.

fuzzyyogi · November 29, 2019, 7:22pm

> A conclusion based on industry behavior and history, as opposed to hopes and speculation. If it feels like I am upset with you specifically that is not the case, only that the way the industry has implemented “live services” up to this point has largely been bad for players and is unnecessary.WerepyreND

Yup that’s a fair conclusion to come to. However my opinions is not entirely founded on optimism and speculation. I did cite games that have done (extremely) well being a live service or having mtx. I forgot to mention FIFA. I would’ve thought their audience would’ve hated the amount of mtx in it. But apparently it’s doing good. My point is there are plenty of evidence for both sides of the argument. But I do agree that the failures of this concept were more damaging than the good that came of the successes for the players. So it’s a net negative imo.

Regarding Esports, I agree the support for grassroots community was kinda overlooked in favour of HCS. But I think a bigger problem is that for a player who is looking to earn as a professional gamer there are more lucrative games than Halo. So I guess 343 decided to pump prize money into H5 to keep the incentive going. It did work…kinda. But once the money went away, H5 dropped like a stone. That’s why I think Halo infinite multiplayer might be a long term package. This gives them time to build a community, implement changes, not risk losing the audience every 3 years cycle to other franchises and just keep adding content for years. Maybe after a 6 to 7 year stint we get a new multiplayer experience. (Meanwhile the campaign gets the usual 3 year cycle. Maybe even pay less for Halo 7 since you already got the multiplayer) overwatch is good example. Correct me if I’m wrong, but overwatch 2 doesn’t alienate players from overwatch 1. Both games can play with each other. And it’s performance would be something to look at.

> Until such time that the industry becomes vastly more transparent on how development money, time, and resources are spent they have no right to plead poverty. They have the power to raise games prices if they actually need to(and games in the N64/PS1 era were more expensive than today relative to inflation and development costs so take from that what you will). If a franchise selling 5 million+ copies per installment is just doing “okay” by any standard that says more about the devs/pubs failures than it does the costs of development.

Yeah the revenue does measure a games financial success. Also I agree financial reports are not transparent. And yes the value of a dollar was higher back at PS1 era. But the retail price of games has not kept up. Whether developers are spending more/less to make a game, we as a consumer are paying less than what we did before. And I also agree they can hike the prices but that has to be an industry initiative and not fall on a studio. Or even a consumer initiative. On the flip side, a business case might prove that hiking the price by x amount of dollars is still less lucrative than an live service.
But I digress. I don’t know if this is how devs/puboom at it. It I would wanna know what aspects of my game is losing. bringing in the money. From a crude guess, I feel that Halo is bleeding money on its esports scene. I have a feeling they’re running at a net loss when it comes to multiplayer costs (development, marketing, esports etc) since maybe Reach? This is why I think live service multiplayer (regardless of how/if it is monetized) makes sense financially not just in terms of profit but also in terms of cutting costs.

You wouldn’t need to build from scratch every 3 years.
It would help grow and sustain the community for the long term
Resources would free up for future developments in other avenues.
There wouldn’t be any dead time between installments.

H1 to 3 were big because it was first to the scene and executed really well. Present day there are just too many options and the competition is fierce. (See Apex vs Fortnite). Its really hard for a game to be relavant online without consistent new content, a healthy community and incentive to compete. 3 areas a live service game might help.

WerepyreND · November 29, 2019, 9:16pm

> 2535424770694943;7:
> Yup that’s a fair conclusion to come to. However my opinions is not entirely founded on optimism and speculation. I did cite games that have done (extremely) well being a live service or having mtx. I forgot to mention FIFA. I would’ve thought their audience would’ve hated the amount of mtx in it. But apparently it’s doing good. My point is there are plenty of evidence for both sides of the argument. But I do agree that the failures of this concept were more damaging than the good that came of the successes for the players. So it’s a net negative imo.

Most of the games you listed were either F2P(Fortnite), cheap(CSGO), or had serious launch controversies and growing pains(Destiny). FIFA is a particular bad example as there have been plenty of horror stories coming out of FIFA(and other similar models) and its MTXs. High revenue from a game MTXs is not indicative of widespread support among a fanbase, it just means manipulative MTXs(keep in mind FIFA still has lootboxes) and game design are doing their jobs. The sad irony is Sports games are one of the best possible candidates for an honest to god live service where you buy one game that gets updated seasonally for years to come, but the industry want to have its cake and eat it too with a F2P economy and frequent releases.

> Regarding Esports, I agree the support for grassroots community was kinda overlooked in favour of HCS. But I think a bigger problem is that for a player who is looking to earn as a professional gamer there are more lucrative games than Halo. So I guess 343 decided to pump prize money into H5 to keep the incentive going. It did work…kinda. But once the money went away, H5 dropped like a stone. That’s why I think Halo infinite multiplayer might be a long term package. This gives them time to build a community, implement changes, not risk losing the audience every 3 years cycle to other franchises and just keep adding content for years. Maybe after a 6 to 7 year stint we get a new multiplayer experience. (Meanwhile the campaign gets the usual 3 year cycle. Maybe even pay less for Halo 7 since you already got the multiplayer) overwatch is good example. Correct me if I’m wrong, but overwatch 2 doesn’t alienate players from overwatch 1. Both games can play with each other. And it’s performance would be something to look at.

The problem is if you don’t build a game that your hardcore audience actually want to compete in it doesn’t matter how much they support any particular game. It isn’t drip fed content that keeps games alive it is the community and dedicated communities can keep the flame alive a lot longer than corportate whims(See: The Smash community and Melee in particular).

As far as Overwatch 2 is concerned it is true that both are being supported together, but it is still anyone’s guess whether the content in Overwatch 2 can reasonably justify the cost, the $60 price tag for console Overwatch was already a big stretch.

> Yeah the revenue does measure a games financial success. Also I agree financial reports are not transparent. And yes the value of a dollar was higher back at PS1 era. But the retail price of games has not kept up. Whether developers are spending more/less to make a game, we as a consumer are paying less than what we did before. And I also agree they can hike the prices but that has to be an industry initiative and not fall on a studio. Or even a consumer initiative. On the flip side, a business case might prove that hiking the price by x amount of dollars is still less lucrative than an live service.
> But I digress. I don’t know if this is how devs/puboom at it. It I would wanna know what aspects of my game is losing. bringing in the money. From a crude guess, I feel that Halo is bleeding money on its esports scene. I have a feeling they’re running at a net loss when it comes to multiplayer costs (development, marketing, esports etc) since maybe Reach? This is why I think live service multiplayer (regardless of how/if it is monetized) makes sense financially not just in terms of profit but also in terms of cutting costs.

No one is denying that the live service model isn’t lucrative, only that the traditional model hasn’t been proven to be a financial risk. Saying a particular cost X tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to produce doesn’t tell the whole story when we hear about management disasters like Anthem. Its not on the players to make of the cost of dev/pub mismanagement.

And no one is denying that these companies try to make as much money as possible, but that pursuit still needs to be tempered by legal, ethical, and logical restraints. Just because they could hypothetically make more money on top of already great profit does mean we actually have to let them. If more money than God isn’t already enough for them again it says more about their unreasonable expectations than it does the increasing costs of development.

> 1. You wouldn’t need to build from scratch every 3 years.
> 2. It would help grow and sustain the community for the long term
> 3. Resources would free up for future developments in other avenues.
> 4. There wouldn’t be any dead time between installments.
>
> H1 to 3 were big because it was first to the scene and executed really well. Present day there are just too many options and the competition is fierce. (See Apex vs Fortnite). Its really hard for a game to be relavant online without consistent new content, a healthy community and incentive to compete. 3 areas a live service game might help.

1.) They almost never build from scratch in the first place, truly brand new engines and systems are a rarity.
2.) Sequels are already a well established method of growing and sustaining a community in the long term
3.) The constant support of a live service requires a dedicated team in the first place so it doesn’t really free up anyone.
4.) There is rarely any dead time between installments when you have a fully featured game to being with along updates, Halo is already a perfect example.

The “competition” argument was bad when it first started making the rounds and is still bad now. It always had competition, especially H3, but it is still the most successful Halo game of all time. There may be overall more hands grabbing for a slice of the pie, but the pie itself has also grown tremendously to compensate. Failing to secure a sizable slice at this juncture says more about your own failures than it does your competitors success.

I’m never going to not find it weird when fans try to qualify Halo’s success as being a result of a lack of competition. “Hey guys, we have to do what the competition is doing because we were only truly successful because folks literally had no other options” is never not going to be a weirdly dismissive take.

fuzzyyogi · November 29, 2019, 11:37pm

> Most of the games you listed were either F2P(Fortnite), cheap(CSGO), or had serious launch controversies and growing pains(Destiny). FIFA is a particular bad example as there have been plenty of horror stories coming out of FIFA(and other similar models) and its MTXs. High revenue from a game MTXs is not indicative of widespread support among a fanbase, it just means manipulative MTXs(keep in mind FIFA still has lootboxes) and game design are doing their jobs. The sad irony is Sports games are one of the best possible candidates for an honest to god live service where you buy one game that gets updated seasonally for years to come, but the industry want to have its cake and eat it too with a F2P economy and frequent releases. WerepyreND

I did acknowledge they were F2P, cheap etc. But they are not requirements for a live service model to be viable. They are just indicators. That’s my point. A live service model does not need to be constrained by pre requisites such as F2P etc for it work. A game can launch at full price and be a live service if consumers see value in it. Just because it hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean it never will.

I just mentioned FIFA as an example of how players are willing to pay for MTX. The game has a card trading/fantasy league vibe to it. Its a culture. Yes the pubs money making strategy is working but you seem to imply that the players are just being ripped off which is not the case. Granted I’m not aware of the horror stories in fifa, but like I said there are horror stories and there are lessons to be learned from them.

If I deliver a 60$ game that has all the content that was promised and then later add opt in, non random monetization (dlc, season pass etc) thereafter that has value for money in the customers eyes then I see no issue.

> The problem is if you don’t build a game that your hardcore audience actually want to compete in it doesn’t matter how much they support any particular game. It isn’t drip fed content that keeps games alive it is the community and dedicated communities can keep the flame alive a lot longer than corportate whims(See: The Smash community and Melee in particular).

You seem to be putting a negative spin on my premise. My suggestions of a live service is NOT at the cost of a good game (content/mechanic wise). I certainly did not suggest that infinite launch bare bones and then drip feed content. Also, not all post launch content is indicative of bad practice. And Post launch content influences your community. If there’s nothing new to play and if a good game drops at the same time, who’s to say your population/community won’t leave . I don’t know how you don’t see that good post launch content/support won’t build/sustain communities. It IS contingent on your base game to begin with I agree with that. But I think it’s best to state that my suggestions are under best case assumptions to avoid any ambiguity.

> No one is denying that the live service model isn’t lucrative, only that the traditional model hasn’t been proven to be a financial risk. Saying a particular cost X tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to produce doesn’t tell the whole story when we hear about management disasters like Anthem. Its not on the players to make of the cost of dev/pub mismanagement.

This is a valid point. The mediocrity of recent Halo esports is entirely on 343. I also did not suggest that they continue the mediocrity and cut their financial losses via live service model. Only that a live service model might be a safer model in the long run. Especially given how Microsoft is willing to heavily invest in Halo. That investment I think will be best served in continuing support for a prolonged multiplayer experience rather than pouring money in and expecting things to be revived within 3 years.

Build from scratch as in: new assets, new design language, increased fidelity, all new marketing, new negotiations with esports orgs, all new testing, coding etc.
Live service and sequels are both viable. Currently, other than COD I am not aware of any other franchise with sequels that has a strong continued multiplayer/esports scene.
A dedicated team is all it needs yes. But it’s not on the same scale as building a new game. (see point 1)
Halo 5 has been virtually dead for over a year. There’s no reason for anyone to pick up halo 5 for its multiplayer now. Or a year ago. It can be attributed to the base game, lack of grassroots community etc…but other esports/multiplayer offerings can not be ignored as a major factor Also. Or even the desire to just play something new. With sequels, devs will eventually stop support and move on. All it takes is a timely launch of a good game to eat away at the same targeted population. If your game is “good” enough the population may come back. And the term good can mean anything. Apex vs fortnite. Apex dethroned fortnite for a while. But neither can be considered a 'bad" game. Fortnite continually pumped out content which made it #1 again.

And what I meant by competition I was purely talking about esports. Back in early 2000s, Halo was one of 3 major shooter esports. And back then, esports as a whole wasn’t exactly a career option either. Now if a budding 18 year old wants to be a professional gamer, there are so many lucrative options out there. Unless the 18 year old is loyal to one franchise all of them are fun to play as well. For Halo to be one of them it has to pay big. Their orgs offers 50-60 k salary per player and it makes sense for them to do so because the COD scene is much bigger and established. Also is basically a live service cuz there’s a new game practically every year. So the “COD” scene doesn’t really have downtime.

Shotzzy, arguably the best player in H5 been playing since Halo 2 or something. Transfered to COD and will have zero reason besides loyalty to come back to halo to earn less than he did in COD. Competition is truly a big factor when it comes to esports because money talks.

TLDR my whole premise centers around multiplayer particularly esports and the community. And my premise is based on the assumption that a good (in every aspect) game at launch is furthered upon through a live service model. (Assuming the game/content is good) While the traditional model does work well, it comes with all the inherent risk of starting fresh with every subsequent installment because of competition in the esports scene…especially for new audiences. A live service (if done well) fosters longevity, growth and sustainability, pressure off from stakeholders to deliver on 3 year cycle financial bottom lines. If it fails they can just move onto sequels without skipping a beat.

WerepyreND · November 30, 2019, 1:52am

> 2535424770694943;9:
> I just mentioned FIFA as an example of how players are willing to pay for MTX. The game has a card trading/fantasy league vibe to it. Its a culture. Yes the pubs money making strategy is working but you seem to imply that the players are just being ripped off which is not the case. Granted I’m not aware of the horror stories in fifa, but like I said there are horror stories and there are lessons to be learned from them.
>
> If I deliver a 60$ game that has all the content that was promised and then later add opt in, non random monetization (dlc, season pass etc) thereafter that has value for money in the customers eyes then I see no issue.

Again, being “willing” to pay doesn’t actually say anything. Manipulative design and business models have a funny way of making people “willing” to pay for exploitative practices.

The whole problem is that the horror stories are the end goal of these practices not a side effect. They are only horror stories to folks with a conscience, but to the people who make and sell these products those are the success stories. The majority of the revenue from these practices come from a much smaller portion of the communities the leeches like to call “whales.” The “free content” people get is paid for a relative handful of people and I honestly find it pretty gross.

> You seem to be putting a negative spin on my premise. My suggestions of a live service is NOT at the cost of a good game (content/mechanic wise). I certainly did not suggest that infinite launch bare bones and then drip feed content. Also, not all post launch content is indicative of bad practice. And Post launch content influences your community. If there’s nothing new to play and if a good game drops at the same time, who’s to say your population/community won’t leave . I don’t know how you don’t see that good post launch content/support won’t build/sustain communities. It IS contingent on your base game to begin with I agree with that. But I think it’s best to state that my suggestions are under best case assumptions to avoid any ambiguity.

I’m not saying that either, only that you can support a particular game all you want if you don’t actually cater to your hardcore audience you simply are not going to have a healthy esports community that doesn’t evaporate the moment the money goes away. At that point it isn’t a community it is just a marketing arm. Even if the game is filled to the brim with content at launch and has healthy support, you are not going to get anywhere fast in esports if the grassroots portion of your competitive community isn’t enjoying the core gameplay and/or the tournament settings.

> This is a valid point. The mediocrity of recent Halo esports is entirely on 343. I also did not suggest that they continue the mediocrity and cut their financial losses via live service model. Only that a live service model might be a safer model in the long run. Especially given how Microsoft is willing to heavily invest in Halo. That investment I think will be best served in continuing support for a prolonged multiplayer experience rather than pouring money in and expecting things to be revived within 3 years.
>
> 1. Build from scratch as in: new assets, new design language, increased fidelity, all new marketing, new negotiations with esports orgs, all new testing, coding etc.
> 2. Live service and sequels are both viable. Currently, other than COD I am not aware of any other franchise with sequels that has a strong continued multiplayer/esports scene.
> 3. A dedicated team is all it needs yes. But it’s not on the same scale as building a new game. (see point 1)
> 4. Halo 5 has been virtually dead for over a year. There’s no reason for anyone to pick up halo 5 for its multiplayer now. Or a year ago. It can be attributed to the base game, lack of grassroots community etc…but other esports/multiplayer offerings can not be ignored as a major factor Also. Or even the desire to just play something new. With sequels, devs will eventually stop support and move on. All it takes is a timely launch of a good game to eat away at the same targeted population. If your game is “good” enough the population may come back. And the term good can mean anything. Apex vs fortnite. Apex dethroned fortnite for a while. But neither can be considered a 'bad" game. Fortnite continually pumped out content which made it #1 again.

A “live service” model is one of the least safe things they could possibly do. As much as we can hope for a great game with great support, the possibility exists that this product that was meant to be supported for years to come is subpar to the degree it would require an entire new game’s worth of adjustments to sort out and we are back at square one. Since everyone and their mother in the industry is pushing “live services” that demand huge chunks of any given player’s time that a large number of live service losers are inevitable. Sequels are one of the safest things to do and during CE-H3 they never needed “reviving.”

1.) Every one of the things you listed remains as part of a live service. None of this goes away.
2.) Halo did, until the scene was destroyed by supbar competitive titles
3.) Point 1 simply isn’t true and from what we do know about the ongoing development of something like Fornite the game is under constant crunch to get said content out. Keeping a constant schedule of solid content requires just as much effort as a separate game, the only difference is the timeline is shorter.
4.) There is no reason to go back to play Halo 5, unless you know, you like playing Halo 5… Remember that? Playing a game because you enjoy playing that not because of nebulous content updates? By that logic CE-H3 must have been ghost towns when you contrast the number of updates those games actually had with modern games, yet they were continuously played right up until the moment their sequel released. Despite all the support Halo 5 did get by comparison, its a “dead” game, I wonder what the difference is?

And Apex never “dethroned” Fortnite, it found its own success with its own audience.

> And what I meant by competition I was purely talking about esports. Back in early 2000s, Halo was one of 3 major shooter esports.

In that regard yes, Halo was a pioneer, but the money followed the community not the other way around. The community was built around a shared love of a particular game, there wasn’t any inherent audience waiting for any old game to get shown on TV.

> TLDR my whole premise centers around multiplayer particularly esports and the community. And my premise is based on the assumption that a good (in every aspect) game at launch is furthered upon through a live service model. (Assuming the game/content is good) While the traditional model does work well, it comes with all the inherent risk of starting fresh with every subsequent installment because of competition in the esports scene…especially for new audiences. A live service (if done well) fosters longevity, growth and sustainability, pressure off from stakeholders to deliver on 3 year cycle financial bottom lines. If it fails they can just move onto sequels without skipping a beat.

That’s not how any of this works. If that were the case CoD would be the riskiest possible thing with its yearly releases. Folks follow a franchise just as readily as a specific game and as much as we hope and pray following a “live service” model for release still has the same types of risks associated with it as a traditional release.

fuzzyyogi · November 30, 2019, 3:39am

> Again, being “willing” to pay doesn’t actually say anything. Manipulative design and business models have a funny way of making people “willing” to pay for exploitative WerepyreND

Also “funny” way of making people willing to pay doesn’t paint the complete picture either. There are bad examples and good examples. Unless you take a survey of every player that pays for mtx, you can’t dismiss players who genuinely don’t mind mtx if theyre implemented properly as being victims of manipulation.

> I’m not saying that either, only that you can support a particular game all you want if you don’t actually cater to your hardcore audience you simply are not going to have a healthy esports community that doesn’t evaporate the moment the money goes away. At that point it isn’t a community it is just a marketing arm. Even if the game is filled to the brim with content at launch and has healthy support, you are not going to get anywhere fast in esports if the grassroots portion of your competitive community isn’t enjoying the core gameplay and/or the tournament settings.

I already mentioned that I’m not suggesting live service model as an excuse to deliver a subpar game. We’re just going in circles here. My point is…on top of a solid game and post launch content and regional support is important. Maps, game modes, expansions, dlcs etc. to sustain a community.

> A “live service” model is one of the least safe things they could possibly do. As much as we can hope for a great game with great support, the possibility exists that this product that was meant to be supported for years to come is subpar to the degree it would require an entire new game’s worth of adjustments to sort out and we are back at square one

The possibility for a subpar game is present regardless of what business model it is executed on. I’m not sure how that risk is exclusive for a live service model. And I’m not sure how that makes live service one of the least safest options. Yes H1-3 didn’t need reviving. But that doesn’t change the fact that Halo needs reviving now. And it has the freedom to change up its plans. To contrast, I would not suggest a live service model for COD. Because it already has an established scene. And a live service wouldnt be feasible because they literally pump out a game/year. And if you think about it, the esports scene more or less falls under the COD umbrella with a game every year to support the community as a whole. Kinda like consistent timely content from a live service.

You can’t seriously suggest the scale of development of multiplayer in a new game is the same as updating content in an existing one. Polygons in an asset skyrocket with eac installment. That affects physics, lighting, rendering, game design etc. And that’s just one avenue of development.
Yes Halo did. That doesnt mean it’s the only way halo can do it again. As is evident from successful shooters now.
I agree, You have to also consider fortnite had to fend off wave after wave of battle Royale games so it couldn’t afford to take its foot of the gas pedal. But I imagine CS GO, LOL are not under the same kind of stress. Halo can do its own thing and not succumb to crunch (Bonnie Ross made it a point that they are moving away from a crunch development cycle)
Well I’m assuming you refer to the experience of playing H5 multiplayer. If you get on H5 in the past year, you could only get a decent experience if you’re in NA. Otherwise, you’d have to wait in the lobby for several minutes, get matched to a distant server creating lag, play at untimely hours just so you can find enough people to fill a lobby and play in a ranking system that’s broken because of low population. If someone can enjoy H5 beyond all these reasons good on them. Reasons why H5 is dead is varied. I’m not here to argue that.
And you keep bringing up the original trilogy as if it’s an apples to apples comparison. The original trilogy were inherently good. No doubt. But you also have to consider the that it was the first properly executed console shooter, Microsofts marketing, competition etc. And these factors still exist today BUT their degree of influence is varied. Competition now is different to competition then. Console competition, games ecosystem, buying power are all very important variables. If you made a comprehensive thesis titled “Analysis of the success/failure of the Halo Franchise” you HAVE to consider ALL the factors and value their influence in that time period accordingly. It is hardly an apples to apples comparison where you can just attribute any failures of current halos to “because they’re not as good as the original trilogy”. To get the complete picture you have to take in every factor.

Regardless my point is, even if your game is good, you are always at the risk of losing population to another game. The game doesn’t even have to target the same audience. How many players would’ve left fortnite to play Death Stranding? Games are so accessible now that it’s easy to stumble upon a better experience. Halo cannot be better than every game for everyone.

My example was apex vs fortnite. And it “dethroned” Fortnite when it became the #1 most played game on twitch. And fortnite was #2. And since both are Battle Royale games, I think it’s safe to say that there was some transfer of players between games. I can’t say for sure, just as you can’t claim current the audience for apex and fortnite are mutually exclusive.

> If that were the case CoD would be the riskiest possible thing with its yearly releases.

COD is risky. But it’s yearly releases helps alleviate that. And remember there is one general COD umbrella community. So let’s say…COD 2015 is a flop on the esports scene, they only have to wait another year to get a brand new experience from another developer. There literally is no downtime between installments. Their model is super condensed that they have the ability to offer better experiences from the past years learnings. A traditional halo model, has the risk of delivering a subpar game (which is a risk for live service model too) but the difference is the outcome has more time to do more damage (see halo 4) than it is for COD who can quickly redeem themselves in a year.
Yes live service and traditional models share many risks. But I look at it this way.
Live service model = create one good multiplayer experience lasting for 5+ years cuz imo reviving takes time.
Traditional model = create good multiplayer experience every 3 years

EDIT: Easiest way to resolve this would be to do a SWOT analysis for both models.

WerepyreND · November 30, 2019, 6:52am

> 2535424770694943;11:
> Also “funny” way of making people willing to pay doesn’t paint the complete picture either. There are bad examples and good examples. Unless you take a survey of every player that pays for mtx, you can’t dismiss players who genuinely don’t mind mtx if theyre implemented properly as being victims of manipulation.

I can absolutely dismiss those players becuase they obviously are not going to be affected or at least they believe they won’t be. All the good examples have been in F2P, have discount price points or are otherwise proper MMOs. I couldn’t care less about hypothetical “good” versions of fee 2 pay “live services”, only about what we have actually gotten which so far consists of hiding content/progression behind gambling mechanics, purposely tedious grinding, and creating problems to then sell solutions to. If they want the benefit of the doubt the industry should actually try and earn some goodwill back.

> > I’m not saying that either.
>
> I already mentioned that I’m not suggesting live service model as an excuse to deliver a subpar game. We’re just going in circles here. My point is…on top of a solid game and post launch content and regional support is important. Maps, game modes, expansions, dlcs etc. to sustain a community.

Bolded since you missed it the first time. I’m just entertaining the possibility that the game could be less than ideal regardless of the model. As in even if the game has a plethora of content to begin, but the actual game itself is less than ideal(for reasons that are not the fault of the live service model) then it won’t matter how carefully laid out their plans are. At least in the case of traditional sequels there is the possibility of change in only a few years rather than just plowing ahead with a poor base for who knows how long.

> 1. You can’t seriously suggest the scale of development of multiplayer in a new game is the same as updating content in an existing one. Polygons in an asset skyrocket with eac installment. That affects physics, lighting, rendering, game design etc. And that’s just one avenue of development.
> 2. Yes Halo did. That doesnt mean it’s the only way halo can do it again. As is evident from successful shooters now.
> 3. I agree, You have to also consider fortnite had to fend off wave after wave of battle Royale games so it couldn’t afford to take its foot of the gas pedal. But I imagine CS GO, LOL are not under the same kind of stress. Halo can do its own thing and not succumb to crunch (Bonnie Ross made it a point that they are moving away from a crunch development cycle)
> 4. Well I’m assuming you refer to the experience of playing H5 multiplayer. If you get on H5 in the past year, you could only get a decent experience if you’re in NA. Otherwise, you’d have to wait in the lobby for several minutes, get matched to a distant server creating lag, play at untimely hours just so you can find enough people to fill a lobby and play in a ranking system that’s broken because of low population. If someone can enjoy H5 beyond all these reasons good on them. Reasons why H5 is dead is varied. I’m not here to argue that.

1.) I absolutely am suggesting that when you account for time, especially if we are talking about the kind of pace that keeps something like Fortnite running. Crunch is crunch regardless of whether you are building new complex system or churning out skin after skin like a machine.
2.) If we are worried about risk surely the safest thing would be to stick with what works rather than going after a risky new model that has thus far proven to be of little benefit to players.
3.) Fornite hasn’t had to “fend off” anything. There isn’t a fixed amount of players to go around, there is enough room for games both new and old to find a niche and an audience.
4.) I was being facetious when I said “I wonder what the difference is?” its because Halo 5 playerbase doesn’t enjoy playing it as much as the Halo 3 playerbase enjoyed playing Halo 3. It doesn’t matter how much “content” you add if the game itself doesn’t have a passionate following.

> Regardless my point is, even if your game is good, you are always at the risk of losing population to another game. The game doesn’t even have to target the same audience. How many players would’ve left fortnite to play Death Stranding? Games are so accessible now that it’s easy to stumble upon a better experience. Halo cannot be better than every game for everyone.
>
> My example was apex vs fortnite. And it “dethroned” Fortnite when it became the #1 most played game on twitch. And fortnite was #2. And since both are Battle Royale games, I think it’s safe to say that there was some transfer of players between games. I can’t say for sure, just as you can’t claim current the audience for apex and fortnite are mutually exclusive.

Stealing the spotlight on twitch is hardly “dethroning.” This isn’t a game of hungry hungry hippos, success of one player doesn’t inherently take anything away from another. The industry has consistently failed to understand this and have constantly shot themselves in the foot by chasing the success of genre leaders at the expense of their own audience. This is why the “competition” argument is irrelevant, success of one thing isn’t contingent on another’s failure.

> COD is risky. But it’s yearly releases helps alleviate that. And remember there is one general COD umbrella community. So let’s say…COD 2015 is a flop on the esports scene, they only have to wait another year to get a brand new experience from another developer. There literally is no downtime between installments. Their model is super condensed that they have the ability to offer better experiences from the past years learnings. A traditional halo model, has the risk of delivering a subpar game (which is a risk for live service model too) but the difference is the outcome has more time to do more damage (see halo 4) than it is for COD who can quickly redeem themselves in a year.
> Yes live service and traditional models share many risks. But I look at it this way.
> Live service model = create one good multiplayer experience lasting for 5+ years cuz imo reviving takes time.
> Traditional model = create good multiplayer experience every 3 years
>
> EDIT: Easiest way to resolve this would be to do a SWOT analysis for both models.

There is no need for “revival” if they make a worthwhile game in the first place. I don’t know what point you think you are trying to make. A live service isn’t in any better a position to redeem itself than a traditional model. A complete lack of any downtime doesn’t make a game people don’t enjoy any better or inherently keep people around. The bigger problem is that the industry largely doesn’t make any distinction between the two as they keep releasing traditional sequels with live service model strapped on top of it despite having no intention to actually support the game beyond how long it takes to produce the sequel.

fuzzyyogi · November 30, 2019, 10:32am

> I can absolutely dismiss those players.WerepyreND

I guess our personal biases now count for objective absolute truth. But OK. I know friends who actively bought HCS team skins to support their preferred team and contribute to the HCS prize pool but I guess they were manipulated.

> All the good examples have been in F2P,etc…
> I couldn’t care less about hypothetical “good” versions of fee 2 pay “live services”

Then why even have this discussion? That is what innovation is isn’t it? Take the learnings of the industry and do something new with it. If we’re going to talk about how live services affects games/players are you suggesting there’s absolutely nothing to be learned/adopted from the good examples I suggested? If your argument is “there hasn’t been a successful/well received franchise that was formerly traditional model turned live service model hence it will never work” then there is no point in you even discussing further.

> In the case of traditional sequels there is the possibility of change in only a few years rather than just plowing ahead with a poor base for who knows how long.

I agree. Also a failed live service model can be given up at anypoint to start development on the next sequel. So if you have a well thought out contingency plan you can still put out a traditional sequel within the typical time period regardless of what model it is based on.

> 1.) Crunch is crunch regardless of whether you are building new complex system or churning out skin after skin like a machine.
> 2.) If we are worried about risk surely the safest thing would be to stick with what works rather than going after a risky new model.
> 3.) Fornite hasn’t had to “fend off” anything. There isn’t a fixed amount of players to go around, there is enough room for games both new and old.
> 4.) I was being facetious when I said “I wonder what the difference is?” It doesn’t matter how much “content” you add if the game itself doesn’t have a passionate following.

1.0 Agree to disagree. Time and effort taken to make a skin is not the same as building a new complex system.
1.1 And crunch is crunch yes. But crunch is crunch if you don’t plan well. When you put out a project plan on any industry, you don’t put down “crunch” as the last phase of the project. Every plan looks to avoid crunch. Crunch is due to factors such as scope creep, variations in vision, mismanagement etc. Crunch is widespread in the gaming industry but its not a given. And I’m backing my stance with Bonnie Ross views on crunch in 343. You can choose to believe crunch is inevitable no matter the context.
2. For Halo? yes the live service model is new. But in the gaming industry its hardly new. But then again you dismiss good examples because they’re not the same genre/price point. So no point in discussion.
3.# of players worldwide are fixed. And when you categorize based on console, age, preference
region etc them they become even more finite. That’s why there is a concept called target audience. A good game will get a following but a portion of the following came from playing some other game.
4. Gameplay experience, content, value for money etc all contribute to a passionate following. You seem to cherry pick favourable factors to further your own argument. Regardless my original point was no matter how good your game is, you’re ALWAYS at the risk of losing a portion of your population especially in a competitive genre such as shooters. Reasons can vary from competition, prize money, community culture, gameplay preference, fatigue etc.

> The industry has consistently failed to understand this and have constantly chased the success of genre leaders at the expense of their own audience. This is why the “competition” argument is irrelevant, success of one thing isn’t contingent on another’s failure.

My point was apex took a share of fortnites population. Maybe dethroned was the wrong term. But both were not failures. This was mainly in support of point #3 and #4. You chose to belove apex and fortnite audience never had an overlap. So we agree to disagree. However, I never said a game has to fail for another to succeed. Rather success of a game is likely to eat away at anothers population. Its a consequence. Not a requirement. But according to you there’s enough gamers to go around. Especially in a saturated genre such as shooters? I disagree.
Also competition is never irrelevant cuz it’s always a variable in the equation. It’s not a constant. Is a battle royal game more likely to succeed now or a few years back? Why do you think pubs are so cautious about launch dates? There are so many examples where a good game didn’t do financially well because it released close to a juggernaut or because the market just was too saturated.

> Failing to secure a sizable slice at this juncture says more about your own failures than it does your competitors success.

But your argument would be that it would be more of the games fault for not being good enough, Competition has little to zero effort and therefore is irrelevant.

And chasing genre leaders has given us great games. Ever heard of the terms dark souls esque, metroid-vania, battle Royale games, halo killer? They all should speak for itself. And there have been terrible flops too. In the same vein lessons can be learned form Industry leading live service games no matter the genre/price point. You’re again playing to your own bias by cherry picking “bad” historical evidence to make your argument seem objective.

Finally, I feel like I need to clarify a few things and present my argument again.

Assumptions

Base game is good in terms of story/content/mechanics. Ergo removing the concept of subpar games out of the equation.
Halo is always at the risk of losing some portion of its population due to a number of factors except assumption #1.
Learnings from successful live service models can be adopted/modified for a particular audience/genre/price point ethically.

So given these assumptions I claimed live service models has better potential to bring back halo multiplayer. Because

As evidenced from my “good examples” a prolonged good multiplayer has the potential for more overall net content than content of a 3year cycle.
Successful tradinonal model based COD is nowhere near a successful live service model in terms of numbers.
Has better potential to gain/reclaim population during its lifespan because the game only keeps getting better with time.
Gives time for global regions to set up with proper halo communities. Not every region is like NA/Europe with proper infrastructure and a prevalent esports culture.
Traditional models has the risk of rendering the previous installment irrelevant. Even if both games are good people might prefer one over the other. Infinite can be THE go to Halo game for loyal and new fans alike.

Your counter argument is centered around.

You don’t care for hypothetical good games (assumption #1)
A good game never loses population. Competition is a non factor. (assumption #2)
3.0 A live service model primarily leads to unethical practice and results in launch of subpar games. (assumption #1)
3.1 An exact replica of the proposed live service model has never been tried/successful therefore there are no case studies to learn from. (assumption #3)

See how you’re attacking the assumptions of my premise ? Assumptions (1&3)I made in response to your 1st post. Assumption #3 is just an observable fact. Even though your arguments are somewhat valid that is NOT the point of this discussion.

Grumble_Volcano · November 30, 2019, 3:26pm

We don’t know much about Infinite but what we do know is how MCC is being changed to fit a live service model. The new progression system starting December 3rd is pretty much a free variant on the battle pass system which is present in many multiplayer games released since loot boxes were banned in some countries. It seems a reasonable guess that MCC’s progression system is an experiment for Infinite’s progression system so my guess would be Infinite’s progression system ends up somewhere between a paid version of MCC’s progression system and Gears 5.

fuzzyyogi · November 30, 2019, 3:37pm

> 2533274848051892;14:
> The new progression system starting December 3rd is pretty much a free variant on the battle pass system which is present in many multiplayer games released since.

Not familiar with this. Can you elaborate please? Or link?

Grumble_Volcano · November 30, 2019, 4:05pm

> 2535424770694943;15:
> > 2533274848051892;14:
> > The new progression system starting December 3rd is pretty much a free variant on the battle pass system which is present in many multiplayer games released since.
>
> Not familiar with this. Can you elaborate please? Or link?

MCC is getting a seasonal structure starting December 3rd coinciding with the release of each game on PC so if all games have different release dates, the first 6 seasons will be:
Season 1 - Halo Reach
Season 2 - Halo CE
Season 3 - Halo 2
Season 4 - Halo 3
Season 5 - Halo 3 ODST
Season 6 - Halo 4

Season 1’s unlocks are the customization options you could get on the original Halo Reach game. You play matches, rank up and get to progress to the next unlock tier with later on challenges introduced which will be another way to get to the next unlock tier. From what I gather, the main differences between MCC’s progression and a traditional battle pass are:

It’s free (battle passes are usually paid)
You can progress in season unlocks even when a season is over (unlockables not unlocked are usually gone at the end of a season)

Here’s the most recent MCC development blog (don’t think I’m high enough rank on the forums to do a direct link):

halowaypoint.com/en-us/news/mcc-development-update-november-2019

WerepyreND · November 30, 2019, 5:17pm

> 2535424770694943;13:
> I guess our personal biases now count for objective absolute truth. But OK. I know friends who actively bought HCS team skins to support their preferred team and contribute to the HCS prize pool but I guess they were manipulated.

No, I just don’t care whether you or your friends think you were being manipulated, because I know that other more vulnerable people are. The modern MTX business is based entirely on hunting for those people. The consequences of these models exist regardless of whether you or your buddies personally feel bothered by it.

> Then why even have this discussion? That is what innovation is isn’t it? Take the learnings of the industry and do something new with it. If we’re going to talk about how live services affects games/players are you suggesting there’s absolutely nothing to be learned/adopted from the good examples I suggested? If your argument is “there hasn’t been a successful/well received franchise that was formerly traditional model turned live service model hence it will never work” then there is no point in you even discussing further.

You are the one who made this a discussion. If I were to sum up my first post it would be: “Live services, let’s not.” To begin with the current industry obsession know as “live services” is about “innovating” in monetization not for the sake of players. If the industry wants to learn anything, it should learn some restraint.

> 1.0 Agree to disagree. Time and effort taken to make a skin is not the same as building a new complex system.
> 1.1 And crunch is crunch yes. But crunch is crunch if you don’t plan well. When you put out a project plan on any industry, you don’t put down “crunch” as the last phase of the project. Every plan looks to avoid crunch. Crunch is due to factors such as scope creep, variations in vision, mismanagement etc. Crunch is widespread in the gaming industry but its not a given. And I’m backing my stance with Bonnie Ross views on crunch in 343. You can choose to believe crunch is inevitable no matter the context.
> 2. For Halo? yes the live service model is new. But in the gaming industry its hardly new. But then again you dismiss good examples because they’re not the same genre/price point. So no point in discussion.
> 3.# of players worldwide are fixed. And when you categorize based on console, age, preference
> region etc them they become even more finite. That’s why there is a concept called target audience. A good game will get a following but a portion of the following came from playing some other game.
> 4. Gameplay experience, content, value for money etc all contribute to a passionate following. You seem to cherry pick favourable factors to further your own argument. Regardless my original point was no matter how good your game is, you’re ALWAYS at the risk of losing a portion of your population especially in a competitive genre such as shooters. Reasons can vary from competition, prize money, community culture, gameplay preference, fatigue etc.

1.) Of course it isn’t the same on its face, but eventually the work on the new complex system stops, the “live service” content factory that is Fortnite(one of your ‘good’ examples) doesn’t. My point that is that being a true “live service” ala something like Fortnite doesn’t mean that anyone is actually saving any time or energy compared to traditional development due to the shear volume of content on a much shorter schedule.
2.) Its almost like context matters, imagine that?
3.) Funny thing is that so often the industry is so busy chasing said “target audience” that they forget about their actual audience or other potential audiences. At the scale we are talking about unless someone is somehow preventing people from playing other games, there are plenty of crossover and untouched players to go around.
4.) Of course those things matter, I just take issue with the notion that the “competition” has fundamentally changed since Halo peaked.

> My point was apex took a share of fortnites population. Maybe dethroned was the wrong term. But both were not failures. This was mainly in support of point #3 and #4. You chose to belove apex and fortnite audience never had an overlap. So we agree to disagree. However, I never said a game has to fail for another to succeed. Rather success of a game is likely to eat away at anothers population. Its a consequence. Not a requirement. But according to you there’s enough gamers to go around. Especially in a saturated genre such as shooters? I disagree.

By all indications Apex didn’t “take” any appreciable shares of Fortnite’s population, you are correct when you state that neither of them were failures. I’m not saying that there isn’t any crossover, only that they don’t eat into each other’s population to any meaningful degree. Good games can potentially get lost in the scuffle, TItanfall 2 is a perfect example, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t mean that TF2 didn’t have any possibility of securing its own audience. A saturated release window =/= a saturated market.

> But your argument would be that it would be more of the games fault for not being good enough, Competition has little to zero effort and therefore is irrelevant.
>
> And chasing genre leaders has given us great games. Ever heard of the terms dark souls esque, metroid-vania, battle Royale games, halo killer? They all should speak for itself. And there have been terrible flops too. In the same vein lessons can be learned form Industry leading live service games no matter the genre/price point. You’re again playing to your own bias by cherry picking “bad” historical evidence to make your argument seem objective.

Those success stories do speak for themselves. They say we stand on a pile of corpses who would rather starve trying to mimic the success of their “competitors” rather than just continue doing what made them successful in the first place. The idea of learning lessons from the past has obvious benefits, but the industry has proven itself notoriously bad at actually learning those lessons. When they do eventually learn it is long after the fact and the damage is already done, which is a big risk to take considering you are the one making the claim that the “live service” model is less risky.

> Your counter argument is centered around.

Let me clarify some things for you.
1.) I don’t care about hypothetical good models because the industry has not earned that trust.
2.) A good game doesn’t immediately “die” if the #content stops or otherwise doesn’t keep the same pace as a modern “live service”
3.) Unethical practices that are designed to frustrate player isn’t a bug, its a feature, it is the entire reason for the “live service” obsession but they also don’t feel like giving up the old model either

The problem with this whole thread is that it is based on your own hopes and speculation whereas I am basing my disdain for the idea on the industries’ past and present behavior.

fuzzyyogi · November 30, 2019, 7:06pm

> The problem with this whole thread is that it is based on your own hopes and speculation whereas I am basing my disdain for the idea on the industries’ past and present behavior. WerepyreND

Never knew hoping for something fundamentally irks you. I’m well aware of the evil industry that hasnt gained your trust. This post was not intended for anyone to school me of the evils of the industry. I’m a pretty avid follower of the industry and I am aware of how the behaviour and horror stories you talk about.
That’s why I clarified in my 1st response to you…how my argument is structured so you can actually get look beyond the past and actually criticise THE premise. Also speculation? Why is my premise a speculation but yours is a conclusion based on evidence? Past and present (cherry picked) evidence much? Id call both a hypothesis based on evidence. When it comes to my evidence you disagree

Because it’s not the exact evidence you want. (fortnite, Cs go)
Your let your own personal experiences speak for the entire industry (mtx)
Because you choose to believe/put more weight on your own evidence (when mine is also valid) without any objective reason. (competition)
Or just flat out refuse to acknowledge them.
Attach negative sounding adjectives to make it seem like my suggestions are inherently flawed (drip fed, nebulous, speculation etc)

You can have a problem with my “hopes and speculation”. That’s fine. But I was going more of an objective argument/investigation (since I was the one who started this thread) When you put forth a hypothesis you.

State your argument.
State the consequence of your argument backed up by evidence.
State your assumptions, limitations the argument is predicated on.

And then hypothesis is then criticised on the premise and it’s consequences. Not the assumptions (unless your assumptions makes your premise unfalsifiable). That’s how scientific/objective arguments work. I assumed you knew this.

Example: if someone put up a thread “i assume/hope sprint is going to be infinite. Thoughts on how it can be implemented well?” i wouldn’t comment on their thread saying their assumption/hope is wrong and “sprint? Let’s not” because sprint is bad historically and any evidence you cite doesn’t fit my criteria or bias. You can if you want (cuz freedom of expression) but the courteous thing to do is respect their premise and talk along the same lines. My post was if halo was a live service model how can it be done right citing it’s good/bad consequences of the live service model. We both put forth our good/bad evidence and consequences but never actually got to the premise. Granted my first post was a bit ambiguous but I cleared it up in my 2nd response. And here we are.

WerepyreND · November 30, 2019, 8:38pm

> 2535424770694943;18:
> > The problem with this whole thread is that it is based on your own hopes and speculation whereas I am basing my disdain for the idea on the industries’ past and present behavior. WerepyreND
>
> Never knew hoping for something fundamentally irks you. I’m well aware of the evil industry that hasnt gained your trust. This post was not intended for anyone to school me of the evils of the industry. I’m a pretty avid follower of the industry and I am aware of how the behaviour and horror stories you talk about.

Since it seems like you missed it the first time: “If it feels like I am upset with you specifically that is not the case”

> That’s why I clarified in my 1st response to you…how my argument is structured so you can actually get look beyond the past and actually criticise THE premise. Also speculation? Why is my premise a speculation but yours is a conclusion based on evidence? Past and present (cherry picked) evidence much? Id call both a hypothesis based on evidence. When it comes to my evidence you disagree

I find it amusing that I’m “cherry picking” for pointing out the issues with “live services” among Halo’s contemporaries, but bringing up free 2 play games, discount games, or games that had their content dived to sell back to you isn’t, but okay. Ultimately we can talk about the success of Valve or Epic or anyone else until we are blue in the face, but unless MS actually bother to change course with how they have implemented “live services” thus the problems with said implementation will remain.

> 1. Because it’s not the exact evidence you want. (fortnite, Cs go)
> 2. Your let your own personal experiences speak for the entire industry (mtx)
> 3. Because you choose to believe/put more weight on your own evidence (when mine is also valid) without any objective reason. (competition)
>
>
> You can have a problem with my “hopes and speculation”. That’s fine. But I was going more of an objective argument/investigation (since I was the one who started this thread)

1.) Neither of those are even a relevant comparison unless Infinite actually has F2P multiplayer. Which could happen, but given the current behavior of MS seems highly unlikely. What you think a “live service” is supposed to be is clearly very different from how the industry has been using it in practice.
2.) No I let the industry speak for itself and it rarely has anything good to say.
3.) That’s because you have failed to demonstrate that there has even been a increase in the level of “competition” that hasn’t kept pace with the growth of the industry as a whole.

> Example: if someone put up a thread “i assume/hope sprint is going to be infinite. Thoughts on how it can be implemented well?” i wouldn’t comment on their thread saying their assumption/hope is wrong and “sprint? Let’s not” because sprint is bad historically and any evidence you cite doesn’t fit my criteria or bias. You can if you want (cuz freedom of expression) but the courteous thing to do is respect their premise and talk along the same lines. My post was if halo was a live service model how can it be done right citing it’s good/bad consequences of the live service model. We both put forth our good/bad evidence and consequences but never actually got to the premise. Granted my first post was a bit ambiguous but I cleared it up in my 2nd response. And here we are.

You might not, but I would and have done that very thing, more or less. From the perspective of a person who has played and disliked sprint in all its iterations thus far(or the opposite for that matter), it really isn’t worth it to engage with the premise that maybe this time we will find the perfect solution that can reconcile the community because we saw how sprint can work in a totally different context or other games succeeded in spite of it. Ultimately it would be better to commit fully to either sprint/no sprint, but the actual historical precedent tells me that they are going to try and find that magic solution anyways regardless of whether that is healthy for the community. How many times does something have to fail in the exact same way before we say maybe we just shouldn’t keep trying to ram that square peg through a round hole.

fuzzyyogi · November 30, 2019, 9:32pm

> I find it amusing that I’m “cherry picking” for pointing out the issues with “live services” among Halo’s contemporaries, but bringing up free 2 play games, discount games, or games that had their content dived to sell back to you isn’t, but okay. WerepyreND

Difference is I didn’t make sweeping generalizations/refuse to hypothesize based on the evidence presented. I also acknowledged your evidence, but presented a what if scenario…which you’re clearly not interested in. For every “bad” evidence I cited a good example just to point out there are two sides to the argument or that your argument is not complete to make a generalization/state a fact. What I did was hypothesize. Still you disregarded my evidence because of your own criteria. And the proverbial cherry on top is when you claimed my statements were just hopes and speculation and yours was based on (solid complete unbiased) evidence. I’ll demonstrate how you do this

Analysing live service model is only valid in the context of halo and not the industry as a whole. R6 seige, overwatch, Cs go are not successful SOLELY because they’re F2P/discounted. But that’s all that matters to you. You can’t look past that. So unless I come up with a game that launched at 60$ and was successful at launch and had a successful tenure as live service, you won’t entertain the conversation. You compare your version of halo infinite to my examples and cling onto differences ignoring commonalities.
*Competition is irrelevant to you. Then it is not…*but not on the same scale. I cited examples that competition is never irrelevant with examples. And that the degree of importance is case specific also with examples. (you never answered my question about battle royal games) And now it is again on me to prove competition has scaled? You need to learn how arguments work.
Mtx
FIFA, H5 REQS. but you don’t care. Enough said.

Lastly, I’m not upset. It’s frustrating cuz I was eager to have a productive conversation where like minded people could hypothesize and critque each other PROPERLY. Similar to academics. I gave you the structure to do that too. (see the process of an objective argument in my previous post). But as you alluded to

> You might not, but I would and have done that very thing, more or less.

You don’t respect/care for the process and the OPs premise. If you find a topic in the premise that you fundamentally disagree with you feel the need to prove your point even when said point is not relevant to the original premise/discussion.

So in light of this, you’re free to continue as you have done (freedom of expression and all that) but I am politely asking you to stop contributing unless it is within my original premise. I wanted to brainstorm how a live service could work in infinite but have gotten nowhere with you.

Cheers