Need answers from MMORPG experts (long read)Follow

This is in regards to F2p and P2P MMOs... it’s my belief that if a game that was P2P goes F2P or start off F2P it’s because it sucks and they know they can’t get ppl to pay monthly for it so it’s the only way they can get a bigger user base is by letting ppl play for free... I would even say things like Everquest 1 (which has been out since the early 90s) Everquest 2 and World of Warcraft would NEVER go free to play because they aren’t and never will be that desperate.

I also notice in Free to Play MMOs (I’ve played many such as Last Chaos, 9 DRAGONS, TWO MOONS, AND dc Universe Online) THEY ALL CONSIST OF THE same THING, extreme level grinding leveling in DCUO is fast and easy though (were talking to the point that at higher levels you need 100.0% to level up but you’re only getting 0.001% every 4 kills), pvp and raids, other than that no new/real content, their idea of "new content" is raising the level cap and giving you new areas and monsters to grind on. Also micro transactions that give paying characters a huge advantage over those who play for free

Yet P2P games are FULL of content... the only one I’ve played extensively for example.. Final Fantasy XI... on top of grinding (which even before it was as easy as it is now, still wasn’t half as demanding as the game I exampled above), there’s storyline missions and cut scenes that advance the plot, well thought out missions instead of just random fetch quests that consist of (go get me 20 wolf furs.. or kill 20 robots), endgame events such as Sky, Sea, Limbus, Dynamis, Einherjar, NM and HNM hunting, Abyssea, game changing updates every 3 months with new things added and stuff fixed/balanced with new expansion packs almost every year... whereas F2P game can go years or months with nothing fixed or added. (which I’ve never done) there’s a HUGE variety of stuff to do in endgame instead of the same 2-3 raids like F2P games... it was a game I devoted 5 years of my life too and would gladly continue to do if I had the money (and a working copy of CoP disc for the Ps2, that isn’t running for 700 bucks on eBay)

Now yesterday I read what I thought I’d never read... Everquest 2 has gone COMPLETELY free to play, does that mean that game has or will devolve to the standards I listed above for F2P mmorpgs or will it (being an Everquest game) be the first MMORPG to break the F2P mold kind of like FFXI was the first MMORPG that had good graphics and not ugly highly unrealistic looking characters (and an actual storyline that didn’t just consist of a paragraph of text in the instruction manual yet you never seen anything else regarding said story while you play the actual game).

Will there ever be an F2P MMO that’s as content heavy as something like FFXI or are F2P RPGs doomed to always be inferior to the ones ppl are paying monthly for? At the very least make F2P MMOs that you have to pay for but no monthly fee afterwards.. kind of like Guild Wars that was pretty content heavy and had a story the only thing I disliked about it was everything outside of the towns was instanced and secluded to just you or your party... it’s not fun NOT running into other people while you’re out exploring a vast world.

I want to see F2P mmos evolve to what P2P mmos do, or will they always have a "you get what you pay for" stance and as such we will never see the level of commitment or dedication from those games developers as we see from the ones who are getting our money every month?

lotro
ddo
fallen earf

i'm out.