[MUD-Dev] Business models for commercial text games

[Matt Mihaly]

On Wed, 28 Mar 2001, [iso-8859-1] Emil Eifr=E9m wrote:

> As far as technology goes, I can come very far in 6 months dedicated
> to full-time coding with no distractions such as meetings,
> mentoring, operational responsibilities, meetings, phone calls,
> meetings and did I mention meetings? But, as Matt Mihaly just
> pointed out, in the end technology doesn't really matter all that
> much for a commercial text-based online rpg.

Well, if it helps you any, I've had only a handful of meetings (5?) 
over the course of the 4 or 5 years I've been doing Achaea. I rarely
use the phone in regards to it. In fact, my lead investor, from Hong
Kong, is a guy whom I've never met and never even talked on the phone
to.

 
> What matters, IMHO, is high quality content, intelligent
> administration along with a healthy business model. Content is the
> hard part, but here I have the slight advantage of being the "owner"
> (if not the current operational administrator) of a fairly
> successful mud that has built up quite a lot of unique material over
> the past 7 or so years, all of which (thankfully) is legally owned
> by me. Granted, all of it ain't up to professional standards, but
> it's a nice foundation to build upon and content isn't the big worry
> right now.

Your existing MUDs should make it easy for you to drum up some
investment if you so desire, but that would, then, require you to try
and aim a bit higher than you seem to want to (ie aim for healthy
profits, not just a living).

 
> The "business model," OTOH, is another story. Firstly, the phrase
> really sounds too fancy for me. I'm not looking into making the big
> bucks here. I'm aiming for a life where I could do what I love the
> most for a few years while I figure out what to do next, preferably
> without living off savings.  The base source of income in the
> "business model" would be, in rough priority:

>    * Pay-to-play. Incentive would be (1) in-game advantages such as
>    artifacts, money or skill practices, (2) access to "value-added"
>    (sorry) services integrated with the web site and (3) a
>    banner-free environment [see below].

I'm a bit confused. Do you mean monthly charges? If so, I don't
understand the bit about in-game advantages. If it's pay-to-play (ie
you can't play unless you pay) then how do you make something everyone
has an advantage?

Or do you mean selling artifacts, money, or skill practices as Achaea
does? (well, we don't sell money, but you can buy credits from us and
then buy gold from other players with those credits).
 
>    * Ads / banners. This market is not by far as nice today as it
>    was just 3 months ago (cf Yahoo) but with directed banners, a
>    medium-sized pbase and a decent hit rate on the web site, they --
>    however evil they are -- might produce a few silver coins as
>    well.

Scott Martins (Eternal City) probably has a few nasty things to say
about the banner ad market.
 
>    * Sponsorship. Local fantasy book stores, game companies, etc. No
>    clue if this is realistic, but I do know that much of the player
>    base consists of a demographic (mostly teenage males) that is
>    attractive to the consumer-oriented enterprise.

My opinion is don't waste your time. Given the size of playerbase you
sound like you're going for (few thousand), don't waste your time on
looking for sponsors. Invest your time in improving your world and
then sell things to people, as you plan. It'll be time much better
spent.

 
>    * Sales of components. After my journey into the commercial
>    world, I realize that much of the code in the mud world I came
>    from are up to -- and in some cases, way above [1] --
>    professional standards. Basing my server on a standard
>    server-side component architecture (EJB) might produce a few
>    opportunities to make some bucks by selling high-quality generic
>    components for a competetive price.

Interesting! Likewise, when Rapture is finished, we may license it
out.

 
> How do people in the low-end commercial games area do this? Is
> credit card payment the end-all-be-all solution?

Yes. However, we get a fair number of money orders, cheques, and
bundles of bills sent to us. Sometimes when people make large
purchases, they wire it into the company's checking account.

There are other kinds of options, but they aren't widely spread
yet. For instance, 7-11 sells cards that you buy for cash, and then
use on the net as a debit card tied to a bank account with that amount
of cash in it.


> The above-mentioned demographic might be comparatively rich (or,
> rather, willing to spend a large percentage of their available money
> per month on games), but they're also quite low on VISA cards. The
> general trend (looking at for instance Avalon, Achaea, Fed, etc)
> seems to be offering credit card payment as well as cheques... are
> there not better ways? Over here in Sweden you can do similar
> payments via the phone -- dial a number, confirm, and bam, your next
> phone bill will be 10 more bucks -- but I'm not sure if it's
> available in the US and I'm certain that it's not availble for an
> international audience.

But surely this audience's parents have credit cards. And if they can
get permission to put 10 bucks on the phone bill, they can probably
(not always as some parents get concerned about security of their info
on the net) convince them to let them put 10 bucks on the credit card.


> Comments? Are these the main sources of incomes for other text-based
> commercial muds? Is the practicality issue something to worry about?

Definitely the main sources of income for us, and I'm sure we lose
some purchases because kids don't have credit cards, but c'est la
vie. In our case, adult customers are generally better anyway, because
we have more money and you can pretty much spend as much as you want
playing Achaea (either little or tons).

--matt

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