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Would you pay to play?


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Well there ARE game companies but in this reality scenarios are being created for free and very easy to get to. To make "paid for" scenarios successful you must provide or consider:

1. a highly superior product, beyond that provided by the free scenario designers.

2. you must somehow restrict people sharing the scenario (the napster syndrome).

3. it might be possible, having thought about it for awhile that people might pay for a complex campaign game or something that isn't being produced by the free scenario makers. However as I understand these are being run at this moment without fees.

4. you now have a environment where free scenarios are the norm - you'll have to fight uphill to change that since that 'culture' is now set after 4+ years.

5. feel free to send me money for any of my scenarios you like!

6. conduct a market survey to see what (better coordinate that with BFC however) on the boards and see what people say. I'd be interested in the answers.

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Originally posted by willbell:

Right now I would gladly put down $10 for a really good city fight that required patience, planning and a cool head. It would have to keep me and another player occupied for at least 40 or more turns, but also work against AI, and be re-playable. There could be no flaws, the map would have to be like I'm in a movie, there would have to be surprises that gave me a gut deep reaction (happy or upset) and I would have to end up anxious as hell for the designer to do another one.

The briefing would have to be very well written. Sorry you guys, I sometimes can't even finish reading them because they are written so poorly.

CM has the raw material, it just needs designers willing to go the extra mile, with a touch of brilliance added.

SP-Our Backs to the Volga

Cost Free.

Check it out.

H

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Originally posted by junk2drive:

one of the best things in cm series is the editor. and bmp modding.

look at all the games that you cant change, you have to buy expansion packs.

Actually, there are many games that you can mod substantially, not just graphically but creating totally new units etc.

But I think that it is a good thing for BFC that there are lots of user-made scenarios available, and that they are available for FREE. It adds to the value of CM, because you can get them without any extra investment by a player nor by BFC. Thus, CM offers more but at the same price.

Having people demand money for their scenarios would fly in the face of this strategy, so I don't think BFC would ever give their support to it, not even if it could work (and I don't think it could).

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Why would anyone pay for a scenario when most of the good one's are free?

there is NO market for it

I find the whole idea that some feels they could or should or would like to make money from this "hobby" by offering their (questionable) wares (scenarios) for $ale, objectionable and bordering on profoundly offensive!

But that is just my personal opinion!

smile.gif

carry on

and all that other stuff about it NOT in keeping with the spirit of sharing and community and that stuff too!

-tom w

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Hans,

Thank you, I could not have explained what it would take to sell scenarios any clearer than you did. Now it just takes some creative person with a little good old American can do attitude to take up the challenge.

As for the socialists out there who take offence at profit, none of this is about you.

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Originally posted by junk2drive:

one of the best things in cm series is the editor. and bmp modding.

look at all the games that you cant change, you have to buy expansion packs.

bfc have really been our friends and fellows.

even if we fight like family sometimes tongue.gif

Yes the editor was one of the main things that attracted me to CMBO.
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Originally posted by willbell:

Hans,

Thank you, I could not have explained what it would take to sell scenarios any clearer than you did.

Hans: Thanks, I teach this kinda stuff to Arab Women (setting up business ventures)

Now it just takes some creative person with a little good old American can do attitude to take up the challenge.

Hans: There MAY be a market, the only way you'll know is to run a marketing survey on the players here with BFC permission. One thing you might look at is customized scenario for individuals based on specific requests, however those would probably not be terribly profitable. Another area might be creating scenarios in specific langauges and areas not covered by CM. I've done a half dozen or so "request" scenarios - but for free! Those were mainly for people interested in the Spanish Civil War.

As for the socialists out there who take offence at profit, none of this is about you.

Hans: Oh as a rabid capitalists myself I would say keeping my hobby and money separated is probably a good idea-nothing kills fun faster than arguing over money.
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Actually, last night I was thinking about this (which I would not have done without this stimulating thread). I think that perhaps, a tournament, with really great scenario designs, which ad up to a larger overall battle, with top players as leaders, which could introduce some strategy too, coupled with a convention type set-up, on-line, with some commercial space sold to boot, might possibly allow you to make a little scratch.

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Hate to tell you will, but conventions generally dont make money. Hope is to break even and get awesome industry press. Moreover, the few attempts at lan-party type conventions for games have ended rather horribly. And these are for games that blow CM's popularity away (like counterstrike).

Not to mention most of the authors capable of putting out production-quality work probably get paid alot more to do whatever it is that they do to pay the amazon bill than they could ever hope to make for CM scenarios.

WWB

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Yikkes, do you guys live in log cabbins with no books? The history of successful entreprenures is full of exactly these types of arguments. It's the same stupid arguments that forced the creators of CM to go out on their own.

Here's my last word on this type of subject. Don't listen to the nay sayers, if you really want to make money designing scenarios, then use all your creativity, inelligence, stick-to-it-vness, and energy and JUST DO IT. Don't listen to the no, no, no, no, no, yo yo's.

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Good luck Willbell

I wanted to run a Lan Games mini campaign affair and in the end got a couple of great designers to run it for me.

All I had to do was open my house to a group of players who brought there PC's to network.

No charge for it and I even provide a cook'd breakfast in the morning and light lunch.

Bloody excellent fun and the last get together saw a German and a Swede join us from Europe.

Two sides and the Refs provided the Fog Of War and created games on the fly. Lasts from Friday Evening to Sunday afternoon.

Only downside is that I can only run one a year to keep it special and keep my wife sane...

;)

H

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Mark

The Refs also diddled you out of your MMGs, so you would probably have refused payment because of this, or even charged them for loss of fun/realism/etc. Actually, I just remembered your face during the last battle, and I am sure I would not have had the stomach to ask you for any payment, even if we had agreed on that before hand. ;)

Will - it has nothing to do with socialism, but with the enforcement of the private property rights by the game code developer. A very capitalist concept. I.e. BFC have as part of their EULA that you are not allowed to charge for scenarios. That is their prerogative, and to infringe it by charging is socialism - i.e. the ignorance of their property rights. smile.gif

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Adreas,

You have to read it from the beginning.

You can't, "without their permission." As I said, you just have to convince them.

As for the socialists, I'm referring to the comments that it is soooooo mean, wahhhhh, and not nice to charge for something that we all want for free.

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Two pages of completely hypothetical discussion.

It doesn't matter if you would pay for scenarios or not.

You're not allowed to sell them! Nor Mods. Nor Mod-managers.

So just enjoy making them, if that's what you enjoy, and/or using them if _thats_ what you enjoy.

If you have a brilliant game idea, make it & sell it & make lots of money. But don't dream of doing it in the CM arena, 'cause you simply aren't allowed to.

GaJ.

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Originally posted by Andreas:

BFC have as part of their EULA that you are not allowed to charge for scenarios. That is their prerogative, and to infringe it by charging is socialism - i.e. the ignorance of their property rights. smile.gif

Instead, BFC have the right even without needing your permission, so I have understood, to sell your scenarios for big money on a "Germanboy Special Edition" CD. I think their business model, therefore, is closer to war communism. :D
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Originally posted by willbell:

Adreas,

You have to read it from the beginning.

You can't, "without their permission." As I said, you just have to convince them.

.

You can't convince them. When I politely enquired about the possibility of making McMMM shareware, I was left in no doubt (politely) that they would defend their rights. Their business model is not to have an after-market.

GaJ.

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The more likely model would be to form a company such as the old Novastar (?) which made add-on scenario packs for SSI's Steel Panthers etc. But times have changed and even if a contract was made with BFC, competing with all the offerings of Scenario Depot would be tough. Matrix Games released SPWAW for free (I doubt SSI would have given the rights otherwise), but made at least some money with the Mega Campaigns which were something unique. If you look at Eichenbaum's Operation Störfang, I think you get some idea of how things would have to be done: not to compete with public domain, but to offer something brand new, some extra value. Campaigns are what people have asked for, and maybe some would gladly pay for something like that.

Anyway, it doesn't bother me in the least if anyone wants to think about this. The fool is not the one who asks for money but the one who pays. Sure, if anyone is looking for business ideas, I can tell you that electronic entertainment business is only going to grow bigger in the future. If you think you can make a living out of it somehow (like internet gaming cafe), go for it, but don't expect it to be easy money. Work is work is money.

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